“Granted, the plants all looked dead or dying. Granted, the windows of the house stared down like eye sockets in a row of skulls, yes, but so what? Actual rows of skulls wouldn’t affect me so strongly. I knew a collector in Paris … well, never mind the details.”
— T. Kingfisher, What Moves the Dead (source link)
Welcome
We’re officially into spring. In this part of the world, that means a brief respite from cold drizzle, and I’m enjoying a little sunshine.
But not too much sunshine.
I’m a creature of shade and cooling rain at heart, and this month’s newsletter takes a look at some suitably umbral offerings!
ICYMI: The Bread Must Rise is a Nebula Finalist!
I’m thrilled to announce that The Bread Must Rise is a finalist for this year’s Nebula award for game writing.
James and I had a ton of fun writing and coding this weird comedic baking eldritch horror fantasy, and we’re both very honoured to have our work recognized like this!
There are a ton of other great stories, books, and games on the final ballot, as there are every year. I’m especially excited to be sharing space on the list with so many writing friends and acquaintances.
You can watch the official SFWA announcement video here.
Sworn Soldier Series: Historical Horror That’s a Lot of Fun
Recently, I picked up T. Kingfisher’s historical horror novella, What Moves the Dead.
The book is an unapologetic retelling of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher, which was enough for me to pick it up. Although I love T. Kingfisher’s writing, so I didn’t need much convincing.
As you might guess from the cover art (pictured here) and the concept, this isn’t the kind of book where everyone lives happily ever after.
But it is fascinating—and fun!
Set on the shores of a gloomy tarn in a fictional eastern European country in the late 1800s, the story follows Alex Easton, a very voicy narrator called to the Usher estate by a desparate letter from an old friend.
As anyone familiar with Poe might suspect, it doesn’t end well for the Ushers. But getting there is a lot of fun (for the book’s readers, at least).
One thing that added to the fun for me was how Kingfisher plays with pronouns. The language spoken by Easton’s fictional country is described as the worst in the world because it steals bits and pieces from all the other languages it encounters.
One thing it also has in spades? Pronouns, including specific ones for rocks, God, and soldiers.
This last one is important, because Alex Easton is a sworn soldier, a person who was born female but gave up that birth identity to serve in one of the country’s many ongoing wars. Originally, all the country’s soldiers were male, but because the language has a specific set of pronouns for soldiers (kan), technically anybody can become a soldier. And during the time the book is set, there are many non-male soldiers, known collectively as “sworn soldiers” and viewed with a mix of lurid obsession and terror by the residents of many other countries.
The interplay between Easton’s soldier-identity and the people around kan is incidental at most to the plot of the book, but it adds a whole layer of fascinating subtext in kan interactions with other characters. Plus, kan is just a super-fun character to follow!
If you have gothic sensibilities, love queer retellings of classic works, are the kind of history/literature nerd who’s excited by the word Ruritania, or just want an all-around good time, I highly recommend What Moves the Dead. (As a bonus, the second book in the series, What Feasts at Night, released recently and was also a treat!)
What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher (Tor Nightfire, 2022)
What Feasts at Night by T. Kingfisher (Tor Nightfire, 2024)
Perturbator: Horror Synth
This month, I am pleased to suggest Lustful Sacraments by French artist Perturbator.
The synth-based sounds and horror-inspired backdrops of this 2021 album pair wonderfully with gothic horror.
You can listen to the album on YouTube, courtesy of the artist and publisher.
The Heartbeat of the Universe
In other publication news, my Asimov’s Readers’ Choice award winning poem “The Three Laws of Poetics” is included in The Heartbeat of the Universe, a multi-author collection of speculative poetry.
This book has a ton of great poems from the pages of Asimov’s and Analog, with work by amazing poets like Jane Yolen, D.A. Xiaolin Spires, Mary Soon Lee, and many, many more!
Sounds good, right?
You can preorder The Heartbeat of the Universe now using this link.
The publisher, Interstellar Flight Press, is throwing a virtual release party at 4pm Pacific Time on April 4th. It’s possible I will be reading from my poem “The Three Laws of Poetics,” so I hope to see you there!
Writing Update
I recently finished up the second chapter of my second Choicescript game, Gigantea: Age of Rot. Huzzah for progress!
I’m hoping to have the first three chapters finished and polished enough by June that I can share a demo during the 2024 Nebula conference, which I’ll be attending online.
Finally, I have a short story collection coming out soon!
That’s called The Butterfly Disjunct after one of my earliest published stories, and it will feature science fiction stories ranging from the hilarious to the heartfelt to the unsetling. Sometimes, individual stories are all three at once.
Watch this space for more details on both the game and the collection. :)
Thanks for reading. See you soon!
Stewart