Each author will read from a selection of their work, followed by Q&A with the audience, moderated by Cliff Winnig. Schmoozing with the authors and book signing follows the end of the discussion.
$10 at the door
$8 for students with valid high school or college ID card
All proceeds benefit the American Bookbinders Museum
There will be an opportunity to have books signed at the end of the event. Books will be for sale courtesy of Bookshop West Portal, and attendees are welcome to bring books from home for signatures. There is no charge for autographs.
Podcasted by SOMA FM – SF’s internet radio station
This fast-paced novella blends a pitch-perfect noir voice with all the excitement and grit of an action movie, but at its core, it is ultimately a tale of community, identity, and connection. Izzy Wasserstein is a true and tender storyteller with a head for twisty plots and a heart for complex love.
—Emma Törzs, author of Ink Blood Sister Scribe
[STARRED REVIEW] Recommended for SF readers who love a good mystery, can’t resist a queer romance, and adore seeing a corporate conspiracy unraveled and undone
Library Journal
ISBN: 978-1-61696-412-2 (print); 978-1-61696-413-9 (digital)
Available Format(s): Trade paperback; digital formats
In a queer, noir technothriller of fractured identity and corporate intrigue, a trans woman faces her fear of losing her community as her past chases after her. This bold, thought-provoking debut science-fiction novella from a Lambda Award finalist is an exciting and unpredictable look at the fluid nature of our former and present selves.
Within a twisted conspiracy thriller is a compelling slice-of-queer-life, uninterested in simple representation. An irresistible afterword will leave readers eager for more from Wasserstein. This book is perfect for anyone interested in community politics, body politics, the craft of writing, or a page-turning thriller.
Kirkus
Security expert Dora left her anarchist commune over safety concerns. But when her ex-girlfriend Kay is killed, everyone at the commune is suddenly a potential suspect. In the remains of Kansas City, which the government has all but abandoned, Dora knows there will be no justice unless she solves the murder herself.
But Kay’s death is only one of several shocking incidents. A strange new drug is circulating, people are disappearing, and a war between two nefarious corporations is looming. As Dora untangles a terrible conspiracy, she must also come face-to-face with assailants from her pre-transition past.
THESE FRAGILE GRACES, THIS FUGITIVE HEART is a work of astonishing heart. It bridges isolation and belonging, hate and forgiveness, riveting tension and emotional nuance, to fearlessly explore the chasm between who we are and who we were expected to be. Izzy Wasserstein has given us something we need, as only she can: a story about surviving the near-future hellscape that makes you want to survive the present hellscape. I know I’ll be reading it again before long.
Elly Bangs, author of Unity
Recommended for SF readers who love a good mystery, can’t resist a queer romance, and adore seeing a corporate conspiracy unraveled and undone.
—Library Journal *STARRED REVIEW*
This fast-paced novella blends a pitch-perfect noir voice with all the excitement and grit of an action movie, but at its core, it is ultimately a tale of community, identity, and connection. Izzy Wasserstein is a true and tender storyteller with a head for twisty plots and a heart for complex love.
—Emma Törzs, author of Ink Blood Sister Scribe
In a queer, noir technothriller of fractured identity and corporate intrigue, a trans woman faces her fear of losing her community as her past chases after her. This bold, thought-provoking debut science-fiction novella from a Lambda Award finalist is an exciting and unpredictable look at the fluid nature of our former and present selves.
With an anarchist’s eye for flipping all the old tropes, Wasserstein makes her propulsive, stylish cyberpunk murder mystery sing on every page. Dora defines her own story, and it’s absolutely engrossing. You’ll want to follow the secrets as far down as they go.
—Karen Osborne, author of Architects of Memory
Security expert Dora left her anarchist commune over safety concerns. But when her ex-girlfriend Kay is killed, everyone at the commune is suddenly a potential suspect. In the remains of Kansas City, which the government has all but abandoned, Dora knows there will be no justice unless she solves the murder herself.
But Kay’s death is only one of several shocking incidents. A strange new drug is circulating, people are disappearing, and a war between two nefarious corporations is looming. As Dora untangles a terrible conspiracy, she must also come face-to-face with assailants from her pre-transition past.
Wasserstein’s debut novella does not give easy answers, but instead urges us to remember: the moment we lose sight of love—for our communities and for ourselves—is the moment we risk harming everything we hold dear.
—Naseem Jamnia, author of the Crawford, Locus, and World Fantasy nominated novella The Bruising of Qilwa
A queer and trans woman, Izzy Wasserstein crafts acclaimed fiction and poetry. Her works have appeared in Clarkesworld, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Resist Fascism, Apex, Fireside Magazine, A Punk Rock Future, Heartland! Poetry of Love, Resistance, & Solidarity, Escape Pod, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Lightspeed, Fantasy, Fighting for the Future: Cyberpunk, Climbing Lightly Through Forests: A Poetry Anthology Honoring Ursula K. Le Guin, and Solarpunk Tales, We’re Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction 2022. Much of Wasserstein’s fiction was collected in the Lambda Literary Award finalist All The Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From (2022). She also has two volumes of poetry: This Ecstasy They Call Damnation (2012) and When Creation Falls (2018). Next month, Tachyon publishes her eagerly anticipated first novella THESE FRAGILE GRACES, THIS FUGITIVE HEART.
Born and raised in Kansas, Wasserstein relocated to California where she teaches writing and literature. She shares a house with a variety of animal companions and the writer Nora E. Derrington.
All of us at Tachyon, wish the charming Izzy a happy birthday. Slow down and enjoy the day!
Recommended for SF readers who love a good mystery, can’t resist a queer romance, and adore seeing a corporate conspiracy unraveled and undone.
Library Journal
with LP Kindred
Virtual event
with Naseem Jamnia
with Gail Carriger
Virtual event
This fast-paced novella blends a pitch-perfect noir voice with all the excitement and grit of an action movie, but at its core, it is ultimately a tale of community, identity, and connection. Izzy Wasserstein is a true and tender storyteller with a head for twisty plots and a heart for complex love.
—Emma Törzs, author of Ink Blood Sister Scribe
With an anarchist’s eye for flipping all the old tropes, Wasserstein makes her propulsive, stylish cyberpunk murder mystery sing on every page. Dora defines her own story, and it’s absolutely engrossing. You’ll want to follow the secrets as far down as they go.
—Karen Osborne, author of Architects of Memory
In a queer, noir technothriller of fractured identity and corporate intrigue, a trans woman faces her fear of losing her community as her past chases after her. This bold, thought-provoking debut science-fiction novella from a Lambda Award finalist is an exciting and unpredictable look at the fluid nature of our former and present selves.
Wasserstein’s debut novella does not give easy answers, but instead urges us to remember: the moment we lose sight of love—for our communities and for ourselves—is the moment we risk harming everything we hold dear.
—Naseem Jamnia, author of the Crawford, Locus, and World Fantasy nominated novella The Bruising of Qilwa
Security expert Dora left her anarchist commune over safety concerns. But when her ex-girlfriend Kay is killed, everyone at the commune is suddenly a potential suspect. In the remains of Kansas City, which the government has all but abandoned, Dora knows there will be no justice unless she solves the murder herself.
But Kay’s death is only one of several shocking incidents. A strange new drug is circulating, people are disappearing, and a war between two nefarious corporations is looming. As Dora untangles a terrible conspiracy, she must also come face-to-face with assailants from her pre-transition past.
A queer anarchist commune in near-future Kansas City is threatened by corporate espionage in this fun and well-paced neo-noir cyberpunk adventure from Wasserstein (All the Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From). Theodora “Dora” Madsen lives in “self-imposed exile” from the commune she once called home, but when her ex-girlfriend, Kay, is found dead of an apparent overdose, Dora, suspicious, is compelled to investigate. Now an outsider to the tight-knit community, her investigations raise echoes of the conflict that led to her departure, and call into question the very principles on which the commune was founded. Can Dora discover the truth without tearing apart the community that sheltered her when she needed it most—and before someone else gets hurt? Wasserstein makes clever use of genre tropes, including clones, snappy noir-style dialogue, and the damaged, insomniac detective archetype. With a complex and enjoyably flawed trans protagonist and a portrayal of queer life that goes deeper than casual representation, this marks Wasserstein as a voice to watch out for in LGBTQ science fiction.
—Publishers Weekly
Wasserstein makes clever use of genre tropes, including clones, snappy noir-style dialogue, and the damaged, insomniac detective archetype. With a complex and enjoyably flawed trans protagonist and a portrayal of queer life that goes deeper than casual representation, this marks Wasserstein as a voice to watch out for in LGBTQ science fiction.
Publishers Weekly
Following Wasserstein’s Dora Madsen through Kansas City’s pot-holed, climate-catastrophized streets is more exciting than I or any other reader have the right to expect. I recommend grabbing it up as soon as you possibly can.
Ambling Along the Aqueduct
Really loved this one. Cool technonoir, and equity based communes (on of the main settings)are always interesting to me.
Litsy
We discussed the way Sarah Pinsker sparked her lightbulb moment, why it’s important for her to learn your chosen D&D character, which Star Trek: The Next Generation characters caused her to take her first stab at writing, the change she’d make in her life if she were independently wealthy, why we both miss those paper rejection slips from publishing’s pre-electronic days, the disconnect between the way we feel about certain stories of ours and how readers respond, the most important gift she was given by the Clarion writing workshop, our perverse love for second-person present-tense stories, how surprised she was when she sold a story to Analog, and much more.
Eating the Fantastic
BITTER MEDICINE by Mia Tsai
“The magic system had me mesmerized in how it blends cultures. Inspired by Chinese drama, the romance & action were addictive”
This novella is a prequel to Kornher-Stace’s 2021’s Firebreak. In the spirit of “the dog doesn’t die,” since older versions of 06 and 22 appear in Firebreak and other works, it is unlikely either will die in this prequel. It seems odd that I would encounter two 2023 SF novels about workers being brutally exploited by ruthless corporations. What possible reason could there be for SF authors to focus on this subject in particular at this specific moment in time? This must be just one of those odd coincidences one sees from time to time in SF…
Umm… I just read Atoms Never Touch by micha cárdenas, which I highly recommend. Also recently: OK Psyche by Anya Johanna DeNiro, All the Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From by Izzy Wasserstein, UNITY by Elly Bangs, and Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki, off the top of my head. I also urge everyone to hunt down books by April Daniels, Roz Kaveney, and Rachel Pollack. Oh, and here’s a list I did a while back in my newsletter.
Sometime in 1989, Terry Bisson was driving his daughter to college in upstate New York when an idea for a short story came to him. Glancing toward the highway median, he had a vision: animals sitting together, in their own world, talking to one other. The vision became a title: “Bears Discover Fire.”
