Get your copy of Alt Hist Issue 1 before everyone else hears about it! Alt Hist is now available in print format and ebook format, and readers of this blog will be the first people to hear about it!
Print copies are available via Lulu and ebooks available via Smashwords right now!
Over the coming weeks other ebook retailers will start getting the book, so don’t worry if you want to get it via your Kindle or iPad, we have a solution for you!
With all the proofs processed, additional non-fiction content added and a cover design created, I am getting close to being able to announce the publication of the first issue of Alt Hist. At this stage a number of complications arise regarding timing. Ideally I’d like to announce publication of the print and ebook versions at the same time, but because certain retailers take a bit of time to get ebooks onto their platforms there maybe some delay. I anticipate though that Alt Hist will be available in some sort of ebook format within a week. When this happens I will announce it on this site, but we may well go for a more full scale announcement once all the distribution channels have got the “book”.
The PDF proofs of the first issue of Alt Hist are now with authors, so I think we should still be on track for publication towards the end of October.
I have to sort out one of the non-fiction pieces and also write an editorial and design a cover. But then everything should be ready for publication. I’m very excited to be reaching the finishing stages of this inaugural issue. Having read through all the stories again during the proof-reading stage, I felt very proud of the quality of contributions – there’s some great story-telling to look forward.
I have now completed the typesetting stage of putting together the first issue of Alt Hist. All 6 stories are typeset for print publication and formatted in a PDF file. The next step is to go through each story and mark-up and suggested edits in the PDF file and then send each author their proofs. Once I have these back I can begin to finalise the contents of the issue.
Things still left to do other than that are:
Interesting that a lot of the work on putting this together is very focused on the print version. I wonder which will be more popular the print or online version?
We’re planning to charge about £3.99 for print and £2.99 for the e-book version (multiply by 1.5 ish for the dollar rate, but these things tend to be in the hands of the distributors!)
I am now at the stage of putting together a table of contents for the first issue of Alt Hist. The following short fiction pieces will be published in the first issue:
After much thought I decided the fairest way of ordering the contents of the first issue was by date of acceptance. So David W. Landrun’s story was the first accepted, and Ian Sales’s story was the last accepted (i.e. because it was submitted recently, not because it took longer than any other story to evaluate!).
The stories are a good mix of fairly straight historical fiction and very alternate history fiction, with one story actually taking the whole history of creation as its narrative. Other settings covered in the first issue include Anglo-Saxon England, the London of Jack the Ripper, Glasgow street riots in 1930, as well as fiction portraying alternate histories of the USA and air travel.
We will also be publishing pieces about two upcoming alternate history anthologies: Columbia & Britannia and Aether Age.
I now have six short fiction pieces ready for typesetting as part of the first issue of Alt Hist. I am really excited about this collection of stories and will be writing a bit more about them as we get nearer to publication. The next stage is to typeset each story and to get PDF proofs out to our contributors. Whilst that happens I will also be working on front and back covers of the issue and also designing some marketing material.
The aim is to have the first issue published by the end of October.
I am happy to announce that we now have three accepted stories for the first issue of Alt Hist, which means that we are halfway to our target of six.
But once we get to our target of six stories accepted that doesn’t mean the issue will be ready. There will still be quite a bit of work to do on getting the stories type set, deciding a table of contents, choosing artwork and designing front and back covers, writing an editorial, and also getting proofs out to our contributors.
So in a sense the work is only just beginning!
What does Alt Hist stand for? Here’s our new mission statement.
Alt Hist, http://althistfiction.com, is the new magazine of Historical Fiction and Alternate History. Lovers of historical fiction for too long have been denied outlets for short pieces of fiction, as the number of print and online magazines for historical short fiction is very limited compared to the popularity of fiction set in past times. Alt Hist’s mission is to provide readers with entertaining and well-written short stories with a historical setting, whether portraying actual events or events that could have happened. If you read and enjoy historical fiction, alternate history or historical fantasy then we think you will like Alt Hist.
I’m happy to report that Alt Hist has now been added to Duotrope’s Digest as a fledgling market.
Duotrope’s Digest is a great resource for anyone looking for short fiction markets (as well as poetry and novels actually). I use it all the time for my own work as it has an excellent Submissions Tracker and a very comprehensive database of markets.
As a result of our listing I’m now looking forward to some short story submissions hitting our email address soon. If you have anything that you think might be appropriate please send it to althist.editor@gmail.com.
It’s a new magazine dedicated to readers and writers of historical fiction and also alternate history. We’re currently looking for contributors for our first issue, which will be published as an ebook and a print-on-demand book. To find out what we want go to our Submissions page, and if you are interested in reading the result sign-up to the RSS feed to get the latest updates about our publishing programme.
If you read Science Fiction or Fantasy you might have heard of the term as related to Alternate History. In Alternate History the course of history is radically changed and the author imagines what might have been if…
Some examples of alternative history are Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America and the prolific Harry Turtledove.
For the purposes of this magazine we are also considering works such as Susanna Clarke’s Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell and Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series to be alternate history as well. Really anything that has a basis in history, whether or not it then crosses over into another genre such as Science Fiction, Fantasy or Horror.
