04.24.04

Has David Pringle started a trend with his plans to hand over control of Interzone? You could have knocked me down with a slim digest-sized magazine when I heard that Gardner Dozois is moving on after more than 19 years in the editorial chair at Asimov's. 'Other projects,' such as writing more books of his own, await. Executive Editor Sheila Williams steps into Gardner's enormous shoes; meanwhile he'll keep up the Asimov's connection as Contributing Editor.

Nebula Awards.

  NOVEL Elizabeth Moon, The Speed of Dark

  NOVELLA Neil Gaiman, Coraline

  NOVELETTE Jeffrey Ford, 'The Empire of Ice Cream' (Sci Fiction 2/03)

  SHORT Karen Joy Fowler, 'What I Didn't See' (Sci Fiction 7/02)

  The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

Another SF Prediction. Slavishly imitating the title gadget of Jonathan Lethem's Gun, With Occasional Music, there's now an MP3 player ('AK-MP3') designed to fit the ammo clip slot of a Kalashnikov. Read all about it here.

R.I.P. Peter Diamond (1929-2004), UK actor, stuntman and stunt arranger who choreographed lightsabre duels (and had bit parts in) the original Star Wars trilogy, died on 27 March. He also worked on Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Princess Bride, Who Framed Roger Rabbit? and Highlander.

What the Papers Say. The Herald's story about the fabulous Charlie Stross's Hugo nomination ('A little known Scots writer hopes to follow in the footsteps of JK Rowling ...') mentions an illustrious past winner: 'Issac Asimov, the legendary Russian author.' (19 April)    The Sun paid homage to Interzone with its 15 April headline 'Universe "Is giant pringle". ('The universe is curved — like a giant ...')

James White Award for best unpublished story by a new writer: Deirdre Ruane, 'Lost Things Saved in Boxes'. Christopher Priest spoke for the judges' panel: 'I'm supposed to say how difficult the judging was, but in this case it was really very easy. The winning story was obvious to everyone as soon as we read it.'

Publishers and Sinners. Prometheus Books, best known in fan circles for sceptical nonfiction — Martin Gardner and company — is launching a new sf line in Spring 2005, with Lou Anders of Argosy as editorial director. The imprint name is Pyr (not, alas, PyrE).   Jonathan Weir, who in late 2002 moved from Amazon.co.uk to run Voyager sf publicity at HarperCollins UK, was made redundant by the latest HC 'restructure' on 15 April.

Thog's Masterclass. Swinging Sixties Dept. 'Blake had a tantalizing glimpse of two impudent little breasts which made up in quality what they lacked in quantity.' [Later:] 'Blake noticed that when she was angry her bust measurement was fully adequate.' (J.T. McIntosh, 'Planet on Probation', Science Fantasy 42, 1960)

David Langford is an author and a gentleman. His newsletter, Ansible, is the essential SF-insider sourcebook of wit and incongruity. His most recent books are Different Kinds of Darkness, a new short-story collection of horror, SF, and fantasy, Up Through an Empty House of Stars: Reviews and Essays 1980-2002, 100 pieces of Langfordian genre commentary, and He Do the Time Police in Different Voices, a short-story collection that brings together, all of Dave's SF parodies and pastiches. (This is a scary thought. Are you ready to laugh that hard?)

Dave lives in Reading, England with his wife Hazel, 25,000 books, and a few dozen Hugo awards. He continues to add books and Hugos.