Let’s just stop and bask in the glory that is Muppet nail polish. Muppet nail polish, people!
Also, a TARDIS corset. Doctor Who cosplay is one of those things that has made my internet a better place over the last few years. I love these crafty, creative geekpeople!
I was deeply sad to read this post by Cheryl Morgan, who is feeling beaten down by the mudslinging she has been experiencing for years, and decided to withdraw her connection to many fan, volunteer and professional projects. Cheryl’s commitment to our community and the science fiction field as a whole has always been inspiring to me, and it’s devastating to realise what the personal cost of that has been for her.
Tehani is running a blog series on the relationship between pro writers and indie press over at The Booknut. I particularly liked this guest post by Trent Jamieson.
Smart Bitches made me aware of this film about the Victorian medical treatments for hysteria, which looks like the best kind of British historical comedy gold, and features my beloved Sheridan Smith, among many others:
Ms Magazine, meanwhile, brought to our attention the sterling work of Geena Davis and her institute who have been investigating the dire representation of girls and women in kids TV/movies. (Thanks to Rowena Cory Daniells for this link) Hard data, people! It’s not just Pixar letting the side down, and I think it’s especially important that they are focusing on the effect this has on boys as well as girls.
Angry Robot announces Worldbuilder, a creative commons plan to expand the fictional worlds of their authors. i’m skeptical about this one – I’m all for not harassing fanfic writers, but the idea of commissioning fanfic for a work that hasn’t been published yet is a whole different ballgame. Still, will be interesting to see the results!
My plan was for today’s Friday links to be all about the SF gateway, but in breaking news, the World Fantasy nominations were released, and I’m SO EXCITED that Alisa Krasnostein has her first nomination! It’s for Best Non-Professional Achievement (some day she will be able to start paying herself and it will be Best Professional!) and I love that it is for Twelfth Planet Press rather than all the volunteer work she does in the community for projects like ASif & Swancon – much though I appreciate her work in that area, TPP is her future and for it to be the reason she has her first WF nomination is fabulous.
Congrats to all the nominees – I’m particularly delighted by the diverse and exciting novel shortlist, but also crowing over Rachel Swirsky’s novella “The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers beneath the Queen’s Window,” Jonathan Strahan’s anthology “Swords and Dark Magic,” and Angela Slatter’s exceptional collection, Sourdough and Other Stories. Also, extra congrats to Charles A Tan & Lavie Tidhar for their nods in the same category as Alisa, for Bibliophile Stalker and the World SF blog respectively.
But now, links!
I haven’t spotted quite as much analysis as I had expected about the significance of the SF Gateway, but here are some key posts from the last week or so:
Not sure I’ve linked to Kathleen Jennings’ The Dalek Game before, but I love her illustrative blog and this series which mashes up pencilled Daleks with famous book/movie titles are just adorable.
Linda Nagata gives an unvarnished account of her career trajectory as a female hard SF writer.
A discussion at the Mary Sue of genderbending in geek culture & cosplay – the impression I’ve got is that men dressing as women is a lot more acceptable in the cosplay community than this article suggests, though. I was delighted to hear there was a male Sarah Jane at the last Gallifrey, dressed in the Andy Pandy overalls!
Grant Watson reviews Summer Wars, a new anime movie which we watched recently with friends and I agree with Grant about how exceptional it is. A screwball family comedy and science fiction thriller combined! I love stories of big crazy families, and this handles that so well (though I was delighted today to find the wikipedia page that tells me who they all are and how they’re related to each other). I was amazed how much story and character was packed into the running length of a normal movie – and the combination of science fiction, contemporary issues (information hijacking, vulnerability of overstretched resources in the face of terrorist action) and deeply-felt emotions was fabulous. I particularly love the introverted hacker teen character Kazuma, and the sword-wielding matriarch grandmother, whose backstory is conveyed through mastery of the telling detail.
Chris Moriarty on the Women in SF conversation, and the danger of labels.
Thoraiya passed on a link to this fascinating article about the “chilly climate” for women in professional areas (such as the sciences) dominated by men, and one amazing woman who defined that term decades ago, as part of her work in the creation of policies to prevent gender discrimination. Most important quote: “This is changeable behaviour.”
Check out the current SF MindMeld for a variety of recommendations of writers outside the UK & US who are worth checking out – from many corners of the globe!
This one is small but elegant – which is unsurprising as it’s my second links post this week!
N.K. Jemisin wrote a very cool post about women’s roles in fantasy and the problematic nature of judging the strength and value of female characters by masculine standards – the conversation in the comments is interesting, as so many people jump in to talk about domestic skills and values in fantasy, and why giving a woman a sword isn’t the only way to make her a “strong” character.
But you know, when it comes down to it, the most awesome thing about this week was Noni Hazlehurst reading modern classic picture book, Go The Fuck to Sleep. Text Publishing hit on a genius method of publicising the fact that they are the Australian publishers of this instant classic for exhausted parents everywhere. Noni is a goddess as well as a national icon, and her performance of the book, including traditional Play School commentary & asides to the viewer, and a deeply authentic ‘going downhill rapidly’ emotional journey, is note-perfect.
The glee on Twitter as Noni’s reading was announced (you can keep your Samuel L Jackson, Americans!), the outrage as YouTube canned the video for offensive conduct (you know where you can go, YouTube…) and the joy as the video was re-released on other platforms… honestly, this is the most patriotic joy I think most Aussies have felt in years.
I skipped my Friday links post last week, because… well, you know. It was one of those days. I have so many links building up, though, I thought I’d better get one in now or I’ll end up having to produce a whole magazine by the time Friday comes around again! Also, some of my links are in danger of looking severely dated…
In other news, it is raining. Grim, vengeful rain. How else would you expect rain that holds off all day and then starts while I am EN ROUTE to pick up my daughter for school, with the baby in the back seat, so I don’t even get a head’s up that maybe today was not the day to put the baby in soft slippers? In other news, Jem has grown so much now that her feet entirely stick out of the stroller, and the plastic rain cover for said stroller. All of these facts are related.
Deb Biancotti is interviewed by Alisa at Galactic Chat!
Fabulous roundtable about (global) Women in World SF – every comment is packed with intelligent, thoughtful ideas. I am delighted such a thing exists in the world. Some important questions are asked, like – why is it so easy for urban fantasy to be excluded from any discussion on spec fic? And why is it that crime readers are so much more open to female authors than SF readers?
The roundtable was in response to this original post by Joyce Chng about women outside the English speaking world are doubly marginalised in the science fiction field.
Maureen Johnson takes on the writer of that Wall Street Journal article (podcast), on the topic of whether YA fiction is getting too dark for teenagers to be allowed to read – fabulous radio and it’s cool to see how articulate Maureen is in person. It’s irritating that the final word goes to a caller who is obviously just out to plug his own book and hasn’t actually been listening to much that has been said in the conversation, and I was disappointed Maureen didn’t get to comment on what he said, but for the most part I think her point of view came across clearly and the conversation was absolutely one worth having.
This post by Tricia Sullivan is getting a little long in the tooth now, but I think it’s absolutely worth checking out if you haven’t already. To put it and the conversation it responds to into context, it’s also worth reading these two posts by Cheryl Morgan: Here We Go, and Further Thoughts. There is some intelligent, interesting conversation in the comments of all three of these posts.
I’m still chewing over my thoughts on the upcoming DC reboot, and this is one of the best posts I’ve seen exploring some of the problematic aspects of regressing storylines, particularly when it comes to female and minority characters.
For those looking for a World Cup update from me, all I can say is it is no shame at all for the Matildas to have lost to Brazil, because come on, it’s freaking Brazil, they were up against Cristiane and Marta, so I’m really not being an Australian apologist to say that it’s impressive the gap between scores wasn’t much wider. (here’s a summary of the match from the Boston Globe)
Meanwhile, thanks to a combination of the ‘women’s football’ RSS feed from the Guardian and the presence of at least 4 Arsenal players, I’ve been paying a lot more attention to the England team, which is amusing to me because when the England men’s team plays anything I normally spend most of my time muttering at them with very narrowed eyes. I kind of love the video diaries the team have been releasing, if only to listen to their cute accents, though sadly they didn’t win their match either. (1-1)
Moving aside from sport now, here’s an extra plug for Marianne de Pierres’ new project, cowpunk webcomic Peacemaker. Check out the first issue now for a measly 99¢ – much though I disapprove of people pricing whole novels at 99¢, I think it’s exciting for shorter pieces, and as an Australian it’s rather nice to actually get the 99¢ price for once (yes, iTunes with your $1.19, I’m looking at you, you know what the Australian dollar is actually worth, right?). I believe later issues will be priced higher, so now’s your chance to find out if you like Peacemaker!
I have been so impressed with Torv’s performance throughout the third season of Fringe, playing two versions of the same character, and managing to make both utterly compelling rather than falling into the Spock’s beard style of parallel world characterisation. Speaking of Spock’s beard, the episode which required Torv to channel Leonard Nimoy for a whole episode was amazing. Kudos to the show for the subtle and powerful writing, too. Having loved Fringe in spite of itself in season one, and gone through such excitement when season two was so very good from beginning to end, I’m somewhat beside myself that Fringe is now some of the most exciting and interesting SF TV in years, and mark it as a coup that my honey now watches it with me. It’s gone from a show I considered a guilty pleasure to one that so many of my friends respect, like and get excited by. So hooray for the excellent cast, whoa for the spectacular final episode, and woohoo for season 4 on the horizon. I’m glad to hear that Torv’s performance is being heralded (finally!) but I really really hope John Noble gets the Emmy or the GG – his Walter Bishop has always been exceptional to watch, and it feels like every time the rest of the cast rise to his challenge, he just gets better.
(Thanks to Helen Merrick for knowing this picture was something I needed to see)
It’s Friday! I wrote 5000 words this week! Smug, cheerful and almost caught up with the week’s tasks. To make up for being so disgustingly pleased with myself, I present Friday links!
Via my Mum, who tries regularly to catch me out by knowing something on the internet before I do, and almost always crashes and burns, an interview with a new young Doctor Who writer, Tom McRae, who is not only contributing to the most mysterious episode of the next half of this season, but also is staging an interactive Doctor Who play for little ones. Who believe in Santa.
Jeff VanderMeer presents Women of the Supernatural: A Tartarus Press Sampler, which looks gorgeous, and features a story by Australia’s own Angela Slatter. Kudos to Angela, it’s not every day you share a TOC with Edith Wharton.
I think we were a little dismissive of the Pottermore announcement last night on Galactic Suburbia (and Twitter, and and and). Some other perspectives: Hoyden About Town report on some of what is being offered on the new site, while The Guardian explores some of the marketing genius behind the announcement, and the site itself. I think it’s pretty disingenuous to suggest, as several journalists and bloggers have, that this is something that other writers will in any way be able to replicate, but I also think that anything which takes the wind out of Amazon’s sails (heh, sales) as far as ebooks are concerned is fighting the good fight.
(my main thought on all this is… so, those bestseller lists that everyone’s relying on to promote their ebooks, they’re about to take a bit of a beating, aren’t they? Suddenly that 99c price point can’t be looking too hot…)
Speaking of ebooks, I was inspired by Sarah Rettger to download Babs: A Sub-Deb by Mary Roberts Rinehart from Project Gutenberg. As Rettger suggests, this is great fluffy YA fiction, with a very appealing voice, which happens to have been written in the 1920′s. I’ve inhaled a good chunk of the book already, despite the rather annoying quirk of including all of the protagonists spelling mistakes.
Three female scientists at the top of their field are interviewed about the challenges in their lives, whether they have the same chances as men to build successful careers, balancing work and family, and the advice they would give to the women who come after them. I think the best thing about this article is the focus on three women in similar positions rather than a single woman to represent her whole field, as they provide a wider perspective and often disagree with each other. Because all women aren’t the same – shock!
Penni Russon writes about the choices (and non-choices) about having or not having (wanting, or not wanting) children, in a beautiful post. I always love to read Penni’s posts about motherhood, because the way she looks at the world has such a gorgeous balance of pragmatism and romanticism.
In closing, Jem and I watched this on Sesame Street this morning, and at the risk of over-exposing you to the adorableness that is Neil Patrick Harris, I had to share The Fairy Shoe Person:
Tansy Rayner Roberts is a writer, a mum, a doll merchant, and in my spare time (ha!) likes to cut up fabric and sew it back together in an amusing fashion. I live with my partner and our two constantly alarming little girls in Hobart, Tasmania, and I am one of the three voices of the Galactic Suburbia podcast. Check out my new books, the Creature Court trilogy. Come and find me on Twitter!
