Pixel Scroll 3/6/16 Life During Scrolltime

(1) MODERATE TO HEAVY PUPPIES. Standback contributes “A Moderate Conversation Re: Sad Puppies”.

So to some extent, this is a sufficient answer to Stephanie’s question. Why is there so much vitriol against the Puppies? Because we’re on the internet, where it doesn’t take a whole lot to escalate an argument over Best Brand of Pasta into virtual knifings…..

To start things off: I would say I understand the core Puppy complaints, and agree with many of them (to varying extents).

I definitely see a shift in the “focus” of the genre, even if I’d be hard-pressed to nail it down to a definition (not unreasonable, in a genre still best-defined as “what we point to when we say it”). The disproportionate influence of particular groups and fandoms has been raised and enthusiastically argued over in the past (e.g. [1] [2] [3]). And I think there’s been a lot of snubbing, condescension and ad-hominem attacks coming from non-Puppies. Which they often don’t notice, or consider justified. (Scott Alexander’s I Can Tolerate Anything Except the Outgroup springs to mind, as it so often does.)

I won’t go over the Puppy grievances one by one, but I think I can see where all of them are coming from.

(2) DAN SCHNEIDER VIDEO INTERVIEW #68. Steven H Silver says, “Yesterday, Terry Bisson and I were interviewed for a podcast about Alternate History. If you want to hear what I would sound like recording on an Edison cylinder, I imagine this is pretty much it.”

(3) EATING THE FANTASTIC. Scott Edelman’s third episode of his Eating the Fantastic podcast is now live, with guest Bill Campbell.

BillCampbellEatingtheFantastic-300x300

Bill opened up about many things, including the genius of Samuel R. Delany, how Rosarium’s first book Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism and Beyond gave birth to a new publishing company, the challenges of crowdfunding creative projects, why he was once blacklisted at a convention, and many other topics which I hope you’ll find as fascinating as I did.

Episode four, coming in two weeks, will feature writer Tom Doyle.

(4) REQUESTING MORE CONTENTS, FEWER TABLES. Black Gate continues its Hartwell tribute with “The Books of David G. Hartwell: Visions of Wonder and The Science Fiction Century”. I’m all in favor of paying tribute to Hartwell, I’d just like to see more in these posts than the reprinted tables of contents of his collections.

(5) NAMING CONVENTIONS. Michael J. Walsh observes what a well-Cultured sense of humor Elon Musk displayed in naming his ships.

By January 2016, a total of three ASDSs have been refitted. The first ASDS, named Just Read the Instructions (JRtI), was converted from a barge in late 2014 and was deployed in January 2015 during the CRS-5 cargo resupply mission to the International Space Station in order to provide a landing platform for a test flight of the returning booster stage. It was used for two landing tests through April 2015, and by June 2015, was retired as an ASDS.[1] The second ASDS, named Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY), was converted from a much-newer deck barge and became operational in June 2015 to support a landing test on the CRS-7 mission.

(6) CRADLE OF SF’S GOLDEN AGE. Robert A. Heinlein’s birthplace in Butler, MO has been listed for sale. The asking price is $97,500.

Geo Rule says “The Heinlein Society will gladly accept a six figure donation to purchase it and turn it into a museum, if you’re feeling generous as well. Well, maybe seven figure to turn it into a museum…”

 

Lou Antonelli takes a selfie at Heinlein's birthplace.

Lou Antonelli takes a selfie at Heinlein’s birthplace.

(7) STATHOPOULOS EXHIBITION. Rejects! The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, a retrospective of portraits by famed Australian painter Nick Stathopoulos , runs March 28-April 15 at Project 504 Studio in St. Leonards (Sydney). Stathopoulos is a 10-time Ditmar Award winner, who also was a 1999 Hugo nominee in the Best Professional Artist category.

rejects stathopolous

(8) NANCY REAGAN OBIT. Former First Lady Nancy Davis Reagan died today, March 6, at the age of 95. Like her spouse, she had an acting career prior to living in the White House, which included a role in the genre movie Donovan’s Brain. The movie was based on a 1942 horror novel by Curt Siodmak who, showing what a small world it is, lived in those days not far from Robert A. Heinlein’s home on Laurel Canyon.

(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOYS

  • Born March 6, 1906 — Lou Costello. “Abbott and Costello Meet…  have to be some of the best monster movies,” says John King Tarpinian.
  • Born March 6, 1928 – William F. Nolan
William F. Nolan, Forrest J Ackerman, and Ray Bradbury.

William F. Nolan, Forrest J Ackerman, and Ray Bradbury.

(10) ACE OF HORROR. SF Signal has “5-Time Bram Stoker Winner Jonathan Maberrry on His Prolific Career”

CARL SLAUGHTER: Which of your novels is being adapted by hollywood?

JONATHAN MABERRY: I’m fortunate to have several of my projects in development for film and television. My Joe Ledger thrillers are being developed by Lone Tree Entertainment and Vintage Picture Company as a possible series of movies, likely beginning with Extinction Machine, the 5th in the series. And my vampire apocalypse series, V-Wars, is headed to TV, with a brilliant script by former Dexter head writer, Tim Schlattmann. Several other properties, including Rot & Ruin, The Pine Deep Trilogy, and others, are being discussed.

CS: How long and how hard is the journey to the screen?

JM: Like most writers I’ve coasted the edges of the Hollywood experience for years. There are some frustrations, of course, but that’s part of the game. For example, back on 2007 I co-created a show for ABC-Disney called On the Slab, which was a horror-sci fi-fantasy news program. Disney paid us to develop it and write a series bible and sample script; and then there was a change of management in the department that purchased it. Suddenly the project was orphaned and therefore dead in the water. Another time producer Michael DeLuca (Blade, Magnolia) optioned the first Joe Ledger novel, Patient Zero, on behalf of Sony, who in turn took it to ABC, who hired Emmy Award-winning TV writer Javier Grillo-Marxuach (Lost) to write a pilot. Then after we’d gone a long way toward seeing it launch they decided instead to focus on the reboot of Charlie’s Angels, which flubbed badly. That’s Hollywood. I don’t take this stuff personally, though. And I never lost my optimism.

(11) FRIENDSHIP CALCULUS. Adam-Troy Castro explains “How To Remain My Friend When You Really Hate My Friend”.

I guarantee you, if I am close to Friend X, I know that “Asshole” is part of his Venn Diagram. As it is part of mine. As it is part of yours. I have clearly already made my personal calculations and decided that his other aspects are more important. I may someday change my mind. But it is my mind to change, based on whatever passes between me and Friend X; possibly even depending on what I see Friend X do to Friend Y. But you, who have had a different experience with Friend X, and therefore a different reaction, cannot win this argument with me using words, no matter how eloquently you express everything you find objectionable about him. It is, however, very possible for you to lose it. You can become a bore. You can become a scold. You can just become the distasteful person who always feels obligated to piss on my pal; the guy who gives me the impression that nothing will satisfy him until I start pissing on my pal too. That makes YOU the shithead.

(12) VIRUS WITH A LIBRARY. Nature reports “CRISPR-like ‘immune’ system discovered in giant virus”.

Gigantic mimiviruses fend off invaders using defences similar to the CRISPR system deployed by bacteria and other microorganisms, French researchers report. They say that the discovery of a working immune system in a mimivirus bolsters their claim that the giant virus represents a new branch in the tree of life.

Mimiviruses are so large that they are visible under a light microscope. Around half a micrometre across, and first found infecting amoebae living in a water tower, they boast genomes that are larger than those of some bacteria. They are distantly related to viruses that include smallpox, but unlike most viruses, they have genes to make amino acids, DNA letters and complex proteins.

(13) TO BOLDLY BUILD WHAT NO MAN HAS BUILT BEFORE. Collider explains why “NASA Has Designed a Warp Ship Inspired by ‘Star Trek’s Enterprise”.

When does science-fiction become science fact? Throughout various mediums over the last few centuries, we’ve seen early versions of concepts that would eventually become a reality. Sometimes these portrayals are pretty far off base (still waiting on those flying cars), while other times they feel downright prescient. But in the case of Star Trek and one particular engineer at NASA, science-fiction actually informed science fact, with NASA engineer and physicist Harold White now actively working on a space ship that would allow travel faster than the speed of light—or, for the Star Trek inclined, warp speed.

White announced this idea a few years ago, with the concept seeking to allow travel faster than the speed of light by literally expanding space-time behind the object and contracting space-time in front of it. In reality, the object doesn’t “go fast,” but instead takes advantage of Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity to move between space-time.

If your head has yet to explode, sit tight—in concert with White, designer Mark Rademaker has now created a CGI design concept of the ship that would operate using this theory, which they have aptly named the IXS Enterprise. Per Rademaker in an interview with the Washington Post, the idea behind the concept art serves two purposes: to visualize their idea, and to inspire burgeoning young scientists

(14) PAGING HUGO NOMINEES. George R.R. Martin knows it’s “Nomination Time”. His short fiction recommendation is a needle in a small Venusian haystack.

Last year, however, these three categories were among those most impacted by Puppygate. The slates dominated all three, sweeping the board and shutting out all other work. In the novelette category, a disqualification allowed one non-Puppy nominee to squeeze onto the ballot, and that story ultimately won. In novella and short story, fans unhappy with the choices presented them voted No Award. Understandably, IMNSHO… still, it was not a happy ending. There was some wonderful and powerful work published in these categories in 2014, and it was a shame that none of it could be recognized. (I was proud and pleased to present Alfie Awards to Ursula Vernon for “Jackalope Wives” in short story, and to Patrick Rothfuss for “The Slow Regard of Silent Things” in novella… but we all know that an Alfie is not a Hugo, and in an ordinary year both Vernon and Rothfuss would surely have been contending for a rocket).

That’s last year, however. No amount of rehashing can change what happened. The important thing is to see that it does not happen again. And to that end, it behooves all of us to nominate the short stories, novelettes, and novellas that we enjoyed most last year… to share our thoughts with our friends… to shout our recommendations from the rooftops. Let’s make sure this year’s shortlists truly represent the best of what was published in 2015.

As to my own recommendations…

Ah, there I hit a problem. I am not making any recommendations in these categories. Problem is, I have a conflict of interest. As a writer I did not publish any original short fiction in 2015, true. As an editor, however… well, Gardner Dozois and I co-edited an anthology called OLD VENUS that came out last year, and in my (admittedly less than objective) view, that book contained several stories that are worthy of Hugo nominations, and one that is so bloody brilliant that I think it stands right up there with any story that ever won the Hugo.

I really can’t tell you which one it is, however. Or the names of the other stories in the book that I think worthy of consideration. Look, Gardner and I liked all the stories we included in OLD VENUS. If we hadn’t, we would not have purchased them (and we do reject stories for every one of our anthologies). But we’d be lying if we said we liked all of them equally. There are stories Gardner liked more than I did; there are stories I liked more than Gardner did; there are stories both of us loved, loved, loved. As editors, however, it would be unethical for us to say which were which in public. Just as parents need to maintain devoutly that they love all their children equally and have no favorites, it behooves the ethical editor to take a similar stance toward the stories they purchase and publish.

(15) GIVING KATE A HELPING PAW. Steve Davidson hated to let go to waste the effort he invested on a comment I deleted here the other day. It now has manifested as “Puppy See, Puppy Do-Do” at Amazing Stories.

Kate Paulk recently closed the comments (at the beginning of March) so that they could be compiled and a final list composed.

It’s a little late in the game, especially considering that nominators are kinda expected to read and be familiar with works they’re going to recommend (but that isn’t necessarily an impediment for organized voting), so we’ve decided to help them out a bit and give them a hand up.

We started with one of the most visible categories – Best Novel. The following list contains all of the individual works mentioned in the comments. We did not verify eligibility (although most, if not all of the works seems to meet that criteria). When judging whether or not someone recommended something, we took “Plus 1” and “Me Too” to count for a “vote”. If someone talked about a work but didn’t expressly indicate that it was something they were going to nominate, we didn’t count it.

If a “top ten” is going to be compiled, it’s pretty obvious from the counts below what we should see on the Sad Puppy IV Slate. It will be interesting to see how the final list compares.

(16) HAMMER EMCEE RAPPED. Marie Porter has some feedback for masquerade emcees, triggered by a recent bad example of the art.

I want to talk about Emcees for convention ?#?cosplay masquerades.

It feels like almost every masquerade we’ve competed in, judged, or watched – with maybe 1-2 exceptions – has had an emcee that behaves in a manner that I find disrespectful to the competitors.

As a general thing, it usually comes in the form of trying to be “entertaining”, and basically comes off like this emcee has an audience, that they are the STAR of the show, and the competitors are basically props to them. They feed off the laughs, which they try to obtain by any means necessary.

A lot of the time, it happens by cracking rude and unnecessary jokes while introducing the competitor, as the competitor leaves the stage, etc.

When it happens, it feels like the emcee has lost sight of what the show is actually about – showcasing the hard work of the competitors. It’s not the “emcee show”, no matter how much they would like to think it is.

Tonight, a few things happened that still have me mad, so let me describe it to demonstrate what I’m saying.

A friend of mine was competing in the beginner category, in a costume she SLAVED over – a Steampunk Lady Thor. I watched her build progress – she put a ton of work into it, and she had every reason to be proud of it.

As she was on stage – being judged, mind you – the emcee talked *over her provided audio* to say – and I quote

“She could hammer me any time”.

She looked horrified, and – quite frankly – like she wanted to murder the guy. Rightly so, IMHO. She basically had all of her hard work diminished into a sexual joke. It was degrading and objectifying, and had no place happening. SHE WAS COMPETING, during PERFORMANCE judging. Can you imagine being shocked by something like that, after all that work?

This is a Facebook link to video of the emcee’s “hammer” line. You can see it for yourself.

(17) UNLOOTED LOOT? Nile Magazine wonders if someone blabbed: “It is full of treasures… the discovery of the 21st century”.

Tantalising news about the ‘secret chamber’ in Tutankhamun’s tomb.

“We do not know if the burial chamber is Nefertiti or another woman, but it is full of treasures.” – Egypt’s Tourism Minister, Hisham Zaazou.

It seems that some secrets are too good to keep. Is this a phenomenal leak about what lays beyond the false wall in Tutankhamun’s tomb? Is it speculative wishful thinking? Or is this a clever boost for badly-needed tourism?

Mr. Zaazou claims that the announcement of what lays inside the secret chamber will be made in April. “It will be a ‘Big Bang’ – the discovery of the 21st century.”

To be honest, I’m not sure what to make of the news that has wafted out of Egypt via Spain in the past 24 hours. The Spanish national daily newspaper, ABC, claims that Egypt’s Tourism Minister, Hisham Zaazou, who was in Spain a few weeks ago, confirmed that there is “treasure” in Tutankhamun’s tomb.

(18) OLD NEWS IS GOOD NEWS. Shortly after Ray Bradbury died in 2012, Jessica Allen wrote a retrospective for Maclean’s about the Bradbury stories Maclean’s had published, in “Here’s to you, Ray Bradbury”. Her article was adorned with photos of the title page art, including a notable typo in the credit for his contribution to Maclean’s September 15, 1948 edition.

Bradbury MacLeans the long years

[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Michael J., Walsh, Steven H Silver, Lis, Andrew Porter, and Will R. for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day IanP.]

Rosarium Publishing Set to Adapt Tobias Buckell’s Arctic Rising

arctic rising .promo.corr.flat COMPTobias S. Buckell’s near-future thriller Arctic Rising will soon be adapted as a comic book by Rosarium Publishing.

Set in a future possibly mirroring our own where the polar ice caps have all but melted, Arctic Rising centers around a United Nations Polar Guard pilot, Anika Duncan. She finds herself caught in the middle of an international battle between corporations, ecoterrorists, and global powers to stop a plot that could very well decide the fate of Mother Earth.

The first of twelve issues of Tobias S. Buckell’s Arctic Rising will be released digitally in February 2016. Keith A. Miller (Manticore, Triboro Tales, and Infest) is writing the adaptation and the art is being done by comics newcomer, Tommy Nguyen.

Buckell states, “I believe in creating diverse futures, and writing Arctic Rising was important to me because it attempts to tackle both the ecological issues I see just around the corner and the diverse peoples who will be affected (and who will be trying to solve the problems we leave them). Partnering with Rosarium to create the graphic novel is a tremendous opportunity, as I think they share a similar yearning for more diverse futures. I can’t wait to see what happens next.”

Arctic Rising is such an action-packed thrill ride, turning it into a comic book seemed like a no-brainer almost as soon as I cracked the cover,” says Rosarium Publishing head, Bill Campbell. “This adaptation is a dream come true.”

Pixel Scroll 9/8 Perfidious Etceteras

(1) This day in history:

…in 1966, “Star Trek” premiered on NBC-TV.

Which makes it the perfect day to release Captain Kirk’s autobiography:

“The Autobiography of James T. Kirk – The Story of Starfleet’s Greatest Captain,” is to be published by Titan Books on Tuesday – 49 years to the day after “Star Trek” premiered on television in 1966.

It comes with illustrations, including Kirk’s Starfleet Academy class graduation photo and an unsent letter he penned to his son.

Fan fiction plays a popular role in the “Star Trek” universe and interest has been building since actor William Shatner, the best-known embodiment of Kirk, appeared at July’s Comic-Con International with Goodman and read excerpts from the book. A Shatner-signed copy of the book can be found on the Internet selling for $150.00.

According to the autobiography, Kirk passed over the Vulcan Mr. Spock to be his first officer of the starship Enterprise; 20th century social worker Edith Keeler, not the mother of his son, was the great love of his life; and Kirk may have another son on a distant planet – who makes what suspiciously looks like “Star Trek” movies.

(2) Now there’s an official touchscreen that can turn your Raspberry Pi into a tablet.

 Two years in the making, an official touchscreen for the tiny board has gone on sale.

The diminutive Raspberry Pi – a computer on a board the size of a credit card – has been wildly successful. It was created with the aim of encouraging children to experiment with building their own devices and while the makers thought they might sell 1,000 they have now sold well over five million.

(3)  The roads must roll! Chris Mills on Gizmodo says “Replacing Subway Lines With High-Speed Moving Sidewalks Sounds Terrifying”.

London has the oldest subway system in the world: great for tourism, but sometimes not-so-great for commuters. There’s all sorts of sensible plans to upgrade the city’s public transport, but here’s one particularly outside-the-box solution: a 15mph moving sidewalk, looping 17 miles under London. What could go wrong!

(4) Erin Underwood has a fine interview with Rosarium Publisher Bill Campbell at Amazing Stories.

Bill Campbell

Bill Campbell

(ASM): What upcoming book or project are you are especially excited about? Why that book/project? (Bill, this can be a Rosarium book or something else.)

(BC): All of our projects are really near and dear to my heart, and so are our authors and artists. At this level, you really get to know the people you work with, and you really find yourself rooting for their success and work yourself to the bone to try to help them reach it.

I think the one project, though, that’s nearest and dearest to my heart is Stories for Chip: A Tribute to Samuel R. Delany that I co-edited with Nisi Shawl. I don’t know if I’d have ever written science fiction if it weren’t for Chip, and I can’t help thinking how hard it must’ve been for him to be alone in the field for as long as he was. He had to carry a mighty large load for a lot of people and did it with such grace and intelligence. I told Daniel Jose Older that there are, perhaps, five people on this planet who intimidate me. Delany’s one of them. I just wanted to thank him. It took over two years to do it properly, and, thanks to Nisi and the authors involved, it turned out a lot better than I could’ve possibly hoped.

(5) Tom Knighton’s blog has a new header with a photo of the author, which really brightens the place up.

(6) Mark Pampanin of SCPR has dug a little deeper into how gay rights got its start in science fiction.

But it’s true – gay and lesbian writers and activists who wanted to connect with others in the LGBT community in the 1940s could only do so with pseudonyms and double entendre. And they were able to do it with the help of another burgeoning movement with roots in Los Angeles – science fiction….

Kepner and Ben, as Jyke and Tigrina, were both devoted members of the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society, which met weekly in the basement of the Prince Rupert Arms near downtown Los Angeles to imagine a future of technological marvels and social equality.

The society still exists. Now in Van Nuys, it’s the oldest running science fiction society in the world, and holds members just as devoted as Kepner and Ben once were, like June Moffatt, who joined the society in August 1947 when she was a teenager. She says she “only met Tigrina once” but she knew Kepner quite well.

“He was good fun,” says Moffatt. Moffatt knew Kepner was gay and an activist, but he was still just “one of the gang. I remember once sitting down next to [Kepner] and telling him he was in danger,” Moffatt says, laughing. “I was flirting with him.”

(7) Black Nerd Problems’ L. E. H. Light declares “No More Diversity Panels, It’s Time To Move On”.

What’s a convention program director to do? They want to present and represent “diversity” in their audience. They’re hearts are in the right place, or not. As others have pointed out, sometimes The Diversity Panel is an excuse for the convention to avoid actually integrating their other panels. Well intentioned or not, the recent fuss at the Hugos really proves this point: we’re here, we’re not going any where. We and our allies vote for awards and read books and *gasp* write and publish them too! The “why is diversity important” is an answered question. So what’s next?

(8) Yesterday I had a clip about a spider clock, but there is a lot more to know about mechanical spiders if you’re interested. (The two of you who raised your hands can keep reading.) One example is this video, Inside Adam Savage’s Cave: Awesome Robot Spider!

We’re back in Adam’s cave to check out his latest obsession, a robot spider with incredibly realistic movement. Adam shows off the special box and platform he built to tinker and calibrate the spider, and then sends it crawling around the pool table in his shop. It’s not for the arachnophobic!

 

Other recommended one-day build videos are this one building Cylon raiders and troopers from plastic model kits with Aaron Douglas:

And this one building his Kirk chair:

(9) BBC Two has optioned China Miéville’s The City & the City and will develop the novel into a four-part series based on the Inspector Tyador Borlú character. British screenwriter Tony Grisoni is writing the adaptation.

“We are thrilled to be bringing China’s dazzlingly inventive novel to BBC Two,” said Damien Timmer, managing director at Mammoth Screen, which will produce the project. “It’s a 21st Century classic — a truly thrilling and imaginative work which asks big questions about how we perceive the world and how we interact with each other.”

(10) As you already know, Soon Lee is hosting a collection of the punny variations on the title of Rachel Swirsky’s “If you were a dinosaur, my love” produced on File 770 today.

(11) John Scalzi has entered Hugo hibernation. (See last comment on this post at Whatever).

I have officially come to the end of thinking about the Hugos for 2015. If other people decide they want to, that’s their business, but as for here, my plan is let it be through the end of the year. Because, fuck me, I’m tired of them.

May I also suggest that you let it go as well? Surely the rest of your 2015 is better spent doing something else with your time. I’m not saying you have to. I’m just saying you should. That goes for everyone.

(12) John C. Wright, on the other hand, is still roaming the tundra hunting for fresh prey.

If you voted, please write Sasquan, and demand, not ask, that they release the nomination data. The idea that the data must be kept private to avoid someone from deducing the voter’s identities is an absurd lie, not worth wasting ink to refute. They are trying to hide a bloc voting pattern, or a large number of votes that were entered after voting closed or something of the sort.

(13) Charles Rector in Fornax #5 [PDF file] begins his editorial on the 2015 Hugos with this tantalizing hook —

Have you ever taken a firm position on a subject only to realize later that you were on the wrong side and as time went on, you got to wonder how you ever took that previous position? That was my experience with this year’s Hugo Awards. When the year started, I was on the side of the slates. It seemed that the slates were a good idea given the state of the Hugo Awards.

I bet you’ll never see a turnaround like that anywhere else.

(14) 100 Years of Robots in the Movies. (Despite the title I’m pretty sure I saw a split second of Doctor Who in there – and other TV shows…)

[Thanks to Andrew Porter, Jerry Pournelle, Ita, and John King Tarpinian for some of these links. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Cubist.]

What Stories Are In “Stories for Chip”?

Stories for Chip cover COMPEditors Nisi Shawl and Bill Campbell have announced the table of contents of Stories for Chip: A Tribute to Samuel R. Delany, coming July 1.

The book honors SFWA Grand Master, Science Fiction Hall of Fame inductee, and multiple award-winner Samuel R. “Chip” Delany.

  • Christopher Brown – “Festival”
  • Chesya Burke – “For Sale: Fantasy Coffin”
  • Roz Clarke – “Haunt-type Experience”
  • Kathryn Cramer – “Characters in the Margins of a Lost Notebook”
  • Vincent Czyz – “Hamlet’s Ghost Sighted in Frontenac, KS”
  • Junot Díaz – “Nilda”
  • Geetanjali Dighe – “The Last Dying Man”
  • Timmel Duchamp – “Real Mothers, a Faggot Uncle, and the Name of the Father: Samuel R. Delany’s Feminist Revisions of the Story of SF”
  • Hal Duncan – “An Idyll in Erewhyna”
  • Fabio Fernandes – “Eleven Stations”
  • Jewelle Gomez – “Be Three”
  • Eileen Gunn, Michael Swanwick and Samuel R. Delany at the Joyce Kilmer Service Area, March 2005
  • Nick Harkaway – “Billy Tumult”
  • Ernest Hogan – “Guerilla Mural of a Siren’s Song”
  • Nalo Hopkinson & Nisi Shawl – “Jamaica Ginger”
  • Walidah Imarisha – “Walking Science Fiction: Samuel Delany and Visionary Fiction”
  • Alex Jennings – “Heart of Brass”
  • Tenea D. Johnson – “Each Star a Sun to Invisible Planets”
  • Ellen Kushner – “Delany Story”
  • Claude Lalumiere – “Empathy Evolving as a Quantum of Eight-Dimensional Perception”
  • Isiah Lavender – “Delany Encounters”
  • devorah major – “Voice Prints”
  • Haralambi Markov – “Holding Hands with Monsters”
  • Anil Menon – “Clarity”
  • Carmelo Rafala – “Song for the Asking”
  • Kit Reed – “Kickenders”
  • Kim Stanley Robinson – “Introduction”
  • Benjamin Rosenbaum – “The First Gate of Logic”
  • Geoff Ryman – “Capitalism in the 22nd Century”
  • Alex Smith – “Clones”
  • Michael Swanwick – “On My First Reading of The Einstein Intersection”
  • Sheree Renee Thomas – “River Clap Your Hands”
  • Kai Ashante Wilson – “Legendaire”

Editor Nisi Shawl is the author of the James Tiptree, Jr. Award-winning collection Filter House. She has edited Bloodchildren: Stories by the Octavia E. Butler Scholars and co-edited Strange Matings: Science Fiction, Feminism, African American Voices, and Octavia E. Butler. She’s a co-founder of the Carl Brandon Society and a board member for Clarion West.

Editor Bill Campbell co-edited the groundbreaking anthology, Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism and Beyond.

The project is supported by a $1,500 grant from SF3.

“State of Short Fiction” Video Posted

(L to R) Writer Erica Satifka; editor Jonathan Landen (Daily Science Fiction); moderator Sarah Pinsker; and editors Scott Andrews (Beneath Ceaseless Skies); Neil Clarke (Clarkesworld Magazine); Norm Sherman (Drabblecast); and Bill Campbell (Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism).

(L to R) Writer Erica Satifka; editor Jonathan Landen (Daily Science Fiction); moderator Sarah Pinsker; and editors Scott Andrews (Beneath Ceaseless Skies); Neil Clarke (Clarkesworld Magazine); Norm Sherman (Drabblecast); and Bill Campbell (Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism).

A video of “State of Short Fiction” roundtable hosted by the Baltimore Science Fiction Society on March 22 is now available on YouTube.

[Thanks to Alexander Harris for the story.]

Cyborg Monday Sale

Sunshine Patriots coverThe Fifteenth Anniversary of Bill Campbell’s anti-war military science fiction novel Sunshine Patriots drops on “Cyborg Monday,” December 2, 2013.

Rebellion erupts on the “paradise” planet of Elysia, plunging the colony into chaos. In response, the all-powerful United Earth dispatches its elite corps of cyborg soldiers, led by Aaron “The Berber” Barber. For a hero celebrated galaxy-wide for his acts of bravery against alien hordes, a ragtag group of colonized miners with antiquated weapons should be no challenge. But Barber and his soldiers are unprepaed to meet the most dangerous enemy yet–humans just like them. And on Elysia, the soldiers discover dangers that neither United Earth nor the Elysians themselves could have foreseen. The secrets Barber and his soldiers uncover lead them to question the true meaning of freedom in a world where nothing is what it seems.

The new edition from Rosarium Publishing includes an eye-popping cover by Vincent Sammy and an introduction by Prof. Jonathan R. Harvey, who wrote part of his Ph.D. dissertation on the book.

Mothership Has Launched

Mothership SMALLWord is out about the groundbreaking anthology, Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism and Beyond edited by Bill Campbell and Edward Austin Hall. Even James Bacon is recommending it!

Winners of literary awards from the Pulitzer Prize to the Bram Stoker are represented in the collection, the first from Rosarium Publishing. Contributors include Junot Diaz, Victor LaValle, Lauren Beukes, Tobias Buckell, N.K. Jemisin, S.P. Somtow, Eden Robinson, Vandana Singh, Rabih Alameddine, Linda D. Addison, Charles R. Saunders, Darius James, Greg Tate, Carmen Maria Machado, Chinelo Onwualu, Jaymee Goh, and Tade Thompson. Many of the stories have been published previously.

Co-editor Bill Campbell told the Washington City Paper that he started the book project to gain more recognition for black sf authors:

While attending predominantly white science-fiction conventions, the Prince George’s County resident perceived a general disregard for black authors writing speculative fiction. “I would mention these people’s names and people would just be like ‘who?'” Campbell says. “Either I could complain that these people aren’t known or I could do something about it.”

…Campbell refers to the pieces in Mothership as “story donations”—he couldn’t afford to commission his writers. He started his own publishing company specifically for the book.

And he explained the choice of title in an interview for RisingShadow:

We named the collection “Mothership” because we wanted to capture the spirit, in a literary sense, of what one could expect in a Parliament/Funkadelic album, which was the unexpected. We also wanted to give readers a taste of the diversity that many of these writers have to offer. So, we have stories from all the genres within speculative fiction. We have stories with and without overtly political content. We even have stories that some would most likely contest aren’t speculative fiction at all. But that is the beauty and spectrum of the writers represented here. We felt that it was important to celebrate that.

Bill Campbell outside of the American Book Center in Amsterdam, where he, Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, Tade Thompson, and Hodan Warsame conducted a Mothership lecture and book signing (11/9/13).