Aphelion
Entry updated 8 May 2019. Tagged: Publication.
1. Australian magazine, Summer 1985/6 to Summer 1986/7, five issues, edited by Peter McNamara (1947-2004) from Adelaide, A4-size, quarterly on coated stock. One of many short-lived, quixotic Australian attempts to produce a viable professional sf magazine, Aphelion soon failed, but honourably. Good stories by George Turner, Greg Egan, Rosaleen Love and, most often, Terry Dowling, were among the better work published in an uneven magazine. Dowling won the Ditmar Award for both "The Man Who Lost Red" (Autumn 1986) and "For As Long as You Burn" (Summer 1986/87). It ran a serial by McNamara under the alias Patrick Urth, "Oasis" (Spring/Summer 1985-Winter 1986), about the colonization of the Antarctic, which has not been reprinted. The stories were generally better than the magazine's appearance implied, though the covers, by Simon Altmann and John Beswick, were attractive. The final issue went fully typeset but the internal layout remained unimpressive. McNamara always regarded Aphelion as an experiment and built upon it to publish well-produced sf books by Australian writers under his Small-Press imprint, Aphelion Publications. [PN/MA]
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2. Online Amateur Magazine produced in Georgia by Dan L Hollifield, which has appeared on a monthly basis, with occasional gaps, since February 1997 making it one of the oldest surviving continuously published Online Magazines. Although a non-paying market it attracts a number of contributors who have built up a solid body of material, most of which is still accessible at the website. Most contributors were writers of competent fan fiction, and only a few more widely known names have appeared, among them Phil Foglio, Robert Thurston and the ubiquitous D F Lewis. The editor encouraged the development of a number of Shared World concepts, primarily the Mare Inebrium series of Club Stories told in a spaceport bar at the north pole of the Moon. [MA]
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