About DarkEcho
◊ Contact
◊ Featured Art: Rick Berry
◊ Content
◊ About Paula Guran
◊ Some Photos
Contact
◊ General information or to contact Paula Guran: Email darkecho@darkecho.com
◊ To contact Rick Berry, email art@braid.com
Featured Art by Rick Berry
Please note: Copyrights to all of the artwork reproduced at the top of the page or on "view art" pages of DarkEcho 4.0 and in the left column under the DarkEcho Horror logo on DarkEcho 3.0 is held by the individual artist, Rick Berry and is used by his permission. Nothing may be reproduced, linked, or transmitted in any form without written permission from the artist. If you are interested in rights for these works, please include the title of the piece, specific use and rights you require and email art@braid.com. Mr Berry is also available for original illustration, design and concept work. Please visit the Braid Art site to view more of his work.
Each "page" of both DarkEcho 3.0 and 4.0 is graced with the incredible art of Rick Berry. Berry is an accomplished oil painter, draftsman, and a pioneer in new media. In 1984, he created the world's first digital cover illustration for a work of fiction, William Gibson's Neuromancer. He left school at age 17 to begin a career in underground comics. After hitching east to Boston from Colorado, he shifted his artistic focus and has produced hundreds of illustrations for books, magazines, games, CDs, and comics. In addition to illustration, Berry's early experience in the print production trenches of comics has evolved into specialty editions design work, and has sent him to some interesting places. He was flown to Hong Kong in 1993 to supervise presses and advise the Chinese on current electronic press capabilities. His fine art work can be seen in galleries internationally and online at Braid Media Arts.
Berry has an abiding interest in collaborative work, and, in 1993,
joined with Phil Hale to produce Double Memory, an 110 page book
that Peter Straub called "...a dazzling achievement." Berry and William
Gibson worked together again in 1995 when Braid Media Arts (Berry,
Darrel Anderson, and Gene Bodio) designed and executed the CGI
cyberspace climax of TriStar Productions' film, Johnny Mnemonic. The sequence
was featured in SIGGRAPH's animation revue, 1996.
Berry also has a long-term collaboration with fellow professional artist/illustrator/designer for 30 years. The founders of Braid, their work has received awards from The Society of Illustrators, Communication Arts, Spectrum, MacWorld Macintosh Masters, Computer Graphics World, and the Truevision International Videographics Competition. It has appeared in nearly every major computer graphics/media/arts magazine, as well many other publications including books, comics, posters, and a few doorstops.
Berry teaches Digital Art: A Collaborative Approach at Tufts University, as well a conducting lectures and workshops at colleges and corporations nationally on the nature of creativity. He lives with his wife and three children in Massachusetts.
Content
DarkEcho, in general and currently, focuses on literature of the fantastic science fiction, fantasy, horror, speculative fiction, whatever you want to call it. It features a blog, reviews, interviews, and essays. There is a free e-mail newsletter that you may subscribe to.
In the last ten years there have been three major site constructions: the original tacky little site (v.1.0), the first makeover with Rick Berry art during the OMNI era (v.2.0), the massive remodel of about 3.5 years ago (v.3.0), and now the new "white site" (v.4.0).
DarkEcho 3.0 (re-designed and re-launched 1 May 2002)focuses primarily on horror. It incorporates professionally published content from several sources including all of the content of DarkEcho OMNI Horror, originally produced (1996-1998) under editors Ellen Datlow and Pam Weintraub for pioneering professional Web publication OMNI Online (no longer an active site). Universal Studios' HorrorOnline went on the Web in October 1998 and existed in a monthly format through the spring of 2001. Now that HorrorOnline no longer exists, most of the content produced for its horror literature area -- monthly interviews, essays, and reviews -- is also republished here.
Other content came from Spook magazine, the "Waves of Fear" column in Cemetery Dance magazine, the
DarkEcho Horror site (established 1995) that was produced
in support of DarkEcho, a weekly email newsletter for horror
writers and others, and from the newsletter itself.
Further original material from writers Colleen Crary, Hank Wagner,
Justin Norton, Fiona Webster, John Grant, M. Christian, and Thomas Roche
is also included.
DarkEcho version 4.0, emphasizing science fiction and fantasy (including horror) was launched in October 2005. Along with some original content, there are re-printed reviews and interviews from CFQ magazine, Fantasy Magazine, and "Waves of Fear" column in Cemetery Dance magazine.
About Paula Guran
The Very Short Bio (Less than 100 words)
Paula Guran is the editor of Pocket Books fantasy imprint Juno (www.juno-books.com).
In an earlier life she produced weekly email newsletter DarkEcho (winning two Stokers, an IHG award, and a World Fantasy nomination), edited Horror Garage (earning another IHG and second a World Fantasy nomination), and has contributed reviews, interviews, and articles to numerous professional publications. She's sometimes a publisher (Infrapress, Cælum Press, and Writers.com Books), teaches, and is author John Shirley's (www.john-shirley.com) literary agent.
The Long Bio
Paula Guran is the editor of Pocket Books fantasy imprint Juno
(www.juno-books.com). From its launch in September 2006 until 1 January, Juno Books was an
imprint of Wildside Press.
In an earlier life she produced Darkecho, a weekly email newsletter for horror writers and others, for over six years (1994-2001) and was recognized with two unprecedented back-to-back Bram Stoker Awards for Nonfiction from the Horror Writers Association (1998 and 1999) as well as an International Horror Guild Award (1999), and a World Fantasy nomination (1997). She began producing the horror portion of the pioneering professional Web publication OMNI Online in 1996 and became the Literature Editor of Universal Studios' HorrorOnline in October 1998.
She reviewed regularly for Publishers Weekly for over a decade, was review editor for Fantasy magazine for a few years, a columnist for Cemetery Dance magazine for five years, and consulting editor for the print section (reviewing and writing articles about sf/f/h) of CFQ (Cinemafantastique) Magazine.
She also edited edited Horror Garage for three years. The print zine, an eccentric mix of original dark fiction and garage/punk/indie music, received an IHG award for Best Publication of 2000 and Guran was honored with a World Fantasy nomination for it in 2002. (Note: She is no longer connected with Horror Garage in any way.) Guran also edited the anthology Embraces: Dark Erotica (Venus or Vixen) -- termed in a starred review in Publishers Weekly: "Provocative, intelligent, subversive and, above all, artful." It was an IHG nominee as Best Anthology. Her anthology for Juno Books, Best New Paranormal Romance, also received a starred review in Publishers Weekly. It was followed by Best New Romantic Fantasy 2. While with Stealth Press she edited, designed, and executed the original promotional PDF anthology All Hallows-E: Halloween Tales by Seven Masters of Horror with stories by Ray Bradbury, Peter Straub, F. Paul Wilson, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, John Shirley, William F. Nolan, and Al Sarrantonio. It was downloaded more than 20,000 times in the six-week period it was available online.
Other than publications already mentioned, she has written articles or reviews for Icons of Horror, Supernatural Literature of the World, SciFi Magazine, SciFipedia, Locus, Locus Online, Weird Tales, The Third Alternative (UK), Event Horizon, Dark Wisdom, Dead Reckonings, Barnesandnoble.com, Gettingit.com, Mystery Scene, Inklings, SciFiEye, Horror, Pulp Eternity, Cabaret, Tangent, ZENtertainment, The Market List, Heliocentric Net, Into the Darkness, D8, for Writers Digest books, and various convention programmes. Some of her work has been translated into German and Russian.
She mentored the The Spook and was a contributing editor for that publication. She authored introductions for the multiple award-winning collection Black Butterflies by John Shirley, anthology Imagination Fully Dilated 2, and Nancy Kilpatrick's collection Cold Comfort. Her essay on the history of Halloween was featured in the award-winning Cemetery Dance anthology, October Dreams.
Dabs of fiction have appeared under pseudonyms for professional webzines and, under her own name, in anthologies Eros Ex Machina and the Stoker Award-winning 365 Scary Stories. Guran is the former fiction editor for Gothic.Net Webzine and previously edited and published Wetbones, a print magazine of cutting edge dark fiction. She has been award-winning author John Shirley's literary representative since January 1996.
She chaired the Horror Writers Association Bram Stoker Awards Jury for two terms and is a former member of the Board of Trustees. Guran served as a World Fantasy Award judge in 2001 and has administered the a International Horror Guild Awards from 1997 until its demise in 2008. She was a member of the Board of Directors of The Mirabundus Project, Inc., a non-proft corporation that oversees the IHG Awards.
Guran has moderated and served on panels for the World Horror Convention, SFWorldCon, World Fantasy Convention, Wiscon, the Horror Writers Association Annual Meeting, Dragon*Con, Context, Death Equinox, and NeCon. She's also been interviewed by media including the BBC, NBC-affiliate KVOA, The Cleveland Plain Dealer, and several online and print magazines.
She worked for Stealth Press -- a publisher of sf/f/h & more -- in marketing, as Online Content Editor and in other capacities. Guran is the author of The Word Book from Writers.com. She serves as publisher of Writers.com Books and its imprints Infrapress and Cælum Press In addition to her publishing duties, Guran has worked, taught, and edited for Writers on the Net and produces a monthly newsletter for them which garnered her a nomination as Favorite Online Writer for Inscriptions Magazine's 2001 Engraver Awards.
And since it seems to be a rule to have photos of yourself online:
Some Photos
Current Web Site Design and Webmastering:
Caelum Press
Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
DarkEcho (inactive)
Ellen Datlow
Infrapress
International Horror Guild (Design by Chad Savage) (inactive)
John Shirley
John Shirley: In Darkness Waiting Sub-site
John Shirley: Cellars Sub-site
Juno Books
Messages from Michael
The Mirabundus Project
Writers.com
Writers.com Books
Books Edited
Forthcoming in 2009
Jun 09: Amazon Ink, Lori Devoti (Pocket Juno)
Jul 09: Vicious Circle, Linda Robertson (Pocket Juno)
Aug 09: Demon Inside, Stacia Kane (Megan Chase #2) (Pocket Juno)
Sep 08: Matters of the Blood, Maria Lima (Pocket Juno, reprint)
Oct 08: Blood Bargain, Maria Lima (Blood Lines #2) (Pocket Juno, reprint)
Nov 08: Blood Kin, Maria Lima (Blood Lines #3) (Pocket Juno)
Dec 09: Vampire Sunrise, Carol Nelson Douglas (Delilah Street, PI #3)(Pocket Juno)
2008
Jan 08: Apricot Brandy, Lynn Cesar (Juno)
Feb 08: Living Shadows: Stories: New and Pre-Owned, John Shirley (Prime)
Feb 08: House of Whispers, Margaret Lucke (Juno)
Mar 08: Clockwork Heart, Dru Pagliasotti (Juno)
Mar 08: Blackness Tower, Lillian Stewart Carl (Juno)
Apr 08: Personal Demons, Stacia Kane (Juno)
Jul 08: Seaborn, Chris Howard (Juno)
Aug 08: Nights of Sin, Matthew Cook (Blood Magic #2) (Juno)
Sep 08: Matters of the Blood, Maria Lima (Juno, reprint)
Oct 08: Brimstone Kiss, Carole Nelson Douglas (Delilah Street, PI #2) (Juno)
Nov 08: Blood Bargain, Maria Lima (Blood Lines #2) (Juno)
Nov 08: Black Glass, John Shirley (ESP)
Dec 08: Riversend, Sylvia Kelso (Sequel to Amberlight) (Juno)
2007
Jan 07: A Mortal Glamour, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (Juno, restored version)
Jan 07: The Strangeling, Saskia Walker (Juno)
Feb 07: Nimuar's Loss, Camille Gabor (Juno))
Mar 07: The Bone Whistle, Eva Swan (Juno)
Mar 07: The Other End, John Shirley (Cemetery Dance)
Apr 07: Matters of the Blood, Maria Lima (Juno)
May 07: Best New Romantic Fantasy 2, ed. Paula Guran (Juno)
Jun 07: Euryale, Kara Dalkey (Juno, reprint)
Jul 07: Twelve Steps from Darkness, Karen Taylor (Juno)
Aug 07: Unveiling the Sorceress, Saskia Walker(Juno)
Aug 07: Wind Follower, Carole McDonnell (Juno)
Sep 07: The Eternal Rose, Gail Dayton (Juno)
Sep 07: Dark Maiden, Norma Lehr (Juno)
Sep 07: Master of Shadows, Janet Lorimer (Juno)
Sep 07: Blood Magic, Matthew Cook (Juno)
Oct 07: Dancing With Werewolves, Carole Nelson Douglas (Juno)
Nov 07: Amberlight, Sylvia Kelso (Juno)
Dec 07: The Sarsen Witch, Eileen Kernaghan (Juno, reprint)
Dec 07: Chasing Silver, Jamie Craig (Juno)
2006
Oct 06: Best New Paranormal Romance, Paula Gurana, ed. (tp)
Nov 06: Rags and Old Iron, by Lorelei Shannon (Juno, reprint)
Dec 06: Beyond the Hedge, by Roby James (tp)
Earlier
2001: Darkness Divided: A Collection, John Shirley (Stealth Press)
2000: Embraces: Dark Erotica, Paula Guran, ed. (Venus or Vixen)
1999: Really Really Really Really Weird Stories: A Collection, John Shirley (Night
Shade Books)
1998: Black Butterflies: A Flock on the Darkside, John Shirley (Msrk V. Ziesing)