The Australian Horror Writers' Association wishes to remind members of the forthcoming special Australian publisher showcase in the AHWA chatroom.
About Our Special Guests
James R Cain lives in the Blue Mountains in New South Wales, Australia. A graduate of the Clarion South writers workshop, he has had stories and poems published in more than 130 publications, including
Red Scream and the anthologies
Cold Flesh,
Lurking Fear, and
Cloaked in Shadows. Since 2002 James has edited and published
Dark Animus magazine.
Angela Challis is editor-in-chief of
Black: Australian Dark Culture magazine, director of Brimstone Press, was editor of
Shadowed Realms, and has edited numerous anthologies including
Book Of Shadows,
Australian Dark Fantasy and Horror 2006 (with Shane Jiraiya Cummings),
Australian Dark Fantasy and Horror 2007,
Australian Dark Fantasy and Horror 2008 (forthcoming),
Shadow Box (with Shane Jiraiya Cummings) and
Macabre - A Journey Through Australian Horror (with Marty Young).
Shane Jiraiya Cummings is the managing editor of
Black: Australian Dark Culture magazine. He has edited several anthologies including
Australian Dark Fantasy & Horror 2006,
Shadow Box, and
Black Box. Shane is also the founder and managing editor of
HorrorScope. With over fifty short stories published, his work has been translated into Spanish, Polish, and French; many of these are showcased in
Shards: Forty Short Sharp Tales (illustrated by Andrew J McKiernan), and
In the Heart of Midnight (forthcoming). A graduate of the Clarion South writers workshop and a member of the US and Australian Horror Writers Associations, Shane has garnered numerous nominations, and has twice been honoured with a Ditmar Award. Shane has acted as Convenor of the Aurealis Award Horror panel, and twice judged for the Australian Shadows Award.
Dr Stephen Dedman is author of four novels, a non-fiction book and more than 100 short stories, plus reviews, role-playing games, stageplays, essays and editorials. His fiction spans the speculative, fantastic, and just plain weird – as well as forays into the thriller, erotica, and western genres (sometimes all at the same time). Stephen is fiction editor of
Borderlands magazine, co-editor of the
ConSensual anthologies, a former associate editor of
Eidolon, and a member of the Horror Writers’ Association’s Bram Stoker Awards Oversight Committee and the Katharine Susannah Pritchard’s Board of Literary Advisors. He’s previously served on the committee of the Festival of Perth Writers’ Festival and innumerable science fiction conventions. Stephen is book buyer at Fantastic Planet, a tutor at the University of Western Australia, and was recently awarded his PhD in Creative Writing.
Stuart Mayne is a book and magazine editor who has worked in publishing for 16 years. He currently edits
Aurealis – Australian Fantasy and Science Fiction magazine.
Aurealis has been publishing since 1990. With issue 40 currently on sale, Stuart is putting the final touches to issue 41, an issue featuring Australian female SF writers. Stuart is also an expert on Australian crime fiction author Arthur Upfield, editing Upfield's last published novel,
The Great Melbourne Cup Mystery, and a collection of Upfield's unpublished short fiction.
Kirstyn McDermott was born on Halloween, an auspicious date which perhaps accounts for her lifelong attraction to all things dark, mysterious and bumpy-in-the-night-ish. She has been published in various magazines and anthologies, including
Shadowed Realms,
GUD, Redsine,
Southern Blood and
Island . Her short fiction has been nominated for two Ditmar Awards, and has received an Aurealis Award Honourable Mention and three Honourable Mentions in
Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror. Kirstyn lives in Melbourne and is a member of the SuperNOVA writers group. She is currently the Vice President of the Australian Horror Writers Association and co-editor of
Midnight Echo.
Ian Mond is co-editor of
Midnight Echo - the Magazine of the Australian Horror Writers Association, Issue 1. Mond is also author of several Bernice Summerfield and Doctor Who short stories for Big Finish in the UK, and is a General Officer on the committee of the Australian Horror Writers Association. In a
recent interview with Shane Jiraiya Cummings at
HorrorScope, Mond revealed, "
Midnight Echo has given me the urge to get back to writing original short fiction. And like everyone on the planet, I’ve got this idea for a novel banging about in my head."
This chat is scheduled for Tuesday the 29th of July at 9:30pm EST. It will run for approximately 1 hour (to be extended informally at guests discretion).
This is an outstanding opportunity for all AHWA members to network with local editors and publishers, and take stock of the current Australian publication market for horror genre; gain an insight into the creation of Black and Midnight Echo, discuss the format change of Dark Animus from print to an online subscription model, and get feedback from the fiction editor of the prestigious Borderlands journal, and the editor of Australia's longtime flagship speculative literature journal Aurealis.
The AHWA Chatroom is available exclusively to AHWA Members and invited guests. To find out more about joining the Australian Horror Writers' Association visit http://www.australianhorror.com/.
Written and Compiled by Talie Helene, AHWA News Editor
BLACK: Australian Dark Culture magazine is now on sale (for $7.95) around the country. Distributed by Gordon & Gotch, the magazine is available at over 1,000 newsagents, Borders stores, and independent retailers.
