On the news front, UK genre mag Whispers of Wickedness has changed from a free chapbook zine to a 60 page perfect bound magazine retailing at £3, or £10 for four issues. Contributors in issue 11 include Neil Ayres, Rhys Hughes, Liam Davies, Terry Gates-Grimwood, Pete Tennant, Aliya Whiteley and others. I’ve yet to see a copy of the new mag. A proper review of issue 11 will appear in the Spring.

Slipstream mag, The Third Alternative / TTA, is also making significant changes. The next issue, as far as I’m aware, will be renamed Black Static. I’ve heard that the mag will be somewhat more focused towards horror, but I don’t know how much truth there is in this. A semi-prozine, it’s certainly one of the most successful UK mags.

Aesthetica has also undergone major changes, switching from a book type perfect bound format to a glossy black and white A4 style. There’s still poetry and prose and the text size is much better now on the former. The non-fiction side seems to have grown, with a lot of coverage of music and film. Definitely a magazine worth checking out.

Another issue of Zembla has hit the shops. There’s an interview with actress Samantha Morton, and an article on literary translation, amongst other things. Zembla is like a fashion or film mag with its glossy colourful appearance. I’d like to also mention Wasafari which currently has a stunningly beautiful cover. I wanted to buy it today, but the pre-Xmas queue in Borders was a nightmare. The US journal The Antioch Review was stacked on the shelves though, along with UK horror/dark fantasy mag Scheherezade, UK poetry publication Magma, PN Review, Dreams That Money Can Buy, The London Magazine, and other fiction and poetry mags.

The most recent issue of Mslexia, Oct-Dec, continues to offer readers fascinating and informative articles on writing and publishing. This is probably one of the best magazines anywhere for writers, and though it’s specifically aimed at women, dealing with sexism, and issues in the publishing world relating to women writers and readers, most of the articles are also useful to men. This is a magazine that comes highly recommended. Issue 27 has articles on the campaign for real women in commercial fiction, travel writing, journalism, a piece on acting skills that might be useful in writing, and another on characterisation. There’s an interview with Kate Atkinson, plus fiction and poetry from Mslexia readers and contributors on the theme of flying. The news on Nemonymous is less positive. Editor Des Lewis announced there would be no Nemo 6. He wanted to concentrate on selling the remaining copies of the five anthologies he’s produced so far. However, he has since indicated there might be another Nemo, but not for some time. We’ll just have to wait and see.

There’s been a change of editors at Poetry Review. I was extremely unimpressed with those copies of the magazine I saw under the previous editors. I haven’t had a chance to read the Autumn issue yet, but the Summer issue under new editor Fiona Sampson was a breath of fresh air. It will be interesting to see if this continues.

As far as this season’s crop of magazine reviews goes, the ones that really impressed me were Banipal, Glimmer Train, Night Train and TriQuarterly. I’d like to commend the translators in Banipal and TriQuarterly for their excellent work. Banipal in particular is dependent on the skills of its amazing translators. Meanwhile, Crimewave seems to have impressed Marion Arnott. All these magazines/publications are extremely high quality productions. It’s impossible to start naming the best of the stories and poems from these five since there are so many. Readers are advised to check out the reviews themselves. QWF, Midnight Street, Open Wide, Bonfire and Gator Springs also feature in the present crop of magazines. I haven’t had the chance to read my copy of Bonfire yet, so I’m looking forward to that. Thanks to Marion Arnott and Rosanne Rabinowitz for their insightful critiques. Unfortunately there’s no review of Fairy Tale Review (as previously promised), but we hope to have it reviewed for the Spring, along with Banipal, Whispers, Interzone, Trunk Stories, possibly Black Static, and whatever else comes our way. I'm hoping 2006 will be a good small press year, for print mags and for web magazines too.

Kara Kellar Bell is a film and media graduate from the West of Scotland, with a passion for European novels, French films, silent cinema, and Brazilian music (everything from Daniela Mercury and other pop stars through to bossa nova). As a writer, she likes to have room to move around creatively, so she’s not located in one genre. She writes realism and also stories of a more fantastic nature, usually grounded to some extent in the real world. She also takes delight in writing across the sexual spectrum, and as a bisexual, considers it important to remind people that things are not always black and white, either/or, in sexuality or in gender. For a selection of Kara’s writing on the Showcase section of this site, click here

© 2006 Laura Hird All rights reserved.