Aaron Pound of Dreaming About Other Worlds has offered the most comprehensive review to date of The Ruin of Beltany Ring: A Collection of Pagan Poems and Tales. Among other things, he writes:
"At a mere eighty-two pages, this collection ends much too soon. C.S. MacCath's short stories have a raw and almost visceral feel that hones directly into the travails and triumphs of everyday life, casting light onto the ways in which those living such lives might turn to Pagan spirituality to help guide them through their days. The poems, on the other hand, display a strange mixture of the seriousness of epic myth combined with a joyful willingness to play with those myths, and an angry undercurrent beneath it all, that sometimes rises to the fore in a bitter rage. As I noted before, this isn't really a collection of fantasy stories: The subtitle for the book is A Collection of Pagan Poems and Tales, and that is an entirely accurate description. One could almost think of this book as a Pagan prayer manual, offering a brief and engaging glimpse into the thinking of a member of the modern Pagan movement, and as that it is definitely a collection worth reading."
I'm glad Beltany is still doing its job out there in the world, and I'm grateful for Aaron's thoughtful treatment of the collection. You can read the entire review here.
Which brings me to another piece of news. On October 31st, I'll be releasing a second collection of previously-published fiction entitled, The Longest Road in the Universe: A Collection of Fantastical Tales via Triskele Media Press. These tales were first published between 2008-2016 and include fiction nominated for the Pushcart Prize, shortlisted for the Washington Science Fiction Association Small Press Award, and offered honorable mention in The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Sixth Annual Collection, edited by Gardner Dozois. Mike Allen of Mythic Delirium Books has graciously agreed to introduce the collection, which will feature cover art by UK artist Nancy Farmer originally commissioned for the title story by Murky Depths.
This work departs from the overtly Pagan writing of Beltany and into new fantastical worlds and futures. There are sentient bombs, the descendants of genetically-engineered slaves, modern-day Pied Pipers, battle monks, and chimeric supermassive black holes at the end of the universe. I'm excited to be gathering these tales together and hope you'll enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed writing them. More later, as the release date nears.