New British SF magazine
Another magazine I picked up today was the first issue of SciFiNow - a new SFX style science fiction magazine published by Imagine. It’s huge - a large format, 140-odd pages, glossy, nicely designed (if a bit too busy for me - it’s one of those magazines that seems to encourage attention deficit disorder) and with lots and lots of tv/film/comic related stuff.
The literary side of things does get a look in, there are a few book reviews and there’s the first part of a feature on the history of science fiction as a literary form (oddly tucked away in the fanboy section).
The features are a bit shallow, and the way the magazine has been broken up into segments feels a bit random to me, but it does look like it could, given time, develop into a serious rival for SFX.
Hmmm. From the sounds of the minimal literature content, probably not a potential market for yours truly. But maybe they need an insigtful and vociferous movie critic, eh?
“But maybe they need an insightful and voiciferous movie critic, eh?”
If only I knew one…
Actually, it’s even worse than I first thought. Looking at the magazine there are only three pages given over to books and two of those go to graphic novels (mostly old Marvel reprints for some reason) - so there’s only actually one page of book reviews and half of that is given over to the editors’ “best books” (1984, Frankenstein, I am Legend and The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories).
So there’s actually only one new book reviewed - Deadstock by Jeffrey Thomas.
I’m wondering if the BSFA should approach them and see if we can trade reviewers/fan news/interviews for coverage…
“I’m wondering if the BSFA should approach them and see if we can trade reviewers/fan news/interviews for coverage…”
Sounds like a sensible idea to me…