Charlie's Diary

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Fri, 23 Apr 2004 End of an Era This week, Gardner Dozois stepped down as editor of Asimov's SF Magazine, after about 19 years at the helm. His replacement, Sheila Williams, is already editor there and indeed has worked on Asimov's for about as long as (if not longer than) Gardner, so it's not as if things are adrift: Gardner's simply spent a long time there and wants to spend more time on his own writing. (Lest we forget, not only did he win about fifteen Hugo awards as best editor -- he won a couple for his stories, in the dim and distant past.) This news comes less than a month after Dave Pringle announced that he was stepping down as editor of Interzone, after a similar duration. (Interzone is being sold as a going concern to Andy Cox, who will be editing it in parallel with The Third Alternative.) Why do I get a slight shiver at this news? Interzone was where I sold my first stories, back in the 80's, under the editorship of Dave Pringle. Asimov's SF is where I really broke into the American market after 1999, via Gardner's auspices. Gardner in the US and Dave in the UK probably published the first short fiction of about 50% of the successful SF writers who came to notice from 1980 onwards! Saying this is the end of an era is, I think, an understatement -- it'll go unnoticed in the mass media, but some of those authors have gone on to have massive effects outside the genre. It's one of those defining moments that will potentially change the entire shape of our genre, thirty years down the line. And where written SF goes today, Hollywood (in its voracious search for new properties to sell) sometimes follows tomorrow: so it may well change the entire shape of mass entertainment in the longer term. Think I'm exaggerating? Try and itemize a list of those successful authors who first got noticed via short stories in Interzone or Asimov's SF, under those editors. Without pausing to look at a bookshelf, in the case of Interzone I can rattle off: Paul MacAuley, Simon Ings, Eric Brown, Greg Egan, Keith Brooke, Stephen Baxter, Geoff Ryman, Eugene Byrne, Richard Calder, Zoran Zivkovic (in English), Liz Williams, Nicola Griffith, Peter F. Hamilton, Ian MacLeod (and me). This, I stress, is without looking up the full bibliographical list, and it's for the smaller of the two magazines. Asimov's broke Ian MacDonald, Alan Steele, to name but two (and probably a host of others who I'd be able to list if I wasn't down with a nasty flu-like bug right now). This is really, really big news for SF. The only trouble is, I have no idea how significant the news is -- and I don't think any of us will, for at least the next couple of years. [Discuss writing] posted at: 23:51 | path: /writing | permanent link to this entry

specials: Is SF About to Go Blind? -- Popular Science article by Greg Mone Unwirer -- an experiment in weblog mediated collaborative fiction Inside the MIT Media Lab -- what it's like to spend a a day wandering around the Media Lab "Nothing like this will be built again" -- inside a nuclear reactor complex Quick links: RSS Feed (Moved!) Who am I? Contact me Buy my books: (FAQ) Missile Gap Via Subterranean Press (US HC -- due Jan, 2007) The Jennifer Morgue Via Golden Gryphon (US HC -- due Nov, 2006) Glasshouse Via Amazon.com (US HC -- due June 30, 2006) The Clan Corporate Via Amazon.com (US HC -- out now) Accelerando Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB -- due June 27, 2006) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK PB) Free download The Hidden Family Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) The Family Trade Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) Iron Sunrise Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK PB) The Atrocity Archives Via Amazon.com (Trade PB) Via Amazon.co.uk (Trade PB) Via Golden Gryphon (HC) Via Amazon.com (HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (HC) Singularity Sky Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) Via Amazon.com (US ebook) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK PB) Toast Via Amazon.com Via Amazon.co.uk Some webby stuff I'm reading: [ Engadget ] [ Gizmodo ] [ The Memory Hole ] [ Boing!Boing! ] [ Futurismic ] [ Walter Jon Williams ] [ Making Light (TNH) ] [ Crooked Timber ] [ Junius (Chris Bertram) ] [ Baghdad Burning (Riverbend) ] [ Bruce Sterling ] [ Ian McDonald ] [ Amygdala (Gary Farber) ] [ Cyborg Democracy ] [ Body and Soul (Jeanne d'Arc)  ] [ Atrios ] [ The Sideshow (Avedon Carol) ] [ This Modern World (Tom Tomorrow) ] [ Jesus's General ] [ Mick Farren ] [ Early days of a Better Nation (Ken MacLeod) ] [ Respectful of Otters (Rivka) ] [ Tangent Online ] [ Grouse Today ] [ Hacktivismo ] [ Terra Nova ] [ Whatever (John Scalzi) ] [ GNXP ] [ Justine Larbalestier ] [ Yankee Fog ] [ The Law west of Ealing Broadway ] [ Cough the Lot ] [ The Yorkshire Ranter ] [ Newshog ] [ Kung Fu Monkey ] [ S1ngularity ] [ Pagan Prattle ] [ Gwyneth Jones ] [ Calpundit ] [ Lenin's Tomb ] [ Progressive Gold ] [ Kathryn Cramer ] [ Halfway down the Danube ] [ Fistful of Euros ] [ Orcinus ] [ Shrillblog ] [ Steve Gilliard ] [ Frankenstein Journal (Chris Lawson) ] [ The Panda's Thumb ] [ Martin Wisse ] [ Kuro5hin ] [ Advogato ] [ Talking Points Memo ] [ The Register ] [ Cryptome ] [ Juan Cole: Informed comment ] [ Global Guerillas (John Robb) ] [ Shadow of the Hegemon (Demosthenes) ] [ Simon Bisson's Journal ] [ Max Sawicky's weblog ] [ Guy Kewney's mobile campaign ] [ Hitherby Dragons ] [ Counterspin Central ] [ MetaFilter ] [ NTKnow ] [ Encyclopaedia Astronautica ] [ Fafblog ] [ BBC News (Scotland) ] [ Pravda ] [ Meerkat open wire service ] [ Warren Ellis ] [ Brad DeLong ] [ Hullabaloo (Digby) ] [ Jeff Vail ] [ The Whiskey Bar (Billmon) ] [ Groupthink Central (Yuval Rubinstein) ] [ Unmedia (Aziz Poonawalla) ] [ Rebecca's Pocket (Rebecca Blood) ] Older stuff: June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 April 2003 March 2003 February 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 October 2002 September 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 April 2002 March 2002 (I screwed the pooch in respect of the blosxom entry datestamps on March 28th, 2002, so everything before then shows up as being from the same time)

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