Forgot to post this a few weeks ago.
My story, Jigsaw Children, is available in audio form, narrated beautifully by Alethea Kontis.
Available at the Clarkesworld website: http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_02_20d/
Aurealis Awards 2019: Shortlisted!
Greetings, digital ghosts.
Just a little post to announce that my short story, The Mark, has been shortlisted for Best Horror Short Story in the 2019 Aurealis Awards.
I’m feeling incredibly privileged and honoured that my second published work is an Aurealis Awards nominee.
Congratulations to all the other finalists: a stellar line-up!
https://aurealisawards.org/2020/03/25/2019-aurealis-awards-shortlist-announcement/
2020
Although the demands of the day job have slowed down my writerly habits over the last six months, 2020 has been off to a wonderful start. At the start of February, my gene-splicing novelette, Jigsaw Chidren, was published in Clarkesworld. A year ago, I would never have imagined that I’d have my first publication in a pro SF&F magazine in the United States!
I’m thrilled to share two further acceptances, both of which have special meaning to me.
Father’s House is slated for publication in the April 2020 issue of Aurealis. This short story toys with the hypotheticals of medical technology, and also draws on my reflections about intergenerational stories and parent-child relationships. I’m over the moon that it has found a home in the Aurealis world!
Mother of the Trenches has been accepted into CSFG’s upcoming anthology, Unnatural Order. This is a wacky, wonderful, tentacled short story with my most experimental structure yet! I had a ball writing it (I was also devouring, at the time, with great fascination, this book–a gift from my brother). I wanted this story to disgust, delight, and challenge our anthropocentric biases. My excitement levels are super high to see this appear in print. Slated for release at WorldCon 2020 in July.
I’m also working on a piece for Black Cranes, an anthology of horror stories by Asian women writers, edited by Lee Murray and Geneve Flynn. Black Cranes is also slated for release at WorldCon, and it’s a project that I’m ridiculously excited to see come together.
And, finally, yes–edits for my novel in progress, Uploading, are plodding along. If only I didn’t have to study for this pesky exam…!
Off to make another coffee.
Jigsaw Children – Clarkesworld
I think I’m reasonably lucky, only having five parents. I guess my donors didn’t have too many risk mutations. Some of my classmates have been spliced together from eight, nine, even twelve donors. I don’t envy them the task of juggling their Chinese New Year dinners.
In 2018, I scribbled an opening line in the back of my diary: ‘I have three mothers and two fathers.’
A few weeks later, I had an unwieldy sci-fi story about gene splicing, mothers, attachment, and identity, set in near-future Hong Kong. It was too long. It had a terrible first title (which I changed, thanks to my writing bud’s feedback).
But I liked Lian’s story. I reworked it. Submitted.
And held my breath.
And screamed a bit (OK, a lot) when I saw the acceptance email.
Jigsaw Children has just been published in Clarkesworld’s February 2020 issue, alongside five other fascinating stories–and that sweet, sweet cover art!
I hope you stop by to hear Lian’s story.
PS. This is my first publication for 2020. There are a couple more things in the works, so do follow, stay tuned, and maybe even drop me a line…we of the writer-hermit folk subsist on little nuggets of feedback!
The Misplaced Giant – AntipodeanSF
Hello, internet!
My flash fiction, The Misplaced Giant, is live!
You can find it online here in Issue 255 of AntipodeanSF, for a limited time.
I dug this wacky little piece out of a folder of buried scribblings from my good ol’ university days, and thought it a perfect fit for a SF/F/H mag from the bottom side of the planet.
I hope you enjoy it.
PS. A narration by yours truly may be forthcoming.
***
Update (04/02/2020): The Misplaced Giant is no longer live on the AntiSF website, but you can still read it from the archives.
Brewing…
It’s been quiet on the blog front.
Life, work, and other inevitable mundanities have unfortunately slowed the writing down these past few months. My health has taken a hit, and it has been hard to find the mental and physical energy to work on my creative projects. But I’m hoping to make a slow U-turn, back towards the things that mean the most to me.
I’m delighted to share that the first draft of my novel-in-progress, Uploading, is taking shape. There are now 77,000 wacky, cyberpunky, meandering, feely, technophilic words in there!
This year, I’ve also had two super exciting acceptances. One is a short short story, and the other is a novella. I’ll have more news about these closer to their publication. Stay tuned!
Viva La Novella Shortlist & Excerpt: The Ship of Theseus
Earlier this year, I found out that my near-future, virtual reality, mind/body splitting, Asian-Australian spec-fic novella was shortlisted for Viva La Novella VII.
Needless to say, I had to pinch myself, oh, several hundred times.
If you like the sound of The Ship of Theseus, you can check out an excerpt of it now at Seizure Online. Thanks for reading!
