Steven Utley started publishing back in the 1970s.  He wrote smart and strange stories, stories occasionally set in the far future, but mostly set in the deep past.  He was part of the Turkey City Writer’s Workshop, which also included Bruce Sterling, Lisa Tuttle, Lewis Shiner, and Howard Waldrop.  And he was best known for a group of stories known as his “Silurian Tales”, which he started publishing in 1993 and kept writing until his sad death earlier this year.

Somewhere back in the ’90s he connected with local Perth publisher Ticonderoga, who put out Ghost Seas, a collection of his stories.  The book did well and everyone was happy, and fifteen years slipped slowly past (as they are wont to do).  Then last last year they reconnected and Ticondergo published The 400 Million Year Itch, the first of a two volume set of Utley’s collected “Silurian Tales”. The book was well received and now the second volume, Invisible Kingdoms is about to his the shelves.

It’s a cool book and you should consider checking it out. If you’re interested, you can read one of the stories, “Another Continuum Heard From!” at Revolution SF.  Recommended.

There is a pragmatic, if somewhat blind, terror stalking my everyday thoughts as the month of May slowly slides by as though nothing could possibly be amiss.

Every day a new story is published. Hah! Every day dozens of new stories are published. Hidden in books and magazines and websites, in .epub files and .mobi ones, places you’d never think to look. I struggle to find them, to not lose track of them on my Kindle, in my iBooks thingie, on the shelf behind my desk. Wherever they may end up. And every day we move inevitably, inexorably towards the moment when I’m going to have to start choosing stories for my next best of the year volume. I can see the day from here, and I am not ready!

Not only am I not ready, but I have a magazine issue to get ready for the end of September and two original anthologies due in January and March of next year. Things are going to be crazy over Christmas, my friends. Off the top of my head, I’ll be delivering 400,000 wds of manuscript, a collated reading list and writing an essay between Christmas and the end of March. I have no idea how that’s going to work out!

How can you help? Let me know about the best stories you see. Blog, tweet, post on my Facebook or email me direct, but let me know. If you’re working on something, let me know too. I want to know. Really!

Great news to start the day! Locus has announced the finalists for the 2013 Locus Awards. I’m deeply honoured to be short listed for Best Editor and delighted to see that Edge of Infinity and The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume Six are finalists for Best Anthology.  Even more pleasing is that stories from Edge of Infinity, Hugo nominee “The Girl-Thing Who Went Out for Sushi” by Pat Cadigan and “Deeps of the Sky” by Elizabeth Bear, have been short listed for Best Novelette and Best Short Story respectively.   My sincere congratulations to them, and to all of my fellow nominees.

I especially want to thank the great team at Solaris who have made Edge of Infinity such a success, and everyone behind the scenes who worked on The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume Six at Night Shade. It’s a privilege to work with all of them.

I wish I could be at the Locus Awards Weekend. It sounds like a brilliant time and I envy everyone who will be there more than a little.

For a full list of nominees, see here.