WWWednesday: November 13, 2019

This might be gallimaufry. Or it might be lamb stew, who knows?

Cool word for a Wednesday: gallimaufry (gall-uh-MAW-free); a noun meaning a jumble, a medley or a hodgepodge, or a spicy meat hash. (Isn’t that the planet Doctor Who came from?)

Housekeeping:

There will be no links columns on November 20 or November 27 because I will be out of town both weeks, but I will post a single-subject column on those dates.

Awards:

File 770 reported that the Sunburst Society, a Canadian society for the appreciation of science fiction, has suspended its Copper Cylinder award in 2019. They aren’t giving a reason at the moment.

K.R. Richardson, also known as Kat Richardson, won the Endeavor award for her SF novel Blood Orbit.

Books and Writing:

ChiZine Publishers, a Canadian small horror press, had a bad week, as complaints surfaced about slow or no payments to writers, verbally abusing writers, and engaging in racism and sexism. Jason Sanford includes an interesting factor in his essay on his Pateron page: the amount of money the publishers had from Canadian grants. And Michael Matheson, who worked for CZP, provides some financial information on his Facebook page. However bad a week it was for the publishers, it’s pretty clear their writers had it worse. (Thanks to File 770 for these links.)

Update: Sandra Kasturi and Brett Savory have released this statement.

BBC.com has an interesting article on the Staunch Award. This is a British award for thrillers that do not feature women as victims or prey. Some writers applaud this attempt to spotlight work that is breaking out of stereotype; others feel that the award somehow hampers writers.

In John Scalzi’s “The Big Idea” column he hosted this fascinating essay by Cynthia Hand, about the nature of adoption, and what she learned about herself as she wrote a novel about an adoptee and her biological mother.

From several months ago, here is a gathering of unusual books. Many are flip books or pop-ups, both of which I enjoy. While I’m not a fan of the “people of Walmart” meme, I have seen and do like Porn for Women. Several of these look like fun.

PEN has a nice interview with Daniel Jose Older.

So, here’s a new graphic novel that I want to read: The Black Mage.

Rebecca Ferguson plays a charismatic villain in DOCTOR SLEEP. (c) Warner Brothers 2019

TV and Movies:

IO9/Gizmodo shares Pixar’s early trailer of its 2020 movie, Soul.

Doctor Sleep did not take the crown at the Box Office over Veterans Day weekend. (I think this headline is labored but I like it anyway.) The writer is surprised that a WWII movie ousted it for the top spot. I wonder why. War story. Veteran’s Day. Maybe there’s a connection. Variety liked Doctor Sleep, though.

JoJo Rabbit also opened last week. Rotten Tomatoes likes it.

Over at File 770, Chris Barkley has opinions on various iterations of Watchmen. Warning; Spoilers.

Does The Invisible Man look good to you?

Internet:

Yum! Atlas Obscura wants you to know about yangmei fruit.

Irish data czar Helen Dixon may not be Facebook’s biggest nightmare, but she’s probably not helping the tech behemoth sleep at night, either, as she prepares to enforce Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation.

Earth:

Early humans hunted the mammoth on the North American subcontinent, specifically Mexico, according to BBC News.

This Ars Technica article looks at two papers recently published that discuss the frequency and cost of natural disasters. Are they increasing? Both papers say “Yes.” It’s a good article in itself, and if you are interested in analysis, you’ll get a lot out of it.