The Mammoth Book of Best New Science Fiction: 23rd Annual Collection (3 page)

The British magazine
Postscripts
, another professional-level publication in spite of low circulation figures, reinvented itself as an anthology this year, so we’ll cover it there, below. (I’ll list the subscription information up here, though, for lack of anywhere else to put it, and, because, unlike most other anthology series, you
can
subscribe to
Postscripts.)

Publisher Sovereign Media announced that they were pulling the plug on
Realms of Fantasy
early in 2009, and what was ostensibly the magazine’s last issue appeared in April. That looked like the end of the line for
Realms of Fantasy
, but then the magazine was bought by Warren Lapine of Tir Na Nog Press, who started it up again. Three issues of the resurrected magazine appeared throughout the rest of the year, for an overall total of five. Shawna McCarthy, who has been the editor since the founding of the magazine in 1994, was retained as editor, and the resurrected version of the magazine looks and reads much like the old version, and features the same sort of fiction.
Realms of Fantasy
published good work this year by Ian Creasey, Jay Lake, Richard Parks, Cat Rambo, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, and others.

Weird Tales
had a rocky year due to the reorganizaton of publisher Wildside Press in response to the recession, and only managed two 2009 issues; nevertheless, there’s an energy and drive here that hints to me that this intelligently edited horror/fantasy magazine will survive. At the beginning of 2010, Ann VanderMeer was promoted from fiction editor to editor in chief, and Mary Robinette Kowal and Paula Guran joined the staff as art director and nonfiction editor, respectively. Their circulation seems to be somewhere in the five thousand copy range, and again many critics seem to consider them a professional magazine in spite of that. Interesting stories by Jeffrey Ford, Richard Howard, Hunter Eden, Michael Swanwick, Robert Davies, and others appeared there this year.

If you’d like to see lots of good SF and fantasy published every year, the survival of these magazines is essential, and one important way that you can help them survive is by subscribing to them. It’s never been easier to do so, with just the click of a few buttons, nor has it ever before been possible to subscribe to the magazines in as many different formats, from the traditional print copy arriving by mail to downloads for your desktop or laptop available from places like Fictionwise (www.fictionwise.com) and Amazon (www.amazon.com), to versions you can read on your Kindle. You can also now subscribe from overseas just as easily as you can from the United States, something formerly difficult-to-impossible.

So in hopes of making it easier for you to subscribe, I’m going to list both the Internet sites where you can subscribe online and the street addresses where you can subscribe by mail for each magazine:
Asimov’s Science Fiction
’s
site is at www.asimovs.com, and subscribing online might be the easiest thing to do, and there’s also a discounted rate for online subscriptions; its subscription address is Asimov’s Science Fiction, Dell Magazines, 6 Prowitt Street, Norwalk, CT 06855 – $32.97 for annual subscription in the US, $42.97 overseas.
Analog Science Fiction and Fact
’s
site is at www.analogsf com; its subscription address is Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Dell Magazines, 6 Prowitt Street, Norwalk, CT 06855 – $32.97 for annual subscription in the US
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
’s
site is at www.sfsite.com/fsf; its subscription address is Fantasy & Science Fiction, P.O. Box 3447, Hoboken, NJ 07030 – annual subscriptions cost $34.97 in the US
Interzone
and
Black Static
can be subscribed to online at www.ttapress.com/onlinestore1.html; the subscription address for both is TTA Press, 5 Martins Lane, Witcham, Ely, Cambridge CB6 2LB, England – $68.51 each for a twelve-issue subscription, or there is a reduced-rate dual-subscription offer of $127.23 for both magazines for twelve issues; make checks payable to TTA Press’.
Postscripts
, at http://store.pspublishing.co.uk/acatalog/PS_Subscriptions.html, has a variety of subscription options, including 50 Pounds Sterling for a one-year unsigned hardcover (two issue) subscription, or 100 Pounds Sterling for a one-year signed traycased subscription.
Realms of Fantasy
offers yearly subscription in the US for $19.99, or overseas for $29.99; write to Tir Na Nog Press, Realms of Fantasy, P.O. Box 1623, Williamsport, PA 17703, call 1-877-318-3269, or subscribe online at www.realmsoffantasymag.com.
Weird Tales
offers a few different subscription options, including a one-year, four-issue subscription for $20 in the US; contact them at Wildside Press, 9710 Traville Gateway Drive #234, Rockville, MD 20850, or online at http://weirdtales.net/wordpress.

The print fiction semiprozine market, subject to the same pressures in terms of rising postage rates and production costs as the professional magazines are, continues to contract.
Aeon, Talebones, Paradox, Fictitious Force, Farrago’s Wainscot
, and
H.P. Lovecraft’s Magazine of Horror
all died this year, and
Zahir
is transitioning from a print format to an electronic-only online format, something that
Subterranean, Fantasy Magazine
, and
Apex Magazine
did the year before. (I suspect that this will eventually be the fate of most print fiction semiprozines – they’ll transition into all-electronic formats, or they’ll die.)

Of the other surviving print fiction semiprozines,
Electric Velocipede
, edited by John Kilma, managed two issues in 2009, one a double-issue, publishing worthwhile material by Merrie Haskell, Mercurio D. Rivera, Yoon Ha Lee, and others. The Canadian
On Spec
, one of the longest-running of all the fiction semiprozines, edited by a collective under general editor Diane Walton, once again kept reliably to its publishing schedule in 2009, and featured interesting stories by Tony Pi and Jack Skillingstead, among others. Australia’s
Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine
, another collective-run SF magazine with a rotating editorial staff under editor in chief Robbie Matthews, managed five of its scheduled six issues this year, publishing good stuff by Damien Broderick and Paul Di Filippo, Brian Stableford, Jason K. Chapman, Caroline M. Yoachim, and others.

I saw two issues of Australian magazine
Aurealis
, edited by Stuart Mayne, in 2009, although they were both dated 2008. A small British SF magazine edited by Ian Redman,
Jupiter
, managed all four of its scheduled issues in 2009; I like the fact that it’s all-SF, but the quality of its fiction needs to come up. A Canadian magazine, edited by Karl Johanson,
Neo-Opsis
, ostensibly quarterly, produced three issues in 2009; the same comment made about
Jupiter
would apply equally well to them. Long-running
Space and Time
produced four issues, as did fantasy magazine
Tales of the Talisman;
there were two issues apiece produced by fantasy magazine
Shimmer
, the Irish
Albedo One, Greatest Uncommon Denominator
, and
Not One of Us
, and as far as I can tell there was only one 2009 issue of sword & sorcery magazine
Black Gate
, as well as the slipstreamish
Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, New Genre
, and
Sybil’s Garage.
I saw no copy
of Tales of the Unanticipated
or
Aoife’s Kiss
this year.

Most of the print critical magazine market is gone. One of the hearty survivors, and always your best bet for value, is the newszine
Locus: The Magazine of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Field, a
twenty-eight-time Hugo-winner which for more than forty years has been an indispensible source of news, information, and reviews; co-founder, publisher, and longtime editor Charles N. Brown died this year, but
Locus
continues under the guidance of a staff of editors headed by Liza Groen Trombi, and including Kirsten Gong-Wong, Amelia Beamer, and many others. Another hearty perennial, one of the last men standing in this field, is the eclectic critical magazine
The New York Review of Science Fiction
, edited by David G. Hartwell and a staff of associate editors, which publishes a variety of eclectic and sometimes quirky critical essays on a wide range of topics.

Most of the other surviving print critical magazines are professional journals more aimed at academics than at the average reader. The most accessible of these is probably the long-running British critical zine
The Science Fiction Foundation.

Subscription addresses follow:

Locus: The Magazine of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Field
, Locus Publications, Inc., P.O. Box 13305, Oakland, CA, 94661, or online at https://secure.locusmag.com/About/Subscribe.html – $68 for a one -year first-class subscription, 12 issues.
The New York Review of Science Fiction
, Dragon Press, P.O. Box 78, Pleasantville, NY, 10570, or online at http://www.nyrsf.com/subscribe - today.html – $40 per year, 12 issues, make checks payable to “Dragon Press.”
The Science Fiction Foundation
, Science Fiction Foundation, Roger Robinson (SFF), 75 Rosslyn Avenue, Harold Wood, Essex RM3 ORG, UK, or online at http:// www.sf-foundation.org/joining.html – $39 for a three-issue subscription in the U.S.
Aurealis
, Chimaera Publications, P.O. Box 2164, Mt Waverley, VIC 3149, Australia, or online at www.aurealis.com.au – $59.75 (AUD) for a four-issue overseas airmail subscription, checks should be made out to “Chimaera Publications” in Australian dollars.
On Spec, The Canadian Magazine of the Fantastic
, P.O. Box 4727, Edmonton, AB, Canada T6E 5G6, or online at www.onspec.ca – $25 for one year.
Neo-opsis Science Fiction Magazine
, 4129 Carey Rd., Victoria, BC, Canada, V8Z 4G5, or online at http://www.neo-opsis.ca/Subscriptions. htm – $25 (Canadian) for a three-issue subscription.
Albedo One
, Albedo One Productions, 2 Post Road, Lusk, County Dublin, Ireland or online at http://www.albedo1.com/html/albedo _1 _subscriptions.html – $39.50 for a four-issue airmail subscription, make checks payable to “Albedo One.”
Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet
, Small Beer Press, 150 Pleasant St., #306, Easthampton, MA 01027 or online at http://smallbeerpress.com/shopping/subscriptions/ – $20 for four issues.
Electric Velocipede
at http://www.nightshadebooks.com/cart.php?m=product_detail & p = 143 offers a two-issue annual subscription for $25.
Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine
has a six-issue subscription rate of $69 (AUD), visit them online at www.andromedaspaceways.com.
Zahir
is transitioning to an all-electronic format, see www.zahirtales.com for further information.
Tales of the Talisman
, Hadrosaur Productions, P.O. Box 2194, Mesilla Park, NM 88047-2194 or online at http://www.hadrosaur.com/order.html – $24 for a four-issue subscription.
Black Gate
, New Epoch Press, 815 Oak Street, St. Charles, IL 60174, or online at http://www.blackgate.com/black-gate-subscriptions/; there are multiple subscription options, including downloadable PDF versions for $4.95 apiece or $29.95 for a one-year (four issue) subscription.
Jupiter
, at 19 Bedford Road, Yeovil, Somerset, BA21 5UG, UK, offers four issues for 10 Pounds Sterling.
Greatest Uncommon Denominator
, GUD Publishing, P.O. Box 1537, Laconia, NH 03247, or online at http://www.gudmagazine.com/subs/subscribe.php – $22 for 2 issues.
Sybil’s Garage
, Senses Five Press, 76 India Street, Apt A8, Brooklyn NY11222-1657, or online at http://www.sensesfive.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2&products_id=9 – $29.95 for four issues (2 years).
Shimmer
, P.O. Box 58591, Salt Lake City, UT 84158-0591, or online at http://www.shimmerzine.com/purchase/subscribe/ – $22.00 for a four-issue subscription.

The online world of electronic magazines seemed to have more energy and momentum this year than most of the print world, and probably published more good fiction than all but perhaps the top three or four print fiction magazines. Not that it was all good –
Jim Baen’s Universe
is scheduled to die after the April 2010 issue, and
Shiny
and
Lone Star Stories
are both already dead. On the other hand,
Apex Magazine
came back from the dead, Tor.com,
Subterranean Press, Strange Horizons, Orson Scott Card’s InterGalactic Medicine Show, Clarkesworld Magazine, Abyss & Apex
, and
Fantasy Magazine
still seem to be going strong, and a promising new ezine,
Lightspeed
, edited by John Joseph Adams, will be starting up in 2010.

Jim Baen’s Universe
(www.baensuniverse.com), once the Great White Hope of the online fiction-magazine world, is in its fourth year, and it will unfortunately be its last, since it’s been announced that the ezine will shut down after its April 2010 issue, a major loss for the field, and one that will be advanced as an argument against the long-term viability of ezines – if an ezine paying top-of-the field prices, attracting the biggest name authors, and getting major publicity and visibility can’t attract enough paying readers to stay alive, who can?
Jim Baen’s Universe
published only one really major story in 2009, a complex time-travel piece by John Barnes, but there was lots of other good work, both SF and fantasy, by David Gerrold, Jay Lake, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Naomi Kritzer, Lezli Robyn, Graham Edwards, John Lambshead, Gary Kloster, and others. Its editors were Mike Resnick and Eric Flint.