Writing Bits: Armadillocon Writer’s Workshop
This week Shaun gave me permission to talk about the Armadillocon Writer’s Workshop, which is a little event that I run for my local convention. It’s close to my heart for multiple reasons — among them is the fact that it gave me a leg up as a new writer. I feel passionate enough about it that I’ve been running it for seven years. If you’re interested in becoming a professional Science Fiction and Fantasy writer, I think it’s one of the best, least inexpensive workshops designed for beginning and intermediate writers. This year, it will be held on Friday, July 25th, and the manuscript submission deadline is June 15th. Each student is required to submit a manuscript of no more than 5,000 words, which will then be critiqued at the workshop. Check in begins at 8:30am, and the workshop runs until the convention starts (usually, at 4:30pm). It’s a full day of lectures, writing exercises, and critiques. In the last part of the session, students are sorted into critique groups of no more than five. Each group is led by two publishing professionals. We use the Milford Method, and each student both gives and receives critiques. This year, we’re proud to have the following instructors: Ian McDonald, Ted Chiang, Jacob Weisman, Skyler White, Mario Acevedo, Martha Wells, Kat Richardson, Stina Leicht, Alex C. Renwick, Claude Lalumière, Joe McKinney, Martin Wagner, Marshall Ryan Maresca, Mark Finn, Dr. Anne-Marie Thompson, Derek Johnson, Jayme Blaschke, and Nicky Drayden If you’re a new writer without publishing credits and you’re interested in professional publishing, this is the workshop for you. It’s a lot of fun. The fee is $70. For more detailed information see the Armadillocon website.
Poll: Shaun should read this as…?
If you’ve been paying attention, there’s this whole Worldcon Fundraiser thing going on for Shaun (i.e., me). One of the Milestone Perks involves me reading a classic work of literature or philosophy as either Captain America (post-government cutbacks) or Yoda (the green ninja). I’ve let one of the donors pick the work, but the general public (i.e., you) gets to pick the character I will play! Fabio Fernandes wants me to read from Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None by Friedrich Nietzsche. Now it’s up to all of you to decide the character!
Top 10 Episodes and Blog Posts for April 2014
Here they are! Episodes: 201. The Hugo Awards (A Discussion w/ Justin Landon and Natalie Luhrs) 198. Brazilian SF w/ Fabio Fernandes, Cesar Alcázar, Libby Ginway, and Jacques Barcia #WorldSFTour 199. Sofia Samatar (a.k.a. Malkia wa Ndoto) at ICFA (An Interview) #WorldSFTour Episode 4.2 — Torture Cinema Meets The Wicker Man 200. We’re 200! (Hugos, World SF, and Trivia w/ the ENTIRE Crew) 197. Mannequin (1987): A Torture Cinema “Adventure” 116. Season of the Witch — A Torture Cinema “Adventure” 141. Final Hugo Thoughts + the Hugh Howey Fiasco w/ Justin Landon and Jonathan McCalmont #18. Summer Wars (2009) w/ Daniel Huddleston — #WorldSFTour 196. Fran Wilde (a.k.a. Chadwick’s Prodigy) — An Interview at ICFA Blog Posts: We’re Nominated for a Hugo Award! On Recent South(east) Asian SF/F by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (Guest Post) New to The Skiffy and Fanty Show podcast? Hello! Cultural Tourists (Part 2): Publishing and Representation by Charles Tan This Katamari Feels Cleaningsish — Magical Cleaning Methods! by Julia Rios Book Review: The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch (by Paul Weimer) Mining the Genre Asteroid: THE DRAGON WAITING by John M. Ford (by Paul Weimer) A (World) SFF Film Odyssey: Mutant Girls Squad (2010) and Anime’s Excesses by Shaun Duke IDIC and the problem with gatekeepers by Joyce Chng Book Review: Heirs of Grace by Tim Pratt (by Paul Weimer) Enjoy!
Announcement: Live Recording of Episode #202 (Torture Cinema Meets Highlander II: the Quickening)
Swords, first time flyers, and overacting, oh my! In our 2nd ever live-recording, the crew (Jen and Julia) are joined by Michael J. Martinez to tear apart Highlander II: the Quickening (1991). This month’s movie was selected by Mike as part of Shaun’s Worldcon fundraiser (the 5th Milestone Perk). All Torture Cinema episodes come with a skit. Since we’re recording live, the skit will be a teaser for the mp3 version. If you want to hear us do impressions of Sean Connery or what have you, you’ll be able to DL the mp3 from the main feed on this blog when it is released on April 30th. 2014. Feel free to join us at 10 PM EST on April 25th, 2014 (Friday). The Q&A function will be turned on; your comments and questions are more than welcome!
New to The Skiffy and Fanty Show podcast? Hello!
Hi there! You may have come here because we were nominated for a 2014 Hugo Award for best Fancast. In which case, welcome! Skiffy and Fanty is a blog, and most pertinently, a weekly fan podcast created by Shaun Duke and Jen Zink, Me, I’m Paul Weimer. You probably know me as @princejvstin on Twitter. If you run an F/SF blog, its likely I’ve commented on it. I joined Skiffy and Fanty in 2012. In 2013, the Skiffy and Fanty show added a whole bunch of new people in our efforts to bring genre goodness to you on the blog and on the podcast: Mike R Underwood: Author, and works at Angry Robot Books Julia Rios: Fiction Editor and Podcaster in her own right. (The Outer Alliance) Stina Leicht: Fantasy Author ( Of Blood and Honey and And Blue Skies from Pain) David Annandale: Fantasy Author of Warhammery goodness, Kaiju Master, and Teacher. Skiffy and Fanty as a podcast has a couple of different varieties of episodes. We’ve been accused of having an identity crisis (hello, Jonathan McCalmont!) but we do all sorts of stuff on the podcast you might like to listen to: We interview authors like Adam Christopher. We have discussion episodes like, say, SF and Music with John Anealio and Peter Orullian This year we are doing our World SF Tour, with roundtables of genre people to connect with fiction from around the world. Like our recent Brazilian SF episode We sometimes watch something topical or not so topical and then discuss it. Like our opinions on the 1954 Godzilla. And, perhaps most infamously, sometimes we get together, get inebriated and discuss horrible, bad SF movies. Like, yes, Sharknado! We’re the Skiffy and Fanty podcast and we’re delighted for you to listen and tell us what you think.
We’re Nominated for a Hugo Award!
Did you hear the exciting news? DID YOU? We’re officially on the final ballot for the 2014 Hugo Awards! How cool is that? So a few quick things to say: We’re on the Hugo Award ballot! OMG! A whole bunch of you nominated us! Thank you ever so much. We love you. We really do. You are all so super awesome. Also: thank you so much for listening to our show! We’ll give you free cookies one day. Promise. We’re on the Hugo Award ballot! OMG! Wait…I already said that. Oh well. So what does this mean? Simple: We’re on the ballot, which means all of you who have attending or supporting memberships will be able to vote for us or one of the other lovely podcasts that made it to the final list (also: all the books, short stories, movies, and what not that got nominated). It’s up to you! If you haven’t purchased a supporting membership, you should probably do so right now so you can vote! And not just for us, because that would be silly and self-serving. No. You should get a supporting membership because a) all the cool kids are doing it; b) you’ll get a huge packet of free reads (not guaranteed, but it always happens these days); c) to support the Hugo Awards by making it bigger and better than ever before; and d) to have a say in what gets an award! It also means we could really use your support to bring The Skiffy and Fanty Show to Worldcon this year. We need to at least raise the funds for the plane ticket by the end of this month, so if you can spare $10, please do so! Julia and Shaun would love to attend the convention and sit among the nominees at the Hugo Awards (and Jen is planning to make this happen now, too, which is awesome). And that’s it! Thanks so much for nominating us. Thanks to the Hugo committee folks for sending us the amazing news. Thanks to everyone who has supported us in any way: listeners, readers, hosts, friends, writers and sf/f fans…thank you all. Squeeeee! —————————————————————- P.S.: Don’t forget that we’re hosting our 200th episode live on Monday! Details here.
