Last month, Rebecca and I were on the Oregon coast teaching an intensive, invitation-only anthology workshop (approx 46 students) with Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Dean Wesley Smith, John Helfers, and Kerrie Lynn Hughes—as the result of which, I’m editing a new anthology for the Fiction River series, PULSE POUNDERS, and Rebecca is editing a YA anthology called SPARKS.

photo by Annie Reed

photo by Kim Mainord

PULSE POUNDERS stories “start with a bang, end with a bang, with a lot of bang in between.”  I read through a stack of 46 submitted manuscripts and also solicited other pieces for the book, including new thriller stories by David Farland, Kevin J. Anderson & Peter J. Wacks, Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Kathryn Rusch—and, as a special treat, a new and never before published thriller by Frank Herbert.  The rest of the stories I selected from that stack of 46 manuscripts…and it was a tough call.  After spending an entire day critiquing the submissions, I had to whittle down the stories I liked from the stories I LOVED, and even then I had to sacrifice some.

Then Mark Lefebvre from Kobo came to the rescue at the end of the night, offering the funding for a Kobo special edition of the anthology, offering enough money that I could buy three more stories (15,000 words) in the budget, and I was able to accept some of the ones that caused me the most angst. I finally ended up with a magnificent 72,000 word book that will be out in late 2014.

I’ll submit the full table of contents as soon as I get the pieces polished and organized.  This is an excellent anthology from an excellent and diverse series.  I have a new Dan Shamble, Zombie PI story appearing in the upcoming Fiction River volume FANTASTIC DETECTIVES in the next couple of months.