Via the Double-Boing, Ed Yong of Discover‘s Not Exactly Rocket Science blog presents a graphical representation of his writing process, which is so incredibly similar to my own experience of writing reviews and essays that it’s almost scary… right down to the querulous “maybe pissing around on the internet would help?” (It never has yet, but I refuse to deny it the chance.)
A website called The Short Review has just republished a review of the Solaris Book of New Science Fiction Volume 2 which I wrote for Interzone a while back.
Well, all but one of the reviews for Interzone #217 are in. All that remains to be done now is give them a thorough editing sweep and email them off to TTA Towers …
… and then step out of the driving seat. Yup – thanks to the pressures of actually having lots of proper paid work coming at me from various angles, as well as all the other as-yet-non-lucrative stuff I’m entangled in, plus the fact that a lot of my new work puts me in the direct employment by authors and/or publishers, I’m stepping down as Interzone‘s Reviews editor as of the forthcoming issue.
Hard to believe I’ve been doing it for a year. In some ways it feels like much longer, in other ways it feels like I only just started. One thing’s for certain: if time were no object, I’d not be leaving the post, as I’ve had a lot of fun doing it and worked with some great people in the process. But time is the one resource that no amount of mining, outright theft or invading other countries can secure for you; as I’ve just said in an email to my team of reviewers, the Interzone gig is the easiest thing to disentangle myself from – not easy, by any means, but easiest.
In addition to being vaguely informative to the blogosphere at large, this post is to thank all the people I’ve worked with indirectly as a result of being IZ‘s Reviews Editor – the publishers, authors and website types who form part of the network of genre. Thanks for going easy on a neophyte, and for teaching me a lot in the process!
I’m looking forward to using that knowledge (and gathering more) in my various other posts – as PS Publishing‘s PR guy, as website-manager to various stars of the genre firmament, as Futurismic‘s editor-in-chief, and as a critic and writer in my own right (time permitting, natch, especially regarding the latter). Meanwhile, my Interzone post will be taken on by the eminently capable Jim Steel, who I’m positive will do a job far superior to my own.
All change!
As should be apparent already to regular readers, I get sent a lot of CDs these days. Here are just some of them:
That’s about a third of the albums I’ve been sent to review in the last year – the third that I’m actually interested in keeping, naturally. The others will be migrating their way to second hand shops some time in the new year.
I’m quite astonished at myself, really – if you count pieces pending publication, I’ve written well over 200 pieces of music journalism in the last year. Crikey.
As the above isn’t really a very creative photograph, you can have a bonus shot from the gig I went to last Sunday (I know, I’m too good to you):
That’s Ash from Southampton pop-punk band Not Advised, who is probably most unimpressed by me not only capturing a great gurning moment, but plastering it on my review of the show at The Dreaded Press.
There’s an interview with the band, too. Not my normal cup of tea, music-wise, but a damn fine live act and a lovely bunch of lads to boot.
I remember being that full of enthusiasm once – perhaps if I hang around young musicians more I’ll rediscover the secret!*
I’ve pre-empted some of my music hack news above, but it’s been a busy week nonetheless.
Work continues to gather for The Dreaded Press, which is great news – I’m immensely chuffed that tomorrow (at very short notice) I’m interviewing the infamous Ginger, frontman of The Wildhearts and pathological side-project creator. Which is going to be awesome.
Hey, my interview with David Yow went live, in case you didn’t notice. I’m rather pleased with it (though Morrissey’s lawyers may be less so) – here’s a teaser quote:
“That’s the thing — I can handle eating nothing but baked potatoes and baked beans for a week, if that means that every night I get to get totally f*cked up and sleep with some slut who I never met before and will never speak to again, y’know?”
There’s no slacking for me next week either – Monday sees me reviewing Minus The Bear, and later in the week I’m interviewing Benedict Hayes of Enochian Theory for The Dreaded Press.
That last one is a bit of a cheat, in that I know Ben of old (local chap, lovely fellow, very tall, Cornish, mad), but his band are doing the brave new “start your own label and go it alone” thing, and I think it’ll be interesting to talk about the hows, whys and wherefores.
Still waiting on the replies from Henry Rollins, and just entered into negotiations (read as “pleading begging emails”) to arrange an interview with Bob Mould (Hüsker Dü, Sugar) some time early next year.
Haven’t actually done any reviewing of books this week, having been instead concentrating on actually reading books instead, which has been very pleasant – I’d forgotten what it’s like to read a book by choice.
However, it appears the note-taking habit is now thoroughly ingrained … so my ARC of Stross’s Halting State is now festooned with post-it markers, as has become my tradition. I think I’ll probably review it anyway – it’s a strong novel with some good talking points, and it’s not like there’s any shortage of places to publish it.
Also minimal. My excuse here is that I’m still doing the self-tuition thing with XHTML and CSS, which is a slower and more frustrating process than I’d like. But hey, when was learning something worth knowing ever easy, right?
Only one confirmed literary arrival this week, namely my latest assignment for Vector in the form of Swiftly by Adam Roberts**, which I’m pleased about – Roberts is a challenging read, but that’s half the appeal for me. Although this is one of his works that bolts on to a literary classic – in this case, Gulliver’s Travels – which leaves me in a bit of a bind.
Yes, I’m ashamed to admit it, but I’ve never actually read Gulliver’s Travels (though I know a fair bit about its content by inference). Methinks a trip to Project Gutenburg is in order if I want to do this one justice.
There may be more titles that should have arrived this week – if the “you were out” red card from the Post Office is anything to go by – but as it’s the (allegedly) festive season, I can’t go and check until tomorrow because they’re busier than usual. Selah.
Another high-velocity week has hurtled by. As much as I loathe [the holiday that shall remain nameless], I’m looking forward to having some downtime just so I can recover from what has felt like twelve months of relentless acceleration. Having discovered that my mother now has wi-fi at her house (w00t!), I should be able to finish up a lot of back-burner stuff in time for the new year.
Of course, we all know the saying about best-laid plans, so I’m not going to make any bets just yet. If I can just get some fiction writing done and develop a pre-emptive stock of Friday Flash I’ll be a happy man. Anything else will just be gravy. Mmmm. Gravy.
And talking of gravy, my tongue pines for the taste of cumin and other Eastern spices, which means I should be making tracks toward the Temple Of Culinary Delights and make my obeisance at the altar of The Friday Curry.
So have a good weekend yourselves, ladies and gents, and stay warm. Hasta luego!
[* Or get arrested on suspicion of more dubious motives, maybe.]
[** For which the rather fetching jacket art is seemingly unavailable online as yet. Sorry.]
I expect many of you will have already noticed that the guys at SF Signal were short of more erudite commentators, and hence decided to ask me to contribute to their new “Mind Meld” feature. The question was:
The responses are very interesting, actually – quite harmonious in many respects, though with everyone playing their own little melodic riffs on the theme. Go take a look, leave some comments over there.
***
While we’re on the subject of the effect of the web on genre fiction, here’s an intriguing thinking-out-loud post from Jeremiah Tolbert, who’s wondering where he should be submitting to build up his short fiction career:
“For a while, I decided that I would only submit my work to places that would take electronic submissions. I was making so little off of the sales that I did make that it wasn’t worth the cost of postage and envelopes. I haven’t decided whether I should change that policy yet or not, honestly. So many ‘zines do take electronic submissions now. Which don’t? F&SF, Asimov’s, and Analog. The so-called “Big Three.”
I’m kind of curious to see if I can build a reputation for myself without appearing in those markets. They don’t pay that much better than anyone else, and their circulation isn’t spectacular (although it may be better than just about everyone except Escape Pod). It’s kind of weird, but for the purposes of building an audience, I think making reprint sales to Escape Pod might be the best thing I can do for myself.
That’s a very weird situation, and really represents the state of the industry.”
The man has a point. Your thoughts?
What a rotten week for weather, eh? It’s turned quite clear today, but there’s been little opportunity for taking pictures outdoors in the last seven days.
So, it’s lucky I got some half-way decent shots at the Electric Eel Shock show last weekend, isn’t it?
Yes, they’re as endearingly crazy as they look. If you like your rock and metal music – but don’t take it so seriously that you can’t stand to see it spoofed – you really must see Electric Eel Shock play live.
A friend who I took with me described it as “the most hilariously enjoyable gig I’ve seen this year”. It’s a fair description. More shots available if you’re interested.
As the above should make plain, I have a review of the last show of Electric Eel Shock’s European tour for you to read over at The Dreaded Press … but of course, as you’ve all subscribed already, you’ll already know about that, and the handful of other stuff that’s appeared over there in the last week or so.
The really good news is that there’s much more to come. I’m very pleased to have gotten myself onto the mailing lists of five PR outfits already. That’s small beer for the big players, but not bad going for a one-man-band site that’s two months into operations, as far as I’m concerned.
So, I’ve got a stack of material with forthcoming release dates that I need to get reviewed, which means I’ll have to start incrementally pulling back on the writing I do for other sites. Which is kind of a shame, as I’ve become rather fond of the discipline of doing it .. but onwards and upwards is the way.
I’m off out again this Sunday to a local show by a young band called Not Advised, and I’ll be interviewing them also. That’ll be my first face-to-face interview off my own back for my own site! Yay!
In the pipeline (sometime after the New Year passes) will be a chin-wag with Justin Broadrick, formerly of Napalm Death and Godflesh, currently of depleted-uranium-shoegaze-metal band Jesu – I’m looking forward to that one, I can tell you.
Other interview news – I’ve sent off a batch of questions to Sir Hank of Rollins, and am eagerly awaiting the responses. The PR sent the first draft back, because I included about three times as many questions as he’d have the time spare to answer …
I’ve been shown the preliminary typeset PDFs of my Iain Banks article, and I have to say I’m fairly pleased with it. You lot will have to wait for the next issue of Interzone before you can give me any feedback, of course … 
Otherwise, no reviewing to report this week, as I’ve been busy wrangling with music deadlines. But for the first time in ages I have no outstanding or pressing deadlines of a literary nature, which has given me the chance to (gasp!) read a book just because I wanted to.
I’m not complaining, because I love my reviewing work, but it’s strangely liberating to walk up to your shelf and think “hmm, what do I fancy?” The [holiday which shall remain unnamed] break (which I will be spending in the tranquillity of the Yorkshire countryside) promises to be a catch-up reading binge of truly satisfying proportions. wh00t!
Of course, in the meantime I need to figure out how to deal with the Interzone reviews section in light of the seasonal postal delays …
No hay libros o revistas esta semana. Apesadumbrado, amigos.
Well, if (comparative) brevity is a virtue, this is one of the more virtuous FPBs of recent times. It always feels odd to have little to report, and somehow a little disappointing … what that says about my personal psychology, I have no wish to know in detail.
I’m working on this “content to be myself” thing right now, and at the times it fully clicks into gear I can see why people who are good at it make a point of recommending it. Practice will (hopefully) make perfect – or as near to perfect as is possible in an imperfect universe, eh?
Enough blather – I have things to do, and I expect those of you who are still reading this far down the page probably have things to do as well (no matter how well you may have convinced yourself otherwise).
So, before setting off on the traditional jaunt to collect The Friday Curry Of Intestinal Righteousness And Olfactory Justice, I will bid you all a good weekend – have fun, ladies and gents.
Well, the Readercon panel on book reviews seems to have generated a lot of dicussion around the issue … kind of the inverse of the Eastercon panel, which took place after the worst of the smoke had cleared from that particular salvo.
“My own credo is simple. A review should be honest (any reviewer who allows her opinion to be swayed by friendship, bribery, peer pressure or whatever, is not worth reading), defensible (I don’t mind if people disagree with my judgement, I am quite used to being the only critic to hold a certain position, pro or con, on any particular book, but I want to be sure the readers can see why I reached that particular judgement), and, so far as I am able, well written (a review is also an entertainment, the reader should be rewarded for taking the time to read the piece). This credo, it should be noted, is an aspiration; I have no idea how close I ever get to achieving it.
Notice I say nothing about reviews being good or bad, positive or negative. It is part of the honesty of a review that if you don’t think a book is any good you have to say so. It is also part of the honesty of a review to recognise that very very few books are entirely wonderful or entirely terrible, and the job of a reviewer is to identify and note that balance. Because of that I do not believe I write positive reviews, or negative reviews – but I hope I write honest reviews.”
Result. Paul Kincaid is one of my newly-inherited reviews team at Interzone, which – given his pedigree and experience – is quite bizarre, because by rights he should be the person editing me. Though I doubt he wants the administrative headaches that come with the post – another indicator of his native common sense!
He and I (and others) are keen to see what comes from Jonathan’s plans for Son of Scalpel, too. This debate – for better or for worse – probably has a good few years mileage in it yet.
We move away from photos of plants (and, indeed, from actual photos taken with an actual camera) for this week’s FPB, because … well, because I’ve not taken any. So instead, here’s a snapshot of me checking out an air kraken in Babbage Square, Second Life:
I went to see Babbage because it was one of the places Warren Ellis mentioned in his column about ‘awesome builds that seem like ghost-towns’. A fair assessment, too – Babbage is a beautifully made steampunk-themed sim, but it was dead as a Victorian doornail when I went there, except for a few other people who’d obviously had the same idea about following Mr. Ellis’s list of suggestions. That flying squid just had to be photographed. You can buy your own, too. Second Life is like that.
***
Even that screen shot is from over a week ago, too – time has been short, and SL exploration has to, by necessity, be one of the first casualties of temporal triage. I think my keyboard is starting to resent the ceaseless battering – it keeps sighing whenever I sit down in front of it.
Of course, I could be making all this up, couldn’t I? Yakking on about how busy I am in an attempt to make you all think I’m something I’m not? Well, I might be trying to convince you I’m a more professional and successful writer than I really am, but I assure you that I’ve been working. In fact, I have the proof.
I pointed earlier in the week to my critique of Mike Resnick’s Starship: Pirate at SF Site (and in doing so proved the axiom of the Summon Author spell), so you already knew about that. But I write about music too, you know – and a whole lot of my stuff has gone live on the intarwebs in the last week.
For Subba-Cultcha.com, I have reviewed albums by Dungen (trippy), Azalea City Penis Club (interesting), and Blacktop Mourning (by-the-numbers emo pop). Plenty more stuff already submitted but yet to be published.
For Pennyblack Music, I have reviewed albums by the Young Gods (mind-blowingly brilliant industrial) and Malkovich (craftily nihilistic Dutch metal lunacy), an EP by Silicon Vultures (very promising but as yet unpolished), and live shows from Pelican (supported by These Arms are Snakes) and Clutch (supported by The Sword). Here too, at least as many pieces again still pending publication. And I still need to write up and submit my interview with Franz from the Young Gods that I recorded on Tuesday …
Plus I’m off to review Biffy Clyro and supports on Sunday night, and on June 2nd I get to interview the mighty desert rock heroes, Fu Manchu! OK, so I don’t get paid for any of this, but it’s great fun and great portfolio. If I can just work out how to survive on three hours sleep a night, I’ll be doing brilliantly. And there’s paid work in the offing, too – I’ve got my first test copywriting assignment for the Sea Your History project to work on. I have to boil down the Admiralty’s attitudes and approaches to naval dis- and re-armament in the inter-war years … to 500 words! Yipes!
***
So, incoming materials for the week are all magazines (because I only count items that I intend to read, which invalidates the latest batch of teen vamp-shagging novels from Orbit … the public library will be more grateful for them, I expect):
Hell knows when I’ll get time to read them, though, because I’ve also received the recommended reading list for the SF Criticism Masterclass next month – and it’s … well, it’s extensive. It’s also almost entirely made up of articles from learned tomes of crit that I have little or no chance of getting hold of, so it’s lucky that the SF Foundation’s library can supply me with copies of the relevant articles and extracts. I don’t think I’ll be doing much reviewing of books this month, that’s for sure.
Oh, and talking of reviewing and Interzone, I think I can now safely reveal that I have just become Assistant Reviews Editor for Interzone, which is something I’m inordinately proud to announce. I think it’ll be a lot of work, but well worth it for the prestige alone. How I will manage to eventually fill the wonderful Sandy Auden’s shoes, I have no idea, but I’m going to give it the best shot I have.
***
So, there you go. I really have had a busy week – not that you ever doubted me, of course, but I like to be able to back up my assertions occasionally. But now that I have shared the wonder that is my week-to-week existance with you, good people of the internet, it is time. It is time for That Thing Which Must Be Consumed On A Friday … I’ll need the calories to keep me at my desk all weekend, if nothing else!
Have a good one, boys and girls.
Rejoice, veterans of VCTB; for this week FPB returns to plants, its original subject of observation!
About three months ago, I’d been making homemade guacamole (which was less than successful, truth be told) when I found myself about to throw out the stone from the avocado. “Hang on a minute,” I thought to myself. “I wonder if I can grow an avocado tree from this thing?” So I turned to the mighty intarwebs (source of all knowledge, accurate or otherwise), which advised me to put the stone in a pot of compost (pointy end up), moisten the compost thoroughly, and then seal the pot in a freezer bag and leave it somewhere sunny.
Above is the result, released from it’s bag only yesterday (because I’d quite forgotten it was there at all). Whether it will survive in the non-tropical UK climate, I have no idea – but given the fact we’ve just had an April that felt more like a June, I may be able to go into business selling my homemade guacamole … if I ever get the recipe nailed. I’ve been to the avocado capital of the world, y’know; did I ever tell you that?
***
Sheesh. Another week flies by – but I’ve not been idle, oh no. I submitted a critique of Mike Resnick’s Starship: Pirate to SF Site. I read, took extensive notes on and reviewed Dark Space (which was rather good, as it happens), and I’ve written four CD reviews and an essay for Pennyblack. I’ve also been poking at a new project that, although unpaid and entirely voluntary, has a real creative appeal to it – and which I shall talk about more when details are forthcoming. I haven’t got as much done as I hoped I would this week, but that’s par for the course really. I’ve met all my deadlines, and that’s the unbreakable rule. The pipeline is not clogged. Yet.
But thank [insert whichever deity, physical constant or expletive you prefer] for bank holiday weekends, because I could do with some rest time away from the computer screen. That said, I have a couple of assignments to finish before Monday arrives, so it won’t be all sofa and sunshine. Plus I’m off to review the rather excellent Nine Black Alps on Sunday night – a night out of the house with some raucous guitar music included in the deal. Result.
***
Incoming materials are fairly thin this week, if you don’t count the CDs (which, for FPB purposes, I don’t). The May issue of F&SF has arrived, and seeing as it contains a Bacigalupi story I may be forced to cherry-pick from it at some point over the weekend.
But the real rosette of the week is the eventual arrival of something I’ve been looking forward to for almost six months:
Mwahahaha! My copy of David Marusek’s short story collection Getting to Know You! At last!
When you consider the fact that I’ve been engaged in a few email discussions recently that deplore the whole ‘limited edition’ culture of the small press scene, it could be considered an act of hypocricy on my part to have shelled out the extra for a signed and numbered copy (#15, since you asked). In my defence I’d say that, for the little extra on top of the price of a normal Subterranean hardback, the chance to possess a signed artefact from an author that you [a] would jump in front of a moving train for, and [b] will probably never get to meet in person, was a hard thing to resist. So I didn’t. Resist, I mean.
And I know I’ve previously declared my ambivalence about book cover illustrations, but I’m unashamed to say that this is a gorgeous piece of work. Just look at that thing; lovely. Plus, being a SubPress job, the book itself is made to exceptional standards. I shall be savouring the reading of it as soon as I can find a window of opportunity in which to do so.
***
So, there it is, ladies and gents. Another thrilling week in the life of yours truly – I admire your fortitude and constitution, that makes you able to cope with vicariously experiencing my deeds and doings without passing out or expiring from the excitement! And so, the time for that most important of weekly rituals has arrived. I don’t know if any of you also intend to have A Friday Curry*, but regardless, I hope you have a damn fine weekend. Hasta luego.
[* Just a quick Eastercon flashback, and a commentary on the nature of being vaguely known within a select sphere of interest via one's internet activities: one of the weirdest moments of Eastercon for me occured on Friday evening. As I was stepping into a lift which was already occupied by a lady with whom I was completely unfamiliar, said lady asked me cheerfully if I'd managed to have The Friday Curry or not. It took a good thirty seconds of full-bore paranoia before I realised that she must be one of the silent subscribers to VCTB. So if you're reading, ma'am, accept my apologies for being impolite and neither asking your name or introducing myself in return. As I'm sure you could tell, I was a little shocked at the time ...]
Well, well. You think us genre reviewers and critics are a stroppy lot, you should see at the literary reviewers from US newsprint media getting all hissy about their platform being eroded away from underneath them. The Print is Dead blog has this to say:
“And when Winslow himself writes that the loss of book review sections will “[choke] off such discussion of books,” he couldn’t be more wrong. There is now, because of the Web, probably more discussion of books than ever before. But what really infuriates Winslow, and many of the other critics, is that all of this discussion is happening without them. So it’s not that books are being burned; instead, what’s happening is the self-importance of book reviewers is going up in smoke.”
That really underscores why I’m glad to see the genre scene thriving online – I think we may get over that particular hump before the ‘straights’ do. I can’t think of any reviewers in sf/f who I think of as being self-important – but then (with the obvious exception) I can’t think of anyone who has made it their sole career and source of income, either. There’s a corellation there, I think.
Meanwhile, Gabe Chouinard has come back in response to Jonathan McCalmont’s post that I mentioned yesterday. Señor Chouinard argues that a new critical venue should strive to build a new audience from scratch with innovatory approaches, rather than trying to entice away established readers from other venues:
“… street-level criticism is going to open up the genre dialogue to once and for all include people from outside of genre, rather than excluding them from the discussion. Our approach is meant for a NEW kind of audience, an audience that we have to manufacture from the ground up. There’s plenty of room for all kinds of readers in street-level criticism, and it’s my assertion that, by treating reviewing as a subset of the greater literary critical dialogue, we’re in effect opening the ghetto walls to allow outsiders to come in and have a good look around, without fear of stigma and without fear of rejection.”
Someone else responding to Jonathan (or rather, apologising for a response he neither finished or posted) is Andrew ‘SFBC’ Wheeler. After having had a while to ruminate on the matter, Mr. Wheeler has decided that his reaction to Jonathan’s post on the aesthetics of fantasy had roots in other things:
“Eventually the Clue Stick descended heavily on my head and I realized McCalmont was exactly the same sort of blogger as I was, and that was what annoyed me. (A similar realization hit me about William Lexner, previously — though I think Lexner really is trying to be incredibly obnoxious, while people like me and McCalmont just come off that way sometimes.)
So I’ve moved McCalmont into the mental category of “curmudgeons who occasionally annoy me but who I want to take seriously,” joining such excellent company as Barry Malzberg and Norman Spinrad (mostly for his book reviews, which I don’t read as often as I should these days). That doesn’t mean that I won’t post a “look at this stupid thing someone said” essay about any of them — that seems, for better or worse, to be a lot of what I do here — but I hope it means that I’ll take the idea seriously first…and only then reject it out of hand.”
As back-handed compliments go, they don’t come much bigger than that. I think.
A few other things of note, while I’m at it:
Matrix Magazine (another fine product of the BSFA stable) has an article featuring soundbite interviews with the shortlist nominee authors for the 200 Arthur C. Clarke Award. Ironic understatement award goes to Brian Stableford, talking of the importance of genre awards:
“It’s obviously better to have such reference-points than not to have them … [e]specially if they can occasionally whip up a little controversy.”
Controversy, Mr. Stableford? Surely not …
(Which reminds me, I wrote an essay ages back about the value of genre fiction awards, and it’s probably high time I looked at it again in the light of the huge amount I’ve learned since I first published it.)
As far as good reviews of the Clarke shortlist are concerned, you could do an awful lot worse than let the ladies from Eve’s Alexandra take you through them. Their take on M. John Harrison’s Nova Swing went up yesterday.
Last but not least, I propose the creation of a new award, to be given for ‘most laugh-out-loud metaphor deployed in a serious review of a serious genre novel’. The first winner for this award (which can be given out whenever I or anyone else decide it’s time for one to be announced) is Adam Roberts, for this genius line from his review of Ian McDonald’s Brasyl:
“Brasyl’s 2006, 2032, and 1732 are not, it turns out, part of the same timeline, but salami slices from different places on the sausage of the multiverse.”
As this is the inaugural award, the recipient sentence will provide the name for it; feel free to confer a Salami Award on any piece of critical writing you encounter and feel worthy.
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