So, I have finally come to the end of my several-month-long quest that is the five books of the unfinished A Song of Ice and Fire saga, AKA A Game of Thrones The Books.

I’m not feeling the entitled outrage that GRRM hasn’t finished writing them yet, but I’m sure it’s gonna kick in any day now.

I’m still digesting it all, but wanted to start processing some of my thoughts about this series, its incredible popularity and acclaim (even before the TV series started, but way more now) and its role at the centre of so many discussions about what’s right and wrong with the fantasy genre when it comes to the representation of women, gender issues, and sexuality.

What intrigued me most, to tell you the truth, is that whenever the big discussion about female characters in epic fantasy fiction starts up again, ASOIAF (Game of Thrones is SUCH a better series title, just saying) is frequently cited on both sides of the argument – that is, as an example of a male writer writing a variety of female characters in a rich, nuanced and substantial way, AND a male author writing female characters in an extremely problematic way.

Looking at the books from the other side, I have to say – well, yep. Both those things are true.

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So it’s my 35th birthday! It was a pretty chilled out day. My presents so far have mostly included chocolate and tea which is most pleasing and appropriate, though I’ve also received a couple of rather lovely pieces of crockery for my new (super old) kitchen dresser: a gorgeous Persephone Books bowl featuring a pomegranate design from Alisa, and a TARDIS teapot from my honey.

Raeli gave me a beautiful piece of artwork – a sketch depicting our family in the Trojan War, playing Sparkly Monopoly, napping together (that is, me and the girls piled on top of each other reading books while their Daddy naps deeply beside us which is ENTIRELY ACCURATE), and a family portrait of us as fairies.

Lunch, some actual reading time (shock!) and I also probably spent more time than I should have working on a post about A Song of Ice and Fire. I got a single lovely child free hour thanks to my honey taking Jem for a walk to buy CAKE.

Jem went through a slightly frantic and stressful (for me) art period in the afternoon – MUST MAKE ART MUMMY – which involved clue and paper curls and cutting random bits of paper and oh gah, artistic children. Lovely but also messy and inconvenient. I am proud of her love of art but there are times when I just want her to go watch some nice tidy television instead.

But the really cool thing is that before dinner, my whole family gathered together and watched all 5 episodes of The Mind Robber (1968) with me! I’d always thought that the ‘books and fairy tales’ theme of this story would make it a Classic Who my girls were likely to enjoy despite the whole black and white thing, and I was right! Not only my three-year-old Hartnell fan Jem watched rapt but after one episode of casually playing Minecraft while glancing up occasionally, Raeli was hooked too.

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In which we chew over shortlists, awards winners, book covers and gender issues, all of which pales in comparison to the FIRST QUILT IN SPACE.

Download or stream the episode here, or get it direct from iTunes.

Hugo Packet! What are YOU going to read? Would password protected freebie novels put you off reading them?

Locus Award finalists

Sturgeon finalists

Campbell Memorial Award finalists

Mythopoeic Award finalists

Nebula winners

Aurealis Awards winners

Comments: Tansy on “winning too many awards” & Keith Stevenson on why the awards are just fine and don’t need to be ‘sorted out’. To add some positivity (which more accurately reflects most people’s experience of this awards night!) check out Sean’s Storify of the AA’s night and Tehani’s post on attending at the last minute with lovely frockage pics. For even more gorgeous pictures, Cat Sparks’ Flickr feed is the way to go!

The coverflip experiment, started by Maureen Johnson’s piece on Huffington Post.

The artist behind the Georgette RR Martin cover discusses her imaginary brief.

Hawkeye Initiative Coda – using humour & art to get the gender point across in the workplace.

THE FIRST QUILT IN SPACE! Frontier craft for the final frontier.

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The 1990’s were an important era for me as a Doctor Who fan. They represent my teen and early adult years, when I was building on my fannish love.

This decade – and in fact the entire period from 1990-2004 (with a brief holiday in 1996) is often referred to as ‘the Wilderness Years,’ coined by the team who worked on the eternal Doctor Who Magazine during this era and feel the need (quite rightfully) to point out their valiant efforts in maintaining a quality media tie in publication without a regular show to support. For more than a decade.

In truth, the 90’s were full of Doctor Who – just as the Target novelisations came to a natural end, the VHS releases of classic stories took off with a vengeance, bringing new audiences to old stories. The original series of adult New Adventures and Missing Adventures novels began in 1991 and produced an enormous quantity of stories over the next six years, only to be replaced by the similar-but-different BBC Book range of Eighth Doctor Adventures and Past Doctor Adventures which continued well into the new Millennium. There were comics and radio productions (okay not many, but some). Here in Australia we had even Doctor Who repeats on the ABC, often in the crazy early hours, which gave me the opportunity to see some Fifth and Sixth Doctor stories for the first time ever.

So yes, there was a lot happening with Doctor Who in this decade, but a lot of it hadn’t started yet in 1990. I freely admit that this at least was a Wilderness Year, though for many it wasn’t entirely clear that Doctor Who had in fact ended…

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So, that crime-writing alter ego of mine has a pretty exciting weekend coming up in a few weeks. Those of you likely to be in Melbourne on 14th June, check out this awesome Sisters in Crime event!

Josephine Pennicott, Poppy Gee and Livia Day have all set their novels in the Apple Isle, but with different and fatal twists. Presented by Lindy Cameron, a Sisters in Crime National Co-convenor and author.

Sydney-based Josephine Pennicott is the author of three fantasy books and now Poet’s Cottage (Pan MacMillan), a mystery novel set in a Tasmanian sea-fishing village in the 1930s and present day. It was sold in a bidding war to Ullstein publishers (Germany), along with Currawong Manor, her current mystery-in-progress.

Poppy Gee, who was born in Launceston, spends every summer with her family at its shack in the Bay of Fires, also the title for her forthcoming debut novel (March, Hachette). The body of a backpacker washes ashore at the idyllic small town in Tasmania and the close-knit community starts to fall apart. As long-buried secrets start to come out, the delicate balance of their fragile lives is threatened. Poppy has nearly completed her next novel, another literary thriller set in the Tasmanian ski village Ben Lomond.

Livia Day has lived in Hobart for most of her life and A Trifle Dead (Deadlines/Twelfth Planet Press) is her first crime novel. The action revolves around Tabitha Darling who has always been a dab hand at pastry and a knack for getting into trouble – not a useful trait when she’s trying to run a hipster urban cafe?, invent the perfect trendy dessert, and stop feeding the many (oh so unfashionable) policemen in her life. It all goes pear-shaped when a dead muso is found in the flat upstairs. Livia fell in love with crime fiction at an early age.

DETAILS …
Venue: The Rising Sun Hotel (upstairs – no lift, cnr Raglan Street and Eastern Road South Melbourne)
Dinner: upstairs from 6.30pm (no need to book)
Men or ‘brothers-in-law’ welcome
Sun Bookshop stall: members get 10% discount
Melways: map 57H2
Trams: 1, 55, 112 or St Kilda Road trams
Parking: free on-street parking after 6pm

www.sistersincrime.org.au

For the last couple of years I have attended the Sydney-hosted Aurealis Awards weekend, which is always a blast. Sadly I was reining back on travel this year and couldn’t make it – but it sounds like those who were there had a great time! Check in on the #AurealisAwards hashtag on Twitter to see some of the commentary on the night from those who were there. Sean the Blogonaut also Storified the event which provides the highlights in Tweets and Twitpicks.

Some great results here, and congratulations to all the winners! Special congratulations to Margo Lanagan who had a great night, taking out four awards (each chosen by separate juries!) for Sea Hearts, “Bajazzle” and “Significant Dust.”

I have to say, I found it pretty tiring that so many people (including tons that I love and respect) started trotting out the jokes so early about Margo winning so many awards, or as the jokes implied, TOO many awards. (Note: the jokes started before her first win) It reminds me of the recent commentary about Hilary Mantel in the UK winning “all” the awards and not leaving any for anything else. The jokes might all have been intended as good-natured joshing, but it’s a disappointing aspect of Australian culture in particular that there is such a low ceiling to people (even friends) celebrating your success, before they turn around and start suggesting (in jest or otherwise) that it’s something you should be ashamed of.

Chances are pretty high that Margo found it as funny as anyone else there last night, but as an onlooker on the proceedings the sheer weight and number of those jokes flying thick and fast across Twitter did make me a bit uncomfortable.

Sometimes, as I tweeted last night, an author has a really spectacular year, and awards reflect that. Margo Lanagan is one of our best authors, who happens to have put out a fantastic novel AND a brilliant original collection in the same year, and I know she wasn’t taking those wins for granted.

Margo is aces & I love her as a person as well as for her writing, and I doubt very much she will ever have a night where she goes home with four trophies again, so let her enjoy it, eh?

This might be a good time to link to the article that reworks Helen Garner’s speech for the Stella Prize recently – about how awards can mess with your head as a writer, regardless of whether you win or don’t win.

And now, the Aurealis Award winners! A great range of works being honoured here, very much worthy of a ‘To Read’ list. Too many of the winners are my actual friends so I’ll just say congratulations to EVERYONE. Worth noting that there’s quite a spread of publishers being covered here, from old hands HarperCollins and Allen&Unwin to new kids on the block digital-only publisher Xoum and some Aussies published overseas with NightShade and Clarkesworld. Twelfth Planet Press flew the flag for Australian indie presses with three short stories honoured from two Twelve Planets collections, Through Splintered Walls by Kaaron Warren and Cracklescape by Margo Lanagan. There was even a self-published winner with KJ Bishop’s collection – so, variety!

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Another decade down, and that means it’s time for another WHO-50 round up!

The Eighties was a turbulent time in Doctor Who, beginning with the cancellation of the part-filmed Shada, and ending with the hiatus and final “rest” of the show beloved by so many. The showman sensibilities of producer John Nathan-Turner meant some fantastic guest stars and overseas filming, and script editors Christopher Bidmead (science should not be silly), Eric Saward (if you’re going to have violent stories, let’s make them PROPERLY violent) and Andrew Cartmel (let’s show you just how sneaky and manipulative the Doctor has to be to save the universe) put their stamp on the show, as did the three actors who came in to play the Doctor in the wake of the iconic Tom Baker: Peter Davison, Colin Baker, and Sylvester McCoy.

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Probably the most important blog post I read in the last week is the update from the long-missed Hyperbole and a Half about her depression. As ever, she slices through the hard and complicated issues with a sharp, dissecting knife, using humour and clever artwork to communicate something of deep value and significance. While I am sure that many who suffer from depression will find something powerful in this post, I think it may have particular relevance to those who never have felt the symptoms of clinical depression, and despite their best intentions have trouble understanding how it FEELS.

I have a horrible feeling that I have been, more than once, that gabbling friend trying to give helpful advice about a thing I know nothing about – and this post brought home exactly how little I know about this particular type of mental illness despite having many friends who have suffered from it in their lives. As with all great writing, this piece made me think differently about myself and the universe. Also, it’s horribly hilarious. Highly recommended, and I’m so glad to see H&aH back.

This sweet story is about a mother who decided to go beyond the ‘princess’ motif for her daughter’s fifth birthday commemorative photo, and dressed her up as a selection of feminist historical heroines.

A nice coda to the Hawkeye Initiative – how the genderflipping art project inspired an employee at a gaming company to take a stand and communicate a problem to her boss in a creative, classy way.

How Muriel Spark Saved Mary Shelley – the fascinating story of how “the canon” of literature really can be changed. Because, you know, it’s all about perception of value.

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David is coming to New Who for the first time, having loved Classic Who as a kid. Tehani is a recent convert, and ploughed through Series 1 to 6 (so far) in just a few weeks after becoming addicted thanks to Matt Smith – she’s rewatching to keep up with David! Tansy is the expert in the “Doctor Who in Conversation” team, with a history in Doctor Who fandom that goes WAY back, and a passion for Doctor Who that inspires us all. We are working our way through New Who, using season openers and closers, and Hugo shortlisted episodes, and sometimes a couple of extra episodes we love as our blogging points. Just for fun!

“Turn Left”
Series 4, Episode 11
THE DOCTOR – David Tennant
DONNA – Catherine Tate
ROSE – Billie Piper
WILF – Bernard Cribbins
SYLVIA – Jacqueline King

TEHANI:

So here we are at “Turn Left”, the only other Hugo nominated episode from this season, which I think is a bit sad because the Doctor/Donna season is one of my favourites. We just passed “Midnight”, which despite being Donna-lite, is really rather exceptional, I thought. Certainly one of the creepier episodes, with a good hard look at human nature (and, weirdly, it reminds me of how reality tv shows work, when they shove a bunch of strangers into a small space and see what happens). Lesley Sharp as Sky Silvestry is really quite marvellous, doing some incredible dialogue with Tennant. And of course we get a bonus fandom points with Colin Morgan (Merlin) as Jethro and David Troughton (yes, Patrick Troughton’s son!) as Professor Hobbes.

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Many fans have pointed out the role of Ace, the last of the “classic Who” companions, in shaping what the modern companion of New Who would look like. In particular, there has been a great deal of commentary and analysis about the changes that were starting to be made during this last gasp of Doctor Who (not just the idea of the companion as protagonist, and raised emotional stakes for the Doctor himself, but also stories that reflected a more gender-aware and diverse Britain) and how this seems to have had a powerful impact on the returning version of the show, especially the 2005 Eccleston and Piper season.

This is hardly surprising, as McCoy’s Doctor and Ace’s character were not just central to the last “proper” run of the show, but also remained the focus of fan and pro creativity for many years in the decade that followed, and many of the fans, pros and fannish pros who were part of that world were themselves involved in the return of the show.

Ace is not Rose, not by a long shot, but there are many elements of her character that demonstrate her influence over the creation of Rose, and why RTD might have thought that the returning show should revolve around the family, angst and narrative of a working class teenage girl.

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