The times, they are a’changing, as Dylan once whined. Nowhere is that more true than in genre fiction publishing, it seems, with some interesting examples of new delivery systems among this week’s free reads:
At Manybooks.net, they’re rocking the old-school sf novels for free: Gordon Randall Garrett and Laurence Randall Janifer’s The Impossibles and Supermind, to be precise.
Free Speculative Fiction Online list a whole batch of newly available works; go and see, and give the gift of traffic.
Pete Tzinski (of Blood, Blade and Thruster magazine fame) is blogging an online fiction serial called God in the Machine. (As a side note, I reckon this will be one of the fiction formats of the future, so I’ll be watching closely to see how this does.)
The webzine Byzarium returns from the metaphorical wastelands of the intarwebs, complete with their archive of previous material. All new material will be for paid subscribers only – another interesting potential business model for short fiction online.
Classic free pulp-era science fiction: Edmond Hamilton’s “The Man Who Evolved”.
Don Sakers is inviting people to subscribe to his latest ongoing Scattered Worlds novel, Hunt for the Dymalon CygnetHunt for the Dymalon Cygnet. You can read everything that’s been published already for free, and then sign up to get the latest parts before anyone else.
Here’s Paul McAuley’s short story “Gene Wars”.
The first stages of Subterranean Magazine‘s Fall 2007 issue have started to appear – columns, audiobooks and fiction by the big guns of the genre, costing you nix.
Electric Velocipede’s John Klima has Ezra Pines’ story “Antevellum” available as a PDF – read about this satire on Hal Duncan at the EV blog, then grab the file.
And a few bonus tidbits for the writers among the readers:
Nick Mamatas on the scene break, and why you shouldn’t overuse it.
Futurismic’s own Jeremiah Tolbert shares a nugget of wisdom on “the holy math of story”.
Enjoy!
Writers, editors and anyone else – if you want something you’ve written or published on the web for free mentioned here, drop me (Paul Raven) an email to the address listed for me on the Staff page, and I’ll include it in next week’s round-up.
“Gene Wars” is one hell of a little blast of a story.