The Chosen from the First Age

by Noel Chidwick (Editor)

After only 3 years in existence Shoreline of Infinity Science Fiction Magazine won the British Fantasy Society Award 2018 for best magazine/periodical. To celebrate this occasion we decided to publish a selection of stories from the Issues 1-10 (including a special edition 8½). We could have chosen every story, of course, but for that you will have to read all the issues. These stories are chosen as together they are the ambassadors for the magazine; together, we felt, they represent the character of the magazine - welcoming, challenging, enthralling, a touch mischievous - andof course, they're stonkingly good stories. Bo Balder Shaker Look
Gregg Chamberlain APOCALYPSE BETA TEST SURVEY
Thomas Clark Incoming
Ephiny Gale Little Freedoms
Caroline Grebbell Model Organisms
Ken MacLeod The Last Word
Tim Major The Walls of Tithonium Chasma
M Luke McDonell See You Later
Jeannette Ng Goddess With A Human Heart
David Perlmutter The Brat and the Burly Qs
Nathan Susnik The Pink Life (La Vie En Rose)
Andrew J Wilson The Stilt-Men of the Lunar Swamps

Genres: Science Fiction

122 pages, Paperback

First published February 15, 2019

About the author

I'm Editor-in-Chief of Science Fiction magazine, Shoreline of Infinity (www.shorelineofinfinity.com), published in Scotland.

I've been a reader for as long as I can remember, my tastes tending towards the fantastical rather than the realistic. After all, isn't that the point of a story, to be taken to a different place?

Science Fiction and fantasy is where I have lived and dreamed since I first read Grimm's Stories. My teenage years were spent absorbing every word I could find by the likes of Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein, Wyndham, Bradbury, McCaffrey, LeGuin, Moorcock, Ballard, Priest.

I loved the early stuff from the 30s and 40s with writers such as E E Smith, Olaf Stapledon and the many other writers who earned their keeping bashing away at typewriters in dark, dust attics.

And my enjoyment in SF continues unabated with the writings of Stephen Baxter, Charles Stross, Ken MacLeod, Eric Brown, Peter Hamilton.

And many more. Many, many more.

I've written on and off over the years, dabbling in SF as a teenager when I had some stories published in fanzines. I have recently returned to the words with greater relish, and have released a couple of small collection of tales based on my adopted home town of Edinburgh.

I was shortlisted for a short crime story competition for Bloody Scotland, and the story is available, along with its fellow shortlistees, as an ebook published by Blasted Heath.

Reviews

[Robert Bagnall · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think it was a review of the Tindersticks’ first album in Melody Maker that had a line that ran something like, ‘More ideas than are strictly speaking necessary in a single record. About bloody time.’ That’s not a bad way to sum up this short anthology, each one trying to do something different. Not every story worked for me, they never do, but I’ll highlight Andrew J Wilson, Bo Balder, Nathan Susnik, and Ephiny Gale for particular praise. Thomas Clark gets the firework prize for disappointment for a story that went up like a rocket but fizzled back to earth like a stick.