Tsana's August Status (Snapshot, Worldcon and, of course, books)

It's been a super busy month on the blog, mostly thanks to the Australian Speculative Fiction Snapshot. There have been a bajillion interviews posted over the two weeks. I would love to link you to the link round-up on SF Signal, but as I write this (in advance) it's not up yet. Instead, I'll just point you in the direction of all the interviews on the blogs of: Stephanie Gunn, Kathryn Linge, Elanor Matton-Johnson, David McDonald, Helen Merrick, Ben Payne, Alex Pierce, Tansy Rayner Roberts, Helen Stubbs, Katharine Stubbs, Tehani Wessely, Sean Wright and here. If you want a more structured list of the interviews I've run, here it is:

1. KA Bedford 
2. Trudi Canavan
3. Nina D'Aleo
4. Jennifer Fallon
5. Donna Maree Hanson
6. Richard Harland
7. Edwina Harvey
8. Simon Haynes
9. Jay Kristoff
10. Justine Larbalestier
11. Jason Nahrung
12. Simon Petrie
13. Amanda Pillar
14. MC Planck
15. Jo Spurrier
16. KJ Taylor 

And in case you're interested in seeing me interviewed in the Snapshot, you can read Stephanie Gunn do it here.

On a completely different note, starting today (posting day), I'm going to be at LonCon 3, this year's World Science Fiction Convention. While there, I'm going to be on two panels and, of course, I'm planning to attend a bunch of other panels, parties and get myself a small book pile from the Dealer's Room. If you're going to be there and would like to watch me talk about stuff, these are my panels:

The World at Worldcon: SF/F in Australia and New Zealand
Capital Suite 3 (Level 3), 4:30pm - 6pm, Sunday, August 17
Amanda Bridgeman, Tsana Dolichva, Ian Nichols, Ben Peek, Janice Gelb

From afar, Australian SF publishing seems to be in good health, with books such as Nike Sulway's Rupetta (winner of this year's Tiptree Award) and publishers such as Twelfth Planet Press attracting international attention, and writers such as Ben Peek and Rjurik Davidson scoring international publishing deals -- not to mention already high-profile exports such as Greg Egan, Margo Lanagan, and Shaun Tan. To what can the current depth and breadth of the Australian scene be attributed? Which other writers should we be looking out for?


SF and Space Travel: Pragmatism or Pessimism?
Capital Suite 11 (Level 3), 12pm - 1:30pm, Monday, August 18
Guy Consolmagno SJ, Rohan Shah, Ben Bova, Tsana Dolichva, Mary Turzillo

Charlie Stross has said the idea of space travel happening any time soon is complete nonsense. Not everyone has agreed with him, but does the discussion he started highlight something about the proliferation of near term science fiction? Does the dearth of spaceships on TV, and the glut of climate-change thrillers on paper, indicate that we have lost faith in the idea that humans will travel among the stars? Or should we be engaging with issues much closer to home anyway?

After LonCon, I'll be holidaying for a couple of weeks so the blog will be a bit quiet. I'll probably have some reviews queued up while I'm away, but expect the blog to be very quiet. Possibly twitter as well, once the Con is over, although who knows.

Aaaaand that's most of my news. On a completely different note, you can read my link round-up for the Australian Women Writers Challenge.

What Have I Read?

• Last Year, When We Were Young by Andrew J McKiernan — short story collection of horror, mostly
• Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie — A really awesome book that all SF fans should read.
• The Girl Who Loved Doctor Who by Paul Cornell — A meh graphic novel/comic published to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who
• Silver Shadows by Richelle Mead — The pretty great latest/penultimate instalment in the Bloodlines series
• The Guild of Assassins by Anna Kashina — sequel to Blades of the Old Empire and not as good as the first book
• The Dagger of Dresnia by Satima Flavell — the first book in a new fantasy series

...which is not very many books, but that's because of Snapshot.

What Am I Currently Reading?

Too many books at once. I compulsively picked up Juliet Marillier's collection Prickle Moon (which I started reading a while ago because two stories were shortlisted for Ditmars) and read a few stories. I still have a lot to go, although they can't all be particularly long given how many pages I have left (I'm halfway-ish through according to Goodreads).

Also on the short story front, my copy of Kaleidoscope, edited by Alisa Krasnostein and Julia Rios, arrived in the mail (and in my email for the ebook), so I had to start reading that. I'm not very far in, but it is awesome as expected.

I've just about finished reading Wonderbook, a writing advice book by Jeff Vandermeer, which was really awesome. I've just got some appendices to go and then I'll post my review. It will probably be the next post after this one.

The novel I'm reading — or really, have only just started — is Fool's Assassin by Robin Hobb. So far I've only been reading it at night in bed until I pass out, which has not gotten me very far. Nothing much except the initial inciting incident has happened so far, and we still don't know what the ramifications of that are. I've actually spent most of the book trying to remember what happened in the earlier two series an, crucially, how old they all were. Fitz was really young in the Farseer trilogy, even by the end.

New Booksies

Not a huge haul this month, with only three review books and two crowdfunding rewards, but I'm sure WorldCon will help me buy too many books for next month's update.

• Silver Shadows by Richelle Mead — already reviewed
• The Godless by Ben Peek — new fantasy series by an Australian author
• Aurora in Four Voice by Catherine Asaro — audiobook of a collection I supported on Kickstarter
• Zac & Mia by AJ Betts — Aussie book about cancer and teenagers (I will admit that "Aussie Fault in Our Stars" is the first thing to pop into my head)
• Kaleidoscope edited by Alisa Krasnostein and Julia Rios — anthology of diverse YA (contemporary) fantasy