“William Shunn is one of those SF writers who, because they specialize in short fiction, are not given quite the recognition they deserveno novels, no mass-market publication, so only the plaudits of the cognoscenti of the short form. Yet Shunn is a fine writer; ingenious, stylish, closely in touch with current global trends and expert in producing thought-provoking near-future SF, and at last he has a collection to show off that keen ability . . . including two impressive original novelettes.”
A presidential inauguration in a fascist America eerily similar to our own. A man who broadcasts his every sense and emotion to a national audience. A space station unequipped to deal with alien visitors. Welcome to an off-kilter 21st century as only Hugo and Nebula Award nominee William Shunn could envision it.
From time travel to nanoterrorism, Los Angeles to Lagrange Point 2, the six stories in this collectionoriginally published by Spilt Milk Press in 2007span not just the length of a century but the breadth of a unique and provocative imagination. Step inside, settle in, and discover a world that’s always surprising but never unfamiliar. Discover the 21st century.
“[These stories] tellingly and concisely ironize the clichés and tropes of genre SF, but without destroying their use as toolkit.”
“[William Shunn] has the sure instincts of a twenty-first century science fiction writer. He is keenly attuned to the present (in the twenty-first century, there’s no point keeping track of the future). He recognizes those truly present-day moments that could only come now, today, in this futuristic present that we swim through without ever really seeing. This extraordinary book is a journey through our present. From the bitingly political (‘From Our Point of View We Had Moved to the Left’) to the sad and personal (‘Not of This Fold’a gorgeous novella about faith and humanity that could only have been written by a lapsed Mormon sf writer), and everything in between, this collection is the kind of thing that you can never unread, a book that will awaken you to the present all around you.”
I’ve had this idea rattling around in the back of my head for few months now, but the starts have been all false, and a little voice has been telling me for a while now that I should contact you. You interested in doing a short story together? It involves photography and spirituality, sorta, which might make for a nice blend between us.Except for one very short story almost a decade earlier, I had never collaborated, so I had some reservations. I honestly wasn’t quite sure how to collaborate properly. But I decided to give it a try anywayand I’m glad I did. We hammered out a basic plot, based on Derryl’s initial idea and some moody photographs he had taken of graveyard statuary. Then we started tossing the manuscript back and forth via email. Sometimes the work went quickly. Other times it languished for months while we both worked on other projects. In the process, what was supposed to be a short story grew longer and longer. By the time we finished our final draft in 2007, four years later, we had a 24,000-word novella on our hands. That was a problem. There are only so many markets for a tale of such an intermediary length. We tried a couple of the major magazines without success. Ellen Datlow asked to see the manuscript and really liked it, but she didn’t have a project going that it would work for. Still, her enthusiasm gave us hope enough to prompt Derryl to send a query to PS Publishing in England. An acceptance soon followed. Two years after that, in 2009, our long-gestating story manifested in the form of a very beautiful limited-edition hardcover. Actually, there were two editions of the book. One was an unjacketed hardcover, limited to 500 copies. The other was a signed, numbered, jacketed hardcover, limited to a mere 100 copies. What’s more, the book included a lovely introduction by Charles de Lint, who, among other kind things, wrote this:
The authors know how to tell a story. They have good narrative drive, they deliver strong characterization without a lot of exposition, and the supernatural elements of the story are inventive, building one upon the other. . . . Cast a Cold Eye is one of those stories that work on many levels. I’ve reread the manuscript a few times since I first received it, and every time I do, I find another layer waiting for me. It’s past time for you to discover its treasures for yourself.Well, the hardcovers sold out completely, and Cast a Cold Eye has only been available from used booksellers for most of the past decadesometimes going for as high as $75 a pop! Clearly there are collectors willing to pay that much, and that’s a fine thing, but Derryl and I are also interested in letting as many people as possible discover and read what we think is a pretty special story. That’s why Sinister Regard will be releasing Cast a Cold Eye as an ebook on July 30th, and that’s why you’ll be able to purchase a copy for just $1.99. As we were preparing the ebook for release, Derryl reached out to several colleagues to see who might be interested in giving the manuscript a read. That’s how this very nice quote from no less than Harry Turtledove came to appear on the cover:
A genuinely spooky story that lies somewhere near the place where fantasy, horror, and science fiction meet.What more can I tell you to encourage you to preorder Cast a Cold Eye? Well, I could tell you that some critics compared it favorably to a certain other work of midwestern American fantasy. Here’s something Paul Witcover wrote in his March 2010 Locus review:
Any fantasy of a certain ambition set in the American Midwest in the late 19th through early 20th centuries must reckon with The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, book and movie both, and Shunn & Murphy do so squarely, not only in the situation of their main character Luke Bryant, an orphan living with his aunt Maura (Auntie Em, indeed!) and uncle Roy, but in his perceptionsas the title, drawn from Yeats’s epitaph, implies, perceptions, or ways of seeing, matter in this novel.Believe me, Derryl and I were both more than a little bowled over when we read this. I mean, we hadn’t intentionally riffed on Baum or the best-known film version of his work, but we also couldn’t deny that the resonances were there. (I can’t get into most of those elements without entering spoiler territory, but I will say that much of the magic in our book takes place in a photographic darkroom“behind the curtain” as it were. And Paul wasn’t alone in seeing these connections. John Clute also brings up the topic in my entry in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.) Finally, if I haven't yet convinced you to preorder Cast a Cold Eye, I'd like to call out the evocative photograph Derryl created for the cover of the new edition. In another nod to Oz, he’s gone black-and-white where our original cover artist, Steve Leary, went full Technicolor. Which do you prefer? Me, I love them both. And I hope you’ll preorder the ebook. ]]>
As it happens, my limerick was read on the December 28 edition of the CBC Radio public-affairs program "As It Happens" during a segment remembering Dr. Eisenberg. Listen here:With a wry little wave and a chortle,
— William Shunn (@shunn) December 27, 2018
Dr. Eisenberg slipped through the portal.
He had nothing to fear
As he passed from this sphere.
His limericks had made him immortal.
RIP. https://t.co/n8d3R0XPvx