Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Interview: Lynne & Michael of Uncanny Magazine

Uncanny is a likely a familiar name to many readers, particularly of Charles' excellent Monthly Round. Now entering its third year, they are running a Kickstarter campaign to fund it. The editors, Lynne & Michael, took the time to answer a few questions about the magazine and campaign:
 

You're in the midst of your Year Three Kickstarter campaign - Why Kickstarter instead of subscriptions?
 
We do both. We have multiple revenue streams, so that we are never dependent on just one. Along with our Uncanny Magazine Year 3 Kickstarter, we sell subscriptions through Amazon Kindle and Weightless Books. We also have a Patreon, and sell advertising on the website.

 
We’ve discovered that we have different communities of readers with different preferences, so we try to provide whatever way they prefer to support us.
 

The best part of any Kickstarter campaign is the rewards- what goodies are there for backers?

Along with our fabulous eBooks of the Uncanny issues, we are offering numerous backer rewards including A Very Special Verity! Multifandom Podcast Mashup episode recorded just for our backers featuring Special Guest Appearances from members of the Radio Free Skaro and Down & Safe podcasts, autographed books, manuscript critiques, author video chats, author meals, cover art prints, and even becoming a Guest of Honor at the first UncannyCon!

Uncanny has published a lot of great stories in just two years - What can we expect from year three?

Uncanny Year 3 has an amazing group of solicited short story writers including Paul Cornell, John Chu, Maria Dahvana Headley, Nalo Hopkinson, N. K. Jemisin, Mary Robinette Kowal, Seanan McGuire, Sam J. Miller, Sarah Pinsker, Delia Sherman, Ursula Vernon, Catherynne M. Valente, Alyssa Wong (with art by Grace P. Fong), and Isabel Yap.  We will also be opening up to short story submissions again soon, so we will once again feature many newer voices from every conceivable background.

And speaking of great stories, Uncanny is nominated for more than a few awards- how does it feel to be at that level so quickly? Even with such a stellar editing staff, it's quite an accomplishment.

We are truly humbled. It is such an huge honor to have all of this award attention for works from our first year. We didn’t expect that level of appreciation so soon. We are giddy that these stellar works and creators are being read and appreciated. We are so happy for our staff, writers, and artists.

With all that you've accomplished in those first two years, how does Year Three top that?

We feel that we keep growing as editors and publishers, so hopefully each issue is better than the one before it.

If we reach certain stretch goals in the Kickstarter, we’re also planning on increasing our website content with more paid blogging.

How does my hair look? Don't answer that; I know it's terrible.

Fabulous. As a Space Unicorn should be.