Guest Post: CliFi, et al. by Marianne de Pierres
Marianne de Pierres is the author of the popular PARRISH PLESSIS trilogy and the award-winning SENTIENTS OF ORION and PEACEMAKER series. The PARRISH PLESSIS series has been translated into many languages and adapted into a role-playing game, while the PEACEMAKER series is being adapted into a novel adventure game. The sequel to PEACEMAKER, MYTHMAKER was just released by Angry Robot Books. Fictional dystopias born from climate change are increasingly prevalent in fiction. Not that it’s a new concept … JG Ballard wrote The Wind from Nowhere, The Drowned World and The Burning World back in the ’60s, and they weren’t the first CliFi novels by any means. Jules Verne, I believe, wrote one in 1889. Recently though, the sub-genre has gained momentum as particularly seen in the success of Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl, and Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake trilogy.
Interview with Jaime Lee Moyer
Jaime Lee Moyer is the author of the Delia trilogy (Delia’s Shadow, A Barricade in Hell, and Against a Brightening Sky). Jaime answered some questions about her work and her new novel. PW: For those readers unfamiliar with you, who is Jaime Lee Moyer? JLM: I’m a writer, a poet, and a dreamer. A huge part of my childhood, from 7 to 14, was spent living in a housing project in South Central Los Angeles, which by definition was an interesting place for a shy Irish girl to grow up. Books and reading saved me as a kid, and allowed me to escape the unpleasant — okay, rotten — reality that was day to day life. Living there is what taught me to dream and made me a writer. Chasing dreams got me to the place I am today, with a third book coming out. Getting here wasn’t easy, nor painless, but I wouldn’t have missed any of it. I have far too many interests and creative hobbies. I love to travel. Most of the time I’d rather listen to others than talk myself.
Mining the Genre Asteroid: Tea with the Black Dragon, R.A. MacAvoy
Martha MacMamara has had a strained relationship with her computer programmer of a daughter, Elizabeth. When Elizabeth sends her a plane ticket and a reservation to a hotel in San Francisco, however, Martha is drawn west to find out what is going on in Elizabeth’s life. Martha’s arrival coincides, however, with Elizabeth’s outright disappearance. With Martha unable to find her daughter, the help and aid of a mysterious Chinese gentleman may prove to be a most fortunate and propitious meeting. For, you, see, Mayland Long is far more, and far older, than he appears, and the perspicacious Martha recognizes this right off. And so one of the most interesting and powerful relationships in the history of SFF novels is born. Tea with the Black Dragon is R.A. MacAvoy’s 1983 Nebula and Hugo nominated novel. On the strength of the novel, MacAvoy won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 1983. The novel won the Locus Award for best first novel in 1984. It’s a short novel, most especially by modern standards, and aside from the richness of the writing to slow you down, it goes down as a very fast read (or re-read).
Book Review: Dragon Heart by Cecelia Holland
A fantasy kingdom under threat, avaricious and grasping scions of an Empire seeking their ambitions and desires, and an implacable dragon come together in Dragon Heart, the first fantasy novel from Cecelia Holland. Holland is best known for a long string of historical fiction novels set across history and time such as The Secret Eleanor, looking at the life of Eleanor of Aquitaine. The Angel and the Sword is set in 9th Century France, a telling of the female knight legend of Roderick the Beardless. Pillar of the Sky details the construction of Stonehenge, and Until the Sun Falls goes deeply into the life of Psin, a General in the Mongol horde in the time after Genghis’ death. In Dragon Heart, King Reymarro, the King of Castle Ocean, at the edge of the sea, is dead. The grasping, avaricious Empire to the East has seized the opportunity to exert dominion over this last outpost of land in the west. Queen Marioza and her children face the scions of the Empire come to take control of the land and the Castle. These scions themselves have ambitions, plans and desires of their own, and struggle and conflict amongst themselves as well as the royal family. Control of a kingdom like Castle Ocean could be a stepping stone to challenging the Emperor for supremacy, after all, or at least to keep in his good graces.
Skiffy and Fanty Interview with author Jamie Wyman
Paul: So, for those readers unfamiliar with you, who is Jamie Wyman? Jamie: Jamie is the geeky, chai-swilling writer of urban fantasy, Sherlock spec fic and a variety of flash fiction. Paul: Your urban fantasy revolves around a couple of characters and series. Tell us about Catherine Sharp, your protagonist in the Etudes in C# series.
