AMAZING NEWS of FANDOM

ANSIBLE November 2014

German Science Fiction Fandom Celebrates 60 Years

Rust Hevelin Fanzine Collection to be Digitized

NEWS HEADER FOR FILE 770

Serendipity and Mr. Bradbury

By James H. Burns: A LOST Ray Bradbury Documentary? I rather serendipitously came across this 1963 Ray Bradbury documentary from David L. Wolper’s and Mel Stuart’s Story Of* series (this one produced and directed by Terry Sanders). The Story of … Continue reading

Warren Clarke (1947-2014)
Warren Clarke, a British actor who appeared in A Clockwork Orange and was best known for his role in television’s Dalziel And Pascoe, died November 12 after a short illness. He was 67. In Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange he played … Continue reading

Gee, Whiz: Hasn’t DARPA Heard of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Helicarrier?
DARPA wants the capability to launch and recover multiple small unmanned air systems from existing large manned aircraft such as the C-130 cargo plane. The agency has issued a request for information (RFI) asking for technical, security and business insights to help them do this. Military … Continue reading

Glen Larson (1937-2014)

Glen A. Larson, producer of Battlestar Galactica, Knight Rider, and Six Million Dollar Man, passed away November 14 of cancer. He also had many non-genre hits: Quincy, M.E., Magnum, P.I. and The Fall Guy, plus a few that weren’t hits – … Continue reading

Nina Horvath To Be TAFF Candidate
Nina Horvath of Vienna will be in the next Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund race. TAFF co-administrator Jim Mowatt made the announcement on Facebook. She is the second person to join the field, Wolf von Witting having declared in September. Horvath is a … Continue reading

Around the World in 72 Days
I may have to start a department called “Yesterday in History” for items like this. It was on November 14, 1889 that New York World journalist Nellie Bly boarded a steamship bound for Europe and began her attempt to break the fictional record … Continue reading

Shadow of a Doubt
The European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft successfully deployed its Philae lander November 12 on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, with a mission to drill, extract and analyze samples, and send pictures back to Earth. Unfortunately, Philae landed in the shadow of a cliff that … Continue reading

Lions Agree How To Divide The Lambs
Publisher Hachette and online seller Amazon announced Thursday they have reached an agreement to end eleven months of economic warfare over e-book pricing that cost everyone involved, especially book authors who were least able to afford it. The New York Times reported the … Continue reading

Robot Overlords Trailer
Ben Kingsley’s just happy to be working, but for the audience isn’t it bit jarring to see Gandhi in a war, even against totalitarian robots?…Continue reading

Why Tolkien Needed an Audience
“Why would a compulsive Elf-chronicler need encouragement?” asked Brandon Rhodes’ during his keynote talk at Pygotham 2014, a conference for those interested in the Python programming language. Nancy Lebovitz drew attention to the video on her blog: This is a … Continue reading

Michel Parry (1947-2014)

The passing of Michel Parry, horror author and anthologist, was reported November 1. He was 67 and had been diagnosed with cancer some years ago. James H. Burns says, “I would have first ‘met’ Parry in the pages of Castle … Continue reading

Law and Odor
Does this pass the smell test? Dragon*Con founder Ed Kramer spent 13 years avoiding trial on child molestation charges, then took a plea-bargain when trial was imminent last December, but now his new attorney is trying to get that conviction thrown … Continue reading

Adam West 86 on Batman 66
Adam West, now 86, spoke to the LA Times to promote the Warner Home Video release of the entire 1960s Batman series on Blu-ray and DVD. As a young actor in Hollywood, West got a call about playing the DC … Continue reading

Auctioning the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Two art sales on opposite sides of the world are also poles apart in their artists’ vision of characters from children’s books and cartoons. Kiddy lit at its most innocent is the trademark of next month’s Sotheby’s London “English Literature, … Continue reading

Sofia Samatar on Winning the World Fantasy Award
Although she was scribbling changes to her acceptance speech up to shortly before the ceremony, when she was named winner of the World Fantasy Award for Novel Sofia Samatar didn’t refer to her notes and could only approximate what she … Continue reading

Famous Firsts: Authors on Their First Novels
We’re almost halfway through NaNoWritMo — National Novel Writing Month — a November tradition where aspiring authors challenge themselves to produce a complete novel in one month. For many, this will be their first novel. Science fiction and fantasy authors … Continue reading

Consolmagno To Give Sagan Acceptance Speech at Sasquan
Brother Guy Consolmagno, an astronomer at the Vatican Observatory, will give an acceptance speech for the Carl Sagan Medal at Sasquan, the 2015 Worldcon. The award is given annually by the American Astronomical Society. Brother Guy, an active fan and … Continue reading

Leigh Chapman Passes Away
By Andrew Porter: Leigh Chapman, 75, 1960s actress-turned-screenwriter, died November 4 at her West Hollywood home, after an 8-month battle with cancer. Chapman was familiar to TV viewers as Sarah, Napoleon Solo’s efficient secretary in several 1965 episodes of The … Continue reading

Lovecraft Comic Hits Kickstarter Goal

There is no army so powerful as an idea whose time has come, and apparently the idea of making H.P. Lovecraft the protagonist of his own comic is that idea. A week ago, while I was writing about the late … Continue reading

Tayler Sets An Example
At World Fantasy Con this past weekend Howard Tayler lent a hand to assure someone got the medical attention they needed. I was engaged in a late-night conversation in the lobby bar when one of the bikers with whom we … Continue reading

Furry Footnote In Flaunt
Fred Patten and furry fandom got a mention in the November issue of Flaunt, a high-end glossy fashion magazine that sells for $15.95 a copy. Blogger “Patch O’Furr” at Dogpatch Press paged through their special Nine Lives issue that profiles … Continue reading

Second Round of Bradbury Estate Auction
Items that went unsold during the first Ray Bradbury Estate Auction are being auctioned again by the Nate D. Sanders firm, some with significantly reduced minimum bids. For example, they’ll accept a starting bid of $22,500 for the Charles Addams painting … Continue reading

Call For Anthropomorphic Listings
By Fred Patten: There are less than two months left to recommend titles for the Anthropomorphic Literature and Arts Association’s 2014 Recommended Anthropomorphics List. See the Ursa Major Awards website for the current 2014 Recommended List. The next update will … Continue reading

Carol Ann Susi (1952-2014)

Carol Ann Susi, the voice of Howard Wolowitz’ mother on The Big Bang Theory, died November 11 of cancer. She was 62. Susi grew up in Brooklyn and moved to Los Angeles in the 1970s. Her first role on TV was as Kolchak’s secretary, … Continue reading

Harlan Calls for Spinrad To Be Named SFWA Grandmaster
Apropos of the day, Harlan Ellison has sounded a bugle call summoning all within hearing to join him in demanding that Norman Spinrad be selected a SFWA Grandmaster. Ellison wrote in his online forum: HARLAN ELLISON – Tuesday, November 11 … Continue reading

Joe Buckley Dies for Charity
On Veterans Day, Baen Books is launching a charity ebook — The Many Deaths of Joe Buckley. Joe Buckley is a character that has appeared in many books by Baen authors, a tongue-in-cheek tradition. “The reason for this string of … Continue reading

Incurable Beauty
The Twilight Zone episode “The Eye of the Beholder” was originally aired this date (November 11) in 1960. The plot: Janet Tyler is undergoing her eleventh treatment (the maximum number legally allowed) in an attempt to look like everybody else. … Continue reading →

Laser Has Enough Power to Imitate a Super-Power
By James H. Burns: I used to love when Superman would take a lump of coal in his hands, and via super-pressure or some such, change it into a diamond! I hope this new discovery, doesn’t render such Kal-elian alchemy, … Continue reading

Clarke Center Presents Shaun of the Dead 12/3
The Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination will show the zombie comedy film Shaun of the Dead (2004) on December 3. Before the screening, “Zombie Experts” Bradley Voytek (UC San Diego, Computational Cognitive Science and Neuroscience) and Ricardo Dominguez (UC San … Continue reading

Lunacon Will Skip 2015
The New York Science Fiction Society, Lunarians, Inc., has decided against having a Lunacon in 2015. However, Lunarians secretary Stuart C. Hellinger announced on Facebook: “We are planning to hold a new and improved Lunacon in 2016 on March 18-20, probably at … Continue reading

Tomorrowland Teaser Trailer
Disney began promoting its movie Tomorrowland in 2013 with cryptic tweets and a mysterious box. Now that the movie’s release is only seven months away they’re back to using conventional weapons of mass publicity – like this teaser trailer which … Continue reading

Condensed Cream of OryCon
Whatever mysterious souls produced the daily newzine for OryCon 36 last weekend helped everyone have a good time by running great out-of-context quotes in every issue. (But the staff didn’t run their own names!) See this example from The Oryconian #3, published … Continue reading

2014 Endeavour Awards
The winners of the 2014 Endeavour Awards were announced November 7 at OryCon in Portland, OR. The result was a tie: Nexus by Ramez Naam and Requiem by Ken Scholes both won. The Endeavour Award honors a distinguished science fiction or fantasy book … Continue reading

Labor and Delivery
Question: In what favorite human activity does the fun part take far less time than the hard part? Answer: Well, that too, but today at File 770 the official answer is – writing a science fiction novel! After David Levine … Continue reading

A Review of “Better Things”
By James H. Burns: I just spent a rather extraordinary 83 minutes watching the 2013 documentary about artist Jeff Jones, Better Things: The Life and Choices of Jeffrey Catherine Jones (available on DVD). Jones first earned attention for a series … Continue reading

2014 World Fantasy Award Winners
The recipients of the 2014 World Fantasy Awards were announced November 9 at World Fantasy Con in Arlington, VA. Novel Sofia Samatar, A Stranger in Olondria (Small Beer Press) Novella Andy Duncan & Ellen Klages “Wakulla Springs” (Tor.com, 10/13) Short … Continue reading

Space Collectibles Fund Scholarship
The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation’s latest auction of astronaut memorabilia closed November 8 and the most valuable item by far was the Armstrong family’s “Apollo 11 Crew-Signed Insurance Cover” which sold for $18,251. The Foundation was created in 1984 by the … Continue reading

efanzines header

Added Guy H. Lillian’s Spartacus #5
Added Lisa & Joseph Major’s Alexiad #77
Added Jean Martin’s Science Fiction/San Francisco #158
Added Alex Case’s Breaking It All Down: The ’Zine #4

canadian fanzines

Added THE PLEASURE OF RUINS

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