The Coode Street Podcast

This week we welcome distinguished historical novelist Cecelia Holland back to the podcast to discuss her new fantasy novel Dragon Heart, her classic SF novel Floating Worlds, the relationships between SF, fantasy, and historical fiction, and historical and political themes in the work of writers like Kim Stanley Robinson and George R.R. Martin. As always, our thanks to Cecelia for making time to be on the podcast. We hope you enjoy the episode.

This week we are joined by multiple award winning writer and editor Kristine Kathryn Rusch who discusses her long and diverse career in science fiction, as a writer,  as editor at Pulphouse then at F&SF, and her more recent experiences as a writer working in both mainstream and independent publishing. We also discuss her 'Retrieval Artist' saga, including the eight novel 'Anniversary Day' series. We spend most time, though, discussing Kris's work editing a new anthology of science fiction by women, Women of Futures Past, which will be published by Baen Books in 2016, and her new Women in Science Fiction website. As always, we'd like to thank Kris for making the time to talk to us, and hope you enjoy the episode!

The glory days of 2003 when I was going to review every short story that I read and publish it at The Coode Street Review of Science Fiction. Sanity prevailed, but reviews did appear.  During 2003 I reviewed Howard Waldrop's "A Better World's in Birth", Ellen Klages' "Basement Magic", and Lucius Shepard's "Liar's House". During the podcast I recommend the following books:Portable Childhoods, Ellen Klages (Tachyon) The Dragon Graiule, Lucius Shepard (Subterranean) Howard Who?, Howard Waldrop (Peapod) Things Will Never be the Same: Selected Stories, Howard Waldrop (Old Earth) More anon!

Every three months Locus publishes a long list of forthcoming science fiction, fantasy, and horror books that are being published in the US and the UK. As we have been doing all year, whenever one of these ‘Forthcoming Books’ issues hits the newsstands and your email inboxes, we invite Locus Editor-in-Chief Liza Trombi to join us to discuss some of the books we’re excited about reading.  This episode is a little different, though. After more than forty years, Locus is moving premises, leaving the home of founder Charles N. Brown in the Oakland hills and moving to bright new digs in San Leandro. Before getting into our discussion of new books, we chat about the herculean task of packing and moving one of the best collections of science fiction books and art in the world, the incredible kindness of Alan Beatts and the Borderlands Books team, and hopes for the future.  As always, our sincere thanks to Liza for taking the time to chat to us. We hope you enjoy the episode and will be back next week with more!

Following on from yesterday's podcast discussion with Zen Cho about her new novel, Jonathan delivers a short audio review of Sorcerer to the Crown.  If you've read the book, or have anything you'd like to add, please leave a comment.

This week Coode Street welcomes Zen Cho, who received the Crawford Award earlier this year for her story collection Spirits Abroad and whose delightful first novel, Sorcerer to the Crown, is published this week.  We discuss what it’s like to be a Malaysian writer living in London, the influences and background of her new Regency-romance fantasy, the heritage of colonialism, the expectations sometimes faced by writers from non-Western cultures, and her recent anthology of stories by Malaysian writers Cyberpunk: Malaysia.  As always, we'd like to thank Zen for making the time to appear on the podcast and hope you enjoy the episode.

In keeping with yesterday's quick squib about Limekiller, here's another short piece of review/commentary, this time about Kim Stanley Robinson's Aurora. With all of the conversation about Hugo Awards at the moment, I (Jonathan) am tempted to make some brief comments about books, stories and other works that I feel are nomination-worthy and that may make my own ballot next year. It is possible that I won't follow through on this, or that the latter half of the year will be such that I won't get to do more. It's also possible that these will get folded into the main podcast (I certainly don't intend to keep bombarding you with new content like this every day), but for the moment here's a sample of a possible 'Jonathan's Personal Thoughts on Possible Hugo Nominees' series. Please, if you have a moment, drop me a note in comments or on Twitter to let me know what you think of the idea for the series and if you'd like to see more.  

Between 1997 and 2003 I was a reviewer for Locus. Growing demands on my time from my work as reviews editor for the magazine and as an anthologist eventually led to me giving that up. But during my tenure I reviewed a number of books I look back on very fondly.  As a bit of an experiment, I've recorded the review I wrote in 2003 and am publishing it here. It stands as a snapshot of my writing at the time, a glance at a good book, and as a test for Coode St audio. Although the book is now twelve years old, you can still order it from Old Earth Books.  I definitely recommend it.  I hope you enjoy the review.

With Gary only just returned from Spokane and the 73rd World Science Fiction Convention, we sit down to discuss the success of Sasquan, the successful site selection for Helsinki in 2017, congratulate our friends at Galactic Suburbia for their big win, and touch on some of the many and varied issues surrounding the 2015 Hugo Awards. During the podcast we:encourage you to join both MidAmerican II (Kansas City) and WorldCon 75 (Helsinki); mention io9s list of alternate Hugo Awards nominees; and discuss Jay Maynard’s article at Black Gate about conservatives in the SF field . This episode was recorded the day after Sasquan and is being sent out early. We expect to return to our usual schedule this coming weekend. Till then, we hope you enjoy the episode!

Two weeks ago we were fortunate enough to have Nina Allan and Renay as guests on the Coode Street Podcast (Episode 244: Renay, Nina Allan & the Weight of Fannish History). We discussed barriers to entry to fandom, inclusiveness and other issues  This week Gary and Jonathan continue that discussion in a fairly typical Coode Street ramble where we talk about inclusiveness, attending conventions, and much more. This episode was recorded prior to WorldCon and the Hugo Awards, which we may get to in coming weeks. Until then we hope you enjoy the episode!