50% Off of all Millennium Books' Books

Intre 22-29 februarie, puteti cumpara orice carte de pe siteul editurii Millennium Books cu 50% reducere.

Gasiti acolo 2 carti de-ale mele, plus 6 antologii la care am colaborat.

"Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" Review (3)

May 1st also brought a review of "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" on Subtext.ro. Radu Romaniuc said:

"Ioana Vișan, una dintre cele mai ambițioase scriitoare implicate în self-publishing, cu mai multe volume în librăria electronică a Amazonului, scrie literatură pop într-o proză alertă, sigură. Noapte bună, Mihai, urmărește un grup de prieteni dintr-o așezare de provincie, care încearcă să recupereze o bătrână rătăcită noaptea pe coclauri. Se pare că e greu să recuperezi băbuțe în vremuri de zombi:" (followed by a quote)

In the end, Radu said that he tried to keep his tongue in check because Millennium Books' anthology project is an initiative that deserves to be supported and not put down. I liked that.

"Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" Review (2)

A new review of "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" appeared in the May issue of Nautilus Magazine. This is what Mr. Radu has to say about my story "Noapte buna, Mihai!":

"Ioana Vișan – Noapte bună, Mihai! Nu cunoșteam textul, apărut inițial pe AtelierKult. Unul dintre cele câteva texte extraordinare din antologie. Povestea este bine localizată, cea a Laurei Călin era în mediul urban, asta e în cel rural, dar amândouă au o încărcătură emoțională impresionantă." - Liviu Radu in Nautilus

Dunno why but I get ridiculously happy each time Mr. Radu enjoys one of my stories. So this month has started well.

"Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" First Review

The first review of "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" showed up online on Fan SF blog. Liviu has good things to say about the book.

I've only managed to read the first eight stories yesterday, but I tend to agree. Now the cat looks at me like she's about to ask for punitive damages. I must have traumatized her last night.

"Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" can be ordered here.

"Efectul de nautil" and "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" Book Launch

Well, I wasn't there, but people kept telling me that the book launch went very well, and now we have proofs too.

Here are photos from "Efectul de nautil" book launch and photos from Final Frontier book fair in general courtesy of Assassin CG.

And here are videos from the launch courtesy of the same Assassin: part 1 and part 2.

The speakers were Horia Ursu from Millennium Books and Mircea Naidin. I thank them both for the nice presentation.

Lessons to be learned for upcoming writers: 1) make sure to have a well-organized website so people can find information about you; 2) be careful what you say in the interviews because you never know when you will be quoted next. :)

The launch of "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" took place during the same panel, right after my launch, and we have videos from that too: part 1 and part 2.

The speakers were Mircea Pricajan (the editor of the book) and Mihai Adascalitei from Dark Wolf's Fantasy Reviews.

One small correction I have to make as they discussed at some point how many of the authors are from Transylvania. I just happen to be born in Moldavia and live here, but my dad is from Vallachia and my mom is from Transylvania where I spent a big part of my childhood, so I consider myself to be Transylvanian. :)

As far as I am concerned, Assassin is the star of the day because he filmed the whole thing!

Now that we've had the book launch(es), the book(s) should be in the stores soon. If you can't wait, you can order them here.

Update: Catalin Badea-Gheracostea talks about Final Frontier and "Efectul de nautil" in his article from Observator cultural.

2nd update: And here is an article about the event on Galileo Online.

Final Frontier Update

Due to health issues, I won't be able to attend Final Frontier book fair in Bucharest this weekend, and I'll miss my own book launch. Boo-hoo!!

For those of you who considered going in hope of getting my autograph, fear not, I have a little something prepared and sent ahead so make sure to stop by the Millennium Books' stand and check the merchandize. And if you're there buy a book or two as they promise nice discounts.

What books to get? I'm happy to suggest mine and the anthologies that include my stories.

From Millennium Books:

• "Efectul de nautil" by Ioana Visan
• "Zombii: Cartea mortilor vii" edited by Mircea Pricajan 
• "Cele 1001 de scorneli ale Mosului SF" edited by Stefan Ghidoveanu
• "Steampunk: A doua revolutie" edited by Adrian Craciun
• "Dansand pe Marte si alte povestiri fantastice" edited by Michael Haulica

From Nemira:

• "Calatorii in timp. Antologie de povestiri SF" edited by Antuza Genescu
  (on their site, the book's status is still set to pre-order, but who knows maybe it will be there)

If you can't make it to Final Frontier, the books can be ordered on-line here and here, and the discounts still apply! 

About “Zombii: Cartea mortilor vii”

Here is the story behind “Noapte buna, Mihai!” (Good Night, Mihai!), my story included in “Zombii: Cartea mortilor vii” (Zombies: The Book of the Living Dead), edited by Mircea Pricajean, and published by Millennium Books in March 2013.

After going through the steampunk anthology experience, I was quite anxious to see what the next Millennium Books' project would be. And then, the announcement was made I kind of deflated… Zombies? Really? But they’re dumb and filthy. And I don’t write stupid characters and don’t do horror. It looked like I would have to pass on this project. At about the same time, SRSFF was announcing their own anthology, titled Venus—a bit too mushy for me, but it was better than zombies. I could write about love. In the end, I managed to make it not mushy at all, but this is another story that can be read here.

Soon after the announcement, AtelierKult declared zombies to be the theme of the next writing contest. That irked me a little because it meant another door was closed. I couldn’t write about something I knew nothing about and had zero interest in finding out more. I considered the subject closed and tried to put it out of my mind, but a thought kept nagging me. What do you mean I can’t write it? That was a bit of an insult to my intelligence.

So just as an exercise, I began to think about how I would write such a thing. A story that wouldn’t focus on the gore, and it would also have to be appealing to me or I wouldn’t waste my time writing it. For a whole week, I spent the time before falling asleep plotting such story. Yes, I know, not the best way to invoke pleasant dreams, but it brought no nightmares either. In order to stay away from the gore and conceal my lack of expertise in this field, I knew I had to find a different angle. So I cheated. I used first person point of view and made the readers focus on the character’s internal drama. To this, I added a bit of local flavor and made sure my zombies didn’t stink, hehe.

After everything was plotted from the first line to the last, it was time to do some research. I know people usually do it first, but I don’t bend my stories around reality, I bend reality around them. Anyway, I needed to see how zombies were portrayed in literature. My only encounter with them had taken place during middle school while watching The Night of the Living Dead, which caused me nightmares for a week. World War Z by Max Brooks was on top of all zombie book lists so I gave it a try. I gave up on it after the first fifty pages. It didn’t sound like a book I would read even without the zombies, there was no attachment to the plot and storyline. I moved on to David Moody’s Autumn. This one read much better, and I managed to get to the end without much problem. It also confirmed my suspicions that I didn’t need any more information to write my story.

I did and sent it to AtelierKult to have it critiqued and make sure I had gotten the horror part right. I must have since it won the contest. To those who don’t like open endings—I can’t stand them either—if you’re familiar with my stories then you’ll have no trouble knowing how it ends once you read the last line.

In conclusion, it’s not a challenge I would take every day, but it’s good to step out of your comfort zone now and then and try something new, especially when it ends with a satisfying “Yeah, I can do that too!”

P.S. I’m giving away an autographed copy to the first person who figures out in which town the action takes place. Close friends and family are excluded. :)

Romanian Anthology: Zombii: Cartea morţilor vii

Cu moarte pe moarte călcând…

Acolo unde viaţa se termină începe moartea. Şi regulile se inversează definitiv. Noua orânduire aduce domnia morţilor-vii. Nimeni nu mai e în siguranţă. Vânătoarea poate să înceapă. Acum, speranţa înseamnă doar amânarea vieţii de după moarte. Într-o Românie trecută, prezentă sau viitoare, nouăsprezece autori români imaginează apocalipsa zombilor. Douăzeci de viziuni originale, înfricoşătoare, credibile, care aduc România pe harta literaturii universale cu zombi.

Cu o moarte suntem toţi datori.

I'm not even going to try to translate the book description. All you need to know is that it's about zombies!

Published by Millennium Books, edited by Mircea Pricajean, and including stories by Laura Sorin, Răzvan T. Coloja, Ioana Vişan, A.R. Deleanu, Tudor Călin Zarojanu, Narcisa Stoica, Liviu Radu, Cristina Nemerovschi, Oliviu Crâznic, Florian Nan, Antuza Genescu, Florin Irimia, George Lazăr, Tiberiu-Virgil Popescu, Ciprian Mitoceanu, Roxana Brânceanu, Felix Tzele, Andrei Gaceff, and Diana Alzner, this book has been in the making for almost two years so I'm quite happy it finally sees the light of day.

The official book launch will be on March 23 at 1 PM, at Final Frontier book fair in Bucharest.

Pre-order it here.