Solar Flare: Science Fiction News

Author Jeff VanderMeer has a great post on his blog about how to build good fantasy worlds. As well as mentioning the usual basics about consistency and making up rules and sticking to them, Jeff also takes a different look at world building.

One great point he makes is that the fantasy world shouldn’t be too consistent. The real world is full of mysteries and inconsistencies. If the fantasy world is…

I’ve just finished reading The Elder Gods, which is subtitled as The Dreamers, Book 1 by David Eddings and all I can say is what the hell happened? Okay, lets back up a step. The Dreamers is projected as a four book cycle, but if The Elder Gods is a sample of what is in store I can’t see many people reading to the end.

The story (such as it is)…

Locus has announced winners of the 2005 Locus Awards. A complete list of results will be published in the July issue of Locus, but the winners are listed below:

SF NOVEL
# The Baroque Cycle: The Confusion; The System of the World, Neal Stephenson

FANTASY NOVEL
# Iron Council, China Miéville

FIRST NOVEL
# Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, Susanna Clarke

YOUNG ADULT NOVEL
# A Hat Full of Sky, Terry Pratchett

NOVELLA
# “Golden City Far”, Gene Wolfe

NOVELETTE (tie)
#…

Here’s an interesting item that either hasn’t had much coverage or just slipped right by me. Scottish author Campbell Black who writes under the name Campbell Armstrong, is suing George Lucas for £2 million. The suit is for unpaid fees for writing a novel based on the film Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Campbell Black is accusing Lucas of fraud. The Raiders of the Lost Ark book was a huge bestseller…

According to a report at XMenFilms.net the Nightcrawler was dropped from current scripts of X-Men 3 for a very simple reason. That being quite simply that the studio felt there were too many X-Men in the story. The studio was keen for the new heroes like Beast to get a decent amount of screen time and with so many X-Men in the script something had to give.

A second, but related…