News for 2008

We have a new video Interview with Terry Pratchett, posted recently on You Tube and also available on the official...

Documents made public for the first time show the BBC were very nervous about releasing Doctor Who or a Sci Fi show into a mainstream audience.

Concerns were raised that bringing a science fiction drama to the BBC would not be an automatic winner and was considered too an obscure subject with a too small set and limited budget.

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Science Fiction author Ian McDonald has been nominated for the Warwick Prize for his novel Brasyl.

The Warwick Prize is an biennial international cross-disciplinary award open to literature in any genre or form in the English language. An author winning this award stands to get £50 000 prize money.

Ian McDonald who won the 2008...

You heard right, we are going to get four brand new episodes of the hit TV series Red Dwarf on the TV Channel Dave.

These are to celebrate the 21st birthday of red dwarf and filming begins in January 2009 with two episodes being created with the same look and feel as the original series.

Doug Naylor is masterminding the special episodes and the...

One of the greatest space ships ever, the millenium falcon from Star Wars has been rebuilt by those clever toy makers Hasbro, and for the first time in ages (and I mean years) it actually looks like a good quality build. It really does remind me of those star wars toys made to such a good standard in the 80's, (I used to have most of the set including the ewok village and the star destroyer).

The ship has been launched with...

Michael Crichton, the celebrated author of "Jurassic Park", has lost his battle with Cancer and sadly passed away on Wednesday 4th November 2008, aged 66.

Michael achieved the most fame for his book "Jurassic Park", which was turned into a block busting movie by Steven Spielberg. Michael had however previous success with books turned to movies,...

A new film by fans of the lord of the rings films has been made, called The Hunt for Gollum.

The new film is an entirely non profit venture, starring produced and directed by fans of JRR Tolkiens works. Chris Bouchard is the director (and the brainchild) behind this very limited budget venture (less than ?3000) but...

Write A Novel in November is an international project to encourage people to put pen to paper. The NaNoWriMo project was created by American Author Chris Baty in July 1999 and in the first year it had 21 participants, all in the San Francisco Bay area in the USA. Since then the project has been growing steadily and the number of participants...

Google has agreed a copyright deal, including paying $125 million to settle long standing lawsuits brought against them. These lawsuits were brought against Google over their plan to use copyright material online in Google books. While this has been agreed by the American Authors and Publishers, it has yet to be approved by the US District Court for...

JK Rowling is to launch her new novel, The Tales of Beedle the Bard, at a tea party at the National Library of Scotland in edinburgh, hosted by herself for school children.

The book was originally never intended for mass publication, with 6 copies being handwritten by JK Rowling as...

Vampires are real! and everyone knows it!, well maybe not really but this is the premise of the new novel "Vampire Zero" from David Wellington.

The Vampires are portrayed in this novel as real monsters that have been thought to have died out by all but a few police officers. The story centers on vampire...

The Director of Pans Labyrinth, Hellboy and the yet to be released The Hobbit films, is publishing his first ever novel. Guillermo Del Toro has signed a publishing deal with HarperCollins to publish a trilogy of novels about a vampiric virus invading New York.

The first novel, titled "The Strain" is due to be published...

A Brand new novel in Douglas Adams Hitchhikers guide series is to be written by Author Eoin Colfer, best known for his childrens fantasy novels featuring Artemis Fowl.

Douglas Adams widow, Jane Belson has agreed that Eoin can write this new novel, to be published by Penguin and is going to be titled "And Another Thing..."

Eoin is a very succesfull Author who has written an astounding series of childrens novels featuring a...

Preperations are well underway to present the new David Gemmell award for Fantasy which will be presented to the best Fantasy novel of the year 2008.

This award has been instigated by the colleagues and friends of the Late David Gemmell, with official support from his wife Stella Gemmell and will cellebrate Davids Life and...

Neil Gaiman has been touring for his new book, The Graveyard Book and at each appearance he has been reading chapters aloud while being filmed.

Each film is then being posted to Neil Gaimans Website for young readers: Mouse Circus, so people can then watch each of these broadcasts.

Also on the website is a chance to win one of 25 copies of the book, all you need to do is put your contact details in for a chance to win!.

The...

The J.R.R. Tolkien estate and HarperCollins, current publishers of JRR Tolkiens works, have been refused the right to seek punitive damages in their lawsuit against New Line Cinema for failure to pay royalties for the film versions of The Lord of the Rings.

Tolkiens estate claimed that New Line Cinema breached the agreement...

Author Brian M Thomsen, who was also a consulting editor for Tor Books, has passed away after a sudden heart attack.

Tomsen was a great Science Fiction and Fantasy writer, publishing several fantasy novels including the Forgotten Realms series novels Once around the Realms, Realms of Magic, Realms of the Arcane and The Mage in the Iron Mask. He was also a great writer of short stories and an editor of many Anthologies.

He also...