Babel Clash

Although I’m very excited about launching Lightspeed, readers can still expect to see a steady stream of anthologies from me. In 2010, I’ll have The Living Dead 2 (Night Shade Books) released in September, and The Way of the Wizard in November (Prime Books).

The Living Dead 2 is full of more zombie goodness; it’s about 50% original, 50% reprints. I’m still putting the final touches on it, so I’m not sure what the final percentage breakdown will be. But chances are if you’re strictly a zombie reader, you won’t have read these reprints before. Everything I currently have earmarked for inclusion have never previously appeared in a zombie anthology, and there’s no duplication with any of the other recent zombie anthologies that have come out since The Living Dead. And of course the originals are all-new and never appeared anywhere previously.

The Way of the Wizard is also about 50/50, and as the title indicates, is about wizards. It’s also in progress, so I’m not sure about the exact percentages and I can’t say who will be in it as of yet.

Other things I have lined up for the future include The Mad Scientists’s Guide to World Domination (Tor Books) and Brave New Worlds (Night Shade Books).The former is an all-original anthology will feature stories of mad scientists and evil geniuses , from their point of view, rather than the point of view of the good guys. The latter is another reprint anthology, this time focusing on dystopian fiction–think 1984, Fahrenheit 451, and, of course, Brave New World, etc. Publication date is not certain for either of these yet. Mad Scientists will probably be out sometime in 2011, while Brave New Worlds will likely be a 2012 release.

I’ve got a couple other things for which I haven’t signed contracts yet, so I shouldn’t mention them, but suffice to say there’s a few other projects in there that will probably be announced in the coming months. But of course, there will also be Lightspeed–not only online but in anthology form as well, so 2011 should see publication of volume one of that in June, if all goes to plan.

If there’s a secret to my anthology success–and I will not confirm that there is one–it would behoove me not to reveal it, now wouldn’t it? If I’m to achieve world domination, I suppose it’s inevitable that I will attract an arch enemy, so I probably shouldn’t make it easier for him to attack me.

No, but seriously. That’s a long answer, so I’m going to beg off again and promise to post about it later.

As for Avatar, I really want to go see it, but I’m not sure how it will work out this weekend. There’s a particular theater in New York that I want to see it at, because it’s the best IMAX theater I’ve been to (and not all IMAX screens are created equal). And given that everything I’ve heard about Avatar is that it has the most amazing visuals ever, I definitely want to see it in the best venue possible.

I’ve kind of decided that in general, IMAX is probably what’s going to save movie theaters from going the way of the dinosaur. I mean, I have a ginormous HDTV at home and blu-ray etc., and given how expensive movies are and how annoying it can be dealing with all the people in the audience, whether it be the crowded environment or crying babies or ringing cell phones, it just generally seems like a better idea to watch stuff in my home theater instead. IMAX, however, does seem like it’s an order of magnitude better than anything else, to the extent that it seems worth it to me to actually go to the theater for that. And that goes double for a spectacle like Avatar.

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