- Ballard
- Obituaries and tributes by Christopher Priest, John Clute, Toby Litt, Malcolm Edwards, Geoff Manaugh, Michael Moorcock, David Cronenburg; further links collected here
- Ballard’s last short story, and the rest of the Guardian’s Ballard features
- I have finally watched the finale of Battlestar Galactica, and my basic reaction is: oh dear. It’s most frustrating because I don’t think it would have been hard to make it good; see, for instance, Abigail Nussbaum on the need for the ending to have the courage of its convictions. Other links:
- Analysis of character arcs in “Daybreak”, part one and part two
- SF Signal’s Galactica finale Mind Meld
- Peter Watts; Amanda Marcotte; laurashapiro; Matt Ruff
- A roundup of other reviews
- Awards news
- This year’s Tiptree Award winners are Nisi Shawl, for Filter House, and Patrick Ness, for The Knife of Never Letting Go; I’ve not read the former yet, but I’m pleased by the latter, which I think is not only a good winner of the award, but also pleasingly Tiptree-ish in the ferocity of its execution
- The ballot for the Shirley Jackson Awards
- Samantha Hunt’s The Invention of Everything Else, which I rather liked (but not everybody is so keen) is on the shortlist for this year’s Orange Prize
- Reviews
- Edward James reviews the Arthur C Clarke Award shortlist. The winner is announced on Wednesday.
- Nic Clarke continues her Clarke reviews with posts on Anathem, Martin Martin’s on the Other Side, and Song of Time
- Adam Roberts reviews Pop Apocalypse by Lee Konstantinou
- Matt Denault reviews Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente
- Abigail Nussbaum reviews Mr Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters by John Langan
- Paul McAuley likes the new Star Trek film
- We should all go and see Sleep Dealer, apparently
- Adrienne Martini reviews Yellow Blue Tibia by Adam Roberts
- Miscellany
- A Dollhouse vid, and a response to the vid with which I broadly agree.
- “Racism and science fiction“, by Samuel Delany, from NYRSF in 1998
- Obligatory reviewing meta: the future of newspaper sf/f reviews, and reconsidering responding to reviews
- The genre bestsellers of 2008
- And a reminder that the BSFA website is now fixed, after the problems the other week, and in particular that the forums are now back up and running.
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One might note that the story the Guardian printed as Ballard’s “last” is indeed apparently his last short story, but that it was first published in Interzone way back in 1996. I think it’s a bit cheeky of the Guardian to by omission imply that they received it from JGB’s hands, ink still wet, as he breathed his last.
I’m glad Wheeler posted that because, as he says, “I think it’s important to be clear-eyed about what people are actually buying, reading, and enjoying, and lists like this help that.” the list itself isn’t very shocking but it is a bit depressing.
One thing: it is no surprise that Star Wars sells loads but I was surprised that Tobias Buckell’s Halo novel sold 170,000 copies given the canon is so much less well developed. I wonder how much Predator: South China Seas sold.
Regarding the Halo novel, the sales might be less surprising when you consider that the latest Halo game has sold 5.9 million copies. Also note that most buyers paid $60 for the game; a tie-in novel is a relatively cheap way for a fan to get more Halo content.
I’m sure raw volume of original product is a major contributing factor but I was still surprised at how big the effect was, particulalry in the abscence of a fandom of the sort that Star Wars has. Gears of War 2 sold over 4 million copies in its first two months of release, I wonder what the figures for Karen Traviss’s are?
Plus a film and a game remain two different media. I can see why a Star Wars fan would want more narrative content, I’m less sure why a Halo fan would want it considering the game isn’t primarily narrative based and has an essentially infinite amount of content in the form of multi-player. Certainly I would prefer to just play Halo and read Crystal Rain.
Hey, I totally play Halo for the story.