Masses of monsters! Bountiful beasts! It’s the Shared Worlds Critter Corral! I am delighted to have helped out with this fantastically cool project, part of a registration and fund drive in support of the Shared Worlds SF/F teen writing camp! It features all new flash fiction from Neil Gaiman, Michael Moorcock, Scott Westerfeld, Gene Wolfe, Patrick Rothfuss, Jeff VanderMeer, Ann VanderMeer, Lev Grossman, N.K. Jemisin, and on and on: a who’s who of speculative fiction including my wondrously talented Clarion 2010 colleague Karin Tidbeck.
Jeff VanderMeer conceived the idea, which was based around an image from the always astounding Jeremy Zerfoss. The delightful Teri Goulding compiled and edited the stories, and I did the web coding and contributed a small story of my own.
The image here is just a sliver of the wonders that await. Head over to Shared Worlds and explore. And if you like what you see—and I am sure you will—then consider leaving a donation to support these sort of projects and a truly great writing program.
Greetings! A mutual friend from NJ, Emmy J, sent me the Shared Worlds info for my son. Sadly he’s only in 5th grade, but I will send the info out to an organization he belongs to and I’m sure many of the kids fit the target audience profile. I imagine he’ll be really keen on the pgm when he’s old enough. Plus, I hear you and I may live in the same neck of the woods; if so, I would like to invite you to something….
The Shared Worlds Critters are popping up all over! I’m hoping this means lots of donations for the Shared Worlds camp, which will let them support more kids and bring in more excellent instructors. And maybe lead to more cool projects like the Critter Corral!
Here are some of the mentions, including Boing Boing, the Huffington Post, and USA Today!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/13/shared-worlds-neil-gaiman-lev-grossman_n_1274039.html
http://boingboing.net/2012/02/12/sf-flash-fiction-from-gaiman.html
http://scottwesterfeld.com/blog/2012/02/shared-worlds-workshop/
http://www.angelaslatter.com/in-which-there-are-critters/
http://bookrecommends.tumblr.com/post/17498205141/shared-worlds-is-a-unique-sf-fantasy-teen-writing
http://jmmcdermott.blogspot.com/2012/02/shared-worlds-critters.html
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2012/02/shared-worlds-sff-teen-writing-camp-2012-registration-and-fund-drive/
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/popcandy/post/2012/02/sci-fi-writers-boost-donations-to-shared-worlds-camp/1
…and there’s a tons of Twitter tweets, including a couple from @neilhimself:
https://twitter.com/#!/search/shared%20worlds