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reviews_and_ramblingsAnd the Rainbow Award goes to:
1) Sandra McDonald - Diana Comet and Other Improbable Tales (Lethe Press)
A writer of whimsy and passion, Sandra McDonald has collected her most evocative short fiction to offer readers in Diana Comet and Other Improbable Stories. A beautiful adventuress from the ancient city of New Dalli sets off to reclaim her missing lover. What secrets does she hide beneath her silk skirts? A gay cowboy flees the Great War in search of true love and the elusive undead poet Whit Waltman, but at what cost? A talking statue sends an abused boy spinning through a great metropolis, dodging pirates and search for a home. On these quests, you will meet macho firefighters, tiny fairies, collapsible musicians, lady devils and vengeful sea witches. These are stories to stir the heart and imagination. McDonald's stories have appeared in many national, small press and online magazines and anthologies including Asimov's, Strange Horizons, Realms of Fantasy and Best New Paranormal Romance. She is the author of a series of novels—The Outback Stars, The Stars Down Under, and The Stars Blue Yonder—about an Australian military lieutenant, her handsome sergeant, and their adventures in deep space.
2) Angelia Sparrow & Naomi Brooks - Showdown at Yellowstone River (Pink Petal Books)
Not truly a transgender story, more of a cross-dressing or unisex sort of stories. It is a good story none-the-less. --Merith
Gunslinger Matt Court has hung it up for good after a disastrous encounter in El Paso. He moved to Dakota Territory, took out a homestead and started courting Annie, the banker's daughter. But when Annie comes up pregnant and runs away with her lover, her father calls in the notorious killer, Paz, to eliminate Matt. But the mysterious Paz holds many secrets and Matt discovers not only the gunfighter's personal code of honor, but a truth that is worth both their lives.
3) Iolanthe Woulff - She's My Dad (Outskirts Press)
If I was judging it on the main characters alone, it would absolutely warrant a full 9. They are written so well, with real personalities full of good & bad qualities. They are memorable and distinct, right from the start, and none of them exit the story quite how the entered it. --Heathyr
"Don't hate, Nicholas. Hate destroys everything. Don't let it destroy you..." For decades, ultra-liberal Windfield College has been a thorn in the side of Northern Virginia's hidebound elite. When a teaching position unexpectedly becomes available, the school hires a former male graduate - now a transsexual woman named Nickie Farrell - as an assistant professor of English. Hoping to find peace, Nickie keeps her secret under wraps until ambitious lesbian student reporter Cinda Vanderhart outs her. And Cinda has noticed something else: both Nickie and a young townie waiter named Collie Skinner have a genetic quirk which causes their eyes to be different colors. Convinced that the similarity is no coincidence, Cinda begins an investigation to discover the connection between them. Meanwhile, in a death-bed confession as she succumbs to years of brutality at the hands of her disgraced cop husband, Collie's mother Luanne reveals that his birth resulted from an illicit affair she had with a long-vanished Windfield college senior named Nick Farrington. Shattered by his mother's death, Collie turns for comfort to Robin Thompson, a gentle-hearted Christian co-worker at the upper-crust Foxton Arms restaurant. As Nickie is stalked by a pair of homicidal sociopaths, Robin finds herself entangled not only in Cinda's investigative machinations but also a murderous plot by former U.S Ambassador and tycoon Eamon Douglass to eradicate the hated college with a suicide detonation of a Cesium 137 dirty bomb. Lives and secrets hang in the balance until everything comes to a head on the morning of Windfield's annual spring picnic: April Fools Day. Filled with richly-drawn characters and building to a stunning climax, SHE'S MY DAD is a story about the destructiveness of hate, the power of love, and the redemptive triumph of good over evil. Like her title character Nickie Farrell, Iolanthe Woulff is a transsexual woman. A sixty-year-old Princeton-educated English major, she lives in Palm Springs, CA, where for several years she wrote a column in a local magazine about the challenges of gender transition. As the eldest child of author Herman Wouk, storytelling has always been dear to Ms. Woulff's heart. Her hope is that besides providing a suspenseful read, SHE'S MY DAD will help to dispel some of the widespread misconceptions about transsexual people.
1) Sandra McDonald - Diana Comet and Other Improbable Tales (Lethe Press)A writer of whimsy and passion, Sandra McDonald has collected her most evocative short fiction to offer readers in Diana Comet and Other Improbable Stories. A beautiful adventuress from the ancient city of New Dalli sets off to reclaim her missing lover. What secrets does she hide beneath her silk skirts? A gay cowboy flees the Great War in search of true love and the elusive undead poet Whit Waltman, but at what cost? A talking statue sends an abused boy spinning through a great metropolis, dodging pirates and search for a home. On these quests, you will meet macho firefighters, tiny fairies, collapsible musicians, lady devils and vengeful sea witches. These are stories to stir the heart and imagination. McDonald's stories have appeared in many national, small press and online magazines and anthologies including Asimov's, Strange Horizons, Realms of Fantasy and Best New Paranormal Romance. She is the author of a series of novels—The Outback Stars, The Stars Down Under, and The Stars Blue Yonder—about an Australian military lieutenant, her handsome sergeant, and their adventures in deep space.
2) Angelia Sparrow & Naomi Brooks - Showdown at Yellowstone River (Pink Petal Books)Not truly a transgender story, more of a cross-dressing or unisex sort of stories. It is a good story none-the-less. --Merith
Gunslinger Matt Court has hung it up for good after a disastrous encounter in El Paso. He moved to Dakota Territory, took out a homestead and started courting Annie, the banker's daughter. But when Annie comes up pregnant and runs away with her lover, her father calls in the notorious killer, Paz, to eliminate Matt. But the mysterious Paz holds many secrets and Matt discovers not only the gunfighter's personal code of honor, but a truth that is worth both their lives.
3) Iolanthe Woulff - She's My Dad (Outskirts Press)If I was judging it on the main characters alone, it would absolutely warrant a full 9. They are written so well, with real personalities full of good & bad qualities. They are memorable and distinct, right from the start, and none of them exit the story quite how the entered it. --Heathyr
"Don't hate, Nicholas. Hate destroys everything. Don't let it destroy you..." For decades, ultra-liberal Windfield College has been a thorn in the side of Northern Virginia's hidebound elite. When a teaching position unexpectedly becomes available, the school hires a former male graduate - now a transsexual woman named Nickie Farrell - as an assistant professor of English. Hoping to find peace, Nickie keeps her secret under wraps until ambitious lesbian student reporter Cinda Vanderhart outs her. And Cinda has noticed something else: both Nickie and a young townie waiter named Collie Skinner have a genetic quirk which causes their eyes to be different colors. Convinced that the similarity is no coincidence, Cinda begins an investigation to discover the connection between them. Meanwhile, in a death-bed confession as she succumbs to years of brutality at the hands of her disgraced cop husband, Collie's mother Luanne reveals that his birth resulted from an illicit affair she had with a long-vanished Windfield college senior named Nick Farrington. Shattered by his mother's death, Collie turns for comfort to Robin Thompson, a gentle-hearted Christian co-worker at the upper-crust Foxton Arms restaurant. As Nickie is stalked by a pair of homicidal sociopaths, Robin finds herself entangled not only in Cinda's investigative machinations but also a murderous plot by former U.S Ambassador and tycoon Eamon Douglass to eradicate the hated college with a suicide detonation of a Cesium 137 dirty bomb. Lives and secrets hang in the balance until everything comes to a head on the morning of Windfield's annual spring picnic: April Fools Day. Filled with richly-drawn characters and building to a stunning climax, SHE'S MY DAD is a story about the destructiveness of hate, the power of love, and the redemptive triumph of good over evil. Like her title character Nickie Farrell, Iolanthe Woulff is a transsexual woman. A sixty-year-old Princeton-educated English major, she lives in Palm Springs, CA, where for several years she wrote a column in a local magazine about the challenges of gender transition. As the eldest child of author Herman Wouk, storytelling has always been dear to Ms. Woulff's heart. Her hope is that besides providing a suspenseful read, SHE'S MY DAD will help to dispel some of the widespread misconceptions about transsexual people.
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Date: 2011-06-01 05:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-01 06:38 pm (UTC)I was writing for the Trickster anthology (didn't get in) and preparing for Yule at church.