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Aspiring writers: some calls for submissions!

Jan 26th, 2012
by ctan.
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Three anthologies are currently open for submissions at Circlet Press:

Charming: Modern Gay Fairy Tales — we read for this over the summer/fall, but just didn’t get quite enough. Deadline March 1st. Details: http://www.circlet.com/?p=3045

Erotic Shakespeare — come on, you know you want to! This anthology is being co-edited by Nikola Klaus with yours truly. Deadline: March 15th. Details: http://www.circlet.com/?p=3696

Like a Chill Down Your Spine: Erotic Ghost Stories — edited by Artemis Savory, the same editor who did Like a Moonrise. Deadline March 31st. Details: http://www.circlet.com/?p=3701

Circlet Press publishes erotic science fiction and fantasy, with occasional forays into the real world or literary fiction. The latter two anthologies are open to myriad sexualities and sexual identities, gay, kinky, straight, lesbian, transgender, unlabel-able, etc. There’s more details if you follow the links above and leave questions for the editors on those posts so they can respond directly.

Posted in: writing talk.
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Hogwarts Alumni Party at Arisia (i.e. Harry Potter party for grown-ups)

Jan 6th, 2012
by ctan.
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Guess what? I got a room in the party block at Arisia! So I will be throwing two parties. A Circlet Press book party on Friday night after the Circlet 20th Anniversary Extravaganza (panel with book giveaways, etc) 9:30p-1am, and then
Saturday night:

HOGWARTS ALUMNI PARTY!
9pm – 1am Saturday January 14
Arisia SF Convention (Boston)
Westin Room 462

The Hogwarts Alumni Association and HPEF/Ascendio welcome you to a party for adult fans of Harry Potter. Those in Potteresque costumes may win door prizes! Members of all Houses as well as alumni of Beauxbatons and Durmstrang are also welcome. Those not in houses will be sorted upon entry. Muggles may need the aid of a witch or wizard to enter. NO DUELING. (That means you, Gilderoy!)

I could use some volunteers to help me run the Hogwarts party. Can you bake cauldron cakes? Bring butterbeer? Donate door prizes? Make flyers and/or put them up around the con? Something I haven’t thought of? Please comment or email me at ravenna_c_tan @ yahoo.com!

We should have info available about Ascendio if you haven’t already been fully informed about the HPEF convention in Orlando this coming July. (http://hp2012.org for more info)

We *should* be in room 462, but check the party board/flyers just in case there are any last minute hotel moves…

Posted in: harry potter fandom.

About my heart (not a romance)

Jan 3rd, 2012
by ctan.
7 comments

I just realized that when one is 14 and a goth and writing about mortality, nobody gives a flying fig, because what does a 14-year-old know about mortality, no matter how morbid-minded? But when you’re 44, and have just had two friends your age die within a week, and you have a medical emergency yourself, all of a sudden people take your musings about mortality very seriously.

Herein, the story of my medical emergency, and my musings on mortality, though may I stress I am unlikely to kick off any time soon. For the tl:dr crowd I REPEAT: I’M FINE. For the rest of you, read on.

Continue reading →

Posted in: general blather.

Have tea with me (and other guests) at Arisia!

Dec 20th, 2011
by ctan.
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So…. the Arisia Science Fiction Convention is less than a month away. Lots of fun is planned for it. Among other things I’m doing a panel on being a complete HARRY POTTER fandom NUT (well, that’s not what the panel is CALLED but that’s definitely what it’s about), plus I’ll be giving a Retrospective presentation for the Circlet Press 20th Anniversary at which I will give away lots of smutty books and entertain everyone with tales of being the “world’s premiere science fiction pornographer,” (so spake Walter Jon Williams of me/Circlet).

Another fun thing I am looking forward to is Afternoon Tea with special guests! For $25 per person, attendees get to sit at a table of 8 or 10 with their favorite writer and hobnob for over an hour. The tea will be Sunday afternoon (of course).

If you’d like to be at my table, or the table of one of the other fun guests (including Phil and Kaja Foglio, Gareth Hinds, Hugh Casey, Esther Friesner, Marty Gear, Bob Eggleton, Hildy Silverman, Trisha Wooldridge, and Eric in the Elevator) check out this webpage for more info: http://2012.arisia.org/VIP-Tea

I did the Breakfast with Guests last year, and although I was groggy from lack of sleep, it was a lot of fun. I expect I’ll be more awake for an afternoon event though…

Posted in: appearances, harry potter fandom.
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NLA Writing Awards now open for nominations!

Dec 13th, 2011
by ctan.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



CALL FOR NOMINATIONS


(Columbus, OH) — NLA-International, a leading organization for activists in the pansexual leather community, is now accepting nominations for its annual writing awards for excellence in SM/leather/fetish writing for books, articles, novels, and short fiction first published between 1 January 2011 and 31 December 2011. The deadline for nominations is 31 January 2012. The finalists will be announced in March. The winners will be announced at the National Leather Association’s Annual General Meeting, which will be held during Tribal Fire (4-6 May 2012) in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

The five award categories are: Continue reading →

Posted in: writing news.

The Prince’s Boy wins Honorable Mention in the Rainbow Awards!

Dec 7th, 2011
by ctan.
2 comments

Rainow awards honorable mentionSqueeeeee! The Prince’s Boy (vol 1) has won Honorable Mention in the Rainbow Awards in “Best Gay Fantasy”! These are the annual awards arranged by Rainbow Reviews, Elisa Rolle’s fabulous review blog. Full results on all the winners and the comments from the judges are on LJ at: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/1462385.html

(That is, if the DDoS attack will let you get at LJ. I was able to read the post just fine, but not comment.)

Check out what the review posted with it says: “This story needs to come with a warning. *Do not read if you have any sort of cardiac issues* LOL. No, really. Brilliant from start to finish, but whew! What a marathon! You’d better train up for this one, or be prepared to read it in small bite sized pieces (if you can put it down, and yes, it is that good). There is graphic torture, rape, slavery, every form of questionable behavior one could think of. And with all that? A story not to be missed. By turns gritty and lyrical. It is the chiming of tiny crystal hand bells and the inescapable, thundering peal of the bells of Notre Dame. A powerhouse, a tour de force. –Cherie”

Yes, oh yes. I’m so glad readers feel that way since, well, that was the goal. (*Grin.*)

If anyone’s interested in purchasing a signed copy of the paperback for the holidays, or an ebook edition for anytime, links are below the cut. But mostly I just wanted to squee! Continue reading →

Posted in: writing news.
Tagged: · ·

Guest Post from Amber Rose Thompson!

Nov 28th, 2011
by ctan.
1 comment

Today’s blog post comes from erotic romance writer Amber Rose Thompson, the author of Tied To Passion and Take Bi Love, both from Renaissance eBooks. Take it away, Amber!

Amber Rose Thompson

Amber Rose Thompson: By day I am a librarian, by night an erotic writer with romantic overtones to my work. I wish there was a purple cape to wear while I write. It feels like I’m a covert librarian writing the very material my library would never carry. I have been married for fifteen years to the person of my dreams which is probably why I write erotica. I want to get her turned on. The odd thing about our marriage is that we both are transgendered. When we got married we were in different bodies with different genders. Talk about your odd marriage, but the changes we went through and the experiences garnered infiltrate and affect my writing, giving me an intriguing view on what both women and men experience at the height of erotic tension and passion.

My work is gender switching or fluid at times, with characters breaking from established molds and finding the passion and lust hidden in their psyches. Continue reading →

Posted in: writing talk.
Tagged: · · ·

Our “Duck Day 2011″ (Thanksgiving) menu

Nov 25th, 2011
by ctan.
2 comments

Okay, here it is, the menu from this year’s Duck Day extravaganza. The planning took place last week at a dinner at Journeyman, at which Scliff said “Why don’t we do Mexican or Southwestern?” To which corwin and I said, “Okay!” It’s a cuisine we hadn’t done for a Duck Day dinner party, but we’ve all cooked for ourselves plenty of times.

In the end it was a meal that required six different kinds of milk, seven different kinds of peppers, three kinds of pumpkin, and resulted in 8-9 courses (depending on how you count ‘em). Full menu below the cut! (Photos and recipes coming later.)

Continue reading →

Posted in: recipes.
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Anne McCaffrey: One of My Role Models

Nov 22nd, 2011
by ctan.
4 comments

I just learned that the last of the three authors who influenced me most as a child has died. Rest in peace Anne McCaffrey.

My three writer role models were Roger Zelazny, Marion Zimmer Bradley, and McCaffrey. Oh, of course I also read Tolkien, and Madeleine L’Engle, and Frank Herbert. But Zelazny, Bradley, and McCaffrey were my “big three.” I never took to Heinlein or Asimov (though I liked his YA nonfiction a lot), Robert Silverberg left no impression, Piers Anthony likewise–in one eye and out the other. I liked Frederick Pohl’s columns in Writer’s Digest, but his books didn’t stick with me. But Zelazny, Bradley, and McCaffrey I read over and over, multiple books, multiple times, actively trying to learn from them.

I was a writer from very early on. (My mother has lovingly preserved “books” I wrote when I was four, before I knew of the concept of correct spelling.) I always wanted to write science fiction and fantasy. I think I was drawn to it most because of the way the genre speaks to outsider status. I knew from very young I wasn’t like other kids even though I didn’t then comprehend all the reasons (cultural, social, sexual, et cetera…) Continue reading →

Posted in: writing talk.
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The Romance Reviews Year-End Splash (YES!) Party

Oct 9th, 2011
by ctan.
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I’m one of a passel of authors taking part in “The Romance Reviews” year-end splash! It’s going to be a month long extravaganza at the TRR website with giveaways of tons of free ebooks and gift certificates every day, November 1-28. Here’s where to bookmark:

Click the poster to visit the party page!

Posted in: writing news.

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