Keep up the good work, I’m enjoying both your blog and your editing.

Cool, glad to hear you enjoyed Wastelands. I look forward to seeing the review.

I didn’t mention Alpha in that article, but I do profile it in this other one I wrote about SF/fantasy writing workshops: http://www.johnjosephadams.com/?p=1200 .

It’s really all Dave’s fault. He mentioned attending writing workshops, but the only one he name-checked was Clarion! Blame him! :)

The workshop is now entering its Seventh year, run in Pittsburgh by the local science fiction writers, led by Diane Turnshek and John Schmidt. The website for the workshop is http://alpha.spellcaster.org/

I had the pleasure of attending the first and second years of the course, travelling over from the UK to attend at the age of 17 and 18. I learned a huge amount, which has led on to me being a regular reviewer at SFCrowsnest, blogger for Futurismic, semifinalist for WOTF and a few fiction sales, most for Aberrant Dreams. I’m 22, and among the eldest of the graduates of the workshop.

Some of the other writers those first few years include Michail Velichansky, who has sold to Ideomancer and others, plus won the first quarter of Writers Of The Future 2006, Jeanette Winterson who has sold to Lady Rosebud, Thomas Seay to Boy’s Life among many others.

It’s still early days for Alpha graduates – many of them are still in their teens, some attendees are only 13 or 14. But having been there and seen some of the fantastic talents, I think Alpha graduates will be an important part of the future of the genre.

I loved ‘Wastelands’, by the way. A review should be in SFCrowsnest’s next issue.