Webb, Janeen
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author, Critic, Editor.
(1951- ) Australian author, editor and critic, married to Jack Dann since 1995, who has published notable essays and reviews since 1985 and who was part of the influential editorial collective of Australian Science Fiction Review: Second Series from 1987 to the magazine's closure in 1991. With Dann she co-edited Dreaming Down-Under: Thirty-one Original Stories From the Wild Side of Australian Speculative Fiction (anth 1998), winner of the Ditmar Award and World Fantasy Award as best anthology. A nonfiction work of note is Aliens & Savages: Fiction, Politics, and Prejudice in Australia (1998) with Andrew Enstice.
Webb's first story of genre interest was "Death at the Blue Elephant" in Enter: HQ/Flamingo Short Story Collection (anth 1997); this is assembled along with most of her early short work as Death at the Blue Elephant (coll 2014). The Sinbad Chronicles series, comprising Sailing to Atlantis (2001) and The Silken Road to Samarkand (2003), is Young-Adult fantasy. The Dragon's Child (2018 chap), set in a fantasy version of Hong Kong, is a Satire in which Shapeshifting dragons (see Supernatural Creatures) comprise a ruthless corporate elite. The hoards they accumulate are digital. The tale is all the more chilling (and engrossing) for being told deadpan. [DRL]
Janeen Webb
born Newcastle, New South Wales: 29 August 1951
works
series
Sinbad Chronicles
- Sailing to Atlantis (Sydney, New South Wales: Angus and Robertson/HarperCollins, 2001) [pb/Gregory Bridges]
- The Silken Road to Samarkand: The Sinbad Chronicles: Book II (Sydney, New South Wales: Angus and Robertson/HarperCollins, 2003) [pb/Anna Augul]
individual titles
- The Dragon's Child (Hornsea, East Yorkshire: PS Publishing, 2018) [chap: hb/Greg Bridges]
- The Gold-Jade Dragon (Hornsea, East Yorkshire: PS Publishing/PS Australia, 2020) [hb/Greg Bridges]
collections
- Death at the Blue Elephant (Greenwood, Western Australia: Ticonderoga Publications, 2014) [coll: pb/Nick Stathopoulos]
nonfiction
- Aliens & Savages: Fiction, Politics, and Prejudice in Australia (Sydney, New South Wales: HarperCollins, 1998) with Andrew Enstice [nonfiction: hb/]
works as editor
series
Dreaming Down-Under
- Dreaming Down-Under: Thirty-one Original Stories From the Wild Side of Australian Speculative Fiction (Sydney, New South Wales: HarperCollins/Voyager, 1998) with Jack Dann [anth: Dreaming Down-Under: pb/Nick Stathopoulos]
- Dreaming Down-Under: Book One (Sydney, New South Wales: HarperCollins/Voyager, 1999) with Jack Dann [anth: rev vt, containing the first half of the above: Dreaming Down-Under: pb/Nick Stathopoulos]
- Dreaming Down-Under: Book Two (Sydney, New South Wales: HarperCollins/Voyager, 1999) with Jack Dann [anth: rev vt, containing the second half of the above: Dreaming Down-Under: pb/Nick Stathopoulos]
- Dreaming in the Dark (Hornsea, East Yorkshire: PS Publishing, 2016) [anth: Dreaming Down-Under: hb/Greg Bridges]
nonfiction works as editor
- The Fantastic Self: Essays on the Subject of the Self (Perth, Western Australia: Eidolon Publications, 1999) with Andrew Enstice [nonfiction: anth: papers presented at the tenth conference of the Mythopoeic Literature Association of Australia, July 1994: pb/]
links
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