Congratulations Are In Order

Delayed from May by the devastating tornado of April 27th, the University of Alabama held its graduation today. Though the campus itself was spared major damage, the city was not. They closed the university, cancelled classes and finals, but begged the families to stay away, because the streets were either impassible or needed.

To their credit, the students volunteered to assist. Cynics might argue that they had nothing else to do, but that doesn't explain the speed and the organizing -- they volunteered to serve when they were needed and didn't have to wait around to be asked.

So congratulations to the 'Bama Class of 2011 -- your graduation is more than just the sum of grades and credit hours. And you shall never forget it... or be forgotten.

It's Only Been Three Months

You can still get copies of Southern Fried Weirdness: Reconstruction or check out other ways to help Alabama relief efforts.

Dr. Phil

Now I've Gone And Done It

On Wednesday 27 April 2011, a string of severe storms blew through much of the South. Massive tornadoes struck Alabama and Georgia in particular, with significant loss of life and great damage. Tuscaloosa AL really got hammered. I know several SF/F writers with Alabama connections, and saw messages on Facebook pleading for people to take cover as a mile-wide tornado crossed I-20. My 2004 Clarion instructor Andy Duncan was on the University of Alabama campus and "was huddled with my students in the basement of Nott Hall when the twister plowed through Tuscaloosa this afternoon, a couple of blocks south. We all rode it out OK. I'm at my friends' house in Northport now. I walked out of the Krispy Kreme at 2:30 p.m., carrying two dozen doughnuts to take to my students, little knowing that store would be obliterated three hours later."

T.J. McIntyre posted a plea for giving help at noon on Friday. Ever the troublemaker, I mentioned the success of the 100 Stories for Haiti anthology, where in just weeks had over 400 submissions, and it'd gone from e-publishing to both print and e-print. In just a few months some £4000 had been raised for the British Red Cross -- and the anthology is still out and raising money.

Six hours later, T.J. posted that he was reviving Southern Fried Weirdness for a fundraising e-anthology -- guidelines included at this link and here below:

I have decided to resurrect Southern Fried Weirdness as a temporary one-time ebook anthology to raise funds for The American Red Cross to support tornado relief efforts here in my home state of Alabama. I ask you to respond quickly should you want to be involved. I would like to have this formatted and ready to go next weekend in order to raise funds as soon as possible. My plan is to upload this to Amazon for Kindle, Smashwords, and Barnes and Noble hopefully within the next two weeks.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

• Stories up to 5,000 words.


• Poetry of any length.


• Reprints preferred. Reprints of works previously featured in the various previous incarnations of Southern Fried Weirdness have preferential treatment.


• Format submissions however you want. I’ll reformat the text before going to print anyway.


• Genres: Any. I’d prefer stories with Southern settings with gothic, weird, or surreal elements, but it doesn’t really matter to me as long as the work is of good quality.


• Please take the time to edit before submitting. Due to time constraints, I will not have the same time for the degree of copyediting I would otherwise perform.


• No payment for works, unfortunately, as 100% of the proceeds will be going directly to charity.


• If you would like to submit, please send your stories/poems to southernfriedweirdness_at_gmail.com no later than Friday, May 6, 2011.


• Legal stuff in lieu of a more formal contract: By submitting, you assert that all works are your own, non-derivative, that you own all the rights necessary for me to print your work, and take full responsibility for the content of your text. I am asking for nonexclusive electronic rights to print your work.

Please spread the word.

Thank you!

T.J. McIntyre
Editor, Southern Fried Weirdness

Join Us

By 1:37am this morning I'd submitted. And I'll buy the finished product. And now I'm passing on the word.

Other than money, there's not a lot I can do right now, especially hip deep in final grading. But the Southern Fried Weirdness e-anthology for Alabama relief is the sort of thing that adds visibility -- I can still point people to 100 Stories for Haiti a year later.

Thanks, y'all.

Dr. Phil