Anthologies of mainstream author interviews are common enough, but similar resources covering sf creators rarely see print, except online. Blaschke, fiction editor for RevolutionSF.com, fills something of a vacuum, then, with this outstanding collection of conversations he has had with leading sf editors and authors since 1997. He sorts the interviewees into four whimsically titled categories. "A Source of Innocent Merriment," for instance, focuses on such highly distinctive voices in speculative fiction as urban fantasist Charles de Lint, and "I Am Legend" targets genuine luminaries of the field, such as Samuel R. Delaney and Gene Wolfe. Standout interviews include those with 800-pound gorilla Harlan Ellison, displaying his usual cynicism about sf films and their fans, and perdurable grandmaster Jack Williamson, who explains how he has kept the creative fires burning since his first publication in 1928. Another section takes note of comic book creators, with Sandman author Neil Gaiman leading the pack. Must reading for devotees curious to see what makes their favorite authors tick.
-Carl Hays
That review, which has been reposted on The Dreaming, along with my listing on The Pulse, Digital Webbing and Locus Online have conspired to increase the number of sales VoV has enjoyed of late. Friday morning, my somewhat pointless Amazon sales ranking was in the depressing range of 1,300,000 or so, which means that no books had been sold in weeks. But by Saturday morning, I'd broken into five figures for the first time ever, with the book topping out (as far as I know) at 50,110. Even though the sales rankings are completely pointless for anything other than snapshot comparison with other Amazon titles at that point in time, a million point jump means a nice number of books have moved, no matter how you slice it. Now if I could just manage to keep the number stable in the five figure range for the next year or so...
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