(date: 2024-06-07 11:29:05)
date: 2024-06-07, from: Final Draft blog
With 4.8 million views in one day, the latest Star Wars installment, The Acolyte, is Disney’s biggest streaming launch of 2024. And as a lifelong Star Wars enthusiast, I can see why.
https://blog.finaldraft.com/4-things-the-acolyte-can-teach-you-about-screenwriting
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-07, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
From Jules Feiffer long ago. Nothing changes…
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3kudvsfmsmf2s
date: 2024-06-07, from: Locus Magazine
Asimov’s 3-4/24
The March/April 2024 issue of Asimov’s is quite a strong one. It opens with a “How Sere Kept Herself Together” by Alexander Jablokov, the third in a series of stories featuring Sere, an investigator, who in this case starts off looking into a kidnapping, but finds herself embroiled in a far more complex case. The worldbuilding is nicely done and the novella does a good …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/a-c-wise-reviews-short-fiction-asimovs-2/
date: 2024-06-07, from: Locus Magazine
The 15th Hexagon Retreat was held in April 2024 in Crozet VA.
Photographer: Scott H. Andrews
While you are here, please take a moment to support Locus with a one-time or recurring donation. We rely on reader donations to keep the magazine and site going, and would like to keep the site paywall free, but WE NEED YOUR FINANCIAL SUPPORT to continue quality coverage of the science fiction and fantasy …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/photo-story-hexagon-retreat-xv/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-07, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Thank you!
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3kudj35yzu525
date: 2024-06-07, updated: 2024-06-07, from: NarraScope, Celebrating Narrative Games
Late addition of two workshops for June 21st:
Learn the Basics of Writing Branching Narratives with Yarn Spinner – Paris Buttfield-Addison
This workshop will teach attendees how to use the free, open-source interactive narrative and game development tool, Yarn Spinner. In 90 minutes, you’ll learn how to write stories in …
https://narrascope.org/2024/06/more-workshops-2024.html
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-07, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
I’m glad Frank got away. It was a bit scary.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3kucmhk76vq2t
date: 2024-06-06, from: Locus Magazine
Nightmare 2/24, 3/24, 4/24 The Deadlands Winter ’24 The Dark 1/24, 2/24, 3/24
Of the three originals in Nightmare #137, a flash piece satisfied me the most. Jessica Luke García notes in her introduction to “First Girl” that we “live in a Final Girl world” then proceeds to give the girl who dies first in any slasher movie her telling and sometimes risible due.
Two of the new …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/paula-guran-reviews-nightmare-the-deadlands-and-the-dark/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-06, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Absolutely.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3kubnuayqma26
date: 2024-06-06, from: Locus Magazine
Sun of Blood and Ruin, Mariely Lares (Harper Voyager 978-0-06325-431-2, $30.00, 384pp, hc) February 2024.
Pitched as a reimagining of Zorro against the backdrop of Mexican anticolonial resistance, Sun of Blood and Ruin – the debut novel by Mariely Lares – manages to be a fun comfort read with a distinctively folkloric bent. Like its gender-flipped Zorro protagonist who constantly switches between two identities (Lady Leonora, a member of …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/archita-mittra-reviews-sun-of-blood-and-ruin-by-mariely-lares/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-06, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
I got the best news today from one of the artists whose work went out in the Heritage Auction that someone who bought a drawing from him long ago, and sold it for a lot more recently, is sending him 10% of the profits. So the idea of cutting in the artists is starting to catch on. And I’m glad.
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3kubae7mceq27
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-06, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Tonight a firefly landed on my arm…
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C723FscRd8P/?igsh=MWd3NGd5cTZ5YmkzZg==
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku7xgfbgyc2d
date: 2024-06-05, from: Locus Magazine
LINDSAY ELLIS is an author, media critic, and Hugo-nominated video essayist. She also was the co-host of the PBS digital series “It’s Lit,.” After earning her bachelor’s in Cinema Studies from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, she earned her MFA in Film and Television Production from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts with a focus in documentary and screenwriting. She lives in Long Beach, CA. Apostles of Mercy is her …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/spotlight-on-lindsay-ellis/
date: 2024-06-05, from: Locus Magazine
Yanekon, the 62nd Japan Science Fiction Convention, has announced the winners for the 2024 Seiun Awards, honoring the best original and translated works published last year in Japan.
Best Translated Novel
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/2024-seiun-awards/
date: 2024-06-05, from: Interesting, a blog on writing
Sure, the theoretical particle physicists get it… but will it play in Peoria?
https://inneresting.substack.com/p/making-the-geek-movie
date: 2024-06-05, from: Final Draft blog
“Just a shout out to everybody who’s listening who has ever written a movie. This is a true story –
https://blog.finaldraft.com/write-on-late-night-host-seth-meyers
date: 2024-06-05, from: Final Draft blog
Writing scripts is just one part of being a professional screenwriter.
https://blog.finaldraft.com/owning-the-room-from-general-meetings-to-pitching-on-a-project
date: 2024-06-05, from: Locus Magazine
Winners of the 2024 Kurd Laßwitz Preis have been announced. The prize is awarded to German-language SF works published in the previous year.
Best German SF Novel
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/2024-kurd-laswitz-preis-winners/
date: 2024-06-05, from: Locus Magazine
The Bezzle, Cory Doctorow (Tor 9781250865878, $27.99, 240pp, hc) February 2024.
There are a handful of SF writers so sharply attuned to the arcane systems that underlie contemporary culture that it sometimes becomes a challenge to figure out what’s SF and what’s not; William Gibson and Kim Stanley Robinson come to mind, as does Cory Doctorow. The Bezzle, Doctorow’s second novel in a new series featuring forensic accountant …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/gary-k-wolfe-reviews-the-bezzle-by-cory-doctorow/
date: 2024-06-05, from: Locus Magazine
The annual Writers and Illustrators of the Future Awards gala event was held on April 25, 2024 at the Taglyan Complex in Los Angeles. This years’ proceedings marked two important milestones: the 40th anniversary of the Awards for Writers and the 35th for Illustrators. The lavish ceremonies commemorated 24 new winners and included retrospectives on four decades of imaginative achievement; Grand Prize winners were Jack Nash in writing (for his …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/40th-anniversary-writers-illustrators-of-the-future/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-05, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
I wrote it for them.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku6dympsyc2w
date: 2024-06-05, from: Literature & a Latte blog
<p><iframe frameborder="0" height="200" scrolling="no" src="https://player.fireside.fm/v2/FGsx06Yz+5qVQeZPo?theme=dark" width="740"></iframe></p>Show notes:
<a href="https://www.kateheartfield.com" target="_blank">Kate Heartfield</a>
<a href="https://www.kateheartfield.com/the-embroidered-book/" target="_blank">The Embroidered Book</a>
<a href="https://www.kateheartfield.com/the-valkyrie/" target="_blank">The Valkyrie</a>
<a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/58201/grendel-by-john-gardner/" target="_blank">John Gardner, Grendel</a>
<a href="https://www.aeontimeline.com" target="_blank">Aeon Timeline</a>
<a href="https://vajra.me/books/the-saint-of-bright-doors/" target="_blank">Vajra Chandrasekera, The Saint of Bright Doors</a>Learn more about Scrivener, and check out the ebook Take Control of Scrivener.
If you like the podcast, please follow it in Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app. Leave a rating or review, and tell your friends. And check out past episodes of Write Now with Scrivener.
Kate Heartield studied journalism but had always written fiction. "I'm one of those people who has been a fiction writer since I was a kid. I wrote at 11 o'clock at night when I had a full-time newspaper job and a kid. I would take a few years off from time to time, but for the most part, I've always written fiction."
Now, with about half her time devoted to journalism and half to fiction, Kate has written eight novels and two interactive games, and focuses mostly on historical fantasy.
We discussed the writing process; Kate draws on her experience as a journalist when writing fiction. "I start with a really skeletal draft, and I have to add to it as I go; I'm not one of those people who cuts from draft to draft. I think part of that is my journalistic training, that I've trained myself to write in as few words as possible. And then with fiction, sometimes to build tension and to have emotion and bring the reader into the piece, longer work is actually better paced for that. I've learned about my process that my first draft is probably about 75% as long as the final draft will be."
One of Kate's recent novels is The Embroidered Book, a historical fantasy about Marie Antoinette in the 18th century. I asked Kate if it was easier to have this skeleton of truth that she could add to in telling a fantasy story?
"It was easier in some ways. I really liked telling a story that's in amongst the real facts of history, that uses the real facts of history as a scaffolding and then fills in some secret knowledge in between those facts. I suppose it does give me touch points along the way, or milestones to hit so that I have a structure that I can start with. And then I can work with that and change it in a way that suits the story that I'm trying to tell.
"In other ways, it also does make it more difficult. Because if you get to a point in the story, where you think, 'Oh, actually, for character arc purposes, I need something else to happen,' if you've already committed to telling a story that is not going to deviate from history, you've got to be really creative and find a way to do that without actually departing from those facts. So it's similar to straightforward historical fiction, like Hilary Mantel's books, in that you're still telling a character story within those facts, and so you've got to find a way to work within that, which can be a challenge."
Historical fiction relies on in-depth research and Kate said, "I use Scrivener as a hub for all my research. In the Research folder, I have a bunch of text documents that are my running bibliography and links to sources and interesting web pages. I write myself copious notes that all go into Scrivener as well.“
I asked whether Kate outlines her novels. "I do outline. I tend to work more with a synopsis than an outline, in the sense that I learned that a bullet-point outline, or point form as we say in Canada, is not that useful for me because it doesn't have the connective tissue of storytelling in it. It doesn't have the becauses and therefores and thens, whereas a synopsis is a story, even if it is a short and kind of boring story. It has the logic of a story behind it because it's got to be written in complete sentences and with all of that connective tissue. So what I tend to do now is write myself a synopsis, typically one or two pages. Once I have all my notes about character arcs and the basic beats that I want to hit in the story, I'll write it as a synopsis and then I'll keep that running synopsis in Scrivener, in one of my documents in the Research folder. The reason I call it a running synopsis is because I am the kind of person that changes as I go."
Kate builds a timeline for her novels using Scrivener and Aeon Timeline. "The one really interesting way that I use Scrivener now is to help me with my timeline. I have it integrated into Aeon Timeline, which allows me to put metadata in Scrivener that will then appear in the timeline. That helps me a lot, because one thing I have found as someone writing historical fiction, and also as a reviser who changes as I go, is I end up with my character ages being wrong, or I end up with some sort of continuity error at the end. I find that using Scrivener deliberately to tie into all of my note-taking in my timelines is really helpful, because that way, if I change anything in the document, I'm immediately going to change it in all my notes."
<p>Kirk McElhearn is a <a href="https://kirkville.com" target="_blank">writer</a>, <a href="https://kirkville.com/podcasts/" target="_blank">podcaster</a>, and <a href="https://kirkville.com/kirks-photos-2/" target="_blank">photographer</a>. He is the author of <a href="https://www.literatureandlatte.com/store" target="_blank">Take Control of Scrivener</a>, and host of the podcast <a href="https://podcast.scrivenerapp.com" target="_blank">Write Now with Scrivener</a>.</p>
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-05, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Things I did not know about my dog until tonight:
He eats bear shit.
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku5ixwcuts2m
date: 2024-06-04, from: Locus Magazine
Author John Maddox Roberts, 76, died May 23, 2024 in Estancia NM.
Roberts was born in Ohio on June 25, 1947. He began publishing with SF novel The Strayed Sheep of Charun (1977; revised as Cestus Dei, 1983). Other works include the Spacer series, with Space Angel (1979) and Spacer: Window of the Mind (1988); the Cingulum sequence, with The Cingulum (1985), Cloak of Illusion (1985), and The Sword, …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/john-maddox-roberts-1947-2024/
date: 2024-06-04, from: Locus Magazine
Artist, author, and musician MaryAnn Harris, 71, died June 3, 2024 after a long struggle with the Powassan virus. Harris was married to author Charles de Lint and was his frequent collaborator as manager, editor, and illustrator.
Harris was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. She met de Lint in 1974, and they married in 1980. She served as de Lint’s business manager and first editor, and created the cover art …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/maryann-harris-1953-2024/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Seeing all the firefly conversations, I thought I would put up this song for anyone who misses it or hasn’t heard it ever.
https://youtu.be/OKXkVUM4xu8?si=rk-1vco1oV4rftyg
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku4dyvbhlb2v
date: 2024-06-04, from: Locus Magazine
River Mumma, Zalika Reid-Benta (Penguin Canada 978-0-73524-476-4, C$24.95, 256pp, tp) August 2023. (Erewhon 978-1-645-66135-1, $27.00, 284pp, hc) March 2024. Cover by Rebecca Farrin.
So there you are, grad school completed, back home with degree in hand, and all your hopes and dreams must be shelved because the only job you can get entails a lot of folding clothes, cleaning up fitting rooms, and greeting bored customers. This is the …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/colleen-mondor-reviews-river-mumma-by-zalika-reid-benta/
date: 2024-06-04, from: John August blog
John welcomes Meredith Scardino (Girls5eva) and Jen Statsky (Hacks) to discuss the highs and lows of writing the third season of a hit comedy. But how do you push a series forward without violating the premise or retreading familiar terrain? Are the shows still the shows they pitched? How has streaming changed since their shows […] The post The Third Season first appeared on John August.
https://johnaugust.com/2024/the-third-season
date: 2024-06-04, from: Locus Magazine
Cerilli, Matteo: Lockjaw (Penguin Random House Canada/Tundra 9781774882306, $17.99, 328pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult horror novel of two queer teens in a community that doesn’t accept them. When one is killed by a monster the other has to prove it’s real to clear herself and save the town.
Cobell, K.A.: Looking for Smoke (HarperCollins/Heartdrum 9780063318670, $19.99, 416pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult thriller novel set on …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/new-books-4-june-2024/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Definitely!!
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku42phu5lp2f
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
A win for pedants everywhere.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku3wsire5z2t
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Money from the Heritage Auction has gone out to the charities and to the individual artists (still a couple to track down). I have a dream of making things like this more normal in the comics world. https://journal.neilgaiman.com/2024/06/heritage-auction-wrap-up.html?m=1
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku3wporro42m
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
I’m so heartbroken to hear this.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku3vvrdk4z22
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
I used to write a couple of short stories a year for anthologies or magazines. And at the end of the decade I’d have a new short story collection. Some of the best things I’ve written are in those books.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku3vsevox223
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-04, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
I saw my first firefly of the year tonight, walking the dog. By next week I’ll be blase. Now I’m still foolishly happy.
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku2xwregpc2m
date: 2024-06-03, from: Locus Magazine
International Thriller Writers has announced the winners for the 2024 Thriller Awards, including several titles and authors of genre interest.
Best Hardcover Novel
Best Paperback Original Novel
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/2024-itw-thriller-awards-winners/
date: 2024-06-03, from: Locus Magazine
The Mythopoeic Society has announced the 2023 Mythopoeic Awards finalists. Winners will be announced during Mythcon 53,to be held August 2-5, 2024 in Minneapolis MN.
Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/2024-mythopoeic-award-finalists/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-03, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Sure.
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ku2da4yke32i
date: 2024-06-03, from: Locus Magazine
The winners of the 2023 Bram Stoker Awards were announced by the Horror Writers Association at a gala during StokerCon 2024, held May 30 – June 2, 2024 at the San Diego Marriott Mission Valley in San Diego CA.
Superior Achievement in a Novel
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/2023-stoker-awards-winners/
date: 2024-06-03, from: John August blog
The original post for this episode can be found here. John August: Hey, this is John. Heads up that today’s episode has just a little bit of swearing in it. Hello and welcome. My name is John August, and this is Episode 640 of Scriptnotes, a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to […] The post Scriptnotes, Episode 640: Can You Believe It?, Transcript first appeared on John August.
https://johnaugust.com/2024/scriptnotes-episode-640-can-you-believe-it-transcript
date: 2024-06-03, from: John August blog
The oringinal post for this episode can be found here. John August: Hello and welcome. My name is John August. Craig Mazin: My name is Craig Mazin. John: And this is Episode 639 of Scriptnotes, a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters. Today on the show, why are you or your […] The post Scriptnotes, Episode 639: Intrinsic Motivation, Transcript first appeared on John August.
https://johnaugust.com/2024/scriptnotes-episode-639-intrinsic-motivation-transcript
date: 2024-06-03, from: Locus Magazine
As anticipated, Stephen King’s new collection, You Like It Darker: Stories debuts on print lists this week, ranking #1 on three of the four compiled here.
Title Debut / #wks on any list NYT 06.09 LAT 06.02 USAT 05.26 PW 06.03 Amz (06.03) UK: Amz UK (06.03) Canada: Amz.ca (06.03)
Items on list -x- number of lists surveyed
10×3 10×2 150 15×3 100 100 100
Hardcovers
Aster, Nightbane 11.20.23 / …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/weekly-bestsellers-3-june-2024/
date: 2024-06-03, from: Locus Magazine
Escape Pod 1/25/24, 2/8/24, 2/22/24, 2/29/24 Fusion Fragment 2/24 Strange Horizons 2/19/24, 2/26/24, 3/4/24, 3/11/24 Flash Fiction Online 2/24, 3/24
Catching up with Escape Pod, their January original “The Ballad of Starburst Smith” by David Marino finds a mostly failed musician visiting a special service called a Winnower in order to see a possible future where her music career is more than just disappointing. The downside of using …Read More
date: 2024-06-03, from: Locus Magazine
MICHAEL R. CAREY was born in Liverpool, England in 1959. He attended St. Peter’s College, Oxford, where he studied English, and worked as a teacher for 15 years before becoming a professional writer.
His career began as a comics writer in the 1990s, first for smaller companies and later for Marvel and DC. He is best known for the Lucifer series (1999-2006) and his run on Hellblazer (2002-2006). The Unwritten, …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/m-r-carey-vertical-freedom/
date: 2024-06-02, from: Locus Magazine
The Deadlands Winter ’24
The Winter 2024 issue of The Deadlands is full of lovely prose and quiet stories meditating on life and death. In the beautifully written “Threnody in Dark Wood” by Avra Margariti, a professional mourner who sings the dead through the Doorway receives a mysterious assignment to attend an empty funeral with a sealed coffin and soon realizes this is a job unlike any other. …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/a-c-wise-reviews-short-fiction-the-deadlands/
date: 2024-06-02, from: Locus Magazine
Arnaud Lagardère, CEO of Lagardère SA (parent company of Hachette Book Group), was required to step down from his position after being charged with ‘‘vote buying, abuse of power and breach of trust, disseminating false or misleading information and failure to publish accounts.’’ He is under judicial supervision and was ordered to produce a bond of €200,000. The charges stem from an investigation into the battle for control of the …Read More
https://locusmag.com/2024/06/publishing-news-18/
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-02, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Ursula Le Guin tells you how to be a writer.
https://lithub.com/ursula-k-le-guin-on-how-to-become-a-writer/
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ktx2e4wwf72f
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-02, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
Thank you!
[contains quote post or other embedded content]
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ktwz3kclnk2s
@Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky (date: 2024-06-02, from: Neil Gaiman @ BlueSky)
The Climate Refugee Crisis is here. (Gift article link.)
wapo.st/3RbrJhI https://wapo.st/3RbrJhI
https://bsky.app/profile/neilhimself.neilgaiman.com/post/3ktwz2trdkt2d