blaft

blaft, 5 hours ago to random

“If you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”

Happy Malcolm X Day

blaft, 2 days ago to random

Last day for this!

(If you have a pitch for a translation, the translation doesn't have to be complete!)

https://www.blaft.com/blogs/news/call-for-submissions

blaft, 4 days ago to random

Reprinted and back in stock on our website: STUPID GUY GOES TO INDIA, an autobiographical manga chronicling the adventures of Yukichi Yamamatsu, whose missionary zeal for spreading manga culture inspired him to leave Japan for the first time at the age of 56 to move to Delhi, without knowing any English or Hindi, and try to start a publishing company. Hilarious hi-jinks ensue!

https://www.blaft.com/products/stupid-guy-goes-to-india

Translated by Kumari Sivasubramanian

blaft, 5 days ago to random

Selling books at IIHS Bangalore: City Scripts today! And speaking on a panel about horror fiction at 12:15

blaft, 12 days ago to random

We're in Ahmedabad right now meeting authors and researching the history of Gujarati pulp novels & magazines. Having an absolute blast.

Particularly amazing: The history of Chakram Chandan, a weekly Gujarati fiction & entertainment mag which ran for OVER 70 YEARS (1949-2021). Thriller writer HN "Atom" Golibar took over operations from his father, NJ Golibar, at age 15 (!), and ran it with NO ADS for decades.

Will be posting some vintage art finds and interviews soon!

2015 Diwali Issue of Chakram Chandan
2020 Issue of Chakram Chandan
Aslam Memon story from a 2000 issue of Chakram Chandan featuring illustration by G. Sandhwani

blaft, 15 days ago to random

The Museum of Popular Art in Alwarthirunagar, Chennai, is hosting a retrospective of work by Jeyaraj Fernando (who illustrated Pushpa Thangadorai's "My Name Is Kamala" & "Highway 117" starring Karate Kavitha, both featured in our Tamil Pulp anthos).

https://www.newindianexpress.com/amp/story/cities/chennai/2024/May/01/pages-of-a-vintage-sketch-book

blaft, 21 days ago to random

We're looking in particular for translations! If you know of anyone who writes science fiction, fantasy, magic realism, slipstream, or some related genre in a South Asian language, please let us know!
https://www.blaft.com/blogs/news/call-for-submissions

blaft, 23 days ago to random

Kumari Loves a Monster: A bilingual English/Tamil picture book about South Indian women enjoying fun times with their monster boyfriends

Available as an ebook or in print, from our site, Smashwords, etc.

https://www.blaft.com/collections/ebooks/products/kumari-loves-a-monster-ebook

https://draft2digital.com/book/1421921#ebook

Kumari bathing in a waterfall with her monster
Kumar paddleboating with her monster
Kumari Loves a Monster

blaft, 23 days ago to random

Blaft books are in stock at The Buddha Grove, an amazing indie bookshop in Guwahati, Assam! Mizo Myths, Tamil Pulp Fiction in translation, Kuzhali Manickavel's treatise on How to Love Mathematical Objects, and more!

The Buddha Grove bookshop
Bookstore logo

blaft, 1 month ago to random

Call for Submissions! Poster by the inimitable Priyanka Paul who will be contributing the cover! More here: https://blaft.com/blogs/news/call-for-submissions

blaft, 1 month ago to random

Call for subs!

https://www.blaft.com/blogs/news/call-for-submissions

#ஜெய்பீம்

Submissions open through May 15, 2024

blaft, 1 month ago to random

Twitter ads have become soo bizarre... I've got the Raelians telling me how all Earth life forms are descended from space aliens, and then a biology journal that's... paying Elon money?... to announce the discovery of a new genus of nematodes!?!!

blaft, 1 month ago to random

Read Kuzhali Manickavel's CONVERSATIONS REGARDING THE FATALISTIC OUTLOOK OF THE COMMON MAN

https://www.blaft.com/collections/new-arrivals/products/conversations-regarding-the-fatalistic-outlook-of-the-common-man

Goodreads review by Steven Deobald - 57 reviews - 21 followers Few authors make me laugh, spontaneously and out loud, with nearly every paragraph. Kuzhali Manickavel does. Fewer still can transform that light, insightful humour into the absolute gut-punch that is “The Girl”. The humour isn’t lost, but it is suddenly drawn in relief of a different kind of insight entirely. A four- year-old has to drag us, the adults — with no cooperation from us — through the mud of reality. The best parts of this book are impossible to describe. Each one is something lived, previously or currently, and represents more the sense of something than that thing itself.

blaft, 1 month ago to random

Annnd here's Homegrown with a write-up of our Gujarati Pulp Fiction project:

https://homegrown.co.in/homegrown-supply/a-new-homegrown-anthology-is-aiming-to-capture-the-wild-world-of-gujarati-pulp-fiction

Not sure about the idea that Indian languages pulp fiction "spilled over" from Hindi... I think the Hindi Pulp novel industry probably developed a bit slower than others? But that's a quibble!

blaft, 1 month ago to random

I know we post this rather frequently but I never get bored of it

blaft, 1 month ago to random

A few #KuzhaliManickavel stories have been moving into Indian languages recently. Novelist Hansda Sowvendra Shekar translated "Paavai" (from Manickavel's 1st collection, Insects Are Just Like You and Me Except Some of Them Have Wings) & published it in #Hindi in #VanmaliKatha last month, and Appadurai Muttulingam has a #Tamil translation of "The Statue Game" in #Andhimazhai.

https://www.andhimazhai.com/literature/short-stories/silai-vilaiyattu

Great to see this happening!

blaft, 1 month ago to random

The last few audiobooks I've listened to have all featured white (UK/USian) readers who at some point in the narration do an Indian or Chinese or African-American vernacular accent for a character's voice. This is always offensive, or at best very cringe, even when you can tell the reader is trying valiantly not to do a caricature.

I wish audiobook producers wouldn't do this. Get an Asian or Af-Am reader to read the whole thing, or just the character parts, or at least just read it neutral.