About Prometheus Unbound

Founded in October 2010 by Geoffrey Allan Plauché, Prometheus Unbound is a webzine featuring news, reviews, interviews, and commentary on speculative fiction and literature from a libertarian perspective.

We are fans and critics, and some of us are fiction writers (published or aspiring), who are also libertarian. Meaning that our coverage is from a libertarian perspective, not that we only cover libertarian fiction, so you need not be a libertarian to find our content interesting and valuable.

You’ll find a lot of the analysis, reviews, and literary criticism you’d expect from an excellent review ‘zine. But what you won’t find anywhere else is the unique blend of libertarian insights that leavens our work.

Of course, if you love to consume fiction, in whatever medium, and also love liberty and oppose war and hate the state, then you’ll  enjoy what we have to say even more. Lovers of science fiction and fantasy will be most at home here, but we do also cover other genres on occasion.

Published and aspiring writers, and those who are merely curious, will also find useful resources on the craft and business of writing — from writing tips to marketing advice to publishing-industry news. Part of our aim is to inspire and help libertarians to create more and better libertarian fiction, but the information and analysis we provide will be useful to anyone.

Prometheus Unbound Features

Editor’s Picks — Get started with this handpicked sample of some of our best content.

News — Coverage, commentary, and analysis of upcoming works of speculative fiction, the state of the publishing industry, what authors are up to, and other happenings of interest to writers and fans of speculative fiction, particularly libertarian ones.

Reviews — In-depth, yet accessible, reviews and literary criticism of books, individual short stories, movies, tv shows, comics and graphic novels, and related nonfiction. Browse the always up-to-date comprehensive lists of our science fiction and fantasy reviews. Friends of liberty will be particularly interested in our reviews of works up for the Prometheus Awards for libertarian fiction.

Interviews — Original interviews with authors, publishers, editors, and agents. Both in text and, soon, audio podcast format.

Editorials — Periodic opinion pieces by the editor, Geoffrey Allan Plauché, on speculative fiction, the publishing industry, economics and libertarianism, and other related subjects.

Articles — Nonfiction essays by various writers on various subjects related to libertarianism and speculative fiction, ranging from science fact, economics, history, philosophy, futurism, and more.

The Prometheus Unbound Podcast — Coming in January 2013, an original podcast by staff and contributors, with episodes featuring discussions, news, interviews, recordings of live author chats, listener feedback, and more. We have also curated episodes of The Libertarian Tradition Podcast with Jeff Riggenbach that cover libertarian science fiction.

Community Forums — Powered by Simple:Press, our phpBB-style forums provide a more exclusive venue than the wide-open comment sections of our posts to discuss the fiction that you love with fellow fans and lovers of liberty. Unlike regular phpBB forums, only one user account is needed for both the site and our forums.

The Lightmonthly Read — Our monthly book club: Each month in our community forums we read and discuss a work of speculative fiction that we selected in the previous month. We also occasionally host live author chats via Google+ Hangouts on Air.

Tools for Authors — We keep an eye out for tips, books, and other resources of interest to aspiring and even published authors. There is a dedicated section in the community forums where you can learn about and discuss the business and craft of writing fiction, workshop your stories, and showcase your work.

The Blue Line — An upcoming feature, alluding to the editorial “blue line of death”: while it would not be right to review a work of fiction that we could not bring ourselves to finish, there is nevertheless something to be gained from publicly exploring where and why we stopped reading or watching something. These pieces will not be occasions to rip gleefully rip a story to shreds, but rather will aim to be measured reflections on one reader’s or viewer’s personal experience with the work, to serve as a jumping off point for discussion and, hopefully, an instructive exercise for authors and readers/viewers alike.

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What People Are Saying About Prometheus Unbound

“This site takes a paradigm where it has rarely gone before, and does so with relentless quality and intelligence. There is no other site like it.”
— Jeffrey Tucker, Executive Editor of Laissez Faire Books

Who We Are

Founder, Executive and Managing Editor

• Geoffrey Allan Plauché   — Geoffrey has been a libertarian for over 10 years, a fan of science fiction and fantasy for over 20, and has a PhD in political science. He is an Aristotelian-Liberal political philosopher, an adjunct instructor for Buena Vista University, and the webmaster of The Libertarian Standard. His work has appeared in Libertarian Papers, the Journal of Libertarian Studies, the Journal of Value Inquiry, and Transformers and Philosophy. He lives in Edgewood, KY with his wife and two children.Geoffrey can be reached at executive.editor [at] prometheus-unbound [dot] org, via our contact form, or via voicemail by calling 225-257-9596 or using the widget below to have Google Voice call you:

We are looking to build a small staff of editors and regular writers as well as a larger group of part-time or irregular contributors. If you are interested in joining us or contributing, please contact Geoffrey.

Editors

• Your name could be here.

Staff Writers

• Matthew Alexander is a libertarian living in central Ohio. A graduate of The Ohio State University, he majored in Spanish and has published a work of libertarian science-fiction called Wĭthûr Wē.
• Your name could be here.

(Irregular) Contributors

• Matt Dawson — Matthew is a left-libertarian market anarchist. He is studying computer science at Iowa Western Community College, and play drums for the band Software. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, listening to music, and playing video games.
• Jeremiah Dyke — Math professor, libertarian writer, author of Surviving The Trenches of Education. He runs a hands-on math website.
• Konrad Graf  — Konrad has long been interested in discovering misleading paradigms in social and other sciences and replacing them with better ones. He is the author of Action-Based Jurisprudence, which argues that praxeology and the apriori of argumentation together form the basis for a new school of deductive jurisprudence. He has lived in the United States, India, Japan, and now Germany.
• Stephan Kinsella — Attorney and libertarian writer in Houston, Senior Fellow of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and the founder and editor of Libertarian Papers. His most recent book is Property, Freedom, and Society: Essays in Honor of Hans-Hermann Hoppe (co-editor, with Jörg Guido Hülsmann; Mises Institute, 2009).
• Ray Mangum  — Studies literature at the University of Utah, and libertarian theory in his spare time. He tries to combine the two when he can.
• Allen Mendenhall  — Allen Mendenhall is a writer and an attorney.
• Jeffrey Tucker — Jeffrey is the publisher and executive editor of Laissez Faire Books, the Primus inter pares of the Laissez Faire Club, and the author of Bourbon for Breakfast: Living Outside the Statist Quo and It’s a Jetsons World: Private Miracles and Public Crimes, among thousands of articles.
• Your name could be here.