I am so, so very excited about this project!
Back in February, at the Anthology Workshop on the Oregon Coast, after I’d read nearly 300 short stories, I looked around the room at the incredible wealth of talented authors and thought, “These are some of my favorite authors, and I have all these nifty anthology themes in my head—not only do I want to write stories that fit these themes, I want to read their stories, too!”
Knowing it was a project I could easily go overboard on, I approached just a few author-friends to start—and to my delight, they were not only enthusiastic, but they were thrilled to be a part of this. At which point, we became a collective, with everybody tossing out ideas and volunteering for different jobs.
Since then, it’s been a lot of work and coordination and we probably broke the Internet once or twice with all the emails we fired back and forth, but the time has come to announce the launch of the very first issue of…
The Uncollected Anthology!
The idea is this: We pick a theme and write urban fantasy stories for that theme, just like any anthology. The difference is that instead of bundling all the stories together (and having to deal with accounting when it comes to paying everyone royalties), we each publish our own stories. If you like a story…if you like a theme…then we hope you’ll venture forth from there and buy the other stories.
Honestly? I’ve read all the stories in this first issue, and they rocked my world. I wouldn’t say that unless I meant it. These ladies really are some of my favorite urban fantasy authors.
The first theme is Magical Motorcycles, and all the stories are available as of this morning! If you woke up with your ears ringing, that was from all of us cheering that we’d made it to this point!
I’m so in love with these stories, and my friends who dove in with so much enthusiasm. ::sniff::
Okay, you want the stories, right? Here’s the info on mine:
“The Madness of Survival”
The Faerie Folk come when the veil between the worlds is thin, spinning their sticky-sweet glamour and stealing children away. The only thing standing in their way: a motorcycle gang made up of broken, lost people who managed to escape from the Faerie Realm after their own abductions.
Riding her enchanted steed, sworn to protect children, Alis mourns the loss of her own daughter, taken by the Fae. Abandoned by her husband, shunned by her friends, Alis now knows no family but her fellow riders, knows no joy except when she’s riding.
But freedom comes with a price…
Buy it at any of these fine online retailers:
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Omnilit | Smashwords
And it should be up on iBooks soon…
The incredibly fabulous authors—go check out their stories!
Annie Reed | Leah Cutter | Leslie Claire Walker | Phaedra Weldon
A few necessary shout-outs and links
We are partnered with Kobo books, for which I have to thank the wonderful Mark Lefebvre, Kobo director of self-publishing and author relations. Check out our group page on Kobo!
Stephanie Writt designed our UA logo and the template for our covers. She’s awesome!
Annie Reed and Michele Lang worked hard to hammer out a group agreement so we stay on the up-and-up. (Michele doesn’t have a story in this issue, but my fingers are crossed for the September issue!)
Finally, if you want more info, you can check out our website. We have a newsletter (quarterly, just to tell you when a new issue is available), and there are photos of us and all that jazz. Phaedra Weldon kicked ass designing the site! ::applauds::
I hope you enjoy the stories.
“Living With the Past” is part of the Fantastic Detectives anthology from Fiction River, edited by Kristine Kathryn Rusch (former editor of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction). I need smelling salts, please, because my name is on the front cover. With Kevin J. Anderson and Dean Wesley Smith. And you may not know of Karen L. Abrahamson, but I do, and she’s a phenomenal writer (check out her Cartographers series!). (Alastair Kimble is a new author to me, but I’m eager to read his work.) Seriously, the whole table of contents is amazing.
Meanwhile, from Soul’s Road Press comes “Paying It Forward,” another erotica story from my Andrea Dale pen name:
