Gay Science Fiction and Fantasy Authors.

[mach]

I have a BONE to pick with you. You are guilty of many deep sins against your craft and good taste! If you find yourself guilty of one of these infractions, I beseech thee REPENT! Repent, and sin no more lest my wrath shine forth in your book reviews like a great burning fire

Comments

[markbernstein]

If you're talking to/about authors who are being published by an actual publishing company, as opposed to self publishing, they often have little or no input into the cover.

Other than that, yeah, these points apply to all kinds of fiction. I won't take the time to read anything self-published unless it's strongly recommended by someone whose taste I trust. There's waaaaay too much crap out there.

[mach]

Seriously? NO input? I think I'd be ready to cut someone if I put that much work into something and didn't get some say in how it was marketed.

I've found some very nice jewels in the fan fiction and self-publish arena.. but for the most part you are certainly correct that there's a lot of rough to search through.

[rebelsheart]

The covers for Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files are a beautiful example. Harry is repeatedly described as not wearing a hat and ebing against wearing a hat. The cover artist for the first book drew Harry with a hat based on someone else's description of the story. Apparently Jim knows the new cover artist and Harry now maintains his hat on the cover of the books as an inside joke of sorts.

[rebelsheart]

Do you read Fang by chance?

[mach]

You mean Fang from the Maximum Ride series? No. So far the series doens't look too promising. Why is it good or crap?

[rebelsheart]

I was thinking of the short story anthology series form Bad Dog Books and FurPlanet. I was wondering if you'd seen the new one.

[mach]

No actually. Though I bet it's a pretty good read. Fan magazines with good editors seem to be the haven for good fan written fiction, regardless of genre.

[murakozi]

Aw heck, I couldn't resist a comment or two.

1. A scifi book with cover art that relates to the story? Heck, the ones I grew up on (even if they weren't about gay characters) almost never had art that remotely referenced anything in the book. You kids today and your rock n roll music, Nintendos, relevant cover art, and fax machines...

2. Sounds like pretty much all the old GOR novels. Ugh.

[mach]

Most of the stuff from the 1980's on had something to do with the contents of the novel.. for a bit there in the 90's the cover images were typically based on an actual scene from the book.

Now though, man, sometimes the characters don't even dress right. :-p