Theatre of Cruelty - A Discworld short story by Terry Pratchett

Copyright © Terry Pratchett 1993

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It was a fine summer morning, the kind to make a man happy to be alive. And probably the man would have been happier to be alive. He was, in fact, dead. It would be hard to be deader without special training.

"Well, now," said Sergeant Colon (Ankh-Morpork City Guard, Night Watch), consulting his notebook, "so far we have cause of death as a) being beaten with at least one blunt instrument b) being strangled with a string of sausages and c) being savaged by at least two animals with big sharp teeth. What do we do now, Nobby?"

Neil Gaiman wins Carnegie Medal

Following on from winning the Hugo award and Newbery Medal, Neil Gaiman's 'The Graveyard Book' has now won the Carnegie Medal, the UK's foremost award for children's literature.

Inspired by the sight of seeing his own two-year-old son riding his tricycle round gravestones, 'The Graveyard Book' is the story of a young boy brought up in the quiet and comfort of a cemetery, safe from the dangers of the outside world.

Gaiman once said that it was only because of his established reputation that publishers even considered a childrens' book opening with a serial killer at work. Only in a Gaiman story could the dead and undead be more human than the living. In the words of the Carnegie judges: "'The Graveyard Book ... manages to mix extreme creepiness with gentle humour. ... We felt the book was intriguing, it's very atmospheric and it has an extremely satisfying ending."

Doctor Who The Big Bang preview trailer plus Stephen Moffat interview

Apparently this professional looking trailer is fan-made, though it is hard to believe.  Enjoy

Terry Pratchett returning to SF with Stephen Baxter

(c) Terry Pratchett

After many decades of writing the extremely successful Discworld books, Terry Pratchett is collaborating with Stephen Baxter to write a new science fiction novel: The Long Earth.

"I thought to myself [Discworld] is fantasy, and I want to get back to my first love, which is science fiction" (Guardian Interview)

Guards! Guards!

While Terry Pratchett had already published ten books, Guards! Guards! the 8th Discworld book is the one where he first realises the art of art of “serious comedy”. His previous books had mostly been clever satires on fantasy clichés and popular culture, but with Guard! Guards! we see the flowering of his ability to write about dark subjects yet make laugh-out-loud jokes without belittling the seriousness of the subject. It is true that he more fully realises the technique in his later instalments of the Night Watch series, but it starts here.

The spaces in between - The City and The City

How does one review a book that is a mystery set in a city that is, at its heart, also a mystery? Where the author hides and obfuscates; only slowly revealing what a strange framework the characters walk in? As obligation demands that one does not reveal too much, the answer must be “carefully”.

SFBK reading plan

OK, this may seem a little geeky (and why not), but I have been analysing our reading list to date. The books that we have read so far (including the three planned for the next few sessions) are as follows:

Doctor Who shocker

If you want to conduct the Doctor Who theme tune, it seems all you need is a couple of Tesla coils and 500,000 volts.  You could say that it is an electrifying performance...

Neil Gaiman meets Dr Who

The rumours excitedly circulating the blogosphere have finally been confirmed: Neil Gaiman has written (and delivered) a Doctor Who story for the next series.

Mieville on The City & The City

This month's book is China Mieville's award winning and rather strange police proceedual set in twin eastern european citys. Actually, all his books are strange; it would be strange if they were not. Here China himself discusses his work

Three Science Fiction Writing Exercises

Since many of you who visit website are also science fiction authors yourselves, I thought it might be fun to offer a few writing exercises to help get your creative juices flowing. Instead of focusing on a plot or a character, here are a few things that you can develop that might exist within your story.

The City & The City

by China Miéville

When a murdered woman is found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. But as he investigates, the evidence points to conspiracies far stranger and more deadly than anything he could have imagined.

2010 Nebula Awards winners

The SFWA (Science Fiction Writers of America) have announced their 2009 award winners.

The Lester Dent Pulp Paper Master Fiction Plot

This is a formula, a master plot, for any 6000 word pulp story. It has worked on adventure, detective, western and war-air. It tells exactly where to put everything. It shows definitely just what must happen in each successive thousand words.

No yarn of mine written to the formula has yet failed to sell.

A coalition of equals

Our next meeting is in a week's time (which is a long time in politics) and will be at David's house. We will, of course, be officially discussing The Forever War, but I suspect the forever election may crop up as well.


Mindful that we have a number of postal members that we should not disenfranchise, I have some suggestions for the coming months that we might discuss in advance.

Who will win the Hugo or Nebula?

This year there are six books up for the Nebula award for best novel and likewise six books for the Hugo best novel, making not twelve, but nine books in total.

The Forever War

In the not so far future, William Mandella is young, fit, smart, and conscripted to fight an unknown enemy in deep space. Due to the relativistic speeds involved, Mandella and his fellow survivors return to a society they are no longer a part of. With every mission the estrangement grows greater; Mandella fights for a humanity he is no longer a part of, and he does not know why.

Why read Starship Troopers?

“What would I have left out? The Asimovs and Heinleins, certainly, since in completely different ways they did much to distract everyone from the idea that science fiction should be written well. (This is a personal view – the consensus of the SF world is against me.)
Christopher Priest, Forward to 100 Must-Read Science Fiction Novels

“Starship Troopers is an undoubtedly right-wing in its politics and unashamedly militaristic in outlook but it is also one of the finest coming-of-age stories in SF, a narrative that follows Johnnie Rico’s rites of passage with the kind of detail and empathy that can be appreciated even by those readers to whom Heinlein’s politics and philosophy remain an anathema.”
Stephen E. Andrews and Nick Rennison, 100 Must-Read Science Fiction Novels

“[Heinlein] forgot to insert a story.”
Anthony Boucher, founder of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction

2009 BSFA Award Winners

The 2009 British Science Fiction Awards ceremony took place at the 61st Eastercon convention, Odyssey 2010, at the Radisson Edwardian Hotel, Heathrow, London, UK. The ceremony was hosted by Ian Watson and Donna Scott, and the following awards were presented:

Sweet Charity

Yesterday was a good hunting day in those sometimes rich fields of the Great British Charity Shop. They are, admittedly, full of literary chaff: the Dan Browns and the Geoffrey Archers speak loudly of the triumph of marketing over substance; the airport thrillers nestle shoulder to shoulder with the holiday romances. Read once and then discarded like the throwaway characters they contain.