Talie Helene

I had an excellent time at the Conflux Banquet, due cheifly to Gillian Polack transporting the senses through time with culinary art; our MC Jack Dann delighted all with his wit and sense of mischief. I had an OK performance; it was challenging with ear infection difference in my aural perception, a bit stressful because of that, but I’m glad I went ahead with it. I’ve had mostly good feedback. One horrifically bad review from a lady who was so astute (or unstable) that she spoke of me in the third person to my face. (The mind boggles.) But that’s OK. You cannot exist in the arts if you aren’t resilient enough to contextualise negative feedback as well as positive feedback (and crazy feedback, and legally blind feedback), keep perspective, and keep on keeping on. That is essential.

I did have a bizarre conversation at the Banquet, and I thought I’d document the weirdness.

A gentleman who was seated beside me in the banquet hall, turned to me and said, “So have you read any earlier work by Jack O’Connell?”
I said, “I have not read any works by Jack O’Connell.”
He said, “But…. you were talking about The Resurrectionist on The Writer & The Critic.”
I said, “That’s Kirstyn McDermott.”
He said, “Oh… you mean there’s more than one woman in Melbourne involved in speculative fiction…”

What I said was, “There is more than one woman in Melbourne.”

(What I thought was, “How have you lived so long, dancing through minefields like this? Danger! Danger! Dude!“)

He said, “Sorry.”
I said, “Hey, if I’m being confused with Kirstyn McDermott I must be doing something right, because she’s fabulous.”

Just to confirm: THERE IS MORE THAN ONE WOMAN IN MELBOURNE INVOLVED IN SPECULATIVE FICTION.

There is even more than two.

The chap was perfectly civilized and nice, and clearly engaged with genre reading in Australia, and I applaud the fact he knows ANY women writing speculative fiction in Australia. But he just honestly didn’t know how many female writers and editors active in speculative fiction are based in Melbourne. It’s almost as though we were all blobbed together in his mind. Which I find astonishing, and it really affirms the conscious efforts of various feminists in Aus SpecFic to try to break into the mainstream. We need to do more. There is clearly still a problem with the profile of individual women as practitioners. I don’t often blog about this problem, because I have too many creative plates spinning to also be a theorized feminist. I’m aware of how much I haven’t read regarding feminism, so I hesitate to hold up my opinion as anything new (mostly). But hearing something like this, in the wild – that is something new to say.

He did buy me coffee, which absolves many sins. With me, you can almost barter your way out of hell with coffee. But I think he owes the stunning Kirstyn McDermott much shiny tribute.

I don’t deserve to be confused with Kirstyn – I haven’t earned that as a writer. Not even close. By the time I have a comparable amount of work published, I don’t think the confusion would make sense, other than I’d be flattered because she is wonderful both as a stylist and as a dramatic writer. But that is getting hypothetical – I’m taking my baby steps in publication. Excellent steps, but baby steps. I’m humble about how far I have to go.

I think this guy’s confusion was based on gender, not on actual creative work. That troubles me. It hints at a perception that is worrying. I don’t know how to change that perception, other than to identify there is something weird there, and to point you towards awesome: you can tune in to The Writer & The Critic at writerandcritic.podbean.com. The Writer & The Critic is hosted by the one and only Kirstyn McDermott and the mildly unique Ian Mond.

GN Braun & the AHWA Committee have done a splendid job assembling a page for Online Donations as a parallel  fundraising strategy for the Halloween Fundraiser Dinner Dance.

The page can be found at www.australianhorror.com, viewable to both logged-in members, as well as any interested persons from the wider community who would like to make a contribution.

The direct link is: http://australianhorror.com/index.php?view=287

While we hope to see many AHWA members attending the Halloween Fundraiser Dinner Dance, the Online Donation facility allows interstate and international people to make a contribution at their convenience.
There will also be an External Bidding Service available closer to the Auction, to allow people to make bids on the fabulous items on offer, without having to attend the event.

DONATIONS FOR THE AUSTRALIAN-AMERICAN ASSOCIATION AND THE AUSTRALIAN HORROR WRITERS ASSOCIATION FUNDRAISER DINNER DANCE AND AUCTION

All proceeds will be donated towards the cost of an Eye-Gaze Device for the past president of the Australian American Association and current member of the Australian Horror Writers Association, Mr Rocky Wood, who suffers from a motor neurone disease (MND).

MND affects the nerve cells that control the muscles which enable us to move around, speak, breathe and swallow. With no nerves to activate them, these muscles gradually weaken and waste away. The patterns of weakness vary from person to person, but the disease is invariably fatal.
Eye-Gaze Devices can cost $20,000, and are designed to facilitate eye-based communication for patients who cannot speak or type. These devices are the most effective way MND patients can communicate as the disease progresses.

Please feel free to assist in promoting the fundraiser, by re-posting this information to your blogs, social networks and websites.

For your convenience, there is an Event page live at Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=177798828962251
Full details of the  Halloween Fundraiser Dinner Dance  are available at www.australianhorror.com

Kyla Ward infiltrates Martin Livings masterwork Skeletor & Hordak.

Kyla Ward is an astonishing versatile artist. Her day job is as an actor with James Adam’s Historic Enterprises, a touring troupe reenacting life in the Middle Ages.  It is absolutely normal for Kyla to exclaim, “I’ve been watching jousting all afternoon – it really is the most awesomely violent sport. Those lances explode on impact!” And she is completely unaffected announcing over cocktails, “Today there was a small camp of Romans down by the river.”

Her acting and performance writing has been honed as a member of the Theatre of Blood repertory company, and she has a long list of indie film credits, most notably as lead actor, writer and producer of the short film Bad Reception, which premiered at A Night of Horror 2009 and screened at the Vampire Film Festival in New Orleans. Most recently Kyla appeared on Australian television in Underbelly Razor.

An award winning novelist (co-author of Prismatic, winner of Best Horror Novel at the 2007 Aurealis Awards), Kyla holds a BA in Communications with Honours; she served her indie apprenticeship in the underground, co-creating (with David Carroll) the legendary zine Tabula Rasa, de rigueur alternative reading of the 1990s.

Without even touching on her visual art and writing for the gaming industry, ones head spins at the breadth of this woman’s talents. So it is with great delight, that I can share some Propaganda regarding the launch of Kyla’s debut poetry collection, The Land of Bad Dreams.

Propaganda

The Land of Bad Dreams, Kyla Ward‘s forthcoming collection of poetry from P’rea Press, will be launched in Sydney on Tuesday, 27 September 2011. Festivities will commence at 7.00 pm in the Bordello, top floor of the World Bar, 24 Bayswater Road, Kings Cross.

Described as “… a rich, eccentric miscellany of dark music, skilfully crafted and strangely wrought” (Ann K. Schwader, Rhysling award-wining poet) and “A carnival of life’s cruel and grotesque side, with much pageant and dark laughter” (K. J. Bishop, author of The Etched City), it represents three decades of work and many of Kyla’s obsessions. Expect warriors, magicians and torturers, vampiric beauties and indescribable monsters – and that’s just at the launch!

 

The launch forms part of an overall multimedia release, wherein some of Sydney’s most original performance artists will interpret pieces from the collection, incorporating conjuring, burlesque, puppetry and even fencing. Films of the performances will subsequently be featured on Kyla’s website.

The Event is open to the public. This is your invitation. It  is certain to be a memorable evening!

I have heard Kyla talking of this interdisciplinary soiree while it is in the rehearsal stages, and it sounds positively awesome. I’ve witnessed Kyla performing her own poetry (as well as a pitch perfect rendition of Poe’s The Raven), and unlike most writers, she doesn’t merely read – she performs. That alone would make this event a must-see for Sydneysiders. But she’s also assembled – puppeteers, swordsmen, burlesque dancers, conjurers – a frickin’ decedent circus in a Bordello! Kyla Ward possesses a mastery of the dark arts that has to be seen to be believed! For further reading, I direct you to the 2010 interview from Eye Of Fire. I leave you with Martin Livings‘ haunting images, substantiating that Kyla may have been wandering through the corridors of cinema for a very long time indeed. Believe it, or not…

Kyla – perfectly at home in The Matrix?

Kyla – Underworld figure in The Godfather?

You must remember this… a chocolate curse is just a curse…

Conflux Incorporated is proud to present Five Historical Banquets, a book recording the five Conflux banquets. Written by Dr Gillian Polack, who designed the banquets, it provides an insight into the process of creating the banquets, as well as the menu and recipes for each one. If you want to cook something medieval, Regency, bayou or Prohibition, you’ll find tested recipes that are authentic in this book. Being launched at Conflux 7. www.conflux.org.au

Five Historical Feasts – the Banquets of Conflux

“Years later, I can’t quite remember why we decided that a science fiction convention needed historical banquets. It was at a committee meeting.”

Gillian

And, years later, we’re having a book launch at a science fiction convention, for the book that contains the story and the recipes of these historical banquets. Illustrated with line drawings by Kathleen Jennings, introduced by Garth Nix – it’s the cookbook that only a science fiction convention could produce. It will be launched at Conflux on Saturday 1 October at 2.30 pm. Come and argue with Gillian about the proper use of verjuice, meet some of the recipe testers and banqueters and writers involved with this epic series of dinners. Celebrate food, food history and speculative fiction!

At the same time, same location (in fact at the same event) there will be a chance to farewell Eneit Press, who are closing their doors.

Place: Launceston Room, Quality Hotel, Woden

Time: 2.30 pm

RSVP to Gillian Polack gpolack(at)triviumpublishing(dot)com

2011 CONFLUX BANQUET – The Hellenic Club, Canberra – 10/01/11.

No shows booked at the moment.

When I moved my blog to this page, I wondered if a post about having a “blogging identity” was something I could write. But just the phrase “blogging identity” sounds so Reality Television, and stupid – so I shelved it. I can’t write about it framed in cultural theory, because I’m not hooked into that discourse (and I don’t want to be one of those people). I’m not a marketing person either.

Emerging writers are supposed to keep these things. And established writers seem to roll them out too. It is what you shove between your Media Releases.

The Media Releases and publicity blurbs – you have to have them, they are part of what makes an endeavor professional, or even emerging – but it can make a person sound all ego. Which is kind of repulsive if it’s all you get, because it has no heart to it.

Just having your own website – actually saying, “I think I’ve done enough stuff now, that I can have one” – feels so dubious.

I’ve met really accomplished writers who are uncomfortable with it.

I kind of hijacked my own blog, for a time, with personal writing. I didn’t really plan to put so much of my personal life out there in writing. (But then again, it was only a slice.) But I don’t think being yourself is the worst thing you can do with a blog. (It does go against the culture of not showing emotion.)

I have some friendships – real ones – that I might not have, if I hadn’t been writing like that. The writers who offered me a spare room to crash in last year, well they wouldn’t have even known about my situation, if I hadn’t been Blood Jett Blogging.

That’s a bastardisation of Sylvia Plath’s famous quote: “The blood jet is poetry and there is no stopping it.”

Just to crush the ego out of it – I don’t claim to be worthy of even making the bastardisation. Hey, I know I’m not Sylvia Plath.  My ego is crushable and disposable. I write lots of crap.

Blood Jett Blogging is something I’m tying off a tourniquet on, because it diverts material from the bottom drawer, where raw life writing sits until you have enough distance to sift through life drek for threads and scraps of usable material.

But more importantly – God, am I actually going to write “to change your blog, you have to change your life”? Fuck me sideways, how mind-numbingly Life Coach. I’m trying to evict Blood Jett Puncturing Crap from my personal life. I’m saying no to misery. A big part of rebuilding this year, is letting go of unhealthy things that don’t really fit with my life anymore.

Alcohol is gone. It is completely unappealing. I associate it with the taste of blood. Even just being around it, the smell… I almost taste blood. That is a pretty powerful memory trigger: stranded at night on the side of a road, bleeding, and befuddled by drink and head injuries.

I never want to feel that vulnerable again. I did not like that feeling.

Letting go of a dispersed social group who are friends with the woman who made me bleed that night – I think that is really for the best. I don’t want to go out, and stand around talking superficial garbage with those people, not being OK with their friendship with the assailant, but not having any clear social ritual for declaring that. We don’t actually have some neat bundle of behaviour for that kind of situation. You either linger in complication, and get hurt and slighted but never articulate it – or this.

It has taken me a long time to accept that it is totally OK for me to be not OK with people being socially accepting of the assailant, after what she did. I am allowed to be repulsed by that. It doesn’t matter if I have no clear, elegant name for it – I am allowed to feel it. I haven’t been very articulate about it, but I’m not apologetic about it. It is not an easy thing to put into words.

I had a friend visit in January, when the whiplash trauma was new to the point of being totally confusing. I’d been so pleased to have my own face really returning, and I hadn’t really understood the deeper muscle trauma. (I was so not out of the woods.) This friend had wanted to see me especially because I’d offered some advice on preparing for a classical music audition, and it had been helpful for him – and this friendship is the one I will miss most of all those I’m letting slip away like damaged kites.

While we were having lunch he said, “I’m actually going to see Basher at Hostie-Dude’s housewarming party tomorrow night. I don’t know what I’m going to say to her…”

You don’t have to tell me the intelligent and mature way to interpret that, is to think: Going to a party with the woman who bashed me? Talking with her? Doesn’t sound like much of a friend.

I was still so new to the assault, and barely able to talk about it. Being articulate about how hurt I was in that moment – it would have been better if I’d just asked him to leave then, and dissolved the friendship right there to his face, but I didn’t have the gift of eloquence. It was too soon. I was months away from simple expression about the assault. (“Don’t ask me to be cool with this totally uncool situation.”) The consequences for relationships around the assault was the most complicated fallout from it. It is still hard to be articulate about it, because it isn’t spite – it isn’t willful cruelty – it is complacence and a moral divergence. It was too much to manage uttering, ”You – me – two roads diverged in a yellow wood!” 

The assailant being socially unbound from consequences of her violence against me – I needed time to process what that would mean for my social interaction with those people. The better the friendship seemed, the more it means.

We all throw the phrase “people are crap” around at times, but it can still hit you in new and puzzling ways.

I think letting go of those people is my only really healthy option, because if I don’t the complication in every one of those relationships is unequal to the point of overbalancing. It makes things so much worse, and those people aren’t really my friends. This massive blobular grey area for friends of someone who bashed me… I don’t see why I should accommodate it. It isn’t worth it. I am evicting complication.

Wow. Thanks to the vagaries of Facebook, I’ve just realized how many people who I would have once considered to be essentially decent, are still in contact with the monster who bashed me, and who lied to the police about her maniacal and inexcusable crime. These are people I’ve known in my life, for years. Among that number are some people I considered really genuine friends: a visual artist I wanted to collaborate with; musicians I respected; artists I respected; educated people; people who are parents; people who’s parents I’ve met; people who have invited me into their homes… I’m astonished and appalled. It’s totally not cool.

I don’t really see an alternative to ditching those 26 people – and I don’t just mean Facebook. They are happy to socialise with the assailant. She BASHED me. We didn’t have a fight. I in no way provoked her. It wasn’t self-defense. She simply BASHED me. It doesn’t matter if she lies about it for the rest of her life. She BASHED me.

If someone bashes one of my friends, or a person I respect in any way, I drop the assailant like a poison potato. That person does not get five minutes to make excuses, although I do let them know their violence is the reason I won’t associate with them. I dropped one of my old bandmates from my life, because he karate kicked his then girlfriend – and he was the one I was close to, not her. Playing in a band together, we’d seen one another make mistakes in life (as often as in music) and we compensated for each other, so he and I shared a real fellowship. I mourned the friendship, and I still miss him sometimes, but after what he did – forget it. I couldn’t have a friendship with him after that. Because by my morality – when it comes to violence, that shit is so not on.

Violent assault is not just a crime, it is a violation of another person’s wellbeing.

I am still feeling the injury from that one night. It has made all sorts of activities impossible to sustain. I’ve had massive amounts of time wasted dealing with significant physical pain. It makes life a lot slower and harder than it should be.

Much about the assault I’ve not disclosed publicly. I won’t waste the grit (which I’ve earned through pain) by writing about it on the internet. One day I will draw on the horrible experience in my creative writing, when I am ready to describe that very personal horror with enough distance for it to be artistic.

But one thing I will say – as I go to my published writers group meetings, and prepare for my double bass audition, and practice singing Puccini, Purcell and Mozart, and work on an amazing fiction commission, and promote the international profile of the anthology series I co-edit – and I often do these things struggling with neck pain and headaches, that I hope won’t be chronic – I will say that she called me “A SMARTARSE” before she bashed me.

She said it in a tone I’ve heard before, and which I have long associated with the dark side of patriarchy. I’ve heard the word “SMARTARSE” used derisively by insecure men who are threatened by a strong woman, and so they strike out at them like a caveman whaling against his evolutionary redundancy. But I’d never dreamed a woman could be so disgusting. I certainly never thought I would see another woman be so ugly on the inside. The sight of her twisted face, and the demented screeching of her voice, those are things I won’t ever forget.

“YOU’RE A SMARTARSE.”

It was like something from kindergarten; when a big, mean kid realises you have something they don’t.

It actually isn’t easy pursuing a REAL arts career (not a little hobby). It involves massive amounts of unpaid toil, and it is financially risky, and as a woman foraying into areas that are often male dominated, that entails a whole other set of challenges and set-backs (and harassment and discrimination). It can be really hard to keep believing, to keep going, to not be discouraged. It takes a lot of heart to keep going. It takes courage. Other serious artists will know what I mean.

I have been making some real inroads, most of which I cannot even discuss publicly yet. Trying to work on these things with a neck injury is a daily drag.

I don’t need people in my life who want to BEAT ME DOWN for being “A SMARTARSE”. (Which is to say what? Witty? Creative? Intelligent?)  I equally don’t need people in my life who befriend and support that kind of insecure hater.

To those people – when you are with your violent criminal friend, look into her face. Think about how she would look with her features twisted in psychosis. Think about her voice screeching like a Macbethian witch. Finally, look at her hands. Consider how she shapes them into dumbarse fists.

I’ve turned comments off – my mobile is turned off – I’m not checking emails regarding this. Because this isn’t a dialogue. We live in a democracy, and people have the right to choose their friends. You can choose to have a violent criminal friend. You have that right. But I can choose to not be friends with you, and I am absolutely entitled to feel appalled and hurt that you’d befriend someone who assaulted me, and I really don’t have to further explain myself to you.

For the record, she didn’t have permission to launch those fists at me, nor did she have any right to do so. It is a crime.

She is your violent criminal friend. When you clasp her hand with yours, that is the same hand that punched me in the face.

Archiving some music business documents, I found a couple of playlists from HAMMERHEART – METAL THUNDER EVERY THOR’S DAY. And I thought they’d be kind of fun to share.

If you didn’t know, HAMMERHEART was a nightclub event I ran at the Ding Dong Lounge (Melbourne, Australia) in 2005-2006. Lots of people dream of running their own club, possibly without being aware of the fuckload of work involved, or slim financial rewards (by which I of course mean losses). But I must say getting to play metal to a bunch of mates on a full club PA is pretty fucking sweet. I guess what I really like about our playlists, is they say: REAL METAL PEOPLE RAN THIS NIGHT. You could drop some pretty serious requests on us, and this is before the days of DJs downloading a request from iTunes, instead of really having knowledge. Loads of the stuff here was played on vinyl.

Talie & Beth at Sanguinary Misanthropia gig - courtesy of Atomic Pics.

HAMMERHEART Relaunch – THORZ DAY 15/12/05

BANDS – DREADNAUGHT + CONTRIVE + CANYONERO

Listening Party – DREADNAUGHT – DIRTY MUSIC

(We played the entire DIRTY MUSIC CD.)

DJs Talie + Bethtorian

• Opeth – Demon Of The Fall
• Iron Maiden – The Trooper *
• Nile – Sacrifice Unto Sebek
• The Amenta – Mictlan *+
• Mayhem – Freezing Moon
• Dimmu Borgir – Spellbound
• Embodied – Maleficium Of The Masses *+
• Pitchshifter – Blood Sweat Saliva
• Mercyful Fate – Curse Of The Pharaohs
• Kreator – Some Pain Will Last *
• Fear Factory – Scumgrief
• Meshuggah – Sickening *
• Entombed – Wolverine Blues *
• Testament – Practice What You Preach
• Falkenbach – Heralder *
• Dark Funeral – Godhate
• Amorphis – Against Widows
• Megadeth – Peace Sells *
• Dimmu Borgir – Master Of Disharmony
• Soilwork – Natural Born Chaos
• Trivium – Pull Harder On The Strings Of Your Martyr
• Crematory – Shadows Of Mine
• Old Man’s Child – Soul Possessed
• In Flames – Artefacts Of The Black Rain
• Obituary – Insane
• Hate Eternal – Behold Judas
• Slayer – South Of Heaven *
• Anthrax – Medusa
• Annihilator – Alison Hell
• Death – Within The Mind *++
• Borknagar – Dawn Of The End
• Emperor – I Am The Black Wizards *
• Blood Duster – D.F.F. +
• Soilwork – As We Speak
• Bal-Sagoth – Callisto Rising
• Dreadnaught – Pushed To The Limit * +
• Megadeth – Liar *
• Clutch – Pure Rock Fury *
• Brutal Truth – Regression Progression
• Nasum – Time To Act!
• Metallica – Seek And Destroy *
• Anathema – Where Shadows Dance
• Grand Magus – King Slayer
• Cancer – Mindless Reactions
• Megadeth – Wake Up Dead *

* denotes request.

+ Australian content.

++ denotes request in honour of the Anniversary of Chuck’s passing, December 13, 2001. RIP.

HAMMERHEART THORZ DAY 22/12/05

BANDS – THE ABANDONMENT + HERE I DIE + MOREDHEL

DJs Talie + Bethtorian

• Earth – Of This Spell +
• Opeth – Ghost Of Perdition *
• Zyklon – Hammer Revelation
• Soilwork – The Bringer
• Chinchilla – An Almighty Power
• In Flames – The Jester Race
• Coroner – Sudden Fall
• Minus Life – Dark Child Of Hate +
• Dark Tranquillity – Monochromatic Stains
• Abrasion – Abnormalities +
• Susperia – Devil May Care
• Katatonia – Dispossession
• Morbid Angel – Summoning Redemption
• Slayer – Reign In Blood *
• Dimmu Borgir – Blessings Upon The Throne Of Tyranny
• Metallica – Master Of Puppets
• The Haunted – Trespass
• At The Gates – The Swarm
• Gorefest – Man To Fall
• Ozzy Osbourne and Randy Rhoads – Crazy Train (Live)
• Anarazel – Enochian Christfuck * +
• Slayer – Angel Of Death *
• Sigh – Pale Monument
• Lion – Transformers
• Lock Up – Life In Purgatory
• Cadaver Inc – Deliverance
• Pantera – Cowboys From Hell
• Psycroptic – Of Dull Eyes Bourne +
• Anathema – A Dying Wish
• Doro – White Wedding
• Helloween – I Want Out *
• Fear Factory – Descent
• Iron Maiden – Die With Your Boots On *
• Dismember – Dismembered
• WASP – Animal : F**k Like A Beast *
• Entombed – Evilyn
• Metallica – Trapped Under Ice *
• King Diamond – Abigail
• The Furor – Thrive On War * +
• Bathory – A Fine Day To Die
• Paradise Lost – As I Die
• Anthrax – Antisocial
• Overkill – Fuck You
• Sepultura – Refuse/Resist *
• Exodus – The Last Act Of Defiance
• Nile – Execration Text *
• Dominion – Joyful Tears Of Sorrow
• Angel Witch – Sorceress *

*denotes request.

+ denotes Australian content.

Not a bad mix of stuff, right? You know… I actually didn’t own any Man0war until I started HAMMERHEART. When a drunken metal dude requests Man0war, and you don’t have any… it’s heartbreaking.

The Australian American Association in cooperation with The Australian Horror Writers Association invite you to our Halloween Fundraiser Dinner Dance! Please join us to celebrate Halloween the fun way, by dressing up in your favorite Halloween costume and dancing the night away. The night will include a local DJ along with gourmet BBQ buffet meal and an auction.
When: Saturday 29th October, 6.30 pm to Midnight

Dress: Halloween Costume; or after 5 wear.

Where: City Of Melbourne Bowls, Flagstaff Gardens, Crn Dudley and Williams St

Cost: $55 per person

RSVP: Erin Muscat, Events Manager
Melbourne by 17 October on 0408 830 997
or eventschair@gmail.com
Drinks will be available at bar prices.

Fundraiser Details

All proceeds from the night will be donated towards the purchasing of an Eye- Gaze Device, for the Past President of the Australian American Association and member of the Australian Horror Writers Association, Mr Rocky Wood, who suffers from a motor neurone disease. A motor neurone disease is when the nerve cells controlling the muscles that enable us to move around, speak, breathe and swallow, fail to work normally. With no nerves to activate them, muscles gradually weaken and waste. The patterns of weakness vary from person to person but the disease is invariably fatal. Devices such as this, cost $20,000 and allows eye-based communication for patients who cannot speak or type. It is the most effective way such patients can communicate as the disease progresses.
Further donations will be gratefully received on the night.

You may download a PDF INVITATION and BOOKING FORM.

Please feel free to promote this event on your own website or blog. It would be fantastic if we could muster up a strong contingent of AHWA members – at very least, the Melbourne locals – to show support for Rocky. He not only acts as an outstanding ambassador for Australian horror, through his activities as HWA President, but he is a fine writer and a thoroughly generous person who contributes a good deal of knowledge to local horror events and discourse. Keep the karma real, and help make this event a smashing success! Friends, family, and all gorgeous ghouls welcome!

In anticipation of the imminent release of The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy & Horror, Ticonderoga Publications is releasing the Recommended Reading List for stories published in 2010, compiled by myself and my co-editor Liz Grzyb.

No single volume could contain all the highlights of 2010 Australian horror and fantasy, there is simply too much talent out there – which is brilliant! There really are some great stories in this list, and all are worth hunting down and enjoying.

2010 Recommended Reading List

• Deborah Biancotti, ‘Home Turf’ Baggage
• Jenny Blackford, ‘Adam’ Kaleidotrope #9
• Simon Brown, ‘Sweep’ Sprawl
• Mary Elizabeth Burroughs, ‘The Flinchfield Dance’ Black Static #17
• Steve Cameron, ‘Ghost Of The Heart’ Festive Fear
• Stephanie Campisi, ‘Seven’ Scenes From The Second Storey
• Matthew Chrulew, ‘The Nullabor Wave’ World’s Next Door
• Bill Congreve, ‘The Traps of Tumut’ Souls Along The Meridian
• Rjurik Davidson, ‘The Cinema Of Coming Attractions’ The Library of Forgotten Books
• Stephen Dedman, ‘For Those In Peril On The Sea’ Haunted Legends
• Felicity Dowker, ‘From Little Things’ Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #43
• ——— ‘The House On Juniper Road’ Worlds Next Door
• ——— ‘Bread And Circuses’ Scary Kisses
• Will Elliott, ‘Dhayban’ Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears
• Mark Farrugia, ‘A Bag Full Of Arrows’ Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #48
• Jason Fischer, ‘The House Of Nameless’ Writers of the Future Vol. xxvi
• Bob Franklin, ‘Take The Free Tour’ Under Stones
• Christopher Green, ‘Jumbuck’ Aurealis #44
• Paul Haines, ‘Her Gallant Needs’ Sprawl
• Lisa L Hannett, ‘Singing Breath Into The Dead’ Music For Another World
• ——— ‘Commonplace Sacrifices’ On Spec
• ——— Tiny Drops’ Midnight Echo #4
• Richard Harland, ‘Shakti’ Tales of the Talisman
• ——— ‘The Fear’ Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears
• Narrelle M Harris, ‘The Truth About Brains’ Best New Zombie Tales: Volume 2
• Robert Hood, ‘Wasting Matilda’ The Mammoth Book Of The Zombie Apocalypse
• George Ivanoff, ‘Trees’ Short & Scary
• Trent Jamieson, ‘The Driver’s Assistant’ Ticon4
• Pete Kempshall, ‘Dead Letter Drop’ Close Encounters of the Urban Kind
• ——— ‘Signature Walk’ Sprawl
• Martin Livings, ‘Lollo’ Close Encounters of the Urban Kind
• Penelope Love, ‘Border Crossing’ Belong
• Geoffrey Maloney & Andrew Bakery, ‘Sleeping Dogs’ Midnight Echo #4
• Tracie McBride, ‘Lest We Forget’ (audio) Spectrum Collection
• Kirstyn McDermott, ‘Monsters Among Us’ Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears
• Andrew J McKiernan, ‘All The Clowns In Clown Town’ Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears
• Simon Petrie, ‘Running Lizard’ Rare Unsigned Copy: Tales of Rocketry, Ineptitude, and Giant Mutant Vegetables
• Michael Radburn, ‘They Own The Night’ Festive Fear
• Janeen Samuel, ‘My Brother Quentin’ Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #44
• Angela Slatter, ‘A Porcelain Soul’ Sourdough and other stories
• ——— ‘Gallowberries’ Sourdough and other stories
• ——— ‘The Dead Ones Don’t Hurt You’ The Girl With No Hands and other tales
• Cat Sparks, ‘All the Love in the World’ Sprawl
• Grant Stone, ‘Dead Air’ (poem) Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #46
• Lucy Sussex, ‘Albert & Victoria/Slow Dreams’ Baggage
• Anna Tambour, ‘Gnawer Of The Moon Seeks Summit Of Paradise’ Sprawl
• Kaaron Warren, ‘Sins Of The Ancestors’ Dead Sea Fruit
• ——— ‘The Coral Gatherer’ Dead Sea Fruit
• ——— ‘Hive Of Glass’ Baggage
• David Witteveen, ‘Perfect Skin’ Cthulhu’s Dark Cults

The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy & Horror 2010 is available for pre-order from various stockists, and from the publisher Ticonderoga Publications.