Archive for the ‘SFWA Blog’ Category

LendInk, Author Activism, and the Need for Critical Thinking

If you’ve been living under a social media rock and haven’t heard of the LendInk incident, here’s a brief rundown.

LendInk was a website that facilitated Kindle ebook lending, matching would-be ebook borrowers with ebook owners. All of this was perfectly legal, involving legitimately purchased ebooks, lending options provided by Amazon, and lending terms set by publishers (whether the book was self- or traditionally published).

Guest Post: Dreaming Well: Does the Future of Publishing Need More Imagination?

I feel passionately that some of the information we are getting is increasingly wrong and motivated by selfishness and, yes, to some degree, a form of hyperbolic illogic. We are so hung up on predicting the next big thing, on getting in on the next gold rush when it comes to ways for authors to promote themselves and market their work that we often seem to be active participants in our own destruction.

World Fantasy Awards Nominations

The 2012 World Fantasy Awards ballot has been released. Final results will be announced at the World Fantasy Convention, to be held on Nov 1-4, in Toronto, Canada, where Lifetime Achievement Awards will be presented to Alan Garner and George R.R. Martin.

Guest Post: Writers and Families

My family has a strange attitude toward my writing, which I think is almost always the case unless the writer comes from a family of professional creators. (By professional, I mean people who actually make a portion of their incomes from a creative endeavor — writing, art, dance, etc.) When I met my cousins in Debrecen, they told me they’d heard I’d become a famous writer, of fantasy like J.R.R. Tolkien. Of course, I’m not at all a famous writer, and what I write is nothing like Tolkien.