Purveyor of fine fantasy adventures

Category: rants (Page 5 of 6)

Just for kids?

Lord of the Rings cover image“I love when the ‘literary establishment’ ‘discovers’ fantasy” tweeted @DelReySpectra, the American genre publishers, yesterday, linking to an article in the New Yorker.

The article in question, The Dragon’s Egg – high fantasy for young adults was a very well-written piece, articulate and full of gentle humour, so I can see why Adam Gopnik has won the National Magazine Award for his essays, but by the time I got to the end of it I was left with a somewhat bitter aftertaste: a distinct impression that he thinks *all* fantasy is for young adults.

The books with which he chose to illustrate his piece were Lord of the Rings, the Twilight saga, and the Inheritance Cycle. You could almost see the labels “enduring classic”, “for girls” and “for boys” floating over them, saying look at me, look at how balanced I’m being. Continue reading

Are we cool?

Hey, guess what? Songs of the Earth got a mention in the Sunday Times!

Unfortunately, that mention turned out to be little more than a single line of internal dialogue quoted out of context†, with the admonition that lines like that aren’t going to do anything to make fantasy cool.

Um, what? Who says a particular genre of fiction is cool or uncool? Is there a Department of Cool somewhere in the bowels of the Home Office that makes these distinctions? Do I have to apply to them in triplicate for an EC Certificate of Cool Conformity before I’m allowed to write books? Continue reading

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