Tag: writers

An appreciation of Robert A. Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein was undoubtedly my favorite author at one time of my life (I devoured the Heinlein “juveniles,” liked some of his mid-career adult stuff, was left cold by Stranger in a Strange Land, and kept reading his later stuff mostly hoping that it would somehow enthrall me as the earlier stuff did, which …

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John Scalzi interviews Robert J. Sawyer…

…and you can read it here.

Justine Larbalestier on beginning writers

A follow-up to John Scalzi’s comments on teen writers from Justine Larbalestier, who some time ago wrote her own piece called “Too Young to Publish.” She writes: Neither Scalzi nor I have any interest in stopping teenagers from writing. Au contraire. We both wrote then and got a hell of a lot out of it, …

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More from John Scalzi on teen writers

Sometime last year John Scalzi wrote a post at Whatever called “10 Things Teenage Writers Should Know About Writing”. I agreed with pretty much all of it (although Scalzi’s default writing style is more…well, I don’t think even he would disagree with the description “snarky”…than mine). In fact, I agreed with it so much that …

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Become a science fiction writer…

…and help save civilization: Looking to prevent the next terrorist attack, the Homeland Security Department is tapping into the wild imaginations of a group of self-described “deviant” thinkers: science-fiction writers. As I like to say, science fiction is a vaccine against future shock.

SF Canada website updated

I’ve done a small update to the SF Canada website: the most interesting feature is a long interview with Nancy Kress, conducted by Celu Amberstone. Current news is posted regularly on the SF Canada news blog. SF Canada is the professional association of speculative fiction writers in Canada. I’m the administrative assistant and webmaster.

The shocking truth about the slush pile…

…is revealed by one buried beneath it: It was my first job out of university: I was bright-eyed and idealistic and imagined that I might become some kind of beneficent tweedy sprite, conveying the writing of unknown literary artistes to the masses. By the time I left my job in publishing a few weeks ago, …

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Prydain: The Website

Yesterday I posted about the death of Lloyd Alexander, author of the Chronicles of Prydain, one of my favorite all-time young adult fantasy series. Today I discovered this gorgeous website about Prydain. (Via Kids Lit.)

Lloyd Alexander dies

Lloyd Alexander has died. From SF Scope: Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on 30 January 1924, he was a children’s fantasy author for half a century (though he did also write several adult novels). He won the 1970 Newbery Award, and was a National Book Award Finalist, for The High King. His books include three well-known …

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Mentors and mentees mingle at McNally Robinson

Some time ago I was selected to be one of the mentors for the Saskatchewan Writers Guild‘s first Online Youth Mentorship Program. I enjoyed it very much. I worked with three young writers, Danita Stallard of Estevan, James Waldner of Biggar, and Arnav Jatukaran of Regina. I had at least one face-to-face meeting with all …

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A great literary event in Saskatoon yesterday…

…will be blogged about soon. Watch this space! (Er, well, watch this blog. This particular space will scroll down as I continue to post. But you know what I mean.)

The Nebula Awards…

…have been handed out. These are the awards nominated for and voted on by active members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, which would include me (finally!) this year, although I’m ashamed to say I didn’t vote (I simply hadn’t read enough of the nominees)… Novel: Seeker, by Jack McDevitt (Ace, Nov. …

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