Category: Critical Mass News

Then there was Kim Stanley Robinson’s towering The Ministry for the Future. It was published in October, but I got to read it in mid-February. It struck like a mallet hitting a gong, reverberating through the year. Told mostly from the perspectives of a young aid worker who survives a horrific tragedy in India and a middle-aged Irish bureaucrat running a UN body tasked with representing the rights of future generations in a time of eco-collapse, it’s terrifying, unrelenting, but ultimately hopeful. Robinson is the SF writer of my lifetime, and this stands as some of his best work. It’s my book of the year.

Jonathan Strahan, Notes from a Year Spent indoors…, Locus Magazine

Boskone 58, to be held February 12-14 has been running a series of interview posts.

• “B58 Mini Interview with Linda D. Addison, Karen Heuler, and Dr. Gillian Polack”

Dr. Gillian Polack

…If you were planning a holiday or vacation and could visit any location, whether in the real world or fictional worlds, where would you go? Why? 

I love portal fantasies. I always dreamed of the doors in other peoples’ writing and of walking through those doors into enchanted lands. Then I wrote my own. I now want to visit the house in Borderlanders and travel to strange places. I seldom want to visit anywhere I’ve written about, for I know all the downsides of all the places, but doors that lead to hidden seas or to rooms lined with liquid glass? That’s different.

more interviews & details from file770.com

The United States Postal Service announced Jan 15th it will issue a stamp featuring one of the greats of science fiction, the late Ursula K. Le Guin, in 2021. The stamp portrays Le Guin in front of a scene from one of her Hugo-winning novels The Left Hand Of Darkness. The art for the stamp was done by three-time Hugo winner Donato Giancola.

from File770.com

from the Nova Mob newsletter
Our first meeting of the year is on 3 February at Kensington Town Hall 8.00pm!  And also in Zoom!
Yes we are able to meet again in person, with quasi-embarrassed elbow bumps, diligent hand hygiene, and suitable record-keeping. But we’ll still be doing Zoom, running it at the same time as the in-person meeting. I’d like to introduce our guest speaker for the 3^rd Feb: 

DMETRI KAKMI, who will be taking us on a reader’s, writer’s, and editor’s traverse through the gothic architectures of the mind.
Dmetri immersed himself in horror novels and films during his childhood, and those wide-ranging reading habits in the gothic have culminated in him writing in the genre and bringing that knowledge to his role as senior editor. This could lead to interesting discussions about how genre writing is perceived in major publishing houses in Australia, insights into favourite authors, digressions, etc.

Wednesday February 3rd 8.00pm – 9.30 pm or so, [7:30pm Adelaide time]
first floor Conference Room, Kensington Town Hall
30 – 34 Bellair St Kensington VIC 3031

Kakmi notes:
“To give you an overview, from the late 1970s I started reading Stephen King, Ursula Le Guin, Arthur C Clarke, Richard Matheson, Ray Russell, Alfred Bester, Anne Rice, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, M R James, Algernon Blackwood, Arthur Machen etc. In terms of influences on my writing, I look to Shirley Jackson (I gave an online lecture about The Haunting of Hill House at Writers Victoria mid 2020), Susan Hill, Patrick MacGrath and Robert Aikman. Certainly, these four hang heavy over The Door and Other Uncanny Tales.”

The Door and Other Uncanny Tales has just been published; copies will be on sale and can be signed or inscribed or indeed both. See below for the official bio, to which we append Lucy Sussex’s commendation: “Dmetri? He’s most amusing”.  In order to belie that reputation, Dmetri has provided a photo of himself in Serious Author mode.

Dmetri Kakmi was born to Greek parents in Turkey. For 15 years he worked as senior editor at Penguin Books. The memoir Mother Land was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards 2008, and is published in England and Turkey. He is the editor of the acclaimed children’s anthology When We Were Young. The essay ‘Night of the Living Wog’ is published in Joyful Strains: Making Australia Home, edited by Kent MacCarter and Ali Lemer. ‘A History of Violence’ is published in The Body Horror Book, edited by Claire Fitzpatrick. ‘The Tranny Horror From Outer Space’ is published in Ornaments From Two Countries, edited by Peter Polites. The short story ‘The Boy by the Gate’ was reprinted in The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror 2013. ‘Haunting Matilda’, published in Cthulhu Deep Down Under, was shortlisted for Best Fantasy Novella in the Aurealis Awards, 2015. Both of these stories are reprinted in Dmetri’s new book The Door and Other Uncanny Tales, which was released in late 2020. He lives in Melbourne.
Website: dmetrikakmi.com.au

By Zoom:
Can’t attend in person? The Nova Mob invites you to a scheduled Zoom meeting. 
Topic: Nova Mob 3 Feb Dmetri Kakmi 8.00pm AEDT, 7:30 Adelaide time
Time: Feb 3, 2021 login after 7.20 PM Adelaide time
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/4177583193?pwd=VjdPL1BhSTBNclN2YnRsejN3Y1hlUT09

Meeting ID: 417 758 3193 Passcode: nova

We’ve now added a draft program to the Mass Con ’21 post.
Here’s a link to the PDF spreadsheet: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6n7io718u5iohmt/TimetableW.pdf?dl=0

Please have a look and tell us:

(i) if we’ve left something out;

(ii) if you’re interested in joining one of the panels;

(iii) if you’d like to suggest a panel;

(iv) if you can host the zoom site for an hour or two: this involves welcoming newcomers, helping them with the zoom, and pointing out the program and items currently happening or about to start (training will be provided for those willing to be hosts).