Tagged: Science Fiction

ANDREW’S LINKS: Bikini Jeans

ANDREW’S LINKS: Bikini Jeans

To start the week out on a pleasant note for about half of you – check out bikini jeans. [via Pat Cadigan]

Comics Links

The UK SF Book News Network talked to John Higgins, artist on a graphic novel adaptation of the old splatter-horror movie The Hills Have Eyes.

Estoreal reports on representing the Jack Kirby Museum at New York’s HOWL Festival in Tomkins Square Park.

The Baltimore Sun talks to Steven Parke, who uses a photo-manipulation style to create graphic novels.

A New York Times article on reality TV wandered off into graphic novel-land, talking about a book called The Homeless Channel.

Comics Reporter interviews Chris Brandt.

Comics Reviews

Library Journal’s current graphic novel reviews start out with the fourth volume of Kiyohiko Azuma’s Yotsuba&! (whose first volume recently confused me), and goes on to review a bunch of other things as well.

The Indypendent reviews a graphic novel called Fat Free.

Brad Curran of Comics Should Be Good reviews recent comics, kicking off with Batman #668.

Curran, still at CSBG, also pokes his head into the world of Marvel’s all-ages comics.

At The Savage Critics, two critics unleash tag-team havoc on today’s comics:

Newsarama asks a bunch of comics critics why they don’t talk about the art. (When I don’t, personally, it’s usually because I simply forgot to mention it, or because there wasn’t anything interesting to say.)

Over on my personal blog, I went nuts with a overly long comparison of two art-comics anthologies from last year: Best American Comics 2006 and An Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons, and True Stories.

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Superman’s Fortress of Solitude found

Superman’s Fortress of Solitude found

From Howard Margolin of Destinies: the Voice of Science Fiction, we get this discovery of these cyrstal caverns buried a thousand feet below Mexico’s Naica mountain in the Chihuahuan desert.

This has been quite a year for Superman fans; the deadly remnants of planet Krypton were discovered in a mine in Serbia this past April (see Kryptonite Discovered By Scientist).

And if you look all the way down at the bottom of the cave, you can see Ursa and Non…

Wolfman, Niles, Mariotte Snag Scribes

Wolfman, Niles, Mariotte Snag Scribes

On Sunday at San Diego Comic-Con, the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers held a mid-afternoon program where their first Scribe Awards were handed out.

Member Andy Mangels played host to a small but enthusiastic crowd as they watched winners in attendance collect their prizes.  The association was formed so the best-selling category of fiction could be acknowledged as a category of its own, joining groups for authors of Thrillers, Mysteries, Horror, Fantasy and Science Fiction.

There were six categories and Jeff Mariotte snagged two of them in a bit of a surprise given the volume of works submitted.

The winners:

Speculative Fiction, Best Novel Adapted: Superman Returns by Marv Wolfman

Speculative Fiction, Best Novel Original: 30 Days of Night: Rumors of the Undead by Stephen Niles and Jeff Mariotte

General Fiction, Best Novel Adapted: Snakes on a Plane by Christa Faust

Best Novel Original: Las Vegas: High Stakes by Jeff Mariotte

Young Adult All Genres, Best Novel: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Portal Through Time by Alice Henderson

Grandmaster, honoring career achievement in the field: Donald Bain.

Bain was on hand to accept the award in person, thrilled tghat his accomplishments, incouding over 80 novels, were recognized by peers. The IAMTW (www.iamtw.org) is accepting nominations for works in published 2007 with the awards scheduled for next year’s convention.

People Reading Books

People Reading Books

The Seattle Times reviews Jasper Fforde’s “Thursday Next” series.

Slate looks at Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

The Agony Column reviews Alan Campbell’s Lye Street, a novella-as-a-book prequel to Scar Night.

Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist reviews Jeff Somers’s The Electric Church.

Blogcritics has what I think is their sixth review for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Honestly, I can’t keep track any more.

Book Fetish reviews a three-author linked erotic romance anthology called Hell on Heels. (Oh my God, the Twayne Triplets are back…and this time they’re porn!)

Bookgasm reviews Warren Hammond’s KOP.

Bookgasm also reviews A Dog About Town, a murder mystery told from the POV of a thinking dog, which is fantasy enough for my book.

The Henry Herald of Georgia reviews Kull: Exile of Atlantis by Robert E. Howard.

American Chronicle reviews Harry Potter and the…Half-Blood Prince. (ha HA! Fooled you!)

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Be Vewwy Vewwy Quiet. We’re Hunting Fanboys.

Be Vewwy Vewwy Quiet. We’re Hunting Fanboys.

USA Today stalks the elusive Fanboy.

Locus Online lists new paperback editions of SF/Fantasy books that they saw in June.

Matthew Cheney thinks about the latest eruption of the what-is-SF-and-what-isn’t discussion.

A highly scientific investigation into the age-old struggle between pirates and ninjas. [via Chris Roberson]

tSF Diplomat  thinks hard about online book reviewing and book-blogging.

Biology in Science Fiction rounds up recent interesting news stories about bioscience.

Mundane SF hates astrophysics.

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Science-Fictional-Type Links & Things

Science-Fictional-Type Links & Things

Fantasy Book Critic reviews Warren Ellis’s first novel, Crooked Little Vein.

BestSF has reviewed a few magazines this week:

Don D’Amassa’s Critical Mass has new reviews on the Science Fiction page, including Blake Nelson’s young adult novel They Came From Below, Robert Charles Wilson’s Axis, and Charles Stross’s Halting State.

D’Amassa’s Fantasy page also has new reviews: Steph Swainston’s The Modern World, Charles Stross’s The Merchants’ War, and others.

And D’Amassa’s Horror page has new reviews as well: Scott Thomas’s Over the Darkening Fields, the new Tales from the Crypt #1, and more.

Nader Elhefnawy, at Tangent, goes off on a dumb Christopher Hitchens quote from Atlantic Monthly to the effect that SF has a “dearth of sex.”

Elhefnawy also had an essay at Tangent about Michael Moorcock and censorship.

The Space Review has published a transcript of the talk, and the following question and answer session, given by NASA Administrator Mike Griffin at the recent Heinlein Centennial.

The Contra Costa Times has an article on the huge science fiction collection at the University of California-Riverside.

Ben Bova’s regular column in the Naples News is devoted to talking about his own Campbell Award-winning novel Titan, Campbell himself, and science fiction in general.

The Salt Lake Tribune looks at the interesting phenomenon of Christian fantasy novels.

Neth Space is annoyed that so many titles begin with the word “the.”

SF Scope reports on editor and author Gardner Dozois’s recent quintuple bypass heart surgery. Details are few, but it sounds like he’s recovering pretty well – I certainly hope so, and send him all best wishes. (In happier Dozois news, he recently turned in a new original anthology, tentatively entitled Galactic Empires, to Rome Quezada of the SF Book Club, and I’m sure that book will be another winner.)

Cory Doctorow has another one of his periodic essays at Locus Online this week, all about different kinds of visions of the future.

The soul-searching about reviewing on blogs continues unabated into a second week, as Larry of the OF Blog of the Fallen explains why he reviews.

Similarly, Patrick, of Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist, has a long post about reviewing, book giveaways, and blogging.

 

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Links & News & Interviews & Cats

Links & News & Interviews & Cats

Time magazine, which manages to get so much wrong so much of the time, oddly is very accurate and interesting on the subject of LOLcats. [via The Beat]

Not science fiction, but only because it didn’t happen: the British military is denying sending giant, man-eating badgers to terrify the citizen of the Iraqi city of Basra.

The New York Times’s PaperCuts blog looks at the cover of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road.

David Louis Edelman, at DeepGenre, ponders The End of Science Fiction.

Paranormal romance writer Sherrilyn Kenyon is now listed in Cambridge Who’s Who, and sent out a press release to tout that.

The Readercon brain trust compiled the semi-official canon of Slipstream writing. Great! Now we can go back to arguing about what “slipstream” actually means…

If you happen to be in Luxembourg (and I can’t tell you how often I’ve found myself in Luxembourg without thinking about it), you might want to pop your head into the Tomorrow Now exhibition at the Mudam Luxembuorg, which “explores the relationship between design and science fiction.”

I’d expected something really weird from the Montgomery Advertiser’s reference to “Faulkner’s Narnia” — just think about that for a moment, if you will – but it turns out that Faulkner University is putting on a stage adaptation of C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe as Narnia. Still, the idea of a Prince Caspian/As I Lay Dying mash-up is still out there for the taking…

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Campbell and Sturgeon Award Winners

Campbell and Sturgeon Award Winners

The 2006 John W. Campbell Memorial Award and 2006 Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award were presented at the Campbell Conference this past weekend in Kansas City. Each award was voted for by a jury of experts.

The Campbell Award, for best science fiction novel, went to Ben Bova’s Titan.

The Sturgeon Award, for best science fiction short story, was given to Robert Charles Wilson’s "The Cartesian Theater," from the anthology Futureshocks.

Also at the Campbell Conference, the Science Fiction Research Association presented several awards:

  • the Graduate Student Paper award, to Linda Wight for "Magic, Art, Religion, Science: Blurring the Boundaries of Science and Science Fiction in Marge Piercy’s Cyborgian Narrative"
  • the Mary Kay Bray Award, for the "best essay, interview, or extended review to appear in the SFRAReview during the year," to Ed Carmien for  his review of The Space Opera Renaissance edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer
  • the Thomas D. Clareson Award for Distinguished Service, for "outstanding service activities-promotion of SF teaching and study, editing, reviewing, editorial writing, publishing, organizing meetings, mentoring, and leadership in SF/fantasy organizations,"to Michael Levy
  • the Pioneer Award, for "best critical essay-length work of the year" to Amy J. Ransom for "Oppositional Postcolonialism in Québécois Science Fiction,"  from the July 2006 issue of Science Fiction Studies
  • and the Pilgrim Award, honoring "lifetime contributions to SF and fantasy scholarship," to Algis Budrys.

[via SF Scope]

F&SF Magazine News

F&SF Magazine News

Interzone #211, a special Michael Moorock issue, will be published in a week, so TTA Press has posted its table of contents. Besides a new Moorcock story and novel excerpt, there are stories from Carlos Hernandez, Aliette de Bodard, and Grace Dugan, among other things.

Ansible has put out its 240th issue, full of the usual stuff – quotes that make people look bad, amusing anecdotes, dates, and so forth.

John Joseph Adams’s article about writing workshops, “Basic Training for Writers,” from the SFWA Bulletin, has been posted on the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America website as a PDF.

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Science Fiction/Fantasy Interviews

Science Fiction/Fantasy Interviews

The LA Times profiles “the Dean of Science Fiction,” Robert A Heinlein, in preparation for the 100th anniversary of his birth on Saturday.

Michael Cassutt’s new column at SciFi Weekly is also about Heinlein, and gives more details of the Heinlein Centennial going on this coming weekend in Kansas City (Heinlein’s birthplace).

 

The Globe and Mail lists and profiles Canada’s “best-kept secrets in the arts” – among them, Hugo-winning science fiction writer Robert Charles Wilson.

 

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