Collections and Anthologies 2019

Last year, I shared the number of stories and essays I’d sold with you all. It was a good number, it was (in this one small way) a good year. A lot of those pieces went to anthologies, or were collected later into print works that you can now hold in your hot little hand.

I’m in seven printed collections and anthologies this year. They’re quite different, and there’s lots to talk about here. Bonus round: I own too many books. I have copies of two of them to give away. I’ve noted them below, and if you’d like one please play along.

So here’s the recap:

Top of the stack: The Writer’s Book of Doubt, edited by Aidan Doyle. This one wasn’t an anothology I tried to get into, but I would have. Instead, Aidan wrote me to ask if he would include something I’d previously published: Revenge is 100 Dresses. It’s not about writing, really. It’s abour reading and gender and the body and the way we want to be seen by others. I am stil proud of it and I’m glad it’ll reach some folks who have never been to my blog. This book contains work from Fonda Lee, R. Lemberg, E. Catherine Tobler, and a lot of other people I admire. Plus it’s beautifully illustrated by Kathleen Jennings. If you’re a writer, I’d recommend this one for you.

Next down, fatter and scarier: Wastelands : the New Apocalypse. This one, edited by John Joseph Adams, got some wonderful reviews. It’s a collection of short stories about what happens after the world has ended. I was solicited for this one as well, and I got to contribute a story I wrote about some people running a live version of The Price is Right in an unrecognizable hellscape. It’s one of my favorite pieces I’ve ever written. This anthology gave me a chance to share a table of contents with Tananarive Due and Carmen Maria Machado, as well as Ken Liu and Seanan McGuire. My favorite piece (I’m biased because I got to hear it read aloud) is a twisted sort of dictionary. It’s Francesca Montoya’s Almanac of Things That Can Kill You, by Shaenon K. Garrity. The author read it aloud at a Borderlands event about a month ago, and I laughed and got chills at the same time.

Beneath that is Future Tense Fiction, which is a collection of the stories published in Slate’s Future Tense Series. I was overjoyed to be approached for this series, and stunned to write in the same space as Nnedi Okorafor, Charlie Jane Anders, and Emily St. John Mandel. I wrote a story about collective memory, coffee, and how the details of how you came into the world don’t really ever belong to you. It’s a very good collection, and we’re having an event for it on October 30 at Green Apple Books. I’ll be there with Annalee Newitz, Hannu Rajaniemi, and series editor Torie Bosch, if you’d like to join us.

Do Not Go Quietly is one of a trend of anthologies focusing on stories of resistance and defiance, and I was so glad to make it into this one. I pitched a story that contains a lot of my current political anger, but still manages to have a happy ending. This one has pieces from Brooke Bolandera and Cassandra Khaw that knocked my socks off. I’ve got two copies of this one to give away. If you’d like one, tell me in the comments and the first two people to answer with this title will have it signed and shipped to them!

Shimmer 2018 contains my story, Rapture, along with everything else Shimmer Magazine (RIP) published in 2018. I am so, so proud of this one.

And finally, Urban Crime Short Stories. This gorgeous volume helped me cheat my way into sharing a TOC with Oscar Wilde, my patron saint. My contribution to this one is a fixfic that I’ve wanted to write for years: an abortion provider hunts London’s most notorious killer of women. There’s also a story in here from Rich Larson that I love, and a good one from Rachel Watts. I have one spare copy of this book; please speak for it in the comments and it’ll be yours.

I also have a spare copy of Compelling Science Fiction‘s first collection, and another of Hardened Hearts. Freebies from the past! Tell me if you want to help me get them out of my house.

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