The Future Fire, long-time champions of socio-political SF, have a project up on Peerbackers that’s well worth your support:
Much widely distributed science fiction and fantasy is written by American and other Anglophone authors, and treats subjects close to the hearts of straight, white, English-speaking men. There’s nothing wrong with this sci-fi itself—we love lots of it—but there’s clearly something missing. Having white Anglo cis/hetero/males as (the only) role models is not an option any more… We want to see political stories: not partisan-political, but writing that recognizes the implications for real people and cultures of the events and actions that make up science fictional or fantastic histories, as well as our own history.
For this anthology we will be looking for stories from the perspective of people and places that are colonized under regimes not of their choosing (in the past, present or even future). We are not primarily interested in war stories, although don’t completely rule them out. We are not interested in stories about a White Man learning the error of his ways; nor parables about alien contact in which the Humans are white anglos, and the Aliens are an analogue for other races. We want stories told from the viewpoint of colonized peoples, with characters who do not necessarily speak English, from authors who have experience of the world outside the First World.
They’re looking for $3,000 and there’s some very tasty rewards up for grabs. And, if you donate $5 before May 1st, you get entered into a prize draw to potentially win some signed books!
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UPDATE: The funding goal has been reached!
Pledges on this appeal have surpassed $3000, which means we reached our original target with 20 days to go. We’re not stopping. Every dollar we receive is going directly to the authors and artists published in the We See a Different Frontier anthology, so if we raise another few hundred, we’ll be able to buy even more stories and have a bigger and better publication for you all to read, maybe even increase the pay rate over the level we’ve been planning. Thanks to everyone who has backed us so far. Please keep spreading the word, and please do keep donating.
And, according to the World SF blog, submissions may well be open in June.
