Tag: neil gaiman

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Other worlds: Walton, Gaiman win Hugos

Awards. The Hugo Award winners were announced at Worldcon this past weekend. Taking Best Novel was Jo Walton’s Among Others, beating out George R. R. Martin’s A Dance With Dragons and works by China Miéville, James S. A. Corey and Mira Grant. (Walton also won the Nebula for the book.) Other writing prizes went to Kij Johnson, Charlie Jane Anders, Ken Liu and more.

The dramatic presentation awards went to Game of Thrones S1 and Neil Gaiman for his Doctor Who episode ‘The Doctor’s Wife.’ (Gaiman took the opportunity to announce he’s writing another episode for the show.) Also noteworthy to us, SF Signal winning for Best Fanzine!

Tolkien. With Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit adaption now being three films, the second has been retitled The Desolation of Smaug, with There and Back Again now being the third installment. I fully expect it to contain at least an hour of various slow-motion endings. But seriously, it looks like there was a lot of hints dropped at DragonCon.

A Song of Ice And Fire. A hilarious Storm of Swords ‘It Gets Better’ PSA. Yes, of course there are spoilers. Or, you can read what GRRM has revealed of the Targaryen conquest of Westeros from the upcoming The World of Ice and Fire.

Lists. io9 picks fall’s must-read SF/F books and explores the mermaid trend in YA.

Records. The Hunger Games series has outsold Harry Potter – at least on Amazon.

Also: Ray Bradbury’s FBI file / Lev Grossman interviews Terry Brooks / Ursula Le Guin’s Noble Prize odds / Dark Tower adaption not so dead after all?

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Other worlds: Tor.com readers name their top SF/F novels of the decade

Tor.com has wrapped up their reader’s poll, naming the top ten science fiction and fantasy novels of the decade:

  1. Old Man’s War by John Scalzi
  2. American Gods by Neil Gaiman
  3. The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
  4. Blindsight by Peter Watts
  5. Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey
  6. A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin
  7. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
  8. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
  9. Mistborn: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson
  10. Perdido Street Station by China Mieville

I’ve read half of them: I could see American Gods, Kushiel’s Dart, and A Storm of Swords among my own top reads, but I was distinctly underwhelmed by The Name of the Wind and Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. (I’ve been putting off Old Man’s War – it’s in the pile!) What are your thoughts?

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Will Sandman finally be adapted… For TV?

And can you have Sandman without a McKean?Various movie adaptions of Neil Gaiman’s highly-acclaimed and much-beloved Sandman comic series have ended up stuck in development hell over the years – much to the relief of the fans.

Now, however, a new challenger emerges: TV. The Hollywood Reporter said Wednesday that Warner Bros. is looking to get the rights for the series from DC Entertainment, and Supernatural creator Eric Kripke is their first choice to helm it. Neil Gaiman is not (yet?) involved.

As a fan of Sandman, I’ve never really wanted it on screen: The story works wonderfully as a comic, and I can’t see how doing it otherwise would any favors. (With all apologies to Dark Horse and their Star Wars folks, it was Sandman that finally showed me of the heights the format was capable of.)

I can’t pretend to be an expert on Kripke, but his name does not exactly install faith in the project: I’ve never been able to make it through an entire episode of Supernatural, and little I’ve heard about the series makes me want to keep trying.

If Gaiman gets on board, I would be a little less OH HELL NO about the very idea. But for now? Here’s hoping for another round of development hell.

One way or another, now is a good time to check the series out if you haven’t already. The first volume is a tad shaky, as all newborn comics are, but things start shaping up with the second.

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Drive-by movie news: Twilight, Watchmen, Indy 5

Cedric didn't die, he just went homeOH SHIT IT’S A TWILIGHT ENTRY, GET IN THE CAR. The reviews are not good (43%!) for the preteen squee event of the year, but since when has that ever made a difference at the box office? At the very least, we can hold out hope that the movie is better than the book. Just remember, ladies: stalking is not romantic, even if the guy is hot (well, ‘hot’) and comes with a lifetime supply of built-in body glitter.

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SDCC ’08: Saturday and Sunday at the con

While I don’t doubt there were still plenty of Star Wars fans still roaming around Saturday and Sunday, with most of the panels being on Friday there wasn’t much new floating around. Well, except for the Mandalorian wedding. (Oye vey.) And Cinematical posted a brief review of Fanboys. And the official site has more pictures, of course, while Rebelscum continues exhaustively documenting the booths and products of every licensee.

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Helping out Michael Reaves

Thanks to John Scalzi, I just found out that author Michael Reaves is dealing with some serious health issues related to Parkinson’s. So, Subterranean Press is selling a special edition of Interworld, the YA novel Reaves wrote with Neil Gaiman. All profits will go to helping with his medical and living costs.

Reave’s Star Wars work includes the two Medstar novels, Death Star with Steve Perry, and the upcoming Coruscant Nights trilogy.

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Neil Gaiman and the demigods of geekdom

Stardust may not be out yet, but it’s certainly getting its share of hype. It’s currently getting a 100% on Rotten Tomatoes (from only five reviews, granted) but Neil Gaiman is everywhere.

Really, there ought to be a band

Videos du jour

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More April Fool’s

Our own ‘Club Obi-Wan’ has finally been put down…

As far as SW fandom goes, I think Wookieepedia won this round handily. TheForce.Net phoned it in this year with a less-than-special interview podcast; their boards got a Barbie theme.

I enjoyed LocusMag.com: Sainting Neil Gaiman, Kevin J. Anderson’s hostile takeover of Larry Niven’s legendary “Known Space”; Anita Blake vs. Anna Nicole and Sci-Fi Channel’s real stargate.

Oh, and SyFy Portal think we’re all being terribly unprofessional. I can only dream of having such delusions of grandeur, but then we here are only mere fan bloggers and cannot possibly understand the responsibilities of posting real news.