Juliana sez, "Think Galactic, a Chicago-based reading group, is proud to announce that this month they're reading three stories from from Pump Six and Other Stories by Paolo Bacigalupi. When asked nicely, Bacigalupi and Night Shade Books created a free PDF download of the stories available for book group members and random interwebs denizens to enjoy! — Read the rest

It's time for another Boing Boing seasonal tradition: our charitable giving guide, a list of charities we personally support and want to give more attention to. And as in previous years, we invite you to add your own favorite charities to the list in the comments section. — Read the rest

The Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Workshop at the University of California at San Diego has announced its 2009 instructor lineup: Holly Black, Larissa Lai, Robert Crais, and Kim Stanley Robinson with Elizabeth Hand and Paul Park. Clarion is the oldest science fiction writing workshop, a legendary boot-camp for writers (I'm a proud graduate, instructor, and director of the charitable Clarion Foundation). — Read the rest

Cole sez, "Maureen F. McHugh's speculative fiction collection MOTHERS & OTHER MONSTERS has been released online by Small Beer Press as a free Creative Commons download."

Small Beer is knocking them out of the park with CC releases by some of science fiction's most talented, most brilliant short fiction writers. — Read the rest

The Starry Rift, a new anthology of teen-oriented science fiction, comes out today. It's edited by Jonathan Strahan, and includes fiction by Neil Gaiman, Steven Baxter, Greg Egan, Jeffrey Ford, Gwyneth Jones, Kathleen Goonan, Ian McDonald, Kelly Link, Scott Westerfeld, Garth Nix, Walter Jon Williams and others — including me (with my story Anda's Game). — Read the rest

I'm still on paternity leave, but a couple of matters have come up that are too important to wait (important enough to blog while my daughter naps on my chest!). Here's one from the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' workshop, on whose Board I sit (I'm also a graduate and a former instructor):

Applications are now being accepted for the 2008 Clarion Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers' Workshop at U.C.

Emily sez, "Taos Toolbox is a writer's workshop being run by Walter Jon Williams and Kelly Link in the summer of 2008. The workshop is an advanced workshop, aimed at grads of the Clarion/Odyssey science fiction/fantasy writing workshops to help them polish their skills and learn more about the business of writing. — Read the rest

It's that time of year again — time to make some charitable donations while the giving spirit is on you and while you have the chance to shelter some of your income from the revenooers. I'm rerunning last year's Charitable giving guide for the end-of-year, with a few updates. — Read the rest

Small Beer press is the publisher started by Kelly Link and Gavin Grant, publishers of incredibly brilliant, mind-boggling science fiction and fantasy. They're copyfighter-friendly too, with many Creative Commons releases — and they're committed to publishing some of the best independent work in the field. — Read the rest

The Clarion Science Fiction Writers' Workshop has announced its instructor lineup for summer 2008 — and it's a stellar bunch! Clarion is a kind of six-week boot-camp for sf writers (I'm a graduate, sometime instructor and member of the Board of Directors for The Clarion Foundation, the nonprofit that oversees the workshop), and this year's teachers are: Kelly Link, James Patrick Kelly, Mary Anne Mohanraj, Neil Gaiman, Nalo Hopkinson and Geoff Ryman. — Read the rest

This summer marks the first year that the venerable Clarion Writers' Workshop will run at the University of California at San Diego. Previously, the legendary science fiction writers' boot-camp was hosted at Michigan State, where I attended it in 1992 and taught in 2005. — Read the rest

It's time to donate — the time of year when you have to give your money to charity or turn it over to the gubmint. I've just done a marathon round of end-of-year charitable giving:

US Charities

Electronic Frontier Foundation: EFF always gets my largest annual donation. — Read the rest

Alex Wilson, a student at the legendary Clarion science fiction writers' workshop, has posted a roundup of the blogs of this year's Clarion and Clarion West workshops, who are currently at week five of their six-week programs. Clarion is an intensive, boot-camp style workshop, taught by leading professionals, with an excellent track-record of graduating talented, successful writers like Dale Bailey, Octavia Butler, Ben Rosenbaum, Bruce Sterling, Lucius Sheppard and many others. — Read the rest

The Locus Awards for science fiction and fantasy were just announced, and my story I, Robot won for best novelette! Thank you so much to everyone who voted for me, and to Eileen Gunn for publishing it and for delivering the acceptance speech I reproduce below. — Read the rest

My friend Lauren McLaughlin, an excellent new sf writer, has a story up on today's Salon — "The perfect man" — the story of a woman who found true love by designing an AI, and then turning him loose.

Martin was a mouth breather.

Small Beer Press, which publishes wonderful science fiction and fantasy titles like Kelly Link's Magic for Beginners, is having a giant sale to raise cash to cover its printers' bills. This is a rare opportunity to get hold of some of the finest genre lit being published today while doing a solid for an amazing, ground-breaking, Creative Commons-friendly specialty press:

Get a Massive Box of Books: The Mount, Carmen Dog, Report to the Men's Club, Travel Light, Mockingbird, Perfect Circle, Trampoline: an anthology, Kalpa Imperial, Meet Me in the Moon Room · 9 good books: Only $59

Carol Emshwiller 3-for-1 Super Special:
The Mount, Carmen Dog, Report to the Men's Club
Don't forget to tell us which titles you'd like!

The Clarion Foundation is the charitable organization that oversees the legendary Clarion science fiction writers' workshop, and it's seeking your help in the form of donated banner-space on your site.

I'm on the Board of the Foundation, a new nonprofit, and we've just produced our first-ever marketing campaign with the generous volunteer assistance of Grad Conn, my friend and old business-partner. — Read the rest

My story, I, Robot, is a finalilst for this year's British Science Fiction Awards. The story was the first Creative Commons-licensed work published on The Infinite Matrix webzine, and it's subsequently gone on to sell to two of the three year's best science fiction anthologies — w00t! — Read the rest

Amazon is hosting author-blogs alongside of the sell-pages for those authors' books. I think that this is an incredibly important development, one that recognizes that in the present day, an artist's ability to be conversationally engaged with her audience is a major potential source of career-success. — Read the rest

I've joined the Board of Directors of the Clarion Foundation, a new nonprofit that will manage the Clarion Writers' Workshop, a "boot-camp for sf writers" at Michigan State University that I graduated from in 1992 and taught this past summer. The workshop runs every summer for six weeks, and accepts some 17 students each year. — Read the rest