MICHAEL BLUMLEIN, M.D. is the author of X,Y (now a minor motion picture), THE BRAINS OF RATS, and most recently THE HEALER, headlining Pyr’s prestigious new SF list. A frequent Bram Stoker (horror) and World Fantasy Award nominee, Blumlein lives in San Francisco where he both practices and teaches medicine at the University of California.

“The Healer [is a] haunting literary SF novel…original, surreal and extraordinary!”
–Publishers Weekly

MICHAEL CADNUM has been a National Book Award Finalist and a Fellow of the National Endowment for the Arts. He was twice a finalist for the Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award as well as a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award. CAN’T CATCH ME, a collection of his short stories, has just been released by Tachyon. He lives in Albany, CA.

“Cadnum knocks us off our platitudes and sends us sliding elsewhere…and we are smoothly swept into a new field of perception.” –Ted Kooser, US Poet Laureate

7 pm, Tues July 18
New College Valencia Theatre
777 Valencia St, SF

$4, free to New College community
Discussion and book signing afterward

SF in SF is sponsored by New College of California
and curated by Adam Cornford
Karen Williams and Terry Bisson

Barnes & Nobles’ Paul Goat Allen just sent an email informing us of his upcoming review of Infoquake and interview with author David Louis Edelman. The review & interview will appear in August in the B&N sff newsletter as well as on B&N’s Science Fiction/Fantasy homepage, and I will certainly point out a link to it then. But for now, I’m thrilled to report that Paul says:

“Brilliantly blending the cutthroat intrigues of the high-tech business world with revolutionary world building, Edelman could quite possibly be the illegitimate lovechild of Donald Trump and Vernor Vinge. Infoquake is one of the most impressive science fiction debuts to come along in years – highly recommended.”

Obviously, we are thrilled with the comparison to Vinge which joins prior comparisons to Charles Stross and Cory Doctorow. Not bad company to keep! Meanwhile, an interview with Edelman is already up at the blog Meme Therapy, where Edelman explains:

“When I started writing Infoquake, I gave myself a challenge. If you had virtually unlimited computing power and a virtually unlimited supply of energy, what could you do? Keep in mind that neither of these things is an impossibility. Moore’s Law continues to predict exponential growth in computing power, and there are all kinds of breakthroughs in solar energy just around the corner.”

Finally, Paula Guran blogs about her humorous encounter with Edelman and Yours Truly at the recent Book Expo America, then goes on to kindly praise Infoquake on her blog Dark Echo:

“It is sf, yes, but sf about cut-throat business practices and competitive programming (a way-cool concept of sorta programming in thin air), with an endearingly sociopathic protagonist, and lotsa, lotsa nifty techno-supposings, and an interesting concept of guild/spiritual family/religion/union groups in a technocracy. Highly imaginative use of the current Zeitgeist.”

Rob H. Benford posts his review of Martin Sketchley’s The Destiny Mask to SFFWorld:

“Few middle books in trilogies are as full of action as Sketchley’s, he doesn’t give the reader much room to breathe. While he was able to throw the characters into the plot and action, he still has a chance to develop new characters and examine, albeit briefly, the landscape and politics of his future world….The twin sons and their disparate development provide food for thought in the nature vs. nurture argument, seemingly in favor of the nurture side. In between the chases and escapes, there is some time to consider the nature of government, revolution, and sticking with one’s beliefs, despite the odds.”

Mike Resnick’s short story collection, New Dreams for Old, just got an A- over at Science Fiction Weekly:

“…when Resnick is good, he’s very, very good, and when he’s bad he’s … well, still interesting. ….Resnick uses science-fiction tropes very effectively to enhance the emotional and intellectual impact of his stories. It can also be noted that although the short fiction of Mike Resnick appears in many ways to be very traditional and far from the cutting edge of current SF, he is a master of metaphor and often uses other complex literary devices quite skillfull….an important collection of stories by one of the science fiction field’s best writers.”

Donna Jones, at SFCrowsnest.com, called Keith Brooke’s Genetopia “a genuinely great read” in her review:

“Genetopia manages to elicit all sorts of emotional input from those that read it. Never failing to hit the right note at the right time in the story. Simply brilliant!”

Nicki Lynch posts a review of Mike Resnick’s new short story collection, New Dreams for Old, at SFRevu:

“Mike is an old-fashioned storyteller who delights in telling tall tales and tweaking the notions of the reader. His characters are people we all know, they just live in a different time or place. The stories are build on ‘what ifs’ and ‘how abouts’. If you’re looking for short stories that will have you thinking and laughing, this collection will be a good read…. New Dreams for Old is a pleasing collection of stories well told, with characters and situations that will entertain you and get you thinking.”

Rick Kleffel of the Agony Column has just posted his review of Joel Shepherd’s upcoming novel Crossover. He praises Joel for his:

“…immersive writing style. That and his ability to integrate rip-roaring noir plots with perceptive character development that spins off some interesting thought-experiments about how technology will make our lives bigger but not necessarily better. Shepherd also has a rather droll sense of humor. He pumps up his borderline clichés to make them snicker at themselves. The reader gets to join in. “

Rick goes on to compare Crossover, and the two books in the Cassandra Kresnov series which will follow it, to two other trilogies about “cyberpunkette heroines,” Elizabeth Bear’s Hammered, Scardown, and WorldWire, and Marianne de Pierres’ Nylon Angel, Code Noir, and Crash Deluxe.

My thoughts exactly. In fact, Marianne de Pierres just called Cassandra a “compelling addition to the world of Science Fiction’s Fatal Femmes.” Recall too that Publishers Weekly said, “Shepherd’s intriguing heroine and strong female characters bode well for this projected series. … Shepherd grapples with some genuinely thought-provoking questions on the nature of humanity.” Which is what I like about Joel’s work, as he marries the smart idea to the exciting action as well as anyone I’ve ever seen and better than most.

A review of Chris Roberson’s Paragaea has popped up over at SFSignal:

“In a time when science fiction seems to be taking itself way too seriously, along comes a contemporary pulp adventure that injects some fun back into the genre. …the strong point of Paragaea is the adventure hook; and not just any adventure hook but a retro-style one. Paragaea is enjoyable for the same reason that Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow was – nostalgia. This ultimately gives the book a sheer-entertainment flavor that makes it charming.”

The latest issue of Cheryl Morgan’s wonderful Emerald City is online, and this one includes two very enthusiastic reviews I’d like to call attention to. One is by Karina Meerman and is of Justina Robson’s latest, Keeping it Real. The other is by Joe Gordon and is of Adam Roberts’ latest, Gradisil.

Both reviews are of the UK editions of these novels, both of which were published by Gollancz and edited by Simon Spanton, the man who first brought you Richard Morgan’s Altered Carbon and whose editorial judgement I am coming to greatly admire. In fact, I’ve yet to read a novel Simon selected that I don’t think is positively brilliant. Both these books, certainly, are garnering wonderful reviews in places like Locus, SFX, Starburst, SFFWorld…

Now Keeping it Real and Gradisil will be coming out from Pyr in our Spring/Summer 2007 season. We expect to use a variant of Larry Rostant’s fantastic cover for our edition of Keeping it Real, whereas the marvelous Stephan Martiniere has already turned in his artwork for Gradisil, to my and Adam’s considerable delight, and I am anxious for the day when I can debut it here.

And speaking of that day…

If you live in the United Kingdom or one of the territories served by Gollancz, then I urge to rush out and buy these books right now. Justina’s novel is the most over-the-top fun I’ve had with a book in long time, crazy Matrix action, cyborg-on-elf sex, blood sugar sex magick and rock’n’roll. I’ve not gasped for air in sheer delight at anything like this since Michael Swanwick’s Darger and Surplus tales, and I’ve not seen anyone before exhibit the brazen chutzpah in takes to write total Power Rangers-style action sequences with such a straight face. And being Justina Robson, there’s also a lot of brilliant speculation amid the fun and genuine troubled-girl angst. Think Robocop asking “Do I look fat in these jeans?” Whereas Adam, who has absolutely astounded me since I first read On, who is one of the smartest individuals it has ever been my priviledge to know, and who writes big concept SF of the Arthur C Clarke variety only filtered through a level of literate prose & multi-layered narrative that would do Theodore Sturgeon or Samuel Delany proud, has written a birth-of-a-nation epic that may be his finest achievement to date. Gradisil succeeds on both the macro and micro level, presenting a very convincing portrait of the decades just passed our current wave of non-NASA space exploration, where every dot com billionaire has his own rocket program, to the end of the 21st century when near-earth-orbit becomes a practical destination for people to go en masse, coupled with a very personal tale of revenge threaded through one family tree. Political satire and Greek tragedy. What’s not to love? So yes, if you live in the UK or thereabouts, go pick up the Gollancz versions now with my blessing.

But if you live here in North American, can I ask you a favor, on behalf of myself, Pyr, and both of these authors? Please wait for our edition. I didn’t used to think that it mattered. Sometimes I liked the UK cover better than the US, or I wanted a hardcover when the US publisher only brought the book out in trade paperback or mass market. Or I didn’t want to wait. So yes, if you went through my own library, you’d see a few UK editions acquired in years past. But now I know better. There are a long list of deserving British and Australian authors that you don’t see over here. There are others that you don’t see here any more. Science fiction is not such a big market that the few hundred editions that slip through the specialty shops, or get shipped from Amazon.co.uk don’t make a difference. Oh, if you collect the UK versions of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels, you probably aren’t really going to make a dent in his sales, but for a lot of these writers, particularly of hard, literate SF, it does matter. This is Adam’s first book in the US – something that many people, not just Yours Truly – think is long overdue, and how our edition of Gradisil does will very substantially effect whether his next work of sheer genius comes out in the US or not, either from Pyr or someone else. We’re very fortunate to have Ian McDonald’s magnificent River of Gods, which, unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know is being touted everywhere as being a monumental, landmark work, one of those once-in-a-decade achievements, a “must read,” but Ian is an example of a writer who was out of the US market for several years before finding his way back in. He’s very glad to be back, and we are priviledged to have facilitated his return. So my long-winded point is, if you admire these writers, and you want to see more of their work over here, please show your support for the US editions. Every person makes a difference. And hey, I’m not just talking about our authors and pimping our own books. This applies across the board. Go buy Bantam’s edition of Jon Courtenay Grimwood’s masterpiece; go pick up the Night Shade edition of the latest Iain M. Banks; get the Del Rey edition of that Hal Duncan book you’ve heard so much about. If you’re a collector, and you’ve got to have that UK first edition – if the work means that much to you – consider buying both. Hey, I’ve got all three of China Miéville’s Bas Lag novels in their original UK hardcovers, absolutely, but I’ve got the Del Rey trade paperbacks too.

I appreciate your indulgence with this post. I’ve seen enough people posting on blogs lately, asking “Why can’t I buy the UK version? Why should I wait?” You can make up your own mind, but I think a lot of people don’t actually know the impact of buying outside their territory, and I wanted to set the record straight. And for those of you who’ve been supporting us when we bring you overseas talent, my deep and sincere thanks. There’s a lot more where that came from.