So, your humble ed-otter returns from the 2012 edition of Further Confusion in Northern California, with lots of stuff to report. Including such items as…

Progress is being made on the Cóyotl Awards, a juried award for furry fiction to be run by the Furry Writers' Guild, with the first winners announced at Rainfurrest 2012 next September.

While some details remain private to guild members, preliminary rules have been published. The award is currently to be presented in General and Mature sections for the best Short Story, Novella (over 7500 words) and Novel (over 40,000 words).

Each member may submit five nominations to each category for works they are uninvolved with to a five-member council, rating them on plot, character, setting and literary merit; the four works with the highest weighted average will be voted on by guild members.

The award was floated as an alternative to the Ursa Majors in June 2010. Extensive debate followed to define 'literary quality' and the recognition or differentiation of mature work.

Ursa Major-award winning author M.C.A. Hogarth has released her latest novel in e-book format: Even the Wingless, the story of an empath ambassador sent to a violent court of shapeshifting dragons, there to try to mend a failing treaty... or be consumed by savagery.

The novel is available on the Kindle store and on Smashwords in all other formats. You can read more about the story, and see accompanying art, on the author's LiveJournal.

Book cover by Rukis

After a long journey, up-and-coming artist and writer Amy "Ringshadow" Meister (FA) has entered the publishing market with her first e-book, Rainbow in the Dark (originally named "Like a Rainbow in the Dark", as a tribute to the Ronnie James Dio song of the same name).

The story, set in an anthropomorphic/furry universe, concerns a closet-gay wolf-raccoon hybrid named Marcus Midnight, a fictional rock star, and his power-metal band Guillotine. After a successful musical career spanning twelve years and six hit albums, Marcus feels burned-out and extremely lonely.

M.C.A. Hogarth is releasing short fiction to e-book formats via the Kindle Store and Smashwords.

Stories include the Ursa Major Award-winning space rescue "In the Line of Duty", furry work from her Pelted and Kherishdar universes and alien tales like the Jokka shorts published by Strange Horizons, plus other stories both unpublished and previously published in hard-to-find magazines.

Smashwords supports all e-book formats. Prices range from $0 to $3.99. See the links above for what's available and what order to read them in.

Anthology of Sex Stories features piece on Furry.

Rain pattered off the wind shield, the constant faint drumming stopping abruptly each time the wipers swiped it away, the repeated motion having a sort of heartbeat like rhythm, quite hypnotising when there is nothing but an open road and hundreds of miles between you and your destination.

Renard's Menagerie, the Journal of Anthropomorphic Fiction, has just published its fourth issue, and it's available for purchasing at www.renardsmenagerie.com

What if someone said, evolution was only the first step? The idea that humans evolved from apes is a very popular theory, but why is it that only apes have evolved into something greater? Is it so impossible to believe that other animals are incapable of breaking free of their quadruped, instinct-driven lives, and walking on hind legs? What if a dog could stand on two legs, what if a dog could talk? What if a dog could laugh, and love, and hate and feel? What if a dog could be a productive member of society, if he could be a lawyer, or a doctor, or a dentist? Welcome to the real world, welcome to the world we live in, where the theory is no longer a theory, but an inescapable truth. They are the Anthrahsians, and they are real, there is no denying their existence; they live among us, they work, play, live and love. But like all minorities, there are always those who will persecute and hate them.

Bad Dog Books has released the pocket-sized edition of FANG Volume 1, which collects a selection of high-quality m/m erotica written by K. M. Hirosaki, Kyell Gold (also known for Volle, Pendant of Fortune, and the Volle and Pendant of Fortune novels at Sofawolf Press), Badger, Whyte Yote, Stormcatche, Red Swampwulf and others. FANG Volume 1 is available directly from Bad Dog Books at http://www.lulu.com/content/406016. More information is available at BadDogBooks.com

An ambitious new furry fiction archive, FurRag, has made its current beta state available to the public to aid the furry participants of NaNoWriMo and offer an introduction to the rapidly developing functionalities.

FANG, the Little Black Book of Furry Fiction, edited by Alex "Osfer" Vance, has published its first issue, available here at an RRP of $19.99.

FANG, the "little black book of furry fiction", is an ambitious new project that aims to make quality furry fiction available in comfortable paperback format, slated for an August release to coincide with Camp Feral.
As much an attempt to galvanize the amateur furry fiction community into striving for a higher standard in their work as to provide furs with an anthology of some of the best work currently available, FANG takes a rather unique stance toward material that's been previously available on-line. Not only does FANG not have a policy against previously published material, readers are encouraged to mail their favourite authors, to urge them to submit their work to FANG.

A new furry-themed online magazine focusing on fiction will be launching later this year. From the website:

Claw & Quill: Modern Fables aims to be a professionally-presented web magazine of speculative fiction and related articles/commentary. Specifically, C&Q is looking for stories that involve animals in a fantastic--used in the literary sense--manner. This could be stories from an animal point of view like Watership Down, the "animal people" of Cordwainer Smith's stories and Steve Gallacci's comics, or the lyrical magic realism of Ursula K. LeGuin’s "Buffalo Gals, Won't You Come Out Tonight."

The webzine is looking for both authors and artists willing to do story illustrations, as well as artists willing to submit already-finished work as "cover art" on the front page. More information, including submission guidelines, is available at the website, <http://www.clawandquill.net>.