Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Day -- is here. Please celebrate and share

[kinzel]

Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Day grew, a little like Topsy, from a blog comment someone thought about (see http://rolanni.livejournal.com/439604.html)... and commented on, and as I type is being celebrated, literally, around the world.  Yay crew!
What a community we're part of.

While SF&FWD may lack the cachet, (or the clarity of intent) as such well known days as Mothers Day, Fathers Day, Veterans Day, or even the long-celebrated Administrative Professionals Day (ahem) .... it is here. And like those other days SF&FWD can be seen both as a personal celebration and a community celebration, in effect being a recognition that, hey, these SF&F writers have done something for us all.

Writing is a strange field, a performance art where the performance is largely hidden until the audience wants to see it -- the original on-demand medium. And unlike a play or a movie or a baseball game, for the most part the gathering of the audience is shielded from both the audience and from the performer. The dance between ideas and keyboard, the meaning of the long stares into the ether, is lost to the audience except as perceived on the page.  The relationship of sudden frenzied bursts of typing to the final experience is not the same for all -- in some cases it may be the opening paragraph that takes a week to write, at an average rate of 5 words an hour, or it may be that that opening graph took fifteen seconds, as did the last ... but who knows? In fact, by the end of a book or story, often not even the author can tell you what was difficult and what was easy, what took training and what took intuition, which part was simple craft and which was high art.

The cheers for writers also don't often flow out of the stadium as they score a great idea, the cheers for writers generally  don't pull them to the front of the stage for a curtain call, and not too many writers stand on that top step to get a medal dropped round their neck.

From experience I can tell you how good -- how fortifying! -- it can be to get a note from a reader that says: "I was late for work today because I opened your book up last night and didn't finish it until 3 A.M. Thank you!"  Sometimes notes like that are about all that stands between a writer and the so-called reality of the world, the only thing that makes the hours/days/months of chair-sitting worthwhile, because, frankly, the pay is often sparse, and often comes not days or weeks but months or even years after the performance. 

So please, if you have a writer you appreciate, let them know that. Send an email, send them a bouquet of flowers or a case of double malt, or a couple boxes of favorite oat bran flakes, or a box of Tim Tams* or ask them to dinner or lunch or a convention.

Days of celebration - Mothers Day, Fathers Day, Veterans Day, are, of course, also days of contemplation and remembrance.  So I'm going to ask readers here to share comments about an author, one who has died during your reading lifetime, someone you should have said something to, or someone you meant to share something with.  Not a list of favorite authors, but a single author or storyteller, one gone before you were able to say thanks in person.  From the respondents I'll choose one to get a copy of our ARC for Fledgling.

Thanks for reading here today.

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notes, items, more below the line
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Want to ask a science fiction writer to an event -- here's one place to look --

Available science fiction and fantasy speakers ....
http://www.aboutsf.com/speakers/searchspeakers.php?radius=50&zipcode=&name=&op=AND&topic1=NOT&topic2=NOT&topic3=NOT



* Yes, Lawrence, we broke them out.... and boy are we glad! Many Thanks! PS .. they are almost gone!

Comments

[xinef.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the many hours of pleasure I have gotten from your books. Many of them I have reread several times.

Thank you also for your brilliant suggestion for Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Day.

And I've posted this on my journal (http://xinef.livejournal.com/375354.html). I think that all of these authors, except EE Doc Smith, were alive when I was born. I've mourned the deaths of far too many of them.

[jelazakazone.livejournal.com]

Madeleine L'Engle shaped my reading at an early age. I've read her books since I was 10 and continue to read them. I do wish I had written her a note before she died. I was quite sad when she died. She was a source of peace and comfort for me.

[klingonguy.livejournal.com]

*My work here is done.

Move along, nothing more to see... move along...

Thank You, Lester Del Ray & James Blish

[redpimpernel.livejournal.com]

There were two science fiction writers who were responsible for setting me firmly on the path of of being a lifetime science fiction reader. I was in 3rd grade when I read my first SF book, Runaway Robot by Lester Del Rey. This book was so completely different from anything I had ever read before. It started me on a lifelong journey of discovery and love of science fiction. I probably read Runaway Robot 10 times that year, because it was the only SF on the 2 shelves of fiction books in our classroom. I think this is the first book I ever read under my covers by flashlight. Not long after, I discovered my first Star Trek novelization by James Blish. It was pure gold to my young, Star Trek loving heart. My older sister had enough money to buy that book. In our public library I found other books by James Blish and devoured each one. How my imagination soared with the Cities In Flight. When my sister introduced me to our used bookstore, where books could be had for a dime, I was in heaven. I was always combing the shelves for a new James Blish novel. In the summer after 8th grade, a junk mailing came inviting us to join the SF Book Club, (choose 4 books for $1 -- [plus dangerous small print]) my sister and I quickly signed up, and two of our picks were my first anthologies: SF Hall of Fame 1 & 2 which contained Blish stories. Oh my, were my eyes opened! I discovered Asimov & Ellison & Silverberg & LeGuin & my old friend Del Rey, and Dangerous Visions and my young life changed again.

I started going to conventions when I was in college and managed to meet a few of the authors who had entertained me and made my life so much richer. I inadequately stammered out my thanks and appreciation to each one, but I never had the opportunity to meet or thank either Mr. Del Rey or Mr. Blish. I didn't realize that by then my much loved James Blish was already gone.

Quite honestly, I have never written a thank you note to any author, though I've wanted to many times. The only addresses I could ever find (pre-internet) were publishers, and I always thought that they were such big organizations that my letters would never find their intended recipient and would just be tossed out. I realize now, I was probably very wrong about that.

[drammar.livejournal.com]

I miss Janet Kagan. I missed her before she died because she wrote so few novels, but her death saddened me to tears.

Her novels -- Uhura's Song, Hellspark, and Mirabile (oh i hope I spelled that right) made me think in addition to providing hours of entertainment. She made me examine my feelings about what is "right" and "normal" and "natural," and helped me discover that many of my notions about that were only cultural biases. I have multiple copies of her books, a couple of which are as threadbare and broken as some Liaden Universe books I own. And a couple that are brand new copies of Hellspark that I'm saving to give to people who need to read that story.

I wrote her a note once, but it was not long before she died. I hope that she got it and that it made her happy to know how she affected one reader's life.

Edited for typos *sigh*

Authors I appreciate

[(Anonymous)]

I have spent many hours, as an asthmatic and Crohn's Disease sufferer indoors and in the restroom, so I have used those times to read, as a child to travel in my mind where my body couldn't go, and as an adult to take my mind off the pain.

I started reading Science Fiction when I was 7 years old, first reading Arthur C Clarke's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and progressing to all of his other works as I found them. I read Issac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Zelazny and Andre Norton. Then I stumbled across Anne McCaffrey's Restoree, and I thought I'd died and gone to heaven...here was a woman who understood a 12 year old's body issues! Here was someone who kenned the need of girls to feel that they weren't unlovable and hideous,to literally change their skin like a snake, to emerge beautiful and whole. That was a revelation for me. I found Tanith Lee's "Electric Forest" and "The Silver Metal Lover" to be revelatory also, so much so that I re-read them and pushed them onto my friends with fervent whispers to read and see for themselves how this author knows what it is like to be a teenage girl. Magda Cled was ugly and reborn in a new body and she was my heroine, because I was trapped in this cortisone-bloated body that was the object of ridicule, and I couldn't help but hope that one day, I would get the chance to change bodies and become someone beautiful, valued, loved.
I began to read Marion Zimmer Bradleys works, and they seemed familiar to me, because Ursula Le Guin was also writing about gender issues. Madeline L'Engle had given me spiritual guidance as a child, but now I was feeling a new faith in women and their strength, due to MZB and Zenna Henderson, and Marta Randall.
Once I found Lois Mc Master Bujold in my early college years, again I felt a revelation of reading about a hero who didn't need brawn or special super weapons or powers to solve his problems, he had something better...he was smart, and had brains, common sense and wit enough to talk/think his way out of any situation.
He was amazing, and the quaddies were, too...people who considered being different not a disability, but a gift! Wow! I also found the Dune novels to be mesmerizing when I was in my late teens.
Patricia McKillips books spoke to my soul as a writer, because of her gorgeous, lush prose, and I found the Liaden Universe and all its intricacies to also be a joy to read. Jim Butchers Harry Dresden is also now a favorite, as is Jacqueline Carey's Kushiels Dart series, though its subject matter makes me squeemish. I enjoy Robin McKinley, Charlaine Harris, Mercedes Lackey and many other SF/Fantasy authors as well.
Thank you doesn't seem to cover it, for a lifetime of letting me visit other worlds and live through great characters created by you wonderful authors. But, as a poor person, it will have to do. Thank you, great authors, for my lifetime of joy in reading.
DeAnn

[jelazakazone.livejournal.com]

And I have to add that I am ever so glad that you and Sharon and are alive and well and still producing wonderful stories. I love to reread a good story, but I do so love the anticipation of a new story too.

Robert A Heinlein 1907-1988

[(Anonymous)]

Certainly I'm not qualified to write anything profound about the impact that Robert Heinlein had upon many generations of readers, from juvenile, through young-adult and on to adult topics. All I can do is write about what his stories meant to me over the years.

The first RAH novel I found was Space Cadet, when I was in late elementary school. As a reader, I asked myself the same question that Mr. Heinlein is said to have asked himself as a budding writer -- "how long has this been going on, and why didn't anyone tell me?" (http://templetongate.tripod.com/rahworks.htm)

I then found the omnibus volume "The Past Through Tomorrow" on a family friend's bookshelf. I had been baby-sitting there, and the kid was alseep. Now time to raid his bookshelf. I made it through a bunch of those stories before the parents came home, and had to go to the library to finish the book, but finish it I did. Avidly.

Growing up as a reader, I followed Mr. Heinlein's work as the books came out. I followed the Time Enough For Love characters through all their adventures. This was certainly character driven fiction for me, not plot driven. I wanted to know how these characters would turn out.

I didn't really know much about Mr. Heinlein as a person, while he was alive. He was a source of books to me, and I never corresponded with him. I only learned more about him after his death, and after the Internet made so much information about all topics available at the touch of a key. A few things Mr. Heinlein wrote about writing, probably in "Expanded Universe" resonated with me, such as "I write for money." It made me realize that the best complement I could pay an author was to buy his books. Richard Bach summed this up in "Biplane" when he commented that it was amazing to him that he could go out and buy a book, and the author might be able to go out and enjoy an ice cream cone, just on his purchase. I've since made the effort to buy those hardcovers and trade paperbacks from favorite authors whenever I can afford them, just as a way of giving back. Returning to Mr. Heinlein, I've accumulated at least two linear feet of Heinlein hardbacks on my shelf. (All donated now, since I live in an RV trailer. After all, it was Heinlein who wrote, "If I didn't dispose fo casual fiction, the ship would never lift." )

When I read the end of "To Sail Beyond the Sunset," it seemed to me that Mr. Heinlein had realized his own mortality, and had decided he needed to give his characters some closure. His ending reassured all his fans that his characters would "live happily ever after." Less than a year later, he had passed on. I only found his obituary by chance, since I wasn't really reading the paper daily at that time.

In 1988, when Mr. Heinlein passed away, I was 33 years old. I'd been reading his books since I was eight. I could open one of his books tomorrow, and return happily to any of his fictional worlds. The work stands up. I'm glad to have had him in my world.

Re: Robert A Heinlein 1907-1988

[(Anonymous)]

Oops... I meant to sign that piece.

Ed Greenberg
Van Nuys, CA

Thanks to Zenna Henderson (1917 - 1983) and Theodore Sturgeon (1918 - 1985)

[grassrose.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry - I couldn't narrow it down to one. Both authors were interested in the humanity of science fiction, back when almost everyone else was building bigger and better robots. They got into people's heads, rummaged around and described what they saw better than anyone else I know.

I started reading adult science fiction and fantasy around third grade (around 1971), and these two authors profoundly impacted my youth.

edit: to add a couple of links -

http://www.adherents.com/lit/bk_Zenna.html

http://www.physics.emory.edu/~weeks/misc/sturgeon.html

~ Rosanne

The First Science Fiction and the First Fantasy

[bookmobiler.livejournal.com]

Andre Alice Norton, née Alice Mary Norton (b. February 17, 1912 in Cleveland, Ohio – d. March 17, 2005

'Nuff said!

Writers Who Changed Your Life

[(Anonymous)]

I wish I had written to Madeline L'engle. I came from a difficult family life - really grim and tough at home. My sixth grade teacher was a believer in new things and new ways of teaching - we even had an "open classroom." Every day after lunch he read us one chapter from A Wrinkle in Time. It truly changed my life. I was a reader and this was so different from Betsy and Tacie or The Singing Boones. This was a real fight between good and evil. And good won. God! I knew when that book was finished by my dear teacher, Mr. Lindberg, that I could make it out of my mess of a family life and find happiness and goodness and I did. I wish so much that I had written Ms. L'engle. But I didn't know writers would like this. You make a good argument for writing our authors. BTW - I am a BIG BIG fan of the Lee Miller family of writers.

Kelly
TC, CA

Madeleine L'Engle

[emvt.livejournal.com]

Since C.S. Lewis died just before I was born, I think I'll go with Madeleine L'Engle. I can't say how many times I've read her books, but I loved them. And I actually used the poem "Two Tramps In Mud Time" in a job application last month - a Robert Frost poem that I first saw in her book "Arm of the Starfish."

It would never have occurred to me to write to her. I think I thought of her as a superstar living in a rather alternate universe. When I was little, I got to have tea once at Tasha Tudor's house (we sold her some goats) and since she lived just exactly like her books - it really fed my idea that authors lived in a different world.

I'm off to post reviews at Amazon for my favorite sf authors, Lee/Miller, Silvia Louise Engdahl, Zilpha Keatley Snyder and Patricia Briggs.

Thank you!

[kalimeg.livejournal.com]

Actually there are two: John Brunner and Zenna Henderson.

John Brunner did both amazingly long and complex work, and also short books with a single point. Some of his books I've re-read many times. I miss that there are no more Brunner books -- his work was often a triumph of hope over despair. He died not too long after I learned that you could write to writers.

And Zenna Henderson did The People -- emotional stories, stories that grabbed at the heart. I never had an address, or I would have thanked her.

If I could sing like Uhura...

[(Anonymous)]

Janet Kagan, you are missed. I often wished you'd written more than 3 wonderful novels- they are such wonderful creations to share. I've introduced so many friends, family and strangers to those 3 gifts (and Norton's Gryphon series, McCaffrey's Dragons, most recently Butcher's Codex Alera, and of course the entire Liaden Universe).

Uhura's Song remains one of my favorite novels ever. Your mind was so amazingly complex with the details, no matter how startlingly alien, and yet every character was so human, regardless. The feedback over the years has proven to me that one need not be a Star Trek fan to fall in love with your Star Trek novel.

Thank you for sharing what you were able, while you were here. (and thank you to those who keep sharing their gifts, despite the many trials of writer's life). You have touched many, sometimes profoundly, and we are sincerely grateful. If we are too often silent, it is only meant out of respect.

Thank you all
:) Kit

Janet Kagan, gone too soon

[ebeth-naylor.livejournal.com]

Hellspark is one of my favorite annual re-reads, it falls in the timeless category for me. I wish that I had paused my life long enough to let her know of the joy that her books give me. Three books that, even though I have them almost memorized, I still pull out & read at least once a year.

[(Anonymous)]

Although the very first sci-fi books I ever read were the Zip-Zip series by John M Schealer... Picked up my first Andre Norton book completely by accident in the junior high school library, since it was shelved next to another author I was reading then. First author for which I felt the anticipatory quiver that lets the eye slide over the other books on a shelf until you discover - A NEW TITLE! She is the reason I still read science fiction/fantasy. I did actually send a letter back in the '70's sometime through Ace Pub., but never got a reply.

Cathy C

Robert Heinlein

[(Anonymous)]

So many of my favorites are still alive, or had
passed on before I was born (Henry Kuttner -sigh -
what an imagination).

So I pick Robert Heinlein, who DID pass on during my reading lifetime. "Friday" was the book that hooked me as far as his work was concerned. Now that I am older and can recognize sexism, my favorites of his are the younger, older Heinlein books - Starman Jones and Have Spacesuit Will Travel.

Let me also say, it was a tough choice between him and Janet Kagan. "Hellspark" is darn near perfect.

Lauretta (Constellation Books)
PS I had people in the shop, buying SFF for Father's Day...it was good.

[(Anonymous)]

Robert Heilein changed my life. He made me see a larger more complex world than my insular small middle school. He made me see that there were more ways to be loving and to be a family that the standard male+female=children family of the 1950s. He gifted my with compassion, empathy and a sense of wonder.
Barbara in Texas

Re: Thank You, Lester Del Ray & James Blish

[kinzel.livejournal.com]

I have misplaced your address ... if you send it to me at kinzel (at, of couse, korval dotted com) we'll get you Fledgling Arc out to you) ... thanks!