Tag Archives: writers

May 15 2020

New Release: ‘Dragon’s Physician’ by Joyce Chng!

 

Today, let’s celebrate the newly released ‘Dragon’s Physician’ by Joyce Chng!

Joyce creates the most exciting worlds, I love her work and think you will too!

~Kelly~

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Can Jixin succeed in a world of dragon racing run by powerful women? Can he fight the system and fulfil his dream of becoming a dragon rider? Or does he choose instead to be a dragon physician like his mother? Jixin finds his world suddenly changed when Lu Si, the scion of a Rookery owner, takes a shine on him. He is plunged straight into the lucrative world of dragon racing… Will his life change?

Excerpt:
“A sound woke him up. He opened his eyes and looked into a pair of eyes in the dark. This pair of eyes was familiar.
Lu Si.
She placed a slender finger on his lips.
“We are leaving,” she said.
Jixin sat up abruptly. “What? Where? How?” The air was chest-hurting cold.
In the dark, he felt her smile.
“Can you walk?” she said. “Come with me.”
“You want me to give up on my dream?” Jixin’s words came out sharper than he had originally intended. Lu Si fell silent, staring at him in the dark. Somewhere further down the corridor, Ming Lu snored. Jixin would always remember this moment. He would miss Ming Lu.
“No,” she replied finally. “I am giving you a new one.”

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Amazon US link for Dragon Physican

Also available at Gumroad

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About the Author:

Joyce Chng lives in Singapore. Their fiction has appeared in The Apex Book of World SF II, We See A Different Frontier, Cranky Ladies of History, and Accessing The Future. Joyce also co-edited THE SEA IS OURS: Tales of Steampunk Southeast Asia with Jaymee Goh. Their recent space opera novels deal with wolf clans (Starfang: Rise of the Clan) and vineyards (Water into Wine) respectively. They also write speculative poetry with recent ones in Rambutan Literary and Uncanny Magazine. Occasionally, they wrangle article editing at Strange Horizons and Umbel & Panicle, a poetry journal about and for plants and botany. Alter-ego J. Damask writes about werewolves in Singapore.
You can find them at http://awolfstale.wordpress.com and @jolantru on Twitter. (Pronouns: she/her, they/their)

~~~

Apr 27 2020

Author Spotlight: J.M. WONG

 

Hello everyone, I hope you’re all having a great week.

Today I’d like to introduce another new Insignia Stories contributor, J.M. Wong. She has 3 stories in the ‘Japanese Fantasy Drabbles’ anthology: ‘At the Dinner Table’, ‘Hate Us, Never Love Us’, and ‘Lost, but Found’.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

JM WONG: Born and raised in Hong Kong. Never ever lived in an English-speaking country for more than half a year but insisted on writing her books in English in hopes of sharing her stories with people all over the world. She’s also an English teacher who graduated from Hong Kong Baptist University with a degree in English Language and Literature and Education. She published her first book-Under Her Cursed Scythe in 2018.
Her blog: https://jollymollywongwriter.wordpress.com/

TWENTY-FIVE QUESTIONS

1. Author Name/s: J.M. Wong
2. Years active as a writer: Eight years
3. What genre/s you write: Fantasy, magic realism
4. Favorite genre to write: Fantasy
5. Favorite length of story to write: around 5000 words
6. Your nationality: Hong Kong, China
7. Country you live in: Hong Kong, China
8. Number of Asian countries visited: 6
9. Favorite Asian country (visited): Taiwan
10. Favorite place in Asia (visited): Taipei
11. Place (city or country) you most want to visit in Asia: Korea
12. Favorite Asian cuisine: Sashimi
13. Favorite Asian dish: Topokki (Korean Rice Cake)
14. Favorite Asian movie (any genre): Along With the Gods: The Two Worlds (Korean
Movie)
15. Favorite Asian book (any genre): Goblin: Lonely and Great God (Korean TV drama)
16. Favorite Asian celebrity: Korean Actress Park Min Young
17. Best thing about being a writer: You have another world (the imaginary world) for
you to escape your problems and harsh reality for a little while.
18. Worst thing about being a writer: You can never sleep well because the best ideas
always strike when you try to sleep
19. Day writer or night writer: Night
20. Drink and snack of choice (while writing): popcorn & coffee
21. Number of short stories/poems submitted each month (av): 1-2
22. I dream to be published with/in (publisher/publication): Penguin Publishing Group
23. Most active on (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram): Instagram (@J.M.Wong)
24. Self-published, traditionally published, or both: Self-published
25. Currently working on: my second book of my novel series: The Blessed or Cursed
Series & a short story for an anthology.

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J.M. Wong’s novel, Under a Cursed Scythe is available now from Book Depository!

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And if you haven’t checked out Insignia Drabbles Vol.1. ‘Japanese Fantasy Drabbles’ yet, it’s available from most ebook retailers now for just US.99c! 

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Want to write for Insignia Drabbles Vol.2.? Submissions open May 1st! Theme is Southeast Asian fantasy. Check out the Submissions Page for details.

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Nov 30 2019

November News: Submissions are closed! Thank you!

NEWS

Submission Calls

Submissions for ‘Japanese Fantasy Drabbles’ are officially closed. I want to say a big thank you to all the contributing authors for submitting such a fantastic selection of drabbles. Otsukaresama desu!

I’ll probably write a post in December about the submission call, for those who are curious about the data and behind-the-scenes work involved in this project.

AS for new anthology calls, I’ll try to make a decision about that before the end of December too. I can say that the next anthology will be for short stories and offer a token payment as we have done in the past. Then perhaps we’ll do another drabble anthology after that…

For the poets, we’re always open for Asian Speculative poems. I’m really hoping to see some submissions from Asian writers for next year–please add us to your submissions list for 2020!

Details on our Instincts poetry series are here

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Site Updates

This past week, I made some changes to this site and some of our social media accounts. There’s a new profile logo, and I’ve changed the site name to Insignia Stories where possible. This is because the new drabble anthology will be the first in its own series, Insignia Drabbles Vol.1, Vol.2, etc. So the main site name will be Insignia Stories, and The Insignia Series will continue to be the series name for the anthologies we’ve done. Hopefully that’s clear!

Here on the site, I re-organized the menus and made a few drop-down listings which should make things easier to find. I’ll be putting up a new ABOUT page and one for the drabble anthology very soon, so that will have all the contributors name on it as well.

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Story Recommendation

I read a quite disturbing (in an awesome way) horror story recently, featuring a Japanese woman as the main character. It was written by Insignia: Southeast Asian Fantasy contributor, Eliza Chan and is published online at Three Crows Magazine.

I highly recommend it!

Link: ‘Knowing Your Type’ by Eliza Chan

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Have a great weekend everyone, and Happy Thanksgiving to our North American writers and readers 🙂

~Kelly Matsuura~

 

 

Aug 14 2019

Author Spotlight: RAY DALEY

 

Welcome all, to a new blog series: ‘Author Spotlight’  will feature short interviews with our wonderful Insignia Series contributors.

We are all passionate, cross-genre writers who love Asia and Asian cultures. Get to know us a little better through our Answers to 25 Questions challenge!

First Up….

Ray Daley was born in Coventry & still lives there. He served 6 years in the RAF as a clerk & spent most of his time in a Hobbit hole in High Wycombe. He is a published poet & has been writing stories since he was 10. His current dream is to eventually finish the Hitch Hikers fanfic novel he’s been writing since 1986.

https://raymondwriteswrongs.wordpress.com/

@ RayDaleyWriter

TWENTY FIVE QUESTIONS:

  1. Author Name/s: Ray Daley
  2. Years active as a writer: Ever? 40. Selling stuff? 5.
  3. What genre/s you write: SF, Horror & Fantasy. Literally anything if the mood takes me.
  4. Favorite genre to write: SF.
  5. Favorite length of story to write: Short. I’m lazy.
  6. Your nationality: British. Half Welsh, half English.
  7. Country you live in: The United Kingdom
  8. Number of Asian countries visited: None at all.
  9. Favorite Asian country (visited): N/A
  10. Favorite place in Asia (visited): N/A
  11. Place (city or country) you most want to visit in Asia: I’d love to go to Japan.
  12. Favorite Asian cuisine: I couldn’t pick just one.
  13. Favorite Asian dish: Thai Green Curry.
  14. Favorite Asian movie (any genre): Battle Royale. It’s awesome!
  15. Favorite Asian book (any genre): The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin.
  16. Favorite Asian celebrity: Ming-Na Wen.
  17. Best thing about being a writer: I get to sleep when I want.
  18. Worst thing about being a writer: Not enough money!
  19. Day writer or night writer: Mostly night. I blame the RAF, I used to work in a bunker.
  20. Drink and snack of choice (while writing): Any cold drink. Ginger biscuits.
  21. Number of short stories/poems submitted each month (av): Maybe 10-20? It varies a lot, depending on what’s open.
  22. I dream to be published with/in (publisher/publication): F&SF or Clarkesworld.
  23. Most active on (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram): Twitter.
  24. Self-published, traditionally published, or both: Traditionally.
  25. Currently working on: Not dying of heatstroke. Oh, you meant writing? A story inspired by a terrible Paul Newman movie.

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Ray Daley’s Stories in The Insignia Series Anthologies:

‘Uncle Ping’s Farewell’ (Insignia: Asian Science Fiction, July 2018)

‘How Have the Mighty Fallen?’ (Insignia: Asian Flash Fiction & Poetry, July 2019)

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The Parting

NEW STORY OUT AUG 14!

Read Ray’s latest dark fantasy publication,

‘The Parting’, over at

electricathenaeum.com

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Thanks for joining us!

We’ll have more author interviews coming soon 🙂