Consensus wisdom has it that all modern commercial fantasy novels fall into two camps: those derived from J.R.R. Tolkien and those derived… — Paul Di Filippo Books Copy Share Image
It's certainly a cliche to remark that a nonfiction book 'reads just like a novel,' but in the case of Jonathan Eig's… — Paul Di Filippo Birth Copy Share Image
I suspect that authors who start their careers writing for an adult audience - and who eventually produce a young adult novel… — Paul Di Filippo Adult Copy Share Image
The three touchstones that woke Buddha up - sickness, old age, and death - are a pretty good place to start when… — Paul Di Filippo Age Copy Share Image
'James and the Giant Peach' magnificently starts out Dahl's career as a blithe and droll Bad Uncle corrupter and affirmer of youth.… — Paul Di Filippo Bad Copy Share Image
Quite often, intent on conveying how things can go wrong for a culture (science fiction) or an individual (horror) or all of… — Paul Di Filippo Because Copy Share Image
The science-fictional motif of lethal, infectious information - bad memes - is a fascinating one, with an extended history. One of the… — Paul Di Filippo Act Copy Share Image
Jeff VanderMeer's fiction has always been entrancingly, engagingly, enthusiastically weird, a winning combination of mimesis and the fantastical that privileges neither component:… — Paul Di Filippo Always Copy Share Image
Blending consensus historical events and personages with imaginary occult forces is a strong recipe for counterfactual storytelling goodness that combines the best… — Paul Di Filippo Best Copy Share Image
Writing one's first novel, getting it sold, and shepherding it through the labyrinths of editing, production, marketing, journalism, and social media is… — Paul Di Filippo Arduous Copy Share Image
Of the birth of subgenres, there is no end. They arise like bubbles full of miraculous hopes and potentials from the Planckian… — Paul Di Filippo Alike Copy Share Image
War has always been a part of science fiction. Even before the birth of SF as a standalone genre in 1926, speculative… — Paul Di Filippo Always Copy Share Image
Technically and logically speaking, actual Victorian science fiction writers cannot be dubbed 'steampunks.' Although they utilized many of the same tropes and… — Paul Di Filippo Actual Copy Share Image
The constituents of tragedy may be universally acknowledged, easily invoked and deeply felt, but the elements of comedy are, I think, more… — Paul Di Filippo Acknowledged Copy Share Image
Immensely clever and libidinously hilarious.The most astonishing thing about Love in a Dead Language is its ingenious construction. Insofar as any printed… — Paul Di Filippo Astonishing Copy Share Image
You could engineer a human to survive the greenhouse effect because you think that's what's going to happen, and then all of… — Paul Di Filippo Because Copy Share Image
Writers begin changing the instant they append 'The End' to a novel. Readers begin changing the moment they encounter that same phrase.… — Paul Di Filippo Acquiring Copy Share Image
Any debut novel is usually a case of spitting into the wind - or, just maybe, casting your bread upon the waters.… — Paul Di Filippo Any Copy Share Image
There must be a rule of thumb in pop-culture archaeology that states that the allure of any topic is inversely related to… — Paul Di Filippo Affairs Copy Share Image
It was not until the appearance of cyberpunk in the 1980s that SF began to grapple in a broadly meaningful way with… — Paul Di Filippo Appearance Copy Share Image
For every reader and writer of steampunk fiction, there are probably hundreds or thousands of other activists who gleefully embrace some non-written… — Paul Di Filippo Activists Copy Share Image
Everyone can guess what 'Corn Flakes' tastes like, even if you've never had them. But what, pray tell, does 'High School Musical'… — Paul Di Filippo Actually Copy Share Image
Steampunk, the repurposing of Victorian culture and technology for contemporary fun and profit, is so ubiquitous - in media, books, fashion, music,… — Paul Di Filippo Aspects Copy Share Image
The SF genre, of course, is really an organically evolved, marketplace-determined, idiosyncratic grab bag of themes and signifiers and characters and icons… — Paul Di Filippo Bag Copy Share Image
“Madam, I assure you that you are dealing with two gentleman of the highest propriety and social standing. When one contemplates the… — Paul Di Filippo Gentleman Copy Share Image
Roald Dahl pioneered a new kind of literature for youngsters, one that dispensed with cant and solemnity, favoring anarchy and joy over… — Paul Di Filippo Acknowledging Copy Share Image
One posthumous measure of a person's life is how often you imagine his impossible return to deal with some event he never… — Paul Di Filippo About Copy Share Image
Ribofunk indicates a focus on biology as the upcoming big science in the way that physics was for the last 50 or… — Paul Di Filippo 100 years Copy Share Image
Thomas Pynchon surely inaugurated or crystallized a new genre in 1963 when he published 'V.' The seriocomic mystery or thriller with one… — Paul Di Filippo Baptism Copy Share Image
