BCS #209, our Eighth Anniversary Double-Issue, is out today!

A.M. Dellamonica, a recent winner of the Aurora Award, offers “The Boy Who Would Not Be Enchanted,” a young person on a sea visit to challenging new lands. Gregory Norman Bossert, whose BCS story “The Telling” won the World Fantasy Award in 2013, returns to BCS with “The Wind Shall Blow,” a tale of war-torn border Scotland and a newcomer facing guilt and blame.

Rose Lemberg (“Geometries of Belonging” in BCS #183, “Grandmother-nai-Leylit’s Cloth of Winds” in BCS #175, among others) returns to BCS with “The Book of How to Live,” a new story set in their Birdverse world, featuring protagonists from different walks of society drawn together. Michael Anthony Ashley (“Hence the King from Kagehana” in BCS #81, “To Kiss the Granite Choir” in BCS #27) offers “A Courtship of Beasts,” a tale of love and time.

(The Dellamonica and Lemberg stories won’t be released on the website until next week, but they are available now in the ebook of the full issue, on Kindle and at WeightlessBooks.com.)

The BCS Audio Fiction Podcast episode is BCS 183: The Wind Shall Blow by Gregory Norman Bossert, the story of border Scotland. It’s guest narrated by Alasdair Stuart of the Escape Artists podcasts.

The From the Archives story with BCS #209 is “Boat in Shadows, Crossing,” Tori Truslow’s BSFA Award Finalist story of a journey, different walks of society, and love, from BCS #113 and podcast BCS 100. All behind new cover art for our eighth anniversary: “Ambush” by Raphael Lacoste.

There’s also a giveaway for a signed copy of BCS author Carrie Vaughn’s new short fiction collection Amaryllis and Other Stories, in this post. It ends ends Wed. Oct. 5, so enter soon!

Our Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale continues: buy or renew a BCS Ebook Subscription or buy Best of BCS Year Seven at Weightless Books, and you’ll get a free BCS anthology of your choice.

In eight (!) years of BCS, we’ve published over 425 stories and 215 audio fiction podcasts. And there’s more to come! Thank you for reading!

In conjunction with BCS #209, our Eighth Anniversary Double-Issue, and the new Best of BCS Year Seven anthology, we’ve giving away a signed copy of Carrie Vaughn’s new short fiction collection Amaryllis and Other Stories!

Amaryllis and Other Stories contains eighteen of Carrie’s stories, including “Sun, Stone, Spear” from BCS #169 and podcast BCS 146.

“Sun, Stone, Spear” is also in The Best of BCS, Year Seven, our new anthology from the last year of BCS, which includes stories by K.J. Parker, Yoon Ha Lee, Aliette de Bodard, Fran Wilde, Rose Lemberg, and more.

(During our Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale, buy Best of BCS Year Seven at Weightless Books and you’ll get a free second BCS anthology of your choice.)

To enter, comment on this post (here) and tell us your favorite story that’s in Best of BCS Year Seven.

Your comment will enter you in a random drawing for the signed copy of Amaryllis and Other Stories. This giveaway ends Thurs. Oct 6. This giveaway has ended. (Full Rules are at the end of this post.)

Good luck!

Full rules for the signed Carrie Vaughn Amaryllis and Other Stories giveaway:

You must leave your comment on this Amaryllis and Other Stories Giveaway post. Comments left anywhere else will not enter you in the giveaway.

You must mention a story that appears in Best of BCS Year Seven. Comments that do not mention a story that appears in Best of BCS Year Seven will not enter you in the giveaway.

You must post your comment before midnight PST on Thurs. Oct. 6. Any comments posted after that will not be eligible.

Entrants will be entered in a random drawing to win the book.

BCS will conduct the random drawing from all eligible entries. The copy of Amaryllis and Other Stories, which is signed to BCS, will be mailed to the winner.

You must use a valid email address when you submit your comment (otherwise we won’t be able to contact you if you win).

Each person will be entered only once in the random drawing (even if you leave more than one eligible comment).

BCS is not responsible for comments that get lost or caught in our spam filtering or don’t show up in our system, or email addresses that get garbled or otherwise rendered unusable for contacting an entrant.

This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook or Twitter. Participants are providing information to BCS and Firkin Press and not to Facebook or Twitter or anyone else.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask them in this post or via our Contact page. Good luck!

BCS #208 is out today, featuring two stories at the intersection of culture and legend.

Alex Dally MacFarlane (“Written on the Hides of Foxes” in BCS #156, “Singing Like a Hundred Dug-up Bones” in BCS #121 and podcast BCS 104, among others) returns to BCS with “Teeth, Tapestries,” a story of struggle in the present and in legend.

Jonathan Edelstein offers “Abere and the Poisoner,” a story of monologue and nested tales, legends and gods, in a world rich with culture.

The BCS Audio Fiction Podcast episode is BCS 182: Abere and the Poisoner, the Jonathan Edelstein tale of nested narratives, legends, and gods. It’s guest-narrated by M.K. Hobson, who has narrated past BCS Podcast episodes such as BCS 176: Laws of Night and Silk by Seth Dickinson and BCS 166: The Three Dancers of Gizari by Tamara Vardomskaya.

The From the Archives story with BCS #208 is “The Three Feats of Agani” by Christie Yant, from BCS #100 and podcast BCS 086, a tale of people interacting with legends and gods, not unlike “Abere and the Poisoner.”

Our Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale continues at Weightless Books! Buy the new Best of BCS Year Seven or buy/renew a BCS Ebook Subscription, and you’ll get a free BCS anthology of your choice. All proceeds go to pay our authors and artists!

To celebrate the eighth anniversary of BCS and our new ebook anthology The Best of BCS, Year Seven, we’re having an Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale!

Buy or renew a BCS Ebook Subscription or buy Best of BCS Year Seven at Weightless Books, and you’ll get a free BCS anthology of your choice.

Best of BCS Year Seven has eighteen great BCS stories by authors such as K.J. Parker, Carrie Vaughn, Yoon Ha Lee, and Aliette de Bodard, including “Grandmother-nai-Leylit’s Cloth of Winds” by Rose Lemberg, a finalist for the Nebula Awards.

BCS Ebook Subscriptions are still only $15.99 for a whole year/26 issues (that’s less than 30 cents a story). Subscribers can get issues delivered directly to their Kindle or smart phone (any device with an email address), and they get new issues early, a week before the website.

A free BCS anthology is a $3.99 value. Choose any of our Best of BCS anthologies (which include multiple stories by Aliette de Bodard, Yoon Ha Lee, Marie Brennan, Richard Parks, Gemma Files, Seth Dickinson, E. Catherine Tobler, Alex Dally MacFarlane, Gregory Norman Bossert and more) or our theme anthologies Ceaseless West and Ceaseless Steam.

The ebook subscriptions and anthologies are also a great way to support BCS–all proceeds go to pay our artists and authors.

The sale will end soon, so make sure you buy your BCS subscription or Best of BCS Year Seven at WeightlessBooks.com now!

Our new anthology The Best of BCS, Year Seven is out today at major ebook retailers like Kindle Store and iTunes!

(It was out early last week at Weightless Books. Buy it there and get a free second anthology, as part of our Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale...)

The Best of BCS, Year Seven has eighteen great stories from the seventh year of BCS, by such authors as K.J. Parker, Carrie Vaughn, Yoon Ha Lee, Aliette de Bodard, Richard Parks, and Gemma Files, Rich Larson, and Fran Wilde. It includes “Grandmother-nai-Leylit’s Cloth of Winds” by Rose Lemberg, a finalist for the Nebula Awards.

The Best of BCS, Year Seven is now available for only $3.99 at ebook stores, including Amazon Kindle, Kobo, B&N, iBooks/iTunes, and Weightless Books.

All proceeds go to pay BCS authors and artists for their work. Pick up a copy today, to get some great BCS stories in a handy collection and support us at the same time. Thank you!

Our new anthology The Best of BCS, Year Seven is out early today at WeightlessBooks.com, with a free extra as part of our Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale!

Best of BCS, Year Seven contains eighteen great stories from the seventh year of BCS, by authors such as K.J. Parker, Carrie Vaughn, Yoon Ha Lee, Aliette de Bodard, Richard Parks, and Gemma Files. It includes “Grandmother-nai-Leylit’s Cloth of Winds” by Rose Lemberg, a finalist for the 2015 Nebula Awards.

Best of BCS, Year Seven is available early exclusively at WeightlessBooks.com. It costs only $3.99, and all proceeds go to pay BCS authors and artists for their work.

Buy now and, as part of our Eighth Anniversary Ebook Sale at Weightless Books, you’ll also get a free second BCS anthology of your choice!

Choose from all our other Best of BCS anthologies (which include multiple stories by Aliette de Bodard, Yoon Ha Lee, Marie Brennan, Richard Parks, Gemma Files, Seth Dickinson, E. Catherine Tobler, and more) or our theme anthologies Ceaseless West and Ceaseless Steam. Get two convenient ebooks of great BCS stories for the price of one, and help support the magazine at the same time.

If you didn’t subscribe to BCS until recently or missed any past issues, check out our bundles of back issues at WeightlessBooks.com. 

Some of the BCS Ebook Bundles at Weightless Books

Weightless has ebook bundles of 25 issues, 50 issues, 100 issues, and even a mega-bundle of all 200 issues of BCS! Including some issues never before released on ebook. All at a special low price, delivered straight to your e-reader.

Stock up on older issues that aren’t available anywhere else, or get all the issues you missed before you started subscribing.

Or buy them all, to get the full set of all 200 issues to date, over 400 stories, and support BCS at the same time. All proceeds go to pay our authors and artists for their work.

Deluge your e-reader in great literary adventure fantasy!

Thank you very much to all who bought a BCS ebook subscription during our 200th Issue Subscription Drive! Or a back-issue bundle, or BCS anthologies. We didn’t quite make our second stretch goal, despite a surge on the last day (thank you!), but we blew away our first goal, and our word-count limit for submissions is now 11,000 words. Thank you for making that happen.

Thank you also to all who RT’d or shared or otherwise helped spread word, or bought gift subscriptions for other readers, or tweeted or posted about BCS #200 or stories or podcasts.  That is a great help to us too; reaching readers with our stories and podcasts.

We have many great stories forthcoming this summer and fall, from returning BCS authors and ones new to our pages, including Marie Brennan, Gregory Norman Bossert, Mishell Baker, KJ Kabza, Stephanie Burgis, Walter Dinjos, Tony Pi, A.M. Dellamonica, and Claude Lalumière. We hope you enjoy them!

“Tortoise Caravan” by Marek Hlavaty

The final two stories from and bonus podcast from BCS #200, our celebratory double-issue, are live today!

Catherynne M. Valente offers “The Limitless Perspective of Master Peek, or, the Luminescence of Debauchery,” a lushly and wryly voiced tale of a craftsperson driven to ascend in society on their own terms.

Yoon Ha Lee (“Foxfire, Foxfire” in BCS Science-Fantasy Month 3 & podcast BCS 168, “Two to Leave” in BCS 174 & podcast BCS 151, among many others) returns to BCS with “Shadow’s Weave,” a tale of a mercenary trying to restore her companion’s shadow.

The bonus BCS Audio Fiction Podcast episode is BCS 177: Shadow’s Weave, the Yoon Ha Lee tale. It’s guest-narrated by Tina Connolly, BCS author and narrator of past podcast episodes including BCS 170: A Salvaging of Ghosts by Aliette de Bodard and BCS 150: The Punctuality Machine, Or, A Steampunk Libretto by Bill Powell.

All four of the stories in BCS #200 were available two weeks ago for BCS ebook subscribers. Subscribers get every issue a week before the website, directly to their e-reader.

Would you like to get BCS issues early, and help us reach our stretch goal to raise our submissions word-count to 12,000 words? Check out our BCS Ebook Subscription Drive at Weightless Books. But do it soon; the Subscription Drive ends Friday!