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Jan 28, 2005
Bad news for fans who buy their sf in central London: the
building containing the triple bookshop Murder One (crime),
Heartlines (romance) and New Worlds (sf/fantasy) will shortly be
demolished. Maxim Jakubowski's crime and romance sections are
moving to smaller premises on the other side of Charing Cross Road
at 'about the end of March' -- but owing to lack of space there,
New Worlds will cease to exist. A final book sale is already under
way. Andy Richards of Cold
Tonnage Books confirms: 'Yes, the real shame is that the sf
section as a whole is closing. My second-hand section is just a
part of it.' But his mail order business continues.
Publishers and Sinners. Possibly the most astonishing
novel ever written, Atlanta
Nights by 'Travis Tea' was created to test -- preferably
to destruction --
PublishAmerica's
claim to be a serious 'traditional publisher' with old-fashioned
trappings like editorial standards. James D. Macdonald explains:
'Thirty authors answered the call by banging out a chapter or two
over a long weekend. They were each given a brief outline and a
few character notes. They then wrote their chapters -- without
knowing what might be in other chapters, whether their chapter was
first, last, or somewhere else in the narrative, what time of year
it was, or much of anything else. Any accidental literary
competence was rapidly blue-penciled into oblivion. The result
varied from unreadable to incoherent. The manuscript was submitted
to PublishAmerica by a volunteer. PublishAmerica bought the book.'
The perfection of this story is slightly marred by the fact that
(on counsel's advice) the hoax had to be revealed before signing a
contract which guaranteed that the book was written solely by the
figurehead author, whereupon PA seized the opportunity to back
out. Instead it's been published by
Lulu.com (see
readers' comments), with profits going to SFWA's emergency
medical fund.
Douglas Adams is officially a heavenly body. The
unremarkable object that had been provisionally named 2001 DA42 --
conveniently encapsulating his death date, his initials, and his
Ultimate Answer -- was confirmed
this week as Asteroid Douglasadams.
British SF Association Awards shortlist for 2004 novels:
- Alastair Reynolds, Century Rain
- Kim Stanley Robinson, Forty Signs of Rain
- Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
- Ken MacLeod, Newton's Wake
- Ian McDonald, River of Gods
- Jon Courtenay Grimwood, Stamping Butterflies
Six novels are listed owing to a tie for fifth place.
See the other
categories here.
R.I.P. Bruce Cassiday (1920-2005), US author and
historian of sf and crime fiction, died on 12 January. He wrote
the novelization Flash Gordon: The War of the Cybernauts
(1975, as by Carson Bingham) and edited Modern Mystery,
Fantasy, and Science Fiction Writers (1993).
Poetry Corner. Among the preliminaries to the UK
National Science Week (March 2005),
Terry
Pratchett's 'Ode to Multiple Universes' was aired by BBC
Radio 4 on 14 January.
Letter Column. M.J. 'Simo' Simpson gloats
correctively: 'I was surprised to read a report in Screen
International that my screenplay of Richard Marsh's The
Beetle was "in advanced development" at the modern
day incarnation of Hammer Films. Almost as surprised, it turns
out, as the CEO of Hammer Films, who has expressed his liking for
the script but has not yet optioned it. It seems that some staffer
on the trade paper, reporting Hammer's latest co-production deal,
got somewhat confused about the facts. Film journalists, eh? Who
would trust them?'
Real Lit'ry Awards. The US National Book Critics
Circle awards shortlist of five titles includes two of genre
interest, David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas and Philip Roth's
The Plot Against America. (Publishers Lunch, 24 Jan)
Lambda
Awards (gay, lesbian, etc) sf/fantasy/horror nominees:
- Michael Jensen, Firelands
- Greg Herren, ed., Shadow of the Night: Queer Tales of the
Uncanny and Unusual
- Jim Grimsley, The Ordinary
- Jean Stewart, The Wizard of Isis
- Nicola Griffith, With Her Body
Thog's Masterclass. Solid Geometry Dept. 'The
capsule was a truncated cylinder, perhaps four meters in diameter
at the base and three at the top ...' (Charles Stross, Singularity
Sky, 2003)
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 couple of dozen Hugo awards. He continues to add
books and Hugos.
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