Monthly Archives: January 2012

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Ambient Etude 6

The latest of my series of ambient music pieces is now available for download via the sidebar widget on my homepage. It’s a slow, moody piece, maybe the most “classic” of my ambient compositions so far. What I personally like about it is that I finally found, at least in the middle ranges, a string sound that comes close to those wistful mellotron strings that many listeners may remember from pop and rock songs of the seventies.

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Update on my short fiction blog: On Nirmal Verma

I have just posted an update on my blog A World of Short Fiction. This time it’s the short article “The Master of the Unspoken” about the major Hindi writer Nirmal Vermal. As always I hope that my minor remarks may inspire some readers to read works of this subtle and very human writer. Notes of English and German translations are given. Comments are welcome.

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“Die letzten Tage der Ewigkeit” layouted and proofread

Ernst Wurdack recently completed the layout of my story collection “Die letzten Tage der Ewigkeit”, to be published by Wurdack Verlag in the course of 2012/13. I have proofread the book layout in December and send my last corrections to editor Armin Rösler (whom I have to thank for his meticulous work). My readers may refer to Wurdack’s website for the final publishing date of the book.

The collection is introduced by Franz Rottensteiner and features, among others, my new novella “Zur Feier meines Todes” and a new extended version of my much-praised novella “Ich fürchte kein Unglück”. I have reworked some passages that weren’t completely convincing in the original version and added about five pages of previously unpublished material. I think, however, that these minor changes have decisively improved the original story as published in Nova 4.

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Progress report “In situ”

Every writer has his share of projects that for one reason or another have to wait patiently for the right circumstances to be finally realized. And you can only be grateful if you’re blessed with a publisher who doesn’t lose his good will and his believe in your work when something like this happens. In my case it’s my novella/novel “In situ” and my publisher Harald Giersche (Begedia Verlag) that I’m determined to reconcile with each other in the first half of this year.

What started as a story soon turned out to  be too long for any magazine or anthology publication and Harald was so kind to accept the novella as a standalone publication for his recently founded publishing house. Recurring health problems kept me from completing the book the previous year but at least 100 pages are written and I’ve recently wrote a new outline for the rest, clearing up the whole concept and preventing it from getting too long and losing its focus. It’s the story of a man who is offered a rather bizarre chance to revive his deceased wife. My readers may discover some parallels with my award-winning novella “Ich fürchte kein Unglück”.

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“The End of All Days” to be published in Romania

As Cristian Tamas informed me, my story “The End of All Days” – the first that I’ve directly written in English (and even read to a receptive audience at the Ölberg Lesefestival this year in Wuppertal) – will soon be published in the magazine of the Romanian Science Fiction and Fantasy Association (SRSFF). They will also translate my article on current German science fiction that was initially written for a Spanish web-magazine and has since been republished in English at InterNova.

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“Der Moloch” translated into Romanian

As Horia Nicola Ursu told me in a Facebook chat, my novella “The Moloch”, winner of the Kurd Laßwitz Preis 2008 for the best German sf story of the year, is currently being translated into Romanian to be published by Millennium Books in a series of booklength novellas. Horaia is interested in novellas by further European sf writers and I will try my best to bring him into contact with outstanding sf writers from Germany and other countries.

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Ambient Etude 5

I have just completed the fifth piece in my series of short ambient music compositions. This time it’s a long drone with a lot of rhythmic granular synthesis involved. An .mp3 file of the composition can be downloaded via the sidebar widget.

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Basic information completed

All basic information about me and my various activities – accessible via the main menu – are now completed, including a reference list of my work as a copywriter and translator for my clients. A download widget has been added to the sidebar. Interested clients can download a zip file with my reference list and some work samples here. I also offer my music recordings for download.

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Hello all!

It’s done. The unthinkable has happened and even I have finally got my lazy ass into motion to create my very own homesite in the World Wide Web. All my readers, collaborators, friends, enemies, past and future sweethearts etc. will soon find here all the latest news about my various activities, mostly in the field of science fiction writing, editing and criticism, but also in electronic music and in cross-cultural collaboration in general.

Since I’m increasingly operating  internationally and even have started to write in English recently this site will be completely in English. So all the wimps among you who miss their German mother tongue here, be assured that you came to the wrong place and that, whenever I can spare a little time, I’ll admire you for having circumvented the only truly international language humanity has created so far. It’s quite a personal achievement to remain so ignorant! (Of course it has its drawbacks – for example you can’t understand this insult 🙂 )

Okay, maybe a little bit of German may fit here: “Ich bin neu hier. Ich komm jetzt öfter!”

See you!