A guest editorial
The More Things Change…
…the more they stay the same.
And clichés are only cliché because they are true.
Now that I’ve either annoyed you or amused you with two overused phrases so coated with dust that even new and improved Pledge wouldn’t make a dent in it, I will offer a few words about the changes that have taken place at Abyss & Apex since the beginning of this nutty Election-slash-Leap-Year.
Almost the entire editorial staff changed in the early part of the year, with Carol Burrell remaining on board as acting managing editor to provide continuity, commitment and passion for the tradition of editorial excellence A&A has established. Carol is now the full-fledged editor-in-chief, and she has brought me in as her associate editor to share both editorial and administrative duties.
Carol and I have known one another for many years and have worked together on numerous projects, so I was delighted to be asked to help out and have enjoyed it all very much in spite of the glitches here and there.
Along with the two of us, we have a wonderful group of dedicated submissions editors, some of whom were with A&A before 2004 and some of whom are new. They are all thoroughly experienced and highly talented.
And they are patient, as you have been — you, the readers, as well as the authors and poets who contribute your extraordinary work to the magazine. Like several of our peer publications in the speculative fiction genre, A&A has experienced some serious e-mail problems off and on since March of this year. Our editorial addresses have suffered from spam overload so severe as to nearly cripple our submissions system, and many different approaches to reducing the spam have been tried, with limited success. We’re still working on it, and we encourage you to monitor the Submissions page for any changes in submissions and/or editorial e-mail addresses.
We also experienced a hard drive failure in July with the computer that housed our submissions database. After a few days of panic, we found a computer guru to repair the drive and recover most of the data, but some of the submissions were lost. Please continue to bear with our plucky but small and busy staff as we work through these problems. You’ve all been wonderfully patient so far, and we are profoundly grateful.
The May/June and July/August issues went live a little late. However, I hope you’ll agree with me that both were well worth the wait. We believe the stories and poems in this issue and our upcoming September/October issue, which is on schedule, will prove the truth of the hoary old adage in this editorial’s title.
Luc Reid’s wonderful flash piece, the diverse but excellent stories by Mikal Trimm, Lavie Tidhar and Josh Rountree, and extraordinary poems from Larry Hammer and David Kopaska-Merkel are some of the best work that the speculative fiction genre has to offer. Abyss & Apex will continue to bring you the best every other month, no matter what fleeting challenges we may face.
—Aleta Daknis, Associate Editor
August 17, 2004
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Copyrighted by the author unless otherwise noted.
Art Director: Bonnie Brunish
