io9: best of

"Kicking And Screaming For Science Fiction" Did No Good, On Publishers Weekly's Best-Of List

Charlie Jane Anders — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 06:30:00 PST

What do women authors and science-fiction writers have in common? A notable absence on Publishers Weekly's list of the ten best books of the year. PW apologized proactively for the omission, saying "We wanted the list to reflect what we thought were the top 10 books of the year with no other consideration....We ignored gender and genre and who had the buzz....It disturbed us when we were done that our list was all male. There was kicking and screaming for a science fiction title. A literary ghost story came so close, it squeaked."

Maybe PW didn't look hard enough, suggests About.Com's Linda Lowen. PW's list includes a John Cheever biography and some fairly doughty books of essay and non-fiction. But what about Cherie Priest's Boneshaker? "The fact that it's from Tor, an acclaimed science fiction/fantasy publisher with an award-winning author list, says something...as does PW's inclusion of it in their Top 100 Books of 2009," writes Lowen. Meanwhile, Lowen speculates that the literary ghost story in question was Sarah Waters' Booker Prize-shortlisted The Little Stranger — although there's also Audrey Niffenegger's Her Fearful Symmetry.

Lowen's whole discussion of how the culture industry overlooks women writers, including links and quotes from other people's discussions, is well worth checking out. But it's also fascinating that, in a sense, women literary writers and science-fiction writers seem to get excluded from the mainstream "best of" lists for opposite reasons — the literary women's books are deemed too "small" and "unambitious," whereas science-fiction novels, one senses, are too huge and over-reaching, with their far-future settings or world-transforming technologies. [WomensIssues.About.Com]

10 Worst Moments In 2008's Science Fiction TV

Meredith Woerner — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:51:46 PST

Ever seen a man give birth to a giant fart in the name of science, a deaf severed head seeking revenge, or an episode of Heroes? They're among this year's worst TV moments.

True Blood - Dirt Sex - Fourth Man In The Fire
They are seriously having sex while he is covered in dirt, everywhere. I don't know what kind of medicine to even prescribe for that infection you know she's going to get.

Smallville - Maxima Super Slut - "Instinct"
Maxmia is really needy and quite ridiculous. Withing five seconds of meeting, they're already on to lame elevator sex but, uh oh — guess who pops by.

Torchwood - We Stare Dramatically - "Meat"
Oh my this is just bad acting, full of lip biting and staring. I've never heard anyone say TOMORROW so sternly and yet so full of sadness.

Fringe - Peter Takes Requests (But Not Really) - "Ghost Network"
Oh I so could have done without the entire piano shtick. We really didn't need to turn Walter's lab into a piano bar.

Scream Queens - Is Deaf Voice Funny?
This reality TV show is amazing especially when they decide to do their decapitated head character as a deaf woman.

Heroes - Claire's Death - "The Eclipse Part 2"
This is only really annoying because she didn't die.

Knight Rider - The Car's On Fire, So Let's Get Naked - "A Knight In Shining Armor"
Excuse Number 1,0001 for what's-his-face to get naked, then they pass out naked!

Dr. Who - Annoying Daughter - The Doctor's Daughter
I did not like the Doctor's daughter Jenny, at all. And I especially didn't like it when she came back from the dead. Let me explain some more, it's not because she's "prettier" than, well, everyone in the world in the blond and sweet way, it's because I do not understand where the attachment came from. Why should we care about someone who was so quickly generated and then exterminated? She didn't pull on my heartstrings in the right way.

Heroes - Sylar's Mama Is Disturbing - "A Second Coming"
This mom on son cheek stroking is so disturbing

Testees - Fart Baby - "Gas Pill"
Two idiot human guinea pigs think that they are "pregnant" from a pill they start taking, and give birth to a giant fart. Worst scene in 2008.

Top 20 TV Moments Of 2008

Meredith Woerner — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:07:31 PST

This year the TV was jam-packed with climactic kisses, deaths and waffles. Here's our video roundup of our favorite moments, silly and serious, from 2008 TV.

Compilation 1:

Chuck - Smooch - "Chuck Versus The Ex"
John Casey (Adam Baldwin) is the best part of Chuck and makes the floppy-haired nerd boy tolerable.

True Blood - How To Kill A Vampire - "Plaisir d'amour
Didn't know that the rule of "if you throw up, then I'm going to throw up" applies to vampires.

Doctor Who - Cyberman Transformer - "The Next Doctor"
Jesus H Christ that's cool.

Lost - I Said All Of You - "There's No Place Like Home: Part 2"
Who knew being in a coffin could be so intimidating?

Fringe - First Walterism - "Pilot"
That is the sound of a new era of science funny, crazy-style.

Sarah Connor Chronicles - Crazy Future Ladies - "Strange Things Happen at the One Two Point"
All the ladies from the future put your hands up!

Eureka - Bye Bye Nathan - "I Do Over"
I complained about Nathan's exit on this show the first time around, but it's really grown on me after watching it a few more times.

Eleventh Hour - Flesh Eating STDs - "Spring Break Sucks"
Flesh eating STDs totally ruined my spring break, too.

The Office - Dumbledore Calrissian - "Business Ethics"
Funniest science fiction joke of the season.

Stargate Atlantis - Nerd Love, McKay Style - "Brain Storm"

The nerd gets the girl.

The Sarah Connor Chronicles - Derek Blows Our Minds - "Complications"
Wait, what? How many times did you rewind this part?

Battlestar Galactica - Cally Air Locked - "The Ties That Bind"
GOOD RIDDANCE. Thank you, RDM, for delivering what I needed.

True Blood - Sad Dancing For Drugs - "Escape from Dragon House"
Sparked a whole revolution of sad underwear dancing.

Compilation 2:
Dr. Who - Kiss Goodbye - "Journey's End"
Why can't I meet a man like the Doctor? Best kiss, because it kept the real Doctor at bay, and Rose off in another dimension (not that I don't love her — I'm just ready for some new blood).

Life On Mars - Sam Teaches Black Panthers About Vanilla Ice - "Things to Do in New York When You Think You're Dead"
Sam, you are the man.

Smallville - Doomsday Ruins Lame Wedding - "Bride"
Only thing worth watching on Smallville this season so far: Sam Witwer as Doomsday.

Battlestar Galactica - Finding Earth - "Revelations"
You made a wrong turn at Saturn.

Heroes - Waffles! - "I Am Become Death"
Surprise — I'm creepier when I act normal!

Venture Brothers - OSI Song
Big "Tah Dah" moment.

Lost - World's Best Phone Conversation - "The Constant"
My favorite episode of the season — just a beautiful example of a great pay-off after a long, long, long wait for these two lovers.

25 Years of The Best Short Stories in Science Fiction Has Come To This

Alex Carnevale — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:20:00 PDT

It's been 25 years of Gardner Dozios' The Year's Best Science Fiction, and the 25th anniversary edition totals 692 pages of testimony to the state of the industry. Dozois dedicates the first 51 pages alone to a summation of the previous year, a trend he started in the first volume a quarter of a century ago. Congratulations is in order for the editor of this venerable series. Now we judge whether this year's group was worthy of his attention.In his introduction to the volume Dozois writes of the British journal Postscripts, "I could wish they'd print more core science fiction and less slipstream/postmodernism/ fantasy." This is his usual complaint with the thirteen other "Best of the Year" anthologies released. His preference carries over to SF films, of which he counts only one real science fiction film, Danny Boyle's solar voyage Sunshine in 2007. Dozois doesn't lack for attitude, as friend Michael Swanwick makes clear in his memory of the first time he met the editor:

I first met Gardner twenty-umpty-some years ago at a Philcon. He was sitting in a hallway, surrounded by fans, giving a dramatic reading of Robert Heinlein's Time Enough for Love, in order to demonstrate that sections of it had the same cadence as Longfellow's "Hiawatha." (Go ahead, try it for yourself. Chapter XI: "Stand with me on man's old planet,/gazing north when sky has darkened . . . Here is life or here is dying;/only sin is lack of trying./Grab your picks and grab your shovels;/dig latrines and build your hovels - " And so on.) He was a one-man carnival.

The Year's Best Science Fiction starts off with David Moles' "Finisterra", and Ken MacLeod's "Lighting Out", and more heavy hitters come later in the volume. For some reason, both lead stories feature the same small note at the end - a knowing smile on the part of a character. With a collection of this size, it's difficult to not have overlap: in subject matter, terminology, and general worldview. Some of the stories do begin to blend together despite solid debuts from Una McCormack, James Van Pelt and Justin Stanchfield. But Dozois generally knows where he's going, and in an anthology like this, there's a solid core of impressive regulars. Gardner Dozios published Robert Silverberg (at left) in his first annual The Year's Best anthology in 1984. Silverberg's fifteenth contribution to the series is "Against the Current", a showpiece here, both for its quality relative to the rest of the volume, and its masterful depiction of a man fighting the wrong way against time. Originally appearing in Fantasy and Science Fiction, it's well worth seeking out. Dozois' group is at its best when it doesn't limit its restrictions, and shoots beyond where you usually land in 20 short pages. John Barnes' "An Ocean Is A Snowflake, Four Billion Miles Away" from Jim Baen's Universe is a tender love story, and despite Dozios' shots at fantasy in the introduction, he includes British writer Gwyneth Jones' fantasy-styled short story, "Saving Tiamaat" from his other anthology this year, The New Space Opera - he also reprints a brilliant Ian MacDonald story among other transplanted from that volume. A passion for adventure stories is obvious, and he closes out the volume with Gregory Benford's masterful adventure "Dark Heaven." The reclusive Australian author Greg Egan is Dozois' absolute favorite, as you can see if you check out the number of Egan stories in the anthology's history. Dozois often published two Egan stories each year in the anthology, a distinction he reserved for few other writers. We get two Egan stories here, the better of which is "Glory." The stories that read the best — and some are strangely prescient on this matter — are ones that find ways to comment interestingly on economic issues. In stories by Ian McDonald and Bruce Sterling, the problems of the global economy are depicted with strong characters and economic analysis that make great reading for aspiring Alan Greenspans and young moguls-to-be. Even though many of these stories are available online, $22 sounds more than reasonable given the size of this volume. We leave you with the most "storied" authors in the 25-year history of The Year's Best Science Fiction: Greg Egan (19) Nancy Kress (16) Michael Swanwick (16) Robert Silverberg (15) Robert Reed (15) Walter J. Williams (14) Bruce Sterling (12) Ian MacDonald (12) James Patrick Kelly (12) Ian MacLeod (11) John Kessel (11) Pat Cadigan (11) Ursula K. LeGuin (10) Howard Waldrop (10) Stephen Baxter (10) Joe Haldeman (8) Kim Stanley Robinson (8) Connie Willis (7) Kage Baker (7) Gregory Benford (7) Mike Resnick (7)