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Worlds Without End Blog

A Productive Weekend for Series Books Posted at 10:41 PM by Dave Post

Dave Post

King's DragonThis weekend I made an effort to get some more women authors’ works into the database starting with Ursula K. LeGuin‘s Earthsea Cycle.  I added the first 3 books in that series: A Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan and The Farthest Shore .  We already had Powers (Nebula winner 2008 ) from her Annals of the Western Shore so I completed the trilogy with Gifts and Voices.

Next up is C.J. Cherryh.  Completed The Faded Sun and The Merchanter Novels series with 5 more books, bringing her total to 31 books in the WWEnd database.

Kate Elliott‘s Kings Dragon , part 1 of the Crown of Stars series was nominated for a Nebula in 1997 .  I added in the other 6 books with the really nice re-print covers from Orbit.  Be sure to check those out.

Christopher Fowler‘s Bryant and May Series is popular with the British Fantasy Society.  They’ve nominated 3 out of 7 books in that series including The Victoria Vanishes.  These look intriguing.

Mark Chadbourn‘s third trilogy, The Kingdom of the Serpent, is up to date now.  Nice cover art for these as well.  Nice to see a fantasy series break from the norm.

The Bridge Trilogy from William Gibson is now complete with the addition of Idoru and All Tomorrow’s Parties.  They join Virtual Light his Hugo and Locus SF (1994) nominated book.

Last, but not least is Brian Stableford‘s Emortality Series.  Six books in this one including Dark Ararat, Campbell nominated in 2003.  This one is kind of strange in that the books were written out of series order.  How is one supposed to read this series?  The order in which they were written or the series order?  I’ve listed them in series order because that seems to be the way it’s done everywhere I’ve seen.

For those keeping score, that’s 33 new books added.  Only a billion more to go.

More Series Books Added to WWEnd Posted at 10:43 PM by Dave Post

Dave Post

Skylark DuQuesneAdded some more books over the weekend.

David EddingsKing of the Murgos was a Locus Fantasy nominee in 1989 so I added the other 4 books of The Malloreon to complete the series.

But what’s the Malloreon without The Belgariad? Uh… just 5 books instead of 10? Yep. Had to add the whole saga.

To keep the fantasy series theme going I added in the rest of the books for Memory, Sorrow and Thorn by Tad Williams. Book 3 was nominated for the Locus Fantasy Award in 1994. If you read it, you know that the last book of the trilogy was over 1,000 pages – too many pages for a single paperback, so the publishers divided it into 2 volumes. So the Trilogy is actually 4 books in paperback form but not in hardcover. To get around this problem, I tagged both volumes of To Green Angel Tower as book 3 and added Part 1 – Seige and Part 2 – Storm as sub-titles. It’s still a trilogy but you get credit for 4 books if you read them. Bonus! The new Orbit covers are tasty too.

And now for something completely different… A guy so nice you say the "E" twice – E.E. "Doc" Smith. This is old school SF we’re talking about. Skylark DuQuesne was nominated for the Hugo in 1966. (Check out the Hugo lineup for 1966!) After reading the synopsis I decided I’d have to read this one. Turns out it’s the 4th book of the Skylark Series written 16 years after book 3. The series was a pulp serial originally and published in a book starting in 1946! Check out the covers on this series. These are the stuff of dreams. Classic SF goodness.

These and other new additions to the WWEnd database can be found in the forum. I’ll post up all the newest books each Monday.

The 2009 British Fantasy Society (August Derleth) Award Posted at 4:11 PM by Dave Post

Dave Post

Memoirs of a Master ForgerThe 2009 BFS August Derleth Award winner is:

Memoirs of a Master Forger, William Heaney, (Gollancz)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tim Powers’ book to become Pirates IV? Posted at 11:56 PM by Rico Simpkins

icowrich

On Stranger TidesDisney just announced that Pirates of the Caribbean IV will be named On Stranger Tides.  Sound familiar?

This isn’t so much a fact as, well, pure speculation, but the latest Johnny Depp vehicle may share more than just the title of Tim Powers1988 WFA and Locus Fantasy nominated novel.  According to Zap2it, the Powers character, Jack Shandy, may morph into Jack Sparrow, with the rest of the novel’s elements staying relatively true to the original novel.  Some level of confirmation seems to come from LatinoReview.com, which quotes Powers’ agent as saying "it is not a coincidence".

I’m not sure what to think of a fourth Pirates movie, given the underwhelming nature of part three.  On the other hand, maybe Tim Powers could save the franchise.  What do you think?