Niall Harrison, Editor-in-Chief of Strange Horizons, announced today that Brit Mandelo was hired on to replace Karen Meisner and Susan Marie Groppi as Fiction Editor. No small task, given Groppi and Meisner’s hand in crafting Strange Horizons and positioning it as one of the premier online short fiction venues for genre readers.

From Harrison’s news post:

Communities are made by ideas as well as people, and there are some pretty important ideas shaping Strange Horizons. A belief in the radical potential of speculative fiction, in its ability to help us understand our past and imagine our future by showing us how things can be otherwise. A belief that, in the twenty-first century, speculative fiction must be a proudly global, inclusive tradition, and that Strange Horizons in particular should showcase work to challenge and delight by new and established writers from diverse backgrounds and with diverse concerns.

Which is why I’m absolutely thrilled to announce that the newest member of the Strange Horizons fiction team is Brit Mandelo. You may have read her critical writing on Joanna Russ and queer sf; you may be aware of her forthcoming Lethe Press anthology, Beyond Binary; you may also have read her fiction or poetry. Either way, you can find out a bit more about her on her website. But in everything she’s done, you can see Brit’s commitment to the ideas that underlie what we try to do here at Strange Horizons.

I have great respect for Mandelo and her work as a non-fiction writer (particularly for her work on Tor.com) and feel that her penchant for pushing fiction into uncomfortable places and expecting more from the boundaries place on it by a mainstream readership should fit well with Strange Horizons. I look forward to seeing the stories she publishes (and being rejected by her myself!)