Enjoy Scifi

More Grumbine Science has an interesting meme questionnaire about the relationship between science and science fiction. Here’s my take on it:

1. What is your relationship to science fiction? Do you read it? Watch it? What/who do you like and why?
I prefer science fiction to almost any other type of fiction. I prefer to read it, but I will watch good TV or movies. I don’t like scifi that is based on poor or no science.

2. What do you see as science fiction’s role in promoting science, if any? Can it do more than make people excited about science? Can it harm the cause of science?
I think that this is one of the most important roles of science fiction. If people read scifi and get excited about new ideas, then the book is a success in my mind.

But bad scifi can definitely harm the cause of science. If the science in a book is bad, wrong, or just crazy, people will use that as more proof that science fiction is stupid and science, if just through association will be tarnished.

3. Have you used science fiction as a starting point to talk about science? Is it easier to talk about people doing it right or getting it wrong?
Yes, I have used science fiction in this way. I most often use it to describe or explain things. But I also talk about how science fiction has predicted things like cell phones, automatic doors and so on. I used one novel to explain nanotech to a friend once. It is much easier to talk about people doing it right.

4. Are there any specific science or science fiction blogs you would recommend to interested readers or writers?
About SciFi / Fantasy, Beam Me Up, and IO9

I think the thing I find most interesting about this iO9 article on Great Opening Sentences From Science Fiction is that they are all from some of the best books in the field too. I think it just goes to show you that a great book starts great, gets better and ends awesome. Or else it doesn’t go anywhere at all. I admit, I haven’t read all of these books, but I’ve read most of them, and now I’m going to put the ones I haven’t read on my “to read” list.

• The Hacker And The Ants, Version 2.0 by Rudy Rucker
• The Stone Canal by Ken McLeod
• The Risen Empire by Scott Westerfield

Dollrific had the opportunity to meet Hunter Ansley Wryn, the young woman who played the young River in Serenity. And you can enter to win a hardback copy of Serenity: Those Left Behind signed by Hunter. The book is set in the time between Firefly and Serenity and includes lots of nice extras. I’d love the book all by itself, being signed by Hunter is just a nice extra. Thanks Dollrific!

Get the John Carter of Mars Story Blueprint free online. Pixar’s next film will be based on the book A Princess of Mars. Ironically, I first read A Princess of Mars about 6 years ago by loading the book into my Palm reader. It was free then too (it’s in the public domain, I believe). I felt very out of it for not having read it prior to then, but it was tons of fun reading about how John Carter would rescue the princess, while fighting scads of baddies!

I am really enjoying it. My friends tell me that it only gets better in seasons 2 and beyond. This first season is fairly episodic – but less so than other shows of that same age. I wasn’t sure I’d like Londo, but by the end of the season he was my favorite character. Then there’s the question about why the humans get along so well with the Mimbari – weren’t we just at war with them?

I am looking forward to watching seasons 2-5. And from what I’ve heard, I won’t be disappointed. Season 1 had some boring episodes and some fun ones. But that is to be expected in a television show. The important question is whether the show as a whole is interesting – and I would say that yes, it is. Most emphatically.

I have nothing against novice writers, but frankly it seems like a bad idea to work on writing a genre story when you’ve never read the genre. “beside two Star Trek books (and three ST comics) I came up with… nothing.” What would you recommend NBB read to get up on Science Fiction before embarking on writing it?

Personally, I think NBB should read some of the genre, anything, for that matter before trying to write it. Science fiction is more than just space stations and future dates.

I haven’t read any of the following books, but perhaps NBB might want to look at one or two of them, for help writing in the genre:

• How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy by Orson Scott Card
• World Building (Science Fiction Writing) by Stephen Gillett and Ben Bova
• Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy by Analog and Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine

SF Signal by way of Futurismic has a list of some of the best or most notable. My favorites from the Futurismic list (in no particular order) are:

• Vandana Singh
• Elizabeth Bear
• Cory Doctorow
• Karen Traviss

Who do you think should be on the list? Who is the most influential up-and-coming SciFi author?