Letters to Tiptree: homage to a ground-breaking author

Update: On 25 September 2016 Letters to Tiptree won the British Fantasy Award for best non-fiction. Well deserved! If you’ve not heard of James Tiptree Jr, the acclaimed author of science fiction short stories and a handful of novels, he was active from 1967 to the late 1980s. He also wrote as Raccoona Sheldon, and … Continue reading Letters to Tiptree: homage to a ground-breaking author →

Naomi and Nicola cause a stir

This weekend, I lost what was happening in the rest of my world because I was immersed in the first Historical Fictions Research Network conference, in Cambridge at Anglia Ruskin University. The CFP for the second one, in February 2017 at the National Maritime Museum in London, will be sent out in the next week or so. There are conferences … Continue reading Naomi and Nicola cause a stir →

Nicola Griffith’s dances with martial art: the Aud Torvingen novels

I’m writing about Nicola Griffith’s Hild for a conference, and realise that I haven’t read her three Aud Torvingen lesbian crime-fighter noir novels, which have only been published in the USA. (WHY, British publishers?) I happily begin reading the first one to arrive from Abebooks – Always (2007) - devouring its muscular prose as if … Continue reading Nicola Griffith’s dances with martial art: the Aud Torvingen novels →

Depth and richness in Nicola Griffith’s Ammonite

I think this may have been the first sf novel I read that I instantly recognised as feminist: not stealth, or muted, or sub-conscious. It was Nicola Griffith’s first novel, and if she had never written anything again it would still be stunning: it won the Tiptree Award, the Lambda Literary Award, and the Premio … Continue reading Depth and richness in Nicola Griffith’s Ammonite →