Wiscon scheduling

[owlectomy]

New Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy Sun 8:30 - 9:59AM Caucus
A general panel on the best new YA fantasy and science fiction books.

I'm taking suggestions, if you have them (released before mid-May, preferably); I keep up pretty well with new YA books, but I haven't been reading all that much lately. I'm very intrigued by The Demon's Lexicon but it doesn't come out until June.

Public Libraries: Where's the SF? Sun 10:00 - 11:29AM Conference 5
With the Current Economic Climate (tm), people are flocking to libraries for the free books, dvds, video games, internet access, and programming. With a shrinking budget and an increased demand, what can we as library workers and library patrons do to ensure science fiction gets a good place in the collection? Is it about encouraging the purchase of more materials, making it easier to find those materials once they're in the library, or maybe starting a book club? Should we be focussing on the children's room, the teen collection, or the adults? Are there particular books we feel are essential for a library to have?

I'm not sure whether I'm a good person to answer that question, given that the two libraries where I've worked have had tiny science fiction sections -- actually, Southgate didn't have a science fiction section at all. Must think some more about this one.

Comments

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

In general I think library ordering IS largely driven by patron demand, both from a philosophical point of view and from a pragmatic point of view (because it's easier to make a case for us getting more library money if we circulate a ton of books!), but I think one of the problems for science fiction is that it sort of falls into that gap between "we should buy it because it's really popular" and "we should buy it because it's a classic." So literary or niche or small-press science fiction, or minor classics of the 1970s and 1980s, tend to get ignored. And obviously I can't say that libraries should conform themselves to my tastes just because they're my tastes, but I think it's reasonable for science fiction fans as a group to think about whether we can do something to change that.

(BPL is one of the largest library systems in the country, right? Looking at some of those minor classics at random -- we have half a dozen copies of Neuromancer, 8 of Left Hand of Darkness, two of Snow Crash, two of Mythago World. This is to share between 60 library branches. I tend to think that's not really adequate.)

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

And no copies at all of Little, Big; THAT is a problem.

[diceytillerman.livejournal.com]

How new are you looking for? Just 2009s?

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

Yeah, 2009s. I'm putting some 2008s on my list, I think, but I'm willing to assume that I've at least heard of all the 2008 YA SF/F that I needed to hear about.

[diceytillerman.livejournal.com]

Lyonesse: The Well Between the Worlds, by Sam Llewellyn. Gorgeous prose. Ludicrously (http://diceytillerman.livejournal.com/17578.html) offensive from a fatpol standpoint, but OH, the prose, and OHHHHH, the worldbuilding. (younger end of YA) Feb. 2009.

The Singing (The Fourth Book of Pellinor), by Alison Croggon. Stellar prose, stellar storytelling. Tolkien-flavored in more ways than I can name, but a worthy decendent; feels fresh, not derivative in the stale way. Race ideology: far better than Tolkien in the sense that brown-skinned people are real humans; however, the one city of borwn-skinned people is located in the hot hot south, it's called Turbansk, and let's just say it doesn't fare well. Gender ideology: good. (Not worth reading alone; start at the series beginning.) (YA) March 2009.

Darkwood, by M.E. Breen. Haunting, magnificent prose with magnificent characters. Narration with the kind of restraint that trusts its readers to be intelligent. Fairy tale motifs are present but don't dominate. (younger end of YA) May 1, 2009

...and that was probably far more blathery than you wanted. :)

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

No, I always appreciate blathery. Pellinor and Lyonesse both vanished to the black hole of "it sounds like cookie-cutter fantasy" whenever I heard them mentioned, so thanks for mentioning those.

[mystickeeper.livejournal.com]

Talk about MANGA. They are books! There is a metric fuck-ton of sci-fi/fantasy! And heaps of teenagers read them! But whenever I listen to people talk about YA, they ignore it. It's pretty weird.

Tamora Pierce's Bloodhound just came out, I think.

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

You're absolutely right -- I do fall prey to the assumption that manga readers already know about the good new stuff, much better than I do.

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but do I actually read new manga? Usually I find out about a new series from an English-speaking fan, because I'm just not plugged into the scene any more, and then I get sniffy about reading the original rather than the translation, and I say I'm going to go to Book-Off for it, and then I have to look up the publisher so I can find it at Book-Off, and somewhere along the line it slips out of my head, so by the time I read a manga everybody knows about it already. (Wait, were they going to translate Ima Ichiko? Because I could talk about her, if they are!)