John C. Snider interviews me for the SciFiDimensions Podcast. You can hear in streaming from his website, or you can search iTunes for "SciFiDimensions." I've not listened to it yet, so no idea how I come off, but it felt like a very thorough interview at the time. We talk about Fast Forward 2,
Pyr, the art of John Picacio, and many more topics besides. He's a good interviewer, (and hit me with a curve ball out of the gate. Not that I'm saying that's a criteria for a good interview!) He also interviews Tim Lasuita, licensing director for Jack Lake Productions, a Canadian company involved in reprinting Classics Illustrated. Cool!John also reviews Fast Forward 2 on his blog.
There’s no theme to the Fast Forward series, other than excellence in storytelling. The stories in FF2 cover the spectrum of sub-genres, from near-future parables to far-future space opera, from post-cyberpunk to hard SF; from cautionary tales a la The Twilight Zone to uplifting vignettes that affirm the best in human nature. With such a wide selection of styles and themes, it should come as no surprise that not every entry will appeal to every reader. At the very least, FF2 is like a Whitman Sampler; a little something for everyone, and if you find a story you like, it’ll be from a writer with plenty of other work you can chase down later.
Although I buy and enjoy theme anthologies, I grew up on "sampler" anthologies -- Dangerous Visions, Orbit, New Dimensions, Universe, etc.
ReplyDeleteOne of the best things about FF 1&2is that they *are* "Whitman samplers."
I've always liked potluck dinners, too, so maybe there's a connection...
Robert
My own introduction was finding battered copies of The Science Fiction Hall of Fame anthologies in my grandfather's basement, so I hear you!
ReplyDeleteThose were great, too -- and you remnded me also of searching for used copies of Fred Pohl's old Star SF series, Groff Conklin's stuff...
ReplyDeleteI am really glad they reprinted the Hall of Fame volumes in hardcover recently.
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