Senses Five Press

Hugo Noms

Thanks, John! John Klima of Electric Velocipede gives my story “The Spaces Between Things” his Hugo vote. Also of note, friend and fellow Fluidian Saladin Ahmed, whom John suggests for the Campbell Award: http://blog.electricvelocipede.com/2010/03/2010-hugo-nominations.html Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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Sybil’s Garage Closing to Subs on April 12th

Sybil’s Garage will be closing to submissions for our seventh issue on April 12th. Please make sure to send us your submissions on or before that date. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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Sybil’s Update

Here are the Sybil’s Garage submission stats so far: We have received 361 stories, 55 poems We have rejected 234 stories, 25 poems Average response time: 12 days for stories, 15 days for poems Please be on the lookout for a submissions closing date sometime in April. I will make an official announcement soon. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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Cable is Dead

Last night, the folks in the house wanted to watch the Oscars, but we are all in a house at the top of a small mountain, and there is no television to be found. But there were many laptops, and broadband wireless. So with Googled blogs and followed Twitter feeds we discovered several web streams from which to watch the Oscars. We all huddled around the laptop on the hard floor and watched a satellite feed from England rebroadcast to net viewers by some generous person, and when that failed, ...

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“The History Within Us” up at Clarkesworld Magazine

I’m very happy to announce this morning that my short story “The History Within Us” is up at Clarkesworld Magazine alongside a fine story from Gord Sellar and an interview with Kij Johnson. You can read my story here. And you can find the full issue here. The story’s genesis is an interesting one. My father had several old reels of film from when he was a boy, back in the early 40s, which he had recently converted to DVD. On one long weekend we added his narrative voice-overs, so he ...

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Paul M. Berger’s “Small Burdens” up at Strange Horizons

Drop what you’re doing right now and go read “Small Burdens” by Paul M. Berger, now up at Strange Horizons. Granted, Paul is a friend of mine, and he’s in my writers group. But had that not been the case I’d still be recommending this uber creepy and subtly told tale of faerie and cradle robbing. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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Brief Sybil’s Update

Just a quick update on Sybil’s Garage this afternoon. Here are the stats so far: We have received 293 stories, 46 poems We have rejected 180 stories, 20 poems Average response time: 9 days for stories, 12 days for poems I have also received informal word that two poems from Sybil’s have been nominated for Rhysling Awards. As to which poems, I’m trying to find out. A little behind on slush, but I hope to catch up a little today and this evening. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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The Return of the Mustache (and Other Cultural Oddities)

We were talking at KGB last night about the resurgence of one of mankind’s most lamentable of facial fashions: the mustache. Somewhere, mixed up in the current twenty-something culture of overwrought irony, someone thought it cute to bring back the 1970s porno ’stache. Others, seeing hipster culture as a barometer of what will soon trickle into the mainstream concept of cool began letting their hair grow on their upper lip. Not just a brown dusting of shadow, but a fully grown, almost twirly at the edges ’stache, this seen as hip ...

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Being Human Goes Off the Rails

I have been watching the British TV show, Being Human, am all caught up, and, well, I’m downright angry that they basically destroyed a fabulous show with some downright shitty writing. [WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW] Consider the following: George falls in love with a woman named Nina who is a smart-aleck, funny, perky little woman who he then subsequently accidentally turns into a werewolf like him. Whoops. This devastates him completely. So then what does he do in the final two episodes of the second season? He moves in with his rebound ...

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Tangent Online Review

Tangent Online finally reviewed Electric Velocipede 17/18, of which my story, “The Spaces Between Things,” appears. They say: ““The Spaces Between Things” by Matthew Kressel is a touching near future story about a war between East and West in which the East has somehow acquired the ability to send messages through time which appear as metaphors in the protagonist’s present. A series of flashbacks intersperse with the protagonist’s present dilemma, revealing his personal story of love, coming of age, and the invisible connections between people. He reflects on these bits of ...

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Peter Straub & Daryl Gregory this Wednesday at KGB

FANTASTIC FICTION at KGB reading series, hosts Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel present: Peter Straub, the multi award winning writer of such novels as Ghost Story, Koko, Mr X, and In the Night Room. His most recent novel is A Dark Matter, published by Doubleday this month. He is also the editor the recent Library of America American Fantastic Tales & Daryl Gregory, whose first novel, Pandemonium, won the 2009 Crawford Award and was a finalist for the World Fantasy Award. His second novel, The Devil’s Alphabet, was recently named a finalist for ...

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Continuing Ed

Starting February 25th, I’ll be teaching two classes at Christ the King Continuing Education in Middle Village, Queens: an intro to Linux course and an introduction to Fantasy & Science Fiction. You can find full descriptions and registration information for the classes here. I hope you can join me there. Intro to the Linux OS (1010110) Matthew Kressel Thurs 6:30-9:30 PM 8 Wks 2/25 – 4/29 24 Hrs $240 Wish there was another choice besides Windows or the Mac OS? Welcome to Linux! Linux is an open-source operating system that ...

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Paper Cities for your E-Reader

I’ve just released the World Fantasy Award-winning Anthology Paper Cities as an EPUB, a popular e-book format which can be read on your iPhone, Sony Reader, Barnes & Noble Nook, COOL-ER, and other devices, as well as read with such software as Stanza, Calibre, Mobipocket, etc. The book is DRM-free, which means there’s no copy protection. You can get it here for $9.99. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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Sybil’s Update

Here’s what’s going on in the Sybil’s Garage queue as of this morning: We have received 191 stories, 30 poems We have rejected 89 stories, 11 poems Average response time: 7 days for stories, 6 days for poems Writers group tonight for me, so I’m a little behind on my queue, but I hope to catch up in the next day or so. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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On The Issue of Grammar

I believe I was taught grammar in the fourth grade, and I never studied it again until I took an adult education class at the New School a few decades later. It doesn’t surprise me then the findings of this article, in which freshman college students have poor grammar skills because they are simply not being taught the basics. Why has this been happening?* You can’t just blame the glut of media. These kids are in school for six or more hours per day. Reading. Writing. Arithmeticing. It’s difficult for ...

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History at Clarkesworld

I am very excited to announce that Clarkesworld Magazine has just accepted my story “The History Within Us.” I’ve been a huge fan of Clarkesworld since its inception and it’s a big (ok, humongous) honor to appear there. I’ve had my eyes dilated again today at the eye doctor, so I’m not sure if that’s the reason why everything is glowing. Ads by Project Wonderful. Support Sybil's Garage. Click here to help.

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Like TV Tuned to a Dead Channel

That’s what the sky’s like today: gray, like TV tuned to a dead channel. I was up early today in the pre-dawn light, and now it’s coming on 10 a.m. and doesn’t feel any lighter. Rain then, I suspect, and lots of it. Well, these types of days are conducive to work anyway. Last week I worked on a non-fiction piece and showed it to Mercurio, who said that if I try to sell it as fiction, people will say it’s unbelievable. But it works as a memoir. The story is ...

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Peter Straub & Daryl Gregory, February 17th at KGB

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Updates & Such

What a great inspiration for a short story: a mysterious visitor who leaves roses and a bottle of cognac at Poe’s grave every year on the author’s birthday failed to show up today. It could be because there were, you know, dozens of people watching. But if the mysterious visitor has been doing this for sixty years, maybe he died — or did something more sinister happen? And Sybil’s! We opened on Friday to submissions and have already received about 100. And, wow, some excellent stories already. Were you guys saving ...

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Sybil’s Garage Opening to Submissions Tomorrow

Sybil’s Garage is opening to submissions for our seventh issue tomorrow. What We Want Sybil’s Garage publishes a wide variety of speculative fiction, including traditional science fiction, fantasy and horror as well as more atmospheric/slipstream stories. For issue no. 7 we seek to cast a wider net and encourage contributors to send us both atmospheric/slipstream stories as well as those with traditionally strong plots and characters. We also will look at stories with little or no speculative element, but with speculative tendencies (e.g. weird but not-necessarily supernatural.) In addition, we are very interested in ...

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