Category: books

Susan Forest’s novel, Bursts of Fire, (Laksa Media Groups) will launch at When Words Collide in August.

Bursts of Fire begins an epic political fantasy of revenge, addictions, and redemption for three magiel sisters in an empire where magic has become suspect and where love and loyalty—for one’s lover, one’s family, one’s country—are tested.

A Publishers Lunch Buzz Books 2019 Selection, Bursts of Fire has won praise from Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, and Booklist:

Forest depicts strong female characters, with varying motivations and personalities adding plenty of action in daring raids, battles with war machines, and magical time walking, though equal attention is given to exploring relationships between the sisters and their allies. This exciting new series will have fantasy fans eagerly awaiting the next installment.—Library Journal

The book is an action-adventure epic fantasy, but it deals with the issue of addictions, and it is the publisher’s hope that the topic will help to generate discussion to remove stigma, and possibly lead to positive action in support of this important issue.

Susan Forest grew up in a family of mountaineers and skiers, and she loves adventure. She also loves the big ideas found in SF/F, and finds fast-paced adventure stories a great place to explore how individuals grapple with complex moral decisions. Susan is also an award-winning fiction editor, has published over 25 short stories (four, including her current “For a Rich Man to Enter,” nominated for Canada’s Prix Aurora Award), and has appeared at many international writing conventions. She loves travel and has been known to dictate novels from the back of her husband’s motorcycle.

Bursts of Fire is available from Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound | Apple | Kobo | Overdrive.

SF Canada member Rhea Rose’s latest short story, “Venus and The Milky Way”, is now out in Triangulation’s Dark Skies anthology. Who is holding the stars hostage? Don’t we all have the right to star-filled nights? Do you miss our Milky Way Galaxy arcing overhead? Explore answers in these creative tales of human (and alien) reaction to the yin-yang of darkness and light. Journey with us into darkness, for only there can we see the light. Don’t we all have the right?

Rhea Rose has published many speculative fiction and poetry pieces: Evolve, Tesseracts, 1,2,6,9,10,17, Transversions, On Spec, Talebones, Northwest Passages, Masked Mosaic, and Dead North. She has received honorable mentions in the Year’s Best anthologies and was reprinted in Christmas Forever (edited by David Hartwell) and twice made the preliminaries for the Nebula Award. She edited poetry for Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing and for many years hosted the Vancouver Science Fiction and Fantasy (V-Con) writers’ workshops. She is a teacher of creative writing and a graduate of CW ‘84. Her recent works include: Second Contact, Clockwork Canada, Art Song Lab and three Indie novels, The Final Catch: A Tarot Sorceress series. Twice an Aurora nominee, Rhea has a MFA in creative writing.

Find her at www.rheaerose.weebly.com and find Dark Skies here.

Ecology of Story: World as Character is the 3rd guidebook in SF Canada member Nina Munteanu‘s acclaimed “how to write” series for novice to professional writers. Learn the fundamentals of ecology, insights of world-building, and how to master layering-in of metaphoric connections between setting and character.

Praise for The Fiction Writer, Book 1 of this series:

The Fiction Writer is at the top of the required reading list for my Writer’s Workshop students. With its engagingly direct, conversational style and easily accessible format, it is a veritable cornucopia of hands-on help for aspiring writers of any age…the quintessential guidebook for the soon-to-be-published. –Susan McLemore, Writing Instructor, Glynn Academy

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and internationally published author of award-nominated speculative novels, short stories and non-fiction. She currently teaches writing at the University of Toronto and George Brown College. Her non-fiction book Water Is…–a scientific study and personal journey as limnologist, mother, teacher and environmentalist–was recently picked by Margaret Atwood in the NY Times as 2016 ‘The Year in Reading’. Her latest novel, A Diary in the Age of Water, will be released by Inanna Publications in 2020.

See an excerpt on Nina’s website and be sure to purchase Ecology of Story: World as Character soon!

Two SFC members have stories in Dark Dragon Publishing’s latest release, Canadian Dreadful.

Colleen Anderson’s deeply psychological tale “Sins of the Father” brings attention to the long term repercussions of violence, not only on the victims of violence, but on the family of the person who is perpetrating violence. Colleen has been twice nominated for the Aurora Award in poetry. She has co-edited Tesseracts 17 and Playground of Lost Toys, which was nominated for a 2016 Aurora Award. Alice Unbound: Beyond Wonderland is her first solo anthology (Exile Editions, April 2018). Over 150 of her poems have seen print in such venues as Grievous Angel, Polu Texni, The Future Fire, Polar Borealis and many others. Her fiction collection, A Body of Work was published by Black Shuck Books, UK last fall, and her poetry chapbook Ancient Tales, Grand Deaths and Past Lives is available through Kelp Queen Press.

Pat Flewwelling’s “Nowhere Time” is dark fiction and “not the Canada you are accustomed to.” Pat writes dark fiction of all kinds, from short stories like “The Great Inevitable” in Expiration Date (Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing, ed. Nancy Kilpatrick) and “Cyphoid Mary” in Alice Unbound (Exile Editions, ed. Coleen Anderson), to full-length novels like Blight of Exiles, Plague of Ghouls, and Scourge of Bones (Tyche Books, 2015, 2016, 2017 respectively). Forthcoming works include the fourth novel in her Helix series, Sedition (Tyche Books, 2019). On the side, she also runs a travelling bookstore, is a co-editor at ID Press, and works full-time as a senior business analyst.

In the pages of this anthology, you will discover a dark landscape that will challenge your perspective. From sea to shining sea, stories of a darker Canada will arise, and within them all a kernel of truth. Stories of sacrifice, cannibalism, ghosts, and mystical forests, the authors will plunge you into the country that is Canadian Dreadful.

“CANADIAN DREADFUL showcases some of Canada’s best voices in horror fiction. This anthology is a harrowing tour of the northern landscape that will leave you both dazzled and terrified.” ~David Morrell, New York Times best-selling author of Murder as a Fine Art

Find Canadian Dreadful on Amazon and at Dark Dragon Publishing.