The Sword and Laser

We find out Lev Grossman's picks for the best SFF of the year, as well as welcome a new speculative fiction mag to the scene and review good things to use as a bookmark.

WHAT ARE WE DRINKING?

Veronica: 2008 Legón Ribera del Duero Roble
Tom: 2009 Les Portes de Bordeaux

QUICK BURNS

Fired Up: The Year's Best Science Fiction, Fantasy

SFSite reports The Center for the Study of Science Fiction (CSSF), in association with the University of Kansas, will launch James Gunn’s Ad Astra, an online resource for authors, scholars and all those who are interested in speculative fiction in the summer of 2012.

CALENDAR

BARE YOUR SWORD

What Else Are You Reading - December 2011 Edition

What do You Use as a Bookmark?

TV, MOVIES AND VIDEO GAMES

Worst movies you've paid to watch on the bigscreen

BOOK CHECK-IN

Elantris

1Q84

EMAIL

Hi Tom and Veronica,

On the last S&L I listened to you were talking about Roy Dotrice recording A Feast for Crows to complete his narration of the Song of Ice and Fire series. Veronica mentioned that she had been lucky enough to have the same narrator in all of the multi-book series she has read via Audible. That is great as I can attest from much experience to how disconcerting that can be. I am legally blind, and as such can download digital or borrow cassette audio books from the Library of Congress' National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. (http://www.loc.gov/nls/) This is an awesome service that I have been using for over 30 years. Yes I used to borrow records. While they also try and use the same narrators within series, the problem is I am not a patient man. Since they do their own recordings new titles often take a good while to show up on the service. When you guys recommend a series that has been around for a while I will often start reading if via the NLS, but then I just can't wait when the newest edition comes out. Then I find myself turning to Audible for my fix. This happened recently with A Dance with Dragons, and I am now looking at my credits trying to decide if I should get the latest in the Kingkiller Chronicles series. The problem is it takes me probably 25 of the book to get over the difference in narrator's interpretation of the characters.

Sorry this is longer than I had anticipated, but I just wanted to weigh in on the issue and let you know about the NLS in case you weren't already aware of it and have other handicapped listeners who might be able to take advantage of it.

-Steve

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After listening to the two of you on some of your more recent podcasts and discovering that you also like games, I thought you might be interested in a five minute documentary that my daughter did as a grade 12 media project. It's based on the community of gamers at my store ""The Sentry Box"". We have about 7000 SF&F titles as well as the games which is why I thought of you. Since you are in the warm south, I figured you might be interested in what we do in the cold Canadian north in Calgary for fun.

I actually had nothing to do with anything in the video which is probably why it turned out so well. She just posted it and has had 500 views in four days so I'm pretty impressed and in awe of her skills.

Keep up the great work.

Gordon Johansen

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Hey Tom and Veronica,

I know you were both on the mailing lists for the GoT press kits when the series debuted, but I haven't heard you mention anything about the DVDs. My husband is a film & TV critic and he brought home a big box o' swag today, so with his permission, I thought I'd share some unboxing pics.

Here's a link to the whole set on Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alterjess/sets/72157628490860895/

In the box:

House Baratheon seal & sealing wax
DRAGON EGG
House Baratheon notecards
press photos
DVD of first ep

I don't know if everyone got House Baratheon, or if HBO made up kits for other houses as well - I have to admit, I was a little disappointed to see a stag instead of a direwolf or dragon on the outside of that box.

(DVDs are on sale March 6, by the way, though it doesn't say so anywhere in the press materials!)

Love the show (awww, now I feel like I'm emailing you back at BOL),

Jessica of House HOLY CRAP I HAVE A DRAGON EGG ON MY DESK

NEW MEMBER HELLOS

Martin, Alan, Paul, Seth, John, Vyktor, Amy, Therazor, Thomas, Andrew, Eric, Pete, Joseph, Imogen, Jacqueline, Natalie, Gary, Keith, January!

ADDENDUMS

This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature, including fiction, non-fiction and periodicals. For a free audiobook of your choice, go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.

S&L Podcast - #85 - Bookmark this

We discuss the meaning of religion in Elantris, whether 1Q84 is boring or not, and why Ray Bradbury is so darn crotchety.

QUICK BURNS

Roy Dotrice records new edition of FEAST FOR CROWS audiobook

Rudy Rucker's autobiography: Nested Scrolls

Fahrenheit 451 becomes e-book despite author's feelings

CALENDAR

BARE YOUR SWORD

Elantris - Anyone else feel guilty?

Elantris - Favorite POV

Units of Measure in Fantasy

TV, MOVIES AND VIDEO GAMES

Westeros: Total War needs some help

GAME OF THRONES Season 2 trailer

Lost Doctor Who Episodes Surface With Chumblies, Fish People

BOOK CHECK-IN

Elantris

1Q84

EMAIL

Hello Veronica and Tom,

I have been a long time listener to FrameRate on the TwiT network and have only recently been listening to The Sword and Laser, episode number 82 to be precise. Both this and the later episode have been enjoyable to listen to whilst on long plane journeys and idle time whilst building booths and trade shows. I must admit I finished the Elantris book in a few days and agree with Veronica when she stated this has a first book feel to it. Towards the end I found Sarene to be slightly grating and almost put the book down, but I am glad I pushed through the last twenty or so pages.

I was wondering if you had a few seconds to answer a question so I may learn from people possessing greater knowledge than I? I find myself with a two week break over Christmas and I was wondering if you could suggest any major series I could start getting into? (I have never read the Mistborn, the Way of Kings or Games of Thrones series, but really enjoyed the Dark Tower books.)

I hope you manage to find sometime during your busy schedules to answer my question and I look forward to the next episode.

Kind Regards,

Wilton

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Did you guys see this? A grad student of mine sent me the links and I though Tom in particular might enjoy it:

Part 1

Part 2

-- Dr. Timothy R

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Veronica and Tom, I wanted to reach out to you guys and let you know about our e-zine Flagship. Every other month (soon to be every month) for the last fifteen months we've put out an anthology of positive science fiction and fantasy short stories in both electronic text and audio formats. We were recently featured in Wired magazine's Geekdad blog and are looking for more places to get the word out about what we're doing.

-- Scott Roche

CALLS

NEW MEMBER HELLOS

Chris (Cogitator X), Harm, Kieran, Tim, Urg, Dave, Emma, Brandon, Armando, Kristin, William, Darren, Michael, Marissa, Joe, Jon, Quinn, Chris, Dana, Stephen, Diego, Brandon, Jonathan, Chrys, Alex, Ruth, Shaun, Rob, Melissa, Patrik, Dirk, Link, Leslie, Tom, Peter, Amanda, Mel, Trey, Harry, Bob, Mecque (muh-kay), Kelly, Jack, Charles, Gary, Glenn, Codered, Bryan, Jonathan.

ADDENDUMS

This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet’s leading provider of audiobooks with more than 75,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature, including fiction, non-fiction and periodicals. For a free audiobook of your choice, go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.

S&L Podcast - #84 - Metric is for SciFi, Imperial is for Fantasy

We bid adieu to one of the great fantasy writers of all time, bit off more than we can read, and learn how to pronounce Elantris properly.  Sort of. Also we rename Veronica's Lady Cave. 

QUICK BURNS

Anne McCaffrey, 1926-2011
Science fiction author Anne McCaffrey dies at 85
First woman to win a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award, as well as a Grand Master of science fiction.

Tailchaser’s Song Animated Feature

Norwegian bookseller begins selling e-books on memory cards, for some reason

Martin Fan Letter in Fantastic Four Comic

CALENDAR

BARE YOUR SWORD

Why do people write fantasy?

Biting off more then you can read

TV, MOVIES AND VIDEO GAMES

Skyrim, the black hole of time

Neil Gaiman On The Simpsons

GAME OF THRONES Season 2 behind-the-scenes vid
A first look at GAME OF THRONES Season 2

BOOK CHECK-IN

The Elantris Portal on Brandon Sanderson's website

Sanderson's Female Protagonists

Early thoughts on 1Q84

EMAIL

Hello! My name is Sean Hollenhors and I work at a bookstore in Salem, OR (The Book Bin). I'm a regular Sword & Laser listener and heard you mention collecting first edition hardcovers. We recently revamped our rare book room and put out a plethora of new signed, first edition and rare hard covers. I'm attaching some photos to show off the space as well as some of the titles we have. Give me holler if there are titles you're having trouble finding...we might be able to help! We have an ever expanding selection of Sci-Fi and Fantasy books.

Cheers!
--Sean
The Book Bin

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Hey fellas, love the show, I adore you guys.

So I totally missed the release of Christopher Paulini’s final book of the Inheritance series 10 days ago. It was totally off my radar. I couldn’t believe you guys hadn’t mentioned it because it’s, like, the 2nd biggest fantasy release this year (by biggest, I mean commercial sales). So I went back and listened to the last 3 podcasts and realized it was never mentioned in any of the upcoming release calendar announcements. Apparently it was off your radar too.

Now, I’m pretty certain you guys aren’t some kind of fantasy snob elitist hipsters that dismissively blow off commercial juggernauts for more underground indie stuff. Perhaps you just didn't care much for the other books in the series. To me they’re a bit meh, but still quite enjoyable. Maybe the Eragon movie abomination left you emotionally so scarred that discussion of the upcoming book in the series would dredge up too many horrible memories. Whatever the case, I would’ve thought that you’d at least mention the thing. After all, talking about fantasy books is like, your job ;o) ß this is a very tongue in cheek winky smiley, FYI.

david C

Voicemail from Jenny! She tells us about a cool podcast hosted by Brandon Sanderson at Writing Excuses.

NEW MEMBER HELLOS

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S&L Podcast - #83 - Lady Lair