Once upon a time, I was a book blogger. Mostly, I bought the books that I reviewed on my site, and I created a fabulous community of readers and fellow book bloggers. That community and connectivity was something I missed deeply when I closed up shop in 2013. I had nurtured a pipe dream of a group of us book bloggers combining forces and creating a kind of super-blog, where all of us pooled our reviews into one site. This would mean one site with more content on a daily basis, a greater diversity of books reviewed and opinions on them, and more opportunity for group discussion.
It was never to be, of course. My book blog closed. The book bloggers I had gotten so close to had also retired, and life swept us along our own individual paths.
But I never forgot that dream.
Long-form blogging is something I still cling to, despite the rise of various social media platforms, each one designed to target a particular need among the greater global community. Each and every platform can be an amazing way to meet new people, reconnect with old friends, and discover wonderful and terrible things happening in life and in art. Certainly, that social media kept me connected to people from my past and allowed me to continue to reach out to a community of peers to remind me where I come from, who I am, and what I’m trying to do.
How does this relate to the speculative fiction community? It’s simple, really: Speculative fiction continues to inspire, motivate, and challenge me as a person, as a writer, and as a creator. After a long day toiling in life’s daily stresses, it’s one of the few things that can provide to me a sense of solace, if only for 5 minutes.
And I am not the only one who feels this way.
With that in mind, I grabbed a hold of that pipe dream of mine and started reaching out to friends, writers, and colleagues that I knew from my workshop and book blogging days. I knew I needed to work with a lot of people to make this blog successful, and I knew that we could inspire and challenge each other.
Not everyone said yes. And I didn’t reach out to everyone I knew. I acted mostly on instinct, and perhaps, given my undergraduate career at Hollins University (an all-women’s college in Roanoke, Virginia), it’s no wonder that everyone I invited is a woman.
But hey, why not? I took all those yeses and maybes and threw them in a bucket, and we started brainstorming the hell out of this.
This.
Speculative Chic.
That’s chic. Not chick.
Yes, we’re all women. But as you’ll come to learn, we are not a monolith. Just because we’re all women, all writers, and all fans of the speculative fiction genre, it doesn’t mean we think alike. And that’s the purpose of this blog: to present content-driven entries from fans, readers, and writers that highlight what’s important to them and why.
So welcome. I hope you enjoy what you find here, and I hope you’ll take part in creating the kind of community where we have fun, where we talk about what we love and what we hate, what inspires and disappoints us in the speculative fiction community. There are a lot of ways you can interact with us:
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Get to know Speculative Chic’s contributors by clicking here. You’ll find as we grow, there will be more contributors (male, female, and anyone in between!), as well as more links to their specific posts. And tomorrow, we’ll give you a taste of what we have to offer, by kicking off a semi-regular column “Sound Off!” which will feature some of our contributors’ thoughts and reactions to the NEXT BIG THING in entertainment.
What can you expect in August? First, our weekly column, “My Favorite Things” debuts every Monday, where a handful of us talk about what we love at the moment. August also brings a handful us of together to talk about the Best Novel Nominees for the 2016 Hugo Awards. We’ll discuss conventions, teenagers in the apocalypse, heteronormativity in The Expanse, cosplay, and writing workshops, as well as a bi-weekly column, “Dear Sherry,” where creators anonymously reach out to our resident Life Coach to get advice for what ails them!
In the meantime, feel free to take a look at the posts generated for the sake of getting prepared for our launch date. On Monday we’ll kick it into high gear with daily posts (minus the weekends, of course). If you like something you see, let us know! Comment! Share the post! Spread the word and signal boost!
We’re glad to have you!
[…] a part of. And lo and behold, it just launched today! This group blog is called Speculative Chic, and you can read the intro post here. Starting next week, the blog will feature regular posts all about geek culture and speculative […]
Yay! Finally!