Link Round-Up: July 30, 2010

Books:

• Interview: Booklife hears from 11 Writers on Writing Zombie Fiction.
• Interview: John Scalzi speaks with S.A. Swann, author of Wolf’s Cross.
• Interview: Suvudu interviews Scott Sigler, author of Ancestor.
• Interview: Volume of Kindle book sales stuns Amazon’s Jeff Bezos.
• News: Amazon predicts it will sell more e-books than paperbacks next year.
• News: Barnes and Noble Plans Big Push for Nook E-Reader.
• 18 Contest Dos and Don''ts for Writers
• Anne Rice Quits Christianity. Readers are shocked. “Rice was a Christian?”
• Battle lines drawn over digital royalties
• Booker Prize longlist snubs genre fiction (again); should we give a damn?
• Huffington Post has a list of The 15 Biggest Bestsellers EVER After The Bible.
• Jo Walton asks Why hasn’t Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell been more influential?
• Tor.com discusses the 2010 Hugo Awards Best Novelette Nominees.
• The Wall Street Journal wonders How Low Will E-Reader Prices Go?

Quote

The first time I read an excellent work, it is to me just as if I gained a new friend; and when I read over a book I have perused before, it resembles the meeting of an old one.
— James Goldsmith

Link Round-Up: July 27, 2010

Books:

• Interview: Ann and Jeff VanderMeer talk steampunk at the Comic Con.
• Interview: Brandon Sanderson talks with Suvudu about the Wheel of Time.
• Interview: China Mieville took a few moments out of his very busy Comic Con Schedule to discuss his newest novel Kraken.
• Interview: Christopher Paolini interviews Patrick Rothfuss at Comic Con.
• Interview: Margaret Atwood interviewed by The Globe and Mail.
• Interview: Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist interviews Ian McDonald of The Dervish House… so does the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography.
• Interview: The Sun-Times profiles Nnedi Okorafor.
• News: Stieg Larsson becomes the first author to sell a million Kindle e-books.
• Cracked names 6 Great Novels that Were Hated in Their Time.
• The Daily Press offers this Ode to the death of the paper book.
• Flavorwire shares 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Ray Bradbury.
• Larry Doyle on Genre and Expectations
• New Maps of Science Fiction

Comics:

• Batman: the Least Believable Superhero

Movies:

• 10 Under-Appreciated Sci-Fi Movies

Writing

• 3 shell scripts: Kill weasel words, avoid the passive, eliminate duplicates 
• A. Lee Martinez discusses The Burden of the Smart Protagonist
• Boost your book sales with the magic of niche marketing
• Is "avoiding tropes" the same thing as telling fresh stories?
• The Other Side of the Story: When Plots Go Astray
• Publishing Is the New Literacy: 3 Things Writers Must Know
• A Quick Introduction to a Malaysian and Malaysian SF/F
• Tolkien's Use of Language to Highlight Settings and Events
• The Trouble With Mid-Career Advice.

Book Trailer: The Lost Thing by Shaun Tan

Book Trailer for The Lost Thing by Shaun Tan

Link Round-Up: July 22, 2010

Books:

• Interview: Functional Nerds interviews L.E. Modesitt Jr.
• Interview: Innsmouth Freepress interviews John Joseph Adams, former assistant editor of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.
• Interview: Wizards of the Coast speak with the adventures designers Ari Marmell and Scott Fitzgerald Gray.
• Bookstore Bingo: 13 Of The Most Ridiculous Things Overheard In Bookstores.
• Curtis Brown debunks the Top 10 Myths About Our E-book Future.
• Digital Shockwave: How Millions of Dollars and the Survival of the Publishing Industry are at Stake
• Down This Gravel Road: A Look at Contemporary Rural Fantasy.
• Jacob Lambert offers The Millions : A Report on the Vonnegut Effect
• Laura Anne Gilman discusses The Lasting Appeal of Urban Fantasy.
• Why Cell Phones Will Dominate the E-Book Market in China.

Link Round-Up: July 21, 2010

Books:

• Interview: Orbit interviews Ken MacLeod, author of The Restoration Game.
• Interview: Southern Fried Gamer interviews Judy O’Dea of the funny yet informative How to Survive a Zombie Apocalypse.
• Interview: StarshipSofa interviews Ray Bradbury. [Podcast]
• News: Toronto Burlesque Festival to showcase 'Naked Girls Reading'
• Bookstove names 100 Science Fiction Novels Everyone Should Read.
• NPR explains Why The Next Big Pop-Culture Wave Might Be Libraries.
• Online University Reviews offers a list of 75 Signs You’re a Bibliophile.
• Suite101 discusses Tolkien's Use of Language to Highlight Settings and Events.

Quote

Books. They are lined up on shelves or stacked on a table. There they are wrapped up in there jackets, lines of neat print on nicely bound pages. They look like such orderly, static things. Then you, the reader come along. You open the book jacket, and it can be like opening the gates to an unknown city, or opening the lid of a treasure chest. You read the first word and you’re off on a journey of exploration and discovery.
— David Almond

Link Round-Up: July 20, 2010

Books

• Interview: Apex Books interviews Ari Marmell, of The Conqueror's Shadow.
• Interview: Murder by the Book speaks with Gail Carriger, author the Parasol Protectorate series.
• Interview: Tim Kring discusses his new book, Shift, with Suvudu.
• News: Amazon: Kindle Books Now Outselling Hardcovers.
• News: Swiss bank to lift lid on hidden Kafka works.
  
  

Library Parodies Old Spice Guy Ads

Brigham Young University's Harold B. Lee Library has just created the internet's most popular library promotional video.


In a 50 second spot, a university student channels the Old Spice guy, urging students to start using the library to study. Inside five days of its release, the video earned over 1.2 million views on YouTube.

The New Spice Blog has behind-the-scene photos from the production and crew credits.

Awards: 2009 Sky Awards Announced

The results of the 2009 Sky Awards, presented on July 18, 2010 at a ceremony in Beijing, China, have been announced. Sky Awards are given to science fiction and fantasy stories published in Mainland China in the previous calender year.

• Best Fiction Long Form in 2009: Once upon a Time in Shanghai, JIANG Nan (Volumes Publishing Company)
• Best Fiction Short Form in 2009: “Dark Room”, HAN Song (New Realms of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Jun 2009)
• Most Popular Translated Fiction in 2009: The Girl Who Leapt through Time, Yasutaka Tsutsui, trans. by DING Dingchong (from The Girl Who Leapt through Time, Shanghai Translation Publishing House)
• Special Contribution Award: Odyssey of China Fantasy – a SF/F magazine

Visit the Official Sky Awards Website.

Link Round-Up: July 19, 2010

Interview: Functional Nerds interview Hugo winner Mike Resnick.

Interview: Geek Syndicate interviews Karen Miller, author of The Reluctant Mage.

Interview: Notes from Coode Street speaks with Gary K. Wolfe.

Interview: Suvudu On Air interviews Scott Sigler, author of Ancestor. [Podcast]

Interview: Ted Chiang talks about the future of publishing at ReaderCon.

Review: The Great Geek Manual plugs Ripley's Believe It or Not: Enter if You Dare.

Quote

Books are the most wonderful friends in the world. When you meet them and pick them up, they are always ready to give you a few ideas. When you put them down, they never get mad; when you take them up again, they seem to enrich you all the more.

— Life Is Worth Living: First and Second Series by Fulton J. Sheen

Print: Bride of Frankenstein

Bride of Frankenstein posters by Martin Ansin on sale at Mondo

Cover Art: New H.G. Wells Covers

Spine Publishing, a new publishing house that has a unique interest in reviving classical literature for modern audiences, is rolling out a new line of H.G Wells books designed by Faceout Books.