by Robert Reed
Editor’s Desk:
Clearing Something Off My Desk
Neil Clarke
When we launched Clarkesworld, we had every intention of releasing an annual anthology that collected all of the original stories published that year. The first two, Realms 1 and Realms 2, were published on-schedule, but things crashed to a halt at volume three. Part of the problem was financial and the rest was me.
After my heart attack nearly two years ago, I refocused my efforts in making Clarkesworld a full-time career and mapped out how to get there. One of the items on that list was to catch up on our languishing print anthologies and issues, so I dedicated some of my sitting-on-the-couch recovery time to learning InDesign and book design.
By February of the next year, I had managed to publish several back issues in print and the first of many long-overdue anthologies, Clarkesworld: Year Three. By the end of the year, I was regularly producing print editions of each new issue, had completed working backwards to issue fifty, and published two more anthologies: Clarkesworld: Year Four and Clarkesworld: Year Five.
For the first part of this year, I’ve placed an emphasis on getting completely caught up with the anthologies. After that, I’ll go back and tackle issues one through forty-nine. Moving ever closer to that goal, I published our largest volume, Clarkesworld: Year Six, in late May. Like earlier volumes, Year Six features cover art from a prior issue of the magazine. This time it’s “Space Journey” by Martin Faragasso, which originally appeared on issue seventy-one. The stories are from issues sixty-one through seventy-two, which coincidentally is the year of my heart attack. It’s somewhat sobering to realize that everything from that point forward has been done on time I almost didn’t get. Anyhow, I’m quite proud of this volume.
Contents:
“Introduction” by Neil Clarke
“Scattered Along the River of Heaven” by Aliette de Bodard
“All the Painted Stars” by Gwendolyn Clare
“Prayer” by Robert Reed
“A Hundred Ghosts Parade Tonight” by Xia Jia
“And the Hollow Space Inside” by Mari Ness
“What Everyone Remembers” by Rahul Kanakia
“The Bells of Subsidence” by Michael John Grist
“The Switch” by Sarah Stanton
“Sunlight Society” by Margaret Ronald
“A Militant Peace” by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell
“All the Young Kirks and Their Good Intentions” by Helena Bell
“In Which Faster-Than-Light Travel Solves All of Our Problems” by Chris Stabback
“The Womb Factory” by Peter M. Ferenczi
“Draftyhouse” by Erik Amundsen
“All the Things the Moon is Not” by Alexander Lumans
“Fade to White” by Catherynne M. Valente
“Astrophilia” by Carrie Vaughn
“If The Mountain Comes” by An Owomoyela
“From Their Paws, We Shall Inherit” by Gary Kloster
“Sirius” by Ben Peek
“Synch Me, Kiss Me, Drop” by Suzanne Church
“Iron Ladies, Iron Tigers” by Sunny Moraine
“Mantis Wives” by Kij Johnson
“Pony” by Erik Amundsen
“Robot” by Helena Bell
“The Found Girl” by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell
“muo-ka’s Child” by Indrapramit Das
“Honey Bear” by Sofia Samatar
“The Smell of Orange Groves” by Lavie Tidhar
“Silently and Very Fast” by Catherynne M. Valente
“Fragmentation, or Ten Thousand Goodbyes” by Tom Crosshill
“You Were She Who Abode” by E. Catherine Tobler
“Staying Behind” by Ken Liu
“Immersion” by Aliette de Bodard
About the Authors
Clarkesworld Census
About Clarkesworld
This volume brings me close, but not quite up to date. I have one more volume to finish before October triggers the next one. Wish me luck!
If you’d like to purchase any of our anthologies in trade paperback or ebook editions, they can be ordered direct from us, via Wyrm Publishing, or from any of the booksellers listed on our site.
About the Author
Neil Clarke is the editor of Clarkesworld Magazine, owner of Wyrm Publishing and a current Hugo Award Nominee for Best Editor (short form). He currently lives in NJ with his wife and two children.
Cover Art:
Mecha Collab
Artur Fast and Kemane Ba
About the Artists
Artur Fast is a Kazakhstani artist currently living in Bochum, Germany. He has been a freelance artist for eight years and a concept artist for Flare Games for the last four. He is also part of LMBN, a poetry slam show, in which he creates livepaintings. His current focus is on walls and street art.
Kemane Ba is a freelance illustrator/animator in Frankfurt.