It was great to have two of our highly talented international Orbit authors, Karen Miller and N. K. Jemisin, over in the UK recently. At their joint signing at London’s Forbidden Planet store, we put a few questions to these two fantabulous femmes of fantasy fiction. Take a look below to hear their views on the role of the fantasy genre and to hear about some unusual fan reactions . . .
Jesse Petersen is the author of MARRIED WITH ZOMBIES and the forthcoming FLIP THIS ZOMBIE. Like many of us here at Orbit HQ, she’s also a fan of The Walking Dead on AMC. She’ll be offering recaps of each week’s episode here every Monday. This post will contain SPOILERS (also zombies). For previous recaps see 1.01 and 1.02
Hello again, Undead Army! I’m so excited to watch this episode of “The Walking Dead” since I think the proverbial shit is about to hit the fan. If you don’t remember, when we last left off Rick had found some other survivors in Atlanta who helped him escape the zombie horde AND it turned out they were part of the very same band that his own wife, son and former partner are living with. Wife Lori is still getting it on with former partner Shane (and being a little bit unlikeable in the process) and Rick and the gang are heading back to camp even as we speak. Here we go: (more…)
I’m back to talk about National Novel Writing Month some more. This time, instead of complaining on the internet about how mean everyone is—because that’s productive—I figured I’d take a shot at giving advice. This, of course means, that I will get to be the target of enraged tweeting and, with any luck, at least one table-thumping LiveJournal post.
Anyhow, as with last week, this is all with the caveat that any advice I have is targeted towards Fantasy and Science Fiction writers, because that’s what I know and that’s what I love, and this is the Orbit blog, so, frankly, you’re probably a SFF fan anyways. Also, this is all from the perspective of someone who hasn’t written anything longer than an editorial letter since college. So, advice from an editor. Not even advice, let’s say it’s some things you may want to think about if you have a moment between pounding out thousands upon thousands of words a day. (more…)
And the winner is…….Bountiless! The contest really did come down to the wire between Bountiless and Breathless, but in the end, Boba Fett took the prize. And speaking of prize, we were SO impressed with the quality of the contestants, and the feverish commenting, that we decided to award the winner with a $100 gift certificate to Clockwork Couture, helmed by none other than expert panelist and Alexia model, Donna Ricci.
Mr. Fett, please contact me at lauren (dot) panepinto (at) hbgusa (dot) com and we’ll work out the details on the prize.
Of course, ’tis true that Boba Fett is a bit of a tough fit for the world of the Parasol Protectorate, but I think it can work if you think of it like this: If you forget that this is a reimagining of Boba Fett, and just take the costume fresh and just on Steampunk merit, it is absolutely a fine piece of craftsmanship and design. And a hell of a lot of manpower. And I think there is definitely room in the Parasol Protectorate for a helmeted bounty hunter.
And, you know, besides that, it’s freaking Boba Fett in Steampunk. That’s awesome.
You can find out more about the mysterious Mr. Fett at his facebook page. I hear he is available for parties!
Truth be told, all of our finalists — and really all of the contestants — embodied the best aspect of Steampunk: they had fun. I love Steampunk and other “retrofuturism” because you really can bring so much of yourself to it, and look awesome doing it. Your own background, look, culture, your own nerdy obsessions. And it takes chutzpah to dress up on a day not related to Halloween, even for a convention where a whole lot of other people are dressed up too. I applaud the entire Parasol Protectorate Class of 2010. And get working on your costumes again for next year!
Hey remember this picture? Way back in August I was working on a photo shoot with photographer Laura Hanifin for a cover, and I had to share a picture of one of the crazy props we were using that day. Yes, it was a real live—well, actually, dead—octopus, which Laura had dyed with food coloring in a ziplock bag in her fridge. Yes, I am the one holding it, and yes, it was really really slimy.
I got a lot of questions about it, especially after I made the shot my facebook profile pic, but I just couldn’t tell you guys what the images were for until we were ready to launch the cover, just in case it didn’t work out. But luckily it worked out even better than we had hoped, and launch day is finally here, and I actually have not one but two covers to show you. The shoot went so well that we’ve already used photos on two covers, and we’ve still got more good images left. I’m hoping that will make it up to Laura that her apartment stunk like dead fish for at least a month afterwards. (Sorry!)
A few people DID guess that the octopus was standing in for some kind of intergalactic space creature, and I can finally say that you are correct…and the mind that thought up that creature is none other than Philip Palmer, author of Debatable Space, Red Claw, Version 43, and now…Hell Ship! (more…)
N.K. Jemisin is blowing up in 2010! Her debut novel, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms was released to widespread acclaim.
“The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms… is an impressive debut, which revitalizes the trope of empires whose rulers have gods at their fingertips.— io9.com
“The very best kind of sequel: as lush and evocative and true as the first, with all the same sense of mystery, giving us the world and characters we already love, and yet with a new story and a wonderfully new perspective on the whole dazzling world and pantheon the author has built.”
— Naomi Novik on The Broken Kingoms
Now, the best of lists are coming in and it seems the critical attention was well deserved!
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is #5 on the Amazon’s Top 10 Science Fiction and Fantasy list!
And both The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms and the sequel, The Broken Kingdoms, are on Publisher’s Weekly Best Books of 2010 list!
Check out both at bookstores or online retailers near you. . .
We’re very happy to announce that in a remarkable showing, three of the five books selected by Publishers Weekly as the best science fiction/fantasy titles of 2010 are published by Orbit — THE BONE PALACE by Amanda Downum, FEED by Mira Grant, and THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS/THE BROKEN KINGDOMS (a two-for-one deal!) by N.K. Jemisin.
Congratulations to our authors!! And if you haven’t yet gotten around to these books — happy reading!
Jesse Petersen is the author of MARRIED WITH ZOMBIES and the forthcoming FLIP THIS ZOMBIE. Like many of us here at Orbit HQ, she’s also a fan of The Walking Dead on AMC. She’ll be offering recaps of each week’s episode here every Monday. This post will contain SPOILERS (also zombies) after the jump. For previous recaps see 1.01 (more…)
Parasol Protectorate fans, I have a special treat for you today. I have the face of Alexia Tarabotti herself, Donna Ricci, here to give some critiques and comments on the Parasol Protectorate cover finalists. We’ve talked about Donna’s role in the covers before, but I love talking about what a great team-up these covers have been. Donna is the proprietress of Clockwork Couture, which, in my opinion, has the best selection of Steampunk clothing and accessories on the web. She’s also a professional model, a writer on Steampunk fashion, and a champion of beasts great and small. I can’t think of a more fitting person to be our Alexia. And as an extra treat, I’m going to post the images below that became our Parasol Protectorate covers, before and after I did all the photoshop magic to them. You’ll see Donna needs very little retouching!
Before I hand it over, however, I just want to update you guys. We’re going to leave voting open over the whole weekend, and I’ll be tallying votes sometime Monday (after my first coffee, at least) and announcing the winner. N0w remember guys, one vote per email address please…that means you, mom-of-Doubtless! haha.
Ok, here’s the original images of Donna, next to the cover images of without the text, as a bit of a cover “evolution” shot:
It’s November, which means thousands of aspiring writers are telling their friends and family to go amuse themselves for a while. They’ve got a novel to write.
But, it’s been a bit of a rocky start for the NaNoWriMo crowd. For the uninitiated, National Novel Writing Month is that special time of year where anyone who likes makes a run at writing 50,000 words in 30 days. That’s like, 1700 words a day. Which is like, 3-4 pages. Every day. It’s a monumental task, especially when you consider that most of these people aren’t professional writers and mostly have day jobs, families, social obligations… It’s one thing for the pros who participate (who all seem to finish early) but your average aspiring writer is missing that most precious commodity… time.
Which is why Laura Miller’s post on Salon is so… puzzling. She basically goes after NaNoWriMo with both barrels– I’ll get to specifics of her argument in a moment. In addition to her high-profile attack, I get the sense that there’s a bit of push back in the air this year. Galleycat this morning went after first time fantasy novelists with a funny post about what not to do. It’s hard to argue with a lot of the points, but something about the principle just seemed off to me.
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