Do you wish the publishing industry used some other standard besides Microsoft Word?
Novelist Charles Stross published an anti-Microsoft Word manifesto recently, inspiring debate among writers with a revolutionary thesis: “I want Microsoft Word to die.” Check it out:
It imposes its own concept of how a document should be structured upon the writer, a structure best suited to business letters and reports (the tasks for which it is used by the majority of its users). Its proofing tools and change tracking mechanisms are baroque, buggy, and inadequate for true collaborative document preparation; its outlining and tagging facilities are piteously primitive compared to those required by a novelist or thesis author: and the procrustean dictates of its grammar checker would merely be funny if the ploddingly sophomoric business writing style it mandates were not so widespread.
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Science fiction novelist Charles Stross has inked a “ a major six figure deal” with Tor Books to publish a new trilogy set in the alternate history world of his Merchant Princes series.
Caitlin Blasdell of Liza Dawson Associates negotiated the deal. “I couldn’t be happier than if a sequel to Robert A. Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land was discovered,” quipped senior editor David Hartwell in the release.
Here’s more about the series: “Tor published the first six books in the series to great acclaim beginning in 2004 and looks forward to publishing the new books starting in 2015 … In 2008, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman devoted an entire article to analysing the series from an economic standpoint, and, in 2009 attended the World Science Fiction convention, opening the show with a 75-minute conversation with Stross.”
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Science fiction writer Charles Stross recently held an Ask Me Anything interview on Reddit, sharing tips for aspiring writers.
Stross (pictured, via) shared a link to the free Turkey City Lexicon, a handy collection of overused cliches, terms and techniques in science fiction writing (compiled by Bruce Sterling and Lewis Shiner). However, many of the problems mentioned in the free collection can help all kinds of writers.
Here’s more about the handbook: “This manual is intended to focus on the special needs of the science fiction workshop. Having an accurate and descriptive critical term for a common SF problem makes it easier to recognize and discuss … The terms here were generally developed over a period of many years in many workshops. Those identified with a particular writer are acknowledged in parentheses at the end of the entry.”
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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Jane Rogers has won the 2012 Arthur C. Clarke Award for her novel, The Testament of Jessie Lamb.
Below, we’ve embedded free samples of all the books on the shortlist for the UK’s prestigious science fiction prize.
Here’s more from Tom Hunter, the Prize director: “”It wasn’t an obvious Arthur C Clarke winner – it’s not from a science fiction publisher but from a small Scottish press … It offers a route into dealing with quite serious issues, about science, about maternity and about making choices.”
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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Recently, I walked into my favourite SF bookshop, Of Science And Swords, and asked for something science fictional, as opposed to fantasy. "You're in the mood for SF today ... as always," said the proprietor. He knows me. It's not that I don't like fantasy at all - hey, I write the stuff! - but that I'm picky. Any Tolkien wannabe is right off my list, as is anyone who writes about long-lost heirs to kingdoms that have been usurped, anything with a Dark Lord (see above, Tolkien wannabe), any Mary Sue about an ordinary girl who suddenly discovers she is the princess of wherever (well, I'll make an exception for teen fiction, kids love more of the same) - you know the routine. But when I buy a new book, I want something with a little hard science in it.
I had heard of Charles Stross in Nova Mob meetings, but never read any of his books. So I picked up The Atrocity Archives which is a cross between spy fiction and Cthulhu horror, in which things worked a little differently back in the past and there's an entire branch of the public service dedicated to keeping the Lovecraftian monsters out, when they're not having to attend committee meetings and account for spending on paper clips.
And it gives very good scientific arguments for the magic in the book.
It's a hoot and I am about to read The Jennifer Morgue, the next book about Bob Howard (Bob as in Robert Howard ... geddit?) the monster-fighting computer geek.
If you live in/visit Melbourne, drop into Of Science And Swords - it's well worth the visit and the folk there love spec fic, unlike some bigger shops.
By the way, I have just started teaching this year's 8A and have discovered one of the boys is madly into the subject of alchemy. Who'd have thought it of a 13-year-old?
