#VALYA DUDYCZ LUPESCU

[valya-dudycz-lupescu]

Last week, the British Science Fiction Association (BSFA) released their longlist of nominees for the BSFA Awards, for work published in 2023. Embroidered Worlds: Fantastic Fiction from Ukraine and the Diaspora was among those listed for Best Collections! I am honored that we were included; I'm also so excited to see Ukrainian fiction on a list like this.

When I was a young reader in the 80s and 90s, I dreamed of such an opportunity; and I am heartened to know that readers are enjoying and discussing these stories by writers in Ukraine and the Diaspora.

There are so many thoughtful collections and fantastic stories on this list, and I encourage you to take a look. Congratulations to my incredible co-editors, Olha Brylova & Iryna Pasko and to all the nominees!

[motherchristmas]

Sneak peek at the gorgeous art inside Mother Christmas, Volume 1: The Muse, illustrated by the fabulous Vic Terra.

[paranatellonta]

A Train of Peas

When Peacock was very young, he’d assembled himself a train out of peas. Everyone around him had these majestic tails—even the turkeys on the next farm over.

As the years went by, his friends evolved: the eyes on their trains were exchanged for screens, their meat was swapped out for metal, and their quills came to serve as antennas that only received a signal when they pointed at the sky, allowing the nights to be quiet. Some of those antennas ended in blasters, ready to shoot in every direction.

Peacock still dreamed of his own tail, but in the current climate, no one would spend time on something as frivolous as a decorative source of personal euphoria. He’d have to come up with a solution himself.

He scratched and he tore, he cut and he painted, and finally he was ready. Without a long tail to bear him down, he was much lighter and could fly higher than any of his friends. Now, a large banner trailed behind him in the sky, sending a message to all parties, both directly and through the screens shared by all the other peacocks in the world. It might be that no one had ever been awed by his tail of peas, but they’d definitely be impressed if he were able to bring peace.

—

[Image description: Photo of a colourful origami sculpture of a peacock with its tail on display. On the left in the background, part of a TV screen is visible; the rest of the background is mostly dark.]

—

Atthis Arts has launched a new and important Kickstarter campaign today: Embroidered Worlds: an anthology of fantastic stories from Ukraine and the Diaspora, edited by Valya Dudycz Lupescu, Olha Brylova, and Iryna Pasko. Please consider supporting this campaign, as it’s more important than ever for Ukrainian voices in speculative fiction to be heard widely.

[jujurose222]

“The shape would give her hints about the future. ‘The Holy Spirit of Fire is powerful,’ Baba continues. ‘He can create and destroy. Fire is one of the greatest gifts we have been given. It brings us life, and we must honor it.”

Valya Dudycz Lupescu

The Silence of Tree

[readtheworld2021-blog]

Ukraine (Failed)

For April 2021, I attempted to read The Silence of Trees by Valya Dudycz Lupescu. It is now the middle of May and I've read approximately 64% of the book. I have decided to give up. It is challenging for me to put a book down once I've started reading it, but I have been unable to enjoy this work of literature because it just does not speak to me. There were moments in the book that I found moving and very interesting such as the information about Ukrainian culture and folktales and the narration of the main character's post-traumatic coping skills but I am not particularly taken with the style of prose. It is not poorly written and I would never suggest that anyone avoid reading it, it just isn't for me. I think it is important to allow myself to move on and tackle a different book for this year's reading challenge.

[weirdletter]

The Year’s Best Dark Fantasy & Horror 2019, edited by Paula Guran, Prime Books, 2019. Cover art by Tithi Luadthong, info: amazon.com.

The supernatural, the surreal, and the all-too real... tales of the dark. Such stories have always fascinated us, and modern authors carry on the disquieting traditions of the past while inventing imaginative new ways to unsettle us. Chosen from a wide variety of venues, these stories are as eclectic and varied as shadows. This volume of 2018's best dark fantasy and horror offers more than five hundred pages of tales from some of today's finest writers of the fantastique--sure to delight as well as disturb...

Contents: “Down Where Sound Comes Blunt” – G.V. Anderson (F&SF, Mar-Apr 2018) “Hainted” – Ashley Blooms (F&SF Jul-Aug 2018) “The Empyrean Light” – Gregory Norman Bossert (Conjunctions: 71, A Cabinet of Curiosity, Fall 2018) “Raining Street” – J.S. Breukelaar (Black Static #63) The Black God’s Drums – P. Djèlí Clark (Tor.com) “Faint Voices, Increasingly Desperate” – Anya Johanna DeNiro (Shimmer #43) “Big Dark Hole” – Jeffrey Ford (Conjunctions: 71, A Cabinet of Curiosity, Fall 2018) “And Yet” – A.T. Greenblatt (Uncanny #21) “Second to the Left, and Straight On” – Jim C. Hines (Robots vs. Fairies, eds. Parisien & Wolfe) “He Sings of Salt and Wormwood” – Brian Hodge (The Devil and the Deep, ed. Datlow) “Just Another Love Song” – Kat Howard (Robots vs. Fairies, eds. Parisien & Wolfe) “Four Revelations from the Rusalka Ball” – Cassandra Khaw (The Underwater Ballroom Society, eds. Trent & Burgis) “Rust and Bone” – Mary Robinette Kowal (Shimmer #46) “The Thing About Ghost Stories” – Naomi Kritzer (Uncanny #25) “A Man Walking His Dog” – Tim Lebbon (Phantoms, ed. O’Regan) “Honey” – Valya Dudycz Lupescu (A World of Horror, ed. Guignard) “Big Mother” – Anya Ow (Strange Horizons, 1 Jan 2018) “Fish Hooks” – Kit Power (New Fears 2, ed. Morris) “The Governor” – Tim Powers (The Book of Magic, ed. Dozois) “True Crime” – M. Rickert (Nightmare #72) “Sour Milk Girls” – Erin Roberts (Clarkesworld, Jan 2018) “Every Good-bye Ain’t Gone” – Eden Royce (Strange Horizons, 30 July 2018) “Tom Is in The Attic” – Robert Shearman (Phantoms, ed. O’Regan) “When We Fall, We Forget” – Angela Slatter, (Phantoms, ed. O’Regan) “In This Twilight” – Simon Strantzas (Nothing Is Everything) “The Crow Knight” – Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, 11 Oct 2018) “Thanatrauma” – Steve Rasnic Tem (New Fears 2, ed. Morris) “Sick Cats in Small Places” – Kaaron Warren (A World of Horror, ed. Guignard) “Blood and Smoke, Vinegar and Ashes” – D.P. Watt (The Silent Garden, Vol. 1) “The Pine Arch Collection” – Michael Wehunt (The Dark #36) “In the End, It Always Turns Out the Same –” A.C. Wise (The Dark #37) “Asphalt, River, Mother, Child” – Isabel Yap (Strange Horizons, 8 Oct 2018) “Music for the Underworld” – E. Lily Yu (Terraform, 29 Mar 2018)

[shoppingfordeals]

The Silence of Trees : A Novel by Valya Dudycz Lupescu $4.22

http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53200-19255-0/1?ff3=2&toolid=10039&campid=5337702801&item=142961852924&vectorid=229466 The Silence of Trees : A Novel by Valya …

[humanoid-lovers]

especially if you enjoy nostalgic references Found a review on this book in my alma mater's newsletter (Hail to Pitt) and gave it a whirl. It's cute but definitely not enlightening. Worth a read, especially if you enjoy nostalgic references. Go to Amazon

Child-Rearing Advice from Outer Space, Middle Earth, the Addams Family Mansion and Hogwarts Geek Parenting is not only entertaining, it's useful. The book is divided into mini-essays featuring characters appropriate to each topic. Each essay dispenses child-rearing advice from such parent-child combinations as Spock and Sarek, Buffy and Giles, Frodo and Bilbo, Jor-El and Kal-El, Starbuck and Adama, Luke and Darth Vader, Bruce Wayne and Alfred, Perseus and Zeus, Scott and Dr. Evil, and even the vampire Lestat and Claudia. There are dozens of others, too, including a couple of Game of Thrones duos, the Addams Family, Mary Poppins and her charges, Dorothy and Auntie Em, Samantha and Endora, and more duos from Star Wars and Star Trek. And I'm only naming a few. Go to Amazon

Fun for the geeks and everyone else! This is a really fun book for almost anyone - even people who don't consider themselves super "geeky" are still going to be familiar with a large number of references in this book - Game of Thrones, Sleeping Beauty, Spider Man, Lord of the Rings - these are all pop culture phenomenons that are going to appeal to a wide range of readers. Go to Amazon

If you're a parent and you geek out over geek culture, like I do... I like it when a book says what it's about on the cover and then gives you exactly that, don't you? Go to Amazon

Not As Geeky or Amusing As I'd Hoped Parenting is one of the greatest challenges known to humankind Fun and helpful book of parenting/family advice Nice little book Fun Read little book Perfect for parents who watched Battlestar Galactica together super book Not About Geek Parenting - And Not Very Funny Quite dull, not put together, and stretching, far, to come up with examples.

[mortalpractice]

Months later, land transformed by loss, the winter winds hollow out all the warm, moist places. Trees bend, their bare branches cleaving onto echoes; but God is in the rips, the tears, the holes. The whole remembers what is lost.

—Valya Dudycz Lupescu, from "Phantom Leaf Effect," published in Black Fox

[valya-dudycz-lupescu]

It’s time to unveil the cover of Embroidered Worlds: Fantastic Fiction from Ukraine and the Diaspora, as well as the list of thirty authors and their stories!

Taras Kopansky is the Ukrainian artist who created the art, "Metahutsulka" for the cover. His piece is inspired by Mykola Senkovsky’s famous 1926 photograph “Old Hutsulka” that won the Grand Prix at the European International Exhibition in Paris.

The translated stories have working titles, since our translators are working on them at the moment, but they will give you an idea of what you have to look forward to:

TATIANA ADAMENKO | Kestrel Travel Agency

VOLODYMYR ARENEV | There, Where the Garden Will Be

VIRA BALATSKA | Following Revenge

KÁROJ D. BALLA | In the Belly of the Dinosaur

ELIZABETH BEAR | Lest We Forget

ANATOLY BELILOVSKY | Iron Feliks

ÉVA BERNICZKY | Dreamers of Uzhhorod

OLHA BRYLOVA | Iron Goddess of Compassion

DAVID DEMCHUK | Three Forest Tales

VASYL DUKHNOVSKYI | A Hole in the Shape of God

OLEKSIY GEDEONOV | The Midst of Snow

MYROSLAVA HORNOSTAYEVA | The Stray Tram

YARYNA KATOROZH | The Bike Spirit

MAX KIDRUK | Closer to the Pole

OLENA KRASNOSELSKA | Scream

R.B. LEMBERG | Geddarien

HALYNA LIPATOVA | The Last of the Beads

VALYA DUDYCZ LUPESCU | Honey

ASKOLD MELNYCZUK | A Brief History of the Little : People

MIKHAILO NAZARENKO | Big-Nose and the Faun

IRYNA PASKO | The Rainbow Bridge

STEFAN O. RAK | The Long Black Veil

N.R.M. ROSHAK | Bitter Thing

IHOR SILIVRA | Family v1.1

OLEH SILIN | To See Jupiter

A.D. SUI | Svet

SVITLANA TARATORINA | Battle of the Gods

OSTAP UKRAINETS | Neptune’s Day

YURIY VYNNYCHUK | An Embroidered World

OLEKSIY ZHUPANSKYI | Havrylovna

You can read the rest of the update here:

Just a few days left to become a backer! The campaign ends on September 30th! Please help us to spread the word!

Дуже дякую! Слава Україні!

[motherchristmas]

Mother Christmas is coming!

Order your copy

[geekparentingbook]

We had a great time on our “How Horror Fans Raise Kids” panel and Geek Parenting reading at DragonCon 2016. 

Thanks to everyone who came out to see us in our many incarnations!

[jujurose222]

“If Mykola had lived, I think he would have become a priest… Katya used to call him the Wizard Monk, because he loved Bible stories and fairy tales in equal measure.”

Valya Dudycz Lupescu

The Silence of Trees

[iambikaudio-blog]

Coming soon to audiobook!  Valya Dudycz Lupescu's (@valya) The Silence of Trees (@wolfswordpress):

"Few book reviews start with a foot rub but, really, more should. In one of the most thrilling scenes in Valya Dudycz Lupescu’s first novel—exciting for its unabashed passion and feminism, and most important for the new story it promises to start even thirty pages from the book’s end—octogenarian narrator Nadya gets a foot rub from a long-lost love."   More at The Nervous Breakdown

Also see her Kickstarter campaign for a new comic project, Sticks and Bones

[humanoid-lovers]

especially if you enjoy nostalgic references Found a review on this book in my alma mater's newsletter (Hail to Pitt) and gave it a whirl. It's cute but definitely not enlightening. Worth a read, especially if you enjoy nostalgic references. Go to Amazon

Child-Rearing Advice from Outer Space, Middle Earth, the Addams Family Mansion and Hogwarts Geek Parenting is not only entertaining, it's useful. The book is divided into mini-essays featuring characters appropriate to each topic. Each essay dispenses child-rearing advice from such parent-child combinations as Spock and Sarek, Buffy and Giles, Frodo and Bilbo, Jor-El and Kal-El, Starbuck and Adama, Luke and Darth Vader, Bruce Wayne and Alfred, Perseus and Zeus, Scott and Dr. Evil, and even the vampire Lestat and Claudia. There are dozens of others, too, including a couple of Game of Thrones duos, the Addams Family, Mary Poppins and her charges, Dorothy and Auntie Em, Samantha and Endora, and more duos from Star Wars and Star Trek. And I'm only naming a few. Go to Amazon

Fun for the geeks and everyone else! This is a really fun book for almost anyone - even people who don't consider themselves super "geeky" are still going to be familiar with a large number of references in this book - Game of Thrones, Sleeping Beauty, Spider Man, Lord of the Rings - these are all pop culture phenomenons that are going to appeal to a wide range of readers. Go to Amazon

If you're a parent and you geek out over geek culture, like I do... I like it when a book says what it's about on the cover and then gives you exactly that, don't you? Go to Amazon

Not As Geeky or Amusing As I'd Hoped Parenting is one of the greatest challenges known to humankind Fun and helpful book of parenting/family advice Nice little book Fun Read little book Perfect for parents who watched Battlestar Galactica together super book Not About Geek Parenting - And Not Very Funny Quite dull, not put together, and stretching, far, to come up with examples.