Category: Fiction

Shortlisted Photograph for Baltic Island Days

My photograph taken and submitted while I was camping on Aegna was shortlisted for the photo competition as a part of the Baltic Island Days featuring Aegna. The photograph was displayed on the Pirita promenade for the event. There were over 80 works submitted of which 20 were selected to be exhibited in the pedestrian underpass leading to Freedom Square for the month of October.

Gender and Age/Aging in Popular Culture

I’m thrilled to be a part of the Gender and Age/Aging in Popular Culture taking place this week at the University of Graz. As with many conferences these days, this is a virtual event.

I am speaking on Thursday about Old Age and Aging as Represented in Star Trek as a part of the panel on Representations of Gender and Aging in Speculative Fiction. It looks set to be a fascinating collection of subjects and I’m very much looking forward to it.

The Triangle

Realm has re-released The Triangle, a fun action thriller developed by Dan Koboldt and written by Dan Koboldt, Mindy McGinness and me, has been released as a podcast available to everyone. You can listen to all ten episodes narrated by Neil Hellegers for free on Apple, Spotify and other podcast sysytems.

The mysticism and intrigue of the Bermuda Triangle has just turned personal for Admiral David Segarra: his former ship, the USS Wasp, has gone missing in the area without a trace.

I had great fun taking part in this collaboration and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. I think this is a great story and I’m really glad it is getting a bigger audience.

Diamond Jack, Smirnov and the Pelikaan

I was asked to take part in an interview for ABC’s The History Listen, which was used for a mash-up documentary on one of my favourite Australian characters, Diamond Jack.

It’s a fantastic format, which my mother described as natural storytelling, like we are all telling the story over drinks.

You can listen to the full podcast here: Diamond Jack, Smirnov and the Pelikaan

Estcon 2020 experience in Locus Magazine

2020 has been a difficult year for events and conventions, which led to Estcon being the biggest event of the summer for me. My write-up and photographs were featured in the November issue of Locus Magazine and you can read all about it at the Locus online magazine: https://locusmag.com/2020/11/estcon-2020-report/

Attending a science fiction convention from a tent was definitely not what I expected to be doing this summer but my presentation went well and I had a great time.

Exoplanet Demographics Conference

I was excited by the opportunity to take part in the Exoplanet Demographics conference hosted by the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute at IPAC/Caltech over the 9-13th of November.

The organisers of the virtual conference were surprised by the amount of interest they received from science fiction writers and decided to do a Collaborative STEAM public outreach project, soliciting science fiction stories, poetry and art inspired by the discoveries being presented during the conference.

I was given the abstract of a presentation by Juliette Becker entitled The Origins of Multi-Planet Systems with Misaligned, Nearby Companions. Inspired by the details of the discovery (at least those that I understood), I wrote a short-and-sweet science fiction story called “The Missed Connection”.

This was published in the Wednesday edition of the Heavy Metal Jupiters and Other Stories e-zine edited by Jessie Christiansen and Heather Clitheroe.

I’m doubly excited to discover that the author of the research talk said that she loved my story!

This was a great initiative and I am proud to have been a part of it.

Space Ageing

I’m thrilled that my article on Old Women in Science Fiction has appeared in Nature magazine!

I wish I’d tried harder to mention Chrisjen Avasarala in Caliban’s War and Ofelia Falfurrias in Remnant Population but I struggled with the space limitations.

You can read the full article here: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-03618-w