ZNAK SAGITE — više od fantastike — edicija, časopis, knjižara...

Author Margaret Atwood incorporates elements of both genre and literary fiction in her novels  Photo by Imeh Akpanudosen/Getty Images for LA Times
  It's been well established that publishing is not a great place to be if you're a woman. VIDA's 2012 report on the proportion of men and women reviewed and reviewing at major magazines was just as bleak as usual. Geek culture can be equally unwelcoming to women, as recent events have shown. But what about the intersection of the two—science fiction and fantasy publishing?  The online magazine Strange Horizons has just published a study that applies VIDA's methodology to sci-fi and fantasy publications, and it shows pretty much what you'd expect. Of 14 publications surveyed, only one reviewed books by women more than 50 percent of the time. (That was Cascadia Subduction Zone, which has the specific goal of "[treating] work by women as vital and central rather than marginal.") Five of the publications devoted less than 25 percent of their coverage to books by women. The ratio of men to women among reviewers was similarly discouraging: Although three of the magazines employed more woman reviewers than men, seven had less than half as many women as men, and two publications had no female reviewers at all. (Admittedly, those last two publications had only four reviewers between them.)  These data are similar to what VIDA found in more mainstream publications, where only the literary magazine Tin House had more female contributors than male ones. (The New York Times Book Review deserves note for having 327 female reviewers to 400 male ones). Many of the reasons for and effects of those statistics hold across the genres as well. Male writers submit more short fiction, and are more willing to promote themselves. Most editors are men. The most popular and respected authors also tend to be male, as China Miéville, Neil Gaiman, and Brandon Sanderson can attest.  But considering fantasy and science fiction writing only as a microcosm of the larger publishing world misses the more complex dynamics that contribute to women's position in the industry. I've so far been lumping together sci-fi and fantasy—and it's true the line between them can be fuzzy.  But there's actually a considerable gap between how many women write novels classified as straight science fiction and how many write novels classified as fantasy or some combination of the two. Only about a quarter of science fiction novels are written by women; for fantasy and combination novels, it's closer to half. This gap suggests that women writers are running up against the same division that causes so much trouble for us in other corners of the geek universe: the split between hardcore and casual fans.  As Game of Thrones has shown, mainstream audiences can embrace even the most labyrinthine epic fantasy. But that's unlikely to be true for hard science fiction, much of which is heavily focused on scientific accuracy and plausibility. Hard sci-fi is not the only kind of science fiction, but the qualities it champions are profoundly important to a vocal subset of fans. Most people unfamiliar with science fiction, on the other hand, are not overly excited to read about the inner workings of a plasma engine. Even Miéville's acclaimed novel Embassytown focuses on how the linguistic differences between races affect their relationship. As fascinating as the challenge of cross-species communication may be to some (myself included), it demands the kind of specialized knowledge you don't need to appreciate, say, royal scheming and swordfights.  Just as women struggle to be taken seriously as scientists, they may struggle to be seen as writers of "real" science fiction. But for some, avoiding the bubble of hardcore fantasy and sci-fi has been a major boon. The three most successful fantasy authors of the past decade—J.K. Rowling, Suzanne Collins, and Stephenie Meyer—are women.* Similarly, the science fiction and fantasy writers embraced by mainstream literary culture are often women: Kelly Link, Susannah Clarke, and even Margaret Atwood have made their careers by straddling the line between genre and literary fiction.  Of course, as the VIDA numbers show, literary fiction can be an equally challenging environment for women. Whatever the reasons, whatever the genre, woman writers are still at a disadvantage.

The official WonderCon trailer for Pacific Rim has dropped and oh boy, talk about monster mashing goodness, this has Kaiju bashing in spades (and oil tankers). You're either going to love giant robots vs. monster or not, I'm pretty sure there's no middle ground. Maybe Guillermo del Toro can add a bit of depth to what otherwise looks like a giant summer blockbuster. We'll see, but really, when you have Godzilla mixed with Neon Genesis Evangelion, do we really care? Wait, was that GLaDOS? It's official, I don't care if there's any more to the story or not...


Pacific Rim - Official Wondercon Trailer #2 (HD) Guillermo Del Toro

Leva ruka tame na daskama koje život znače

(audio snimak: Ursula Legvin, reditelj i glumci o adaptaciji)

via Stage and Studio

The late author Arthur C. Clarke once said, "The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible."
He was an expert on the matter. Clarke went far beyond the possible in "2001: A Space Odyssey," his classic sci-fi story about humans making contact with intelligent, extra-terrestrial life. The novel was so imaginative that many people didn't grasp its meaning. Some still don't.
It's led more than a few to ask, "How'd he come up with such ideas?"




The question represents the driving purpose of the new Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination at the University of California San Diego. The center is set to formally open on Tuesday with "Visions of the Future," a public symposium about what the world might be like in 2046, or 33 years from today. The novel "2001: A Space Odyssey" was published in 1968 and focused on a period 33 years into the future. (Speakers/registration.)
The center's second major symposium will occur May 21-22, when some of the world's best-known authors and scientists will meet at UC San Diego for "Starship Century," which will examine four questions: Is this the century we begin to build starships? Why go to the stars? Can we? Should we?"   (Speakers/registration).
UC San Diego said such symposiums are part of a larger exploration about how imagination can be better applied to problem-solving and nurturing creativity and education.
To highlight the center's debut, we asked four symposium speakers and panelists to answer the question, "What is imagination?" Here's what they said:


http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/may/12/imagination-ucsd-science-fiction-clarke-center/

 SFE Picture Gallery launch  15 May 2013
 
The SF Encyclopedia editors have long wanted to add a little tasty eye candy to this website's massive textual presentation. Now at last we have a new page for this purpose, the Picture Gallery, which when visited shows a randomly selected image from our growing visual archive -- mostly book covers, but with occasional surprises. Once on the Gallery page, you can search to reveal everything the archive contains for a particular author, title keyword, illustrator or publisher; you can select Slide Show for an ever-changing presentation of available pictures, more than 1700 of them on launch day; or you can simply click on Lucky Dip for another unpredictable image, to be replaced by further visual serendipity as often as you care to hit the button again.
Gallery links for artists and authors well represented in the image archive have been added under links at the ends of the creators' entries. More and more of these Picture Gallery links will appear as the months go by and the archive grows.
There are several further entertaining (we hope) Gallery features, some self-explanatory and others described in more detail on the About page which is the second link below. The Gallery itself is the first. Have fun!

   
• SF Encyclopedia Picture Gallery
• About the Gallery

Thursday 16 May 2013 18:00 -   19:00
London Megastore, 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, WC2H 8JR

Join Jon Courtenay Grimwood and Lavie Tidhar as they launch the ADVENTURE ROCKETSHIP at the Forbidden Planet London Megastore on Thursday 17th May from 6 – 7pm.

Blasting off for the first time this May, Adventure Rocketship! is a new anthology series steeped in science fiction and geek culture. Mixing interviews, essays and fiction, each book is themed, with the first issue, Let's All Go To The Science Fiction Disco, exploring the interface between SF, music and the counterculture.

That means, among other subjects, it look at how JG Ballard invented post-punk (sort of...), the strange vistas of cities daubed with digital street art, how jungle changed the trajectory of China Miéville's King Rat and David Bowie, the alien connection... Cover art is by Stanley Donwood, famous for crafting Radiohead's album sleeves.

Issue one of Adventure Rocketship! will include: • New fiction from Lavie Tidhar, Liz Williams, Tim Maughan, Martin Millar and Nir Yaniv. • New essays by Jon Courtenay Grimwood, David Quantick, Sam Jordison, NK Jemisin and Jason Heller. • Interviews with China Miéville, Michael Moorcock, Mick Farren, The Orb and Bill Nelson.

Adventure Rocketship! will initially be available in a limited-edition print run. It's edited by Jonathan Wright, who has written about science fiction literature for SFX for more than a decade now.

When Publishers Weekly finally reviewed the dystopian sci-fi thriller "Wool" last month, its assessment was lukewarm. The reviewer called Monroe native Hugh Howey's characters bland and his writing immature.But it didn't much matter. By the time the review came out, Howey already had sold more than half a million copies of his "Wool" stories, the saga of a post-apocalyptic civilization that lives in a giant underground silo. He even missed the review, because he was busy meeting fans on a book tour in Australia and New Zealand.

Howey's self-published sci-fi hit, which took off as an e-book, demonstrates how digital technology continues to transform publishing. But his particular story has made headlines for another reason: When he parlayed his success on Amazon into a mid-six figure print deal with Simon & Schuster, he negotiated to keep the e-book rights.

It's rare for a publisher to let an author keep those lucrative rights. But the deal shows that, at least in some literary genres, authors, not publishers, now hold the upper hand.
Howey's personal story is as unusual as his publishing deal.

As a young man, years before becoming a New York Times bestselling author, he fixed computers at Computer City on Independence Boulevard, waited tables dressed as a court jester at a Charlotte restaurant, captained yachts, shingled roofs and worked in Appalachian State University's bookstore.
He quit his bookstore job just over a year ago, after his e-book sales took off.

Howey, 37, who now lives with his wife in Jupiter, Fla., said in a telephone interview that he didn't expect this success. In fact, he doubted "Wool" was marketable. It is a dark story, and it doesn't end happily.

A dream at 99 cents

Howey grew up in Union County. His dad, Hamp Howey, who now lives in Colorado, was a farmer. (Perhaps the farm's grain silos subconsciously inspired his son's fictional subterranean silo.)
His mom, Gay Murrill, taught at Monroe's Piedmont High School. She now owns a yarn shop in Charleston.

Howey graduated from Piedmont, then went to ECPI, a for-profit university in Charlotte, where he learned to repair computers. He graduated in 1994.

Later, rebounding from a failed marriage, he sold most of his possessions and enrolled at the College of Charleston, where he lived not in a dorm, but on a sailboat.
"I'm pretty impulsive, I guess," he says.
Though he'd always been a voracious reader, Howey says he was a lazy student. He finally got serious, he says, during his sophomore year at Charleston. But he was also becoming a serious sailor, enamored of Joshua Slocum's 1900 memoir, "Sailing Alone Around the World." He ended up leaving college to pilot yachts.

More jobs followed. After moving to Virginia with Amber Lyda, his wife, he worked as a roofer for a couple of years while she worked on her PhD in psychology. Roofing was a "perfect daydreaming job," he says. Perched on roofs, he thought up ideas for his books.

When Lyda took a job at Appalachian State, Howey got the bookstore job and wrote in his spare time.
In 2009, he published the novel "Molly Fyde and the Parsona Rescue," the first of a series. It's the story of a spaceship pilot who travels the galaxy in search of her father.

He put his first "Wool" story on Amazon in July 2011 for 99 cents, opening with a sentence designed to grab readers: "The children were playing while Holston climbed to his death; he could hear them squealing as only happy children do."

The original story, a longish short story at about 12,500 words, describes a society forced by a toxic atmosphere to live in an underground 144-story silo. Every so often, someone is sent outside to clean dirt off sensors that bring in light. That's where the book gets its title. The cleaning is done with industrial-grade wool. The downside to the scrubbing job? No one has figured out how to get the person back into the silo alive.

Within a couple of months, to Howey's surprise, his sales began climbing. He sold about 1,000 copies in October 2011 alone. Readers posted glowing reviews – and told him they wanted more.
He got busy. Three months later, he had published four additional "Wool" stories and was selling thousands of e-books a month on Amazon. "It was just an incredible trajectory," he says.
Once sales began climbing, Howey used Facebook and his website,  hughhowey.com, to publicize the books.

By March 2012, less than a year after selling his first "Wool" story on Amazon, he was earning enough to quit his bookstore job. He generated more buzz by hosting an "Ask Me Anything" session on  Reddit.com: "I'm a self-published author who quit his day job," he wrote, and invited people to ask him anything.

For 12 hours, he sat with his laptop answering questions and giving self-publishing advice.
As sales rose, literary agents offered to represent him. After the BBC contacted him about making "Wool" a television show, he says, he hired an agent and ended up selling film rights to 20th Century Fox. Director Ridley Scott is interested in adapting "Wool" to the screen.

$100,000 a month

Howey was determined to retain e-book rights. Publishers offered seven figures for a print and e-book deal, but he turned them down.

Howey says it simply made no sense to sell those digital rights. His e-book sales were bringing in more than $100,000 a month. A publisher, he suspected, would double the $5.99 e-book price of his "Wool" five-story omnibus, a move sure to dampen sales. In the U.S., Howey says about 90 percent of his book sales are in e-book form. Abroad, that number is about 55 percent.

Eventually, Simon & Schuster agreed to buy print rights only. Asked by the Observer why the publisher agreed to make the deal, a spokeswoman declined comment.

But the deal seems certain to make the publisher money – just not as much as it would make with digital rights. Though e-book sales are growing – they accounted for 20 percent of publishers' revenues in 2012, up from 15 percent in 2011 – print still dominates. A Bowker Market Research survey of regular book buyers found about 75 percent bought a print book only while 17 to 20 percent bought an e-book only. About six percent bought a print and e-book.

In March, Simon & Schuster published "Wool" in paperback and hardback, and Howey embarked on a book tour that began in Europe and ended in New Zealand. He didn't make it to North Carolina, but says he plans to do an N.C. tour in July, when he returns home for a family reunion.

Howey is modest about his success. "Wool," he says, has probably received more attention than it deserves. "I read better books all the time."

Why did it succeed when most books don't? There are many possible reasons. The stories, priced at 99 cents, encouraged impulse buys. The cryptic title, "Wool," didn't sound like science fiction and may have attracted non-sci-fi fans. And the fact that five "Wool" stories were showing up at the same time as Amazon top sellers may have piqued readers' curiosity.

Undoubtedly, glowing reader reviews were key. "There's nothing you can do that replaces reader word of mouth, which nobody knows how to generate," Howey says.

Breaking out

Howey's success offers more proof that e-books – and self-publishing – are in their ascendancy, says Danny O. Snow, a senior fellow with  The Society for New Communications Research, based in Palo Alto, Calif.

These days, self-published authors such as Bella Andre and CJ Lyons regularly appear on New York Times bestseller lists. Self-published titles made up 25 percent of the top-selling books on Amazon last year, according to the Wall Street Journal. "The stigma of self-publishing," Snow says, "has largely vanished."

Howey believes self-published authors are succeeding because traditional publishers aren't meeting readers' demands for certain literary genres, particularly science fiction, romance and erotica. E.L. James' three-volume erotic novel, "Fifty Shades of Grey," is a prime example. Random House has sold more than 70 million print, e-book and audio copies of the trilogy, which began as a self-published book.

Howey understands why publishers are reluctant to lard their catalogues with these genres. "It would be jarring if half the Penguin catalogue was erotica," he says. "I think their self-respect is more important than the bottom line."

He says he also knows that many authors – more than the literary establishment realizes – are making a good living through self-publishing. Months ago, he did an informal survey, posting a message on an Amazon Kindle forum asking for examples of self-published writers earning $100 to $500 a month.
He got at least 1,000 responses, he says, with many people noting they were earning a lot more than the range he had posted. "I've heard from people making tens of thousands of dollars," he says, "and I've never heard of their books."

Rising above the noise

Snow believes Howey was smart to retain e-book rights. In fact, he argues that an author whose e-books are selling briskly would make more money by self-publishing print books and bypassing traditional publishing completely.

That's exactly what Howey is doing now. He doesn't regret his foray into traditional publishing, but in January, he self-published "The Shift Omnibus," a prequel to "Wool." He's writing "Dust," the third and final part of the saga, and he has no immediate plans to publish either of those books traditionally in the United States.

You can now get his first "Wool" story on Amazon for free, by the way. "I'm of the idea that it's so hard to rise above the noise, free is a good way to break out."

Howey argues that more traditional publishers should allow self-published authors to retain e-book rights, as he did. "It's only fair," he says, "if you've already published with e-books and are successful."

Though Publishers Weekly wasn't crazy about "Wool," other reviewers have raved. "The characters are well drawn," the Washington Post wrote, "with a rousing protagonist and antagonist, and the plot races forward without resorting to melodrama."

Most importantly, readers have raved. Howey's "Wool" now has more than 4,700 Amazon reviews. They average 4.7 out of five stars. http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2013/05/19/4045290/monroe-native-becomes-sci-fi-publishing.html

 


While fixing up a house he purchased in Elbow Lake, MN for $10,000, David Gonzalez ripped out a wall and discovered an original copy of Action #1, which introduced Superman being used for insulation.  Although its condition has been ranked at only 1.5 on a 10 point scale, the comic has already achieved a bid of $127,000 with 19 more days to go before the auction ends.  While most known issues of Action #1 have changed hands many times, this issue has not, which adds to its mystique. The auction ends on June 11.
For more information...

The Congress is a film based on Stanislaw Lem's novel The Futurological Congress. I say based, because the plot of the book, as given by Amazon, and the synopsis of the film share similar themes, but that's about it:

Robin Wright, playing the role of herself, gets an offer from a major studio to sell her cinematic identity: she'll be numerically scanned and sampled so that her alias can be used with no restrictions in all kinds of Hollywood films – even the most commercial ones that she previously refused. In exchange she receives loads of money, but more importantly, the studio agrees to keep her digitalized character forever young – for all eternity – in all of their films.

Almost Human is a new J.J. Abrams TV series set to debut on Fox at some, as yet to be specified, time. Almost Human stars Karl Urban as a cop forced to partner with a very human-like android. Synopsis follows:

Almost Human - "FOX" Trailer [HD] official

The year is 2048. Meet JOHN KENNEX (Urban), a cop who survived one of the most catastrophic attacks ever made against the police department. After waking up from a 17-month coma, he can't remember much. Suffering from depression, mental atrophy, trauma-onset OCD, PTSD and the "psychological rejection of his synthetic body part," John returns to work at the behest of longtime ally Captain Sandra Maldonado. By mandate, every cop must partner with a robot. And despite his passionate aversion to androids, John is paired up with a battle-ready MX-43.

Hmm, tri meseca od poslednjeg gejta... Vidi, Warrior Woman skandal! 

O cemu se radi (na kraju al' je podugacko):

http://radishreviews.com/2013/05/31/linkspam-53113-edition/

Sta kaze raja:

http://jimhines.livejournal.com/682063.html

Sta kaze SFWA:

http://www.sfwa.org/2013/06/sfwa-bulletin-task-force-announced/

mrzi me dalje da kopam

  ma FB zuji i bruji, sharuje se i lajkuje, neki iz uverenja, neki iz opreznosti a neki bogami i iz profita, jer sve je to u velikoj meri i soubiz marketing dreka, E. Catherine Tobler je eno napisala javnu & dirljivu ostavku na sfwa clanstvo, a ja se ne mogu cuda nacudit kako neki ljudi zive samo da bi mogli neke genericke kontroverze na srce priviti kao duboke licne & personalne uvrede. I jeste da Resnik opasno preteruje kad cima taj 'liberalni fasizam' lejbel, ali brate, samo zato sto olako cima etiketu ne znaci da siromaj uopste nije u pravu.

Ima li neko link za dijalog iz biltena, onaj kad njih dvojica pričaju o urednicama i spisateljicama, i više pominju koje od njih su dobre ribe nego šta su konkretno uređivale/pisale?

Umesto Warrior Woman trebalo je da na naslovnicu ture Warrior Black Jewish Gay osobu. Sa velikim mačem.

Problem je sto je na internetu masovna histerija postala default reakcija na bilo sta, nebitno ima li, i kolikog, razloga za nju. I svima koji ne budu uvuceni u tu histeriju sve to, naravno, deluje sumnjivo. Liberalni fasizam i tiranija politicke korektnosti ne deluju previse neverovatno kad se pokrene internet linc gomila. Kazem, opet, bez obzira ko je u pravu i ima li realnog povoda.

@Angel Nisam naleteo na isti, al' nisam ni preterano trazio

Ok, hvala. Masovna histerija je svakako neprimerena reakcija, ali me je interesovalo da vidim taj tekst oko koga se podigla frka.

Ponekad se pitam koliko takva masovna histerija ima efekta (osim onog da sa strane izgleda sumnjivo). Da li se nešto pozitivno postigne tom histerijom, da li bez tolike frke ništa ne bi bilo urađeno, ili su neki tiši metodi efikasniji.

Slazem se to za histeriju kao difolt i jeste da sve to izgleda drugacije iz perspektive onoga ko nije direktno u sve to uvucen... ali sve mi se cini da ima jako puno ljudi koji u ovakvim kontroverzama reaguju kao po duznosti, uz tonu i po ubedjenja ne samo da su apsolutno u pravu, nego i iz nekog skroz bizarnog ugla zastupanja mnostva, neka vrst samozvanih 'branioca' celokupne 'uvredjene strane'... neke od najgrlatijih su mlade autorke, i ima vec par imena koje po pravilu skrolujem, nemam vise snage da ih citam ni u uzgrednom fb komentaru, a kamoli nedaj boze u prozi.

Endzi, koliko ja znam sfwa bilten je striktno papirni, mada, kako je krenulo, neko ce garant da okaci makar sken. 

Ovo njakanje se vuče još od Biltena 199.
Ako sam dobro shvatio, pobesneli su zapravo kada su Malcberg i Reznik okarakterisali kriticizam njihovih seksističkih izjava kao pokušaj cenzure u broju 202.
Tu na početku su linkovi prema skeniranim stranicama iz Biltena 202 (označeni kao 1/2/3...)

http://file770.com/?p=13115

Lavie Tidhar o svemu tome: http://worldsf.wordpress.com/2013/06/03/editorial-in-a-global-economy-what-place-for-the-sfwa/

J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot To Develop Rod Serling's Final Screenplay Into Event Series   

Thirty eight years after Rod Serling's death, his final screenplay is heading to the screen. J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot Prods. has acquired the rights to The Twilight Zone creator's unproduced last feature script The Stops Along The Way. The project will be developed into an event limited series through Bad Robot's deal at Warner Bros. TV and taken out into the marketplace. Details about the premise are being kept under wraps. Serling talked about the project in his final interview four months before his death when he was asked if he had a script he has special feeling for. "I just wrote The Stops Along The Way, which is, I think, a lovely script," he said.Related: '101 Best Written TV Series': Hammond On What Series Were Snubbed


Emmy and Golden Globe winner Serling wrote and produced a number of TV and feature screenplays, including Rod Serling's Night Gallery, Planet Of The Apes, and Requiem For A Heavyweight, but he is best known for his Twilight Zone anthology series, which was just named one of the top five Best Written TV Series of all time by the Writers Guild of America, West. A reboot of the TV classic is in the works at CBS TV Studios with X-Men director Bryan Singer at the helm.Event/limited series are red-hot at the moment, with four greenlighted in the past month alone, Fox's 24: Live Another Day and Wayward Pines, FX's Fargo and HBO's Criminal Justice. Bad Robot has four series on the air next season, returning Revolution and Person Of Interest and upcoming Almost Human and Believe. Code Entertainment, which reps the Serling Estate, made the deal with Bad Robot.

Producer Rick McCallum, who worked on the Star Wars prequels and Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, has revealed his next project to The Hollywood Reporter: R'Ha, a "high-concept sci-fi feature." The film's script is being written by Life on Mars co-creator Matthew Graham, who THR says was one of the lead writers on the shelved Star Wars live action series. (He was reported as working on the show in 2011, but it was never, to my knowledge, confirmed.)
R'Ha was created by Kaleb Lechowski, who will be directing the film based on his short of the same name.

A walk in memory of Iain M. Banks is scheduled for June 29.  The walk will take place in London and will follow the chapter titles used by Banks in the Graham Park portion of Banks's second novel, Walking on Glass.  Participants will meet up at the corner of Southampton Row and Theobald's Road at 1:00 PM on June 29, the day after the thirtieth anniversary of the walk that occurs in the book.

For more information...

A new day brings a new trailer for Guillermo Del Toro's Giant Robots vs. Giant Monsters movie. This trailer focuses more on the humans involved in the fighting and tones down the sound effects and dials up the dialog. What you get is awesomeness. This one screams to be seen on the big screen, if you know what I mean.


Pacific Rim - "At the Edge"

Hollywood Reporter says that not only will there be an adaptation of Ransom Riggs' debut novel Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, but that it will also be directed by Tim Burton, have a script written by the scribe of X-Men: First Class, Jane Goldman, and will hit theaters July 31, 2015. They describe the story as one that "follows a teenage boy who is transported to an island where he must help protect a group of orphans with special powers from creatures out to destroy them."

Knjiga je izašla kod nas 2012 kod Orfelina


http://www.orfelin.info/page12.html


Ransom Rigs
Dom gospođice Peregrin za čudnovatu decu

TAJANSTVENO OSTRVO
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NAPUŠTENO SIROTIŠTE
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NEOBIČNA ZBIRKA VEOMA
ČUDNOVATIH FOTOGRAFIJA
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Sve to čeka da bude otkriveno u knjizi Dom gospođice Peregrin za čudnovatu decu. To je nezaboravan roman koji, kombinujući prozu i fotografije, stvara uzbudljivo čitalačko iskustvo. Naša priča počinje užasnom porodičnom tragedijom zbog koje će se šesnaestogodišnji Džejkob otisnuti na sudbonosno putovanje do udaljenog ostrva u Velsu, gde će pronaći ruševne ostatke Doma gospođice Peregrin za čudnovatu decu. Dok Džejkob istražuje napuštene sobe i hodnike postaje mu jasno da su štićenici gospođice Peregrin bili više nego čudnovati. Možda čak i opasni. Možda su bili zatočeni na tom ostrvu sa valjanim razlogom. A možda su i nekako – mada je to delovalo nemoguće – još uvek bili živi.
Ovo je čudesno delo mašte od kojeg će vam žmarci krenuti niz kičmu. Dom gospođice Peregrin za čudnovatu decu oduševiće i odrasle i tinejdžere, kao i svakoga ko nalazi zadovoljstvo u senovitim avanturama.


Veoma neobična knjiga koja je prevedena na preko dvadeset jezika i koja je već stekla kultni status. 20th Century Fox je otkupio filmska prava na ovu knjigu, a film će režirati Tim Barton, čovek koji nam je podario Edvarda Makazića, Noćnu moru pred Božić i Mrtvu princezu.


Dom gospodjice Peregrin za čudnovatu decu - Ransom Rigs trejler za knjigu

Osim Doma gospodice Peregrin, evo jos nekoliko naslova kojima su otkupljena prava, pa DeNardo smatra kako bi trebalo pozuriti sa citanjem pre no sto ih se filmuje:




Still More SF/F Books to Read Before You See Them on the Screen

The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
Lauren Buekes burst onto the literary scene relatively recently. In 2008, she released Moxyland, a high-tech fable set in an alternative futuristic Cape Town, South Africa. In 2010, she released Zoo City, a modern fantasy whose characters are magically partnered with animals, which went on to win the Arthur C. Clarke Award. This year she released an exciting time-travel thriller called The Shining Girls and not only is it turning heads in literary circles, but it's also been acquired by MRC and Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way for the purposes of a television adaptation. The Shining Girls tells the story of a serial killer who escapes the authorities using time travel, at least until one of his victims survives and begins to figure out the truth. The surprising thing about this particular adaptation is that it was announced nearly simultaneously with the book's release. How's that for a fast-tracked project?


The Moon and The Sunby Vonda N. McIntyre
Some films take longer to percolate through the mysterious machine that we call Hollywood. Vonda N. McIntyre's historical fantasy novel The Moon and The Sun, for example, was originally published back in 1997. It went on to win the Nebula Award the following year...and it's only now been optioned for film. Pierce Brosnan is the actor set to play Louis XIV and Sean McNamara (whose credits include Soul Surfer) will direct the adaptation. The story of The Moon and The Sun is one inspired by legendary tales of ancient sea monsters. It's an alternative-history fable that's set at the 17^th-century court of King Louis XIV, and the shows the desperate efforts of the so-called "Sun King" to achieve immortality. His plan: stealing the life force from a captive mermaid. The King's efforts are hampered by his own 18-year-old illegitimate daughter, Marie-Josephe, who has fallen in love with the mermaid's keeper and wants to set both of them free.


American Godsby Neil Gaiman
There are few rock superstars in the world of science fiction and fantasy. Neil Gaiman is one of them. It is perhaps no surprise that his book American Gods(published in 2001), is now being adapted into a series for HBO. Gaiman's work is not new to Hollywood; his wonderful book Coraline was adapted by Henry Selick and made into a beautifully animated feature film in 2009. But American Godsmade such an impression that HBO is planning to run it for at least 6 seasons of 10-to-12 episodes each. The first two seasons will cover the novel, but by then Gaiman hopes to have published a sequel. The central premise of American Gods is that mythological gods exist in our everyday, modern world, but their power and influence comes from humans' belief in them. Against this backdrop is the story of a man named Shadow, his tragedy and his dealings with his enigmatic employer.

Izašao odlomak Doma gospođice Peregrin..., celo prvo poglavlje, u Zabavniku, prenosim ABNov komentar sa AA:

Quote from: ABNНа стр. 56-58 имате фантази причу, скоро сигурно српску, али потписану псеудонимом ,,Рансом Ригс", под насловом ,,Дом госпођице Перегрин за чудновату децу". То није жанр којим се бавимо, али, утисак је слаб, на крају се све претвара у политички пледоаје. У сваком случају, ако то прочитате, биће вам (претпостављамо) сасвим јасно зашто многи фанови СФ не желе да се њихов жанр помеша са фантази жанром.

Mogu da potvrdim da je tekst na stranama 56-58.

San Diego (CNN) -- For actor Harrison Ford, who is starring in a movie adaptation of Orson Scott Card's heralded and popular novel "Ender's Game," statements against same-sex marriage by the science-fiction author "are not an issue for me."
At a Comic-Con news conference on Thursday, Ford responded to concerns that Card's comments have overshadowed the production of the movie.
The author of the 1985 novel professed his opposition to same-sex marriage in 2009 when he joined he board of the National Organization for Marriage, which opposes same-sex unions.
Although Card released a statement declaring the same-sex marriage issue "moot" after last month's Supreme Court ruling striking down a key part of the Defense of Marriage Act, the film has continued to be plagued by controversy.
Ford told reporters that while he fundamentally disagrees with the author's stance, the film stands separate from the issue.
"I think none of Mr. Card's concerns regarding the issues of gay marriage are part of the thematics of this film," Ford said. "He has written something that I think is of value to us all concerning moral responsibility. I think his views outside of those that we deal with in this film are not an issue for me to deal with and something I have really no opinion on.
"I am aware of his statements admitting that the question of gay marriage is a battle that he lost and he admits that he lost it. I think we all know that we've all won. That humanity has won. And I think that's the end of the story."
For Ford, "Ender's Game" addresses its own social and political concerns.
The film is set in the future, depicting a child military trained by the government to wage interplanetary war.
Ford plays Col. Hyrum Graff, a military commander who trains the titular character of Ender Wiggin, played by Asa Butterfield.
Even though the movie is set in a science fiction universe, Ford said he has found many contemporary comparisons to the moral concerns of the story.
"This movie is very prescient, and I think the novel was prescient in recognizing something that we now have as a reality in our lives, which is the ability to wage war at a distance," Ford said.
"So the morality of that military commander and the military command structure, the morality of a society which raises a military and wages war are the moral concerns of this film and something we are wrestling with daily.
"The issue of interplanetary warfare is the science fiction aspect of it, but what gives it such emotional tone and reality is that these are the concerns of our everyday lives.
"Drone warfare and the capacity that we have technologically is one part of the moral package. The other is the use of young people in the business of war, which has always historically been the case. Our youngest and fittest of our cultures have always been the ones who are first in line for warfare."
Ford, who noted that it was particularly compelling to work with "talented young actors" such as Butterfield and Hailee Steinfeld, as well as Sir Ben Kingsley, was also asked whether he found any comparison between Col. Graff and his famed "Star Wars" character, Han Solo.
"Graff is a very complex character that's charged with an awesome responsibility," Ford said. "The complex moral issues are part of Graff's story. Ender doesn't really face so much the issues of morality until the end of the film until he knows what's happened to him.
"Graff is aware of his moral responsibilities all through his part of the story. I was just delighted to be involved in a film of such high ambition with such talented people. I think Graff is a much more complex character than Han Solo, which doesn't mean that I regret Han Solo."
"Ender's Game" is scheduled to be released in theaters on November 1. Summit, the film's studio, released a new viral clip from the film Wednesday in honor of its presence at Comic-Con, and they also premiered atrailer for the film at the fan panel that followed the news conference.
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/18/showbiz/comic-con-enders-game

The Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship
Sponsored by the Center for the Study of Women in Society,
Robert D. Clark Honors College, and Knight Library
Special Collections and University Archives

As part of the Center for the Study of Women in Society's 40th Anniversary Celebration, and as a way of honoring the role that Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA) played in the founding of CSWS, we are collaborating with the University of Oregon Knight Library and the Robert D. Clark Honors College (CHC) to create the Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship.

Purpose: The intention of the Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship is to encourage research within collections in the area of feminist science fiction. The Knight Library houses the papers of authors Ursula K. Le Guin, Joanna Russ, Kate Wilhelm, Suzette Haden Elgin, Sally Miller Gearhart, Kate Elliot, Molly Gloss, Laurie Marks, and Jessica Salmonson, along with Damon Knight. SCUA is also in the process of acquiring the papers of James Tiptree, Jr. and other key feminist science fiction authors. For more about these collections, visit http://library.uoregon.edu/node/3524.

Fellowship description: This award supports travel for the purpose of research on, and work with, the papers of feminist science fiction authors housed in the Knight Library. These short-term research fellowships are open to undergraduates, master's and doctoral students, postdoctoral scholars, college and university faculty at every rank, and independent scholars working in feminist science fiction. In 2013, $3,000 will be awarded to conduct research within these collections. The fellowship selection committee will include representatives from CSWS, CHC, and the UO Libraries.

Funding: CSWS is accepting donations to permanently endow the Le Guin Science Fiction Fellowship. To contribute to the endowment, please visit https://securelb.imodules.com/s/1540/
foundation/index.aspx?sid=1540&gid=1&pgid=408&cid=1095. Click on "additional options" and enter "CSWS – Le Guin Fellowship" in the box marked "additional gift instructions."

http://www.hastac.org/opportunities/le-guin-feminist-science-fiction-fellowship

   
• Star Wars (300+ volumes) - 160m (missed this the first time around, whether or not it is fantasy or SF, I'll leave to you...)

   
• J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings - 150m (Wikipedia classifies it as a single volume)

   
• C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia (7 volumes) - 120m (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe alone - 85m)

   
• Stephanie Meyer's Twilight (4 novels, 1 novella, 1 guide) - 116m

   
• J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit - 100m (Not a series - unless you're Peter Jackson)

   
• Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles (12 volumes) - 80m

   
• E.L. James' 50 Shades of Gray trilogy (3 volumes) - 70m (For comparative purposes)

   
• Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins' Left Behind (16 volumes) - 65m

   
• Terry Pratchett's Discworld (39 volumes) - 55m (65m according to the author's note in Unseen Academicals)

   
• Edgar Rice Burrough's Tarzan (26 volumes) - 50m

   
• Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games (3 volumes) - 50m [The Hunger Games alone - 23m)

   
• Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson's Wheel of Time (14 volumes) - 44m

   
• Christopher Paolini's Inheritance Cycle (4 volumes) - 33m [40m now]

   
• Stephen King's Dark Tower (8 volumes) - 30m

   
• Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth (12 volumes) - 25m

   
• Terry Brooks' Shannara (20 volumes) - 21m

   
• Eoin Colfer's Artemis Fowl (20 volumes) - 21m

   
• Isaac Asimov's Foundation (3 volumes) - 20m

   
• Brian Jacques' Redwall (22 volumes) - 20m

   
• Dragonlance (150+ volumes) - 20m

   
• Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire Hootenanny (21 volumes) - 20m

   
• Douglas Adam's (and Eoin Colfer) Hitchhiker's Guide (6 volumes) - 16m

   
• Raymond Feist's Riftwar (25 volumes) - 15m

   
• George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire (5 volumes) - 15m

Continue reading "The Biggest Fantasy Series of All Time is..." »

50 Shades of Gray je fantasy? Mislim, jeste nekakva fantazija, al' nisam sigurna da su na to mislili. 

ma, to im je izgleda samo za benefit poređivanja... 

Book View Café has signed a deal with Audible.
Book View Café Signs Deal with Audible
Audible acquires audio rights to more than 100 works by award-winning and nominated authors in multiple genres
Book View Café (BVC), the author-run publishing company, today announced an agreement with Audible, Inc., the world's largest seller and producer of downloadable audiobooks and other spoken-word content. The worldwide English-language audio rights deal, which includes a substantial part of BVC's rapidly growing catalog, will make more than 100 works of romance, science-fiction, fantasy, young adult, mystery, as well as nonfiction titles available as audiobooks to a global readership. Book View Café's impressive line-up of author-members includes Hugo, Nebula, and Philip K. Dick award winners and New York Times bestsellers.
"Having our titles available at Audible is further evidence of the momentum Book View Café has gained in the past year," says Pati Nagle, BVC president. "In that period we've launched our new online bookstore, signed distribution agreements that are getting our ebooks into libraries and online booksellers worldwide, published 113 works, taken on six new members, and seen our first New York Times ebook bestseller for a BVC original." She adds, "It's a huge win for BVC, enabling us to outsource our audiobook services and give our authors immediate access to a vibrant and growing market segment."

BVC's business development manager Chris Dolley agrees. "This is the first of more such deals," he says. "We look forward to making other titles we acquire available at Audible going forward. We want all of our authors to benefit from more exposure to Audible's engaged and increasingly significant audience of book lovers. "
"We are delighted to add titles from this strong group of Book View Café authors to the Audible catalog," said Audible EVP and Publisher Beth Anderson. "Our members, who download an average of 18 books a year, will especially welcome this increased selection among many of their favorite genres."

More details at the Book View Cafe site. This is excellent news for independent book writers and readers!

DeNardo dopunjava listu naslova kojima su otkupljena prava za ekranizaciju:


Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Although not really marketed as science fiction, Kurt Vonnegut's beloved satire nonetheless contains elements of the fantastic, easily seen in how the book's protagonist, Billy Pilgrim, experiences several episodes of time displacement in which he travels back and forth across his life span. Oh, there's also the alien Tralfamadorians. The book, which is partly about Billy's World War II experiences, explores themes of fate, free will and the illogical nature of the human race.
If this project sees the light of day, it will be something to behold...not just for the novel's mind-bending story coming to life, but also since it's being written by Charlie Kaufmann (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and directed by Guillermo del Toro (Pacific Rim, Pan's Labyrinth). We can only imagine how those visionaries will interpret the imagination of Vonnegut.

The Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss
The Kingkiller Chronicles is a trilogy of books written by Patrick Rothfuss comprised of The Name of the Wind, The Wise Man's Fear and a forthcoming conclusion to the trilogy (tentatively titled The Doors of Stone). This wondrous fantasy is the story of Kvothe, who tells the story of his life to Devan Lochees (known as Chronicler). The books themselves are largely comprised of flashbacks of Kvothe's life told over three days (one book for each day of the narration). The narrative occasionally switches to the present day, where faerie folk (known as demons to the locals) are showing up more frequently than usual.
The Kingkiller Chronicles was recently optioned for television adaptation by New Regency Productions and 20th Century Fox Television. It's still too early to know much more than that, but if the popularity of the books is any indication, this one will be a hit with viewers.

CyberStorm by Matthew Mather
Matthew Mather's self-published book CyberStorm just recently came on like gangbusters earlier this year, with sales coming close to those of A Game of Thronesand World War Z. Hollywood took notice and then scooped up the film rights. Besides being an author, Mather is a cybersecurity expert, and Cyberstormleverages his experience to create a thrilling, near-future New York disaster story that uses the idea of online information and security in its depiction of a man trying to save his family from the surrounding collapse.
It was 20th Century Fox that acquired the film rights to CyberStorm—not a bad deal for a previously unknown author whose books had only been on the market for a few months. What bodes well for this project is that a story set against a technical backdrop was written by someone familiar with technology. Hopefully, Hollywood will keep it grounded in reality as much as possible.

Westlake Soul by Rio Youers
Westlake Soul is the name of a 23-year-old former surfing champion who suffers a catastrophic accident. Although he wakes up in a permanent vegetative state, he discovers that he can nonetheless read minds, mentally communicate with animals and project his consciousness anywhere in the world. In this neo-superhero novel by Rio Youers, Westlake discovers that great power comes with great responsibility—namely to use his newfound powers to go up against an equally new archenemy: Dr. Quietus, the nightmarish embodiment of Death itself.
Westlake Soul was optioned for television and film by Stephen Susco, screenwriter for the horror film The Grudge. It's too early to tell how this one will play out, but hopefully the film will play up the book's non-superhuman element.

Nexus by Ramez Naam
In this near-future thriller, a new high-tech drug called Nexus allows people to link up, mind to mind. The applications are huge, but like any new game-changing tech, there are those that are for it and those that are against it...and those that seek to control it at any cost. In Nexus, a young scientist with only the best intentions for mankind gets caught up in the dangerous world of international espionage.
Nexus was optioned for both television and film by Paramount Pictures, to be adapted by Ari Handel (co-writer of Darren Aronofsky's upcoming Biblical epic Noah) and Mark Heyman (whose credits include Black Swan).

The Postmortalby Drew Magary
Magary's "pre-apocalyptic" near-future envisions a world where effective immortality has been achieved after a cure for aging is found. The trouble with this seemingly good news is that it comes with strings attached, namely: government-instituted euthanasia programs, evil green people, and never-ending moral and political debates. It's a fertile topic for some thought-provoking ideas, and the book is not afraid to address them as it evolves from fable to morality tale.
Very little is known about the adaptation of The Postmortal beyond the author's letting-the-cat-out-of-the-bag tweet on Twitter. But don't let that stop you from enjoying the book's meaty ideas.

LiBeat

QuoteSlaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Although not really marketed as science fiction, Kurt Vonnegut's beloved satire nonetheless contains elements of the fantastic, easily seen in how the book's protagonist, Billy Pilgrim, experiences several episodes of time displacement in which he travels back and forth across his life span. Oh, there's also the alien Tralfamadorians. The book, which is partly about Billy's World War II experiences, explores themes of fate, free will and the illogical nature of the human race.
If this project sees the light of day, it will be something to behold...not just for the novel's mind-bending story coming to life, but also since it's being written by Charlie Kaufmann (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and directed by Guillermo del Toro (Pacific Rim, Pan's Labyrinth). We can only imagine how those visionaries will interpret the imagination of Vonnegut.

Uljepša mi dan, mjesec i godinu. Meni je žao što je vjerovatno propala adaptacija "Robapokalipse" (aka - "World War Z" sa robotima), ali ja sam baš uživao dok sam je čitao. To je trebao da radi Spilberg koji je sarađivao sa Vilsonom još dok je ovaj pisao knjigu, ali odustalo se početkom godine, iako su imali spreman scenario. Zato i ovo uzimam sa rezervom, čisto da se ne radujem previše.

aha, pa ti si znaci overio Robokalipsu. I jos ti se i dopala... pa sto to krijes kano zmija noge? 
inace, osim Postmortala, mene ovde jako zanima i CyberStorm, jos jedan ultrauspesni self-published fenomen u rangu Hugh Howey Wool serijala, ne samo po parama koje je zaradio, nego i po pametnom cuvanju autorskih prava, sto verovatno i znaci da ce sami autori blisko nadgledati i kontrolisati ekranizaciju, a to me uvek raduje. (Istanjilo mi se strpljenje za kasapljenja dobrih romana kroz nemastovite ekranizacije.  ) 

Hej Libe, pa čitam ja mnogo toga što ti preporučiš na forumu (i Nightflier, za koga se nadam da će se vratiti), tako da sam ti prećutno zahvalan (sada i napismeno!). "Robapokalipsu" sam pročitao čim si je preporučila, jer mi je djelovalo kao dobra ideja. Mada, taj roman ima sve što volim: AI koji se oteo kontroli, hidraulične robote + post-apokalipsa, tako da je to za mene bio čisti iz 1-1.  A ovaj "Cyberstorm" zvuči super zanimljivo, to bi valjalo da se pročita.

Trenutno bistrim "A Once Crowded Sky: A Novel", isto na tvoju preporuku (negdje prije dvije-tri sedmice). Dopada mi se, jer imam utisak kao da čitam novelizaciju stripa. Doduše, više mi se sviđa kao koncept, da Tom objavi nastavak ne bi bio oduševljen. Ali super mi je to gdje imaš novelizaciju stripa, ekranizaciju knjige, pa onda strip po filmu... sve to ide iz medija u medij, utiče jedno na drugo, a to su fine stvari kad neko zna da piše.

Postmortal jurim - odlična, odlična ideja, za čistu desetku. Mislim da je to na tragu socijalno osvješćenog SF-a, mada pomalo razvodnjenog (nije svako Ursula). Nego, znaš kako je već - dobrih knjiga mnogo, a slobodnog vremena malo. I još sad kad si ubacila "Cyberstorm"... 

Pozdrav.

The Postmortal, Drew Magary - 978014311982


Dobro zvuči Postmortal, dodat u gigabajt stvari za čitanje...

giga, a? pa dobro, tu smo negde, s tim što sam ja starija pa otud i startujem sa hendikepom.    ali Postmortal je debi roman a ja uvek gledam da takvima dam bolju šansu, valjda baš zbog toga. 




@Blejd: e pa, uzvratio si mi sa ulepšavanjem meseca, a možda i cele godine, ko zna...     Ja sam već bila na pola puta da batalim ove topike, nekako mi se činilo da malo koga ovde više sve to uopšte zanima... ruku na srce, ima tušta i tma stranjskih blogova na kojima se ovakav info lako može naći, pa sam mislila da tamo i idete, vas par koji ste (ako ste) preživeli ovaj sagitaz del-judž...      ajde pa javi ako ti ustreba kakav linkić, vidim zakk je ovaj već okačio, a i baja dejann je tu, pa... slobodno cimaj sve redom kad štogod slično ustreba i javljaj kad štogod slično nađeš. Poz.

Ne bataljuj, mene zanima!

Dobro. 


Elem, iz prvih pedesetak strana reklo bi se da je Postmortal vrlo moderan, pisan u formi blogerskih unosa, stil odličan, introspekcija ležerna i prijemčiva, karakterizacija isto tako, humor suptilan i osvežavajući, tema dobro odabrana i još bolje obrađena, sve u svemu biće to prava čitalačka uživancija.


a na malko neobaveznu notu, evo malko posrednog uvida u teškoće koje čak i dobre knjige imaju u probijanju na ovom varljivom i teškoj komercijali orjentisanom tržištu:






http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/31/business/cuckoos-calling-reveals-long-odds-for-new-authors.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0&hp






[/size][size=78%]
Mystery solved? Maybe not. It's no surprise that "The Cuckoo's Calling," a detective story set in a London populated by supermodels and rock stars, shot to the top of best-seller lists once the identity of the author was revealed. But if the book is as good as critics are now saying it is, why didn't it sell more copies before, especially since the rise of online publishing has supposedly made it easier than ever for first-time authors?

"It makes me sad," Roxanne Coady, founder of R. J. Julia Booksellers in Madison, Conn., and the online retailerJustTheRightBook.com, told me last week from Maine, where she said she was sitting near a stack of unread new books. "Because not everyone turns out to be a J. K. Rowling. It reminds me how difficult it is for even good books to succeed."

It's not entirely clear why Ms. Rowling decided she wanted "to fly under the radar," as she put it on the Robert Galbraith Web site, other than to say that "being Robert Galbraith has been all about the work, which is my favorite part of being a writer." Writing under a pseudonym obviously ruled out any tedious book signings or publicity appearances, but Ms. Rowling doesn't have to do anything she doesn't want to.
And it wasn't about money, since Ms. Rowling is donating all royalties to charity. "If sales were what mattered to me most, I would have written under my own name, and with the greatest fanfare," she said. (A spokeswoman in London for Ms. Rowling responded to my questions by directing me to the Galbraith Web site, and said Ms. Rowling would have no further comment.)

Ms. Rowling's last book, "The Casual Vacancy," an adult comedy of manners published under her name and the first since the end of the Potter series, was met with high expectations and withering reviews from prominent critics. Michiko Kakutani wrote in The New York Times, "the real-life world she has limned in these pages is so willfully banal, so depressingly clichéd that 'The Casual Vacancy' is not only disappointing — it's dull." The Los Angeles Times faulted "Rowling's inability to engage us, to invest us sufficiently in her characters."
Still, with hardcover sales of just over 1.3 million copies, it was the No. 1 hardcover fiction title of 2012, according to Publishers Weekly's annual ranking, outselling John Grisham, James Patterson and Danielle Steel.

Ms. Rowling may well have felt that the reaction, both critical and commercial, was distorted by her fame, and hence decided on a pseudonym for "The Cuckoo's Calling." It's not clear exactly who was in on the secret: her agent, of course, and at least someone at Little, Brown & Company, her publisher, including her editor, who also edited "The Casual Vacancy." ("The Cuckoo's Calling" was published by Mulholland Books, a Little, Brown imprint.) "Few people within the publishing house knew the true identity of Robert at the time," Nicole Dewey, a Little, Brown spokeswoman, told me, declining to be more specific about who knew.

But that already distorted the experiment to some extent. Given how difficult it is for first-time fiction authors, especially in a crowded genre like mystery, to find both an agent and publisher, it's not clear "The Cuckoo's Calling" would have made it off the slush piles. At least one other publisher, Orion Books, which like Little, Brown, is a subsidiary of the Hachette Book Group, rejected the manuscript. An editor there told The Telegraph in London that the book "didn't stand out."

In any event, a publishing contract is hardly a guarantee of critical or commercial success. Much depends on how a new manuscript is treated by the publisher. Morgan Entrekin, the president and publisher of Grove Atlantic, is widely viewed as a master at introducing new literary talent to the marketplace. He published "Cold Mountain" by then first-time novelist Charles Frazier, which went on to win the National Book Award and sell over 11 million copies.

"There's no question, if a publisher decides to get behind a book, to invest its publishing capital, to use its traction with the chains, with Amazon, fight for the promotion money to get the book into the front of stores, you can do a lot to bring attention to a worthy first novel," he said.

Mr. Entrekin cited "Matterhorn," by first-time novelist Karl Marlantes, which he published in 2010. The author "worked on the book for over 20 years and couldn't find a publisher," Mr. Entrekin said. Then, as the book was about to be published in a tiny first edition, Mr. Entrekin got a copy from a buyer at Barnes & Noble, loved it, and bought out the first printing.

He re-edited it, cut 300 pages, got advance quotes from prominent authors, introduced the author to booksellers and hosted a media lunch in Manhattan. Amazon.com gave the book a glowing review, chose it as a best book of the month, and got an exclusive review from Mark Bowden, author of "Black Hawk Down." " 'Matterhorn' is a great novel," his review began. It sold over 400,000 copies.[/size][size=78%]
Of course, most new books don't get that kind of support. Suffice it to say that "The Cuckoo's Calling" didn't, even though Ms. Dewey told me it "was treated like any new novel by a first-time writer. Little, Brown sent out bound galleys and talked it up to retailers, as they do with all new titles. We aim for all of our books to reach the widest possible audience and make every effort to market and publicize each title in a way that connects it with that audience."

I spoke to several book retailers, at both large chains and independent stores, and not one could recall seeing an advance reading copy, or hearing anything from the Little, Brown sales representatives.

"There was absolutely no buzz," Ms. Coady said. "There was no direct correspondence from the editor or a publicist. We didn't hear anything from the sales representatives. They'll usually tell us that there are five to 10 books on their list that we want to make sure you read. They know our customers and what they like, so we trust them. This book wasn't one of them. I don't know if we bought any copies. Maybe one."

The publisher procured two quotes, or blurbs, for its news release, one from the Scottish crime writer Val McDermid, the other from the English novelist and actor Mark Billingham, who said, perhaps all too presciently, that the book was "so instantly compelling it's hard to believe this is a debut novel." Booksellers said Little, Brown could have rustled up more prominent authors, including at least one American.

Nor did "The Cuckoo's Calling" get much critical attention. I asked Little, Brown for reviews that appeared before the identity of the author was known, and the only examples it provided were from Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and Booklist, all trade publications. Several newspapers reviewed it in London, but no mainstream American book critic did. The early reviews were positive — far more so than those for "Casual Vacancy" — which must have been heartening to Ms. Rowling. But those in Publishers Weekly and Booklist were a single paragraph, and they failed to generate much buzz or help it stand out from the masses of genre fiction published each year.
It's not clear how many copies had sold by the time Mr. Galbraith's identity was revealed in July by The Sunday Times of London. The BBC reported that it had sold just 1,500 printed copies. Ms. Rowling, on the Galbraith Web site, maintains that the book had sold 8,500 copies across all formats and received two offers from television producers. "Robert was doing rather better than we expected him to," she wrote. Ms. Dewey said it had sold an additional 5,000 copies in the United States, for a total of 13,500, which is "a great achievement for any unknown author." Still, from Ms. Coady's perspective as a bookseller, "It would have stayed on the path it was on, which is towards oblivion."

If Ms. Rowling had been paid the traditional 15 percent of the $26 hardcover price in royalties, and less on e-books, that would amount to less than $50,000.

The experiment, of course, was over. It's safe to say that "The Cuckoo's Calling" has gotten more media attention than any other book this year, thanks to Ms. Rowling's celebrity and her unmasking. "The Cuckoo's Calling" was immediately reviewed pretty much everywhere. Ms. Kakutani called it "a highly entertaining book that's way more fun and way more involving" than "The Casual Vacancy."

"I read it," Ms. Coady said. "It's pretty good. Is it brilliant? No. It's a classic detective story, better written than most."

Little, Brown told me this week that "The Cuckoo's Calling" has sold 1.1 million copies in all formats, and is still on best-seller lists. "It's the power of the author brand," Mr. Entrekin said. "It transformed the exact same text into a far more salable book. It got media attention all over the world. That's a level of attention you can't buy at any price."

What's clear is that without the aura of celebrity, "The Cuckoos' Calling" would have been just another work of debut crime fiction. Its author might have gotten a modest TV deal, and maybe another book contract, while working another job to make ends meet. "Most books come out and do nothing," Ms. Coady said. "There are still too many books being published. We can only get behind so many books, and then hope they take off on their own. It worries me that so many slip through the cracks."

New authors can still make the best-seller lists, as Ms. Rowling herself did with the Potter books, or E. L. James with the erotic "Fifty Shades of Grey." But they are extreme exceptions. Mr. Entrekin agreed that many good books don't achieve the success they deserve. "There's no formula," he said. "A publisher can only do so much. A book's fate is ultimately in the hands of the book gods."



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Hugo Rising -- The nominees for science fiction's best novel of 2013 find a new guard challenging the old

LiBeat

QuoteDobro. 


Elem, iz prvih pedesetak strana reklo bi se da je Postmortal vrlo moderan, pisan u formi blogerskih unosa, stil odličan, introspekcija ležerna i prijemčiva, karakterizacija isto tako, humor suptilan i osvežavajući, tema dobro odabrana i još bolje obrađena, sve u svemu biće to prava čitalačka uživancija.

Zvuči kao knjiga godine . Jedva čekam da počnem.

Quote from: angel011 on 30-08-2013, 18:40:06
Ne bataljuj, mene zanima!

+1

Uvek se nešto zanimljivo može naći na ovakvim temama.

Iako ne postižem da svaku preporučenu knjigu odmah i pročitam, pribeležim one koje mi zvuče zanimljivo. Moja lista za čitanje, doduše, neprestano raste, tako da je pitanje kada će, i da li će, neke od njih doći na red. Deril Gregori je čekao godinu dana pre nego što sam mu dao šansu.

Ne bataljuj, LiBeat. Ima nas koji pratimo ovakve teme, iako se ne oglašavamo tako često.

Quote from: LiBeat on 30-08-2013, 18:24:36
giga, a? pa dobro, tu smo negde, s tim što sam ja starija pa otud i startujem sa hendikepom.    ali Postmortal je debi roman a ja uvek gledam da takvima dam bolju šansu, valjda baš zbog toga. 




@Blejd: e pa, uzvratio si mi sa ulepšavanjem meseca, a možda i cele godine, ko zna...     Ja sam već bila na pola puta da batalim ove topike, nekako mi se činilo da malo koga ovde više sve to uopšte zanima... ruku na srce, ima tušta i tma stranjskih blogova na kojima se ovakav info lako može naći, pa sam mislila da tamo i idete, vas par koji ste (ako ste) preživeli ovaj sagitaz del-judž...      ajde pa javi ako ti ustreba kakav linkić, vidim zakk je ovaj već okačio, a i baja dejann je tu, pa... slobodno cimaj sve redom kad štogod slično ustreba i javljaj kad štogod slično nađeš. Poz.

- iskreno. I naravno da se javljam ako nešto ne uspijem da nabavim, bilo na PM, bilo ovako. I što kažu Angel i Grimjack, naravno da nas ima koji to i te kako pratimo i čitamo. To smo mi, tiha snaga Sagite.  Even though we walk through the valley of the (SF) shadow of death, we fear no evil

a quiet force to reckon with! 


a evo i gomile septembarskih gudiza:

"Jumper" author Steven Gould will pen four stand-alone novels that will expand on the universe created in the hit 2009 film.















http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/james-cameron-spins-avatar-book-612326

nego, da malko proberemo kroz onih 211 septembarskih predloga:







Lakin-Smith ima kod mene silni kredit koji joj je obezbedio njen odlični Cyber Circus.










šta reći - ovo ime podrazumeva da će se overiti svako slovce koje ikad igde objavi.   










Daglas je prikupio pristojne rivjue, sinopsis je intrigantan (! psihopate i kako sa njima izaći na kraj -- možda od svega toga ispadne koristan priručnik tipa WWZ  ) pa time zaslužuje makar i minimalni ulog visokoobdarenog prelistavanja    prvih nekoliko poglavlja. 









red je, a i valja se. 













moderišem očekivanja, ali u pitanju je debi roman, pa je fer i pošteno svrnuti pogled kad i ako se ima vremena.













!već dve godine čekam ovaj naslov. dve godine!











debi zbirka sa umereno pozitivnim preporukama.




to je to.    ko ima vremena i dobre volje, neka svrne na:  http://www.znaksagite.com/diskusije/index.php/topic,10791.0.html

Izdvojio bih i ovo:

Sad, sad news, folks. Another legend has left us.
Emily Pohl-Weary, Frederik Pohl's granddaughter, is reporting that Frederik Pohl has passed away. He was 93 years old.
Frederik Pohl is a science fiction Grand Master the author of numerous science fiction novels, including the Gateway series, Man Plus, The Years of the City and most recently, All the Lives He Led.
Besides winning numerous awards for his novels throughout his career, he also won the 2010 Hugo Award for best fan writer.
He will be missed.