(1) HUNDRED BEST. Unbound Worlds knows there’s nothing like a “best” list to get everyone riled up. To that end they present “The 100 Best Fantasy Novels of All Time”. I’ve read a solid 15 of these, which tells you I’m not a big fantasy fan, but even I know they should have picked a different Pratchett book.
It was daunting, but we did it: a list of the one hundred best fantasy books of all time. What was our criteria? Well, we loved these these books and thought they deserved to be on the list. That’s pretty much it. This list is totally subjective, and with a cut-off of one hundred books, we couldn’t include all of the amazing fantasy tales out there. We hope you look through this list and agree with a lot of our picks, and that you also find some new stories to pick up. If there’s anything we left out, please add it to the comments below — we’d love to see what books would be on your list!
So without further ado, here’s what makes our list of best fantasy books of all time (arranged alphabetically)! Fair warning: your TBR pile is about to get a lot bigger…
(2) NEW GROENING SERIES. The Verge’s Andrew Liptak reports “Matt Groening’s new animated fantasy show will premiere on Netflix in August”.
Matt Groening’s animated epic fantasy series has a release date: Netflix has revealed that Disenchantment will premiere on August 17th. The company also shared a handful of pictures that show off an art style that will be familiar to anyone who’s watched Futurama or The Simpsons.
Netflix officially announced the series last year. It’ll follow a “hard-drinking young princess” named Bean, an elf companion named Elfo, and her personal demon named Luci as they encounter all manner of fantasy creatures in a magical kingdom known as Dreamland. Netflix ordered 20 episodes of the show; the first 10 will premiere this year.
Drink it in, peasants! @Disenchantment, the latest series from The Simpsons creator Matt Groening, premieres August 17 on Netflix. pic.twitter.com/INr3mDOzuB
— Netflix (@netflix) May 23, 2018
(3) HELP FRANKENSTEIN AUTHOR GET BUSTED. Sculptor Bryan Moore hopes to crowdfund the rest of the expenses of the Mary Shelley Bronze Bust Project. So far people have contributed $3,546 of the $16,000 goal.
To celebrate the 200th publication anniversary of the legendary novel “Frankenstein”, we’re donating a life size, bronze bust of Mary Shelley to the Museum of Pop Culture in Seattle, WA on August 30, 2018!!!!
While I’ve donated the last six months of my time sculpting Mary, I can’t get her across the finish line without your help to pay for the considerable costs at the bronze foundry to mold, cast, finish and fire the patina on the bust itself.
Mary Shelley is the second of three busts that MoPOP has graciously agreed to accept in my horror author bronze bust series; “Dracula” author Bram Stoker was unveiled in October, 2017, Mary Shelley will be installed on her birthday on August 30, 2018 and Rod Serling will be unveiled in 2019 to celebrate the 60th anniversary of “The Twilight Zone”. As you’ll see in the video, I’ve also sculpted and donated bronze busts of H.P. Lovecraft and Edgar Allan Poe.
(4) SEEMS LIKE FOREVER. It was another busy day at the Romance Writers of America.
We are aware of and in communication with attorneys about the new trademark filing for the word "forever."
— RWA (@romancewriters) May 23, 2018
The author and agent have reported the trademark filing is being withdrawn. We’re glad to see the issue resolved so quickly and appreciate the romance community’s alertness. Members affected by issues like this can always contact RWA for author relations assistance. https://t.co/FMbZlQewxw
— RWA (@romancewriters) May 23, 2018
(5) TODAY IN HISTORY
- May 23, 1969 — Destroy All Monsters premiered.
(6) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS
- Born May 23, 1933 — Joan Collins, who won genre fame as “City on the Edge of Forever’s” Edith Keeler.
- Born May 23, 1986 — Black Panther director Ryan Coogler
(7) COMICS SECTION.
- John King Tarpinian witnessed the first book tour at Non Sequitur.
- And Lio seems to have the wrong idea about The Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.
(8) PERSISTENT BELIEVERS. Did you think this was a settled question? Oh, such a silly person you are… “Loch Ness Monster’s Existence Could Be Proven With eDNA”.
Is the Loch Ness real? We may soon have an answer.
A team of scientists have proposed using actual science to figure out if the mythical creature allegedly lurking in Scotland’s River Ness is actually real.
Their proposal? Using environmental DNA, or eDNA, a sampling method already used to track movements in marine life. When an animal moves through an environment, it leaves behind residual crumbs of its genetics by shedding skin or scales, leaving behind feathers or tufts of fur, perhaps some feces and urine.
Scientists think those residual clues left behind by a monster like that of the Loch Ness could be collected by eDNA and subsequently used to prove its existence.
“This DNA can be captured, sequenced and then used to identify that creature by comparing the sequence obtained to large databases of known genetic sequences from hundreds of thousands of different organisms,” team spokesman Professor Neil Gemmell of the University of Otago in New Zealand told Reuters.
It’s certainly not the first time that people, scientifically minded or not, have attempted to track the legendary monster’s existence. A sixth century document chronicles the tale of an Irish monk named St. Columba, who banished a “water beast” to the bottom of the River Ness.
(9) JDA WILL PROVE LOVE. Since his lawsuit won’t even get its first hearing til October, Jon Del Arroz came up with a new plan to make people pay attention to him: “Announcement: Rally For Freedom And Anti-Discrimination Demonstration At Worldcon 76 San Jose” [Internet Archive].
Civil rights activist Erin Sith, trans for Trump, and I talked about this briefly on our livestream last Thursday. As we are both minorities on the right, we’ve both had a lot of shared similar experiences where those of privilege on the left have treated us inhumanly because we left the proverbial slave plantation they set up for us. 2018 is the year we will let our message be heard, in unity, in love, and for tolerance and diversity.
We are planning a gathering outside Worldcon 76 in San Jose, on Saturday, August 18th, 2018. I’ve talked with the city of San Jose and the convention center and we are cleared to go on their end. We cannot allow these institutions to willfully discriminate and spew hatred just because someone is an outspoken political personality. With Worldcon’s actions emboldening ConCarolinas and Origins to similarly attempt to harm and discredit other popular conservative authors because of politics, enough is enough….
(10) ANTIMATTER. Gizmodo swears it happened in 2015: “A Recent Hurricane Shot a Bolt of Antimatter Toward Earth”.
The detector onboard the plane measured a phenomenon that scientists have been interested in for decades: terrestrial gamma-ray flashes. It’s unclear exactly how it happens, but lightning in storms seems to accelerate electrons to nearly light speed. These electrons collide with the particles in the atmosphere, resulting in high-energy x-rays and gamma rays that scientists have measured in satellites and on the ground. The rays could also result from collisions between electrons and their antimatter partners, positrons.
The team behind the newest paper had a tool called the Airborne Detector for Energetic Lightning Emissions (ADELE) on board a hurricane-hunting WP-3D plane, according to the paper published recently in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.
(11) UNDERGROUND. “New whisky distillery in Moray ‘like nothing else'”. It blends in with the landscape, but visits expected to double. Chip Hitchcock asks, “A side trip for next year’s Worldcon?”
The new distillery, on the Easter Elchies estate near Craigellachie in Moray, has been camouflaged under a vast turf roof, to blend in with the rolling hillside.
It is believed to be the most expensive in the country, going 40% over budget, with a total cost for the production facility and visitor centre of £140m.
The roof, with 10cm (4in) depth of turf and meadow flowers, covers 14,000 sq m.
Underneath are ventilation, vapour control, flexible waterproofing and irrigation systems.
Under those is a complex ceiling structure comprising 2,500 panels, few of them the same.
(12) HEAVY DEW. “GRACE mission launches to weigh Earth’s water” – BBC has the story. This is a replacement/upgrade for applauded 15-year-old satellites which will track icecaps, and sea/land exchanges.
A joint US-German mission has gone into orbit to weigh the water on Earth.
The Grace satellites are replacing a pair of highly successful spacecraft that stopped working last year.
Like their predecessors, the new duo will circle the globe and sense tiny variations in the pull of gravity that result from movements in mass.
These could be a signal of the land swelling after prolonged rains, or of ice draining from the poles as they melt in a warming climate.
The satellites were launched on Tuesday aboard a SpaceX rocket from the Vandenberg Air Force base in California.
(13) SUMMA WHAT? Bakers are more activist in some parts of the country: “US student’s ‘Summa cum laude’ graduation cake censored”.
The South Carolina student’s mother had asked a local grocery store to print the term “Summa Cum Laude” (with the highest distinction) on her son’s cake.
The store censored the term “cum” deeming it offensive and put three hyphens in its place.
(14) TODAY’S CLICKBAIT. Frog in a Well asks “Was Hirata Atsutane Japan’s first Science Fiction writer?”
Maybe. Well, sort of. It kind of depends on how you define things.
Hirata Atsutane (1776-1843) was one of the key thinkers and popularizers of Japanese Nativism. He was a prolific writer, and most of what he wrote was aimed at proving that Japan was the center of the universe. In particular, he argued against Chinese learning, which was pointless, and to the extent it was any good, the Japanese had done it first. He argued against Indian (Buddhist) learning, which was pointless, and to the extent it was any good, the Japanese had done it first. He argued against European (Dutch) learning, which was pointless, and to the extent it was any good, the Japanese had done it first. As you may guess, he was a bit polemical. He was also pretty important in the creation and popularization of a specifically Japanese identity.
One of his important works is Senkyo Ibun (Strange tidings from the realm of the Immortals), 1822. This is an account of his interviews with the teenage tengu Kozo Torakichi. Tengu are the trickster/mountain goblin figures of Japanese folklore. Torakichi claimed to have been raised by them, and to have learned all the secrets of true Japanese-ness in the process.
(15) PERSONAL 451. Mr. Sci-Fi delivers “Ray Bradbury & Fahrenheit 451 – The Untold Story.”
Sci-fi whiz Marc Zicree shares stories his dear friend and mentor Ray Bradbury told him about the genesis of Fahrenheit 451 and gives a history of the work that includes first editions, plays, radio versions and movies.
[Thanks to Chip Hitchcock, JJ, Martin Morse Wooster, John King Tarpinian, Alan Baumler, Cat Eldridge, Mike Kennedy, Kendall, Andrew Porter, and Carl Slaughter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Rev. Bob.]
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Filenheit 770.
(#1) I would describe that list as “charmingly idiosyncratic” and also “a lot better than I expected.” Although you are correct about the Pratchett book.
(#7) Attack of the Killer Tomatoes was the first (and so far, only) movie to give me nightmares. In my dreams, the giant tomatoes sounded like the Hamburglar (robble robble robble).
57 out of the 100, but I find many of their choices dubious to say the least. And not only is the Pratchett choice horribly wrong, so is the Lloyd Alexander.
(4) SEEMS LIKE FOREVER.
As someone on Twitter pointed out, there must be an advice course for aspiring writers somewhere which is encouraging them to do this.
(9) JDA WILL PROVE LOVE.
This should be interesting. I’ll be having the SJPD on speed-dial in case he and his fellow recalcitrants try to harass people or instigate fights.
(4) By the age of 35, you should have copyrighted three personal pronouns, an indefinite article, and a conjunction.
(1) HUNDRED BEST.
Holy shit, I’m not a huge reader, and I’ve read 32 of these (to be fair, a couple of them were DNFs, and a couple of them were “well, that’s 3 hours of my life I’ll never get back”s).
1) I have read around 35 books from the list. I am relatively impressed with what Unbound Worlds came up despite the questionable choices that I was totally uninterested in (see previous Scroll).
(9)
One day only!
A (unfortunately far more than) one act play
“Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me”
Sponsored by the Mendacious Whinery
Hugo reading: I finished all of the short stories, and am going to have great difficulty ranking them, this is a strong category this year IMO. Carnival Nine may win my top spot due the fact that it managed to move me to tears at several points, but I’ll probably give most of the stories a second reading before I finalize my ballot. I finished The Collapsing Empire, in the novel category; it took until about the middle of the book for me to really get pulled in and invested in the characters. Also it felt like half a story. Definitely not my favorite Scalzi work. Making my way through the novelette category now.
This is probably a long shot, but does anyone here recall a small anthology of sci-fi/horror short stories; would have been around in the 80s but could have been published prior to that? Three stories I can recall:
1) Kids playing a version of baseball modified for low gravity; the kids scramble for shelter as it starts hailing, and the hail is revealed to be diamonds.
2) A guy led to a room by a woman who says she’ll let him out if he can figure out what’s missing; it turns out to be he doorknob.
3) An evacuation of Earth on a space ship, a kid realizes her grandfather has not boarded, she goes to find him, and he says he’s staying. There’s a line that’s talking about them not going to ‘New Earth’, and the grandfather saying “they took the old earth with them” (probably badly paraphrased).
I can’t recall if it was a collection of stories by a single author or if multiple authors contributed; I can’t recall the title of any of the stories or the overall book. I’d love to find a copy of it again, but what I can remember is vague enough that it defeats my searching skills.
(1) I’ve read 24 of those (with several on my TBR stack)
Thirty Two here. Since I’m not much of a fantasy reader it’s more than I expected 🙂 Though there’s stuff I’d have expected on the list that is decidedly missing…
That list is mostly alphabetical by title, with a couple of anomalies:
The Bloody Crown of Conan is in the H’s, I conjecture for Howard.
The Chronicles of Chrestomanci is in the L’s. I’m guessing that it occupies the position that The Lives of Christopher Chant would have.
I also noticed one amusing thinko:
Oops.
And, copying over from the other thread: 56 read, 6 more either TBR soon or part of Mt. Tsundoku. (Might be 7 – isn’t Akata Witch on the Lodestar shortlist?)
From the previous thread: 18, plus about four more that are on Mt Tsundoku.
===
Mike, Moray is in Scotland, not Ireland!
@Avilyn
The Collapsing Empire feels like if The Fellowship of the Ring ended with the council of Elrond. All the players are gathered and the stakes are set and then it just ends. It feels like a really, REALLY good setup for a novel with three or four times the page count.
I figure I’m going to wait for the rest of the series to be released and then tear through them in one go. It would be too frustrating to read it in serial chunks as they come out.
Hugo wise, I can’t imagine such a discreet chunk of serial fiction being a best novel. If the rest live up to it maybe it will be a good best series.
(1) Twenty-five out of 100 here, which surprised me–usually I don’t have that many on lists like this.
(9) OMG, that tiresome little twit. *sigh*
(1) And of course I reflexively start counting…and then complexify my counting to include “own but haven’t read” and to track author gender (within my ability to identify — I’m not certain I recognized all the non-binaries). Better gender balance than usual, though somewhat skewed male. (Rather delightful not only in how many recent works were included, but in the specific choices for much older works. Yay for My Father’s Dragon — one of the first books where I made an effort to track down the rest in a series!)
I’ve read 34, with slightly more than half of those by female authors. I own-but-haven’t-read 13, nearly all by female authors. So that doesn’t quite bring me up to 50% overall, but I guess I’m ok with that.
(1) HUNDRED BEST. Still about 1/4 read, 1/3 in Mount TBR or nearby, and happy to see a list from a genre site like this. 🙂 Quick reminder to everyone:
BTW, it’s not said, but I feel like some of the first-in-series listed are really just stand-ins for the series. Yes, I realize they did list some series/omnibuses, but when I think “X was one of my favorite series” and then think “…and book 1 is what got me started on this,” I can see people not always considering which book in the series was best, or just putting down book 1 as a shorthand.
(2) NEW GROENING SERIES. Must have! 🙂 Oh yay (?!), my other half makes us pay for Netflix. Whew!
(4) SEEMS LIKE FOREVER. OMFG!!! Sheesh, people, stop trying to trademark generic words in a romance context! Oh yay, this person did see the light of reason. Gah, though.
(9) JDA WILL PROVE LOVE. Oh, man, that is just so sad. Also, “trans for Trump” sounds like an oxymoron (possibly without the “oxy-“). Also: “Inhumanly”?! Who treated JDA as other than a (jerk) human? Le sigh.
@Mike Glyer: Of course, I did grin at your headline for #9. 😉 He’ll prove something, all right. ::scowl::
(13) SUMMA WHAT? Hahaha, I read about this earlier today at Joe.My.God. So pathetic (Publix, I mean)! A little too much automation and a little too context-ignorant.
@JJ: You’re not a huge reader?! In which reality would that be? 😛
PJ Evans: Well, doesn’t that blow my headline all to heck. I should have known that when it comes to touring a great Scotch distillery, Chip’s idea of what is a “sidetrip” while attending an Irish Worldcon would be more flexible than mine.
(1): I was slightly surprised to discover I’ve read twenty of these.
@Kendall: @JJ: You’re not a huge reader?! In which reality would that be? You beat me to it!
Kendall: You’re not a huge reader?! In which reality would that be?
Good catch; that was supposed to say “I’m not a huge reader of fantasy (I read mostly science fiction)”. 😀
@JJ
You and me both. They don’t pull that in my backyard. And certainly not during my first year going to WorldCon.
Though my experience with JDA so far tells me that his protest will consist of…..one guy… Maybe two or three.
I would advise to still be civil to them even if they are not to us. No insults, no toxic language or behavior. As much as I want to passively aggressively sigh and/or laugh…I won’t even do that.
For one thing, it is the right thing to do. We are better people than that. Secondly, we don’t want to inadvertently give them any more fuel or “prove their point” about the folks that attend WorldCon. If they do start trying to start something, I don’t want to be anywhere near it. Third…they are not worth the time. I am going to WorldCon to do Convention things.
1) Oh, a list. I find I have read 27 of those, with another half dozen or so on the ‘must find that’ list.
Here is the best place in the world for a movie about the end of it, we are getting our very own comic book universe sporting stadium! Disney has taken up sponsorship rights for Melbourne’s Docklands https://www.theage.com.au/melbourne-news/marvel-lous-disney-wins-naming-rights-to-melbourne-s-etihad-stadium-20180524-p4zh5i.html
@JJ: LOL, that makes a lot more sense!
@Lanodantheon: If I were going to W76 and if I were accosted by JDA or (if he has any) a crony, I’d either ignore them or, if that was too difficult, say something like, “Please don’t talk to me.”
Well, okay, I’d just try to avoid wherever they were stationed. 😉 But trust him to make maximum nuisance out of himself. ::eyeroll::
@Ken Richards: Marvel Stadium?! Well, it’s better than some of the company-sponsored names in the U.S., like “Jiffy Lube Live” or “FedEx Field.” Marvel Stadium sounds like where you’d go to see superheroes fight! 😉 (But in general, I dislike sponsor naming like this, at least when it replaces a long-standing name.)
ObHugoReading: While waiting on the Hugo packet, I’m slowly reading Raven Stratagem a.k.a. “Tenfox Gambit.” I’m making horrible use of non-work time; I should’ve finished it by now, but am only getting around to reading when it’s bed-time, so I only get in a little each night.
Current Audiobook (non-Hugo, gasp!): I just started The Spirit Eater, the third in “The Legend of Eli Monpress” series by Rachel Aaron. I’m a little bummed someone I hoped wouldn’t turn into some kind of major villain . . . came back and seems to be doing just that. Other than that, this started out with some interesting backstory and worldbuilding delights, Luke Daniels is doing a great job (as before), and the series still rocks! I mean, I’m like a long prologue and a chapter in, but so far, so great. 😀
1) I’ve read 42(!) of the books and have several more waiting somewhere on Mount Tsundoku. There are some of them that I haven’t liked at all, but I recognize that they have been very popular among others. On the whole, a good list.
(1) I’ve only read eleven of these, which isn’t surprising–for whatever reason, I tend to score low on these Top Arbitrary Number lists. I do have several of the others on the docket, though: some of them I own and haven’t gotten around to reading yet, and I’ve made mental notes to eventually get to others. It doesn’t help that I’m somewhat erratic in which genres I read: I’m currently working on Boone’s Lick, a Larry McMurtry western, and my two reads prior to that were crime novels by Joe Lansdale and Elmore Leonard.
For my money, while Wizard and Glass is terrific, I would have picked The Waste Lands as the best Dark Tower novel (or just listed the series as a single entity).
I have a copy of The Mists of Avalon that I purchased at a library sale a couple of years ago. It’s been sitting at the bottom of a bag while I decide what I want to do with it. I bought it after the allegations against Bradley went public but before I knew of them (I didn’t used to follow SFF news like I do now), and while I’m usually able to approach books on their own terms, it might be tough for me to avoid judging it based on what I know now. Two things are in my favor, though: A. She’s dead. B. Even if she weren’t, it was a used copy that I bought for a buck, so it’s not as though I’d be supporting her. I’ll probably read it one day; I just have to decide when I want to do it.
Vorkosigan Reading Update: A Civil Campaign was very good! Ivan improved some, though still did stupid things. Bujold had a lot of things going on (at least, it felt like more plots and side-plots than usual), but it worked well and came together nicely. The bug stuff got a bit tedious occasionally, but generally was a good light-hearted B- or C- plot.
I just finished Winterfair Gifts, which had two minor things that bugged me. Minor! Other than that, it was kinda delightful. 🙂
#1 Having the third-person narrative use “m’lord” seemed weird and grated for me. I don’t recall Bujold going quite this over-the-top (unlike, say, Rachel Caine in the “Weather Warden” series before I dropped it) in having the third person generic narrator talk quite so much in the POV character’s voice. When Roic’s thinking or talking, using his term made sense; otherwise, it just bugged me a little.
#2 Ekaterin [rot13]gnyxvat gb na nezfzna nobhg Zvyrf’f frk yvsr orsber ure[/rot13] seemed wildly out of character. She may be not quite so reserved as before, but it seemed like the kind of wildly improper over-sharing that she just wouldn’t do. Cordelia, sure, in a heartbeat (and methinks she did). But Ekaterin? That brief exchange didn’t work for me.
::prepares to get beaten up by VorkosiFans and/or writers::
Other than that, it was very good. More Taura and seeing through Roic’s eyes were both great, as was Grover Gardner’s narration (as usual in this series).
I finally decided to go with Falling Free next, before moving on to Diplomatic Immunity. I mean, after The Spirit Eater
(1) Lots. Kept getting distracted by fond memories and losing count.
Kendall: If I were going to W76 and if I were accosted by JDA or (if he has any) a crony, I’d either ignore them or, if that was too difficult, say something like, “Please don’t talk to me.”
My concern is that they will harass and intimidate anyone trying to walk past them into the convention center, and claim that they’re “just trying to engage attendees in conversation about discrimination in SFF”.
I think that the concom will need to keep an eye on these people if they show up, to prevent them from doing that.
@JJ: Oh, for sure! I’m just thinking on a practical level, what I would do if I were attending this year. I’d try to avoid, ignore, or gently rebuff, in that order. That’s not instead of, e.g., hoping the conomm would keep an eye on them. 🙂
Dear JJ, Kendall, et al.,
JJ is correct. If JDA breaks the law (and people might be advised to look up the legal definition of assault), the San Jose Police Department should be brought in. The convention should NOT be brought in. This is not occurring in convention space, they have no jurisdiction nor authority, and bringing the con into it is exactly what JDA wants — he is looking for a confrontation with Worldcon.
As they say in milfic, “Do not engage. Repeat. Do not engage!” Ignore him. Do not respond in any way, do not ask him to leave you alone, just ignore him. No matter what he says or does. Unless it is illegal, in which case call the police.
You do anything else, you will be giving him exactly what he wants. He is going there as a provocateur. He will attempt to provoke, the same way Milo and Coulter went to UC Berkeley to provoke. It would be too much to hope that every fan will have the presence of mind to simply give him the cut direct, but it is what we should be striving for.
Also, this is for your own preservation: this is a man who C said he is entirely willing to record people against their wishes in “self-defense.” In the public space of San Jose, he even has legal right to do so, for any reason he chooses. ANY interaction you have with JDA has the real possibility of winding up on the Internet. Unless you want to risk becoming another public player in his drama, DO NOT ENGAGE!
– pax \ Ctein
[ Please excuse any word-salad. Dragon Dictate in training! ]
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— Ctein’s Online Gallery. http://ctein.com
— Digital Restorations. http://photo-repair.com
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(9) Timothy will be protesting the protest (note: not counter protesting which is something else altogether) because he feels excluded by Jon’s use of the term ‘inhumanely’. He projects ‘8 bajillion’ others will be joining him but he is vague as to what he means by ‘others’ and he might be including his own gut bacteria in the head count.
Ctein: DO NOT ENGAGE!
You’re missing the point. It is all well and good for people who’ve witnessed JDA’s harassment and abuse of authors and fans on Twitter to know not to engage. But that does not help the unaware and unprepared attendees he may waylay outside the convention center.
1) I count 71, with many of the rest in the TBR pile.
i think I may be more fantasy oriented than the average here.
And did lots of fantasy reading in the 70s and 80s when much of the list was being published.
9) “Civil rights activist Erin Sith” turned up chasing headlines in Berkeley.
The best way to handle the pair of them is with complete non-engagement.
Dear JJ,
How in the world am I missing the point?
My advice would apply to **everyone.** I don’t expect to get it to everyone– no one could. I don’t expect everyone to follow it, people being what they are.
Tell what point my advice misses or how it is in error, please.
pax / Ctein
Ctein: Tell what point my advice misses or how it is in error, please.
You’re preaching to the choir. It isn’t the people here, who know who and what JDA is, who are the concern. It’s the ones who don’t, and your advice is not going to reach those people or be helpful to them.
(11) It looks like there are three distilleries in Dublin: Jameson, Teeling, and The Dublin Liberties. The Temple Bar is also in Dublin and has its own line of whiskey but the whiskey is not distilled in Dublin. All four establishments seem worth a visit.
That “100 Best Fantasy Novels” list is one of the most flagrant examples of cultural subliteracy I’ve encountered since . . . well, perhaps ever (aside from the similar list I assembled in high school, but I’m not sure about that). It has a very few saving graces (no Piers Anthony, for example) but is mostly marked by an astonishing level of determined ignorance about the history and landmarks of the genre.
I won’t quibble about the listers’ most unsound decision to systematically list the first volumes of series as the best, or the wholesale exclusion of most darker writers from LeFanu and Machen through Lovecraft and Smith up to Straub and Shirley Jackson, or the failure to adequately represent non-English-language writers (although Calvino and Jansson are quite hard to miss, even if Bulgakov and Lagerkvist might be.
How does The Worm Ourobouros go unmentioned? Have the list compilers never encountered Three Hearts and Three Lions or The Broken Sword? Lin Carter’s editorial acumen was less than comprehensive, but so many books on the list are clearly inferior to the Adult Fantasy Series’s Lud-in-the-Mist and The Island of the Mighty.
The selection of juvenile/YA works is bizarre. No Nesbit? No George MacDonald? Norton Juster? American literary writers from Cabell to Gardner to the present are a looming absence (although, to be fair, much of the best relevant work is at shorter-than-novel length). For a list that overweights contemporary urban fantasy and related schools, it is strange not to see even a mention of Charles de Lint. The list’s compilers seem to be wholly unaware of Kenneth Morris, who Le Guin declared one of the three great fantasy stylists. Even among standard genre/category figures, there are inexplicable omissions; perhaps de Camp’s work does not stand up to its reputation, but novelists like Davidson, Swann, Hodgell, Powers and most especially Fritz Leiber cannot be so casually dismissed. To say nothing of Gene Wolfe, which is precisely what the list’s compilers do.
Why call attention to such wretchedly informed commentary?
Moray is not the most accessible bit of Scotland even. I think you’d be traveling for most of a day to get there.
Wow, I don’t consider myself much of a fantasy fan, but I’ve read nearly half of those books! (46, for those scoring at home.)
There were a few cases of “right series, wrong book” and a couple of “right author, wrong book”, but overall, a better list than many I’ve seen. A few I wouldn’t have included, but no glaring omissions. 🙂
On the other hand, given that I’m not much of a fantasy fan, it didn’t really impact my TBR list much. There were several which I already have on my list, but aside from that, nothing much leapt out at me.
@Kendall The closest we get to superheroes at the stadium are the team mascots who wander the boundary before the game, entertaining the kiddies. There is a mosquito with bomber wings, a cat with a big head, and even a Captain Carlton going around. Agreed, Marvel is a better choice than Stadium, which seems to be the default marketing choice these days.
The do not engage approach seems wisest for dealing with JDA. Long stretches of folk providing the ‘you’re not there stare’, punctuated with the occassional polite rebuff do not the internet outrage viral video make, which I’d warrant is the aim of the exercise.
I’m in the final stretch of ‘The Will to Battle’, which is every bit as engaging and infuriating as its predessessors. Listening to ‘UBIK’ in the car. Where have al the telepaths gone…? Finished volume 7 of my reread of the Foreigner series. Still makes the grade. In other news, CJ Cherryh has reported a possible 5 book deal with DAW.
Dear JJ,
Am I? You wrote:
“I think that the concom will need to keep an eye on these people if they show up, to prevent them from doing that.”
The concom has no say nor jurisdiction.
You and others have talked about engaging him politely. I am saying not to engage at all.
I am not “preaching to the choir,” I am giving advice. You assume everyone here already knows all this. All my experience with this kind of politicking says they don’t.
For the life of me, I cannot figure out you are getting all up in my face over this, but please cut it out.
If you think any port of my advice is bad, engage that. If none of it is bad, then move on, but stop busting my chops.
As for getting the word out, feel free. Broadcast it far and wide.
pax / Ctein
Ctein: I cannot figure out you are getting all up in my face over this… stop busting my chops.
Um… I haven’t done either, my posts to you have been quite mild, and it seems to me that you are being hypersensitive.
(9) Maybe the incel contingent will show up and they can all go fuck themselves.
(1) surprisingly 49. And yes, wrong Pratchett.
I agree with both Ctein & JJ.
Ctein, I agree with you. Mike has been reporting on JDA’s activities for some time now. And the File770 regulars have seen how JDA reacts to his own words & actions being reported. We have also seen how JDA responded to attempts by people (including some File770 regulars) to engage/disengage with JDA. We are not unaware of his history. I (and I expect most of the commenters here) would not willingly engage with JDA, but any Filers who choose to do so will be fully informed.
I equally agree with JJ’s comment that you are preaching to the converted here. The readers here already know, it’s those who have yet to discover JDA (what’s the antonym of ‘serendipity’?) who need the warning & advice.
@Lauowolf, thanks for mentioning this detail. I’m primarily a fantasy reader as well, but I didn’t really get into it until the mid/late 90s, and I’d been surprised not just by how few of the titles I’d read, but by how many of the authors/books I didn’t recognize as well.
(4) So you’re saying someone got too cocky? But not forever?
(9) But who goes outside when the two main hotels connect with the convention center? So he and his buddy can stand out there (in mid-August) all by themselves.
Well, until they start hassling people, at which point convention center security and/or the cops will tell them to move along. Which they will, since Jon-boy doesn’t have the guts to actually deal with authority and especially not get arrested.
I finally made it through “The Way of Kings”. That is the longest introduction I ever read. How much longer does this go on?
Meh. Back to Raksura #2 and then on to City of Whatsits.
Lurkertype: But who goes outside when the two main hotels connect with the convention center?
There are significant blocks of attendees at several other hotels, one of which is the party hotel. There will be a lot of attendees walking outside the convention center.