Out of the Woodwork 166. July 2010
Fantastic Literature - setting the standards for out of print on-line bookselling.

Welcome to our newsletter, it contains up to the minute news and gossip as well as awards details and items requiring help from the collective consciousness. If you wish to contribute please do so! We welcome your thoughts, your news items and any gossip! We do love a bit of gossip here at Fantastic HQ. A very BIG thanks to all who sponsored us for our London to Brighton cycle ride, 60 miles in aid of the British Heart Foundation, you can see some pictures on Facebook, here. Our next jaunt is a 54 mile ride from London to Southend on July 18th - if you fancy sponsoring us please visit our sponsor page.

Contents:-

Terry Pratchett enters parallel worlds of science fiction - according to the Guardian
The John W Campbell Memorial Award and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial award winners - just announced.
Film Science: Future Human BFI SOUTHBANK - July & August 2010 - a season of iconic films - we've got tickets to give away
Fay Shayol recommends an award winning story in the February Interzone.
Author Hilary Mantel's novel Wolf Hall has won the inaugural £25,000 Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction
Superhero Wonder Woman gets a trendy new makeover - and boy she looks good!
The 2009 David Gemmell Legend Awards winners have been announced and we've got the results.
British Fantasy Awards 2010: the Nominees
France's new medieval castle built by hand from scratch!
One for the collective consciousness - can you help? Fay has had a memory lapse! and we are still trying to help Mark
Neil Gaiman wins another top children's book prize
Sir Terry Pratchett and Transworld Publishers have announced a contest for new writers.
Ray Harryhausen could be donating his life's work to a Bradford museum - more Ray Haryhausen below!
The 2010 John W. Campbell Memorial Award finalists have been named and we've the full list
Fifteen-year-old Nicole Hendry, from Sutton Coldfield, has won the Young Crime Writers' Competition
Researchers have discovered the fossilised remains of an ancient whale with huge, fearsome teeth.
The 2010 Locus Awards winners were announced at the annual Science Fiction Awards Weekend.

Crossword fun, and general silliness - contributions welcomed
Obituaries: Everett F Bleiler - editor, bibliographer and scholar. Al Williamson - artist. Nobel Prize-winning Portuguese author José Saramago. Irish SF and horror writer Stephen Gilbert,
Department of Smug Self Satisfaction - what our kind customers have to say about the Fantastic experience

External Blinks:

BBC interview with Matt Smith on his first series as Doctor Who
Giant prehistoric pterosaurs descend on London - BBC video
Medusa and skeleton swordsmen... Nick Park picks his top Ray Harryhausen moments (BBC)

Fantasy might have made him his fortune, but for his next project, Terry Pratchett is set to venture into the world of science fiction, returning to a concept he first dreamed up almost 25 years ago in collaboration with the award-winning British science fiction writer Stephen Baxter.
Pratchett began work on a novel about a chain of parallel worlds, The Long Earth, in 1986, just after completing Equal Rites, the third book set in his Discworld universe in which the world is held up by four elephants, standing on a giant turtle. "I thought to myself [Discworld] is fantasy, and I want to get back to my first love, which is science fiction," Pratchett told the Guardian. The author had previously written two science fiction novels in the late 70s and early 80s, The Dark Side of the Sun and Strata. Guardian

Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl has won this year’s John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best science fiction novel published in 2009, and James Morrow’s novella Shambling Towards Hiroshima has won the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for best short fiction of 2009, in results announced a week prior to the official Campbell Conference and Awards Ceremony next weekend. John W Campbell memorial Award

Film Science: Future Human
BFI SOUTHBANK
July & August 2010
Cinema has long striven to imagine the future, near and distant, but what would it mean to live in the societies depicted in such cinematic speculations? We present a two-month season that surveys the future human condition as it has been imagined by filmmakers over the years. Titles include Fahrenheit 451,Terminator, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Solaris and George Lucas' THX 1138. For full details and guide - click here. If you want a pair of tickets to see anything you want then simply e-mail us - first come first served on this one!

Hi Simon, I flipped through the February Interzone and read part of a curiously interesting story, then read all of it - then read it all again. As I am more of a Golden Age reader I seldom find new stuff I really like, but this story was incredibly inventive, beautifully written, and gets added to my short list of Very Best Ever. And gosh, here in OOTW165 it's won a Nebula Award for best novelette. Eugie Foster's "Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast" absolutely deserves it.
Cheers .. Fay

Author Hilary Mantel's novel Wolf Hall has won the inaugural £25,000 Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction. The book, set in the 16th century, previously won the £50,000 2009 Man Booker Prize and was shortlisted for the Orange prize. Judges praised Wolf Hall as "compulsively readable" at a ceremony at Sir Walter Scott's home in Abbotsford, Scottish Borders. Ms Mantel said she was "astonished and delighted and gratified" BBC story

Wonder Woman has changed her looks and dons a trendy new outfit in issue 600 of the comic book series. The super hero's star-spangled swimsuit is to be replaced by a radical new style that includes leggings. The visual makeover goes hand in hand with changes to the Wonder Woman story, publisher DC Comics says. DC Comics has hired a new writer, J Michael Straczynski, to give Wonder Woman's life a new direction. Mr Straczynski told the New York Times that it had been time to bring the iconic character into the 21st Century."She's been locked into pretty much the exact same outfit since her debut in 1941," Mr Straczynski said. "What woman only wears only one outfit for 60-plus years?" BBC story

The 2009 David Gemmell Legend Awards winners have been announced:
Best Fantasy Novel:
•Empire: The Legend of Sigmar, Graham McNeill (Black Library)
•Best Served Cold, Joe Abercrombie (Gollancz, Orbit)
•The Gathering Storm, Robert Jordan & Brandon Sanderson (Tor)
•The Cardinal’s Blades, Pierre Pevel (Gollancz)
•Warbreaker, Brandon Sanderson (Tor)
The Morningstar Award for Best Fantasy Newcomer:
•The Cardinal’s Blades, Pierre Pevel (Gollancz)
•The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart, Jesse Bullington (Orbit)
•The Adamantine Palace, Stephen Deas (Gollancz)
•The Drowning City, Amanda Downum (Orbit)
•Lamentation, Ken Scholes (Tor)
The Ravenheart Award for Best Fantasy Cover Art:
•Didier Graffet & Dave Senior (Illustration) and Laura Brett (Art Direction) for the cover of Best Served Cold by Joe Abercrombie (Gollancz)
•Jackie Morris (Illustration) and Dominic Forbes (Art Direction) for the cover of The Dragon Keeper by Robin Hobb (Voyager)
•Larry Rostant (Illustration) and Loulou Clarke (Art Direction) for the cover of Fire by Kristin Cashore (Gollancz)
•Jon Sullivan (Illustration) for the cover of Empire by Graham McNeill (Black Library)
•Jon Sullivan (Illustration) and Sue Michniewitz (Art Direction) for the cover of The Cardinal’s Blades by Pierre Pevel (Gollancz)

Here are the nominees for the 2010 British Fantasy Awards. The winners will be announced at the awards ceremony at FantasyCon in September. BFS

Best Novel

BEST SERVED COLD, Joe Abercrombie (Gollancz)
FUTILE FLAME, Sam Stone (House of Murky Depths)
ONE, Conrad Williams (Virgin)
THE NAMING OF THE BEASTS, Mike Carey (Orbit)
UNDER THE DOME, Stephen King (Hodder & Stoughton)

Best Novella

OLD MAN SCRATCH, Rio Youers (PS)
ROADKILL, Rob Shearman, from Roadkill/Siren Beat (Twelfth Planet) and Love Songs for the Shy and Cynical (Big Finish)
THE LANGUAGE OF DYING, Sarah Pinborough (PS)
THE WITNESSES ARE GONE, Joel Lane (PS)
VARDOGER, Stephen Volk (Gray Friar)

Best Short Story

CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR, Justin Carroll, in Dragontales: Short Stories of Flame, Tooth and Scale, ed. Holly Stacey (Wyvern)
GEORGE CLOONEY’S MOUSTACHE, Rob Shearman, in The BFS Yearbook 2009, ed. Guy Adams (BFS)
MY BROTHER’S KEEPER, Nina Allan, Black Static #12
THE CONFESSOR’S TALE, Sarah Pinborough, in Hellbound Hearts, ed. Marie O’Regan and Paul Kane (Pocket)
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU WAKE UP IN THE NIGHT, Michael Marshall Smith (Nightjar)

Best Anthology

CERN ZOO: NEMONYMOUS 9, ed. D.F. Lewis (Megazanthus)
DRAGONTALES: SHORT STORIES OF FLAME, TOOTH AND SCALE, ed. Holly Stacey (Wyvern)
HELLBOUND HEARTS, ed. Marie O’Regan and Paul Kane (Pocket)
SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH: STORIES IN HONOUR OF JACK VANCE, ed. George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois (HarperVoyager)
THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST NEW HORROR 20, ed. Stephen Jones (Constable and Robinson)

Best Collection

CYBERABAD DAYS, Ian McDonald (Gollancz)
JUST BEHIND YOU, Ramsey Campbell (PS)
LOVE SONGS FOR THE SHY AND CYNICAL, Robert Shearman (Big Finish)
ONCE & FUTURE CITIES, Allen Ashley (Eibonvale)
THE TERRIBLE CHANGES, Joel Lane (Ex Occidente)

PS Publishing Award for Best Small Press

NEWCON PRESS (Ian Whates)
SCREAMING DREAMS (Steve Upham)
SUBTERRANEAN PRESS (William Schafer)
TELOS PUBLISHING (David Howe)
TTA PRESS (Andy Cox)

Best Comic/Graphic Novel

FABLES, Bill Willingham and Mark Buckingham (Vertigo)
FREAKANGELS, Warren Ellis and Paul Duffield (Avatar & warrenellis.com)
LOCKE AND KEY, Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez (IDW)
THE GIRLY COMIC, ed. Selina Lock (Factor Fiction)
WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE CAPED CRUSADER? Neil Gaiman and Andy Kubert (DC)

Best Artist

CHARLES VESS, for work including Neil Gaiman’s Blueberry Girl
LES EDWARDS, for work including the cover of Cemetery Dance #62
SHAUN TAN
STEVE UPHAM, for work including the Estronomicon Sketchbook Special
VINCENT CHONG, for work including covers for The Witnesses are Gone (PS) and Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 20 (Constable and Robinson)

Best Non-Fiction

ANSIBLE LINK, David Langford (http://news.ansible.co.uk)
CASE NOTES, Peter Tennant, Black Static
IT LIVES AGAIN! HORROR MOVIES IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM, Axelle Carolyn (Telos)
JOHN SCALZI, WHATEVER (http://scalzi.com/whatever)
KNOWING DARKNESS: ARTISTS INSPIRED BY STEPHEN KING, George Beahm and various artists (Centipede Press)

Best Magazine

BLACK STATIC, ed. Andy Cox (TTA)
CEMETERY DANCE, ed. Richard Chizmar (Cemetery Dance)
INTERZONE, ed. Andy Cox (TTA)
MIDNIGHT STREET, ed. Trevor Denyer (Immediate Direction)
MURKY DEPTHS, ed. Terry Martin (The House of Murky Depths)
THEAKER’S QUARTERLY FICTION, ed. Stephen Theaker and John Greenwood (Silver Age)

Best Television

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA (Sci Fi/Sky 1)
BEING HUMAN (BBC3)
DOCTOR WHO (BBC1)
LOST (ABC/Sky 1)
TORCHWOOD: CHILDREN OF EARTH (BBC1)

Best Film

AVATAR, dir. James Cameron (Twentieth Century Fox)
CORALINE, dir. Henry Selick (Focus)
DISTRICT 9, dir. Neill Blomkamp (Tristar)
LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, dir. Tomas Alfredson (EFTI)
WATCHMEN, dir. Zack Snyder (Warne)

Deep in the forests of central France, an unusual architectural experiment is half-way to completion, as a team of masons replicates in painstaking detail the construction of an entire medieval castle. The ­Chateau de Guedelon was started in 1998, after local landowner Michel Guyot wondered whether it would be possible to build a castle from scratch, using only contemporary tools and materials. Today, the walls are rising gradually from the red Burgundy clay. The great hall is almost finished, with only part of the roof remaining, while the main tower edges past the 15m (50ft) mark. BBC story and video

Hi Simon, Old age must be catching up with my memory at last and I need to ask the collective consciousness a question.

I am looking for a short story I read first many years ago, not later than the 60s or 70s. It must be in my books somewhere but I can't find it. It's a later version of the 'Machine Stops' plot, where a boy and girl are talking via visionphones that are barely working and they only see a blur.
When the boy eventually leaves his home to find the girl, she is obese and can't move, being fed sweets all the time by her robot. Does that ring any bells?

Many thanks, Fay. (if you can help just email us)

still after this little baby as well:

A trilogy I read in the early 70's. Juvenile science fiction/fantasy. Set in some distant future where the Galactic Empire is in disarray - an Interregnum I believe. There are star ships navigated by a priesthood. But the science has been lost. So knights and their horses may be transported in space ships lit by burning torches. Not much to go on I'm afraid. (if you help just email us)

Writer Neil Gaiman has won the prestigious children's fiction prize - the Cilip Carnegie Medal - for his fantasy tale The Graveyard Book. The novel, about an orphaned boy brought up by ghosts, has scored a literary double, having also won the Newbery Medal - the US equivalent of the Carnegie. BBC story

Sir Terry Pratchett and Transworld Publishers have announced a contest for new writers: The Terry Pratchett Anywhere But Here, Anywhen But Now Prize.
Writers are invited to submit novels set on “some version of the past, present or future of a planet Earth” — alternate histories, parallel universes, etc., but all set on Earth and adhering to the actual laws of science. Entrants must be over 18, live in the UK, Ireland, or the Commonwealth, and must have no previously published full-length works of fiction. The deadline for submissions is December 31, 2010, with a shortlist of six to be announced March 31, 2011, and the winner revealed by the end of May 2011. The winning author will be offered a publishing contract by Transworld with a £20,000 advance. Full details on how to enter.

Special effects creator Ray Harryhausen is offering his life's work to the National Media Museum. Harryhausen, 90, was behind dozens of stop-motion creatures which featured in films such as the original Clash Of The Titans and Jason And The Argonauts.The museum, in Bradford, will be able to display the collection if it can raise the funds to preserve it. The hoard contains most of the material connected with the conceptualisation and realisation of films he worked on. BBC story

2010 John W. Campbell Memorial Award Finalists

The 2010 John W. Campbell Memorial Award finalists have been named:
The Year of the Flood, Margaret Atwood (Talese)
The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi (Night Shade)
Transition, Iain M. Banks (Orbit)
Makers, Cory Doctorow (Tor)
Steal Across the Sky, Nancy Kress (Tor)
Gardens of the Sun, Paul McAuley (Pyr)
The City & The City, China Miéville (Del Rey)
Yellow Blue Tibia, Adam Roberts (Gollancz)
Galileo’s Dream, Kim Stanley Robinson (Ballantine Spectra)
WWW: Wake, Robert J. Sawyer (Ace; Gollancz)
The Caryatids, Bruce Sterling (Del Rey)
Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America, Robert Charles Wilson (Tor)
The award, for best SF novel, will be presented during the Campbell Conference Awards Banquet, to be held July 16-18, 2010 at the University of Kansas in Lawrence KS.

Fifteen-year-old Nicole Hendry, from Sutton Coldfield, has won the Young Crime Writers' Competition, organised and judged by the CWA in partnership with library authorities nationwide. The judges praised her story The Demolition of Lives as ‘daring and effective – a convincing emotional journey with a sympathetic protagonist, good motivation and a clever plot.’ CWA

Researchers have discovered the fossilised remains of an ancient whale with huge, fearsome teeth. Writing in the journal Nature, the scientists have dubbed the 12 million-year-old creature "Leviathan". It is thought to have been more than 17m long, and might have engaged in fierce battles with other giant sea creatures from the time. Leviathan was much like the modern sperm whale in terms of size and appearance. But that is where the similarity ends. While the sperm whale is a relatively passive animal, sucking in squid from the depths of the ocean, Leviathan was an aggressive predator. BBC story

The 2010 Locus Awards winners were announced at the annual Science Fiction Awards Weekend, held June 25-27, 2010 in Seattle, WA. The Awards were covered live, and a full report will appear in the August issue.
Best SF Novel:
•Boneshaker, Cherie Priest (Tor)
Best Fantasy Novel:
•The City & The City, China Miéville (Del Rey; Macmillan UK)
Best First Novel:
•The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi (Night Shade)
Best Young Adult Book:
•Leviathan, Scott Westerfeld (Simon Pulse; Simon & Schuster UK)
Best Novella:
•The Women of Nell Gwynne’s, Kage Baker (Subterranean)
Best Novelette:
•‘‘By Moonlight’’, Peter S. Beagle (We Never Talk About My Brother)
Best Short Story:
•‘‘An Invocation of Incuriosity’’, Neil Gaiman (Songs of the Dying Earth)
Best Anthology:
•The New Space Opera 2, Gardner Dozois & Jonathan Strahan, eds. (Eos; HarperCollins Australia)
Best Collection:
•The Best of Gene Wolfe, Gene Wolfe (Tor); as The Very Best of Gene Wolfe (PS)
Best Non-Fiction Book/Art Book:
•Cheek by Jowl, Ursula K. Le Guin (Aqueduct)
Best Artist:
•Michael Whelan
Best Editor:
•Ellen Datlow
Best Magazine:
•The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Best Book Publisher:
•Tor

I General silliness:

So England didn't win the World Cup, such is life. Anyway, at least our boys have brought back one title... Wayne Rooney has been named the ugliest player at the tournament.

Rooney took the dubious honour after users of a controversial dating website for 'beautiful people' ranked the best and worst looking players in South Africa. What an honour Wayne!

Obituaries:

Editor, bibliographer, and scholar Everett Franklin Bleiler, 90, died June 13, 2010 in Ithaca NY.
He compiled The Checklist of Fantastic Literature: A Bibliography of Fantasy, Weird and Science Fiction Books Published in the English Language (1948), which formed the foundation of modern SF bibliography

Artist Al Williamson, 79, died June 12, 2010 in New York from Alzheimer’s. Williamson was best known for his SF/fantasy work for EC Comics in the ’50s, including titles like Weird Science and Weird Fantasy.

Nobel Prize-winning Portuguese author José Saramago, 87, died Friday June 18, 2010, at home on the island of Lanzarote in the Spanish Canary Islands, after a long illness. Saramago received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1998; he was the first Portuguese-language author to receive this honor.

Irish SF and horror writer Stephen Gilbert, 97, died June 23, 2010 in Whiteabbey, Northern Ireland. Gilbert is best known for Ratman’s Notebooks (1968), the inspiration for 1971 horror film Willard.

Department of Smug Self Satisfaction.

1. Hello Simon & Laraine,

Received my copy of Kingsley Amis "The Green Man" in this morning's post. Delighted with this totally "Mint" condition 1st. edition. A perfect gem from the best booksellers on the planet!! As always, a great pleasure to order from you. Sincere kind regards to you from your Canadian enthusiast.

Cheers,

Susan

2. Simon,

Received the issue this morning, very impressed with the turnaround, packaging etc etc. I will be using you again.

Many thanks,

Oliver Howard

3. Hi Simon & Laraine,

Fantasynopsis 3 arrived safely in the mail.  Thanks for the fantastic job of packaging that you did - I wish more abebook sellers were as conscientious as you!

Best regards,

Scott McRae
Toronto, Canada

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