As previously announced, the latest volume in the esteemed Year’s Best Weird Fiction series from Undertow Books is now open for submission, for any works published during 2015. Series Editor Michael Kelly has now announced that esteemed Canadian weird/dark fiction author and anthologist Simon Strantzas is to be the Guest Editor for Year’s Best Weird Fiction Vol. 3.
Michael Kelly said of the appointment, “when I first conceived of this series, and contemplated Guest Editors, Simon sprang immediately to mind. Not only is he at the top of the weird fiction class, he has also established himself as a first-rate anthologist.”
Strantzas is also working on editing the Robert Aickman tribute volume Aickman’s Heirs for Kelly’s Undertow Books. He has spoken extensively elsewhere on the current resurgence of weird fiction, stating: “I think it’s true to say that in the last few years a style of fiction more grounded in the classically weird seems to have a louder voice than in the past, but I’m not certain it’s anything beyond a coincidence, or perhaps a small group of talented writers inspiring one another. These revivals, when plotted over time, are a sinusoid, and it’s likely just the classically weird’s time at the crest … we are seeing new experimentation in the weird horror genre, which in many ways is exactly what the term “weird” is about — these writers are not content in repetiton and regurgitation; they want to bring to the table something only they can bring.”
Given this, it should be very interesting to see what he does with Year’s Best Weird Fiction Vol. 3.
