Wondering what's going on in the world of Australian science fiction and fantasy? Then check out Rich Horton's review of four recent Australian anthologies in Fantasy Magazine. "I'll state upfront that not one of these books fully satisfies. Each is ambitious in its own way, and each has some nice work, but across the board I'd say there are [too] many minor stories, and indeed occasionally some very weak work. But for all that, there is, as I said, some nice work in each of these books: Let's celebrate that." Which is about standard for most short story anthologies.
If you've ever wondered how best to reply to those who don't like your review of their book, then this is probably as good a way as any.
If you live in Australia, and read books, you're probably aware that that the country has a regulation in place that allows Australian publsihers the right to produce an Australian edition of a book if it has not been made available to Australian readers within 30 days of its release overseas. But did you know that the same regulation does not apply to ebooks? Andrew Kelly of the "Black Dog" blog does, and isn't happy about it. I have a feeling that this fits into the same stupid bucket that allows for region-coding of DVDs so that some films available around the world aren't released in Australia until months after their premieres elsewhere.
With the Melbourne Writers Festival starting up soon (August 27th) you need to be reading Estelle and Angela in the associated blog. How else will you know what is really going on?
Scott Westerfeld's follow-up to his wonderful steampunk YA novel Leviathan will be titled Behemoth, which sounds perfectly apt. But did you know that the audiobook of the new title will be released the same day as the print version? Publishing sure is a strange place these days.
