02.22.02

More previews from the sf newsletter that answers the questions you hoped no one would ask…

Simon R.Green probes the heart of the UK tv market with a well-sharpened stake: 'A tv writer I know recently submitted a vampire series to Brit tv, and was told, "We like the scripts, but do they have to be vampires? Couldn't they be AIDS victims instead?"'

As Others See Us. The New York Times e-mail Books Update notes that the blurb on Doris Lessing's latest novel features '…the publisher's statement that this book marks Lessing's return to "realistic fiction." Rockwell, the editor of The New York Times Arts & Leisure section, says this blurb may reflect "the lingering disappointment felt by some Lessing fans about her voyage into imaginative storytelling and about her `space fiction' in particular."' Another poor stray welcomed back to the fold after slumming around in imaginative storytelling.

Neal Asher, author of Gridlinked, spotted the typo in the official BSFA Award nominations release: 'Aaargh! Though I would appreciate the sales of Gridlinked to be confused with Ben Elton's book, I'm a little pissed-off with the confusion of titles! Steve Rawlings' artwork on Gridlinked is a contender for the award, not sodding Gridlock or even Gridlocked! The next person who calls it either of those will get a Gridlinked suppository and should be aware I only have the large format version!' Too late, alas, to change the ballot form already sent out far and wide…

Thog's Masterclass. Dept of Splendid Simile. 'He sounded like a dead child discovering that eternity is some buzzing, languorous dream of Bath.' (M. John Harrison, 'Running Down', 1975)

David Langford is a writer, editor, physicist, bon vivant, and software consultant. His monthly SF newsletter, Ansible, is the essential SF-insider sourcebook of wit and incongruity. He lives in Reading, England with his wife Hazel, 25,000 books, and a few dozen Hugo awards.