Geekomancer Under Glass – Knights of Sidonia Season One
When I saw the announcement that Netflix was going to be the US distributor of the anime for Knights of Sidonia, I was intrigued. I’ve been trying to keep on top of the content wars vis a vis Netflix vs. Hulu vs. Amazon Prime, etc. Adapted from a manga series by Tsutomu Nihei, Knights of Sidonia is a space opera that follows a seed ship of human survivors who have left the Earth after its descrution. Reminiscent of Battlestar Galactica, Macross/Robotech, and other stories, it also includes some elements of hard SF that enrich the fairly standard plot. And this, for me, is the nature of the whole series — very interesting conceptual work and worldbuilding wrapped around a fairly standard, if grim, space opera plot with mecha pilots and giant monster invaders.
Business Time: Handselling Part One – The Chain of Selling
When you’re in traditional trade publishing, as I am, you quickly learn that there are a lot of people working on any given book. Not just the editor, the publicist, and the marketing manager, but sales reps, digital sales staff, warehouse staff, and more. Publishing with a larger press involves becoming part of a very large publishing effort. When you’re sitting in the place of the author, that is both exciting and terrifying. There are, on average, many people between you and the ultimate retail buyer, using the normal model. Having social media in place and attending conventions allows writers to connect directly, but in the normal publishing workflow, things go like this: You write a book. It’s awesome. Then you figure out how to sell that book to an agent — ‘sell’ here in terms of ‘convincing them it’s a project to get excited about.’ Then the agent sells it to an editor. The editor has to sell it to their Publisher and/or the editorial team. Then the team has to sell it to the sales, marketing, and publicity staff. Then the sales staff goes out into the field, to libraries, and so on, and sells the book to wholesalers and retailers. Then the retailers have to sell the book to readers. It’s a big chain, and in order to give the book the best chance to succeed, each person along the way has to be a bookseller — they have to learn how to
Geekomancer Under Glass: Fall 2013 Pilots (Part Two)
This week, I’m going to take another look at Fall TV pilots in the geekiverse, from Tesla Steampunk Tony Stark to the latest Buddy Cops With Androids. Dracula The latest in a years-long trend of re-imaginings and re-boots, the Jonathan Rhys-Meyers-fronted Dracula takes the story forward to the early 20th century, where Vlad Tepes (a.k.a. Dracula) is resurrected from an intricate grave and heads to London to plot against the Ordo Draco, the group that destroyed his life and killed the love of his eternal life, Ilona.
Geekomancer Under Glass: Beyond the Capes (Part Two)
Hello! This is S&F’s own Geekomancer, Mike Underwood, back again to talk about more comics outside the supers genre. Today, I’m going to talk about one classic and a couple of more recent up-and-coming comics. Hinterkind One of the new offerings from Vertigo following the departure of long-time executive editor Karen Berger, Hinterkind (Writer: Ian Edginton, Artist: Franceso Trifogli) is pitched as The Inverse Fables. In this world, Faerie creatures have returned and overthrown humanity, who now live in small enclaves hidden away, like Angus and Prosper’s group, which has ironically holed up in Central Park. When their closest human neighbors in Albany
Business Time: Ebooks are here to stay. Now what?
Hello, my business-savvy Skiffy and Fanty folk. Continuing on the thread of talking about the business side of publishing, I wanted to spend today talking about digital distribution, both generally and more specifically. Ebooks are really new as far as the publishing business is concerned. They’ve been around longer than they’ve been important, and now that they’re important, things have been changing very quickly. Ebooks have gone from 19% of Unit Sales in Science Fiction in 2010 to around 43% by latest reports (my ‘now’ data is from early 2013). And these days, we don’t just read ebooks on e-ink readers or on our computers. We have tablets and mobile phones. I still prefer to read physical books when I can, but I’ve gotten great use out of my e-ink reader, thanks to the fact that it doesn’t contribute as much to eye strain (I spend a *lot* of time looking at glowing screens). Oyster is a ebook service that’s trying to apply the Netflix model to books. For a monthly subscription rate of $9.95, members can read an unlimited selection of the ebooks Oyster has in their library on iPhone and iPad. The selection is currently limited, but only in the way that Netflix’s selection was limited when it
Geekomancer Under Glass: Beyond the Capes (Part One)
Hello, my lovely Skiffys and Fantys! I just got back from a delightful evening of talking about comic books at Atomic Books in Baltimore, so I was inspired to start a Geekomancer Under Glass sub-series about comic books. To start, I want to highlight some comics series outside the superhero genre. A lot of people still conflate comics with superheroes, but there’s incredible storytelling being done in the sequential art/graphic novel form outside the supers genre, in and out of SF/F. Hopefully, this series will expose people to some new titles and expand their horizons. It also gives Shaun a chance to come into the comments and tell me how I’m wrong about everything I say about comics. 🙂
