Gene Wolfe tidbits (April 2013)

Welcome to the second instalment (first here) of tidbits relating to Gene Wolfe picked up over the last month from various shady corners of the interwebs. Not a lot this month, but a few neat things to chew on...

Shared Worlds - "Hand in Hand" (March 2013)
https://www.wofford.edu/sharedworlds/HandInHand.aspx
This webpage, which I found out about this through the SFWA website, was created to encourage registrations for the 2013 Shared Worlds Teen Writing Camp at Wofford College in South Carolina. It features snippets of writing advice from science fiction, fantasy and horror writers (including Wolfe, Gaiman and others) written on their hands and photographed. Quite a neat concept!

Dragoncon - Gene Wolfe (April 2013)
http://www.dragoncon.org/?q=featured_details_page/1964
A very entertaining mini-biography of Wolfe, who is one of the featured guests of this year's Dragoncon (30 August - 9 September 2013 in Atlanta). I assume it was written by Wolfe himself, given the writing style, humour and inclusion of random details I'm fairly sure I haven't read elsewhere - including this fantastic little story that describes Wolfe's retirement from Plant Engineering, the trade journal he was editing, in 1984 to write full time:

By the goodwill of the editor-in-chief, Leo Spector, he got a farewell dinner at which a dozen speakers insulted shamefully. He then rose and insulted all of them back, ending his little talk by throwing aside his orange trade-show jacket, his tie, and his white shirt. Beneath it he wore a T-shirt: REALITY IS A CRUTCH FOR PEOPLE WHO CAN’T HANDLE SCIENCE FICTION.

J E Mooney - Shadows of the New Sun (excerpt) (25 April 2013)
http://www.tor.com/stories/2013/04/shadows-of-the-new-sun-excerpt
Tor.com has published J. E. Mooney's foreword of the upcoming Gene Wolfe tribute anthology, Shadows of the New Sun. We also now have a more solid release date, 27 August 2013, and a cover:

     

Gene Wolfe tidbits (March 2013)

As Gene Wolfe related items pop up on my news feeds and in my inbox, I keep meaning to write blog posts about them... but between full-time work, part-time study and various other commitments, I seldom have the time. So I've decided to start posting "Gene Wolfe tidbits" every month (or few months, as the case may be), linking to interesting Wolfe-related news, reviews, discussions, interviews and so on. With this first post of 'tidbits' I've just included some stand-out news items, reviews and interviews from the last few months. This will, of course, be in addition to other, longer posts, as I have time to write them (and, come July, I should have much more time to write blog posts and the like... more on that later...). So, enjoy!


News, etc.

Gene Wolfe - The Land Across Cover Art and Synopsis Reveal (7/3/2013)
http://upcoming4.me/news/book-news/gene-wolfe-the-land-across-cover-art-and-synopsis-reveal
As I posted the other day, the cover and official synopsis of Wolfe's next novel have now been released. The Land Across is due out this November.

LoneStarCon 3 Announces Initial List of Program Participants (5/3/2013)
http://www.lonestarcon3.org/media/pressrelease-09.shtml
According to the press release, Wolfe will be attending and participating in LoneStarCon 3, the 71st World Science Fiction Convention to be held in Texas.

Michael Swanwick, "Acolytes of the Wolf(e)" on Flogging Babel (25/2/2013)
http://floggingbabel.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/acolytes-of-wolfe.html
Swanwick discusses the upcoming Gene Wolfe tribute anthology, Shadows of the New Sun: Stories in Honor of Gene Wolfe, edited by J. E. Mooney and Bill Fawcett and due out this August.

2012 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Awarded to Gene Wolfe (13/12/2012)
http://www.sfwa.org/2012/12/2012-damon-knight-memorial-grand-master-awarded-to-gene-wolfe/
Maybe old news now, but Wolfe was selected by the SWFA for the 2012 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award! Very exciting. And very fitting, too, since Wolfe has acknowledged Damon Knight as one of his mentors (Knight was his first and perhaps most influential editor).

Michael Andre-Driussi's Gate of Horn, Book of Silk (10/2012)
http://www.siriusfiction.com/gatehorn.html
Again, old news, but Andre-Driussi's long-awaited guide to Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun and Book of the Short Sun series was published late last year. Thus far I've only had time to flick through it, but it looks pretty great. Hopefully I'll have time to delve into it soon.


Interviews, etc.

AudioTim 44: Chicon 7 Panel "Conquering Writer’s Block" (28/1/2013)
http://timothycward.com/2013/01/28/audiotim-44-chicon-7-panel-conquering-writers-block/
An audio recording of a panel held during the 2012 World Science Fiction Convention in Chicago discussing writer's block, featuring Russell Davis, Tom King, Eldon Thompson, Monica Valentinelli and Gene Wolfe.

Coode Street podcast, Episode 128: Live with Gene Wolfe! (22/12/2012)
http://www.jonathanstrahan.com.au/wp/2012/12/22/episode-128-live-with-gene-wolfe/
Wolfe is interviewed in this episode of Jonathan Strahan and Gary K. Wolfe's science fiction podcast.
     

The Land Across cover, synopsis and release date

Gene Wolfe's next novel, The Land Across, now has a cover and synopsis, as revealed by upcoming4.me. The synopsis is similar to what Wolfe has said about the book in recent interviews:

An American writer of travel guides in need of a new location chooses to travel to a small and obscure Eastern European country. The moment Grafton crosses the border he is in trouble, much more than he could have imagined. His passport is taken by guards, and then he is detained for not having it. He is released into the custody of a family, but is again detained. It becomes evident that there are supernatural agencies at work, but they are not in some ways as threatening as the brute forces of bureaucracy and corruption in that country. Is our hero in fact a spy for the CIA? Or is he an innocent citizen caught in a Kafkaesque trap?

Gene Wolfe keeps us guessing until the very end, and after.

Mysterious locations? Dizzying and oppressive bureaucracy? Kafkaesque indeed! I'm certainly looking forward to this. The Land Across is due to be released on 26 November 2013.

     

Gene Wolfe tribute anthology to be published in 2013

I just found out that a Gene Wolfe tribute anthology, tentatively titled Tales from the New Sun and edited by Jean Rabe, is due to be published by Tor in (US) Spring 2013. In July, Jack Dann, a contributor to the anthology, posted the below table of contents on his blog. It looks like the anthology will include two new Wolfe stories (or perhaps they're the book's introduction and afterword?) and some fascinating-sounding short fiction, including Neil Gaiman's "The Lunar Labyrinth." Nancy Kress's story, and probably others as well, will be set within worlds created by Wolfe. I'm looking forward to this one!

Gene Wolfe, "Frostfree"
Neil Gaiman, "A Lunar Labyrinth"
Joe Haldeman, "The Island of the Death Doctor"
Timothy Zahn, "A Touch of Rosemary"

Steven Savile, "Ashes"
David Drake, "Bedding"
Nancy Kress, "... And Other Stories"
Jack Dann, "The Island of Time"
Michael Swanwick, "The She-Wolf’s Hidden Grin"
Michael A. Stackpole, "Snowchild"
Mike Resnick and Barry Malzberg, "Tourist Trap"
Aaron Allston, "Epistoleros"
Todd McCaffrey, "Rhubarb and Beets"
Judi Rohrig, "Tunes From Limbo, But I Digress"
William C. Dietz, "In the Shadow of the Gate"
Marc Aramini, "Soldier of Mercy"
Jody Lynn Nye, "New Sun"
David Brin, "The Logs"
Gene Wolf, "Sea of Memory"

 

Title for new Wolfe novel; uncollected short story list updated

Just a quick post to note a couple of things. In a recent interview with Stephen C. Ormsby, Gene Wolfe wrote that he's finished The Land Across (presumably to be published next year) and is now working on another novel titled A Borrowed Man. No word yet what it's about, but the title at least sounds interesting! Wolfe briefly discussed the idea behind The Land Across with C.S.E. Cooney a 2010 interview.

Also, I just updated my list of Gene Wolfe's uncollected short stories (also on Google Docs) to include a few more stories from recent years. One of which,"Planetarium in Orbit," has only been published in a "Chicago in 2012 Worldcon Bid" booklet released at Anticipation (the 67th Worldcon) in August 2009. Does anyone have this? I'd be interested to know what it's about. Given Wolfe has had 29 short stories published since 2004, I wonder if we're due for another collection some time soon?