"The Tic-Toc Boy of Constantinople"in The Apparatus Almanac: Gizmology and Technomancy Ed. Jessica Augustsson
It's always a thrill when stories reemerge from the thickets to find new homes. Although a relatively dark story in a deliberately richer vein, "The Tic-Toc Boy of Constantinople" was originally published in the Aurealis Award finalist anthology Kisses by Clockwork Ed. Liz Grzyb. It was then mentioned by both editors in the introduction to The Year's Best Australian Fantasy & Horror Vol. 5 and was also included in the Recommended Reading List at the volume's end (sadly this anthology with its yearly list of recommended reads is no longer around).
I thought that was it for the story, although it did get a mention in a captivating essay on steampunk on the Auslit website. But then last year The Conversation had a beautiful article, "Australian writers have been envisioning AI for a century. Here are 5 stories to read as we grapple with rapid change" which included "The Tic-Toc Boy of..." among the five mentioned. I messaged James Bradley about the article as his novel Clade was also one of the five mentioned.
And while I added Clade to my TBR list (I have also praised his retelling of 'Rapunzel', Beauty's Sister, numerous times on this blog) James, despite the fact that he was on a hectic tour with his latest book (a natural history/memoir/homage to the ocean, titled Deep Water: The World in the Ocean) went one step further and read my own story almost on the dot and emailed me this thoughtful message:
Spoiler alert: I've just read the story and I loved it. It's very emotional and the world-building is very intricate, but I think the thing I like the best is the way it manages to weave echoes of other stories into itself – I loved the flashes of Frankenstein in things like the flight into the forest – because it enacts the ideas of assemblage that are at the centre of the story. And he's such a great protagonist – innocent but also alarming. And the questions about bodies and identity it's trying to think about are so important (and questions that often get ignored in SF, which is usually so transfixed by tech and the idea of transcending the physicality of our bodies). I suspect the steampunk elements reinforce that a bit, because it situates it in a more physical and non-virtual universe - I assume that was deliberate!
As a lover of the natural world, and someone passionate about conservation, I'll definitely be tracking Deep Water down too.
And now 'The Tic-Toc Boy of Constantinople" has found another home in what looks like a wonderful table of contents in the The Apparatus Almanac: Gizmology and Technomancy Ed. Jessica Augustsson. It's the first story off the ranks, which is always an additional honour, but I'm really keen to devour all the stories. I've had a squiz at the author bios and I think that we are all in for a real reading treat.
Congratulations to Jessica and the team at JayHenge and to all of the contributors in the ToC listed below:
The Tic-Toc Boy of Constantinople / Anthony Panegyres
A Place for Broken Parts / Matt Bliss
The Golden Age of Science Fiction / David Stevens
East Wind in Carrall Street / Holly Schofield
Hubris in Retrograde / Mike Adamson
To Them We Are Merely Clay / L.D. Colter
What Washes Ashore / Eric Farrell
The Needy Needle / Owen Townend
Veiled Threats / C.J. Peterson
Thought I Saw Something / Jude Atwood
Inktomi and the Skyship / Robert Bagnall
GENIUS Act Response / Pauline Barmby
The Machine That Makes Things / William Kitcher
The Clock and the Copernicus / Jay McKenzie
The Going Price / J.S. Rogers
The Ethics of Elemental Servitude / J. Scott King
One Unchecked Box / Stephen A. Roddewig
The Case of the Vanishing Pennyweight / Don Norum
The Breath of Birds / Devan Barlow
Pulling for Victory / Stefan Markos
Tigers in the Sun / Gabriel Mara
Dreams Of Flight / Sarah Darbee
The Business of Ashes and Dust / J. Aaron Parish
First Day on Night Shift / Robert Runté
An Engine with a Difference / Gustavo Bondoni
The Important Button / Mike Murphy
Oubliette / Tom Howard
A Walk in Time / J. David Liss
Ancient Computer / Susanne Hülsmann
Working Their Magic / Soramimi Hanarejima
Thermodemonics / Robert Dawson
This Far and No Farther / Mike Morgan
Other writers on stories
There is quite a nice behind-the-scene commentary on stories from other writers who read your work. I suppose we are all governed by our own principles to a degree, and one of my own self-imposed rules is that I read each and every story in anthologies and journals that I have works in. After all, if it's good enough to house your own story, plus the editor and publisher have gone to all that effort to make the publication eventuate, then surely at the very least, it warrants a read of the complete final product. I've never regretted that decision, and in every anthology and journal I've been in, I've discovered some unforgettably great works.
For instance, I loved "Appearing Nightly", Greg Bossert's story in Bourbon Penn 25. Bossert is a short story machine...well really more of an artisan jeweller... and a World Fantasy Award Winning author, and he posted the following while we were both commenting on a Facebook post by Jonathan Strahan: Hey Anthony, "Anthropophages Anonymous" was fantastic. Best bear story since Bisson!, which meant a lot, both due to the source of the comment and the fact that Bisson did write the canonical bear story with "Bears Discover Fire".
Goodreads Dilemma and apologies for lack of communication on that platform
I confess to being lazy with regards to the internet and social media world. In fact, the only reason this blog with its slapdash posts exists is that the publisher of my second-ever story demanded a web presence of some kind, and a blog was far easier to create than a website.
Yet, despite my apathy, I did find Goodreads of interest. As a reader, I was fairly active on Goodreads, and I used to access it via a Facebook link, which was quite easy to do. But when that link vanished, I could no longer access my own account as the old original email linked to Goodreads was closed years ago due to spam along with the fact that my Gmail account worked far better.
Believe me, I have wasted plenty of time striving to get myself back on to my Goodreads' author account with my current email address. I'll admit to hounding Goodreads on Facebook, via emails, and also the website contact link. To be fair, the Goodreads Team was apologetic, but despite giving them pre-published blogposts as proof, along with ID and other evidence, they cannot update and change my account's long lost and defunct email address.
So apologies if I have appeared rude on the site. Any messages and communication that have been sent to me on Goodreads will never find me. The Goodreads blogposts, fortunately, remain linked to this blog and will continue to be so as that link remains the same. But I cannot accept friends, nor reply to any messages sent, nor add books read etc. Some kind Goodreads reps said that they can add books I'm involved in and also edit my profile, but due to security reasons, I will not have access, both now and in the future, to the Goodreads community along with my friends on there.
But who knows? I hold hope that Goodreads administrators will one day reach out to me at my Gmail address... the one I've harried them on.
New Story
I'll also have a new story out later this year, but I'll save that news for another post.
Currently Reading
The Book of Magic Ed. Gardner Dozois. This was Dozois' final anthology in a celebrated career. As you'd expect, there are plenty of high quality stories within.
Talking it Over by Julian Barnes. Really amused by this novel so far in, although it's rapidly turning uncomfortably dark.
The Arkansas International 07. Two superb stories well worth tracking down: "Lenin’s Mausoleum" by Ivan Shipnigov and "Acacia" by JoAnna Novak.
A Traveler's History of Greece by Timothy Boatswain & Colin Nicolson. An impressive overview of the history of Greece in its entirety. What's more they include the often overlooked Venetian era.
