I once took a course in writing science fiction and fantasy from Canadian fantasy writer Ann Marston. In it, Ann warned against explaining oft-used concepts and tropes, as they no longer required explanation. She focused on post-apocalyptic literature that rambled on about how the world had ended, rather than advancing the story. Her point was that SFF readers have a vast intertextual repository of print and screen antecedents to fill in the gaps. A few hints are sufficient for the savvy speculative reader’s comprehension. Consider Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. How did the world become this burnt out husk? It doesn’t matter – the world burned, a father and son survived, and continue to survive. This is the story. We don’t really give a damn precisely how the world fell apart because we’re wrapped up in that story, no further explanation necessary.
While reading the third and final act of Felix J. Palma’s The Map of Time, I wondered if his target audience was someone who had never considered parallel universes, or alternate history, or time travel’s ripple effect. In short, someone who has never read Orson Scott Card’s Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus. For anyone familiar with possible world theory or Schrödinger’s cat, it feels terribly contrived. It’s like reading the alt history version of The Celestine Prophecy: characters exist only to deliver philosophical exposition. When H.G. Wells utters the words, “Does this mean we are living in . . . a parallel universe?” I couldn’t help myself. I took a red pen and wrote, “Gasp!” in the margin.
I’ve undertaken a project: reading all of the late, great Joanna Russ’s books in chronological order and sharing my thoughts on them in a series of posts. There’ll be some additional reference material where appropriate from books like Mendlesohn’s On Joanna Russ anthology and possibly Jean Cortiel’s Demand My Writing, too, but mostly just discussions of the books themselves.
Each weekday, Tim will take a look at what we know about each of the 
There are often discussions 
Bust out your atlases, Mapquest apps, and GPS devices, WOTers! It’s a Wheel of Time Re-read, and it’s convinced it knows exactly where it is! Whether it does or not!
With the 25th anniversary of The Magic of Recluce upon us, and 
Four years have gone by. Four battles have been fought. Four victories have been won. The fifth book in J.K. Rowling’s series, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (OotP), marked a pretty significant change in tone from the previous books. Harry had watched a friend die in Goblet of Fire, and, as we quickly learn, he’s had to endure a summer of public ridicule and derision from the Wizarding community, denouncing his claims that He Who Must Not Be Named had returned as lies or merely the ravings of a crazy boy. Combine that with the fact that he turns fifteen in the book, and it’s not surprising to find that a new cross, moody, and short tempered teenage Harry has replaced ‘The Boy Who Lived.’
Every month, Fiction Affliction provides a handy reference of the science fiction, fantasy, urban fantasy and paranormal romance, and young adult paranormal coming out in the ensuing month. Today’s column examines SCIENCE FICTION.
As 
Each weekday, Tim will take a look at what we know about each of the upcoming 52 new comics from the September DC relaunch, one series at a time. Today: BATWING!
