The 10 Worst Fighting Fantasy Covers of All Time

Back when I was a fantasy loving nerdling with suspect taste in books, I was big into gamebooks. This was in Ye Olde 90s before Al Gore invented the internet and the only computer game I had ever played was Alley Cat (Like Canada, my family were late adopters and only experienced the 80s in the 90s). So my main experience with interactive games were through gamebooks - Choose Your Own Adventure books on steroids.

Game of Thrones DVD and BluRay Set

For some reason, HBO does not see a good reason to release the first season of their critically and commercially successful series Game of Thrones before Christmas so fans will not receiving their favourite grimdark fantasy in their stockings. Instead, they have released pictures of the S1 boxset in order to drive fanboys and fangirls into a frenzied anticipation not seen since Julio Iglesias announced his world tour of nursing homes.

Bad Sex Awards 2011

Forget the Grammys. These are the award nominations that matter. They're the Literary Review's bad sex awards given to the most cringe-worthy sex scenes in novels. Anyone who's ever looked at a cover featuring a shirtless viking, pirate or Fabio should be well-acquainted with terribly-written sex scenes. As should anyone who's read a fantasy novel for that matter. I'm looking at you, George RR Martin.

Mark Twain Was a Bitch and I Love It

It's the 176th anniversary of Mark Twain's birth today, the Google doodle reliably informs me. Twain is of course the author of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. But more than just being an accomplished author and social commentator, he was also a catty bitch who had a clever quip and piercing put-down for every occasion. The old bastard spent his final years writing a hundreds of pages of a memoir swimming in bile.



Twain is one of the most eminently quotable authors of all time. Here are some of his best burns:

Every time I read 'Pride and Prejudice,' I want to dig her up and hit her over the skull with her own shin-bone.

-On Jane Austen

Just the omission of Jane Austen’s books alone would make a fairly good library out of a library that hadn’t a book in it.
-More on Austen

Cooper's art has some defects. In one place in Deerslayer, and in the restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offenses against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record.
-On James Fenimore Cooper

Once you put it down, you simply can't pick it up

-On one of Henry James' books

It is chloroform in print. If Joseph Smith composed this book, the act was a miracle - keeping awake while he did it was, at any rate.
-On the Book of Mormon

And some more general quotes from the curmudgeon:

All you need is ignorance and confidence and the success is sure.                

Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.

There is nothing so annoying as to have two people talking when you're busy interrupting.

Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it.

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.

Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.”

Familiarity breeds contempt - and children.

Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.

Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.

If man could be crossed with the cat, it would improve man but deteriorate the cat.

Zoo City To Become Film

Super-talented author/scriptwriter/journalist Lauren Beukes is having a very good year. First she joined the ranks of SFF hard-hitters such as Margaret Atwood and China Mieville as the recipient of an Arthur C Clarke award for her urban fantasy Zoo City, and now she's bagged a movie deal. Helen Spring, one of the people behind Oscar-nominated Yesterday, has optioned the rights to the critical and commercial hit novel.



Can Zoo City become the next District 9? It's early days yet but the book's international success bodes well for its silver screen chances. Like District 9, it's got a truly original premise and a vibrant setting that's sure to capture the imagination of moviegoers sick of the same old, same old sci-fi. Perhaps Beukes' first novel, Moxyland, will be next if the Zoo City film becomes a success.

If you're drooling over the cover, it's by Cape Town illustrator Joey Hi-Fi, whose stuff you should go check out right now here. There is also a Zoo City exhibit on right now at the Old Fort Museum in Joburg, which runs until 8 December.

Wouldn't Zoo City make a great Christmas present for the sci-fi fan in your life? Or the SA fiction enthusiast who's just a little sick of memoirs and political novels? Or yourself? Yes, yes it would. If they or you have already read it, there's always the soundtrack.