Awards:
The Audio Publishers Association announced the 2018 Audie winners on Friday. Provenance by Ann Leckie took an Audie for best SF novel and The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss won for best Fantasy. Because of what they are, the Audies include the voice performer in the award announcement and I think they get an award as well (as they should).
Brian Fies, a cartoonist who has an Eisner, now has won a region Emmy award for his work, A Fire Story. Here is the youtube video of his acceptance. (Full disclosure: Brian is a personal friend.)
You can see some frames of A Fire Story here.
Conventions:
Confluence will be held in Pittsburg, Pa, July 27-29. Catherynne Valente is the writer Guest of Honor. (h/t to File 770).
Books and Writing:
Penguin announced a new imprint for children’s books. It’s called Kokila, and it’s helmed by Namrata Tripathi, formerly the associate editor and publisher of children’s books at Dial Books.
On his blog Whatever, John Scalzi announced that there will be a sequel to his novella “The Dispatcher” later this year.
In a guest post on Cat Rambo’s blog, Robyn Bennis shares some tips for getting over social anxiety. The tips are good, but as you’d expect, the article sparkles with Bennis’s gin-dry humor.
TV and Movies:
Hollywood-watchers are now calling Disney’s Lucasfilm’s Solo; A Star Wars Story officially a flop. (Only in America can you make $115.3 million in two weeks and get called a failure.) The movie went greatly over budget and hasn’t earned back its costs, and that seems to be the problem. And I had to link to this Forbes article because the title is so hilarious.
Freeform has a series based on Big Hero 6 coming out, and another Marvel-based series, Cloak and Dagger, which looks like it would be better suited to the CW to me. On the other hand, what do I know?
Giveaway:
I have a good-condition ARC of Cat Rambo’s Hearts of Tabat that I will send to one random commenter. Tell me why you’d like to read it.
Science and Tech:
Once again, dark matter is the prime suspect! This article in Ars Technica discusses whether dark matter could be responsible for the lower temperature of the universe at its creation than we expected.
Dropmix lets you unleash your inner DJ, if you have one.
The Internet:
Remember Tom Cruise’s movie Cocktail? It looks like there should be a movie called Soda Jerks. In the 1940s, soda jerks were silver-tongued performers, not only mixing you a delicious ice cream but delighting you with soda jerk slang.
Wil Wheaton shared this link to a Youtube video that gives the Star Trek: Next Generation theme song some lyrics. It’s fun.
Space:
NEOWise, a spacecraft in orbit around earth, scans the surfaces of asteroids to provide even more data about these intriguing objects.
Earth:
At 2:45 minutes, this Youtube video of a cute fox greeting its human is a little long… but charming.
Re the “Star Wars” prequel: Perhaps they should have named the film “Chewie”….
Now there’s a character whose backstory I’m curious about!
I’d like to read “Hearts of Tabat” because I love alternate world stories and mythological creatures!
Cat Rambo was interesting to talk to at World Fantasy Convention, so I’d love to read her Tabat series.
“Hearts of Tabat” should be a good read because I have Cat Rambo’s short stories in “XIII”, “Daily Science Fiction” and “Sybil’s Garage”.
Because I’ve never heard of Kat Rambo.
Liz Rohrig, if you live in the USA, you win a copy of HEARTS OF TABAT.
Please contact me (Marion) with your US address and I’ll have the book sent right away. Happy reading!