I’m a day late on this one (damn my interminable email inbox), but better late than never. The genre blogging scene is full of people whose energy and devotion to their projects consistently puts me to shame, and there can be no greater exemplar of that than the tireless Charles Tan – who, in addition to a full-time dayjob, routinely battles with a sketchy internet connection as he runs an assortment of other gigs, most of which I fully suspect don’t earn the man a dime. That’s dedication, people.
The latest of Charles’ projects is the Best of Philippine Speculative Fiction 2009 anthology, whose title is probably self-explanatory and which follows on from 2008’s Philippine Speculative Fiction Sampler. All the stories are free to read online, and downloadable as PDF or EPUB files… so bang goes your accessibility excuse for not reading any non-Western spec fic, eh? Here’s the TOC:
- Summation 2009 by Charles Tan
- “The Fires of the Sun in a Crystalline Sky” by Francezca C. Kwe
- “The Day the World Lost Its Gravity” by Camsy Ocumen
- “Strange Weather” by Dean Francis Alfar
- “The Sewing Project” by Apol Lejano-Massebieau
- “Lex Talionis” by Paolo Chikiamco
- “Isa” by Marianne Villanueva
- “Spelling Normal” by Mia Tijam
- “Daddy” by Yvette Tan
- “From Abecediarya” by Adam David
- “The Annotated Account of Tholomew Mestich” by Elyss G. Punsalan
- “Beats” by Kenneth Yu
- “Wildwater” by Crystal Koo
- “Moondown and Fugue” by Alexander Drilon
- “The Maiden’s Song” by Kate Aton-Osias
- “Capture” by Gabriela Lee
- “The Secret Origin of Spin-man” by Andrew Drilon
Go read. Now!
Normally I save up free fiction links for our regular Friday round-up, but as this is something a little bigger than usual I think it warrants special mention. Filipino genre fiction mavens Charles Tan and Mia Tijam have co-edited