Light Touch Paper Strand Clear published by Peggy Bright Books is an anthology created around the concept of a spark, literal or figurative, of inspiration or of fire.  The anthology title refers to instructions that used to be found on fireworks, and so the authors were given this idea of lighting a touch paper and seeing where the story went.Now, as with all anthologies there were stories that resonated with me and those that didn’t.  I’ll briefly discuss those that I slaked me thirst for good...

Loved the title, and all within were of quality. Katharine is a judge for the Aurealis Awards. This review is the personal opinion of Katharine herself, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of any judging panel, the judging coordinator or the Aurealis Awards management team. To be safe, I won't be recording my review here until after the AA are over.

I finally read a book from my GoodReads want-to-read list. I put this on that list because I loved the title. Light Touch Paper Stand Clear. Three completely random words. What could it mean? I guessed that the book contained five stories, each one hinging on one of these words. How interesting that would be! Light could be light weight, the speed of light, bringing into the light. Touch has infinitely many possibilities for isn't touch the basis of human interaction, both mentally and physicall...

You don't often come across unthemed anthologies in Aussie spec fic, but this is one! Some extraordinarily strong stories in this book, but tempered by some that I thought less than stellar. Longer review to follow.

Original review: http://www.vilutheril.com/?p=1286Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is loosely themed speculative fiction anthology, edited by Edwina Harvey and Simon Petrie, two of the editors involved with Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine. An eclectic collection containing stories from a variety of Australian and international authors, Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is an engaging body of work that contains a number of excellent stories, quite a few memorable ones, and should have something

Another Kindle freebie. I hated the cover and did not care much about the title (which turns out to be instructions for setting off fireworks), but this is actually a pretty good anthology of speculative fiction. The stories don't share any unifying theme or subgenre or even tone. There is a steampunkish story about the colonial conquest of Dantean hell, and one about genetically engineered unicorns as mandatory sober companions for substance abusers, and one about a private investigator who spl...

This is a more or less unthemed anthology of mostly Australian speculative fiction short stories from Peggy Bright Books. First of all, while this is a collection of thirteen very interesting and well written stories - not one of them is a dud - it's a total mixed bag. There's no evident interconnection or sense that these stories form a greater whole. If there's an editorial hand at work, it's largely invisible. It's just a group of spec fic from across the wide range that the term implies.The

http://www.rantingdragon.com/light-to...Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is a loosely themed speculative fiction anthology, edited by Edwina Harvey and Simon Petrie, two of the editors involved with Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine. An eclectic collection containing stories from a variety of Australian and international authors, Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is an engaging body of work that contains a number of excellent stories, quite a few memorable ones, and should have something to suit

Firstly I admit my bias - I am one of the co-editors of this anthology, but even if I wasn't involved with this collection in any way, I would have been impressed by the high level of stories within.We purposefully set out to give all contributors as long a rein as possible with a title that was open to interpretation. Our authors took the idea and ran with it, giving us back a wide diversity of stories.Joanne Anderton offers a dark fantasy of murder, mayhem and unrequited love in "The Bone Chim...

I've got this in ebook, as the hard copy doesn't launch in Oz till next weekend. Okay, I have a story in it and all I can say is I'm rapt to be among such a wonderful group of writers of spec fic, some of Australia and New Zealand's best. The editors simply asked writers whose work they liked and got a great collection, set everywhere and every when from medieval England to future Melbourne (and my own, which is set in mythological Greece). I won't name any individual writers, but you'll find a

There were some okay stories in this anthology, but nothing that explored great themes or that was particularly memorable. I am becoming less a reader of short stories and much prefer the longer formats of novella and novels.

When I was approached about reviewing Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear, I'd just reviewed (and loved) Joanne Anderton's first two novels, so her name was the one that convinced me to accept the review request, together with that of Brenda Cooper, whose writing I've encountered previously in several Valdemar anthologies and which I've always enjoyed. It turns out however, that this anthology holds far more attractions than just those two stories. As the anthology isn't based around a hard and fast

Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is an unthemed anthology edited by Edwina Harvey and Simon Petrie. The anthology itself was shortlisted for a Ditmar award as was Joanne Anderton's story "The Bone Chime Song". Two stories were also shortlisted for Chronos Awards (the Victorian spec fic awards which will be announced at Continuum in a couple of weeks): “Five Ways to Start a War” by Sue Bursztynski and “The D_d” by Adam Browne.Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is quite a mixed bag as far as story conte...

Light Touch Paper, Stand Clear is a great book full of interesting and entertaining stories. The title interested me right off. I pictured the idea of the light of our eyes touching the written page and having a life changing impact on the reader. I’m not sure if this was meant, but it’s what I got out of it. It’s good to have a great title, but it is the stories that really count.As I’ve already said, the stories are great. Every one of them are worthy of positive comment, but I’m going to pick...