March Madness has ended in a TIE!
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Four rounds, thousands of votes, and it came down to two: The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin and A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab.
And then they tied.
Supreme Laser explains:
There appears to be white smoke emanating from the chamber.... wait no I see black smoke too... and pink... and what is that? Violet? And fuschia? Oh that is definitely ultramarine. And now some russet... and hmm how did they nail burnt sienna smoke. Well it is burnt. I suppose that was easy. And forest green. Beautiful. OK so it's basically a unicorn farting a rainbow.
I'm consulting the great book of Empressal Emanations and Statistical Manual V and it says here......Both.
I guess we're doing both.
Veronica and I will start reading A Darker Shade of Magic since we've never done a book from Ms. Schwab before. And The Fifth Season will be the ALT read and our second Ms. Jemisin pick! We'll both make our best effort to read it as well and it will have its own discussion section for those who'd like to make it their primary book.
So there you go. Who could have predicted???
Thanks everybody for participating. This was a lot of fun and I'm glad most of you had fun with us. We'll definitely do it again!
Thanks for playing, everyone!
The Sword & Laser Collection Contest: The Sequel
/The rumors are true! (Were there rumors? There may have been rumors). Along with Inkshares, we're running another Collection Contest to find the next great science fiction and fantasy novels. We are so thrilled with our current (in-production) collection, and we can't wait to see what else is out there!
Head over to Inkshares to get the whole scoop, and to learn how you can submit your idea!
"An Unattractive Vampire" joins the S&L Inkshares Collection!
/Back when we launched the S&L Inkshares Collection, we were thrilled with the quantity and quality of the entries we received. For that first contest, we decided to pick two books that epitomized the concepts of "sword" and "laser" to us, and The Life Engineered and Asteroid Made of Dragons were those selections.
All the while, another book was flying up the contest charts, and capturing our hearts (and blood). An Unattractive Vampire by Jim McDoniel:
After three centuries trapped underground, Yulric Bile—the Curséd One, the Devil’s Apprentice, the Thousand Year Old Vampyr—has risen only to find that no one in this time believes he is a vampire. Werewolf, they call him. Zombie. Mummy. Lich. Vampires, he discovers, have become very pretty, very weak, and most disturbing of all, very good. He resolves to correct this disgusting turn of events, or at the very least, murder the person responsible. Aided by a vampire wannabe, the eight-year-old reincarnation of his greatest foe, and a host of ancient horrors as far from sexy as it is possible to be, Yulric journeys from lost subterranean cities to pink suburban houses, battling undead TV stars and his fear of cars, for the right to determine, once and for all, what it truly means to be a vampire.
I'm very happy to announce that An Unattractive Vampire is officially joining the S&L Collection on Inkshares! Jim is also a S&L listener, so we're extra excited to welcome him to the family.
The debut of the Sword & Laser Collection
/As you may have heard on the podcast, we launched a contest on Inkshares last month to find the debut novel for the Sword & Laser Collection. This novel would be published by Inkshares with the S&L imprint, the author would get an interview on the show, as well as writing advice from Gary Whitta!
Well, the time has come, and the news is out!
Congrats to both of our winners, JF Dubeau and G. Derek Adams! You can pre-order and follow their books, and stay tuned for their interviews on the show!
Of course, a huge congrats to ALL of the top six finalists, who will also have their books published.
Get published with Sword & Laser on Inkshares!
/Good news, everyone! You know we love Inkshares, and now we've partnered with them to kick off their Collections. What does this mean?
To debut the Sword & Laser Collection on Inkshares, we will publish the five science fiction and fantasy projects with the most pre-orders by May 31st, 2015. Sword & Laser will choose their personal favorite from the top five and make it the debut book in their Collection.
The debut Sword & Laser Collection author will receive an interview on the Sword & Laser podcast. All five winners will receive a coaching session from Gary Whitta, Star Wars: Rogue One co-writer and author of Abomination, in addition to having their book published and distributed into independent bookstores, Amazon, Apple, and Barnes & Noble.
You can read all about the content over on Inkshares. Can't wait to see what you guys are working on!
2014 Nebula nominees announced!
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Congrats to all the nominees! Lots of Sword & Laser reads and authors in the list, which is always exciting. The winners will be announced during Nebula Awards Weekend June 4th-7th, 2015 at the Palmer House Hilton in Chicago, Illinois.
Novel
The Goblin Emperor, Katherine Addison (Tor)
Trial by Fire, Charles E. Gannon (Baen)
Ancillary Sword, Ann Leckie (Orbit US; Orbit UK)
The Three-Body Problem, Cixin Liu ( ), translated by Ken Liu (Tor)
Coming Home, Jack McDevitt (Ace)
Annihilation, Jeff VanderMeer (FSG Originals; Fourth Estate; HarperCollins Canada)
Novella
We Are All Completely Fine, Daryl Gregory (Tachyon)
Yesterday’s Kin, Nancy Kress (Tachyon)
“The Regular,” Ken Liu (Upgraded)
“The Mothers of Voorhisville,” Mary Rickert (Tor.com 4/30/14)
Calendrical Regression, Lawrence M. Schoen (NobleFusion)
“Grand Jeté (The Great Leap),” Rachel Swirsky (Subterranean Summer ’14)
Novelette
“Sleep Walking Now and Then,” Richard Bowes (Tor.com 7/9/14)
“The Magician and Laplace’s Demon,” Tom Crosshill (Clarkesworld 12/14)
“A Guide to the Fruits of Hawai’i,” Alaya Dawn Johnson (F&SF 7-8/14)
“The Husband Stitch,” Carmen Maria Machado (Granta #129)
“We Are the Cloud,” Sam J. Miller (Lightspeed 9/14)
“The Devil in America,” Kai Ashante Wilson (Tor.com 4/2/14)
Short Story
“The Breath of War,” Aliette de Bodard (Beneath Ceaseless Skies 3/6/14)
“When It Ends, He Catches Her,” Eugie Foster (Daily Science Fiction 9/26/14)
“The Meeker and the All-Seeing Eye,” Matthew Kressel (Clarkesworld 5/14)
“The Vaporization Enthalpy of a Peculiar Pakistani Family,” Usman T. Malik (Qualia Nous)
“A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide,” Sarah Pinsker (F&SF 3-4/14)
“Jackalope Wives,” Ursula Vernon (Apex 1/7/14)
“The Fisher Queen,” Alyssa Wong (F&SF 5/14)
Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), Written by Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. & Armando Bo (Fox Searchlight Pictures)
Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Screenplay by Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely (Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures)
Edge of Tomorrow, Screenplay by Christopher McQuarrie and Jez Butterworth and John-Henry Butterworth (Warner Bros. Pictures)
Guardians of the Galaxy, Written by James Gunn and Nicole Perlman (Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures)
Interstellar, Written by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan (Paramount Pictures)
The Lego Movie, Screenplay by Phil Lord & Christopher Miller (Warner Bros. Pictures)
Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy
Unmade, Sarah Rees Brennan (Random House)
Salvage, Alexandra Duncan (Greenwillow)
Love Is the Drug, Alaya Dawn Johnson (Levine)
Glory O’Brien’s History of the Future, A.S. King (Little, Brown)
Dirty Wings, Sarah McCarry (St. Martin’s Griffin)
Greenglass House, Kate Milford (Clarion)
The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender, Leslye Walton (Candlewick)
We won a Parsec Award!
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DragonCon was awesome as always, but Tom and I are thrilled that we won a Parsec Award for Sword & Laser! Specifically, the award for Best Speculative Fiction Fan or News Podcast (General).
Thank you to the Parsec Committee, all the voters, and of course our listeners! Here's the list of all the finalists and winners for 2014.
See Sword and Laser Live This Saturday!!
/If you're in Atlanta this weekend and headed to DragonCon you MUST join us in the Crystal Ballroom of the Hilton at 2:00 PM (Eastern) on Saturday afternoon August 30th. Why?
BECAUSE we're doing a live Sword and Laser episode and interviewing the incomparable Naomi Novik! You cannot miss it. So DON'T! See you there.
Time: Sat Aug. 30, 02:30 pm Location: Crystal Ballroom – Hilton (Length: 1 Hour)
Have a free story from the Anthology!
/The Sword and Laser newsletter is our way of reaching out directly to you and letting you know when special things are coming up. As a way of saying thanks for signing up, we're giving away stories.
"Once upon a time there was a frog stormtrooper--"
Sorry I've been informed by Veronica that we need to give away good stories if we really want to thank people for signing up for our newsletter.
Sign up for our newsletter and receive the story "A Night for Spirits and Snowflakes" by Aidan Moher, from the Sword and Laser Anthology!
Update: Thanks to everyone who signed up!
We'll be doing more giveaways on the newsletter soon. Sign up below and never miss out!
S&L and Open Road head to Loncon 3!
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We're happy to announce that we're teaming up with Open Road to get some incredible author interviews at this year's Loncon 3!
We'll be gathering questions from you in this Goodreads thread, and then the Open Road crew will be asking the authors your questions at the conference in August.
Now accepting your book reviews!
/As you guys know, we don't typically post reviews here on the website, and this is mostly because Tom and I rarely have time to read books outside of the actual book club. However, we'd love to feature reviews from you, our audience!
If you think you'd like to submit a book review for the blog, head over to the Reviews FAQ and learn more! We think this will be a great way to highlight other books as well as highlighting the talented writers we have in our very own community!
S&L Anthology Cover Revealed!
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We are very excited to show you the cover art for the Sword & Laser Anthology! Created by artist Cliff Nielsen, each globe within this crazy storage center is a self-contained world. This is how we think of the Anthology itself: twenty worlds that you can easily lose yourself within.
So yes, this means we are almost ready to send the Anthology out into the world! Just wrapping up a few tiny edits, waiting on some blurbs, and then it will be out into the universe! We hope you love it as much as we loved putting it together.
Thanks for coming to Borderlands!
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My dog didn't RSVP...
We had a fantastic time at the meet-up at Borderlands Books in San Francisco! Luke Pebler read his Anthology story, The Same International Orange, in front of the live audience, and we had a fantastic live song from Sky Corbelli! You can listen to it below. It's about the Dresden Files!
We all had a blast, and we hope to do more meet-ups in the future (and not just in San Francisco). Thanks again for coming!
Season 2 Teaser!
/We are wrapped on Season 2! We shot twelve episodes over three days, so needless to say.... we are pooped. But the important thing is that we have twelve amazing Author Spotlights in the can, and we can't wait to share them with you!
So stay tuned! Edits are going to start this week, and we should have the first episode rolling out in Feb. Remember, it's all thanks to you wonderful Kickstarter fans, and we are eternally grateful!
San Francisco Meet-Up, Jan 20th at Borderlands!
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Hey everyone!
If you're in the Bay Area, please come join me and Tom at Borderlands Books on January 20th at 5pm. We'll be reading selections from the Anthology, discussing the current book pick (TBD), and then heading across the street for adult libations afterwards!
The event is free, but we'll have plenty of copies of the February book pick on hand to purchase. Plus, Borderlands is awesome, and you won't be able to leave the store empty-handed!
If you plan on attending, please RSVP on the Goodreads event page! Hope to see you there!
A message from Aaron! Re: Kickstarter
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That's right, we have only 3 days left on the Kickstarter! It has been an amazing month, and we can't wait to bring Season 2 to you guys!
But we are still trying to reach our second stretch goal, and we have some big things planned... including getting a certain someone to speak! Can you guess who?
We added a few new reward levels, in case you missed them:
$60 - A Sword and Laser stein.
Suitable for filling with mead or romulan ale! (plus the DIRK & HEAT RAY and KNIFE & MASER level rewards).
$60 - Sword and Laser Kindle case or sleeve.
Put your Kindle in a case that shows off your a member of the world's greatest SciFi and Fantasy book club! (plus the DIRK & HEAT RAY and KNIFE & MASER level rewards)
$75 - USB Drive with all the audio and video episodes of Sword and Laser!
(plus the DIRK & HEAT RAY and KNIFE & MASER level rewards).
So if you haven't pitched in yet, or want to raise your reward level, now is the time!! Thank you!
Come see us at DragonCon!
/Hey all. If you're going to be at DragonCon this weekend in Atlanta, come see the show live!
We'll be sitting down with author Jim Butcher for an hour of conversation and questions from the audience. (See the Author question section to submit a question for the show!)
The show is Saturday August 31 at 2:30 PM IN the Marriott Room A601-A602
And the word is we will have t-shirts and bookmarks. Yay!
Hope to see you there!
S&L anthology acceptance emails have been sent!
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Hello everyone!
After many months of reading, arguing, fighting, blood oaths, sacrificing to the gods of literature, shoot-outs at dawn, etc... we have picked our twenty selections for the Official Sword & Laser Anthology!
If you have received an email from us, congrats! If you have not (by the time of this blog posting) then you didn't make this round. But let us just say that this task was nearly impossible, considering the amazing talent and writing skills that so many of you exhibited with your submissions. We are truly awed by all of you, thank you.
Also thanks to our crew of intrepid submission readers, including Josh, CJ, Becca and Aaron. The final judgments came down from Tom and me, so please direct all of your hate mail to us specifically ;)
Again, I can't stress enough how difficult it has been to make these choices. We all became very protective over our favorites!
If you want to discuss more, please head over to Goodreads. Congrats again to our anthology contributors!
Catch Tom on the SF Signal podcast!
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Patrick Hester from SFSignal was nice enough to have Tom on the excellent (and Hugo-nominated!) SF Signal podcast this week. we had a fun time talking about what you'd expect, science fiction and fantasy, and a few things you might not expect!
Get the episode here.
