Neither of my cats have ever paid ANY attention to the TV. But awhile back I was watching The Sandman episode “A Dream of a Thousand Cats”. When this episode started, Ancillary Cat suddenly JUMPED off the couch next to me onto the coffee table and was riveted by the TV — for the entire episode. When the second half, “Calliope”, came on, she lost interest.
So I went back to the “Dream” episode, and she was again instantly mesmerized. I have never seen her do anything like this with anything on the TV. I guess it is a high compliment to the animators that it seemed so realistic to her.
Photos of your felines (or whatever you’ve got!) resting on genre works are welcome. Send to mikeglyer (at) cs (dot) com
Was the year too heavy, deep, and real? Yes, but it was also rich in creativity, humor, and shared adventures. It’s a gift and privilege for me to be continually allowed to publish so many entertaining posts. Thanks to all of you who contributed!
… Like many fans, I had tried my hand with writing, especially as a teenager. I wrote notes, drew weird aliens, and even wrote a novel which will never see the light of day. But during all this I did noodle, consistently, with several recurring characters and a story line. It shifted and changed, of course, as I matured and different interests came into my life, and eventually they just settled in the back of my mind.
… Once when [Tim] Powers was being interviewed at an SF convention someone asked “Do you actually believe in this stuff?” He said “No. But my characters do.” As Gordon Bennett wrote, and Frank Sinatra sang, “This is all I ask, this is all I need.”
… I’m a huge reader of novels, but not that big on short fiction. But the last few years, I’ve done a personal project to read and review as many Novellas as I could (presuming that the story Synopsis had some appeal for me). …
… The mission of SAFF is to keep the factual progress of space exploration out there for our community and to help individual Worldcons and other conventions in dealing with the arrangements and funding of space experts as special guests.
… Another solved mystery was that of the vanishing pancake. A friend of mine, by profession police officer, was standing at his stove, frying pancakes. As we both did with pancakes, we flipped them around in the air. So did my friend on this day.
His mystery was that the pancake never came back down. It vanished. There was no trace of it….
Eli Grober’s “Opening Lines Rewritten for a Pandemic” in The New Yorker humorously changes the beginnings of famous books to suit life as we knew it in the plague year of 2020…. Filers answered the challenge to add to the list. Here is a collection from yesterday’s comments….
The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger by Stephen King
The Man in Black fled across the desert, and the Gunslinger followed, being careful to maintain a distance of at least six feet.
… It was the Jeopardy! gameshow display screen one saw all the time on television, in real life, just yards away, here inside the cool Sony studios. Six rows across with the categories, columns of five numbers under each. To the right of the large display was Alex Trebek’s podium, and nearby were the three contestant stations.
There were sixteen of us here, and before the end of the day, all of us but one would have our thirty minutes of fame — or infamy — in this very special place.
… The model took off and rose straight up for maybe 100 feet or so before the second stage kicked in, but then there was trouble. Instead of continuing its upward flight, the thing veered to the right and zoomed away horizontally, slightly descending all the while. It went directly over a house across the street and continued on, neatly bisecting the span between two tall trees behind the house. And then it was gone from sight. I remember that my uncle gave me a quizzical look and asked, “Was it supposed to do that?”…
El (Galadriel) is pissed off. Her classmate Orion just rescued her for the second time –needlessly. She’s capable, more than capable, El’s powerful – El, power, get it? Get it?…
On the evening of Wednesday, June 16, 2021, the Fantastic Fiction at KGB Reading Series, hosted by Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel, presented authors Seanan McGuire and Nadia Bulkin in livestreamed readings on YouTube. (Neither reader is running for Mayor of New York.)
This is the 16th month of virtual readings, in place of in-person reading at the eponymous bar in the East Village in Manhattan, noted Kressel. New York City may be “open,” added Datlow, but they don’t yet feel comfortable “going into the crowd” at the Bar for at least a few more months….
Is there a science fiction movie character you want to smell like? Forget Swamp Thing, c’mon, he’s not in Fragrance X’s catalog. Otherwise, there’s no end of superhero and genre branded colognes you can buy.
There was a post a while ago on twitter that asked, “So what motivates y’all to continue entering bids to host Worldcons? Genuinely curious.”
And I responded with, ”I think there are some great bids out there like Glasgow 2024 that you can genuinely tell they are enthusiastic and want to put on a good show. Working on Dublin was like that for me as well. I am not saying they are perfect but the excitement is really important.”
But that is just the tip of the iceberg of what I wanted to say…
… Now back to Connery. The film would leave him with such a bad experience that claimed he the production of the film and the film’s final quality was what he caused his decision to permanently retire from filmmaking, saying in an interview with The Times that, “It was a nightmare. The experience had a great influence on me, it made me think about showbiz. I get fed up dealing with idiots.”
Space Jam: A New Legacy is a fun-free synthetic entertainment substitute. Its many writers (six are credited) created a screenplay from artificial sweeteners, high fructose corn syrup, and gas….
… Datlow asked Robinson, “How can you be so optimistic?” He replied that his mother was; she felt that it was our duty to be optimistic and to help people….
… I began to wonder whatever became of this marvelous actor and so, before retiring for the evening, I started to research Mr. Persoff’s whereabouts on my computer. As luck would have it, I found him and wrote him a rather hasty letter of personal and lifelong admiration. To my shock and utter astonishment, he responded within five minutes….
Stormm began her humorous series about the misdirected emails she gets from Writer X in August and has done 17 regular and two bonus installments. It swirls together comedy, horror, and the pitfalls of being a writer.
The purpose of this presentation is to place Tolkien’s theory of mythopoeic fiction in dialogue with fantasy series by T. Kingfisher in order to argue that her work is feminist and mythopoeic. While there are a number of elements of Kingfisher’s fiction that are relevant to my purpose, I’ll be focusing on two: her version of Faërie and system of magic, and her portrayal of female characters whose relationships are with failed warrior heroes….
The talk of time capsules and 1000-year M-discs in the Pixel Scroll 8/12/21 discussion of item (16), the Louis XIII Cognac 100-year sci-fi film vault, got me thinking that Worldcon should do Hugos for Best Genre-related Work Created 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000, 10,000, 20,000, 30,000 and 40,000 years ago….
… Considered to be a genius by many, not only was Hergé skilled at drawing, he was also good at fascinating his readers with mysteries, and intriguing situations. For example, why was Prof. Calculus going into the heart of a volcano, following the agitated movements of his pendulum, instead of running away, like all the others? Perhaps he was so oblivious to his real surroundings, and was so desperate to find the cause of the wild swinging of his pendulum for the sake of science, that inadvertently, he was willing to risk his very life. Or was he running away from mundane reality? And why did Tintin rush back to save his friend from going deeper in the maze of the mountain? Possibly because that was Tintin’s nature, to rescue not just the innocent people of the world, but it also showed his deep friendship with the absent-minded professor….
…After watching [John Wick: Chapter 3], my friends and I got some drinks at a nearby bar. There, I found myself repeating a single word from the movie: “Consequences.” Wick utters this word whenever one of the characters points out that his past may have finally caught up with him. Since I like to drive jokes into the ground, I began to say “Consequences” in response to everything that night, in a poor imitation of Wick’s scratchy voice. Why did we need to buy another round? “Consequences.” Why should someone else pick up the tab? “Consequences.” And maybe I should call out sick tomorrow? “Consequences.”…
Right after the Fourth of July might not be when I shop for Christmas ornaments, but somebody does, because that’s when Hallmark runs its Keepsake Ornament Premiere.
If the timing is for the convenience of retailers, there is also a certain logic in picking a spot on the calendar that is as far away as you can get from a date associated with Christmas trees. It’s plain some of these ornaments are intended for a Halloween or Thanksgiving tree, while others probably are destined never to decorate a tree at all but to remain pristine in their original wrapping on collectors’ shelves….
Continuing my reports on museums that might be of interest to Filers coming to Washington for DisCon III, I offer a report on the Museum of the Bible, which I visited recently. (I had a Groupon!)…
… I couldn’t help thinking of the passage from The Lord of the Rings, where the Crebain go searching for the Fellowship. In fact, there are many birds as spies in fantasy fiction, such as the Three-Eyed Raven, the, One-eyed Crow, or Varamyr Sixskins warging into an eagle in A Song of Ice and Fire, to mention a few….
The Best Series Hugo category was added to the WSFS Constitution in 2017 with a sunset clause requiring a future re-ratification vote to remain part of the Worldcon Constitution. That vote happens next week at the DisCon III Business Meeting. If you were there, would you vote yes or no on keeping the category?
Then down the long hall there arose so much chat, that I sprang from my chair to see what was that? Through archways, past plant pots, I slipped through the throng as the loud murmuration came strolling along.
… In reality, China is a huge country with a vast population and an expanding middle class; an enormous SF field and well established fandom. Chengdu is an established international convention site as well as a centre for science and technology.
I rather suspect that from the Chengdu bid’s viewpoint, the US-centric history of Worldcon is at odds with the very name of the event and its claim to be the leading global celebration of the genre. I do not need to believe there is anything suspicious about the bid, because it only needs a tiny percentage of Chinese fans to get behind it to make it a success….
Though Tolkien’s novels were very successful in the last century, after the Peter Jackson trilogy in the early 2000s, their reach increased to encompass the globe. Irrespective of geographical or linguistic differences, they spoke to us in different ways. In an informal Discussion Group at Oxonmoot 2021, (held online), participants were welcome to share their thoughts/reactions/ take on various aspects of Tolkien’s works, mainly his Legendarium….
… Based on reading 20% of Team File 770’s assigned books, I found there are actually 12 I’d say yes to – so I am going to need to cut two more before I finalize this list….
TRIGGER SNOWFLAKE
The saga of Sheriff Trigger Snowflake, the lovely Coraline, and the shenanigans of the Solarian Poets Society added several chapters this year that were not so much ripped-from-the-headlines as amused by the news.
A few days later, down at the Coffee Emporium, Trigger was having breakfast. A nice cup of Bean of the Day and a grilled synthecheese. As he finished the last bite of the synthecheese, Barbara Dimatis walked up to his table.
“Sheriff Snowflake, may I sit?”
“Why, sure, Ms Dimatis. What troubles you?”
“You’ve heard of Bistro Futuristo? Well, turns out that the editor and owner of Futuristo Magazine has made an announcement.”…
… Needless to say, I have witnessed or participated in a number of remarkable, bizarre and historic incidents during my tenure working at Worldcons. I not only know how the sausage was made, I helped make it as well….
So forget about what the naysayers are saying; Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a big, exciting, sprawling, violent, intense, profane, beautiful and ultimately moving film.
In addition to reviewing comics and graphic novels, James used his camera and descriptive abilities to take us along on visits to all kinds of fascinating exhibits and pop culture events.
By JJ: To assist Hugo nominators, listed below are the Semiprozines believed to be eligible as of this writing for the 2022 Best Semiprozine Hugo next year †.
This list has been compiled from Neil Clarke’s Semiprozine Directory at semiprozine.org, supplemented by the hard work done by Filer Cora Buhlert to identify additional eligible Semiprozines.
By JJ: It’s that time of year again! Even though the number of books published this year – and thus the number of eligible series – is down due to the pandemic, there are still plenty of great series for you to consider… and probably more opportunity than usual for you to get caught up on them.
To assist Hugo nominators, listed below are the series believed to be eligible as of this writing for the 2022 Best Series Hugo next year *†.
Each series name is followed by the main author name(s) and the 2021-published work(s).
Feel free to add missing series and the name of the 2021-eligible work in the comments, and I will get them included in the main post when I’ve verified their eligibility.
Note that previous Hugo Administrators ruled that nominations for a series and one of its subseries will not be combined. Therefore, when nominating a subseries work, think carefully under which series name it should be nominated. If the subseries does not yet meet the 3-volume, 240,000 word count threshold, then the main series name should be nominated. If the subseries does meet that threshold, then the subseries name should probably be nominated. This will ensure that another subseries in the same universe, or the main series itself, would still be eligible next year if this subseries is a finalist this year.
By JJ: Enquiring Hugo voter minds want to know: When will we be able to vote online? When will the Hugo Voter Packet be available?
In the fine tradition of similar File 770 posts on the subject in years past, and using my highly-refined statistical skills gained while acquiring my Master’s degree from Cattimothy U*, here is a comparison of the deadlines and availability dates of recent Worldcons.
Because what the hell, we’ve got time to kill. And a year from now, someone is going to ask about this again, the way they do every year.
Historic Hugo Nominating, Voting, and Packet Dates
Notes:
In 2008 and 2009, the Hugo Voter Packet was put together by John Scalzi
In 2012, the Hugo Voter Packet was released in stages starting on May 18, becoming fully available on May 30
In 2008, 2010-2015, and 2018, the Finalist Announcements were made on Easter weekend
Timing Observations:
Aussiecon 4 in 2010 had online nominations available the earliest, on January 1.
Renovation in 2011 and Loncon 3 in 2014 had online nominations available the longest, at 82 days.
Chicon 7 in 2012 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had online voting up and running the fastest, at 2 and 5 days following the announcement of the Finalists.
Chicon 7 had online voting available the longest, at 113 days.
Denvention 3 in 2008 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had the Hugo Voter Packet available the most quickly, at 3 and 4 weeks following the Finalist announcement.
Historic Hugo Nominating, Voting, and Packet Dates
1 – days between online nominations becoming available and nomination deadline
2 – days between nomination deadline and finalist announcement
3 – days between finalist announcement and online voting becoming available
4 – days between finalist announcement and Hugo Voter Packet becoming available
5 – days between online voting becoming available and voting deadline
6 – days between voting deadline and the start of Worldcon
Historic Hugo Nominating, Voting, and Packet Dates
Network Effect by Martha Wells, art by Jaime Jones
The Relentless Moon by Mary Robinette Kowal, art by Jamie Stafford-Hill using figures by Gregory Manchess
The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin, art by Lauren Panepinto
Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse, art by John Picacio
Harrow The Ninth by Tamsyn Muir, art by Tommy Arnold
Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, art by David Mann
By JJ: DisCon III has announced the 2021 Hugo Award Finalists. Since the Hugo Voter’s packet will take awhile to arrive, if you’d like to get a head start on your reading, you can use this handy guide to find material which is available for free online. Where available in their entirety, works are linked (most of the Novelettes and Short Stories are free, as are the Pro and Fan Artist images, and many of the Semiprozines and Fanzines).
If not available for free, an Amazon or other purchase link is provided. If a free excerpt is available online, it has been linked.
If I’ve missed an excerpt, or a link doesn’t work, please let me know in the comments, and I’ll get it fixed.
Fair notice: All Amazon links are referrer URLs which benefit fan site Worlds Without End.
[Update: Now that we have learned that Clarkesworld had the Internet Archive remove its copy of “Helicopter Story” we have taken down our link to a different online archive’s copy of the story.]
During the weekly extended-family Zoom call, we got to see the orange tabby cat stretched out on the bed of my sibling’s adult progeny (who, sadly, did not inherit the Star Trek gene from their parents). “That’s Data, one of my roommate’s cats,” we were told. “The other one is Lore.” I asked if the cats looked the same. “Yes,” came the response. “And originally this cat was called Lore, and the other one was Data — but when their personalities started becoming apparent, the names were switched, and ‘Lore’ was given to the mean one.”
By JJ: To assist Hugo nominators, this post provides information on the artists and designers of more than 800 works which appeared in a professional publication in the field of science fiction or fantasy for the first time in 2020.
These credits have been accumulated over the course of the year from dust jackets, Acknowledgments sections and copyright pages in works, cover reveal blog posts, and other sources on the internet. This year, Filers Martin Pyne and Karen B. also collected this information, and though we had a lot of overlap, their extra entries have greatly increased the information we are able to provide you. My profound thanks go to Martin and Karen for all of their hard work.
You can see the full combined spreadsheet of Editor and Artist credits here (I will be continuing to update this as I get more information).
In this post I will display up to 8 images of artworks for each artist for whom I have identified 3 or more works which appeared in a professional publication in the field of science fiction or fantasy for the first time in 2020. Clicking on the thumbnail will open a full-screen version of each work; where I could find a version of the work without titles, that is the image which is linked.
3.3.12: Best Professional Artist. An illustrator whose work has appeared in a professional publication in the field of science fiction or fantasy during the previous calendar year.
3.2.11: A Professional Publication is one which meets at least one of the following two criteria:
(1) it provided at least a quarter the income of any one person or,
(2) was owned or published by any entity which provided at least a quarter the income of any of its staff and/or owner.
3.10.2: In the Best Professional Artist category, the acceptance should include citations of at least three (3) works first published in the eligible year.
Under the current rules, artwork for semiprozines and fanzines is not eligible in this category. You can check whether a publication is a prozine or a semiprozine in this directory (the semiprozine list is at the top of the page, and the prozine directory is at the bottom).
Please be sure to check the spreadsheet first; but then, if you are able to confirm credits missing 2020-original works and the names of their artists from Acknowledgments sections, copyright pages, or by contacting authors and/or artists, go ahead and add them in comments, and I will get them included in the spreadsheet, and if the artist is credited with at least 3 works, in this post. If you have questions or corrections, please add those also. Please note that works may or may not be added to the list at my discretion.
PLEASE DON’T ADD GUESSES.
Artists, Authors, Editors and Publishers are welcome to post in comments here, or to send their lists to jjfile770 [at] gmail [dot] com.
(warning: this post is heavily image-intensive, and will probably not work well on mobile devices: flee now, or prepare to meet your doom extremely slow page download)
By JJ: To assist Hugo nominators, listed below are the editors of more than 1,000 short form works published for the first time in 2020.
Note that all of the works labeled “novella”, “novelette”, and “short story” are eligible in the corresponding Hugo fiction categories. If a work is not labeled, or it is labeled “short fiction”, its length has yet to be determined. Collections and Anthologies are not eligible for nomination as whole works, but the original pieces of fiction they contain are each eligible in the appropriate length category. Poetry and nonfiction are not eligible.
Note that the Short Form Editors listed below may, or may not, be eligible — that is, have the equivalent of at least 4 anthologies and/or magazine issues in their career, with at least 1 of them published in 2020. If I know for sure that an editor has the equivalent of at least 4 eligible works, they are labeled as “eligibility verified”.
These credits have been accumulated from Acknowledgments sections and copyright pages in works, eligibility posts, short fiction venue mastheads, the ISFDB, and other sources on the internet.
You can see the full combined spreadsheet of Editor and Artist credits here (I will be continuing to update this as short fiction venues post elibibility lists and I get more information).
Feel free to add missing 2020-original works and the name of their editors in the comments, and I will get them included in the main post. Self-published works may or may not be added to the list at my discretion.
PLEASE DON’T ADD GUESSES.
If you are able to confirm credits from Acknowledgments sections, copyright pages, or by contacting authors and/or editors, then go ahead and add them in comments. If you have questions or corrections, please add those also.
Authors, Editors, and Publishers are welcome to post in comments here, or to send their eligibility lists to jjfile770 [at] gmail [dot] com.
Some of the magazines listed below are Prozines and are not eligible in the Hugo Semiprozine category. For a list of Semiprozines vs. Prozines, see Semiprozine.org.
Short Form Editors
3.3.10: Best Editor Short Form. The editor of at least four (4) anthologies, collections or magazine issues (or their equivalent in other media) primarily devoted to science fiction and / or fantasy, at least one of which was published in the previous calendar year.