Another DGLA Photo

And here's the Alchemy Peeps at the DGLA:



From left: Jenny Barber, Jan Edwards, Pat Barber - Photo (c) Peter Coleborn

And of course:



The one and only Peter Coleborn! Photo (c) Jen

DGLA photos

I have posted many photos on my Flikr site -- and some will appear on the official website as well. The shortlisted authors eached received a mini Snaga (see left; photo (c) Peter Coleborn).

It was a jolly posh do, at a magical venue (well, it would be, wouldn't it?!).

David Gemmell Legend Award

The David Gemmell Legend Award was presented on the evening of Friday 19th June at the prestigious Magic Circle HQ in London. Alchemy members Peter Coleborn, Jan Edwards, Jenny Barber and Pat Barber were in attendance, with Peter being official Event Photographer! (Photos should appear on the DGLA website soon)

The Legend Award was won by Polish author: Andrzej Sapkowski for his book Blood of Elves, and was accepted on his behalf by Jo Fletcher from Gollancz. Votes came in from 74 different countries and a combined total of over 10,000 votes were collected from the short & long lists.

The event was a celebration of both fantasy as a genre and David Gemmell the legendary author. Anne Nicholls gave a moving tribute, while Stan Nicholls and Debbie Miller MC-ed and held the night together.

The ceremony was opened by a powerful rendition of A Call to Arms, performed by James Barclay. Barclay later acted as auctioneer for the Charity Auction which raised just over £1000 for Gemmell's favourite charity: Medecins Sans Frontieres.

Truly an excellent start for an important genre award.

Book in a Month!

Stuck in a procrastination loop? Can't wait for Nanowrimo to roll around? Then have I got the thing for you!

Over on Genreality, Sasha White has proposed a Book in a Month (ish) challenge. Starting now, you have until July 31st to get to the end of the first draft of your book project. Or else! And like Nanowrimo, the goal is to switch your internal editor off and get those words down...

See you at the finishing line!

More Alchemy on Authonomy

And Alchemy diva Debbie has added another book to Authonomy! Cherry Picks is a collection of her previously published short stories which have appeared in various small press and larger independent anthologies and also women's magazines. Some have won awards and competitions and one was "highly commended" by American Goddess of fantasy fiction Ellen Datlow.

Link-tastic

Some more fun things to read...

Fed up with being told your favourite style of fiction isn't selling? Read How Readers Drive Publishing by Jane Smith.

Every wondered how to handle being a writer at a Con? Rachelle Gardner's got a few pointers in her Recovering From A Writers Conference post.

Over on Storytellers Unplugged, Gerald Houarner spills his brain and give you Notes from the Front.

Jane Smith talks about Problems with Logic while Jessica Faust give her thoughts on the concept You Have No Business Writing.

And finally, for some light relief, check out 5 Kickass Lessons Books Could Learn From The Movies by Robert Brockway.

More from Mike!

More congrats and bottles of booze to Mr Chinn. Mike's story - Parlour Games - is soon to be appearing in the anthology Tales from the Smoking Room. TftSR is a themed anthology of Victorian/Edwardian horror and is available from the publisher on Ebay. Link here!

The line up for the anthology is:

The Strangled Garden - Stephen Bacon
Room Three - Matthew Crossman
The Iron Ape - Mark Harding
The Decent Thing - VC Jones
Parlour Games - Mike Chinn
Serendipity - Trudi Topham
A Game of Billiards - Craig Herbertson

Online Short Story Course

Award winning author Christopher Fowler is currently running an online short story course on his blog... first lesson here!

Next Meeting

We now have a date for the next Alchemy Meeting... Saturday 11th July at the Alchemy Cats-Have-Eaten-The-Aliens House.

And as a reminder, the story challenge for the July meet is: Write a story including/inspired by one of the following sentences:

And Jonathan jerks up from the floor screaming.

Cold darkness is comforting.

Just like in fairytales.

(For bonus points, include all three!)

Ditmar Awards

This weekend the Ditmars were announced at the Australian National Science Fiction Convention. (Natcon)

Live coverage was provided by Cheryl Morgan on the Science Fiction Awards Watch site.

A. Bertram Chandler Award
Rosaleen Love

William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism and Review
Kim Wilkins, “Popular genres and the Australian literary community: the case of fantasy fiction” in the Journal of Australian Studies

Best New Talent
Felicity Dowker

Best Professional Achievement
Angela Challis, for Black, the Australian Dark Culture Magazine

Best Fan Production
ASif!, edited by Alisa Krasnostein and Gene Melzack

Best Fan Artist
Cat Sparks for Scary Food Cookbook

Best Fan Writer
Rob Hood, for Undead Backbrain

Best Professional Artwork
Shaun Tan, for Tales from Outer Suburbia

Best Collected Work
Dreaming Again, edited by Jack Dann

Best Short Story
Tie between Margo Lanagan “The Goosle” and Dirk Flinthart “This is not my story” (ASIM #37)

Best Novella/Novelette
“Painlessness” by Kirstyn McDermott

Best Novel
“Tender Morsels” by Margo Lanagan

Peter McNamara Award
Sean Williams

New Australian Award

It has just been announced that the Australian Science Fiction Foundation will be launching a new award at next years Aussiecon - Aussiecon 4 - also the 68th World Science Fiction Convention, being held in Melbourne on 2nd –6th September 2010.

The award is to be called the The Norma K Hemming Award and is designed to mark excellence in the exploration of themes of race, gender, class and sexuality in science fiction and fantasy, produced in Australia or by Australian citizens.

Find out more about the award here.

Alchemy Art!

More publishing news - Alchemy member Peter Coleborn will be having a piece of his artwork published in New Horizons #4. The piece will illustrate a short story called 'The Un-Explorers' by Matt Finucane and will hit the streets around December time.

New Horizons is British Fantasy Society Publication edited by the ever lovely Andrew Hook and is given out free to members of the BFS although copies should be available to buy if you're not a member.

British Fantasy Awards Shortlist

The British Fantasy Society have just released the final shortlist for the BF Awards... The awards will be voted on by members of the British Fantasy Society and Fantasycon and will be presented at Fantasycon on the night of Saturday 19th September in a rather lovely awards do.

Appearance Update

Our spies in Alchemy Land have discovered that Mike's Postcripts story will be appearing in the Autumn 2010 issue! Woot!

Alchemy on Authonomy

As internet phenomenons go, Authonomy is one of the fun ones. Set up by Harper Collins as an electronic slushpile, it lets authors display their unpublished books to the world while allowing readers (both pro and 4-the-luv) to comment on the work and vote for their favourites. And as an extra bonus, the five most popular books get sent to HC's editors desks every month...

Alchemy member Debbie Bennett currently has five books up on Authonomy (click on the links to read them and helpful comments welcome!)

1) Hamelin's Child was long-listed (top 25) for the Crime Writers' Association Debut Dagger Award. Gritty and graphic adult stuff, this is not for the faint-hearted. The novel made the Editor's Desk on authonomy in 2008 and received a fantastic HC critique. It's a complete novel and is looking for a permanent home.

2) The Blue Flamingo is another thriller. This has more of a horror edge, but is less graphically-adult than Hamelin's' Child. It's still a work-in-progress and Debbie feels it's still a little rough around the edges.

3) Edge of Dreams is a young adult contemporary fantasy which has also won prizes. This novel is also complete and would love to be on a bookshop shelf somewhere.

4) Flashpoint is another completed YA fantasy novel, which continues the adventures of the characters first met in Edge of Dreams.

5) Blood Ties is an attempt at traditional fantasy (but no elves or dragons!). Debbie was working on this with an editor at Orion many years ago, before real life got in the way. This is still a work-in-progress.

Another Alchemy sale!

And young Mr Chinn does it again! Big congrats to our Mike for selling a story to Postscripts Magazine. When we have further details on which issue and when it's out, we'll let you know... Start saving up now to buy many copies from the ever so discerning PS Publishing!