The art of Bryan Beus

Well, like I promised yesterday, I'm going to feature the winning art from our new winners. I'm starting today with Bryan Beus. Bryan is from Provo, UT and he is a first quarter winner and will be published in volume 23.

These are his three winning entries. The first illustration is entitled "Pinata."


The second illustration is entitled "Clowns."


The third illustration is called "All Grizz."

You'll see art from Bogdan Stetsenko of Kiev, Ukraine tomorrow.

NEWS FROM PAST WINNERS

I was happy to see there was a Writers/Illustrators of the Future blog out there! My story "Blade of the Bunny" was one of the first place stories way back in Volume XV.

Since then, I've sold about 30 short stories, including a sequel to "Blade of the Bunny." "Spell of the Sparrow" came out in late 2004 in Sword & Sorceress XXI, and takes place a while after the bunny tale.

I've also sold two humorous fantasy novels to DAW Books. The first, Goblin Quest, came out in November of 2006. Goblin Hero will be hitting stores this May.
Needless to say, I'm pretty darn excited about both.

Best,
Jim

WE NEED MORE

If you have news that belongs on the Writers & Illustrators of the Future blog, be sure to send it to me. I'm always looking for more great news to share.

Another great review for Writers of the Future

The following review just came in for Writers of the Future Volume XXII from VOYA (Voice of Youth Advocates) a magazine that caters to the teen reader. Pretty good! WRITERS OF THE FUTURE VOLUME XXII BOOK REVIEW BY VOYA (VOICE OF YOUTH ADVOCATES) L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future, Volume XXII. Algis Budrys, Ed. Galaxy Press, 2006, 500p. $7.99 pb. 978-1-59212-345-1 Illus. L. Ron Hubbard is probably best known for his bestselling novels and for being the founder of Scientology. Perhaps less publicized is his role in encouraging emerging writers by initiating various writing contests, including the Writers of the Future Contest ®. This volume contains the twelve winning entries from the 2005 contest, as well as illustrations by the winners in the Illustrators of the Future ® program and essays on writing and art by such authors as Hubbard himself and Orson Scott Card. The stories vary widely in subject matter, but all exhibit consummate skill in crafting an imaginative and thought-provoking tale. A few of the stories merit particular applause. The opening story, The Sword from the Sea by Blake Hutchins, is reminiscent of Ursula K. LeGuin’s Earthsea cycle and its nautical focus, mystical elements, and character-driven plot. Schroedinger’s Hummingbird by Diana Rowland takes the familiar notion of traveling backward through time to change history to a new and eerie place. David John Baker’s contribution, On the Mount, provides a provocative look at the relationship between creator and creation. Many stories challenge the reader to ponder complex scientific concepts such as cosmology, nuclear fusion, cellular biology, and xenolinguistics, especially in At the Gate of God by Joseph Jordan and Tongues by Brian Rappatta. Without oversimplifying the material, each author manages to make the complicated subject matter understandable and relevant to the theme of the story. Card, in his essay, Are We at the End of Science Fiction?, speculates on reasons why “hard” science fiction has not maintained the level of success it had in the 1960s and 1970s, especially in comparison to fantasy literature. The stories contained in this volume demonstrate that the genre still attracts skilled, thoughtful writers who promise hope for the future of such speculative fiction. –Kathy Starks.

ILLUSTRATOR OF THE FUTURE WINNING ART

Starting tomorrow, I am going to start displaying the winning art of the newest winners of the Illustrators of the Future contest - at least the first 9 winners. This is the art they won the contest with and is not the art you will see published in Writers of the Future XXIII. I'll do one artist a day, beginning with the first quarter.

IF YOU ARE A PAST WINNER

If you are a past winner and have published books or art, send me the links or jpgs so I can post these on this blog.

And be sure to tell your friends to check out the blog. Its posted pretty much every day and there is a lot of great news about both contests to tell.

Writers of the Future panel at Ad Astra in Toronto, Can

Mike Rimar and Sarah Totton sent in the following photos from a recent booksigning.

Sarah Totton in WOTF 22 and Mike Rimar from WOTF 21 did a booksigning at a local Coles Bookstore somewhere in Ontario, Canada.

I just received the following additional good news from Canada from Stephen Kotowych (to be published in WOTF 23):

I'm pleased to report that there will be a Writers of the Future panel at Ad
Astra , Toronto's annual science fiction convention , which will take place
March 2 -4, 2007.

The panel will consist of contest judge Robert J. Sawyer , published finalist Mike Rimar , and two of th e 2006 winners, Tony Pi and Stephen Kotowych. This is quite a coup, especially for Tony and I who haven’t even been to the workshop yet.

Ad Astra is now in its twenty-sixth year, and attracts over 1000 people during the course of the weekend. You can find out more about the convention at their website: http://www.ad-astra.org/index.php

Best wishes,
Stephen Kotowych

I also received the following correction to a recent posting on a book signing at Tsunami Books:

Hello,

My name is John Burridge, I'm the current chair of the Eugene Professional Writers' Workshop (Wordos).

I was taking a look at the WOTF / Wordos book signing page on the WOTF blog
http://wotfblog.galaxypress.com/2007/01/tsunami-bookstore-signing.html

I'm sorry to tell you that the link you have to Tsunami Books goes to a
company on the east coast with the same name as Eugene's beloved book
store. I'm unable to find a web page for them (and I believe they do
not have one), but Tsunami's contact information is

Tsunami Books
2585 Willamette St
Eugene, OR 97405
(541) 345-8986

Wordos swear by Tsunami books because they've been really really cool to us; they let us meet in their bookstore every week for very low rent, and they let us book occasional events. Prior to Tsunami opening their doors to us (this was before my time) the Wordos met in a loud restaurant. We're very happy to support them, as they are one of the few bookstores in Eugene's shrinking pool of independent bookstores to stay afloat.

I hope this information is helpful to you.

- John

HOW DO I ENTER THIS CONTEST?

I also received an email from someone who has become interested in the contests having read the blog but wanted to know how to enter. Following is the link with the rules on how to enter the Writers and Illustrator of the Future Contests: http://www.writersofthefuture.com/rules.htm

More good news from our newest winners

I received the following news from Jeff Carlson (WotF 23). First of all he has a new story in print, a quirky action-adventure piece in the January 2007 issue of Asimov's. From an advance review on Tangent Online: "Gunfight at the Sugarloaf Pet Food & Taxidermy" by Jeff Carlson features a most unusual heroine: Julie, a Montanan ranger who roboticizes hunting decoys... The setup has a sitcom's simplicity, but Carlson's dead straight delivery and attention to the fine points of character make "Gunfight" even more memorable and amusing. What's more, after seeing no more than an eleven-page outline, Jeff's editor at Ace made an offer on his second novel, a sequel with the working title War Year. The first novel, Plague Year, will be in book stores in August 2007. War Year is currently scheduled for Summer 2008. If you are a winner - past, present or future - be sure to send me your news. Or if you have news about Writers and Illustrators of the Future, even if you aren't a winner, send this to me as well.

New winners are getting their first taste of media

Hello. Sent out a release yesterday to US and CAN media announcing the winners from the first 3 quarters for volume 23. (I'd like to get any French media to send the release to to announce Aliette as the Paris winner. Perhaps she can translate the release into French for me and we can send it out that way.)

But after sending out the release I had a radio station in Georgia respond wanting to interview Kim Zimring and a newspaper in California wanting to interview Amelia Mammoliti. So, we're off to a pretty good start with our winners for volume 23.


Also had the following sent in to me from Jeff Carlson, also being published in volume 23:

My exciting news for this week is that I received my contract for my second novel with Ace/Berkley, and signed and returned it to my agent, Donald Maass.

Do you have any word on when the XXIII workshop will be scheduled?

All best, Jeff
jeffcarlson@astound.net
PLAGUE YEAR, from Ace Books in August 2007 and PLAGUE WAR, from Ace in Summer 2008

JEFF: To answer your question about the awards ceremony. This isn't locked in yet. But as soon as it is, I'll let everyone know when and where it will occur.


I just caught this in the Orange County Register earlier today. Stephen Woodworth, winner for his story "Scary Monsters" in WOTF vol 7 just published his 4th novel since winning the contest. You can see his most recent novel at http://www.randomhouse.com/bantamdell/violet_eyes/ Here's his book:


Well, gotta go. I have Nancy Cartwright (the voice of Bart Simpson on the Simpsons) about to do a national radio show to promote Writers of the Future as well as audio books that we publish. She has been helping to record some of the audios. Should be a great interview. You can see more about Nancy at her website www.nancycartwright.com.

Volume 23 is coming together

Well I'm getting through all the stories now, reading them and seeing if there is any editing needed from the writers. I've read a few stories so far -- Aliette de Bodard, because she is our first French winner and I really wanted to read what she wrote, and Stephen Kotowych, because his manuscript was behind Aliette's when I finished hers. I'm almost done reading Jeff Carlson's story as the third one. Then it's on to the rest of the stories from the first three quarters. Hope to have them all read within the week. From this, I will write the front page come-on sections. From what I've read so far, volume 23 is going to be another great book. The requests for bios should be to everyone now. So, if you haven't done so, get the bios sent in. You can always look at how we write the bios in existing volumes. If you are uncertain about what to send, just ask. Had a great chat with Algis yesterday, going over what his essay would be about. We came up with some good ideas. Now to get all the research done so it can be written. Kevin Anderson wrote a great essay that will be published. It's called "IF I ONLY HAD THE TIME." I'm sure you can imagine what it will be like. I can assure you that it is really clever method of making a very important point to a writer. I got with Judy today and asked when the results would be out for the fourth quarter. She said the stories were out with the judges and she was hoping to the results in, hopefully as early as next week. I'll let you know as soon as she lets me know. (The winners will obviously receive their phone call from Joni Labaqui immediately - then I'll post.) But while we're working to put volume 23 together, volume 22 continues to do well. I was just told that the book was #20 on the Bookscan SF best seller list this past week. So that's pretty exciting. Showing the Writers of the Future documentary in events around the US really makes a difference in getting people to want to read the book.

Well, I need to get back and finish Carlson's story, so I'll end off for now. But be sure to send me any news you may have for either of the contests! And spread the word about this blog and check it out daily -- I'm posting pretty much every day as there continues to be so much great news.

Tsunami Bookstore signing

There was a great booksigning that happened last month at Tsunami bookstore with most of our past winners from the Wordo writing group and I just received a photo of this. Nina Kiriki Hoffman was also there, but had to leave by the time of the photo. Tsunami was also presented with a copy of a Frazetta print for their store - 'cause they're pretty great. Frazetta painted this cover for Writers of the Future volume 4.

From left to right: Stephen Stanley, Scott Landfield (store co-owner), Leon West, Damon Kaswell, Blake Hutchins and Eric Witchey. Check out www.wordos.com for the writing group site - they are certainly doing something right to have so many great writers coming from one spot.

Tsunami is the store and all the guys in the Wordos swear by 'em http://www.tsunamibooks.com/

Don't forget to send me your writers and illlustrator news to be posted on this blog! You can either just comment on the blow posts or email me at pr@galaxypress.com.

Winners for Writers of the Future XXIII

I had posted this earlier on a different blog and am newly posting this information here. Congratulations to the winners for the first three quarters of volume 23!

FIRST QUARTER

WRITERS OF THE FUTURE
First place: Jeff Carlson of Walnut Creek, CA, USA
Second place: Tony Pi of Toronto, ON, CAN
Third place: Corey Brown of North Palm Beach, FL, USA

ILLUSTRATORS OF THE FUTURE
Bryan Beus of Provo, UT, USA
Bogdan Stetsenko of Kiev, Ukraine
Lars Edwards of Arlington, MA, USA

SECOND QUARTER

WRITERS OF THE FUTURE
First place: Kim Zimring of Decatur, GA, USA
Second place: Douglas Texter of Minneapolis, MN, USA
Third place: Damon Kaswell of Eugene, OR, USA

ILLUSTRATORS OF THE FUTURE
Artem Mirolevich of Brooklyn, NY, USA
Corey Loving of Country Club Hills, IL, USA
Amelia Mammoliti of El Dorado Hills, CA, USA

THIRD QUARTER

WRITERS OF THE FUTURE
First place: Stephen Kotowych of Toronto, ON, CAN
Second place: Aliette de Bodard of Paris, France
Third place: Karl Bunker of Jamaica Plain, MA, USA

ILLUSTRATORS OF THE FUTURE
Randall Ensley of Gales Ferry, CT, USA
Marcus Collins of Pasadena, CA, USA
Peter Town of Sacramento, CA, USA

Rob Sawyer just did a great TV interview

Rob Sawyer, Writers of the Future Contest judge, just did a TV show this week on Rogers TV in Kitchener, ON, where he was on for at least 10 minutes promoting the contest and volume 22. He sent me a few photos taken during his interview which I'm including here.

You can also see more of Rob's stuff at his website www.sfwriter.com

Over the past several months, I've seen more and more how short fiction is seeing a resurgence. I've spoken to lots of folks and found they really do like short stories -- as they often have trouble getting a lot of time to read. They can get through a story in one sitting.

I was recently talking to Neil Gaiman (www.neilgaiman.com) about his latest book Fragile Things and he said it had more of a sustained sell than some of his earlier books - and it too hit the NYT list. I was interested as Writers of the Future and his last book are both short fiction and I wanted to get any tips he had to give on what made his anthology sell so well. He definitely gave his blog the lionshare of credit. As regards his last book, while there were lots of great stories, I did like "The Monarch of the Glen" best. Maybe because I really liked American Gods. Neil earlier gave me a great blurb on Writers of the Future which I've used on the book. I like it so much, I'll use it again here, "Writers of the Future has a record of nurturing and discovering writers who have done on to make their mark in the science fiction field. Long may it continue!"

Anyway, I look forward to any other emails with news on the contests or responses to the Writers of the Future book itself.

So long for now.

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Rebecca Moesta is Latest Contest Judge

Rebecca Moesta has been made a judge for the Writers of the Future Contest. We are very excited to have her on board -- its about time, right? She has been an instrumental part of the Writers Workshop given each your with the special talk she and Kevin give on the "Business of Writing." Barry Hunter in Baryon, ran an article on her becoming a judge and you can see it using the below link. http://www.baryon-online.com/baryon104/104-news.html Barry also gave volume 22 a nice review, which you can also see at this link http://www.baryon-online.com/baryon104/wf22.html Larry Schliessmann (WOTF XX for "Cancilleri's Law" using pen name Gabriel F.W. Koch) recently published Templar's Fire which you can find at Amazon.com using the following link: http://www.amazon.com/Templars-Fire-Larry-Schliessmann/dp/1411692306/sr=8-3/qid=1165148826/ref=sr_1_3/002-6666512-2944059?ie=UTF8&s=books And Steven Saville (WOTF XIX for "Bury My Heart at the Garrick") wrote in with the following good news a short while ago but I want to ensure its posted on this blog as he is doing incredibly well - and has moved state-side since having won the contest in 2003. There's lots of great news from winners. Be sure to send it to me so I can post your news. Send mail to: pr@galaxypress.com

Brandon Sigrist - A Sci-Fi Success Story

Here's some pretty good news -

Brandon just sent me a copy of METRO, Twin Cities Metropolitan Magazine for December. The article has a 5 X 5 photo of Brandon signing a book for astronaut Rick Searfoss and a 5 X 5 article on having been a contest winner.

The subtitle for the article reads: WRITER/ARCHITECT BRANDON SIGRIST WINS A PRESTIGIOUS SCIENCE FICTION WRITING PRIZE

And the article opens:

"Aspiring science fiction and fantasy writers/illustrators take note: Writers of the Future could make you the next Big Thing by publishing your work. Now in its 23rd year, Writers of the Future recognizes amateur talent in quarterly competitions, and publishes winners in an annual anthology of short stories."

I hope you all liked it as much as I did.

Illustrators of the Future at Coleman College

Miguel Rojas (2006 ILOF winner) and I had a great time yesterday doing a presentation on Illustrators of the Future at Coleman College. Dr. CJ Fuller, Associate Dean of the school, invited us to speak to her students. They are located in San Marcos, CA.

Miguel spoke about what the contest did for his confidence and resultant expanded career.
He now works for JINX designing gamer clothing. You can see some of his stuff at
www.jinx.com/worldofwarcraft/default.htm

I talked about how the book is a best seller and is a good indicator of how good they need to be to consider themselves professional - whether writing or illustrating. We also showed them the illustrator contest entries for the winners of volume 20 so they could see what others have submitted in the past.

We also showed the students the documentary of the workshop and awards ceremony done in Seattle. It went over really well and we were invited to come back to brief again at their main campus.

Overall it was a great trip.

Writers of the Future Vol. 22 hits bestseller lists!

Writers of the Future Hits #1 on Amazon.com for sixth week!

We've had lots of airings of the Writers of the Future documentary. And this coupled with nearly 50 events alone in December has resulted in this achievement as well as hitting #6 on the B&N.com internet bestseller list!

We printed 50,000 copies and ran out. We then reprinted an additional 15,000 copies. So any distributors or booksellers who say they are trying to get more - hang on.

We'll keep you posted as more news and sales come in.

John Goodwin
President Galaxy Press
pr@galaxypress.com