(1) CLARION WEST NEXT SUMMER. The lineup of instructors for Clarion West’s 2022 In-Person Summer Workshop has been announced. The Clarion West 2022 Six-Week Summer Workshop will take place from June 19 – July 30, 2022 in Seattle. Applications for the 2022 Summer Workshop open in December 2021.
- Week 1 – Susan Palwick
- Week 2 – P. Djèlí Clark
- Week 3 – Fonda Lee
- Week 4 – Tobias S. Buckell
- Week 5 – Bill Campbell
- Week 6 – Annalee Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders
(2) CLARION WEST THIS FALL. Clarion West also previewed their Fall 2021 lineup of Online Classes & Workshops which includes “but is definitely not limited to” —
- “Hiding the Infodump and Fluffing the Scenecraft” with Henry Lien,
- “The Rule of Three” and writing trilogies with Fonda Lee,
- A multi-session editing workshop with Cat Rambo,
- Writing the modern Southern gothic with Eden Royce.
(3) BIPOC HORROR ANTHOLOGY KICKSTARTER IS LIVE. A Kickstarter appeal launched today to publish the anthology “Death in the Mouth: Original Horror By People of Color” edited by Sloane Leong and Cassie Hart. They have raised $4,086 of their $35,000 goal in the first twelve hours. The fundraiser continues until September 1.
- This horror anthology will showcase BIPOC and other ethnically marginalized writers and artists from around the world.
- It will feature 20 prose stories, each accompanied by an original illustration by a unique artist.
- Authors contributing: C Pam Zhang (How Much of These Hills Is Gold), Darcie Little Badger (Elatsoe), Jewelle Gomez (The Gilda Stories), An Owomoyela (Abandonware), Karin Lowachee (Warchild), Jahra Wasasala (MOTHER/JAW), K-Ming Chang (Bestiary), and many more!
- Artists contributing: Michael Deforge, Joy San, Jabari Weathers, Makoto Chi, Allissa Chan, Alicia Feng, and Natalie Hall and more.
- Once funded, the editors will also hold an open call for submissions.
(4) DRAGON CON ISSUES GUIDELINES. Today Dragon Con announced everyone will wear masks at the con: “Updates – Dragon Con”. There are some additional rules about room capacity and traffic flow at the link.
Face masks and reduced attendance
Appropriate face masks will be required at all times inside convention venues regardless of vaccination status, in keeping with updated CDC guidelines and City of Atlanta requirements.
In 2021, Dragon Con will have reduced capacity from prior years. We have worked closely with our hotels and AmericasMart to determine how many people are permitted in the buildings each day and at a given time and taken further steps to reduce capacity to allow for personal spacing.
They also will have limits on their traditional parade and who can view it live:
We have received our parade permit and at this time will host a modified and scaled back parade. A Dragon Con membership is required to view the parade live and in person for 2021. All others can watch the parade on CW69, our broadcast partner, or on line at YouTube and other social media platforms.
(5) NOT JUST ANYBODY CAN DO IT. Delilah S. Dawson shared some behind-the-scenes info about writing IP books. Thread starts here. (Am I wrong to equate these with media tie-in books? Today was my first encounter with the “IP books” term.)
(6) CONVERSATION WITH ISHIGURO. The Washington Post ran an abridged version of this interview with Sir Kazuo Ichiguro, but here’s a full transcript from Nashville Public Television.
Ishiguro: I can’t imagine what kind of person or what kind of writer I’d be if I hadn’t experienced parenthood. It’s not just the actual hardcore experiences that you have, worrying about your child’s exams and stuff like that. Your perspective shifts. Many, many people will tell you this. Your perspective shifts. Emotionally, intellectually, you look at the world differently. I think your perspective becomes longer as well. You’re not just looking at things in your own lifetime. You see things in terms of your child’s lifetime, your grandchildren’s lifetime, your great grandchildren’s lifetime. The way you look at life, our existence, everything seems to change. And it changes at that kind of empathetic, emotional level.
Occasionally I come across writers who say if you have children it messes up your career. I think this is a profound mistake, unless you think a writing career is just about sitting down and producing a certain quantity of writing.
(7) MEDIA BIRTHDAY.
August 1, 1928 — Ninety-three years ago on this date, Buck Rogers (then named Anthony Rogers) makes his first appearance in the “Armageddon 2419 A.D” novella by Philip Francis Nowlan who would later become a member of the First Fandom Hall of Fame. It was published in the August 1928 issue of Amazing Stories, edited by Hugo Gernsback. A sequel novella called “The Airlords of Han” was published in the March 1929 issue of Amazing Stories. Fifty years later, they would become a single novel as editor Donald A. Wollheim of Ace Books had them combined into one narrative. Spin-offs from the novel would include a Thirties newspaper comic strip, a Thirties Buck Rogers in the 25th Century radio program, a Thirties movie serial Buck Rogers, a Seventies television series Buck Rogers in the 25th Century and the Buck Rogers in the 25th Century film.
(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
- Born August 1, 1862 — M.R. James. Writer of some of the best ghost stories ever done. A Pleasing Terror: The Complete Supernatural Writings, released in 2001 from Ash-Tree Press has forty stories which includes the thirty stories from Collected Ghost Stories plus the 3 tales published after that, and the seven from The Fenstanton Witch and Others. It’s apparently the most complete collection of his stories to date. Or so I though until I checked online. The Complete Ghost Stories of M.R. James, over seven hundred pages, is available from the usual suspects for a mere buck ninety nine! (Died 1936.)
- Born August 1, 1910 — Raymond A. Palmer. Editor of Amazing Stories from 1938 through 1949. He’s credited, along with Walter Dennis, with editing the first fanzine, The Comet, in May, 1930. The secret identity of DC character the Atom as created by genre writer Gardner Fox is named after Palmer. Very little of his fiction is available from the usual suspects. (Died 1977.)
- Born August 1, 1930 — Geoffrey Holder. You’ll likely best remember him for his performance as Baron Samedi in Live and Let Die but he’s also the narrator in Tim Burton’s Charlie and The Chocolate Factory. He was also Willie Shakespeare in Doctor Doolittle but it’s been so long since I saw the film that I can’t picture his character. And he was The Cheshire Cat in the Alice in Wonderland that had Richard Burton as The White Knight. Weird film that. (Died 2014.)
- Born August 1, 1941 — Craig Littler, 80. His main genre role was as space adventurer Jason in Jason of Star Command which of course James Doohan was in. If you looked closely you’ll spot him briefly in Blazing Saddles as Tex and Rosemary’s Baby as Jimmy as well. And he has one-offs in The Next Beyond, AirWolf and Team Knight Rider.
- Born August 1, 1945 — Yvonne Rousseau. Australian author, editor and critic. She edited the Australian Science Fiction Review in the late Eighties. She wrote one work of non-fiction, Minmers Marooned and Planet of the Marsupials: The Science Fiction Novels of Cherry Wilder, and has a handful of stories to her name. She got nominated for three Ditmar Awards for her fan writing. (Died 2021.)
- Born August 1, 1955 — Annabel Jankel, 66. Director who was first a music video director and then the co-creator and director of Max Headroom. She and her partner Rocky Morton first created and directed The Max Talking Headroom Show, a mix of interviews and music vids which aired on Channel 4 (UK) (where it was sponsored by Coca-Cola) and HBO. Jankel and Morton would go on to direct Super Mario Bros. And they’re both responsible for the Max Headroom movie and series.
- Born August 1, 1979 — Jason Momoa, 42. I knew I’d seen him before he showed up as Aquaman in the DC film franchise and I was right as he was Ronon Dex on Stargate Atlantis for its entire run. He was also Khal Drogo in the first season of A Game of Thrones. And not surprisingly, he was the title character in the recent Conan the Barbarian film.
- Born August 1, 1993 — Tomi Adeyemi, 28. Nigerian born author. She won a Lodestar Award at Dublin 2019 for her Children of Blood and Bone novel which also won her an Andre Norton Award. That novel was nominated for a BFA, a Kitchie and a Nommo. Her latest in that series is Children of Virtue and Vengeance.
(9) COMICS SECTION.
- Marmaduke entertains a visitor from outer space.
(10) HAMMER HAND. Here’s one we can all play. Entertainment Earth asked: “What character NOT from the Marvel universe do you think would be worthy of wielding Mjolnir?”
Paul Weimer tweeted a great set of answers (Atticus Finch!!) See what you can do.
(11) OOPS. H&I points out “10 Minor Goofs You Never Noticed In ‘Star Trek'”.
4. A WOODEN STARSHIP
“Errand of Mercy”
In the opening, as the Enterprise is attacked by a Klingon vessel, you can see that the floor behind Nimoy has not been painted. The bare wood is exposed on the elevated part of the bridge.
(12) UMBRELLA ARRIVING. This video announces that Mary Poppins will be reopening in London on August 7. (Petula Clark as the Bird Woman – where has the time gone? Petula was singing pop hits when the ancient Jane Darwell played that character in the original Disney movie.)
Mary Poppins is back in London! Whipping the barriers off the Prince Edward Theatre, Zizi Strallen prepares to return to wowing London audiences. Leading the show are the previously announced Zizi Strallen as Mary Poppins and Charlie Stemp as Bert, joined by Charlie Anson as George Banks, Amy Griffiths as Winifred Banks, Petula Clark as Bird Woman, Liz Robertson as Miss Andrew, Claire Machin as Mrs Brill, Jack North as Robertson Ay and Paul F Monaghan as Admiral Boom and Bank Chairman.
(13) BIRD BRAINS. “Big brains may have helped birds survive dinosaur-killing asteroid” – Yahoo! has the latest speculation.
Just a few million years before an asteroid killed nearly all dinosaurs on Earth, a creature resembling a small albatross with teeth flew through the Cretaceous skies. The creature, known as Ichthyornis, is considered an early bird — but not part of the lucky lineage that survived the mass extinction and gave rise to modern birds.
Now, a newly discovered Ichthyornis fossil sheds light on why some early birds survived the asteroid-triggered catastrophe known as the K-Pg extinction, while close relatives like Ichthyornis perished. The key may have been a vastly expanded forebrain — a trait that all modern birds possess, but Ichthyornis and other extinct lineages lack….
(14) TINY EFFECTS. “Dorset photographer shoots Star Wars Lego in cinematic style” – BBC News shares an intriguing video at the link.
Not content with merely building his Star Wars Lego kits, photographer Daniel Sands has found another use for his collection.
The 34-year-old Dorset photographer tested his creativity during lockdown by putting his models into the action of the movie universe.
He said he uses everyday items such as baking soda and the ashes from his barbecue to give his pictures a cinematic look.
Creative or realistic toy photography is a growing trend on social media, and Star Wars star Mark Hamill has even liked one of his posts.
[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster, JJ, Michael Toman, Sloan Leong, John King Tarpinian, Cat Eldridge, Mike Kennedy, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to contributing editor of the day Rob Thornton.]
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first. thanks for the title credit! 🙂
(10) In case you missed it, a comic in which Thor meets Fred Rogers, which Thor writer Denny Cates has declared is canon
Fyi: Twistwood’s comic is based on a script by Matthew Wisner; the script itself was inspired by a meme
You’ve got to know when to Hodor’em, know when to Scroll’em, know when to White Walker away, know when to Bookworm, Run!
You never File your Pixels when you’re at the Stone Table – they’ll be time enough to File when the clicking’s done.
Geoffrey Holder was also well known for his appearances in 7-Up Commercials, where he would proclaim “7-Up, the Un-Cola” What a voice he had.
M. R. James: when I had to have a root canal done, I took a MP3 player loaded with an Audio Book from Librevox of M. R. James ghost stories. The stories were read by a man with a slight scottish accent. His accent lent quite a touch to the reading.
I remember one of the stories was “Oh Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad”. The oral surgeon’s assistant asked what kind of music I was listening to and I told her I was listening to Ghost Stories. I told her I didn’t want to waste all this fear….
(10) HAMMER HAND.
Paul’s Twitter account is currently friends-locked.
Boo once again to the trolls.
Not awake, nothing to see here.
Soon Lee: Thanks! Didn’t even stop to think about that — I’ve rewritten the line now.
8) Also born today, David Gemmell (08/01/48-07/28/06), another one of those authors I really need to read more of.
10) Jean Valjean?
Marcus Welby, MD, from the 1969-1976 tv series? Though, checking Wikipedia to refresh my memory, some of the episode plotlines were considered problematic at the time (some for opposite reasons they’d be problematic now). But the character, played by Robert Young, was always outstandingly decent at heart, as I recall.
Not sure I’d want Welby wielding Mjolnir, though: “AGGHHH! My knee!” “Sorry, wrong hammer.”
That is funny!
Under birthdays, Tomi Adeyemi is listed as “igerian born”. I can’t help but feel like there might be an issing etter there.
(10) Murderbot! 🙂
7) The Buck Rogers film was just the pilot episode of the series, probably under a slightly different edit. Richard Lupoff wrote a novelization plus a sequel (story not from the series), under the moniker ‘Addison E. Steele’.
A few years after that things got weirder when one of the heirs of the trust owning Rogers became majority owner of TSR Games. As the first competent businessperson the firm had ever seen, she pulled it out of the flat spin it had been in… then forced the company to license Buck Rogers and produce a role playing game, as well as comix, novels, and video games. They were not amazingly popular.
Xtifr: Good catch, thanks!
(10) Hammer time: If you want someone with a warrior spirit and a pure heart, hard to do better than Kimball Kinnison.
10) Hm, non-Marvel character wielding Mjolnir? I’d probably have to go with Pippi Longstocking, a character devoid of maliciousness, and with a heart pure as the driven snow.
@Patrick Morris Miller — I remember when TSR started their Buck Rogers line (which I never did pick anything up), but hadn’t known about the family connection, as it were.
10) How about Chance, the gardener?
10) Thank you 🙂
Yes, the Buck Rogers movie was the pilot, but strangely was given a theatrical release BEFORE the show came on the air. I just re-watched it a few weeks ago when it was run late night on a cable channel and I’m amazed that such cheaply done sets were considered appropriate for a theatrical release.
Geoffrey Holder was also wonderful at Mr. Cujo in the movie Swashbuckler, starring Robert Shaw and James Earl Jones.
Troyce says Yes, the Buck Rogers movie was the pilot, but strangely was given a theatrical release BEFORE the show came on the air. I just re-watched it a few weeks ago when it was run late night on a cable channel and I’m amazed that such cheaply done sets were considered appropriate for a theatrical release.
Next year I’m going to expand that Anniversary note into an entire posting and I’ll do a deep dive into its convoluted history included the three Flash Gordon novels that Niven and Pournelle wrote the outlines for. I’m not kidding. They really did.
Still listening this morning to Charles de Lint’s Someplace to Be Flying though I’ll be starting Greg Bear’s Queen of Angels soon as I finish this novel.
@Cat I remember Niven mentioning those outlines in one of the essays in one of his collections and how they were trying to rationalize the Flash Gordon verse thereby
Thomas the Red says Geoff Rey Holder was also well known for his appearances in 7-Up Commercials, where he would proclaim “7-Up, the Un-Cola” What a voice he had.
Not surprisingly, those commercials are available for viewing such as the one here. I’m too young to remember them airing.
Paul Weimer says I remember Niven mentioning those outlines in one of the essays in one of his collections and how they were trying to rationalize the Flash Gordon verse thereby
Yeah, they even tied those novels into their Lucifer’s Hammer novel. No idea how they did that as I’ve not read the essay yet though I’ll need to do so before I write that post up.
You remember which collection that essay was in? I’ll see if it’s available at the usual suspects.
Btw their essay, “Building the Mote in God’s Eye”, on writing The Mote in God’s Eye is one of the best such ones ever written.
(10) Here Comes The Hammer
Patience at the beginning will be rewarded. It’s genre.
(8) I believe Tomi Adeyemi’s Lodestar-winning book is called Children of Blood and Bone (per the 2019 Hugo Awards, for example).
@Cat without looking, I am pretty sure it’s either N-Space or Playgrounds of the Mind…
(10) Surely Goku could do it? The kintoun accepted him, after all. (Where Goku would rank Mjolnir among all his other transformations is a different question).
@Paul/@Cat — It looks like the essay was “The Lost Ideas” in Playgrounds of the Mind. (And to clarify, the outlines were for Buck Rogers — at some point in the thread here, Buck turned into Flash Gordon. Unless they also at one point were contracted to write Flash Gordon? Which would be fascinating.)
@Joe H: This link has an excerpt of “The Lost Ideas”
https://books.google.com/books?id=lO_L4a9xKz8C&pg=PA503&lpg=PA503&dq=niven+%22lost+ideas%22+buck&source=bl&ots=r0xFXt3y5D&sig=ACfU3U368RBDz8CCjEG9yZsZ5ltqyu_HNg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiWm4XynpPyAhVyFVkFHTbPC-UQ6AEwDnoECB0QAw#v=onepage&q=niven%20%22lost%20ideas%22%20buck&f=false
(would have found it sooner, but I was looking for Flash, not Buck (oops))
@Cat Eldridge: Next year I’m going to expand that Anniversary note into an entire posting and I’ll do a deep dive into its convoluted history included the three Flash Gordon novels that Niven and Pournelle wrote the outlines for.
Ooh!
10) non-Marvel characters wielding Mjolnir…
Krypto
Sam Gamgee
Tesla Strong
Mr Magoo
Bullwinkle Moose. Or Dudley Do-right
Bizarro # 1
Tom Bombadil
Ignatz Mouse….mmmm, no, not worthy
R2D2
Ma Hunkle (the original Red Tornado)
R. Daneel Olivaw
Joe H. says Paul/@Cat — It looks like the essay was “The Lost Ideas” in Playgrounds of the Mind. (And to clarify, the outlines were for Buck Rogers — at some point in the thread here, Buck turned into Flash Gordon. Unless they also at one point were contracted to write Flash Gordon? Which would be fascinating.)
Thanks, I’ve ordered a copy off of ABE Books. An unused copy was remarkably affordable. I did read that collection of essays quite some years ago but of course I don’t remember what that essay said.
I meant Buck Rogers, not Flash Gordon. Brain slippage not noticed at the time.
I mean, they were both played by Buster Crabbe …
(Who did make a cameo in the 1970s Buck Rogers TV series — they really should’ve had him also make an appearance in the 1980 Flash Gordon movie.)
Joe H. says I mean, they were both played by Buster Crabbe …
(Who did make a cameo in the 1970s Buck Rogers TV series — they really should’ve had him also make an appearance in the 1980 Flash Gordon movie.)
Yeah they should’ve have. He also played in the Thirties, Kapsa, the Jungle Man, a role clearly meant to be a very thinly disguised version of Tarzan. It was meant to be a franchise but was poorly received so only one film was ever done.
10) Ursula has a twitter thread of speculation, leading off with Carrot Ironfoundersson from Discworld, starting here, and including all dogs, which leads to some great art in the replies by Lar @lartist.
10) I’m going to suggest a fellow named “Benton Fraser” from a (very lightly genre) buddy cop series called “Due South”
@Daniel Dern
Bob Ross.
Kermit.
@Joe H
Always loved a bit of Gemmell, though if you read too much in one go the trope reuse gets a little obvious. Stirring stuff though, Legend especially.
Besides who else better to wield Mjolnir than Druss?
“”I am Druss. Sometimes called Captain of the Axe. In Ventria they call me Druss the Sender. In Vagria I am merely the Axeman. To the Nadir I am Deathwalker. In Lentria I am the Silver Slayer. But who are you? You dung-eating lumps of offal! Who the hell are you? I have a mind to set an example today. I have a mind to cut the fat from this ill-fated fortress.””
10) Superman (but not the Zack Snyder version), Sam Gamgee, Data, Neville Longbottom, and Kaladin Stormblessed all seem like shoe-ins to me.
10) I wonder about Maia from the Goblin Emperor.
@Joe H
Yes!
@Joe H, Maia is certainly pure enough, but I like Oor Wombat’s definition of paladins for this: they have to be pure AND uncomplicated. I think Maia may be too complicated. He’s full of self-doubt and second-guessing, if memory serves. (Now I have to re-read that book!)
If it has to be a paladin … Hmmm, I’m guessing that Paksennarion might not be uncomplicated enough?
Possibly Ix from Earth Made of Glass?
(13) The creature, known as Ichthyornis, is considered an early bird — but not part of the lucky lineage that survived the mass extinction and gave rise to modern birds.
So, a rare instance in which the worm caught the early bird (so to speak), rather than the other way around.
(10) Another name occurs: John Reed, known to myth as (begin overture) The Lone Ranger