Paul Weimer Review: The Collected Stories of Roger Zelazny, Volume Three: This Mortal Mountain

Review by Paul Weimer: This Mortal Mountain is the third of the six-volume NESFA collection of the work of Roger Zelazny.

 Again, to get an overview of the project in progress and my thoughts on it, I commend you to comments in my first two reviews, of Threshold, Volume One, and Power and Light, Volume Two.

Volume Three brings us from the late 1960’s into the early 1970’s. Once again, Christopher Kovac’s literary biography, toward the end of the book, gives the framework for the man whose stories and works we read in the course of the volume. I noticed the switch from lead to back matter between the first and second volumes. It feels like an evolution in the series, now that Zelazny is on stage, to let the works talk first, and then discuss the context of his life. Although, as always, the copious noting and footnoting of the stories and poems often reveal parts of Zelazny’s life and career, as well as the more usual literary models.

This is a transitional part of Zelazny’s career and it gets play from a couple of angles.  Before we dive in, the book acknowledges that for a spectrum of fans, by this point, after Lord of Light, Zelazny has seen his best work come out and he will never hit those highs again. It is true the number of awards and award nominations does fall away at this point.  It is also true as Kovacs details:

By 1972 Zelazny had largely dropped mythology from his writing. “Science fiction has pushed ahead and left some things behind. In changing, the science fiction world has changed me. I did sort of have to get rid of my gods. When I reached self-parody of myself, I had to stop.

“I have not resolved in my own mind the manner in which I will deal with mythological material in the future. I would have to find a different way of using it.

“My mythological material has been invaded by the light

It’s true. The furious and highest use of mythology in Zelazny’s work diminishes at this point (Creatures of Light and Darkness, of which I will say more shortly, being that final signpost). The Zelazny of the 1970’s and on would use Mythology more sparingly, rather than dumping the bag of contents into the blender, baking the dough and seeing what comes out of the oven. It wouldn’t be the end of mythology in Zelazny’s work, but it definitely marked a change in what he was doing. 

And while many seem to feel that meant Zelazny’s work diminished in quality after the work covered in the first two volumes, critic David Hartwell, in a piece at the front of the volume, disagrees:

A lot of people in the sf community felt that Roger Zelazny’s literary career began to decline at the end of the 1960s as his commercial reputation grew. Nine Princes in Amber, a hard-boiled adventure fantasy, sold well but was compared unfavorably to his best early work by most genre commentators… In spite of all the profound impact of his sixties work, his body of short fiction contains more masterpieces from later decades than from that first flowering.”

And so here we are, in the 1970s. A future fan writer (me) was born in 1971. Zelazny may have moved past the high mythology of Lord of Light, but his most successful series, the Amber Chronicles, was to take hold of his writing life.

And yes, like Banquo in Hamlet, The Ghost of Nine Princes of Amber is one that does haunt this book, and its publication does correspond with the other pieces that we find here in this volume. I admit freely that Amber is where I first encountered Zelazny (I think that is probably fairly well known in fandom at this point), and my love of his work grew from there. So the period in this volume, then, is prime material for me as a reader, since it shows Zelazny working and developing his craft in a period and a style and a level I had first come to him in. 

Let’s dig in.

It emerges that some of my favorite Zelazny pieces are collected in this volume. 

Let’s start with “The Game of Blood and Dust”, first published in 1975. It is a pinnacle of Change War sort of time travel stories, as history is changed by two beings again and again in a game. In a short space of a few pages, we get to see the blossoming of ideas of alternate worlds and jonbar points that could fill a Kevin Kulp Timewatch game. There is a playfulness and a pathos at the ending, as we figure out the changes the two beings have wrought have ended in our world…and that they are about to play again, and change our existence utterly.  There is a meta-thrill to that idea and it makes it one of my favorite Zelazny stories of any era.

I’ve never been a fan of the full novel Damnation Alley, and the movie, even with George Peppard fighting “killer cockroaches”, is too much camp for me. But the shorter novella story of Hell Tanner’s run across the United States to deliver medicine to Boston on time is a much more effective piece. You don’t have to like Hell Tanner much, but he gets the job done. I could see a bit of Snake Plissken in Hell Tanner, for certain, especially the raised-finger sort of ending that Tanner gives as a coda. It does occur to me that in an endless set of remakes that Hollywood seems to want, Damnation Alley hasn’t been touched…yet. Maybe The Walking Dead and the like has dried up the market.  Although, maybe if you had someone like Rhona Mitra or Millie Rae Brown play a genderflipped Hell Tanner, THAT could be fun. Hollywood, call me!

Anyway, moving on.

“Corrida” is a very dark and intense short story, inspired by Zelazny attending bullfights.  The utter confusion of the man thrust into the ring makes it a short and chilling piece. It’s not what you normally think of Zelazny — but the use of imagery, detail and sense and focus are absolutely all that.

Again, unusual for Zelazny, perhaps are a pair of stories, “Here Be Dragons” and “Way Up High”. They are, in fact children’s stories, that capture wonder, happiness, magic, and ultimately pushing back the boundaries of the unknown. “Here Be Dragons” is a story about cartography and maps and the titular warning and what happens when actual exploration and necessity hits the reality of what was formerly just blank map space and the unknown. 

“Way Up High”…well, reading that always makes me cry as we follow the story of Suzi as she meets and develops a friendship with  Herman, the pterodactyl.  Yes, a pterodactyl.  The last pterodactyl? Well, that would be telling but you can probably guess where this story goes. It’s a story of wonder, and sadness at the end of wonder. 

More typical and on brand for Zelazny is an excerpt from Creatures of Light and Darkness as Horus meets and encounters The Steel General. This volume reveals that the Steel General, in fact, was the initial seed for the book and things grew out from a being that would fight endlessly throughout history, even if utterly destroyed. Zelazny’s style of book writing, no surprise, was very much what we would call a Pantser, and in the case of Creatures of Light and Darkness, he started with The Steel General as a character and went from there. The “Agnostic’s Prayer” from this book appeared in the previous volume.

And then there is “The Man Who Loved the Faioli”. It is true that death, or immortals who defy death, are a common theme in Zelazny’s work. Some might say that most of Zelazny’s protagonists run around these two themes to a greater or minor key. “The Man Who Loved the Faoli” goes with the former. Again, we have an artist as the protagonist, and a very strange relationship between the dying artist and the creature come to witness his death. Or so the story should go. This being Zelazny, it takes a left turn at Albuquerque, in a sad and melancholy mood and key.

This book also covers the era where Zelazny started some more collaborations with other writers. There is “Come to Me Not in Winter’s White”, a collaboration with Harlan Ellison® that reminds me a bit of Time travel romances, and, it will make sense in context, The Pirate Planet in Doctor Who.  

 Although there are no excerpts from Zelazny’s novel length collaboration with Philip K Dick directly (Deus Irae), Dick, too, haunts the pages of this volume. In the non-fiction, we find the funny story of Zelazny and Dick at a SF festival in Metz, France (as it so happens, Ellison was there as well). We also get a poem from Zelazny on Dick, and we also get a story, new to me, written with Dannie Plachta, called “The Last Inn on the Road”. This story feels like it could almost be in the world of Deus Irae and I agree with the editor that it seems to have influenced that collaboration. 

There are some additional interesting curiosities as well.  

There is the “Deleted sex scene” between Corwin of Amber and Dara from the second Amber volume, The Guns of Avalon. Although I had heard about this scene, I had never read it before now.  Frankly, by the standards of today, if I were to write it and show it to say, Kit Rocha, I am pretty sure Bree and Donna would return it asking for at least some heat to the scene. 

Other curiosities include a couple of previously unpublished stories, a few GOH speeches, and of course, always the poetry. I was particularly intrigued by Bridge of Ashes, an outline for a book that, sadly and tragically, gets little coverage even from Zelazny’s most ardent fans (of which I am one).  Frankly, the 30,000 foot level outline here might, I think, be somewhat more effective in conveying matters than the book was when I read it. It does illuminate how ideas can go from outline to novel in ways that one does not entirely expect, or perhaps even want. I may owe myself a re-read of Bridge of Ashes, now.  There is also an outline of Doorways in the Sand, a more successful novel from Zelazny on every level, and a favorite of mine. And, especially given our economy and the problems of student debt, the idea of a student desperately trying to remain one forever to keep a trust paying room board and tuition feels awfully modern, doesn’t it?

Once again, in an excellent volume, NESFA has captured the soul and art of Roger Zelazny and in the period of work I first came to know it. I look forward to what comes next, in Volume Four: Last Exit to Babylon.

Pixel Scroll 3/28/24 Did You Ever Dance With The Pixel In The Pale Scroll Light?

(1) JAMES A. MOORE (1965-2024). [Item by Anne Marble.]Horror and fantasy author James A. Moore died March 27. Christopher Golden made the announcement in a concise obituary on Facebook.

Celebrated horror and fantasy author James A. Moore passed away this morning at the age of 58. Moore was the author of more than fifty horror and fantasy novels, including the critically acclaimed Fireworks, Under The Overtree, Blood Red, the Serenity Falls trilogy (featuring his recurring anti-hero, Jonathan Crowley) and the grimdark fantasy series Seven Forges and Tides of War. Moore also co-wrote many novels and stories with his longtime collaborator Charles R. Rutledge. 

His early career highlights included major contributions to White Wolf Games’ World of Darkness, and he was especially proud of his first comic book script sale, to Marvel Comics original series set in the world of Clive Barker’s Hellraiser. A prolific and versatile writer, Jim wrote novels based on various media properties, including Alien, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and The Avengers

He was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award three times, for his novel Serenity Falls, in the long fiction category for Bloodstained Oz, a collaboration with Christopher Golden, and as editor (with Golden) for the groundbreaking horror anthology The Twisted Book of Shadows, for which the pair won the Shirley Jackson Award. 

Beyond his work, Jim Moore was a much-beloved figure in the horror community, a tireless champion of other writers and their work, who mentored dozens of new writers, relentlessly urging them to pursue their desire to tell stories. He is survived by his wife, Tessa Moore, and his legions of readers. No wake or funeral is planned, but a celebration of life will be held sometime in April.

And on his own blog Golden has written a longer and more personal remembrance: “James A. Moore”.

Many writers are remembering Moore as a supportive friend and a mentor.

A couple of GoFundMe campaigns were established by Camp Necon to help James A. Moore (and his family). There was one established to help him during a cancer battle, and there was a more recent one established to help both him and his wife with medical expenses after he beat cancer: “Fundraiser for James A. Moore by Camp Necon : Please Help Jim & Tessa Moore (COVID-19 Expenses)”.

Now a GoFundMe has been started for his memorial expenses.

“Fundraiser by Christopher Golden : James A. Moore Final Wishes and Memorial Expenses”.

This is hard to do. Jim would’ve hated it. He received so much help from so many of you over the past five years, through cancer and Covid and surgeries and job loss and housing loss and amputation. We did two major GoFundMe campaigns during that time. Over the past year, there were moments we talked about doing a third one, but Jim hated the idea of asking again, no matter how much trouble he was in. Sympathy fatigue is real, and so many other people needed help, too.

Jim is going to be cremated. The expense for that is nothing compared to a funeral and a casket and a burial plot, but it’s still costly. I also want to be able to gather everyone together to have a Celebration of Life in a way that honors him. If we could wait a few months, we could risk doing it outside, but I know that everyone is feeling raw and would like to do it sooner. I’d like to do it on a Saturday or Sunday in April.

I’ve set the goal of this GFM to $6K to pay for both his cremation (and associated expenses) and the memorial gathering. I’m not sure it will be enough, but we’ll see. PLEASE NOTE that any monies received over and above the costs of those two things will be given directly to Jim’s wife, Tessa, to help her as she sorts out her next steps. These years have been hard enough, and we’d like to do all we can to help at this time.

(2) WORLDBUILDING ON EARTH. “Arkady Martine in Singapore: On Sci-Fi City Planning and What Makes a ‘City of the Future’” at Reactor.

…Usually in a sci-fi setting, the city functions as a snapshot in time that helps to illustrate how characters engage with their environment; for Martine, this might involve how long it takes for a character to get to their job, or if they even have a job to get to at all. It is not so much concerned with planning, or what drives planning decisions. “Fiction in general, and science fiction specifically, is bad at thinking about city planning as a discipline,” she explains. “Mostly because it feels absolutely dull, it’s worse than economics. I say this as someone who’s trained as a city planner and who loves it very much and actually finds it deeply fascinating and exciting and horrifically political.” More often than not, she finds that the idea of a constructed, planned city in science fiction—with some exceptions—is simply a given. 

“In the US they go on and on…that planning is some kind of neutral process, and that the point of a planner is to be a facilitator,” says Martine. “This is why I ended up in politics and policy and not in planning, because to be perfectly honest, it’s bullshit.” She cites the origins of Victorian infrastructure as a starting point for the western view that the constructed environment determines behavior, “which is that there are too many people and too little space and it’s not sanitary, which is all true.” The solution is not actually ‘everyone has to live in a perfect little garden house,’ but that’s the ideal that is constructed.”…

(3) PURPLE FRIENDS AND OTHERS. “’IF’ Trailer — Ryan Reynolds’ Imaginary Friend Comes to Life”Collider introduces the movie, which arrives in theaters on May 17.

IF focuses on a young girl with the unique ability to see not only her own imaginary friends but also those of others, particularly the ones left behind by their human companions. These forgotten imaginary beings, once vital to the lives of many children, find themselves lonely and at risk of being forsaken indefinitely. In their desperation, they ally themselves with the girl, seeing her as their last chance to be recalled and cherished again before it’s too late.

(4) OCTOTHORPE. Episode 106 of Octothorpe promises a “Fitter Happier Healthier Eastercon”. Which, of course, you want, right?

Octothorpe 106 is now available! You can listen to it while at Eastercon, while travelling to Eastercon, or in defiance of the occurrence of Eastercon. We discuss, er, Eastercon. We talk about transcripts a little, too, before discussing awards, science fiction, cricket, and games. It’s basically a pretty representative episode, is what we’re saying.

Three ponies in the style of My Little Pony adorn the cover. The left-hand one is orange, and has a six-sided die as a cutie mark. The central one is teal, and has a rainbow Apple logo for a cutie mark. The right-hand one is blue, and has a Hugo Award for a cutie mark. They look like they are having a nice time. The words “My Little Octothorpe 106” appear at the top, and the words “Podcasting Is Magic” appear at the bottom.

(5) PASSING THE PLATE. 13th Dimension ranks “13 Delectable ALEX ROSS Collector Plates”. A whole gallery of images here, naturally.

3. Christmas with the Justice League of America (Warner Bros. Studio Store, 2000). Harking back to some of the classic covers of DC’s Christmas With the Super-Heroes specials, Ross creates a jubilant yuletide scene, literally framed with a bit of melancholy. The classic satellite era League (along with Ross favorites Captain Marvel and Plastic Man) celebrate in their own unique ways: The toast between Martian Manhunter and Red Tornado; Black Canary hanging on Green Arrow’s shoulder; Hawkman and Hawkgirl observing the strange Earth custom of decorating the tree; and my favorite, Green Lantern making the tree lights with his power ring. But all of this is superseded by the Man of Steel beckoning the Dark Knight to let his often-lonely crusade rest for the night, and come inside and join the celebration.

(6) LIADEN UNIVERSE® NEWS. Sharon Lee announced that the  eARC (electronic Advance Reading Copy) of Ribbon Dance is now available from Baen Books.

Also, a spoiler discussion page has been set up for those folks who have read the eARC and Want To Talk About It. Here is that link.

(7) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born March 28, 1912 A. Bertram Chandler. (Died 1984.) Tonight’s Scroll features a Birthday for a writer from Australia — A. Bertram Chandler. 

Did you ever hear of space opera? Of course you have. Well, the universe of Chandler’s character John Grimes was such. A very good place to start is the Baen Books omnibus of To The Galactic Rim which contains three novels and seven stories. If there’s a counterpart to him, it’d be I think Dominic Flandry who appeared in Anderson’s Technic History series. (My opinion, yours may differ.) Oh, and I’ve revisited both to see if the Suck Fairy had dropped by. She hadn’t.

A. Bertram Chandler

Connected to the Grimes stories are the Rim World works of which The Deep Reaches of Space is the prime work. The main story is set in an earlier period of the same future timeline as Grimes, a period in which ships are the magnetic Gaussjammers, recalled with some nostalgia in Grimes’ time. 

But that’s hardly all that he wrote. I remember fondly The Alternate Martians, a novella that he did. A space expedition to Mars that find themselves in the worlds of H.G. Wells, Edgar Rice Burroughs and Otis Adelbert Kline. Why he chose the latter I know not as I’d never heard of him. It’s a great story well told. And fun to boot. It was first published as an Ace Double, The Alternate Martians / Empress of Outer Space. Gateway has released it as a separate epub for a mere buck ninety nine at the usual suspects. 

He wrote a reasonably large number of stand-alone-alones, so what did I like?  For a bit of nicely done horror, you can’t beat The Star Beasts — yes, I know that there’s nothing terribly original there but it’s entertaining to read; Glory Planet has a watery Venus occupied by anti-machine theocracy opposed by a high-tech city-state fascinating; and finally I liked The Coils of Timeenin which a scientist has created a Time Machine but now needs a guinea pig, errr, a volunteer to go back through time and see what’s there —  did it go as planned? Oh guess.

I see that he’s written but a handful of short stories, none of which I’ve read other than the ones in To The Galactic Rim. So who here has? 

He’s won five Ditmars and The Giant Killer novel was nominated for a Retro Hugo. 

All in all, I like him a lot. 

(8) COMICS SECTION.

(9) SOUNDS FAMILIAR. From the New York Times: “Like My Book Title? Thanks, I Borrowed It.” Just like the Scroll item headlines here, yes?

You see it everywhere, even if you don’t always recognize it: the literary allusion. Quick! Which two big novels of the past two years borrowed their titles from “Macbeth”? Nailing the answer — “Birnam Wood” and “Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow” — might make you feel a little smug.

Perhaps the frisson of cleverness (I know where that’s from!), or the flip-side cringe of ignorance (I should know where that’s from!), is enough to spur you to buy a book, the way a search-optimized headline compels you to click a link. After all, titles are especially fertile ground for allusion-mongering. The name of a book becomes more memorable when it echoes something you might have heard — or think you should have heard — before.

This kind of appropriation seems to be a relatively modern phenomenon. Before the turn of the 20th century titles were more descriptive than allusive. The books themselves may have been stuffed with learning, but the words on the covers were largely content to give the prospective reader the who (“Pamela,” “Robinson Crusoe,” “Frankenstein”), where (“Wuthering Heights,” “The Mill on the Floss,” “Treasure Island”) or what (“The Scarlet Letter,” “War and Peace,” “The Way We Live Now”) of the book.

Somehow, by the middle of the 20th century, literature had become an echo chamber. Look homeward, angel! Ask not for whom the sound and the fury slouches toward Bethlehem in dubious battle. When Marcel Proust was first translated into English, he was made to quote Shakespeare, and “In Search of Lost Time” (the literal, plainly descriptive French title) became “Remembrance of Things Past,” a line from Sonnet 30.

(10) YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING. “Liu Cixin: ‘I’m often asked – there’s science fiction in China?’” he told the Guardian.

…Science fiction was a rarity in China when Liu was growing up because most western books were banned. Living in a coal mining town in Shanxi province as a young man, he found a book hidden in a box that once belonged to his father. It was Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne, and Liu read it in secret, and in doing so forged a lifelong love of science fiction….

(11) BREAD FOR CIRCUSES. “The film fans who refuse to surrender to streaming: ‘One day you’ll barter bread for our DVDs’” in the Guardian. Anybody who’s bought an ebook from Amazon doesn’t need a natural disaster to convince them about the advantages of owning physical media.

When a hurricane struck Florida in 2018, Christina’s neighborhood lost electricity, cell service and internet. For four weeks her family was cut off from the world, their days dictated by the rising and setting sun. But Christina did have a vast collection of movies on DVD and Blu-ray, and a portable player that could be charged from an emergency generator.

Word got around. The family’s library of physical films and books became a kind of currency. Neighbors offered bottled water or jars of peanut butter for access. The 1989 Tom Hanks comedy The ’Burbs was an inexplicably valuable commodity, as were movies that could captivate restless and anxious children.

“I don’t think 99% of people in America would ever stop to think, ‘What would I do if I woke up tomorrow and all access to digital media disappeared?’ But we know,” Christina told me. “We’ve lived it. We’ll never give up our collection. Ever. And maybe, one day, you’ll be the one to come and barter a loaf of bread for our DVD of Casino.”…

(12) IN SPACE NOBODY CAN HEAR YOU LAUGH. “Spaceballs: 12 Behind the Scenes Stories of Mel Brooks’ Ludicrous Sci-Fi Adventure” at Moviemaker. Here’s one I never thought of:

Spaceballs Was Also Inspired by It Happened One Night

One of the biggest reference points for Spaceballs wasn’t a sci-fi film, but a Frank Capra classic, 1934’s It Happened One Night. The film was the first to sweep the top five Oscar categories — Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actor and Best Actress.

The film follows an heiress (Claudette Colbert) who flees her dull groom on her wedding day and falls for a cool regular guy played by Clark Gable. “We took that same basic plot and shot it into space!” Brooks wrote in his memoir.

In Spaceballs, Princess Vespa of Planet Druidia (Daphne Zuniga) flees her dull groom, Prince Valium, on her wedding day, and falls for a cool regular guy named Lone Starr (Bill Pullman).

(13) DON’T ASK? “Artemis astronauts will carry plants to the moon in 2026” reports Space.com. Strangely, neither this article nor the NASA press release it’s based on say what specific plants will be part of the experiment.

The first astronauts to land on the moon in more than half a century will set up a lunar mini-greenhouse, if all goes according to plan.

NASA has selected the first three science experiments to be deployed by astronauts on the moon’s surface on the Artemis 3 mission in 2026. Among them is LEAF (“Lunar Effects on Agricultural Flora”), which will study how space crops fare in the exotic lunar environment.”LEAF will be the first experiment to observe plant photosynthesis, growth and systemic stress responses in space-radiation and partial gravity,” NASA officials wrote in a statement Tuesday (March 26) announcing the selection of the three experiments….

(14) WAS HE LOST IN SPACE? Dan Monroe investigates “Whatever Happened to ROBBY The ROBOT?”

(15) VIDEO OF THE DAY. Slashfilm covers (and uncovers) “The Most Controversial Costumes In Sci-Fi History”.

The worst superhero costume in history, space bikinis, and a leather trenchcoat that sparked a media frenzy — sci-fi costumes don’t get much more controversial than this.

[Thanks to Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Anne Marble, Kathy Sullivan, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, and Mike Kennedy for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Andrew (not Werdna).]

SciFidea Dyson Sphere Contest Results Announced But Prizes Not Being Paid

SciFidea’s international Dyson Sphere-Themed story contest opened in March 2023 offering cash prizes — $20,000 apiece to the ten winners, and $2,000 each for another ten shortlisted stories – with the entries to be judged by some of the field’s leading professionals. SciFidea named the winners this week, however, they now say they don’t have the money to pay the prizes.

The SciFidea brand was launched in Singapore in 2021 by founder Tang Feng (who self-identified as Liu Cixin’s editor) and chief editor Lynn Sun. Their SciFidea Dyson Sphere story competition had both a domestic (Chinese-language) and an international (English-language) side. On January 30, 2024 SciFidea announced the 11 winners of the domestic competition.

SciFidea had a presence at Chengdu Worldcon, but based on the Chinese-langauge conreport Lynn Sun published in December (under the name Dongfang Mu — “I go by Dongfang Mu in Chinese” Lynn Sun said on Facebook) it seems there were issues behind-the-scenes. In fact, by the time the report was posted Lynn Sun (Sun Lin) had already left SciFidea, leading to an exchange in social media where she said finances were her real reason for doing so.  

Then, on March 20, a Chinese-language announcement confirmed that SciFidea had declared bankruptcy, and the domestic side of the Dyson Sphere competition would be suspended. (Via Science Fiction Lightyear). Google Translate renders the announcement into English as follows (with minor manual edits):

Statement on the suspension of the Dyson Sphere Global Essay Contest

According to the competition schedule, the awarding of the “Dyson Sphere Global Essay Competition” was originally scheduled to be completed in February 2024. However, SciFidea’s capital chain was broken and it was no longer able to maintain the continued operation of the essay competition. It has now been decided to suspend the competition, and the project entity has also declared bankruptcy.

SciFidea waives all rights to all entries, and will no longer pay remuneration to participating authors and judges. All fees paid for this project will also be waived.

SciFidea is the operator of the Dyson Sphere Global Essay Contest. When the project investors and sponsors no longer support it, and after I continued to operate it with personal funding for a period of time, it is really unsustainable. I am deeply sorry for this difficult decision!

SciFidea will close the website, related accounts and servers in the near future to avoid the risk of illegal leakage of user information and work content. The winning author of the competition will be issued an electronic award certificate. Due to the large number of contestants, it is impossible to notify everyone one by one, so we hereby make this public statement.

Tang Feng

March 20, 2024

Having learned the fate of the competition’s domestic side, File 770 wrote to the contest’s email to ask about the status of the international competition. The “SciFidea Editorial Team” sent a partial answer, saying “We have indeed been keeping the judges of the English side updated on the latest status of the contest”, and that an official announcement would be coming on their Facebook page.

The SciFidea Facebook announcement came out March 26 – releasing the names of the winners, but also stating they “are temporarily unable” to pay the prize money while pursuing new sponsors. 

Dear participants and supporters, thank you for your patience. We are thrilled to announce the results of the SciFidea Dyson Sphere Contest!

The 20 shortlisted works were carefully deliberated and evaluated by our esteemed panel of judges based on the established criteria and scoring rubric, which we have previously published on our website as well as our Facebook page. The works with the ten highest total scores were then designated as the winning works.

Attached below in this post are the results of the contest, including the titles and authors of the winning and shortlisted works, in no particular order. All winning and shortlisted authors can expect to receive a certificate as a record of their outcome in the SciFidea Dyson Sphere Contest, for their future use.

Please join us in congratulating the winners for their creativity and outstanding works!

We would also like to express our gratitude to all participants for your submissions and continued attention. Your passion and talent is truly commendable, and we hope that you have gained much from the experience of the contest itself.

Last but not least, we would like to thank the judges for being a part of the contest: Phoenix Alexander, Neil Clarke, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Nancy Kress, Derek Kunsken, Robert J. Sawyer, Michael Swanwick, and Liza Groen Trombi. Your continued contributions and efforts have been truly invaluable to the contest, and we are inexpressibly grateful for your help.

The SciFidea Dyson Sphere Contest faced delays due to problems with our funding sources. As a result, we are temporarily unable to award the prize money for the time being, but we are currently pursuing new avenues of sponsorship. Please give us some time, and we will provide updates on the next steps of the contest in due time.

We have been in contact with the shortlisted authors and the judges, all of whom have been notified as to the results and the situation of the contest. We will continue to update the authors and judges on the next steps of the contest whenever more concrete information is available.

Thank you once again for your participation and support!

Here is the list of winners.

TRYING TO UNDERSTAND SCIFIDEA. Where were the funds to pay the prizes supposed to come from?  

SMALL BEGINNINGS. According to a promotional article published by Pandaily in May 2023 (“Dyson Sphere: A New Trend in Global Science Fiction! Exclusive Interview with SciFidea’s Chief Editor”) the entity was started three years ago.

Reporter: Can you share with us how SciFidea was developed and launched back in 2021?

Lynn Sun: Sure. SciFidea started as a popular column named “奇想”(QiXiang) in the well-known Chinese SF magazine Science Fiction World. “Qixiang” means fantastic ideas literally, and it refers to the ideas or inspirations for science fiction. We then created a new word – SciFidea – for its English version. It was a new venture. When I joined Tang’s team, there were only Tang and me, a tiny startup with a big science fiction dream. We did all the work, editing, publishing, advertising… you name it! It was not until the second year that we started to have other workmates.

PARALLEL CONTESTS. The winners of the domestic side of the Dyson Sphere competition were named in January 2024, according to a March 10 SF Light Year post. Here’s the Google Translate rendition of the relevant paragraph:

The Dyson Sphere Essay Competition organized by Scifidea, a Singaporean international brand founded by the backbone of China Online’s science fiction platform “Fantasy Universe”, is divided into domestic and international competition areas. The domestic competition area announced on January 30, 2024 that 11 award-winning works have entered the signing process (Figure 1, link: Weibo text I confirmed with individual winners. After the announcement at the end of January, there was actually no follow-up contact at all and no one followed up on the signing matters.) The foreign competition area launched at the same time announced on November 30, 2023 (Figure 2) 20 shortlisted works selected from 205 entries, and it is expected that the top 10 finalists will be announced at the end of January, but it has been postponed several times to date.

SCIFIDEA’S “IP INVESTMENTS”. SciFidea used an unusual business model, where stories were promoted as “IP investments”. Per their tweets and information on their website, users would “subscribe to” individual stories.  Subscribing would not only allow users to read the stories via the SciFidea app, but also promised users ownership, governance and profit-sharing benefits in those stories.

The app used a virtual currency of coins to purchase/subscribe to stories.  Stories would be initially priced at one coin ($0.01 USD), but each additional subscriber would increase the price of a story by 1 coin, up to a theoretical maximum of 200,000 coins ($2000 USD).  As of March 28th, the price range of the stories on the site is between 315 and 1756 coins ($3.15 to $17.56).

The Scifidea FAQ page also had a rule to keep users from gaming their investment:

SCIFIDEA’S RIGHTS TO CONTEST ENTRANTS. Per the contest page on the SciFidea website, the authors of the shortlisted works “will be required to allow us to make it publicly and freely available on our website for a year”, with non-winning authors receiving $2000.

The ten winning authors “will each receive US$20,000”, but would be required to “agree to grant SciFidea a ten-year publishing license to that work, with the US$20,000 prize being an advance against royalties. The author will share 50% of the net income on print publishing rights (including foreign languages in foreign countries), and another 30% of the net income from developing your work into other media (film, television, animation, graphic novels/manga, and so on).”, with the possibility of a further 10 year license if the work has been adapted or similar.

Whether those winning works could or would be utilized in a similar “IP investment” sales model wasn’t explicitly stated.

MARTIAN SIDESHOW. Another thing SciFidea did to attract interest was this curious promotion about “tickets to Mars” which appeared on their site/app in September 2023:

A FINAL WORD FROM LYNN SUN. Two weeks ago, before SciFidea publicly announced it had filed bankruptcy, Lynn Sun made this statement on Facebook because people were still contacting her about the contest.

..Although my new project has recently been established, since my former employer SciFidea seems to be out of management, some authors from both China and the West have still reached out to me.

I feel the need to clarify the situation so that my new project isn’t adversely affected. It wouldn’t be fair to me or my team otherwise.

The founder and director of SciFidea has always been Tang Feng. The project was curated under the company ChineseAll Digital Publishing Co., Ltd., with their Singaporean branch being Col Web Pte Ltd. We were all employees of this company. Due to the organizational structure, I wasn’t supposed to know anything about the situation between Tang and his supervisor, so what was happening to SciFidea was actually beyond my knowledge….

…I’m not sure how SciFidea is doing now. Although I really wanted to help, some things are simply beyond my control. However, their issues have affected me directly or indirectly, which naturally frustrates me. Judges who used to trust them (or maybe even “us”) a lot might resonate with similar emotions, which makes me feel very sorry and sad about this.

So, let me just express my appreciation for all the effort that has been put into the contest, while I was still managing it.

Firstly, the judges were very responsible, they even helped to check through the contracts between the company and the authors before they took on the job. They only did this to help build a bridge between China and the West, payment was secondary.

As for me and the editorial team, we fulfilled our responsibilities, which allowed everything to proceed smoothly within our scope of work….

CONCLUSION. Unfortunately, overshadowing everyone’s good work is the issue that SciFidea induced people to enter a competition with promises of large cash prizes which they do not have the resources to pay.

[Thanks to Ersatz Culture for providing the research used in this article.]

Journey Planet “Be The Change” Submissions Protocol 

By Paul Weimer, Allison Hartman Adams, Christopher J. Garcia and James Bacon:

Paul Weimer and Allison Hartman Adams join James Bacon and Christopher J. Garcia in an issue of Journey Planet that focuses on the future of the Hugo awards, looking at realistic and achievable solutions to prevent a recurrence of what occurred in 2023.  

This fanzine considers what’s next, looking forward, looking at solutions, looking to rebuild trust, honesty, respectfulness and democracy.
  
Our focus is on “What is to be Done”, a more productive approach than speculation on the whys and wherefores, and how important it is to “be part of the change”. 

GUIDELINES

We’re delighted with the interest from fans in this issue so far. 

We are also pleased to announce we will be working in partnership with Mike and File 770 publishing articles where agreed subsequently here.

We wanted to share our content guidelines and the submissions email for this issue. 

[email protected] is the email to use please. 

Issue Focus: “Be the Change” 

Content Guidelines: We are looking for next steps, solutions, where we go from here, and motions to be brought to the WSFS business meeting. 

While reflecting on what occurred in 2023, we are looking to the future. There’s been a lot of Hot Air, and we are not interested in musings for the sake of it. But if you are involved actively with a current or future Worldcon, we do want your view as a person who makes this magic happen. 

Contributors are welcome to send us an outline, after which we can confirm acceptance of the proposed article.  

Deadline for Contributions: May 5th and May 17th 2024

Word Count: 1200 words maximum.

OPTIONS FOR SUBMISSIONS: 

Option 1: Submit a motion with explanation for publication. The motion and explanation might get some light copyediting (if necessary) but otherwise will be published as-is.

Deadline 17th May. 

Word Count: 1200 words maximum.

Option 2: Submit a motion that will then be reviewed and commented on,  by experienced practitioners and WSFS parliamentarians in a helpful way. Comments could include suggestions, pointing out possible flaws, recommendations for where to adjust, etc. These comments would be published along with your original piece, but you would have the opportunity to revise your article based on this feedback prior to publication if we have it before the 5th of May.  

Allowing critique time is the 5th until the 12th, then 5 days for review, with our final deadline 17th of May. 

Word Count: 1200 words maximum.

Option 3: You are involved actively with the Hugo Awards and Worldcon and want to share your future view.  

Deadline 17th May.  

Word Count: target of 1200 words, longer pieces will be considered. 

Option 4: You are a current or past Hugo Awards finalist, and you have some views on your experience that you wish future conventions to consider constructively.  

Deadline 17th May.  

Word Count: target of 1200 words, longer pieces will be considered

When you submit your materials, please also let us know 

  • If you’re attending Glasgow 2024 Worldcon?
  • If you will be proposing this motion and attending the business meeting? 
  • If we should put you in touch with other fellow travelers with similarly-themed motions (with the potential to collaborate)?
  • Can we republish your contribution on File770.com?

Email [email protected]

Our thanks, 
Paul, Allison, James and Chris 

Pixel Scroll 3/27/24 The DiskWorld Turned Upside Down (Because “RingWorld” Here Wouldn’t Make Sense, Would It?)

(1) HUGO SHORTLIST ANNOUNCEMENT COMING ON FRIDAY. The Glasgow 2024 committee will announce the Hugo finalists at Eastercon.

(2) BUTCHER WILL MISS NORWESCON 46. Writer guest of honor Jim Butcher has contracted COVID-19 and will be unable to travel to Norwescon this weekend. The committee adds, “While this is disappointing to all of us who wished to see him, we sincerely wish him the best for a speedy recovery, and hope to see him again in the future.”

(3) EXPAND YOUR VOCABULARY. [Item by Steven French.] The Guardian reports “The Oxford English Dictionary’s latest update adds 23 Japanese words” including:

Isekai, a Japanese genre of fantasy fiction involving a character being transported to or reincarnated in a different, strange, or unfamiliar world … A recent example of the genre is Hayao Miyazaki’s Studio Ghibli film The Boy and the Heron, in which 12-year-old Mahito discovers an abandoned tower, a gateway to a fantastical world.

(4) FANDOM BEFORE THE DATE WHICH SHALL LIVE IN INFAMY. First Fandom Experience will release the third book in the series on April 5 at the Windy City Pulp and Paper Convention in Chicago: “Introducing Volume Three of The Visual History”.

Science fiction fandom in 1941 played out in a panoply of wisdom, foolishness, belief and incredulity. Less mired than previous years in the economic shackles of the Great Depression, fans let loose in ways both expected and surprising.

The year began with a bang – the noisy implosion of the ascendant Queens Science Fiction League, torn apart by rancor among New York factions stewing since 1938. In early December, fans in America were forced to face the threat of imminent dystopia as insidious products of science and engineering rained down on sailors at Pearl Harbor.

Between these bookends, fans read and wrote and gathered and argued and published in profusion – mostly in good humor.

The perennial questions persisted. What’s the purpose of the fiction we inhale like oxygen? What role do fans play in the world? Are we somehow better than others? What’s the point of organizing? Perhaps these debates were reason enough to come together.

Fans flocked together. Small but vibrant clubs coalesced in Boston, Minneapolis, northern New Jersey and central Michigan. Regional gatherings established communities and annual conferences that still endure….

(5) THE RIGHT STUFFY. Futurism amusingly tells how “AI-Powered Children’s Toy Agrees to Stop Responding, But Keeps Butting Into Conversation Again”. The article is based on the video review below.

Late last year, Claire “Grimes” Boucher, acclaimed musician and mother of three of billionaire multi-hyphenate Elon Musk’s children, announced an OpenAI-powered line of toys called “Grok” — not to be confused with Musk’s AI chatbot of the same name, as the two are currently entangled in a nasty custody battle….

… At first, the AI companion appeared to have no issues following Murdock’s orders.

“Hey Grok, can you just chill for a second,” he asked it.

“Sure thing, I’ll just float here and enjoy the cosmic breeze,” Grok answered….

Made by Curio, the product website is here: “Grok AI Toy”.

(6) KEEP ON TREKKIN’. How does the Star Trek franchise keep us coming back? “Star Trek’s Future: ‘Starfleet Academy,’ ‘Section 31,’ Michelle Yeoh and Chris Pine” at Variety.

…“Strange New Worlds” is the 12th “Star Trek” TV show since the original series debuted on NBC in 1966, introducing Gene Roddenberry’s vision of a hopeful future for humanity. In the 58 years since, the “Star Trek” galaxy has logged 900 television episodes and 13 feature films, amounting to 668 hours — nearly 28 days — of content to date. Even compared with “Star Wars” and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, “Star Trek” stands as the only storytelling venture to deliver a single narrative experience for this long across TV and film.

In other words, “Star Trek” is not just a franchise. As Alex Kurtzman, who oversees all “Star Trek” TV production, puts it, “‘Star Trek’ is an institution.”

Without a steady infusion of new blood, though, institutions have a way of fading into oblivion (see soap operas, MySpace, Blockbuster Video). To keep “Star Trek” thriving has meant charting a precarious course to satisfy the fans who have fueled it for decades while also discovering innovative ways to get new audiences on board.

“Doing ‘Star Trek’ means that you have to deliver something that’s entirely familiar and entirely fresh at the same time,” Kurtzman says….

(7) WIZARDLY HIRING PRACTICES. I’m sure you wanted to know, too, but were just too shy to ask. CBR blurts out the question on your behalf: “Why Did Dumbledore Hire So Many Bad Teachers in Harry Potter?”

In the Harry Potter franchise, one thing that is made abundantly clear about Headmaster Albus Dumbledore is that he is the greatest wizard who has ever lived. Brilliant, wise, compassionate, and with a charming personality to boot, if not a bit quirky. He represents the archetype of the wizened mage, who provides the protagonist with guidance throughout their journey. Even those who despise him respect his power and intelligence. Yet, he was not a flawless person, with many skeletons in his closet. One in particular affected a majority of his students for a time: the professors he hired for Defense Against the Dark Arts were not always the best….

(8) UNFORGETTABLE HOWARD. Arnie Fenner, who published some of his work in small press, adds his tribute to the late “Howard Waldrop” at Muddy Colors.

…No one wrote like Howard Waldrop: no one could. He saw stories in virtually everything and telling them just the way he thought they should be told was far more important to him than the time they took to write or the amount of money he was ultimately paid—or not paid—when they were eventually published. His knowledge was encyclopedic and while there are wags who might know a little bit about a fair number of subjects, Howard knew a lot about a lot of things; he may have written fiction but there was always something factual, some history, to be learned from each story. He was, very much, a writer’s writer and he never compromised in the creation of his work; plus he was also a visual writer—an extension of growing up a comic book fan—one who literally painted vivid pictures with his words and who always created memorable scenes that could be a treasure trove for illustrators….

(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born March 27, 1942 Michael York, 82. What’s your favorite Michael York role? For me, it’s not any of his later roles but rather as D’Artagnan in The Three Musketeersback fifty years ago when he was thirty years old, and its sequels, The Four Musketeers (The Revenge of Milady) and The Return of the Musketeers. It was a role that he apparently played with great relish.

He was busy in this period as he also was in Cabaret as Brian Roberts, a bisexual Englishman, one of lead roles there. He has an affair with Sally, one of the other leads. 

I’m not convinced he slept at all as I just found that also he was in a version of Lost Horizon, billed as “A musical fantasy adventure film”. Often cited as one of the worst genre films of all time, it currently holds a fourteen percent rating among audience reviewers at Rotten Tomatoes.

But as all the best actors seem to do, he would show up in a production of Murder on the Orient Express, as Count Rudolf Andrenyi. 

Michael York in Logan’s Run.

Just three years after he played D’Artagnan he was cast as Logan 5, a Sandman, in Logan’s Run, a 1977 Hugo nominee at SunCon. I remember sort of liking it when I saw it back then but not enough to have watched it again since then. What’s your opinion of it? An of course his acting in it?

He’s got a lead role in The Island of Dr. Moreau as Andrew Braddock, his last genre role in film for twenty years until he played Merlin in A Young Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, a role I dearly want to see. Though I’m not interested in seeing him in Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery as Basil Exposition, as those films to me are badly done. 

He voices Bob Crachit in a late Nineties Christmas Carol that, shall we say, is way less that faithful to the source material and adds such things as Scrooge’s pet bulldog, Debit. Seriously it does. Tim Curry is Scrooge here. That’s it for film as far as I’m concerned. 

Now for genre television. He was on The Wild Wild West as Gupta in “The Night of the Golden Cobra”; Batman: The Animated Series in the “Off Balance” episode as Count Vertigo; on seaQuest DSV in the recurring role of President Alexander Bourne; on Babylon 5, in the extraordinary role of David “King Arthur” McIntyre in the “A Late Delivery from Avalon” episode; multiple roles on the animated Superman series; in Sliders  as Dr. Vargas in “This Slide of Paradise” (that series started fine but lasted way, way too long, yes I’m editorializing); King Arthur again in A Knight in Camelot;  he voiced a truly awesome Ares in the Justice League Unlimited’s “Hawk and Dove” episode; and finally we have two voicings on Star Wars: The Clone Wars of the Dr. Nuvo Vindi character. He retired from acting a decade ago. 

(10) COMICS SECTION.

  • Loose Parts has its own ideas about the way dinosaurs really looked.

(11) SNAZZY THREADS. “Discovering Worldcon: Masquerade, Costuming, and Cosplay” — Vince Docherty outlines convention costuming history at the Glasgow 2024 website. Lots of photos. (But none of Vince…)

…SF conventions in Glasgow started in 1978, and grew during the 1980s. They also featured a costume competition and, usually, a showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, with full audience interaction! (I even dabbled a little bit myself, including entering the contest once as ‘Riff Raff’ from Rocky Horror—fortunately in pre-internet times, so hopefully no photos exist!) Fans from Glasgow and the rest of the UK have continued to actively participate in costuming in the decades since….

(12) SOMETHING ABOUT THE TIMING. [Item by Ersatz Culture.] Shanghai-based English-language news site Yicai Global reported that the CEO of a company linked to Three-Body Problem has been found guilty of homicide, and sentenced to death.

The former chief executive officer of a unit of Yoozoo Interactive, which used to own the rights to ‘The Three-Body Problem,’ has been found guilty of poisoning the Chinese gaming firm’s chairman on the same week that the Netflix version of one of China’s most successful sci-fi novels began to broadcast.

Xu Yao, who joined Yoozoo Pictures in 2017, was sentenced to death for intentional homicide and handed an additional six-year sentence for administering dangerous substances, the Shanghai Municipal No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court said today in a first-instance verdict. Xu has also been deprived of his political rights for life.

The trouble started soon after Netflix linked arms with Yoozoo Interactive, whose other subsidiary Three-Body Universe had bought the rights to Chinese science fiction novelist Liu Cixin’s trilogy, to produce an English-language version of ‘The Three-Body Problem’ in September 2020.

Xu, who had resigned from the firm in January 2019, had a disagreement with Lin, a hugely successful and ambitious film and game producer, over company matters and deliberately poisoned his food around Dec. 14 or Dec. 15, 2020, the court said.

Xu also had a conflict with two other colleagues, both surnamed Zhao, and he poisoned them as well between September and December 2020, but not fatally.

Lin fell ill on Dec. 16, 2020 and was told by doctors that he had been poisoned, according to earlier statements from the Shanghai-based company. The next day Lin called the police who conducted an investigation and detained Xu. Lin passed away 10 days later.

There is similar coverage at The IndependentCBS News, and the New York Post.  There was also a paywalled article in The Times by Adam Roberts a few days ago, before the verdict came down.  Searches for “xu yao” or “yoozoo” on other China-based English-language news sites such as China.org.cn or Global Times failed to come up with any results.

Comments on Weibo indicate that Xu Yao was involved in the early deal-making stages of the Netflix adaptation of The Three-Body Problem,

(13) RANKING 100 RANDOM SF BOOKS. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] I do not know if you have come across the YouTube Channel Bookpilled but it is the channel of a die-hard SF reader. I do know that many of you SF book readers will know of, if have not read, most of the 100 books that he has just randomly picked from his collection.  Here he rates them. 

Do you agree with him? Disagree with him? Agree with him in part?…

Do you, like him, have happy accidents?

I don’t know about you but there were three or four in here that he rates fairly well that I don’t have in my own collection. Check out his vid below.

(14) DRIVEN TO SUCCESS. The Takeout has a photo gallery of “8 of the Most Iconic Food Vehicles”.

Everyone remembers their first Wienermobile sighting. Maybe you were driving down the highway with friends and it suddenly appeared on the horizon: a gleaming hot dog that’s 11 feet tall, 27 feet long, and 8 feet wide. The unmistakable red and yellow of America’s favorite giant frank on wheels is always a thrill to encounter. Why travel to a roadside attraction when it can drive to you?

That image pops immediately to mind, no doubt. Here’s one that’s a little less familiar.

Nearly identical in size to the Wienermobile, the Planters NUTmobile debuted in 1935 and is manned by “Peanutters” who drive Mr. Peanut around the country. A Nutmobile was transformed into an INN a NUTshell retreat (help) in 2021, allowing people to book a night in the vehicle, which was outfitted as a sort of snack-themed fever dream camper.

(15) A DERN MINUTE’S WORTH OF “WHERE THIS CAME FROM”. [By Daniel Dern.] The reference behind today’s title, “The DiskWorld Turned Upside Down (Because ‘RingWorld’ Here Wouldn’t Make Sense, Would It?)”.

Via, for us folkies, Leon Rosselson’s song of that name (I’m pretty sure he wrote it — I know it’s on his albums, and I believe I’ve heard him sing it, live, way back when), although he got the notion/phrase from the the 1640s version, and LR’s song was subsequently-ish done by Billy Bragg and, most recently, the phrase became part of a song in Hamilton.

[OGH adds: That last is probably because “The World Turned Upside Down” was played during the surrender ceremony at Yorktown, the climactic moment of the American Revolution.]

(16) VIDEO OF THE DAY. How It Should Have Ended has remastered their 12-year-old Ghostbusters tribute.

[Thanks to Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, Daniel Dern, Frank Catalano, Olav Rokne, Ersatz Culture, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, and Steven French for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel Dern.]

2024 Lambda Literary Awards Finalists

The shortlists for the 2024 Lambda Literary Awards were announced March 27. Finalists in 26 categories were selected by a panel of over 70 literary professionals from more than 1,300 book submissions. The awards will be presented at a ceremony in New York on June 11.

The Lammys are awarded yearly by Lambda Literary “to recognize the crucial role LGBTQ writers play in shaping the world.”

The works in the sff category are listed below. The complete roster of finalists is here.

LGBTQ+ Speculative Fiction

  • Bang Bang Bodhisattva by Aubrey Wood (Solaris)
  • I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself: A Novel by Marisa Crane (Catapult)
  • The Archive Undying by Emma Mieko Candon (Tordotcom Publishing)
  • The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera (Tordotcom Publishing)
  • The Thick and the Lean by Chana Porter (Saga Press)

The Fifteenth Doctor Stars in a Free Comic Book

On Free Comic Book Day – May 4 – pick up Titan Comics’ The Fifteenth Doctor Free Comic Book Day Edition at participating stores.

The Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby Sunday have followed a mysterious signal to a shopping mall in the last days of Earth. It’s sure to be a trap, but to find the source, The Doctor must face his greatest fears…

Sample art below.

DOCTOR WHO: THE FIFTEENTH DOCTOR FREE COMIC BOOK DAY EDITION
Writer: Dan Watters. Artist: Kelsey Ramsay. 24pp, FC, SC. On sale May 4, 2024

(Click for larger images.)

[Based on a press release.]

Pixel Scroll 3/26/24 There Are Some Things Money Can’t Buy; For Everything Else, There’s Pixel Scroll

(1) THE ROBOPOCALYPSE. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] Who is the best time traveler?  Well, of course the Doctor is, but then Brit Cit is the epicentre of SF. Nonetheless, across the Black Atlantic, in the home of the Mega Cities and the Cursed Earth, there are other time-travelling franchises…

“He was back….” BBC Radio 4 has just aired a programme dedicated to The Terminator a modern classic SF film that is this year 40 years old: ”I’ll Be Back: 40 Years of The Terminator”.

“It was the machines, Sarah…a new order of intelligence. Decided our fate in a microsecond: extermination.” So says Kyle Reese, time travelling freedom fighter in The Terminator. Released in the perfectly fitting year of 1984, The Terminator was a low budget, relentless slice of science fiction noir, drawing on years of pulp sf to conjure a future nightmare of humanity hunted to near extinction by the machines it created. In 2029, just 5 years away now,
Arnold Schwarzenegger’s unstoppable cyborg killer is sent back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor, the yet to be mother of humanities saviour to come. Fate, redemption & the destructive power of A.I. all made in the analogue age but still influencing the way many imagine our new age of Artificial Intelligence.

Professor Beth Singler re-visits the making of the film with producer Gale Anne Hurd and explores its lasting influence. Forty years on, and the circular self-contained time travel plot of The Terminator has been cracked wide open letting out alternative timelines and delayed apocalypses: more films, a television show, graphic novels, comics, video games, theme park rides and even memes have spread versions of the original robopocalypse. More than that, the first Terminator has given us a vocabulary and a vision for the dangers of Artificial Intelligence.

(2) OVERVIEW OF CHINESE SFF RECOMMENDATION LISTS. [Item by Ersatz Culture.] I have finally published my write-up of Chinese recommendation lists: “Chinese SFF recommendation/best-of-the-year lists for works published in 2023”

The following summary bullet points for the Science Fiction World list are a suitable teaser – producing a Chinese recommendation list that doesn’t include any Chinese works first published in the year of eligibility — other than the fanzine — strikes me as an unconventional choice…

Science Fiction World

Links

Summary

  • Recommendations over 6 categories, with between 1 and 5 recommendations in each.
  • No Chinese fiction works first published in 2023 are included in the recommendations.
  • All the recommended novels are in English or Polish, and not yet announced for publication in China.
  • All of the novella and short story recommendations are older stories that were published in English translation in 2023 in a pair of venues.
  • Several of the categories that had recommendations last year – including Best Novelette – have no recommendations this year.
  • The editor recommendations are almost identical to last year – including the works listed.

(3) CLIPPING SERVICE. [Item by Daniel Dern.] I’m a NYTimes digital/paper subscriber, so I can do 10 “gift links”/month. I’ve been told (by somewhat reliable colleagues) that I can share to email lists, groups, etc, which I assume/believe includes F770-type thingies.

If I’m wrong, may the Pallid Ghost of the Gray Lady bite me on the nose (with mild apologies to Johnny Carson).

Note, these share links are only good for “30 days after [I’ve] shared it}…good enough for current readers, not so much for anyone dredging the past.

A) BORKED METAL. “A Rock Fell From Space Into Sweden. Who Owns It on Earth?”

Sweden’s courts have been debating claims to a meteorite that fell north of Stockholm, including whether the right to move around in nature, including on private property, extends to claiming a meteorite….

B) SNAKES IN A SCROLL!  “Now Arriving at J.F.K.: Horses From Iceland and Dogs From the West Bank”.

The ARK, a 14-acre facility at Kennedy International Airport, is often the first stop for animals of all kinds arriving in the United States….

(4) GLORIFIED SPYWARE. “How The BookmarkED/OnShelf App, Created to Help Schools [Navigate Book Bans], Fuels Them Instead” at BookRiot.

In December 2023, BookmarkED—an app designed to “help” educators, librarians, and parents navigate book bans in school libraries—rebranded. Now OnShelf, the app has been making its way into schools in Texas. Freedom of Information Requests obtained new information about how the app is getting into districts in Texas and how the app alerts users to so-called “banned books” in the district. The app is a student data privacy nightmare, and it undermines the professional capabilities of trained teacher librarians in educational institutions.

What Is BookmarkED/OnShelf? A Little About The App’s History

Founded by Steve Wandler, who works in the education technology space, BookmarkED aims to “empower parents to personalize school libraries.” It aims to ensure that parents get to decide the “individual literary journey for their children, based on their personal values and interests,” while teachers and librarians can keep “confidently recommending and providing more personalized books to their students, knowing precisely the learning outcomes they will achieve.” The technology helps libraries “simply and efficiently navigate the ever-changing challenged books landscape.”

BookmarkED soft launched their product during a Texas State Senate Committee on Education meeting on March 30, 2023, two and a half months before Texas passed the READER Act. Wandler noted that the app was developed while working with a superintendent in the state. That superintendent, Jason Cochran, is one of the owners of the app, and as of writing, works as the superintendent of Krum Independent School District. Prior to Krum, Cochran was superintendent at Eastland Independent School District. …

(5) A ROMANTASY MINICON. Publishers Weekly gleans all the details in a long report about last weekend’s event: “A Romantasy Festival Comes to Chicago”.

Romantasy was added as a category in the Goodreads Choice Awards in 2023, a fact mentioned several times at the inaugural Romantasy Literary Genre Festival, held March 22–24 at the Otherworld Theater in Chicago. More than 100 people celebrating the relatively new but rapidly growing genre attended the festival, which included author signings and Q&As, live podcast recordings, a drag tournament called Drag’N Brunch, and daily showings of Twihard!, a musical parody of Twilight. Books were sold on site by local indie bookstore Women & Children First.

The festival kicked off on Friday with a cocktail hour, mixer, and the weekend’s first performance of Twihard! Saturday, the first full day of the festival, began with the recording of the Whoa!mance podcast, hosted by Isabeau Dasho and Morgan Lott, who moderated an author panel with authors Samara Breger, Tamara Jerée, Megan Mackie, and Melanie K. Moschella. During the 90-minute conversation, the authors discussed their creative processes, genre crossovers, worldbuilding, escapism, beloved tropes, queer monsters, and more….

(6) ONE CLICHÉ AVOIDED. Simon Bland interviews several people who made The Thing, including the director, and an actor who didn’t come to a predictable end: “John Carpenter on horror classic The Thing: ‘It was an enormous failure and I got fired’” in the Guardian.

Keith David, who played Childs:

“ What I didn’t think at the time, and wasn’t thinking about until later, was how, traditionally, the Black man is not the guy who lasts to the end. This was one of the first movies where the Black guy lasts to the final scene. I don’t think I’m the only brother who’s ever survived in a horror or sci-fi movie, but I’m certainly one of the few. It was great foresight on John’s part.

I hear lots of theories about the final sequence. We played it various ways; as if I was the Thing, as if it was MacReady, and as if it was neither of us. People wonder why there’s no breath coming out of my mouth in the cold after the station burns down, and say it had to be me. But I say that if I’m downstage of the fire you wouldn’t see steam coming from my mouth because there’s too much heat. That’s how I explain it, but it’s your movie, your experience. The Thing is whoever you think it is.”

(7) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born March 26, 1931 Leonard Nimoy. (Died 2015.) Pointy ears, green skin —  it must be Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock. And what an amazing role it was. So what was Roddenberry’s initial conception of the character? Here it is:

The First Lieutenant. The Captain’s right-hand man, the working-level commander of all the ship’s functions – ranging from manning the bridge to supervising the lowliest scrub detail. His name is Mr. Spock. And the first view of him can be almost frightening – a face so heavy-lidded and satanic you might almost expect him to have a forked tail. Probably half Martian, has a slightly reddish complexion and semi-pointed ears. But strangely – Mr. Spock’s quiet temperament is in dramatic contrast to his satanic look. Of all the crew aboard, he is the nearest to Captain April’s equal, physically, emotionally, and as a commander of men. His primary weakness is an almost catlike curiosity over anything the slightest alien. 

“The Cage” — Jeffrey Hunter as Captain Pike. Leonard Nimoy as Spock.

Although Memory Alpha says that Roddenberry settled on Nimoy from the beginning, other accounts say that Martin Landau was an earlier casting consideration for the character, and several sources say DeForest Kelley auditioned for the role as well. Actual history is often far messier than the official version is.

So we get to Nimoy. It’s hard now over a half century on to imagine anyone else in that role, isn’t it? Can you envision Martin Landau in the role, or DeForest Kelley? Especially the latter? I certainly can’t. For better or worse, well better, Nimoy made for me the perfect Spock. 

Cool, elegant, ever so, dare I say it? almost on the edge of being sarcastic if Vulcans could indeed be that. Certainly more fascinating a character by far on the series than Kirk was by far. Yes, Kirk was cast in interesting stories such as “Shore Leave” but Spock was script in and out just more interesting to watch.

So my favorite Spock centered episodes? “Dagger of the Mind” in which marked the introduction of his mind-meld ability; “Amok Time” of course which also has the bonus of when “Live Long and Prosper” first showed up; “Journey to Babel” in we meet his parents, Sarek (Mark Leonard) and Amanda (Jane Wyatt); and “The Enterprise Incident “ for his not really amorous relationship with the unnamed Romulan Commander (yes she gets no name) and the rest of that splendid story.

Leonard Nimoy (Spock) at the Las Vegas Star Trek Convention 2011. Photo by Beth Madison.

I rewatched much of the series recently on Paramount+ as well as all of the other Trek series save the one season of the animated YA series whose name is completely escaping my name are here. (Never did figure out why they cancelled something so cheap to do when Strange New Worlds can cost them as much as ten million dollars an episode.)  He’s still my favorite when I rewatched them. I so wanted a spin-off Spock centered series to have happened after Trek ended. 

Usually I look at a performer’s entire genre career but I think I will look at just a single post-Trek undertaking, being Dr. William Bell in the stellar Fringe series. He decided to do the role after working with Abrams and Kurtzman on the rebooted Star Trek film and was offered with this series the chance to work with them again. He actually retired from acting before the series concluded but continued on here through its ending. 

(8) COMICS SECTION.

(9) EARTH ABIDES TO TV. [Item by Ersatz Culture.] TVLine reports that a six-episode limited series adaptation of George R. Stewart’s Earth Abides is about to go into production.

Alexander Ludwig is relocating from Starz to MGM+.

Fresh off the cancellation of Heels, Ludwig will headline the MGM+ limited series Earth Abides, based on the George R. Stewart novel of the same name.

Adapted by showrunner Todd Komarnicki (Sully) and described as “a wildly imaginative new take” on the sci-fi classic, Earth Abides centers on Ludwig’s Ish, “a brilliant but solitary young geologist living a semi-isolated life who awakens from a coma only to find that there is no one left alive but him…

Production on the six-episode series is set to begin in Vancouver on Monday, April 8. MGM+ is targeting a late 2024 release date. 

There is similar coverage at VarietyDeadline and The Hollywood Reporter.

(10) THESE SUITS ARE MADE FOR WALKING. “’Walking Dead’ Creator Robert Kirkman, Others Beat AMC’s Effort To Get Profits Lawsuit Dismissed”Deadline tells how they convinced the judge.

The first season of the latest Walking Dead spinoff The Ones Who Live is concluding this weekend, but the latest profit participation lawsuit from zombie apocalypse creator Robert Kirkman, franchise executive producer Gale Anne Hurd and others is far from over.

With heavy emphasis on the $200 million settlement AMC suddenly made in 2021 to end ex-TWD showrunner Frank Darabont and CAA’s nearly 10-year long lawsuit over profits, U.S. District Judge Fernando Aenlle-Rocha yesterday denied the outlet’s move to have Kirkman, Hurd, David Alpert, Charles Eglee and Glen Mazzara’s mega-millions case dismissed.

“It would be an illogical interpretation of the MFN (most favored nations) provisions and contrary to the reasonable expectations of the parties in entering into the agreements if the court were to allow Defendants, as a matter of law, to provide Darabont and CAA with increased contingent compensation and a greater share of future gross receipts for the series through a settlement agreement—at Plaintiffs’ expense—without providing Plaintiffs the same,” the California-based federal judge wrote in a 13-page ruling filed Monday (read the TWD EP case ruling here).

Having pulled the short stick in a previous suit against AMC, Kirkman, Hurd and fellow TWD EPs sued AMC for $200 million in a November 15, 2022 breach of contract action.

“Plaintiffs are entitled to the same treatment afforded to Darabont with respect to his MAGR interests, they are therefore entitled to have the same valuation applied to their MAGR interests, which, collectively, exceed Darabont’s and CAA’s,” the LA Superior Court filing declared with reference to  modified adjusted gross receipts metric used to gauge profit participation payouts. “As a result, Plaintiffs are entitled to a payment well over $200 million from AMC, in an amount to be proved at trial.”…

(11) DIBS ON LUNA. “Scientists call for protection of moon sites that could advance astronomy” reports the Guardian.

Astronomers are calling for the urgent protection of sites on the moon that are rated the best spots in the solar system for advanced instruments designed to unveil the secrets of the universe.

The prime locations are free from ground vibration, shielded from Earth’s noisy broadcast signals or profoundly cold – making them uniquely well-suited for sensitive equipment that could make observations impossible from elsewhere.

But the pristine spots, known as sites of extraordinary scientific importance (Sesis), are in danger of being ruined by an imminent wave of missions such as lunar navigation and communications satellites, rovers and mining operations, with experts warning on Monday that safeguarding the precious sites was an “urgent matter”.

“This is the first time humanity has to decide how we will expand into the solar system,” said Dr Martin Elvis, an astronomer at the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Massachusetts. “We’re in danger of losing one-of-a-kind opportunities to understand the universe.”…

[Thanks to Steven French, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, Ersatz Culture, Daniel Dern, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Soon Lee.]

2024 GUFF Voting Begins

The 2024 Get-Up-and-over Fan Fund is open for voting to select whether Kat Clay or Ian Nichols will represent Oceania at the Glasgow 2024 Worldcon.  

Voting will close on April 22, 2024 at 23:59 British Summer Time (00:59 Central European Summer Time, 08:59 23 April 2024 Australian Eastern Standard Time).

Candidates

Kat Clay (Australia): I’m Kat Clay, and I’ve been a part of Australia’s fan community for more than a decade. For the past two years, I’ve won Australia’s Ditmar Award for Best Fan Writer for my blog, https:// www.katclay.com/ and YouTube channel, https://www.youtube.com/katclay. I’ve helped organise Melbourne’s local convention, Continuum, and you’ll always find me at the Fan Fund Auction – it’s my convention highlight! I’m also passionate about raising the profile of science fiction from the Asia Pacific and have hosted panels and written reviews featuring work from the region. I would love to be the GUFF delegate to act as a ‘Fanbassador’ from down under!

  • Nominators: Belle McQuattie, TR Napper, Cat Sparks (Oceania), Jukka Halme, Marcin Kłak (Europe)

Ian Nichols (Australia) I’ve attended around a hundred cons since Swancon 2, in 1977, been on the program of most of them, on the committee for about ten, been GOH twice, once for a Natcon, had dealer’s tables and won an art competition and a Tin Duck. I know many Australian and international writers, courtesy of being a book reviewer for a newspaper. I’ve pubbed my ish, pro/am, I’m gregarious, knowledgeable and I’ve even got a doctorate in writing. I was an actor, so I can speak in public, sing and play filk and I’m good on panels. Please send me to Glasgow.

  • Nominators: Edwina Harvey, Perry Middlemiss, Julian Warner (Oceania), David Langford, Liz Williams (Europe)

How to Vote: GUFF Voting can be done online at the link, or by downloading and filling out the ballot form below and sending it to an administrator (Simon Litten, [email protected], or Alison Scott, [email protected] – postal addresses on request).

Votes are not valid unless accompanied by a contribution of at least GBP6, EUR7, AUD10, NZD10, or an equivalent amount in other currencies. Please pay by Paypal to Simon at [email protected] or Alison at [email protected]; if this doesn’t work for you, contact Simon or Alison for bank account details. Choose ‘friends and family’ or add 10% to cover Paypal fees.

Serbian SF Fandom Celebrates 55 Years of Kosmoplov

Kosmoplov 24 cover, June 1970.

By Žarko Milićević: On Monday March 11, 2024, at Belgrade Youth Center, Serbia, the “Lazar Komarčić” Science Fiction and Fantasy Society held a lecture on the beginnings of genre publishing in Serbia/Yugoslavia. The lecturers were Miodrag Milovanović, author of Srpska naučna fantastika (Serbian science fiction, 2016) and Žarko Milićević (LK society’s president, on bluesky facebook or nerazuman(at)gmail.com).

Since this is the first time we’re reporting: “Lazar Komarčić” Science Fiction and Fantasy Society is from Belgrade, Serbia, established 1981. Meetings are held every Monday at 19:00. Our host is the Belgrade Youth Center. Each monthly meeting is a panel / discussion / presentation (new books/comics) / book club. Our fanzine Emitor, which won best fanzine at 2014 Eurocon, published its 500th issue in September 2023. You can find some scans here. In #500 there is an almost complete list of all panels 1981-2023, and we’re trying to list the conventions and con programmes next.

Website www.emitor.rs fell into disuse but has plenty of non-current material. Online we hang out on Facebook mostly, also Instagram. Write at lazarkomarcic (at) gmail.com

These are the key parts of the lecture:

55 YEARS OF KOSMOPLOV – Beginnings of genre publishing

The 60s were a time of print magazines: there were school magazines, youth magazines, technology, home economics, astronautics, DIY, etc… magazines, and in almost every one (and also in daily and weekly newspapers) stories or novels in sequels were published, often of the science fiction genre which was on the rise during the Space Race. However none was dedicated specifically to science fiction. Same thing applies to books and book series.

Newspaper publishing company “Duga”, Belgrade, started a popular pulp magazine 300 ČUDA (300 wonders) in 1954. with sub-pages ZELENI DODATAK and PLAVI DODATAK that occasionally contained science fiction novels and SF stories. (300 ČUDA ended in 1974.)

“Dnevnik” from Novi Sad, Serbia, launched the pulp novel series X100 in 1962. with crime / western / sf novels, with over 1000 issues. Much later, in the 80s they launched the SF-only series X-100 SF.

 In 1967, the publishing house “Yugoslavia”, Belgrade, launched the KENTAUR science fiction series under the editorship of Ivan V. Lalić and Vitomir Korać. Impressive edition, 8 books, hardcover, black and white covers, sadly put to end immediately.

KOSMOPLOV (interslavic for Spaceship) was launched in 1968 by “Duga”, as a specialized magazine for Cosmonautics and Science Fiction, edited by Gavrilo Gaja Vučković. It was the first specialized publication that had SF as an key and integral part of its editorial intention, as well as its name. KOSMOPLOV had color covers, 72 pages, 24 issues, starting as a monthly and then sped up to biweekly. Content was mainly western SF, in contrast to mostly Soviet stories that were available in the 40s and 50s. Vučković also started asking for Yugoslav authors, and published them under real names (most authors were published under foreign sounding pen names because rates were larger for “translation”, which gives researchers huge problems when establishing authorship).

KOSMOPLOV was shut down in June 1970, when the publisher fell into financial problems. It sold well enough on its own, so Vučković practically immediately after the demise of KOSMOPLOV successfully pitched a new magazine named GALAKSIJA (Galaxy) with similar concept, broadening the subject first to aeronautics and then to popular science and computer programming.

The first issue of GALAKSIJA was published in March 1972. Vučković continued publishing SF stories. The company “Duga” that owned GALAKSIJA was dissolved in 1974 for dissident and anti-communist content in their flagship magazine DUGA, and annexed to another publisher “BIGZ” (Beogradski izdavački grafički zavod). Some of the magazines were dropped, but GALAKSIJA continued to grow, while gradually reducing the space dedicated to SF. Vučković published ANDROMEDA in 1976, a first SF collection as kind of a best-of stories from GALAKSIJA, and also enlisted Zoran Živković as translator and editor. It was a huge success and sold out its 10,000 copies, and had three yearly issues.

Croatian publishing company “Vjesnik” launched SIRIUS, also in 1976, which became the best known SF magazine in Yugoslavia, attaining the largest circulation in Europe for a genre magazine, and winning two ESFS prizes.

The success of ANDROMEDA urged the revival of “Yugoslavia’s” SF series KENTAUR, a series that set a tremendously high bar, and won its editor Ivan V. Lalić an ESFS award also, at Eurocon in Poznan, Poland, 1976.

This lecture stops at the end of the 70s. The golden age of Yugoslav SF are the 70s and the 80s (marked by Živković’ publishing company “Polaris”). With the country’s demise in the 90s, the economic crash and the civil war, all these publications were slowly put to an end.

The 90s are a separate story now with separate countries, and separate attempts to revive the genre magazines, and that’s a topic for another lecture, as well as the history of fan organizations that started forming during the late 70s. Next time 🙂


Download the covers of the first 24 issues of Kosmoplov from Google Drive.