Following up: 45 Recommended Authors, plus our October guest readers

The KaCSFFS Thanksgiving Feast at The Writers Place is now in the rear-view (it was taking place when this post went live), but there are some updates due, from recent meetings past.

Recommended Reading

Back in September, inspired by our program of a reading by Christine Taylor-Butler, we posted this notice:

"You wouldn't be a KaXFAN if you didn't love reading. Whose fiction gets your juices flowing or inspires your imagination? We'll have a place where you can share a list of your favorite books and authors, too. We'll publish the list in a future blog post. If you can't make the meeting--or even if you can--please feel free to post a comment that shares some of your reading favorites! KaCSFFS is all about sharing our love of reading."

We got several pages of recommendations from our members (though no comments on the blog post--y'all are falling down on the job!). You'll find a lot of so-called Golden Age SF in this list, but also an eclectic mix of others. Remember, this list is not exhaustive, so we apologize if we left off your favorites: you should have left a comment! (You can do that now, in the place below this post!) Also, not to seem as if we're playing favorites, the recommendations are listed in alphabetical order by the author's last name. 

Poul Anderson: The Flandry stories; Three Hearts and Three Lions. 

Ilona Andrews: The Magic series.

Isaac Asimov: The Foundation Trilogy; The Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun, I, Robot, plus "the rest of the robots and many more."

Robert Aspirin: The Myth Series.

Robin Wayne Bailey: The Saga of Frost Series, Shadowdance, "and many, many others."

David Brin: The Uplift Series.

Lois McMaster Bujold: "Especially the Vorkosigan Saga and the Chalion Series."

Emma Bull: War for the Oaks. 

Edgar Rice Borroughs:  The Barsoom (John Carter/Mars) stories, and Tarzan.

Jim Butcher: The Dresden Files.

Octavia Butler: "Oh, my God, everything!"

Rob Chilson: Black as Blood, Men Like Rats, "and others."

Arthur C. Clarke: Rendezvous with Rama, 2001: A Space Odyssey, "and many others."

Glen Cook: The Garrett, P. I. Series 

James S.A. Corey: The Expanse novels.

E. Everett Evans: Man of Many Minds. 

Alan Dean Foster: The Tar-Ayim Krang, and the rest of the Flinx series and associated stories

Neil Gaiman: Stardust, American Gods, The Graveyard Book, "and many others."

Zenna Henderson: The Books of The People, especially Pilgrimage, and No Different Flesh. 

Robert A. Heinlein: Stranger in a Strange Land, the Heinlein Juveniles, "and many more."

Robert E. Howard: The Conan stories.

N. K. Jemisin: The Broken Earth Series. 

Gini Koch: The Alien Series, especially Alien Nation, Alien Education, Alien Tango, and Alien in the House. 

Ursula K. Le Guin: The Left Hand of Darkness and other Hainish novels, the Earthsea books, and many others.

Madeleine L'Engle: The Wrinkle in Time books. 

Anne McCaffrey: The Dragonriders of Pern Series.

George R.R. Martin: Of course A Game of Thrones, but also Wild Cards, "and earlier works."

Holly Messinger: The Curse of Jacob Tracy.

Elizabeth Moon: The Serrano series the Paksenarrion books, and Vatta's War series.

Andre Norton: The Last Planet, The Zero Stone, Breed to Come, the Witch World Series, Beast Master, and "most everything else." 

Naomi Novik: Uprooted, and the Temeraire novels.

Nnedi Okorafor, The Binti series, Akata series, and "pretty much everything she writes."

Spencer Quinn: The humor-suspense Chet and Bernie mysteries "not normally marketed as fantasy, but when they're narrated by a dog . . . "
J. K. Rowling: The Harry Potter Series, "especially as read by Jim Dale on audiobooks."

John Scalzi: Old Man's War, Redshirts, "and many others."

Lawrence M. Schoen: The Buffalito books, and Barsk: The Elephants' Graveyard.

James H. Schmitz: The Witches of Karres, and the Telzey Amberdon stories. 

Clifford D. Simak: Time Is the Simplest Thing, Way Station, and The Werewolf Principle. 

Wm. Mark Simmons: the Half/Life Chronicles Series, the Dreamland Chronicles. 

E.E. "Doc" Smith: The Lensmen Series, Spacehounds of IPC, The Galaxy Primes, the Skylark Series, the Subspace duo.

George O. Smith: Pattern for Conquest.

Christine Taylor-Butler: The Lost Tribes Series.

J. R. R. Tolkein: The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings.

A. E. van Vogt: Slan, The World of Null-A.

David Weber: The Honor Harrington Series, Out of the Dark, Path of the Fury (and its expanded version), The Hell's Gate Series, and the War God's Own.

As we've said--if you don't see a favorite on this list, please comment below!

Revised Readers

Before our October meeting, we announced that our program would feature short fiction or excerpts by three authors--but as it turned out, one of them had to cancel at the last minute, and another agreed to step in. Our final lineup consisted of Sean Demory, Sherri Dean, and Allison Stein.

The fiction was delightful, although the space was a bit tight--our venue had made an "oops" and booked another event during our time slot (we've since worked that out!). But we all managed to be cozy in the Library (what better spot for a reading, after all?).

Local author Sean Demory read an intriguing chapter from a current work-in-progress, to set the mood for the evening. Standing: KaCSFFS Director David Means. In the background: Allison Stein and Sherri Dean.

Sherri Dean read an as-yet-unpublished story (pages custom-edged with appropriate Halloween-themed designs) that managed to be both gruesome and humorous at the same time.

Allison Stein rounded out the evening with a seasonally-appropriate story, Field Test #421, from the Yard Dog Press anthology Flush Fiction Vol. II: Twenty Years of Letting it Go! edited by Selina Rosen; cover art by Sherri Dean.

IMAGES: Many thanks to Goodreads, for the Asimov Foundation cover image; to Barnes & Noble Booksellers for the Corey Leviathan Wakes cover art; and to Amazon for the Schoen Barsk: The Elephants' Graveyard cover art. The photos of our October readers were all taken with permission, by Jan S. Gephardt, for use in KaCSFFS communications such as this. If you wish to use one, we request a credit and a link back to this page. Thanks!

Every picture HAS a story

The stories behind the images
A guest post by Mitchell Bentley,
Atomic Fly Studios
Editor's note: While I was gathering information for the Mid-Winter Creative Corner post, I received a wonderful email from our Creative Friend and frequent contributor to the feature, Mitchell Bentley. It was full of interesting background notes on the four covers he'd most recently completed, and I thought his email would make the basis for an interesting stand-alone blog post. I asked; he agreed. We hope you find it interesting! --Jan S. Gephardt 

Judas Gene 

I completed a piece in December 2016 for Yard Dog Press. The piece title is A Short Hike to the Rail, and it was first completed in December, but the final printing had a resolution issue. This sometimes happens when an image is over-compressed.

I had to rework the final output to correct it, which is not an unusual occurrence. There is a second book already being written (possibly more in the series?), and I have already been contacted to do the sequel. This is my 10th cover for Yard Dog Press.


Judas Gene by Gary Moreau should soon be available at Yard Dog's convention tables, and is now available on their website.

Outposts of Beyond and Astropoetry
I resold the usage rights of two pieces to Tyree Campbell at Alban Lake Publishing, for use on Outposts of Beyond and a poetry book by Christina Sng. This is a common practice for artists and why keeping one’s rights can be very important. Of course, I usually give Tyree a nice deal to stay within his budget and because he also publishes my calendars.

The January issue of Outposts features my piece Fertility Temple Offerings, from my current 2017 calendar. This one is now available at Alban Lake’s convention tables and online.

Christina Sng’s Astropoetry features my image String Nebula II from my 2014 Calendar, which was also the cover. [Release date was to be in late February]

Earth Gamers
I am just now delivering a piece for a client, D. B. Schrock, that contacted me via my website. Sometimes I do not get to read the book, and usually that is when either time is of the essence, or when the author already has a concept they want depicted. In this case it was both reasons.

Essentially in a case like this the author acts as Art Director. All final files are then provided to a publisher or P.O.D. printer and marketing outfit such as CreateSpace or, as in this case, AuthorHouse Publishing. This should be released in the next couple of months. I am finishing out the contracts now.

IMAGES: All images were provided by the artist, Mitchell Bentley, for use in this post. All rights reserved.

Creative Corner

Here's what Creative Friends of KaCSFFS are Doing!

Bryan Thomas Schmidt

Bryan Thomas Schmidt's debut novel, The Worker Prince, which made Barnes and Noble's “Year's Best SF of 2011,” is being released in a newly-revised and expanded Author's Definitive Version from Kevin J. Anderson's WordFire Press, in November.

Two sequels, to complete The Saga of Davi Rhii space opera trilogy, will be released next year, with both out by MidAmericon II. The Returning was released earlier; it will be re-released in a revised edition, along with the brand new conclusion to the series, The Exodus.

MISSION: TOMORROW, Bryan's next anthology for Baen and his first as a solo editor, is out November 3rd.

Bryan will be appearing at Archon, and as being a Featured Speaker at Susan Satterfield's MCC Longview Literary Festival in October, and appearing at Stan Lee's Comikaze Comic Con in Los Angeles Oct. 30-Nov. 1.

Mitch Bentley
Mitch Bentley will be the Artist Guest of Honor at Fencon, September 25-27, at the Westin Dallas Ft. Worth Airport. He also will appear at Archon the following weekend, October 2-4, at the Gateway Convention Center and Doubletree Hotel in Collinsville, MO (near St. Louis).

Mitch will debut a new cover for Rhonda Eudaly's Tarbox Station, published by Yard Dog Press, at Fencon. Also for Yard Dog, he will debut a new cover for Lee Killough's Ancient Enemy, later this year.

In addition, Mitch just completed the cover for Virtue Inverted, for Piers Anthony and co-writer Kenneth Kelly, who also served as art director on the project. The book is still in the initial stages of layout and design, but it should be released very soon as an eBook. The trade paperback will be released a little later.

William F. Wu
William F. Wu's most recent work is a short story called "China City Flame" in an anthology called Asian Pulp. It's a crime story set in 1939, and is his second published crime story, though the first was also a ghost story.This is his first published story without any science fiction or fantasy elements.

Wu also had a new story, titled "Yellowsea Yank," in the original ebook anthology, Defiant, She Advanced: Legends of Future Resistance, edited by George Donnelly. The story is steampunk, set in the 1890s, and he hopes it'll be the first of a series. He also has another steampunk short story in the pipeline, for another original anthology, the game-related Steamscapes: Asia. This story is titled "Clockwork Glide."

In addition, Wu has an ongoing series of stories in the War World anthology series, edited by John F. Carr, and he has begun releasing some of his short fiction in e-book form, on all the major retail websites.

Mark Esping

Mark Esping has reprinted NEQUA, or The Problem of the Ages, a "feminist, hollow-earth, utopian science fiction novel" originally published in 1900 in Topeka, KS. It includes 40 pages of new material, giving background information on some of the people originally responsible for publishing it. Available via Amazon, ABE, and biblio.com (KAXFEN interested in purchasing a copy should bring $20 cash to a meeting, and he'll hand-deliver your copy).

If you are interested in learning more about this piece of sf history with a local angle, you may find the small item Mark wrote for Fantasy and Science Fiction interesting. The novel also is the subject of a Wikipedia page. There are only 11 or 12 copies of the original edition still in existence.

Susan Satterfield 

Susan Satterfield reminds local and regional writers that the 2015 MCC-Longview Literary Festival will be held Friday, October 23 on the Longview campus of the Metropolitan Community College, in Lee's Summit, MO. (Please note the link currently leads you to information on last year's festival, but 2015 should be similar). For more information or if you'd like to participate in panels, readings, and/or a table to sell your work, contact Susan Satterfield.

IMAGES: Many thanks to Bryan Thomas Schmidt for his cover art, Mitch Bentley for the images of his cover artwork, to William F. Wu for the images of his covers, to Mark Esping for the cover image of NEQUA, and for the photo of students at the literary festival, from the Longview Literary Festival page.