Saturday, May 1, 2010

May’s Featured SF/Fantasy Author

Ellen Kushner

Friend of the store and once-local author Ellen Kushner is an award-winning storyteller, performer, and host of NPR's Sound & Spirit.

Her Riverside novels -- Swordspoint, The Fall of the Kings (written with her wife Delia Sherman), and The Privilege of the Sword -- have been described as "fantasy of manners". Set in the rakish Riverside district of an imaginary city, these novels chart the literal and social fencing of swordsmen-for-hire in grand Regency-era style, replacing battlefields with ballrooms and epic quests with political machinations.

Kushner's second novel, Thomas the Rhymer, won both the World Fantasy Award and the Mythopoeic Award in 1991. Based on the medieval ballad, it tells the story of a wandering minstrel’s time in Elfland, his romance with its queen, and his life afterward blessed by her to always tell the truth. Lyrically written, populated by achingly human characters, and adorned with riddles, poetry, and magic, it is a truly beautiful novel.

http://bit.ly/b9oYkO

2 comments:

Ellen Kushner said...

Wow. Matthew, I'm so honored. I really am a "friend of the store" - I love you guys at Porter Square, and wish I could be there in person in May to receive the accolades of the crowd, shower you with brownies, or whatever seems appropriate . . . .

By weird coincidence, SWORDSPOINT has been chosen as the June Book of the Month over at Joseph Mallozzi's weblog: http://josephmallozzi.wordpress.com/2010/04/27/april-27-2010-junes-book-of-the-month-club-cynthia-cooks-puppy-pics-chotto-mailbag/

Apparently this entitles all his blog readers to post impertinent (or even pertinent) questions about the book, which I then answer via his blog.

If you'd like a similar service, let me know - or else just send your questions via Joseph M. in June.

And thanks again for letting me feel, still, like part of the Porter Square community!

Ellen Kushner said...

Oh, and by the way, I have a new "book" out: it's a gorgeous limited edition chapbook from small press Temporary Culture -- a new short story, "The Man with the Knives," which serves as sort of a coda to SWORDSPOINT.

Details & ordering info here:
http://www.avramdavidson.org/themanwiththeknives.html


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