Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #65: UNSPLATTERPUNK! 3: now out in paperback and ebook!

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GUEST-EDITED BY DOUGLAS J. OGUREK

Vicious parasites, punctured flesh, eyeball trauma, severed limbs, theatrical licking. The TQF UNSPLATTERPUNK! series returns with its third instalment. Six subversive stories, including an all-new tale by unsplatterpunk luminary Drew Tapley, aim to keep the reader entertained and aghast, while delivering a positive message.

A soon-to-be father focuses on helping others amid a Martian base massacre that shows the repercussions of human intrusion. Outraged women unite to stop a high-ranking male oppressor, and in the process, unravel the key to combating male chauvinism and its disastrous effects. A woman, certain of the upstanding life she’s led, learns a lesson that will seal her postmortem fate. Support group bloodshed leads to a scientific breakthrough. Three brothers on an Irish farm dismantle a brutal patriarchy… and chop off body parts. Back-of-theatre make-out sessions plunge to new slimy depths in an exploration of the pressure teens feel to become sexual legends.

So put on your coveralls and jump into the carnage and debauchery… You’re going to get filthy, but you’ll also emerge with a sense of hope.

Also includes reviews of books by Aliette de Bodard, John Llewellyn Probert, Laurie Penny, Pixie Britton and William F. Temple, and of the films Aquaman, Crawl, Every Day, Glass, It Chapter Two, Mary Poppins Returns, Ready or Not, Under the Skin and Us, and of the television series Carnival Row.

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Here are the gore-unsplattered contributors to this issue:

Chris Di Placito is a writer living in Fife, Scotland. His work has appeared in magazines such as Litro, BULL, Porridge, Ink In Thirds, STORGY and Structo.

Douglas J. Ogurek is the pseudonym for a writer living somewhere on Earth. Though banned on Mars, his fiction appears in over fifty Earth publications. Douglas’s website can be found at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com and his Twitter account is at www.twitter.com/unsplatter.

Drew Tapley is a British copywriter, journalist and filmmaker based in Toronto.

Garvan Giltinan is a recovering Irishman with a fascination with the bizarre/grotesque/puerile. His work has appeared in the anthologies New England: Weird, Triggered, and Fatal Fetish. Forthcoming publications include the novel Backdoor Carnivore (JEA Press) and the short story “Titty Kitties” (Thicke and Vaney Books). Giltinan has an MFA in Creative Writing from Pine Manor College, and really weirds out his wife with the subject matter of his stories.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. His website is at www.jacobedwards.id.au, his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, and his Twitter account is at www.twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Joanna Koch writes literary horror and surrealist trash. Author of the novella The Couvade and other short fiction, Joanna has been published in journals and anthologies such as SYNTH #1: An Anthology of Dark SF, Honey & Sulphur and In Darkness, Delight: Masters of Midnight. Joanna is a Contemplative Psychotherapy graduate of Naropa University and lives near Detroit. Follow their monstrous musings at horrorsong.blog.

Rafe McGregor lectures at Edge Hill University. He is the author of two monographs, two novels, six collections of short fiction, and two hundred articles, essays, and reviews. His most recent work of fiction is The Adventures of Roderick Langham, a collection of occult detective stories.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of TQF and shares his home with three slightly smaller Theakers, one of whom provided the art for this issue's cover. His reviews, interviews and articles have also appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism, BFS Horizons and the BFS Journal.

Manchester, UK-based Tom Over is a writer of dark, speculative strangeness. He grew up loving all things horror and has been suckling on the gnarled teat of weird fiction ever since he was knee high to a Mugwump. He generally divides his time between watching cult movies with his girlfriend and working on his first collection. To date, his work has appeared in CLASH Media, Aphotic Realm, Crystal Lake Publishing and Horror Sleaze Trash amongst others. His first collection is due for release in early 2020 from NihilismRevised.

Zeke Jarvis is a professor of English at Eureka College. His work has appeared in Moon City Review, Posit and KNOCK, among other places. His books include So Anyway…, In A Family Way, Lifelong Learning and the forthcoming The Three of Them.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #64: now out, at last!

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Sorry for making you all wait so long for this issue, especially the contributors, who have been so patient while I've been kept busy by freelance work. Rather than keep anyone waiting longer, we're going to put out the pdf now and return later to add extra formats.

This issue contains four stories: “September Gathering” by Charles Wilkinson, “Disappearer” by Matthew Amundsen, “The Haunted Brick” by Walt Brunston, and “Chemicalia” by me, plus twelve reviews, by Rafe McGregor, Douglas J. Ogurek, Jacob Edwards and me. One hundred and thirty-eight pages of fabulous fiction and rollicking reviews!

In this issue our team reviews Artificial Condition by Martha Wells, Autumn Snow: The Wildlands Hunt by Martin Charbonneau and Gary Chalk, BFS Journal #18 edited by Allen Stroud, Hounds of the Underworld by Dan Rabarts and Lee Murray, Pegging the President by Michael Moorcock and Kaijumax, Season Two by Zander Cannon, plus the films Spectre, Venom, The Meg and The Predator, and the television shows Agents of Shield, Season 5 and Westworld, Season 2.

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Here are the splendid contributors to this issue:

Charles Wilkinson’s publications include The Pain Tree and Other Stories (London Magazine Editions, 2000), while his stories have appeared in Best Short Stories 1990 (Heinemann), Best English Short Stories 2 (W.W. Norton, USA), Best British Short Stories 2015 (Salt) and in genre magazines/anthologies such as Black Static, The Dark Lane Anthology, Supernatural Tales, Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, Phantom Drift (USA), Bourbon Penn (USA), Shadows & Tall Trees (Canada), Nightscript (USA) and Best Weird Fiction 2015 (Undertow Books, Canada). His anthology of strange tales and weird fiction, A Twist in the Eye, is now out from Egaeus Press and his second collection from the same publisher Splendid in Ash is available to order. A full-length collection of his poetry is forthcoming from Eyewear. He lives in Wales.

Douglas J. Ogurek is the pseudonym for a writer living somewhere on Earth. Though banned on Mars, his fiction appears in over forty Earth publications. Ogurek founded the controversial literary subgenre known as unsplatterpunk, which uses splatterpunk conventions (e.g. extreme violence, gore, taboo subject matter) to deliver a positive message. He guest-edited Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #58: UNSPLATTERPUNK!, the first ever unsplatterpunk anthology, and then its follow-up, UNSPLATTERPPUNK! 2. He also reviews films for us. Recent longer works include the young adult novel Branch Turner vs the Currants (World Castle Publishing) and the horror/suspense novella Encounter at an Abandoned Church (Scarlet Leaf Publishing). More at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com. Twitter: www.twitter.com/unsplatter.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. His website is at www.jacobedwards.id.au, his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, and his Twitter account is at www.twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Matthew Amundsen has published novellas previously in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #35 (“House of Nowhere”) and #50 (“A Murder in Heaven”) and short stories in such magazines as Cemetery Moon, Jersey Devil Press, Millennium SF & F and Starsong.  In addition, he has written literary and music criticism for alternative weeklies in Athens, Georgia, and brainwashed.com. When not writing, he is a sound engineer and musician in Minneapolis.

Rafe McGregor lectures at Leeds Trinity University and the University of York. He is the author of The Value of Literature, two novels, six collections of short fiction, and two hundred articles, essays, and reviews. His most recent book is The Adventures of Roderick Langham, a collection of occult detective stories.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction. His reviews, interviews and articles have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal.

Walt Brunston’s adaptation of the classic television story, Space University Trent: Hyperparasite, is now available on Kindle.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Ready… set… gross: seeking extreme horror submissions for UNSPLATTERPUNK! 3

Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction aims for three-pugnance with third instalment of controversial anthology that aims to shock, disgust, and morally enlighten.

Sixteenth century English poet Sir Philip Sidney encouraged writers to teach virtue and delight. If readers aren’t delighted (i.e. entertained), he argued, they’ll walk away.

Now that we’re in the twenty-filth century, the unsplatterpunk movement has put a new spin on Sidney’s advice by asking writers to teach and shock and/or disgust readers.

Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction launched the unsplatterpunk movement in 2017 with UNSPLATTERPUNK!. The British Fantasy Society called this inaugural collection “memorable and thought-provoking”. Last year, TQF upped the muck with UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2, which criminologist, aesthetic commentator, and novelist Dr Rafe McGregor called “a provocative, confrontational, outrageous, and innovative collection”.

Next year, TQF will flay new trails with UNSPLATTERPUNK! 3, edited by Douglas J. Ogurek. We challenge authors to submit short stories that submerge a positive message in filth, carnage, and whatever else shocks people.

We’ll take ultraviolent humour, perverted country bumpkin, and raw realism. We’ll take vile fantasy, gruesome sci-fi, and grossmance… anything so long as it defies contemporary sensibilities, repulses us, and integrates a virtuous message.

Bear in mind that this is not an easy task. “Unsplatterpunk is an exceptionally demanding genre in which to write, requiring an almost impossible balancing act between the disgusting and the morally uplifting”, writes Rafe McGregor in the foreword to UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2. “If it doesn’t convey a positive moral message, then it’s splatterpunk, not unsplatterpunk; if it isn’t disgusting enough, then it’s neither unsplatterpunk nor splatterpunk.”   

Also remember that gore is the new norm. Popular TV shows and films drip with eviscerations, decapitations, and amputations. Then there are the splatterpunk/extreme horror books that make those TV shows and films look like children’s programs. The most abhorrent stuff imaginable? We think not. Writers can take it to the next level.

Submissions are open to both established writers and hobbyists. Alas, the only payment we can offer is a pdf copy (available for download to all) and recognition – or is it notoriety? – for contributing to this genre-defining series.

Send your vile concoctions of 10,000 words or fewer (no poetry please) to TQFunsplatterpunk@gmail.com.

Tips

• Try to gross out or appall the person who thinks he or she has seen everything.
• Convey a positive message, whether blatant or subtle.
• Make the story as attention-getting as a death metal concert in a spa.
• Give us something we haven’t seen.
• Avoid traditional revenge stories. Torturing a bad guy isn’t a positive message.

Some people say, “Nothing’s shocking.” Make them eat their words. Give us your worst.

Deadline: 31 July 2019

Word count: 500–10,000

Reprints: No

Multiple submissions: Yes

Simultaneous submissions: No – we’ll get back to those who submit for this project within a couple weeks.

File name: [story title]-[author surname].doc

Payment: Non-paying zine (free epub, mobi, and pdf copies available to everyone including contributors) plus participation in an emerging subgenre

Send submissions as a .doc or .rtf attachment, along with a 3rd person bio, to TQFunsplatterpunk@gmail.com. Please include UNSPLATTERPUNK! in the subject line.

After publication, you are free to reprint your story elsewhere, but please credit Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction for original publication.

See standard guidelines for additional information on rights and legal matters.

UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2 (TQF63): now out in paperback and ebook!

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | print UK | print USA | Kindle UK | Kindle US

GUEST-EDITED BY DOUGLAS J. OGUREK

“Ghastly.” “Bloodthirsty.” “Transgressive.” “Over-the-top violence and sexual deviation.” So said the reviews of UNSPLATTERPUNK!, the first official collection in the unsplatterpunk subgenre.

Now, seven goreslingers and propriety defilers have grossed up their game to deliver UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2. True to the unsplatterpunk subgenre, these stories deliver a moral message while shocking or repulsing the reader. The collection includes a foreword by criminologist, philosopher, and aesthetic commentator Rafe McGregor.

Returning contributor Drew Tapley kicks off the awfulness on an impressively juvenile note with the anthology's most straightforward story. In “First Kiss”, a high school student deals with an expulsive situation with as much stoicism as Conan the Barbarian… maybe “Barfbarian” is more relevant. Trophy hunting is Triffooper Saxelbax’s target as his protagonist, a designer of controversial augmented reality games, takes on the corporate obsession with teamwork in “The Villainy of Solitude”. Hugh Alsin’s satirical piece “Convention Hitler!” explores intolerance run amok when the story’s namesake attends a British horror convention. In “The Music of Zeddy Graves”, Stephen Theaker brings his planet-hopping duo of Rolnikov and Pelney to Melodia, whose inhabitants participate in an endless music festival, and whose main attraction goes to gruesome extremes to achieve her compositions. Douglas J. Ogurek’s “Gunkectomy” alternates between an embittered architect/author and a husband hunter who finds commercial and social value in her earwax. “The Tapestry of Roubaix” by Howard Phillips seems to come off the shelf of a nineteenth century library, until it reveals what the protagonist does in his washbasin. M.S. Swift, another returning contributor, closes out the collection with “The Bones of Old England”, an extravaganza of mania-induced carnage.

Delve deep into the cesspool that is UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2, and remember – sometimes to learn a lesson, you might have to get dirty.

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Here are the unsplattered contributors to this issue:

Douglas J. Ogurek is the pseudonym for a writer living somewhere on Earth. Though banned on Mars, his fiction appears in over forty Earth publications. Ogurek founded the controversial literary subgenre known as unsplatterpunk, which uses splatterpunk conventions (e.g. extreme violence, gore, taboo subject matter) to deliver a positive message. He guest-edited Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #58: UNSPLATTERPUNK!, the first ever unsplatterpunk anthology. He also reviews films at that same ezine. Recent longer works include the young adult novel Branch Turner vs the Currants (World Castle Publishing) and the horror/suspense novella Encounter at an Abandoned Church (Scarlet Leaf Publishing). More at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com. Twitter: @unsplatter

Drew Tapley is a copywriter, journalist and filmmaker based in Toronto.

Howard Phillips is the author of His Nerves Extruded, The Doom That Came to Sea Base Delta and The Day the Moon Wept Blood.

Howard Watts provides the exceptional wraparound cover for this issue.

Hugh Alsin is a writer who now stays away from conventions, although he stresses that the events in his story are completely fictitious, and any resemblance to people living or dead is either unintentional or for the purposes of satire or parody.

M.S. Swift’s work has been published in a wide range of horror and fantasy anthologies, including the first TQF unsplatterpunk collection. Swift’s writing is inspired by the landscape and mythology of his native Britain. He recently completed a witch hunter novel set in an alternative medieval Britain and is seeking a publisher courageous enough to back it.

Rafe McGregor lectures at Leeds Trinity University and the University of York. He is the author of The Value of Literature, two novels, six collections of short fiction, and two hundred articles, essays, and reviews. His most recent book is The Adventures of Roderick Langham, a collection of occult detective stories.

Stephen Theaker has written several novels, but does not recommend reading them.

Triffooper Saxelbax is an emerging (and often grating) voice in the unsplatterpunk subgenre. When he is not writing, he stir-fries vegetables and decorates pine cones. His work has not been translated into any other languages. Neither has it been nominated for nor appeared in the year’s best so and so. Saxelbax’s mental exertions have caused numerous regional power outages.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #62: out now!

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We really needed to start work on our Unsplatterpunk special, so at first we released Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #62 just in pdf form. More formats are now available!

Issue sixty-two contains three stories: “The Nine Dread Ladies of the Tyranium” by Antonella Coriander, “Dundoronum” by Stephen Theaker and “Listen to the Loudest Whisper” by Walt Brunston, plus twenty-one reviews, all by Stephen Theaker.

It also features some “fascinating” statistics about Stephen's lifetime of reading, and the announcement of the winners of the Theaker's Quarterly Awards 2018!

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Here are the superb and mostly pseudonymous contributors to this issue:

Antonella Coriander knows when you’ve been naughty, and she’s going to use that information against you. To this issue she supplies the latest adventure of Beatrice and Veronique: “The Nine Dread Ladies of the Tyranium”.

Howard Watts provides the exceptional wraparound cover for this issue. He is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his DeviantArt page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is available on Kindle.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction. His reviews, interviews and articles have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal. To this issue he supplies “Dundoronum”, an adventure of Rolnikov and Pelney.

Walt Brunston’s adaptation of the classic television story, Space University Trent: Hyperparasite, is now available on Kindle. To this issue he supplies “Listen to the Loudest Whisper”, a new instalment in the adventures of the Two Husbands.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #61: now out!

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Issue sixty-one of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction is out now! It contains two stories from old friends – Allen Ashley (“Bound for Glory”) and Douglas Thompson (“Yttrium: Part 2”) – plus four stories from first-time contributors – S.J. Hosking (“The Guidance Counsellor”), A. Katherine Black (“Tether”), Tim Major (“To Ashes, Dust”) and Libby Heily (“Regression”) – plus “Frakking Toasters”, a non-fiction article on the language of Battlestar Galactica from Jessy Randall.

Then there are nine reviews from the usual team of Douglas J. Ogurek, Rafe McGregor, Jacob Edwards and Stephen Theaker: the BBC Radio John Wyndham Collection, Pawn by Timothy Zahn, Annabelle: Creation, Blade Runner 2049, Geostorm, It, Justice League, Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Thor: Ragnarok. The wraparound cover artwork is by the marvellous Howard Watts, completing a run of thirty-one consecutive covers!

Sorry it’s so much later than planned. But we always get there in the end! We're ten issues ahead of my heroes at McSweeney's now, you know, and we gave them a ten-issue head start…

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Here are the splendid and soulful contributors to this issue:

A. Katherine Black is an audiologist on some days and a writer on others. Her fiction has appeared in Farther Stars Than These, Seven by Twenty, Abstract Jam and others, and is forthcoming in Flash Fiction Magazine. She lives in Maryland with her family, their cats and her coffee machine. Website: www.flywithpigs.com.

Allen Ashley works as a creative writing tutor with six groups running across north London, including the advanced science fiction and fantasy group Clockhouse London Writers. He is the judge for the annual British Fantasy Society Short Story Competition and is currently working on an editing project on behalf of the BFS.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. Douglas’s website can be found at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com and his Twitter account is at www.twitter.com/unsplatter
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Douglas Thompson won the Herald/Grolsch Question of Style Award in 1989, second prize in the Neil Gunn Writing Competition in 2007, and the Faith/Unbelief Poetry Prize in 2016. His short stories and poems have appeared in a wide range of magazines and anthologies, including Ambit, New Writing Scotland and Albedo One. His first book, Ultrameta, published by Eibonvale Press in August 2009, was followed by eight subsequent novels and short story collections: Sylvow (Eibonvale Press, 2010), Apoidea (The Exaggerated Press, 2011), Mechagnosis (Dog Horn Publishing, 2012), Entanglement (Elsewhen Press, 2012), The Rhymer (Elsewhen Press, 2014), The Brahan Seer (Acair Books, 2014), Volwys (Dog Horn Publishing, 2014), and The Sleep Corporation (The Exaggerated Press, 2015). A new combined collection of short stories and poems The Fallen West will be published by Snuggly Books in early 2018. His first poetry collection Eternity’s Windfall will be published by Red Squirrel in early 2018. A retrospective collection of his earlier poetry, Soured Utopias, will be published by Dog Horn in late 2018. “Yttrium: Part 2” is taken from his novel Barking Circus, forthcoming in 2018 from Eibonvale. “Yttrium: Part 1” appeared in TQF60.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. His website is at www.jacobedwards.id.au, his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, and his Twitter account is at www.twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Jessy Randall’s stories, poems, and other things have appeared in Asimov’s, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, McSweeney’s and Theaker’s (most recently in April 2017). She is a librarian at Colorado College and her website is bit.ly/JessyRandall. “Frakking Toasters” was originally written for the wonderful and now-defunct Verbatim: The Language Quarterly.

Libby Heily’s short stories have been published in The Write Room, Mixer Publishing, Bookends Review, The Dirty Pool, Kaaterskill Basin Literary Journal and Twisted Sister Literary Magazine. Her plays have received multiple staged readings around the country and have been produced at Longwood University, Davis and Elkins College, Sonorous Road Theater and by the Cary Playwrights Forum. Her Young Adult novel, Welcome to Sortilege Falls, was published in 2016 by Fire and Ice YA Publishing. The sequel, Wrong Side of the Rift, was published in November 2017.

Rafe McGregor is the author of The Value of Literature, The Architect of Murder, five collections of short fiction, and over one hundred articles and essays. He lectures at the University of York and can be found online at www.twitter.com/rafemcgregor.

S.J. Hosking enjoys a wide variety of literary genres, and historical fiction, horror, fantasy, science fiction, and gothic are amongst his favourites. His literary influences include, but are not limited to, Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett, Robert Harris, C.J. Sansom, and Stephen King. S.J. has had one story published so far, “The Princess and the Tower”, in Aphotic Realm magazine (Apparitions, June/July 2017). Aside from short stories, S.J. also writes poetry and flash fiction, and has had a sestina published online. He is currently working on his first novel. When not writing, S.J. enjoys running, walking, swimming and tennis.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction. His reviews, interviews and articles have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal.

Tim Major is a freelance editor and co-editor of the British Fantasy Society’s fiction journal, BFS Horizons. His first novel, You Don’t Belong Here, was published by Snowbooks. He has also released two novellas: Blighters (Abaddon) and Carus & Mitch (Omnium Gatherum). In 2018 ChiZine will publish his first YA novel, Luna Press will publish his first short story collection and Electric Dreamhouse Press will publish his non-fiction book about the silent crime film, Les Vampires. Tim’s short stories have appeared in Interzone, Not One of Us and numerous anthologies. Find out more at www.cosycatastrophes.wordpress.com.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Extreme Horror Writers: Two Months Left to Submit to UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2 Anthology

Contribute to an emerging subgenre and become a humanitarian in monsters’ clothing.

Many fiction anthologies, journals, and zines have a similar attitude when it comes to “excessive gore” or “shock value”—they don’t want it. We do… for the forthcoming sequel to Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction’s controversial UNSPLATTERPUNK! anthology.

Unsplatterpunk has all the grotesqueness and transgressive subject matter of splatterpunk, plus it contains a positive message—that’s where the “un” fits in.

We encourage emerging and established writers to “take a stab” at this subgenre and submit a story to UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2. Here’s the official call for submissions.

Unsplatterpunk is the villain that helps the needy, the pool of vomit that nourishes. So if you have some diabolical idea brewing, spew it out and send it to us. You have two months.

Call for submissions: UNSPLATTERPUNK! 2

Extravagantly grisly, stealthily virtuous: Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction seeks stories for second anthology in controversial subgenre.

Earlier this year, Theakers Quarterly Fiction #58 eviscerated the extreme horror community with the first ever unsplatterpunk anthology, UNSPLATTERPUNK! 

Unsplatterpunk overtly or subtly integrates a compassionate message into an otherwise splatterpunk story. In other words, unsplatterpunk retains all the taboo subject matter, over-the-top violence, and gruesome details of splatterpunk, but puts a positive spin on it.

Since the release of UNSPLATTERPUNK!, which the British Fantasy Society called “memorable and thought-provoking”, the subgenre has had a polarizing effect. Dr Rafe McGregor of the University of York calls unsplatterpunk “a very risky but highly original take on aesthetic education (or the ethical turn) for those philosophers (or theorists) amongst you”.

Once again, TQF is taking the low road to get to the high road. We’re looking for authors to submit stories that take the first anthology’s depravity and gore to a new low, while still imparting a benevolent message.

Douglas J. Ogurek will reassume editorial duties, while author, critic, educator, and philosopher Rafe McGregor will contribute a foreword.

Unpublished stories of 10,000 words or fewer are welcome. Alas, since TQF is a “for the love” market, we cannot offer monetary payment. Thus, we’re primarily seeking hobbyists who want to make a splash – maybe “splat” is a better word – with their writing rather than people who make their living this way. However, that's not to say we wouldn't welcome submissions by established splatterpunk writers willing to integrate a positive message into their stories. All authors will, like everyone, receive a free pdf of the widely distributed journal. The anthology will also be available for print and ebook purchase via Amazon.

Advice

• Offend John and Jane Doe in the first paragraph
• Embrace taboo subject matter
• Make story concept as attention-getting as death metal at a yoga session
• Convey a positive message, blatantly or subtly
• Thinking of writing a revenge story? Remember that revenge alone isn’t a virtue.

Be a part of the phenomenon that has evoked reader responses ranging from “ghastly” and “sickening” to “transgressive” and “crafty.”

Deadline: February 28, 2018

Word count: 500–10,000

Reprints: No

Multiple submissions: No

Simultaneous submissions: No

File name: [story title]-[author surname].doc

Payment: Non-paying zine (free epub, mobi, and pdf copies available to everyone including contributors) plus participation in an emerging subgenre

Send submissions as a .doc or .rtf attachment, along with a 3rd person bio, to TQFunsplatterpunk@gmail.com. Please include UNSPLATTERPUNK! in the subject line.

After publication, you are free to reprint your story elsewhere, but please credit Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction for original publication.

See standard guidelines for additional information on rights and legal matters.

Now out: Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #60!

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | print UK | print USA | Kindle UK | Kindle US

Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #60 is now available! It contains five stories: “The Lost Testament” by Rafe McGregor, “Turning Point” by Nicki Robson, “Yttrium, Part One” by Douglas Thompson, “Amongst the Urlap” by Andrew Peters, and “Doggerland” by Jule Owen. The wraparound cover is by Howard Watts, and the editorial answers the most urgent queries in Richard Herring’s Emergency Questions. The issue also includes almost forty pages of reviews by Douglas J. Ogurek, Rafe McGregor and Stephen Theaker.

They review books by Martha Wells, Lisa Tuttle, Mira Grant, Gwyneth Jones, Jim Butcher, Skottie Young and Michael Turner, plus the films Alien: Covenant, Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2, It Comes at Night, The Mummy, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, Prometheus, and Wonder Woman, the album Humanz by Gorillaz, the tv shows Iron Fist and Legion, and a pair of events: Eastercon 2017: Innominate (or at least two days of it), and Into the Unknown, the exhibition at the Barbican.

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Here are the kind and beautiful contributors to this issue:

Andrew Peters is an Egypt-based financial writer, who has recently started to publish fiction. His short story “In Dogpoo Park” was chosen as Editor’s Pick in the Aestas 2016 Short Story Competition run by Fabula Press, and was published in an anthology this year. Some of his flash fiction will also be appearing in the 2017 Fish Anthology, having been chosen in competition.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. Douglas’s website can be found at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Douglas Thompson won the Herald/Grolsch Question of Style Award in 1989, 2nd prize in the Neil Gunn Writing Competition in 2007, and the Faith/Unbelief Poetry Prize in 2016. His short stories and poems have appeared in a wide range of magazines and anthologies, including Ambit, New Writing Scotland and Albedo One. His first book, Ultrameta, published by Eibonvale Press in August 2009, was followed by eight subsequent novels and short story collections: Sylvow (Eibonvale Press, 2010), Apoidea (The Exaggerated Press, 2011), Mechagnosis (Dog Horn Publishing, 2012), Entanglement (Elsewhen Press, 2012), The Rhymer (Elsewhen Press, 2014), The Brahan Seer (Acair Books, 2014), Volwys (Dog Horn Publishing, 2014), and The Sleep Corporation (The Exaggerated Press, 2015). A new combined collection of short stories and poems The Fallen West will be published by Snuggly Books in late 2017/early 2018. His first poetry collection Eternity’s Windfall will be published by Red Squirrel in early 2018. A retrospective collection of his earlier poetry, Soured Utopias, will be published by Dog Horn in late 2018. “Yttrium: Part One” is taken from his novel Barking Circus, forthcoming in 2018 from Eibonvale. Part Two of “Yttrium” will be published in TQF61.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford. He provides the wraparound cover art for this issue, his thirtieth consecutive cover for us in the span of eight years. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his DeviantArt page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is available on Kindle.

Jule Owen was born and raised in Merseyside and now lives in London. By day she is a practising digital technologist, working on products that involve machine learning and automation, by night she writes stories about future and other worlds

Nicki Robson writes fantasy and horror fiction. She has had short stories placed in competitions run by the British Fantasy Society and others published in anthologies from Twilight Tales in the US. She is based in Yorkshire and is currently working on a YA fantasy novel.

Rafe McGregor is the author of The Value of Literature, The Architect of Murder, five collections of short fiction, and over one hundred magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. He lectures at the University of York and can be found online at @rafemcgregor.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction. He apologises for this issue being three months late, but expects the next one to be along quite soon.

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Back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are usually available for free download. However, Dropbox have just turned off their public folders function (they did warn me!), so unfortunately the download links for free epub, mobi and pdf copies of the back issues won't work till I rebuild them.

Winners of the Theaker's Quarterly Awards 2017

As announced in Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #59, these are the winners of the Theaker's Quarterly Awards 2017.

Audio

• 1st The Brenda and Effie Mysteries: Spicy Tea and Sympathy, by Paul Magrs (Bafflegab Productions)
• 2nd Doctor Who and the Ark in Space, by Ian Marter (BBC/Audible)
• 3rd Vince Cosmos: Glam Rock Detective, by Paul Magrs (Bafflegab Productions)

Books

• 1st Songs of a Dead Dreamer and Grimscribe, by Thomas Ligotti (Penguin Classics)
• 2nd The Last Weekend, by Nick Mamatas (PS Publishing)
• 3rd Slow Bullets, by Alastair Reynolds (Tachyon Publications)

Comics

• 1st The Glorkian Warrior and the Mustache of Destiny, by James Kochalka (First Second)
• 2nd Ms. Marvel Vol. 1: No Normal, by G. Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona (Marvel)
• 3rd The Savage Sword of Conan, Vol. 14, by Charles Dixon, Gary Kwapisz, Ernie Chan and chums (Dark Horse Books)

Films

• 1st Captain America: Civil War, by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (Marvel Entertainment et al.)
• 2nd Star Wars: The Force Awakens, by Lawrence Kasdan, J.J. Abrams and Michael Arndt (Lucasfilm et al.)
• 3rd X-Men: Apocalypse, by Simon Kinberg (Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation et al.)

Games

• 1st Trials Fusion Awesome Max Edition, by RedLynx (Ubisoft)
• 2nd Rare Replay, by Rare (Microsoft Studios)
• 3rd Saints Row IV: Re-Elected, by Volition Software (Deep Silver)

Music

• 1st It Follows: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, by Disasterpeace (Milan Records)
• 2nd —
• 3rd —

Television

• 1st Doctor Who, Season 9, by Steven Moffat and friends (BBC)
• 2nd The Flash, Season 1, by Andrew Kreisberg and many others (Warner Bros Television)
• 3rd Penny Dreadful, Season 2, by John Logan and chums (Sky Atlantic)

Issue of TQF

• 1st Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #56, edited by Stephen Theaker and John Greenwood
• 2nd Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #54, edited by Stephen Theaker and John Greenwood
• 3rd Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #57, edited by Stephen Theaker and John Greenwood

TQF cover art

• 1st Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #56, art by Howard Watts
• 2nd Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #55, art by Howard Watts
• 3rd Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #57, art by Howard Watts

Fiction from TQF

• 1st The Policeman and the Silence, by Patrick Whittaker
• 2nd Septs, by Charles Wilkinson
• 3rd Nold, by Stephen Theaker

Congratulations to all the winners and runners-up!

Items were eligible for our awards if they were reviewed in our magazine during 2016, whatever their original year of publication, or published in 2016, in the case of the TQF-specific awards. Our readers and the public were then able to vote for as many items in each category as they wanted.  To break any ties we referred to our reviewers’ star ratings, where relevant, and if that didn’t do the trick we invited Alexa to roll a dice with a suitable number of sides.

To claim their prestigious Theaker’s Quarterly Awards, pictured below, winners should email us at theakersquarterlyfiction@gmail.com with an address to which we can send them.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #59: now out!

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | Kindle UK | Kindle US | print UK | print US

Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #59 is now out! This issue, one of our best ever, contains seven short stories, all of them likely to amaze: “The Devil’s Hollow” by Rafe McGregor, “Give You a Game?” by Michael Wyndham Thomas, “The Baby Downstairs” by Jessy Randall, “The Constant Providers” by Charles Wilkinson, “Man + Van” by David Penn, “The Night They Sacked New Rome” by Elaine Graham-Leigh and “Anathema: The Underside” by Chris Roper. The issue also features the announcement of the first annual Theaker’s Quarterly Award winners, and an essay on fake internet reviews, plus a selection of the fake reviews we wrote to raise money for Comic Relief on Red Nose Day.

Then there are ninety pages of real reviews, by Stephen Theaker, Jacob Edwards, Douglas J. Ogurek and Rafe McGregor.

We review books and audios from Joey Graceffa, John Scalzi, James Lovegrove, Emily Foster, Greg Egan, Nick Mamatas, Bruce Campbell, S.T. Joshi, Oliver Langmead, Bruce Sterling, Lisa A. Koosis, Kai Ashante Wilson and Matthew Hughes; comics including Marceline Gone Adrift, Bloodshot: Reborn, The Complete Scarlet Traces, Groo: Fray of the Gods, The Great Darkness Saga, and X-Men: Legacy; films including Assassin’s Creed (reviewed in verse!), The Bye Bye Man, Get Out, Kong: Skull Island, The Lego Batman Movie, Logan, Rogue One, Spectral, and Split; plus a whole bunch of television programmes: Ash vs Evil Dead, Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, Doctor Who: The Power of the Daleks, The Expanse, iZombie, The Man in the High Castle, Sherlock, and Westworld. The spectacular wraparound cover is by Howard Watts.

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Here are the wise and generous contributors to this issue:

Charles Wilkinson’s publications include The Pain Tree and Other Stories (London Magazine Editions), Ag & Au (a pamphlet of poems from Flarestack), and his collection of strange tales and weird fiction, A Twist in the Eye, now out from Egaeus Press. His stories have appeared in Best Short Stories 1990 (Heinemann), Best English Short Stories 2 (W.W. Norton), Unthology (Unthank Books), Best British Short Stories 2015 (Salt) and Best Weird Fiction 2015 (Undertow Books), as well as in genre magazines/anthologies such as Black Static, Supernatural Tales, Horror Without Victims, The Dark Lane Anthology, Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, Phantom Drift, Bourbon Penn, Shadows & Tall Trees, and Nightscript. He lives in Powys, Wales.

Chris Roper is a copywriter living in London. He writes as much as he can in his spare time, exorcising horrible thoughts and bad dreams by committing them to paper. When not writing, he’s admonishing himself for not writing, which in turn leads him to red wine and Asian holidays.

David Penn’s short stories have appeared in the magazines Midnight Street, Whispers of Wickedness and previously in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, and his poems in Magma, Smith’s Knoll and the Poetry School anthology I Am Twenty People (Enitharmon, 2007). He lives in London, where he also works as a librarian.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. Douglas’s website can be found at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Elaine Graham-Leigh is a writer and campaigner based in London. When not bringing down the system from within, she writes speculative fiction and has had previous stories published in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, Jupiter SF, Bewildering Stories and The Harrow. Her website: www.redpuffin.co.uk.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford. He provides the spacetacular wraparound cover art for this issue. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his DeviantArt page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is available on Kindle.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. This writer, poet and recovering lexiphanicist’s website is at www.jacobedwards.id.au. He has a Facebook page at www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, where he posts poems and the occasional oddity, and he can now be found on Twitter too: https://twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Jessy Randall’s science fiction stories and poems have appeared in Asimov’s, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Strange Horizons, and Theaker’s (“The Night of Red Butterflies”, December 2013). Her most recent book is Suicide Hotline Hold Music, a collection of poems and comics. She is a librarian at Colorado College and her website is bit.ly/JessyRandall.

Michael Wyndham Thomas’s novels include The Mercury Annual and Pilgrims at the White Horizon, and his poetry collections include Port Winston Mulberry, Batman’s Hill, South Staffs, Come to Pass and The Stations of the Day. His work has appeared in The Antioch Review, Critical Survey, The London Magazine, Magazine Six, Stand Magazine and the TLS. His novella “Esp” was shortlisted for the UK Novella Award. He is currently working on Nowherian, the fictionalised memoir of a Grenadian traveller. Twitter: @thomasmichaelw. Blog: swansreport.blogspot.co.uk. Website: www.michaelwthomas.co.uk.

Rafe McGregor is the author of The Value of Literature, The Architect of Murder, six collections of short fiction, and one hundred and fifty magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. He lectures at the University of York and can be found online at @rafemcgregor.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, and the father of two amazing super-friends, one of whom also contributes a review to this issue.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Now out: Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #58: Unsplatterpunk!

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Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #58: Unsplatterpunk! is now out! Guest-edited by Douglas J. Ogurek, this is a special issue, an anthology featuring five founding tales of unsplatterpunk, a brand new genre! Douglas describes it as “extreme horror stories [that] offer a positive message, whether blatant or subtle, within their otherwise vile contents”. So don’t expect any slap-up dinners in this issue!

As Douglas says in his editorial, this isn’t a volume you’d want to pull out on family reading night, and you might want to avoid discussing it in detail with your coworkers. But it is interesting! Here’s what Douglas had to say about the stories in this issue:

In M.S. Swift’s deliberately disjointed “A Desert of Shadow and Bone”, brutality meets philosophy in an extravaganza of limb hacking, gentry slaughtering, and drug use that makes a statement about corporate greed and the repression of women. What starts as an extreme, albeit intimate ritual beside a tree-lined natural pool builds to a climax that is both apocalyptic and indicative of personal growth.

There’s something awry about an impending birth in “Quand les queues s’allongèrent”. When you discover what it is, you’ll get a jolt of humour and revulsion. Antonella Coriander offers a slashing take on misogyny and women’s empowerment.

Drew Tapley’s “The Fisherman’s Ring” delves into the absurd as he unveils what really happens in the secretive ceremony to select the next Pope. You get ringside seats for a series of trials full of pain-tertainment. You also get hope and solidarity.

In “The Armageddon Coat”, the collection’s longest work, Howard Watts (who also supplies the terrifying cover) takes us on a more serious journey of two pre-teens as they try to make sense of their world following an alien attack. The theme of innocence vs experience swirls amid political maneuvering, mass destruction, and vicious fighting to survive.

We also have a handful of reviews this issue, from Douglas himself, Rafe McGregor and Rose M. Rye (yes – after two long years we have once again published a female writer!), and they look at the work of Martin Charbonneau, Joe Dever, Gary Chalk, Neil Gaiman and Daniel Egnéus, as well as the films Arrival and Doctor Strange, and season eleven of the television show Supernatural. The issue concludes with twenty-four pages of notes and ratings for almost everything Stephen Theaker read during 2016 but didn’t review for us.

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Here are the munificent contributors to this issue:

Douglas J. Ogurek’s fiction, though banned on Mars, appears in over 40 Earth publications. He is the guest editor of this special issue. Ogurek founded the literary subgenre known as unsplatterpunk, which uses splatterpunk conventions (e.g. extreme violence, gore, taboo subject matter) to deliver a positive message. More at http://www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Drew Tapley is a copywriter and journalist, and has been publishing in Canada, Australia, and his native England for the last decade, both in print magazines and journals, as well as online. He is now based in Toronto, and has been making short films for the last five years. Some of his films have screened at film festivals throughout the world. He was recently published in the UK’s Popshot Magazine, and has two published books: one fiction, and one nonfiction.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford. He provides the wraparound cover art for this issue, as well as a brilliant story. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his DeviantArt page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is available on Kindle.

M.S. Swift writes horror and dark fantasy inspired by the ancient landscapes of the U.K. His contemporary horror tales have been published by Ghostwoods Books, the First United Church of Cthulhu, Schlock! Webzine and Schlock! Bi-monthly. He is currently working on a dark fantasy series inspired by the late medieval witch hunts, the first story of which has been published through Horrified Press. His long-term goal is to write a series of weird tales inspired by the early work of Wordsworth and Coleridge. He is paying off the accumulation of negative karma by working in the English education system.

Rafe McGregor Rafe McGregor is the author of The Value of Literature, The Architect of Murder, six collections of short fiction, and one hundred and fifty magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. He lectures at the University of York and can be found online at @rafemcgregor.

Rose M. Rye is an actual woman, honestly, but she’s writing for us under a pseudonym because she doesn’t really want to be hassled at work by people who disagree with her opinions about television.

Stephen Theaker’s reviews, interviews and articles have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal, as well as clogging up our pages. He shares his home with three slightly smaller Theakers and works in legal and medical publishing.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Closing to fiction submissions till April (except from female writers)

We have enough stories in hand for issue 59 now, so we are closing to fiction submissions until April 1, when we will re-open to subs for issue 60.

However, because all the stories accepted so far for issue 59 are by chaps, we'll remain open to fiction submissions from female writers (as well as new episodes in our ongoing serials).

Guidelines here.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #57: now out, in print and ebook!

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | print UK | print USA | Kindle UK | Kindle US

Issue fifty-seven of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction is now out!

It is one hundred and sixty-eight pages long, and features five tales of fantasy, horror and science fiction: “The Elder Secret’s Lair” by Rafe McGregor, “Nold” by Stephen Theaker, “On Loan” by Howard Watts, “The Battle Word” by Antonella Coriander, and “With Echoing Feet He Threaded” by Walt Brunston. The spectacular wraparound cover is by Howard Watts, and the editorial includes exciting news about the magazine’s plans for 2017. The issue also includes forty pages of reviews, and some sneaky interior art from John Greenwood.

In the Quarterly Review, Stephen Theaker, Douglas J. Ogurek, Jacob Edwards and Rafe McGregor consider audios written by Colin Brake, Jonathan Morris, Justin Richards and Marc Platt, books by Cate Gardner, Erika L. Satifka, Harun Siljak, Joe Dever and Karl Edward Wagner, and comics from Joshua Williamson and Fernando Dagnino, G. Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona, and Erik Larsen, plus the films Don’t Breathe, Ghostbusters: Answer the Call, Ouija: Origin of Evil and Suicide Squad, and the television programmes Preacher season one and The X-Files season ten.

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Here are the kindly contributors to this issue:

Antonella Coriander is not so sure about this. “The Battle Word” is the eighth episode of her ongoing Oulippean serial, Les aventures fantastiques de Beatrice et Veronique.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. He lives in a Chicago suburb with the woman whose husband he is and their pit bull Phlegmpus Bilesnot. Douglas’s website can be found at: http://www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford who provides both a story and the amazing wraparound cover art for this issue. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his deviantart page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is now available on Kindle.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. This writer, poet and recovering lexiphanicist’s website is at http://www.jacobedwards.id.au. He has a Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, where he posts poems and the occasional oddity, and he can be found on Twitter too: https://twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Rafe McGregor is the author of The Value of Literature, The Architect of Murder, five collections of short fiction, and over one hundred magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. He lectures at the University of York and can be found online at https://twitter.com/rafemcgregor.

Stephen Theaker’s reviews, interviews and articles have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal, as well as clogging up our pages. He shares his home with three slightly smaller Theakers, no longer runs the British Fantasy Awards, and works in legal and medical publishing.

Walt Brunston’s adaptation of the classic television story, Space University Trent: Hyperparasite, is now available on Kindle.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #56: now out, in print and ebook

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | print UK | print USA | Kindle UK | Kindle US

Issue fifty-six of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction is two hundred and forty pages long, and features six stories of fantasy, horror and science fiction: “Concerning Strange Events at the Manor of Sir Hugh de Villiers, Valiant Knight” David Penn (transcribed from the Middle English), “Three Bodies” by Cam Rhys Lay, “The Christmas Cracker” by Rafe McGregor, “Mr Kitchell Says Thank You” by Charles Wilkinson, “The Cutting Room” by Chuck Von Nordheim, and “Gliese and the Walking Man” by Howard Watts. They are arranged roughly in chronological order, so fantasy fans should start at the beginning, and science fiction fans should start at the end.

The spectacularly superheroic cover is by Howard Watts, and the emergency editorial by Howard Phillips. The issue also includes over sixty pages of reviews, and some sneaky interior art from John Greenwood.

Writers, artists and other creators whose work is reviewed in this issue include: Adam Cozad, Alberto Giolitti, Angelica Gorodischer, Charles Dixon, Chip Proser, Christian Højgaard, Christopher Markus, Craig Brewer, Craig Mazin, Dennis-Pierre Filippi, Dick Wood, Dirk Maggs, Ernie Chan, Evan Spiliotopoulos, Gabriel Rodriguez, Gary Kwapisz, Guy Davis, Jean-Florian Tello, Jeffrey Boam, Jerry Frissen, Joe Hill, Joe Phillips, John Connolly, Mateus Santolouco, Michael Alan Nelson, Mike Johnson, Naimi Mitchison, Nevio Zeccara, Nick Mamatas, Nicolas Wright, Nicole Kornher-Stace, Philippe Thirault, Simon Kinberg, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Stephen McFeely, Stephen Molnar, Steven Savile, Thomas Ligotti, and Tim Lebbon.

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Here are the delightful contributors to this issue:

Prior to returning to school to pursue his MFA in Fiction, Cam Rhys Lay worked for a decade doing online marketing and publishing pretentious (but beautiful) leatherbound books. His fiction has been published or is forthcoming in Eclectica, The Society for Misfit Stories, and No Extra Words. He is currently finishing his first novel. To learn more about Cam and his writing you can visit his website at http://www.camrhyslay.com.

Charles Wilkinson’s publications include The Pain Tree and Other Stories (London Magazine Editions) and Ag & Au (Flarestack), a pamphlet of his poems. His stories have appeared in Best Short Stories 1990 (Heinemann), Best English Short Stories 2 (W.W. Norton, USA), Unthology (Unthank Books), Best British Short Stories 2015 (Salt), London Magazine, Under the Radar, Prole, Able Muse Review (USA), Ninth Letter (USA), The Sea in Birmingham (TSFG) and in genre magazines/anthologies such as Supernatural Tales, Horror Without Victims (Megazanthus Press), Rustblind and Silverbright (Eibonvale Press), Phantom Drift, Bourbon Penn, Shadows & Tall Trees, Prole, Nightscript and Best Weird Fiction 2015 (Undertow Books, Canada). He lives in Powys, Wales, where he is heavily outnumbered by members of the ovine community. A Twist in the Eye, his collection of strange tales and weird fiction, is now out from Egaeus Press, including stories that first appeared here in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction.

Chuck Von Nordheim lives in northeastern Los Angeles country at the geo-biological point where chapparal merges into pure desert. Currently, he poses as an MFA fiction candidate at CSU San Bernardino on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The rest of the week, he scours Mojave Desert garage sales and antique shops for Highway 66 memorabilia that he can sell on eBay to pay his tuition. His other magreal/surreal works have appeared in Three-Lobed Burning Eye, Ealain, Twisted Tongue, and Daily Science Fiction.

David Penn has previously published fiction in the magazines Midnight Street and Whispers of Wickedness, and poetry in the magazines Magma and Smith’s Knoll. He lives in London where he also works, as a librarian.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. He lives in a Chicago suburb with the woman whose husband he is and their pit bull Phlegmpus Bilesnot. Douglas’s website can be found at: http://www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Howard Phillips contributes the must-read editorial.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford who also provides the wraparound cover art for this issue. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his deviantart page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is now available on Kindle.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. This writer, poet and recovering lexiphanicist’s website is at www.jacobedwards.id.au. He has a Facebook page at www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, where he posts poems and the occasional oddity, and he can now be found on Twitter too: https://twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Rafe McGregor has published over one hundred and twenty short stories, novellas, magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. His work includes crime fiction, weird tales, military history, literary criticism, and academic philosophy.

Stephen Theaker’s reviews have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal, as well as clogging up our pages. He shares his home with three slightly smaller Theakers, runs the British Fantasy Awards (for the rest of this month), and works in legal and medical publishing.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #55: now out, in print and ebook!

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | print UK | print USA | Kindle UK | Kindle US

Issue fifty-five of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction is now out!

It is guest edited by the zine’s long-time cover artist, Howard Watts, and includes stories inspired by his art, including competition winner “The Departure” by Mark Lewis, “Our Sad Triangle” by Len Saculla, and “The Stone Gods of Superspace” by Howard Phillips (a TQF crossover special featuring many friends from past issue), plus the more tangentially related “This Alien I” by Antonella Coriander and “The Little Shop That Sold My Heart”, and an entire weird novella from Anthony Thomson, “My Place”. Then a sixty-page review section features the work of Stephen Theaker, Douglas J. Ogurek, Jacob Edwards, Howard Watts and Rafe McGregor. The cover art is by Howard Watts.

We look at the work of Alcatena, Andy Diggle, Brian K. Vaughan, Cherie Priest, David Tallerman, Douglas Adams, Frazer Irving, Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Guy Adams, Henry Flint, Jimmy Broxton, Joe Dever, John Wagner, Peter Tomasi, Phil Hester, Pia Guerra, Steve Yeowell and Tony Harris. Plus there are reviews of 10 Cloverfield Lane, Ash vs Evil Dead, Deadpool, Fallout 4, Fear the Walking Dead: Season 1, Gods of Egypt, Jessica Jones: Season 1, Sherlock: The Abominable Bride, The Boy and The Witch.

The spectacular wraparound cover art is, as ever, by the marvellous Howard Watts.

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Here are the kindly contributors to this issue:

Anthony Thomson has an idea he lives in Brighton, but can never be sure. His short story “Burning Up” was published by ABeSea magazine. He’s influenced by the paintings of Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varos, and he mines the soundscapes of sixties music for psychedelic nuggets.

Antonella Coriander has never been happier. “This Alien I”, which appears in this issue, is the sixth episode of her ongoing Oulippean serial, Les aventures fantastiques de Beatrice et Veronique.

Len Saculla had a story entitled “Zom-Boyz Have All the Luck” in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #52. He has also had work published in the BFS Journal, Wordland, Unspoken Water and anthologies from Kind of a Hurricane Press in America. In 2015, he was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Mark Lewis has recently had work published in The Four Seasons anthology from Kind of a Hurricane Press, and in collaboration with fellow Clockhouse London Writers in The Masks anthology by Black Shuck Press. He has also had fiction and poetry widely published in the independent press, including the British Fantasy Society Journal, Escape Velocity, Scheherazade, Estronomicon, The Nail, and others. He has also written and performed in pantomimes. More of Mark’s writing can be found at: http://syntheticscribe.wordpress.com.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. He lives in a Chicago suburb with the woman whose husband he is and their pit bull Phlegmpus Bilesnot. Douglas’s website can be found at: http://www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Howard Phillips typed up the novella that appears in this issue, “The Stone Gods of Superspace”, after finding a draft version in his moleksine notebook. He does not remember writing it, and is not sure whether those events really happened or not.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford who also provides the wraparound cover art for this issue. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his deviantart page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is now available on Kindle.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. This writer, poet and recovering lexiphanicist’s website is at www.jacobedwards.id.au. He has a Facebook page at www.facebook.
com/JacobEdwardsWriter, where he posts poems and the occasional oddity, and he can now be found on Twitter too: https://twitter.com/ToastyVogon.

Rafe McGregor has published over one hundred and twenty short stories, novellas, magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. His work includes crime fiction, weird tales, military history, literary criticism, and academic philosophy.

Stephen Theaker’s reviews have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal, as well as clogging up our pages. He shares his home with three slightly smaller Theakers, runs the British Fantasy Awards, and works in legal and medical publishing.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.

Closing to submissions till December (except for the Unsplatterpunk Special!)

We've just closed to submissions for Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #56, and looking at what we have in hand already for that issue, and the additional submissions that have come in over the last month, and the pile of material produced by all of my hard-working pseudonyms, I think we have enough now for both #56 and #57, while #58 is a special issue (see below), so I've decided to close to regular submissions until December.

The exception would be reviews, which are always welcome, and further instalments in any of our ongoing serials, which we can always squeeze in.

Frustrated? Need another outlet for your literary genius? Turn your attention instead to #58, our upcoming Unsplatterpunk Special, edited by TQF regular Douglas Ogurek: submission guidelines here for that one!

By the way, apologies for the delay in publishing issue 55. It's all my fault. Our guest editor Howard Watts completed his work a while ago and it's been waiting for me to do my bit. It'll be with you soon, and it'll be worth the wait, I promise. Issue 56 will probably follow hard on its heels.

TQF contributors: send us your news!

If you have ever contributed to Theaker's Quarterly Fiction, you'll probably know that we have a long-standing offer to run free advertisements for suitable projects in the magazine. And if you don't, sorry, it's because I forgot to say, but it still applies!

I thought it might be nice to collect smaller bits of news from contributors too, for a section in the magazine, maybe also for blog posts, if there were enough to make a blog post worthwhile.

So if you've been a contributor to the magazine, and have any news about what you're up to now, here's the link. Bookmark it and let us know whenever you've got something going on.

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #54: now out!

free epub | free mobi | free pdf | print UK | print USA | Kindle UK | Kindle US

Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #54 is here. It features a new short story by Charles Wilkinson, “Septs”, and an entire novella – complete in this issue! – by Patrick Whittaker, former winner of the BFS Short Story Competition. “The Policeman and the Silence” concerns a murder investigation in the weird town of Kaza-Blanka. I think you’ll love both stories. The issue also includes a tremendously exciting editorial where I (a) apologise for this issue being late, (b) talk about a publisher who doesn’t pay their reviewers slamming people who don’t pay other types of writer, and (c) look back at my reading in 2015. The issue also includes thirty-one reviews, by Douglas J. Ogurek, Jacob Edwards and me.

We look at the work of Charles Chilton, Felicia Day, Warren Ellis, Johann Peter Hebel, K.J. Parker, Terry Pratchett, H.G. Wells, Royce Prouty, Malcolm C. Lyons, Pu Songling, Sam Dyer, Leo, Garth Ennis and John McCrea, Brian Clevinger and Scott Wegener, CLAMP, Robbie Morrison and Brian Williamson, Keith Giffen and Robert Loren Fleming, Alexandro Jodorowsky and Zoran Janjetov, and Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra. Plus there are reviews of Ant-Man, Goosebumps, The Green Inferno, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2, Krampus, Star Wars: The Force Awakens (twice), The Visit, Trials Fusion Awesome Max Edition, Arrow Season 2, Doctor Who Season 9, and The Flash Season 1.

The amazing wraparound cover art is, as ever, by the marvellous Howard Watts.

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Here are the kindly contributors to this issue:

Charles Wilkinson’s books have included The Pain Tree and Other Stories (London Magazine Editions) and Ag & Au, a pamphlet of his poems. His stories have appeared in Best Short Stories 1990 (Heinemann), Best English Short Stories 2 (W.W. Norton), Unthology (Unthank Books), Best British Short Stories 2015 (Salt), London Magazine, Under the Radar, Prole, Able Muse Review, Ninth Letter, The Sea in Birmingham and in genre magazines/anthologies such as Supernatural Tales, Horror Without Victims (Megazanthus Press), Rustblind and Silverbright (Eibonvale Press), Phantom Drift (USA), Bourbon Penn (USA), Shadows & Tall Trees, Prole, Nightscript and Best Weird Fiction 2015 (Undertow Books). He lives in Powys, Wales, where he is heavily outnumbered by members of the ovine community. A Twist in the Eye, his collection of strange tales and weird fiction, is forthcoming from Egaeus Press. Several of the stories first appeared in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. He lives in a Chicago suburb with the woman whose husband he is and their pit bull Phlegmpus Bilesnot. Douglas’s website can be found at: http://www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford who also provides the wraparound cover art for this issue. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his deviantart page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is now available on Kindle.

Jacob Edwards also writes 42-word reviews for Derelict Space Sheep. This writer, poet and recovering lexiphanicist’s website is at http://www.jacobedwards.id.au. He has a Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/JacobEdwardsWriter, where he posts poems and the occasional oddity.

Patrick Whittaker has made the occasional foray into short film making and has two feature film scripts in pre-production. Two of his shorts – The Raven and Raspberry Ripple – have won awards. He has an honours degree in Media Production. In 2009, he won the British Fantasy Society Short Story Competition with “Dead Astronauts”, a tale of odd goings-on in English suburbia. His dystopian novel, Sybernika, is published by Philistine Press: http://www.philistinepress.com.

Stephen Theaker’s reviews have appeared in Interzone, Black Static, Prism and the BFS Journal, as well as clogging up our pages. He shares his home with three slightly smaller Theakers, runs the British Fantasy Awards, and works in legal, medical and political publishing.

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As ever, all back issues of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction are available for free download.