Meanwhile. Today the Aurealis Award shortlist came out and I’m delighted to see the Twelve Planets series get a few nods. Namely, Bad Power by Deborah Biancotti, Nightsiders by Sue Isle and Love and Romanpunk by Tansy Rayner Roberts are all shortlisted for Best Collection. I’m so very proud of these three books. Additional nods came in the Young Adult category where both “Nation of the Night” (Nightsiders) and “The Patrician” (Love and Romanpunk) also got shortlisted.

Huge congratulations to all the other shortlisters. The full list is over at Tehani’s blog if you’re interested.

Firstly, our sale off a bunch of titles ends Dec 31, 2011. Visit our website here and grab A Book of Endings for $16, Glitter Rose for $20, Horn and Bleed for $9.60 each, any of the first 3 Twelve Planets for $14.40, Sprawl for $20 and a bunch more.

Secondly, our novel manuscript submission period opens January 1, 2012 and ends January 31, 2012. Check out all the details on guidelines etc here.

Thirdly, we’re supporting the Australian Women Writers Challenge 2012 with a 10% discount on all our books which fit the challenge all year long. Here’s how.

Fourthly, enter our Goodreads Giveaway to win a copy of Deborah Biancotti’s Bad Power:

Fifthly, keep an eye out for more TPP announcements over the next fortnight or so!

Palming the Lady

“She told me my future.”

“What was it?”

“In the words of Dorothy Parker-”

“I know. No one gets a happy ending.”

“You want to hear something really creepy, you should ask her what she sees in her own future.”

Detective Palmer is called to the home of Matthew Webb, an anxious young medical student who claims he’s being stalked by a homeless woman. When Palmer takes the nameless woman in, she finds she has an uncanny ability to tell the future. By the time Palmer unravels the truth about so-called ‘Mad Mary’, Palmer herself must confront the devastating future that Mary has left her – a future where the only forgiveness available to her will be her own.

Preorder your copy of Bad Power here.

Shades of Grey

“There are two kinds of people with lawyers on tap, Mr Grey. The powerful and the corrupt.”

“Thank you.”

“For implying you’re powerful?”

“For imagining those are two different groups.”    

Esser Grey is a rich and powerful man who has discovered, despite the world’s attempts to soften its edges for him, that one power eludes him: he cannot die. He sets out to divert the unwanted miracle through suicide and, when that doesn’t work, through murder. Along the way he meets Detective Palmer, the first person not only to acknowledge his miracle, but also his humanity.

Gwyneth Jones has this to say on the Twelve Planets volumes so far, which she posted about on her personal blog:

I’ve been reading The Twelve Planets’ latest selections, and enjoying them very much, starting with Deborah Biancotti: police procedural with a sinister undertow of the weird, progressing through Tansy Rayner Roberts (Romanpunk), Lucy Sussex (Thief of Lives), and Sue Isle (Nightsiders). These collections, just four stories in a slim paperback, are an excellent idea, a tasting menu of Australasian female genre writers. Romanpunk has an intriguing twist on the noble vampire and mortal girlfriend* story (see, these vampires are really Lamia, they’re Roman in origin, and very well connected, but they find the C21 street has its uses). Ever wondered why pretty-boy Caligula was such an unmitigated horror in private life? Or why Nero was finally forced to kill his mother? Refreshingly, unlike Buffy, the mortal girlfriend is not allergic to education and actually has a life… Lucy Sussex I can safely say needs no introduction: I loved her beautiful story about modern and ancient Babylon, “Alchemy”. Sue Isle has created a daunting, yet not hopeless day after tomorrow Western Australia; linked stories all set in the same moment, the moment, for various characters, when you realise that climate change has won, and civilisation is not coming back. So you stop mourning, and you move on… Made me wish there was a novel.

Someone said, recently, the Finnish sf community gives me hope for the future of the genre… These Australians give me hope for the future of female, and even feminist, writers in sf.

I couldn’t hope for better feedback.

Bad Power by Deborah Biancotti

Showtime by Narrelle M Harris

Through the Splintered Walls by Kaaron Warren

The season most definitely has a dark bent. Biancotti explores use & abuse of power. You’ll find yourself wondering just what your own bad power is. Harris brings her quick sense of humour & talent for the quirky to her collection. You’ll laugh but you’ll also be deeply discomforted. Warren will take you on a journey through the back roads of Australian towns and leave you feeling uneasy and more than a little creeped out.

Preorders for the season can ber mde over at the Twelfth Planet Press store where you can also upgrade your subscription from a single or two book purchase to a subscription to the full series.