I must admit I was a bit nervous when we opened for applications this year because I had it in my head we'd have trouble getting a decent number of applications. But I'm happy to say numbers are pretty healthy and for the first time we've got some applications in from Asia. Should be another fun workshop.
An interesting choice of The Arrival by Shaun Tan for best Art Book, which illustrates the difficulties awards can have capturing works within neat categories. The Arrival is an illustrated book that tells a lovely story. It also won the 2006 Best Young Adult Short and the Golden Aurealis for short story, which wasn't a perfect fit either. There was some criticism of the choice at the time and the AAs have added a new category - Best Illustrated Book/Graphic Novel to cater for broader ways of telling stories.
But I'm wondering whether awards should have a generic 'other' category that catches different types of story-telling as they emerge. Two years ago it might have been an illustrated book that told the most engaging story of the year but it could have just as easily been a ten part SMS short story or a fake science-fictional blog. I can understand why award administrators don't want to create a new category for each type of story-telling that comes along. And while I think something as good as The Arrival should be awarded even if it has to be in a category that isn't a perfect fit, maybe a broader catch-all category is worth considering.
The full list of Locus Award winners is:
SF NOVEL: The Yiddish Policemen's Union, Michael Chabon (HarperCollins)
FANTASY NOVEL: Making Money, Terry Pratchett (Doubleday UK; HarperCollins)
YOUNG ADULT BOOK: Un Lun Dun, China Miéville (Ballantine Del Rey; Macmillan UK)
FIRST NOVEL: Heart-Shaped Box, Joe Hill (Morrow; Gollancz)
NOVELLA: "After the Siege", Cory Doctorow (The Infinite Matrix Jan 2007)
NOVELETTE: "The Witch's Headstone", Neil Gaiman (Wizards)
SHORT STORY: "A Small Room in Koboldtown", Michael Swanwick (Asimov's Apr/May 2007)
COLLECTION: The Winds of Marble Arch and Other Stories, Connie Willis (Subterranean)
ANTHOLOGY: The New Space Opera, Gardner Dozois & Jonathan Strahan, eds. (Eos)
NON-FICTION: Breakfast in the Ruins, Barry N. Malzberg (Baen)
ART BOOK: The Arrival, Shaun Tan (Lothian 2006; Scholastic)
EDITOR: Ellen Datlow
MAGAZINE: F&SF
PUBLISHER: Tor
ARTIST: Charles Vess
The discussion concerns an imbalance between male and female authors, and what if anything that says about the editor and the anthology. There was a smaller blow-up about the first Eclipse after the cover for the antho, which included a 50/50 gender split of authors, promoted five of the male writers and none of the female writers.
I guess the thing I'm finding uncomfortable about much of the discussion is people making vague innuendos about it all, as if Jonathan has a case to answer and that his choices are based on something other than story merit.
And if we're going to do the demographic splits, why does it always seem to start - and stop - at gender? In the US and Australia between 20% and 30% of the population are disabled. I'm one of them. Should it matter whether a quarter of Jonathan's authors are disabled? By the look of it, 7% of the authors in Eclipse 2 are Australian. But Australians only represent around 0.2% of worldwide English speakers (or 5% where English is the first language). Is this an over-representation?
Where do you draw the line
You might know A&R Whitcoulis better as Angus and Robertson, which makes this an interesting development for authors, publishers and readers. This has been on the cards for a while so shouldn't come as much of a surprise but the sale to A&R of the 20-odd Australian stores is likely to shake things up substantially.
Even before my World Fantasy Award duties began our three bedroom townhouse was hardly coping with the number of books we were buying. Now, we've reached the tipping point and the random piles are just too... random.
The first answer was to stack books against a wall but now I've started a cull some of our books. The first cut wasn't too hard because I began with old non fiction books that I was keeping out of habit - random works from the 1970s and '80s. That hardly made a dent though and now I have to get a bit meaner.
Of course, it was all made a bit more special when on the weekend my daughter looked at one of the random piles of books and announced: "You and Katie live in a library."
Books are good. I love going to a bookstore and buying a cool new book. Sometimes I'll go into Borders after work and buy a few books. Sometimes I'll grab a few books and a magazine or two. Every now and then I'll buy a few books, a couple of magazines and a DVD or two.
But it's a very special day when you come home from work to find a box of books on your doorstep. Today was one of those days, with Tor sending their books published last year for consideration for the World Fantasy Awards. This pile includes a few I've already come across but mostly they're books I haven't yet read.
The process is going well but I now understand why they only ever get judges to do it once. It's a lot of reading. But there's some great stuff out there - not all of it from well known authors.
Luckily this weekend is another long weekend. Thankfully I'm not on call for work. And my daughter is with me too. If only she was a bit older, I could get her to do some sly reading for me on the side.
Last weekend was a slow weekend where fewer new books came in than I got through that week. Don't think that's going to be happening this week somehow.
Oh, and if you're wondering - on top of the pile is the Clarion South mascot Gary the Lion.
I had a good response to my suggestion about the value of doing a speculative fiction version of the Australian Government's 2020 summit. So I've started framing some potential ideas to see what people think. These are broad and some may overlap but I don't want to get too specific or prescriptive in overarching topics. I envisage running a forum over a week or so with various topics starting a day or two apart. Once we'd settled on a range of topics, I'd ask for volunteers to host various topics on their blogs and then kick it off in a week or two after that.
Here are my initial thoughts on potential topics:
About excellence - helping writers produce better work
Commercialising your work - traditional and emerging opportunities for writers
Independent/small press publishing and distribution - more successful, more sustainable
Strengthening the community - getting the most out of fans, organisations, conventions and writing groups
I also wondered whether its worth canvassing issues like awards, their value and how they can be improved, and things like whether some sort of Australian speculative fiction writers association would be of any value. Maybe they fall under one of those categories or maybe someone will suggest a broader area. Or maybe they aren't important.
Speak loudly if you have any suggested changes or topics we could add. I'd like to keep the number of topics under discussion to less than 10 but inside those topics discussion could range quite broadly.
Over to you for your thoughts.
I spent most of my extended (three-day) weekend reading material for the World Fantasy Awards. I puncuated the many pages with some music, dinner with friends, watching some cricket and tuning in every now and then to the ABC coverage of the 2020 ideas summit. Frankly, it made for dull television, so I spent some time on the web tonight catching up with some of the great ideas put forward.
And I got thinking - is it worth doing something similar for Australian speculative fiction writing?
What are the ideas that will shape the genre over the next decade?
How will writers best commercialise their work in the brave new world digital world?
What professional development opportunities will deliver value to genre writers?
And maybe most importantly - is thinking about genre writing in terms of Australia vs the rest of the world even productive?
Who knows what else.
I'm going to ponder it for a while but if you've got ideas for topics and/or how it might be shaped, let me know. Stay tuned for more.
It was a great character sketch of Carey and a demonstration of what a rough upbringing, stupid choices as an adult, sudden sporting fame and the wrong type of football culture can do to a person. I am not a fan of AFL or of Wayne Carey. But I am a fan of good journalism and you don't need to be either to get something out of this. Denton demonstrated why he's one of the best interviewers in the country by showing that you can ask tough questions and demand tough answers without resorting to the in-your-face tactics of outlets like Today Tonight and A Current Affair.
It's no secret Denton had chased John Howard for an interview before his election loss last year and I'm glad the former PM didn't come on the show afterwards. I know Denton had said he probably wouldn't be interested but he may have been tempted to have him on for his first show back in 2008 if Howard had put up his hand. But the Carey interview was so much more interesting, engaging, honest and genuinely tough to watch than Howard would have ever been.
It's a reminder that good journalism is good storytelling and you can pursue answers without having to turn that pursuit into a bloodsport ala the media's treatment of Britney Spears.
Have returned safely from the other side of the continent and my first Swancon.
I took the opportunity on Thursday to visit my sister and her family who live in the 'burbs of Perth. When I returned to the hotel late Thursday night I found the bar closed and most people ready to head on out of there. So the con really didn't kick off for me until Friday. And I had a slow first few days, which I used mostly to catch up with old buddies including Ben, Cat, Launz (Dirk), Sean, Chris, Marianne (when she arrived), Lee, Lyn, Matt, Andy and some other former Clarion South students. I also spent time picking the brains of both Justin Ackroyd and Jonathan Strahan who have also been World Fantasy Award judges. Thanks guys. Made lots of new friends too once I started opening up and being more social.
I found the programming a little dull. I'm generally a bit more open to attending con panels than some of those jaded souls who quite happily announce 'I don't go to cons for the panels.' Swancon seems to be a bit more focussed on the panels that appeal to the fannish community - which is fine - but I would have preferred a few more panels on professional development for writers and some broader stuff on random cool and interesting topics. But I think most attendees went away pretty happy.
I was also surprised that there doesn't seem to be much of a book-buying culture at Swancon. I don't know if this is a chicken-and-egg type issue because I understand Swancon committees have taken the decision to do away with a dedicated dealer's room and have a market day instead. Some brave souls set up in a small (and dark) space and I'm told sales were pretty slow. Again, it probably relates to having such a strong fan community in attendance.
The launches were all enjoyable. I only missed one and that was because a panel I was on was programmed against it. Regular readers will be pleased to know that the 'mystery' launch went well. It was held in the hotel carpark, which suited The Worker's Paradise particularly well. But Russell and Alisa did a good job of getting people there and attracted a crowd of 50 to 60 people. And sales were about normal for a con launch, so the promotion certainly didn't hinder people buying copies of either TWP or 2012.
The awards went well and I was particularly pleased to see Cat Sparks recognised for her writing (though the Aurealis Awards got there first). My highlight of the awards night was Russell B Farr's Best Collection win for Fantastic Wonder Stories. He tied with Jonathan Strahan and Gardner Dozois for The New Space Opera, which was kinda fitting. And it was great to see ASIM recognised across a number of categories, especially Tehani's win.
I suspect the biggest hit to come out of the convention however, will be British scriptwriter and author Rob Shearman. Rob made a big impression thanks to his intelligence, good humour and willingness to have a good old chat. And he felt so welcome at the con that he pretty much had everyone feeling they'd personally been responsible for introducing an old friend into a wonderful new community. Hearing Rob read the story 'So Proud' from his collection Tiny Deaths was one of the highlights of the con for me. If you go here you can download an MP3 of Rob reading the story and buy a copy of the book. Go listen to it now.
Anyway, that was Swancon 2008 for me. Bring on the Adelaide Natcon in 2009.
Of even more joy though is Jonathan's nomination in the Best Professional Editor Short Form category. To my reckoning this is the first time an Australian editor has ever been nominated for a Best Professional Editor Hugo. And it's a well-deserved nomination. Jonathan has done a lot of hard yards and on the way helped (probably) hundreds of authors he's published. The nomination is a real credit.
Brisbane to Perth is about 3600km (2200m) as the crow flies. But we didn't fly in a straight line. From Brisbane we flew south west over northern NSW into South Australia and then turned directly west over the Great Australia Bite and headed into Western Australia.
The flight takes around five-and-a-half hours and about halfway through I had my head buried in Sean Williams' wonderful The Changeling (stay tuned for more on this). I had my earphones in and was lost to the outside world.
We must have been over South Australia when I looked out the window to see the ground below covered in white. In all directions the desert was filled with white - as if someone had just spilled a billion buckets of white paint on the ochre landscape. I presume it was Lake Eyre because it was massive and even from 36,000 feet almost blindingly bright. I sat for a moment - transfixed - lost in its beauty and then my iPod started playing Sarah Blasko's cover of Flame Trees (a great song, whoever is singing it) and a strange moment of happiness came over me. Reading Sean's book that was describing similar desolate sights, listening to a great Aussie song and flying over such a sparse and strange landscape I revelled in the Australian-ness of it all. It was a unique conjunction of events.
I'm not a jaded flier. But give me a good book, my iPod Touch, my 900 gram ultra-portable laptop and I'll happily lose myself in one or all of them for the bulk of the journey. But this happy coincidence restored my faith in the randomness that can sometimes come your way thanks to a well-placed window and looking up at the right time.
Clarke - with Asimov and Heinlein - was one of the big three that powered science fiction through its golden age of the forties and fifties. His fiction was never short of a big idea but he always tried to express it through accessible characters. On a Saturday my parents would head to the local shops to buy fruit and vegetables, and meat. While they were doing that I was scouring our local library for new SF to read. The yellow covered Gollancz classics were always easy targets, but that's a story for another time. I read a lot when I was a kid and I read fast but I had a rule that I could only take out books I could carry in one hand. Quite often there was an Arthur C. Clarke book smongst them.
The list of his achievements speak for themselves: 2001 A Space Odyssey, The Nine Billion Names of God, Rendezvous with Rama, The Fountains of Paradise, The Songs of Distant Earth... I always enjoyed his short stuff more than his novels (though there is one where Brisbane is the capital of a world government, which I smile at).
The last book of his I read was probably 3001: The Final Odyssey, which came out 10 years ago. But I'm on holidays and might excuse myself from my World Fantasy Award reading and packing for Swancon to reread some old short story favourites.
Charlie Anders over at io9 has a fun post about why prequels are evil.
To make her case she says, in part: "But prequels aren't just boring and predictable - they're also morally wrong and a scourge on humanity, because they portray people as helpless pawns of a history that's already set in stone. Click through for five reasons why prequels are actually evil." She then talks through some specific problems and relates them back to the Star Wars prequels and the J.J. Abrams Star Trek prequel (though I'm guessing this will actually end up being an alternate universe story).
The five reasons she elaborates on are:
- Prequels are anti-creativity
- Prequels are anti-futurist
- Prequels are anti-heroic
- Prequels are all about trivia
- Prequels are small and personal
While prequels can be all of those things, I don't think - by definition - they always are. There's not enough space on this blog to describe the things wrong with the Star Wars prequels. But one of the things that is right with them is their essential prequelness - that is finding out how Anakin became Darth. Yes, doing a prequel does constrain some things you can do plot-wise but that does not mean they are by definition anti-creative.
And there are lots of examples in genre fiction where prequels have worked well. I was particularly impressed as an impressionable teenage spec fic reader with Isaac Asimov's second Foundation trilogy. In those three prequels Asimov manages the quite substantial task of unifying his foundation novels with his robots and empire novels. This required a lot of creativity but he pulled it off quite well in my mind. They were also big stories that were at the same time small and personal - connecting two of Asimov's most memorable characters. People will criticise the books but I suspect those criticisms are probably ones you'd level at much of Asimov's writing.
But there are other examples too - The Silmarillion, the new Dune books and others. Again, just because some future plot aspects of the stories these books are telling is constrained it doesn't mean they can't tell a good story.
Novels face all sorts of constraints. It's these constraints that drive good authors to tell better stories.
I suspect for the next six months I won't be getting a lot of science fiction read or much of my daily diet of non fiction either. Plus new stuff from Aussie authors will probably have to wait until the end of the year. My non fiction books at home are likely to take a hit as well with me needing to cull something to find bookshelf space so I can keep a watch on what I've read and haven't read and easily retrieve books as needed.
To give you an quick idea, the picture above shows the works I've received from publishers in the first three weeks judging has been open. I'm off to the post office shortly to pick up any more that are there. I know there are already more on the way because my fellow judges in the northern hemisphere are already mentioning works here and there.
I'm intending on weighing all the works at the end. Anyone wanting to take a punt on the final weight can register their guess here. I'm sure I can work out some sort of suitable prize.
This is a pre-emptive rant, and something that has bugged me for a while. Anyone who is launching a book at Swancon, please go heavy on the buy-it-because-it-is-good angle and soft on the buy-it-to-support-a-small-press-angle.
If you're launching a book of short stories tell me why these are stories I must read. Tell me which of the stories is the best urban fantasy I'll read this year. Tell me which of the authors is the new Jeffd Ford or Elizabeth Hand or Margo Lanagan. Tell me which bright new artist has set the pages alight with their internal art. Tell me... okay, you get the picture.
Don't try to guilt $25 out of me as a purchase-as-charity sale to support a small press. Yes the publisher has put lots of effort into the book and will almost certainly make a loss on the publication. But don't say you're going to bar the doors until everyone buys a book because the small press publisher deserves our support. Small publishers deserve and get our support because they publish shit-hot stories. If you don't at least try to sell me on buying the book because of its quality then you're not doing you're job and you don't deserve a sale.
I have been to too many launches where the only call to action is "buy the book so you can support the publisher's hard work and they can do more publications."
Harper Collins won't be telling me to buy the books at their launch because Rupert Murdoch needs the money. They'll be telling me to buy the book/s because if I don't I'll be missing the hottest YA fantasy of the year or the best science fiction debut since Mary Doria Russell.
Also, I'm surprised to see one launch being promoted as a mystery, where we have to keep an eye out for clues as to when/where it will be. Sometimes there are reasons these things aren't known a week out from the con. Often they're out of the control of the publisher. It happens. But if that's the case tell us and let us know when we can find out. Otherwise it's just as likely we won't come because we won't know when the bloody launch is on! As Kate would say on Electric Alphabet, it's not good 'platform.'
If you want to catch up with me, at the very least you'll be able to find me at the panels below:
The Politics of Fandom
David Cake, Paul Raj Khangure, Robert Hoge, Rohan Wallace,
Cocktail Lounge Friday 12:00 PM
Someone in fandom must be making the decisions that determine why conventions are run the way they are, and other fannish projects. Who makes the decisions? Why isn't it you? Should it be? Why are things run the way they are? Want to achieve your SMOF merit badge? Are the institutions of fandom evolved to be the way they are due to accidents of history, or because they are built on experience? Experienced fannish politicians explain the mysterious workings of fandom, and how you can become involved and get the con run just the way you want.
Critiquing: how much feedback is too much?
Juliet Marillier, Satima Flavell Neist, Lee Battersby, Robert Hoge
Oshanesii Sunday 5:00 PM
Writers' groups (face to face and online), manuscript assessment services, mentoring - will they help you write better? Or will they hurt your confidence, or waste your time?
It's an online book cataloguing/social networking service which has lots of functionality. You can tag books, read reviews and find other users with similar libraries, Basically, it's pretty damn cool in a 2.0 world.
What got me really excited was the option to buy a bar code reader that you plug into your laptop, go to the website and wave it over the ISBN barcode on the back of the book and it finds all the relevant info you need to add it to your catalogue.
The Cue Cat reader - shaped like a cat no less - was $15 (mmmm US$ parity) and it only took a few goes to get the technique right.
One of my 'winning lotto fantasies' was to pay a friend of mine who is a librarian $10,000 to spend two weeks cataloguing our books. Peending a call from the lotto people, this is the next best thing.
I've only scanned six books so far because I'm going to devote a heap of time on the weekend to getting it done and I need to work out a system so we know which books we've scanned and which ones we haven't.
It's a great tool if you've got a lot of books you need to keep track of.
You can check out my library (so far) here.
I'm really excited by the honour and I'm looking forward to half a year of solid reading (and reading and reading). It's even better because Kate and I had already decided to make the trip to Canada for the convention this year. So I'll be there to see the awards presented.
I'm really keen to encourage locals to nominate. If you've got a great fantasy work, please send it in.
For the full list of judges, details of categories and nomination timelines etc go here.
There's nothing quite so good as finding books from friends in the wild. To escape Brisbane's 40 degree heat yesterday we headed to the local super shopping centre to see two movies and do some shopping.As usual I spent time scouring the massive Borders bookstore and managed to track down Fivefold by Nathan Burrage, which came out from Bantam last month. Nathan was a graduate of Clarion South in 2005. Nathan was nicknamed 'Doktor Logic' by his fellow participants for his ability to pick logic flaws in almost any story.
Right away it was obvious that he was serious about his writing and that he'd go places. But I was pleasantly surprised just how quickly he went. Just over a year ago I got a call on my mobile (on the way to a Clarion South 2007 author reading) no less from Nathan to tell me he'd sold his novel.
The book starts off with a prologue in the 14th Century where a priest is working desperately to hide a religious treasure from an invading horde. The action then quickly cuts to present day England where we're introduced to five friends whose lives are impacted by events 700 years before. I've just started reading and it feels like it's going to be a great romp. And i's great to see an enthusiastic Clarion South graduate do so well straight out of the blocks.
Find out more at Nathan's website here.
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roberthoge- Robert Hoge
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