We find out Lev Grossman’s picks for the best SFF of the year, as well as welcome a new speculative fiction mag to the scene and review good things to use as a bookmark.
WHAT ARE WE DRINKING?
Veronica: 2008 Legón Ribera del Duero Roble
Tom: 2009 Les Portes de Bordeaux
QUICK BURNS
Fired Up: The Year’s Best Science Fiction, Fantasy
SFSite reports The Center for the Study of Science Fiction (CSSF), in association with the University of Kansas, will launch James Gunn’s Ad Astra, an online resource for authors, scholars and all those who are interested in speculative fiction in the summer of 2012.
BARE YOUR SWORD
What Else Are You Reading – December 2011 Edition
What do You Use as a Bookmark?
TV, MOVIES AND VIDEO GAMES
Worst movies you’ve paid to watch on the bigscreen
BOOK CHECK-IN
Hi Tom and Veronica,
On the last S&L I listened to you were talking about Roy Dotrice recording A Feast for Crows to complete his narration of the Song of Ice and Fire series. Veronica mentioned that she had been lucky enough to have the same narrator in all of the multi-book series she has read via Audible. That is great as I can attest from much experience to how disconcerting that can be. I am legally blind, and as such can download digital or borrow cassette audio books from the Library of Congress’ National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. (http://www.loc.gov/nls/) This is an awesome service that I have been using for over 30 years. Yes I used to borrow records. While they also try and use the same narrators within series, the problem is I am not a patient man. Since they do their own recordings new titles often take a good while to show up on the service. When you guys recommend a series that has been around for a while I will often start reading if via the NLS, but then I just can’t wait when the newest edition comes out. Then I find myself turning to Audible for my fix. This happened recently with A Dance with Dragons, and I am now looking at my credits trying to decide if I should get the latest in the Kingkiller Chronicles series. The problem is it takes me probably 25 of the book to get over the difference in narrator’s interpretation of the characters.
Sorry this is longer than I had anticipated, but I just wanted to weigh in on the issue and let you know about the NLS in case you weren’t already aware of it and have other handicapped listeners who might be able to take advantage of it.
-Steve
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After listening to the two of you on some of your more recent podcasts and discovering that you also like games, I thought you might be interested in a five minute documentary that my daughter did as a grade 12 media project. It’s based on the community of gamers at my store “”The Sentry Box””. We have about 7000 SF&F titles as well as the games which is why I thought of you. Since you are in the warm south, I figured you might be interested in what we do in the cold Canadian north in Calgary for fun.
I actually had nothing to do with anything in the video which is probably why it turned out so well. She just posted it and has had 500 views in four days so I’m pretty impressed and in awe of her skills.
Keep up the great work.
Gordon Johansen
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Hey Tom and Veronica,
I know you were both on the mailing lists for the GoT press kits when the series debuted, but I haven’t heard you mention anything about the DVDs. My husband is a film & TV critic and he brought home a big box o’ swag today, so with his permission, I thought I’d share some unboxing pics.
Here’s a link to the whole set on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alterjess/sets/72157628490860895/
In the box:
House Baratheon seal & sealing wax
DRAGON EGG
House Baratheon notecards
press photos
DVD of first ep
I don’t know if everyone got House Baratheon, or if HBO made up kits for other houses as well – I have to admit, I was a little disappointed to see a stag instead of a direwolf or dragon on the outside of that box.
(DVDs are on sale March 6, by the way, though it doesn’t say so anywhere in the press materials!)
Love the show (awww, now I feel like I’m emailing you back at BOL),
Jessica of House HOLY CRAP I HAVE A DRAGON EGG ON MY DESK
NEW MEMBER HELLOS
Martin, Alan, Paul, Seth, John, Vyktor, Amy, Therazor, Thomas, Andrew, Eric, Pete, Joseph, Imogen, Jacqueline, Natalie, Gary, Keith, January!
ADDENDUMS
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