Paul Goat Allen has been a full-time book reviewer specializing in genre fiction for almost the last two decades. He has written more than 6,000 reviews for companies like Publishers Weekly, The Chicago Tribune, and BarnesandNoble.com.

Paul and I discussed how he became a reviewer, changes in the industry, his basement full of books, writers: Ken Scholes and Claude Lalumière, the pleasure of re-reading, and his thoughts about my new novel, Yarn.

Visit Paul at The BN SciFi and Fantasy Blog

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Anthony Palumbo graduated from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 2002 and has been exhibiting in fine art galleries in Philadelphia, New York, and Connecticut since. His work as a freelance illustrator has appeared in publications by Night Shade Books, Wizards of the Coast, and Heavy Metal Magazine among others.

I spoke with Anthony because he did the cover painting for my novel Yarn. I asked him how he got the job, what was he told about the novel, and how did he work, among many other things. The were several surprises along the way!

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Anthony Palumbo’s Illustration Website

See all the sketches for Yarn!

I have also created a video based on the podcast with more of his art and some of the referenced material in a slide-show format. Enjoy!

Anthony Palumbo Talks Painting, The Process of Producing Book Cover Art, Yarn from jon armstrong on Vimeo.

Leanne Prain is the co-author of Yarn Bombing: The Art of Crochet and Knit Graffiti. Her book as been called the definitive guide to knit street art. and has participated in her own knit graffiti projects.

Leanne co-founded a stitch and bitch called Knitting and Beer in order to expand her skills while knitting at the pub. She is a professional graphic designer, Leanne holds degrees in creative writing, art history, and publishing.

Leanne and I talked about the world of yarn bombing and other forms of graffiti, her book, and her own run in with yarn and the law.

The website is Yarnbombing.com.

Yarn Bombing is available at Amazon.

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John Joseph Adams is a best selling editor of the anthologies: Wastelands, The Living Dead, By Blood We Live, Federations, and The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. His latest is the The Living Dead 2 (Amazon Link)
. John is the fiction editor of the science fiction magazine Lightspeed and the co-host of The Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy podcast. John and I talked about his just released anthology, zombies, how book publicity works, and the strange and sometimes threatening responses writers have to rejection.

John’s website is: johnjosephadams.com. And the link to the book site is: johnjosephadams.com/the-living-dead-2/.

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Mary Robinette Kowal is an author and puppeteer. Her first novel, Shades of Milk and Honey
(Amazon link) was recently published.
If you’ve listened to this podcast for a while, she was on when she was nominated (along with myself and others) for the Campbell Award. Since that time I have gotten to know Mary and have even worked for her. She is a great person and a fantastic writer.
She and I talked about her book, Jane Austen, and a not-to-be-missed story about that not-safe-for-work puppet. And seriously, this podcast contains material that some may find offensive, although it’s nothing vulgar, just a part of the male anatomy.

Photo credit: (C) 2010 Annaliese Moyer

Mary’s website is: http://www.maryrobinettekowal.com/

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Paul G. Tremblay has written two novels, more than fifty short stories, and has a new collection of short stories out titled: In the Mean Time. His novels are The Little Sleep, and No Sleep till Wonderland, which both feature his narcoleptic detective, Mark Genevich.

Along with his novels, he is the author of the short speculative fiction collection Compositions for the Young and Old and the novellas City Pier: Above and Below and The Harlequin and the Train. He served as fiction editor of CHIZINE and as co-editor of Fantasy Magazine, and was also the co-editor (with Sean Wallace) of the Fantasy, Bandersnatch, and Phantom anthologies.

Paul and I speak about his novel narcolepsy and The Little Sleep, an operation he had on his nose and some bloody consequences, his rejection of his dad, and his intense dislike of me. (You’ll have to listen to get the stories!)

Visit Paul’s website at: http://www.paultremblay.net.

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I attended ReaderCon for the first time this year and (among many others) attended a panel titled: “The Year In Novels”. I was able to get two of the panelists, Rose Fox and Graham Sleight, to recreate some of what they said for this special edition of the podcast.

Rose Fox is a longtime book reviewer currently editing science fiction, fantasy, and horror book reviews for Publishers Weekly and maintains a blog named Genreville.

Graham Sleight is a British writer, editor and critic, whose work has appeared in Strange Horizons, The New York Review Of Science Fiction and Vector. He currently writes a column for Locus.

Rose and Graham mention the following authors and books (please note the books are all Amazon links): Peter Straub’s A Dark Matter and A Special Place: The Heart of a Dark Matter, Greer Gilman’s Cloud & Ashes: Three Winter’s Tales, Catherynne Valente’s Palimpsest, China Mieville’s The City & The City, Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl, Ian McDonald’s The Dervish House, William Gibson’s Zero History, and N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, Book 1 (The Inheritance Trilogy).

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I met Paul De Filippo at ReaderCon just a week ago and recorded this conversation. Paul talked about the rise of Fandom, ReaderCon, being on discussion panels, music, and about meeting one of his favorite authors, Samuel (Chip) Delany.

Paul has been working as a freelance writer since the early 80s. He is a novelist (including: Spondulix, Harp, Pipe, And Symphony, Creature from the Black Lagoon: Time’s Black Lagoon, and most recently, Cosmocopia), short story writer, reviewer, and has written for comics.

His website is: pauldifilippo.com

He is part of a group blog called The Inferior 4 + 1.

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The award-winning Elizabeth Hand is that special kind of writer who can seemingly do anything. She’s written novels (including: Generation Loss, Mortal Love, and most recently, Illyria), short stories, comics (Anima), and movie and television spin-off novels (including: Boba Fett: Maze of Deception and12 Monkeys).

We talked about her wonderful new YA novel, Illyria, terrible auditions, and the importance of character’s names among other things. Elizabeth also gives me some writing advice–advice she admits she has and will continue to ignore!

Her website is ElizabethHand.com.

Photo Credit: Liza Croen Trombi

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Amelia Beamer works as an editor, reviewer, and photographer for Locus: The Magazine of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Field. She has published fiction and poetry in Interfictions 2, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Red Cedar Review, and other venues, but the big news is that her novel, The Loving Dead, (Night Shade Books, July 2010) is just days away.

Amelia and I talked about zombies, nightmares, Trader Joes, her writing process, and of course her new novel!

If you’re seeing this before July 1st, her novel is available on her website for FREE. Hurry! Or better yet, read the first couple of chapters and then order your very own copy of The Loving Dead (Amazon.)

Her website: http://www.ameliabeamer.com

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