Mad Scientist Journal: Autumn 2015

Edited by Dawn Vogel and Jeremy Zimmerman

by Anatoly Belilovsky, Maureen Bowden, Daniel Coble, Dave D'Alessio, Alby Darling, Domenic diCiacca, Judith Field, Michael Hudson, Julie Bloss Kelsey, Jennifer Mitchell, Alan Murdock, Diana Parparita, Torrey Podmajersky, Steve Toase, Deborah Walker, Marlee Jane Ward, David J. Wing, Adam Wykes, Rich Young, Richard Zwicker

Steampunk butlers, the execution of Earth, and binary fission in rabbits. These are but some of the strange tales to be found in this book.

Mad Scientist Journal: Autumn 2015 collects thirteen tales from the fictional worlds of mad science. For the discerning mad scientist reader, there are also pieces of fiction from Anatoly Belilovsky, Judith Field, Diana Parparita, and Deborah Walker. Readers will also find other resources for the budding mad scientist, including an advice column, horoscopes, and other brief messages from mad scientists.

Authors featured in this volume also include Maureen Bowden, Adam Wykes, Stephen Toase, Alan Murdock, Daniel Coble, Rich Young, Richard Zwicker, Marlee Jane Ward, Alby Darling, Domenic diCiacca, Jennifer Mitchell, Dave D'Alessio, Torrey Podmajersky, Michael Hudson, Julie Bloss Kelsey, and David Wing. Illustrations by Luke Spooner, Shannon Legler, Amanda Jones, Justine McGreevy, Errow Collins, Scarlett O'Hairdye, and Ariel Alian Wilson.

About the Authors

Anatoly Belilovsky

Anatoly Belilovsky is a Russian-American author and translator of speculative fiction. His work appeared in the Unidentified Funny Objects anthology, Ideomancer, Nature Futures, Stupefying Stories, Immersion Book of Steampunk, Daily SF, Kasma, Kazka, and has been podcast by Cast of Wonders, Tales of Old, and Toasted Cake. He blogs about writing at loldoc.net, pediatrics at belilovsky.com, and his medical practice web site is babydr.us.

Anatoly Belilovsky was born in a city that went through six or seven owners in the last century, all of whom used it to do a lot more than drive to church on Sundays; he is old enough to remember tanks rolling through it on their way to Czechoslovakia in 1968. After being traded to the US for a shipload of grain and a defector to be named later (see wikipedia, Jackson-Vanik amendment), he learned English from Star Trek reruns and went on to become a paediatrician in an area of New York where English is only the fourth most commonly used language. He has neither cats nor dogs, but was admitted into SFWA in spite of this deficiency.


Maureen Bowden

Maureen Bowden is a Liverpudlian living with her musician husband in North Wales. She has had over a hundred stories and poems accepted for publication by paying markets. Silver Pen publishers nominated one of her stories for the 2015 international Pushcart Prize. She also writes song lyrics, mostly comic political satire, set to traditional melodies. Her husband has performed these in Folk clubs throughout England and Wales. She loves her family and friends, Rock 'n' Roll, Shakespeare, and cats.


Daniel Coble

Daniel Coble lives with his wife, daughters, and sister in southern California, where he develops Web applications in the light of day and commits his literary crimes under cover of darkness. Those abetting these offenses include River Lit, Spank the Carp, Third Flatiron anthologies, Halfway Down The Stairs, Fabula Argentea, Frostfire Worlds, and the Zombies in Japan anthology from Dreamscape Press. He enjoys 1,354 other hobbies, but like some kind of sad, bespectacled prose shark, he cannot stop writing, lest he perish.


Dave D'Alessio

Dave D'Alessio is an ex-industrial chemist, ex-TV engineer, and ex-award-winning animator currently masquerading as a social scientist. His more than twenty previously published stories include "The Twenty-Year Reich," finalist for the Sidewise Award for best alternative history short story of 2017, and "Jack the Giant-Killer: A Species Traitor?" in Mad Scientist Journal, Volume CXCVIII, August 2015.


Alby Darling

Alby Darling is a former frequent-traveler and current resident of New Jersey, where they spend their time predominantly involved with the organizing of shelves. Besides being addicted to short-form writing and drafting novel outlines, Alby is fond of pepperjack cheese, songs that don't make any sense, and mythologies related to aquatic beings.


Domenic diCiacca

Domenic diCiacca lives on a farm in Missouri where he excels as a time-share mattress for cats. Domenic's hobby is making his wife laugh.


Judith Field

Judith Field lives in London, UK. She is the daughter of writers, and learned how to agonise over fiction submissions at her mother's (and father's) knee. She's a pharmacist working in emergency medicine, a medical writer, editor, and indexer. She started writing in 2009. She mainly writes speculative fiction, a welcome antidote from the world she lives in. Her work has appeared in a variety of publications in the USA, UK, and Australia. When she's not working or writing, she studies English, knits, sings, and swims, not always at the same time.


Michael Hudson

Michael Hudson is originally from Springfield, Missouri and moved to Austin, Texas while in the Army. He lives there with his girlfriend and their lazy, poop-machine of a cat, Prince.


Julie Bloss Kelsey

Julie Bloss Kelsey writes speculative fiction and science fiction poetry from her home in suburban Maryland. In 2011, her scifaiku "Comet" won the Dwarf Stars Award given by the Science Fiction Poetry Association. You can catch her on Twitter where she posts @MamaJoules.


Jennifer Mitchell

Jennifer Mitchell is a Canadian writer of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Born in 1722, a homemade time machine has allowed her to write stories for the people of the future. She has been abducted by aliens twice. Do not approach Jennifer, because it may be her identical evil twin, NotJennifer, who is a wanted criminal in six galaxies.


Alan Murdock

Alan Murdock is a writer of horror, sci-fi, and other weird fiction. He lives with his wife and daughter in New England, but is a frequent visitor to the fictional town of Haven Falls, Connecticut. When not reading or writing, he enjoys spending time with his family, watching the Red Sox, and drinking beer--usually all at once. For information on his upcoming projects, follow him on Twitter @AlanMurdock13.


Diana Parparita

Diana Parparita’s short stories have appeared in Mad Scientist Journal, Enchanted Conversation, Avast, Ye Airships!, and other publications. She is currently working on the fantasy web-novel Toadmila Wartly, which can be found at toadmila.blogspot.com.


Torrey Podmajersky

Delivered by time travelers to a newly-cooled Earth, Torrey Podmajersky spent her formative years in de facto world domination. Since her peaceful abdication, she and her knifemaking husband embroider the outskirts of imaginalia with monsters, tools, and words.


Steve Toase

Archaeologist and writer Steve Toase lives in North Yorkshire, England, and Munich, Germany.

His work has appeared in Scheherezade's Bequest, Not One Of Us, and Cafe Irreal, amongst others. In 2014, "Call Out" (first published in Innsmouth Magazine) was reprinted in The Best Horror Of The Year. He is also a regular Fortean Times reviewer.

Recently, Steve worked with Becky Cherriman and Imove on Haunt, about Harrogate's haunting presence in the lives of people experiencing homelessness in the town.

stevetoase.wordpress.com


Deborah Walker

Deborah Walker grew up in the most English town in the country, but she soon high-tailed it down to London, where she now lives with her partner, Chris, and her two young children. Find Deborah in the British Museum trawling the past for future inspiration or on her blog: http://deborahwalkersbibliography.blogspot.com/. Her stories have appeared in Nature’s Futures, Cosmos, Daily Science Fiction, and The Year’s Best SF 18.


Marlee Jane Ward

Marlee Jane Ward is a writer, reader, and weirdo from Melbourne, Australia. She's a Clarion West Writers Workshop alum, took second place in the Katherine Susannah Prichard Speculative Fiction awards for 2014, and her debut novella is shortlisted for Seizure Online's Viva La Novella. She has a lot of thoughts and feelings that she overshares at http://marleejaneward.com. She digs cats, babes, and food, in that precise order.


David J. Wing

David is predominantly a short fiction writer, but he's venturing into children's novels at the moment. He has a beautiful wife, a gorgeous baby daughter and a needy dog. He runs a flash fiction site: www.zeroflash.wordpress.com


Adam Wykes

Adam Wykes is a technical writer at Forte Automation Systems, and fascinated with science in fiction and reality--especially complexity, cosmology, cognition, evolution, or ants. He lives in Rockford, IL, with his wife Emily, his new son Joseph, a dog, and the target host for toxoplasma gondii. In his spare time, Adam games, builds computers, learns Linux, reads, and tries to write a novel. His work also appears in the Von Neumann/Darwin-inspired game Boss Constructor, due for release on Steam soon, and the self-published (and free!) "Witness to the Dawn" on Lulu.


Rich Young

Rich Young is a writer, guitar player, business analyst, father, and husband from Michigan. He has completed one novel, Letters From Tomorrow, and several short stories ranging from horror to science fiction. He is currently working on a series of Tales of The Scraping, and a novel that sums up all the experiences of his life in some odd fashion or another.


Richard Zwicker

Richard Zwicker is an English teacher living in Vermont, USA, with his wife and beagle. His short stories have appeared in Penumbra, Farstrider Magazine, Perihelion Science Fiction, and other semi-pro markets. A collection of his short stories, Walden Planet and Other Stories, is available on Amazon.