"Who cares what label gets attached to it? If it's a good story that makes you think, then it's good speculative fiction. If it doesn't make you think then, well, it's just entertainment
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I understand that some will always cry foul when a completely impossible, or non-scientific, concept is introduced as science fiction (Any godlike being with unlimited powers, for example), but for things like time travel or even Star Trek's McGuffin red matter, I think there's definitely an argument to be made for it being more - or more SF, at least - than just plain "fantasy."
I find the concept of "plain" fantasy (fixed the quote marks there) to be a little baffling, if not completely oxymoronic. When will the SpecFic snobbery end?
*rolls eyes* I'm getting so sick of this sort of bickering-- I think we ought to just rename it all "Speculative Fiction" and stick it all together-- Bradbury and Vonnegut and Card and Tolkien and all the Terry's (Brooks, Goodkind, and Pratchett, at any rate).
Octavia Butler wrote a vampire novel that was very much more sci-fi than fantasy, while telepathy, which is clearly fantasy, is generally categorized with the sci-fi books.
I do like (and can't recall whether I mentioned) that Pat Rothfuss brought up an excellent point-- sci-fi and fantasy can each be either "hard" or "soft." Star Trek, much as I love it, has always been "soft" sci-fi, whereas Tolkien is absolutely "hard" fantasy (everything works firmly within a given set of rules and the world is internally consistent. As Rothfuss put it "in a hard fantasy world, if you have dragons, you also have an ecosystem capable of supporting that large a predator.")
I also agree completely with Rothfuss' point. I have always, always written soft sci-fi and soft fantasy. I don't like making given set of rules in internally consistent worlds. I love randomness and oddity. My stories have always been fantasy, perhaps set in a science fiction sort of setting (for example, a bunch of telepaths living on a space station in the far future with aliens and far-out technology). A lot of people don't realize that psionic abilities -- or psychic abilities -- are fantasy. Just not the "wizards and dragons and people on horseback" fantasy that people seem to think of when they hear the word "fantasy."
I have Rothfuss' novel in my library and I have yet to read it. I still have to finish Vicki Pettersson's "City Of Souls." Then It's on to Caitlin R. Kiernen's "The Red Tree." Then the anthology "Strange Brew." Then CE Murphy's "Urban Shaman" series (a reread). Then Amber Benson's "Death's Daughter." Then I can read "The Name Of The Wind."
*grins* You sound like me. I'm currently trying to reread the complete Discworld series before the convention next month... and I keep getting distracted by all the dozens of other books I want to read!
I loved the "Urban Shaman" books. "Death's Daughter" is on my list too (my autographed copy, yay!), and I'll probably get around to Rothfuss eventually. After "Mean Streets," "Skin Trade," the latest John Flanagan book, and the other random odds and ends I couldn't help picking up at the library.
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I find the concept of "plain" fantasy (fixed the quote marks there) to be a little baffling, if not completely oxymoronic. When will the SpecFic snobbery end?
Oh, wait, never. 8-(
Kudos to you, science fantasyist!
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Octavia Butler wrote a vampire novel that was very much more sci-fi than fantasy, while telepathy, which is clearly fantasy, is generally categorized with the sci-fi books.
I do like (and can't recall whether I mentioned) that Pat Rothfuss brought up an excellent point-- sci-fi and fantasy can each be either "hard" or "soft." Star Trek, much as I love it, has always been "soft" sci-fi, whereas Tolkien is absolutely "hard" fantasy (everything works firmly within a given set of rules and the world is internally consistent. As Rothfuss put it "in a hard fantasy world, if you have dragons, you also have an ecosystem capable of supporting that large a predator.")
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I also agree completely with Rothfuss' point. I have always, always written soft sci-fi and soft fantasy. I don't like making given set of rules in internally consistent worlds. I love randomness and oddity. My stories have always been fantasy, perhaps set in a science fiction sort of setting (for example, a bunch of telepaths living on a space station in the far future with aliens and far-out technology). A lot of people don't realize that psionic abilities -- or psychic abilities -- are fantasy. Just not the "wizards and dragons and people on horseback" fantasy that people seem to think of when they hear the word "fantasy."
I have Rothfuss' novel in my library and I have yet to read it. I still have to finish Vicki Pettersson's "City Of Souls." Then It's on to Caitlin R. Kiernen's "The Red Tree." Then the anthology "Strange Brew." Then CE Murphy's "Urban Shaman" series (a reread). Then Amber Benson's "Death's Daughter."
Then I can read "The Name Of The Wind."
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I loved the "Urban Shaman" books. "Death's Daughter" is on my list too (my autographed copy, yay!), and I'll probably get around to Rothfuss eventually. After "Mean Streets," "Skin Trade," the latest John Flanagan book, and the other random odds and ends I couldn't help picking up at the library.
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CE Murphy needs to hurry up with the Urban Shaman series. Joanne and Coyote are marvelous.
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