Is here! Go read it! Emphatically!
Yes, even this dude's horny for the latest Wild Cards hotness.
Yes, boys and girls, it’s Fort Freak, the latest installment in the long-lasting series of senses-shattering shared-world anthologies known to an awestruck world as Wild Cards. This time out we launch a new triad (our fancy-dancy name for “trilogy”) by getting back to the roots of the whole Wild Cards Universe: Jokertown. And – it’s a genre-busting cop-u-drama.
This time out we bring the hot new blood with a vengeance. The sizzling interstitial material was written by one Cherie Priest, the widely and justly acclaimed High Priestess of Steampunk (slumming here: it’s steamy, and there are certainly punks, but this isn’t alternate history – it’s alternate now.) There’s Paul Cornell, Hugo-nominated writer for comics and some obscure Brit TV SF show about some doctor (who?.) Plus we got David Anthony Durham, who brings with the 2009 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. There’s USA Today Notable Book author Mary Anne Mohanraj. And finally what I think’s the debut effort from one half of James S. A. Corey – author of the terrific new space opera Leviathan Wakes – and assistant to the series editor, That American Tolkien Guy: the all-round excellent Ty Franck.
Then, as if that wasn’t enough to blow the top off your Awesomometer – wait, there’s more! We’ve also got our older-school Wild Carders (and even some original Wild Cards Mafiosi): series co-editor Melinda Snodgrass; Steve Leigh, who’s Bubonicon 43 Author Co-Guest of Honor with the mysterious SL Farrell; the irrepressible Kevin Andrew Murphy; and the ever-popular John Miller.
Oh, and yeah – proving once again that you really can’t keep a good man down: me.
And – even though it surfeit ye with wonder* – there’ll be a signing of Fort Freak on Saturday, July 9th, 2011, 2:30 PM MDT at Albuquerque’s own independent bookstore Page One (they don’t do permalinks, there, so, legions of dear future readers, use your imaginations). Attending will be Melinda Snodgrass, John Jos. Miller, and of course, me. Oh, and George R.R. Martin. Him too.
(Just a note: this’ll happen before the release of A Dance with Dragons, his newest volume in that other little series he works on, so please adjust your expectations accordingly.)
Meanwhile, there are plenty of other things going on here in Victor World, some of them quite exciting. But you’ll have to wait to read about them. Mainly because now I best go do a few of them.
As always – thanks for reading!
*Apologies for being even more bombastic than usual, but I spent last weekend at the Albuquerque Comic Expo hanging with the likes of Stan “the Man” Lee and Len Wein – whom I actually did spend time with, thanks to Melinda. And had a swell time doing so indeed! Impressionable lad that I am, it clearly affected my brain.
Megathanks to founders and show-runners Greg Derrick and Mike Thompson for inviting us to come play, and showing such strong support for Albuquerque creators, Wild Cards in particular, and for Bubonicon! Plus a huge thank-you to all the participants and wonderful volunteers – many of them Bubonicon stalwarts themselves, who made it all possible. With a special shout-out to Michelle Foley, for getting me my actual Celebrity Guest badge, and thereby validating my presence, if not my entire existence!
