Dear Friend of Fantastic Fiction,
Our Fantastic Fiction Kickstarter at KGB has only two days left and we’re still about $1500 shy of what we need to run for six years. We really could use one final push to get us over the edge. Can you kind folks help us out by mentioning the Kickstarter on your social media pages and/or writing articles or blog posts? We could use a big bump in publicity before the end. The short URL is: http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
To make it easy, Here are some ready-made Facebook made by the Kindling Kris Dikeman, and some Tantalizing Tweets by me below:
Freaked out about the current administration’s attack on the arts? Here’s your chance to help. I’ve got a [book/tuckerization/whatever] up at the Fantastic Fiction Reading Series Kickstarter. The Fantastic Fiction Reading Series helps writers promote their work and creates a community for genre artists. By supporting them, you’re telling the government to sit and spin AND picking up cool stuff. Here’s the link: http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
Sick of how things are going? Hoping the singularity hits soon? You can make things better right now by supporting the Fantastic Fiction Reading Series Kickstarter. The Fantastic Fiction series helps writers promote their work and creates a community for genre artists. Pay tribute to our future robot overlords and receive cool stuff at http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
Has the state of our world got you wishing the zombie apocalypse would just start already? You can make make the world a better place without the rotting undead’s help by supporting the Fantastic Fiction Reading Series Kickstarter. The Fantastic Fiction series helps writers promote their work and creates a community for genre artists. Plus, you’re going to need stuff to read while you’re cowering in the dark. Check it out: http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
Considering a move to the Shire to escape the current state of the world? Put down that second breakfast and shuffle your hairy little feet on over to the Fantastic Fiction Reading Series Kickstarter. The Fantastic Fiction reading series helps writers promote their work and creates a community for genre artists. Galadriel sez: do it for me, hafling: http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
Concerned about the future of fantastic #literature in the #arts? Support the #FantasticFiction reading series. http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
Plz help support the #arts and keep the #FantasticFiction reading series run for another six years. http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
You know what looks good on you? #Fiction. Help the #FantasticFiction reading series run for another six years. http://kck.st/2rq5KFA
Thank you for your continued support!
Best,
Matt & Ellen
Previous Post:
Fantastic Fiction Needs Your Help
Fantastic Fiction at KGB is a monthly reading series hosted by Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel. We are looking to fund several more years of our popular Manhattan-based reading series and will be holding a Kickstarter fundraiser from May 17th through June 14th, 2017. We need to raise a minimum of $4500, which will keep us funded for three more years.
About
Fantastic Fiction at KGB is a monthly reading series held on the third Wednesday of every month at the famous KGB Bar in Manhattan, hosted by Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel. The reading series features luminaries and up-and-comers in speculative fiction. Admission is always free. The series brings together the greater New York community of writers, editors publishers, agents and fans into one location each month. We also publish a monthly podcast audio of the readings so people who cannot attend the physical event can still enjoy the readings. Additionally, we sell the authors’ books at the events (currently through Word Bookstore Brooklyn). Fantastic Fiction is a great place to hear and meet talented new and veteran authors, as well as make valuable connections and meet new friends.
Who We Are
The series is hosted by veteran editor Ellen Datlow and award-nominated author Matthew Kressel.
Ellen Datlow has been editing science fiction, fantasy, and horror short fiction for over thirty-five years as fiction editor of OMNI Magazine and editor of Event Horizon and SCIFICTION. She currently acquires short fiction for Tor.com. In addition, she has edited more than a hundred science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies, including the annual The Best Horror of the Year, Lovecraft’s Monsters, Fearful Symmetries, Nightmare Carnival, The Doll Collection, The Monstrous, Nightmares: A New Decade of Modern Horror, and Black Feathers. Forthcoming are Haunted Nights (with Lisa Morton), and Mad Hatters and March Hares (stories inspired by Alice’s Adventures in in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There). More at http://www.ellendatlow.com/.
Matthew Kressel is a multiple Nebula Award-nominated writer and World Fantasy Award-nominated editor. His short stories have appeared in Tor.com, Lightspeed, Nightmare, Clarkesworld, io9.com, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Interzone, Electric Velocipede, Apex Magazine, and the anthologies Cyber World, Naked City, After, The People of the Book, and The Mammoth Book of Steampunk, and elsewhere. His work has been translated into five languages. His first novel, King of Shards, was hailed as “Majestic, resonant, reality-twisting madness,” from NPR Books. Kressel is a member of the Altered Fluid writing group. He created the Moksha manuscript submissions system, currently used by a majority of the largest speculative fiction publications. By day he works as a freelance web designer and full stack developer for small and large businesses. More at http://www.matthewkressel.net/.
What We Do
Fantastic Fiction at KGB is a monthly science fiction, fantasy, and horror reading series held on the third Wednesday of every month. We aim to promote speculative fiction authors and their forthcoming works. Authors read for about twenty to twenty-five minutes each, and we also sell the authors’ books at the event (currently through Word Bookstore Brooklyn.) The series serves as a salon for writers, editors, agents, and fans to co-mingle in a relaxed environment. Many lasting friendships and professional connections have been made through the Fantastic Fiction reading series. It has been running since the late ’90s. More on our history below.
Our Guest Readers
Some of our past readers include Joyce Carol Oates, Lucius Shepard, Jeffrey Ford, N.K. Jemisin, Scott Westerfeld, Kelly Link, Paul Tremblay, Laird Barron, China Miéville, Nancy Kress, Peter Straub, James Patrick Kelly, Victor LaValle, Joe Hill, Jack Ketchum, Brian Keene, Samuel Delany, Holly Black, Michael Swanwick, Kit Reed, Andy Duncan, Richard Bowes, Catherynne M. Valente, Jeff VanderMeer, Naomi Novik, Elizabeth Bear, Lev Grossman, and a host of other talented authors.
See this link for a full list: http://www.kgbfantasticfiction.org/previous-readers/
Why We Need Financial Support
Each month we give the authors a small stipend, we tip the bartenders (who always give the authors free drinks), and we take the authors out for dinner after the reading. Since it typically costs us around $120 per month, we need $1500 per year to maintain the series. We are looking to raise $4500, which would allow us to keep the series running for another three years. Each additional $1500 will let us run for an additional year. Fantastic Fiction has been a bright light in the speculative fiction community for nearly two decades, and with your help we can continue for many more years to come. Any donation, no matter how small, is greatly appreciated.
History
Terry Bisson and Alice K. Turner started the KGB Fantastic Fiction reading series in the late 1990s, attempting to bring together mainstream writers with writers of speculative fiction in order to show, in Alice Turner’s words, “that at a certain level they were plowing exactly the same field.” In the spring of 2000 editor Ellen Datlow took over for Alice K. Turner and in August 2002 Gavin J. Grant, publisher of Small Beer Press, stepped in for Bisson when he moved to California. Author Matthew Kressel stepped in for Gavin in April of 2008.
Location
The reading series is held at the famous KGB Bar at 85 East 4th Street in Manhattan’s East Village. Once serving as a speakeasy for Ukrainian Socialists, the Soviet-themed bar now is a home for various literature and poetry readings almost every night of the week.
Contacts
KGB Fantastic Fiction: http://www.kgbfantasticfiction.org
Fantastic Fiction Kickstarter Page : coming Wednesday, May 17th, 2017, 9 a.m. Eastern Time
Ellen Datlow: datlow [at] yahoo [dot] com
Matthew Kressel: mattkressel [at] gmail [dot] com
Please feel free to contact us with any questions or requests for interviews.
Best,
Ellen Datlow & Matthew Kressel
