J. Michael Straczynski told Facebook readers today that The Last Dangerous Visions has been finished.
THE LAST DANGEROUS VISIONS has at last been completed. The final draft went off to the agency that will be handling the sale about fifteen minutes ago. This has been a massive effort…112,000 words…tracking down the estates of the original writers to be included in the book, and nailing down some newer A List writers; fans of Harlan’s who wanted to be a part of TLDV. (And for the record, Harlan continued to buy stories for the anthology right through the 90s, and stopped only due to illness. He saw TLDV as a living document, and fought to keep it relevant when some stories became less timely or were supplanted by real world events.)
I will have more to say about the contents at a later date, but suffice to say that they include some of the most visionary writers in the science fiction genre over the last 48 years.
[Thanks to JJ and Chris Barkley for the story.]
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This is nice to hear, in more ways than one. I had heard rumors that Ellison and Straczynski were estranged.
I feel that the final story in this anthology should be a fantasy in which a team of plucky heroes have to stop JMS from completing Ellison’s anthology as it will trigger the end of the world when finished.
The Nine Billion Dangerous Stories Of…
(suddenly, all over the world, all the word processors were blinking out. Only three portable manual typewriters at the heart of the world continued to tickytickytick away, punctuated by the sounds of lever slaps and “returning” carriages…)
Yes, we need this story, and shame on JMS if he doesn’t include it!
Exciting news. I’d really like to see the table of contents.
I still want to know if this is going to include Ellison’s story introductions. Oh, well, I know I’m going to read it either way!
I also note that the book is going to be only 112,000 words long; according to one of JMS’ Facebook comments, that’s reduced from 700,000 words of fiction that Ellison had purchased for TLDV and were available for inclusion. So this is kind of like “The Best of the Last Dangerous Visions”.
Rusty said: “I also note that the book is going to be only 112,000 words long; according to one of JMS’ Facebook comments, that’s reduced from 700,000 words of fiction that Ellison had purchased for TLDV and were available for inclusion. So this is kind of like “The Best of the Last Dangerous Visions”.
But it leaves it open to “Absolutely the Last Dangerous Visions”; “OK-This is the Last Dangerous Visions” and “We SWEAR this is the Last Dangerous Visions”
Yes, instead of the longest of the three books it’s going to be the shortest.
Straczynski said earlier that he was not including any stories that Ellison had bought but have since appeared elsewhere, which is quite a few of them. That still leaves way more than 112,000 words in the projected table of contents, though, plus whatever has been bought since then, by both HE and JMS. I’m guessing that relatively little of the original book will survive.
The Best of the Last Dangerous Visions
The Rest of the Last Dangerous Visions
Beyond the Last Dangerous Visions
Dangerous Visions: A New Beginning
These Are Not Your Grandparents’ Dangerous Visions
Spam
Spam
Spam
Spam
Last Dangerous Visions
Eggs and Spam
A Few More Dangerous Visions
Don’t suppose any of the publishers reading this want to take it on?