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Women Destroy Science Fiction!

Women Destroy Science Fiction!
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LIGHTSPEED is an online science fiction and fantasy magazine. In its pages, you will find science fiction: from near-future, sociological soft SF, to far-future, star-spanning hard SF—and fantasy: from epic fantasy, sword-and-sorcery, and contemporary urban tales, to magical realism, science-fantasy, and folktales.

For our June 2014 issue, we presented our special double-sized anniversary issue: Women Destroy Science Fiction!, an all-science fiction extravaganza entirely written—and edited!—by women.

Guest-edited by long-time LIGHTSPEED assistant editor Christie Yant, our Women Destroy Science Fiction! Issue contains eleven all-new, original science fiction short stories, plus four short story reprints, a novella reprint, and for the first time ever, an array of fifteen flash fiction stories. In addition to all that goodness, we also have more than two dozen personal essays by women talking about their experiences reading and writing science fiction, plus seven in-depth nonfiction articles.

Thanks to the efforts of more than one hundred women, our Women Destroy Science Fiction! issue includes a wealth of original short stories, flash fiction, reprints, essays, articles, and original art highlighting the work of women in the field, past and present.

Content available to read free on the web is linked below. All other content is exclusive to the complete edition, available as an ebook or trade paperback.

*Winner of the British Fantasy Award for Best Anthology*

“A master class in all the ways women are writing — and have written — some of the best science fiction available.” —NPR, an NPR Best Book of 2014

“This special, all women’s issue (anthology, really, weighing in at 488 pages), has a number of absolutely fantastic original and reprinted short stories, as well as essays by and about women working in science fiction. This is a must-buy.” —BuzzFeed

“One of the themes that comes through as a whole—[is] a concern not just with the shiny concept but with the real, human experiences that roll out as a consequence of the concept. Nothing is easy or simple, in these stories, but it is important.” —Tor.com

Table of Contents

Content available to read free on the site is linked below. All other content is exclusive to the complete edition, available as an ebook from the Lightspeed store, or in trade paperback from Amazon.

FROM THE EDITORS — Christie Yant, Rachel Swirsky, Wendy N. Wagner, Robyn Lupo, and Gabrielle de Cuir

ORIGINAL SHORT STORIES — edited by Christie Yant

REPRINTS — selected by Rachel Swirsky

  • Like Daughter by Tananarive Due
  • Love is the Plan the Plan is Death by James Tiptree, Jr. (Alice Sheldon)
  • The Great Loneliness by Maria Romasco Moore
  • Knapsack Poems by Eleanor Arnason
  • The Cost to Be Wise by Maureen F. McHugh (novella)

ORIGINAL FLASH FICTION — edited by Robyn Lupo

BONUS STORY, EXCLUSIVE TO LIMITED EDITION

  • They Tell Me There Will Be No Pain by Rachael Acks

NOVEL EXCERPT

  • Artemis Awakening by Jane Lindskold

NONFICTION — edited by Wendy N. Wagner

PERSONAL ESSAYS — edited by Wendy N. Wagner

(Archived at Kickstarter.com except where noted)

AUTHOR SPOTLIGHTS — edited by Jude Griffin

With contributors Laurel Amberdine, Lee Hallison, and Sandra Odell

ILLUSTRATORS — art direction by Galen Dara

PODCASTS — produced by Gabrielle de Cuir

(Click “Listen” in top right corner of the story’s page to download or launch player)