Speculative Fiction Links of the Week for June 5, 2015

And here is our weekly round-up of interesting links about speculative fiction from around the web, this time with yet more Hugo debate as well as plenty of discussion of Mad Max: Fury Road.

Speculative fiction in general:

• John Bardinelli discusses Dune by Frank Herbert on the occasion of its 50th anniversary.
• Staving Darkness discusses her experiences reading classic science fiction as a teenaged girl. 
• Andrew Kane shares five great Steampunk stories that aren't actually Steampunk.
• Robert Irwin shares his appreciation for The Once and Future King by T.H. White.
• Noah Berlatsky asks if there can be a black fantasy hero. 
• Natalie Zutter discusses the "We Need Diverse Books" campaign.
• Shveta Thakrar discusses Hinduism in YA fiction. 
• Margaret Fortune discusses the crossover effect of speculative YA fiction.
• Margaret Fortune also reevaluates The Neverending Story by Michael Ende.
• Jo Zebedee asks whether SFF should have a funny bone. 
• Neil Clarke shares the results of a survey on the influences of SFF short fiction writers.
• Nathan Ballingrud discusses horror and the small press. 
• M. Harold Page offers a defence of traditional fantasy. 
• Ursula K. LeGuin is angry at Amazon.
• Damien Walter wonders why the mainstream media still won't take geek culture seriously.
• Karl-Johan Noren discusses the changing nature of SFF fandom.
• Peter Orullian discusses the intersection of music and fantasy. 
• George R.R. Martin responds to those who cricitise the sexual violence and treatment of women in Game of Thrones.
• The Book Smugglers share their appreciation for the movie Willow. 
• Landon Porter explains why he feels that superheroes should not kill.
• Robert J. Sawyer discusses the sexism of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. 
• David Mack responds to those who criticise him for including a lesbian relationship between a Vulcan and a Klingon spy in a Star Trek tie-in novel.
• Larry Taylor wonders if it is time to terminate the Terminator franchise. 
• Tasha Robinson points out that the future has always looked bleak on film in spite of Tomorrowland.
• Landon Palmer discusses the hidden brilliance of the Wachowski siblings.
  

Tributes to Tanith Lee:

• Timmi Duchamp shares her appreciation of the late Tanith Lee.
• Anne Groell shares her appreciation for Tanith Lee.
• Catherine Lundoff offers some advice where to start reading Tanith Lee.
• John O'Neill shares some of his favourite Tanith Lee novels.

Awards:

• The finalists for the 2015 David Gemmell Legend Awards have been announced and voting has opened. 
• The shortlist for the 2015 Mythopoeic Awards has been announced.
• The winners of the 27th annual Lambda Literary Awards have been announced.
• The longlist for the 2015 Sunburst Awards has been announced.
• The winners of the 2015 Prix Imaginales have been announced.
• The finalists for the 2015 Manly Wade Wellman Award have been announced.
• The winners of the 2015 Bill Finger Award have been announced.
• The nominees for the 2015 Russ Manning Award have been announced. 
• The winners of the 2015 Audie Awards for best audio book have been announced.
• The nominees for the 2014 Cóyotl Awards have been announced.
• The Carl Brandon Society has awarded the 2015 Writing Excuses Scholarship to Shveta Thakrar.
  
• Fantasy Fraction discusses the pros and cons behind several major SFF awards.
• An SF Signal Mind Meld asks what genre awards are good for anyway.
  

Hugo Controversy:

• Samatha Noll explains why the Hugo debate matters for philosophers of science.
• Adam Troy Castro explains what he considers the most infuriating thing about the Hugo debate. 
• Camestros Felapton has some statistics on Hugo winners. 
• Camestros Felapton also points out some inconsistencies in the beliefs of the Sad and Rabid Puppies as well as the reflection of those inconsistencies in the works they nominated.
• Alexandra Erin points out that the Sad Puppies seem to underestimate the scope of the SFF field and also responds to some Sad Puppy claims.
• Rich Horton has a proposal to improve the Hugos.
• Caitlin at Devourer of Words explains why she is voting for the Hugos this year.
  

Discussion about Mad Max: Fury Road:

• The Skiffy and Fanty Show discuss Mad Max: Fury Road.
• Genevieve Valentine discusses the feminine desert of Mad Max: Fury Road.
• John Wiswell discusses the treatment of special needs in Mad Max: Fury Road. 
• Derek Austin Jones compares Mad Max: Fury Road to the novel Archangel by Marguerite Reed.
• Ian Failes discusses the visual effects of Mad Max: Fury Road.
• Vashi Nedomansky discusses the editing of Mad Max: Fury Road.
• Every killer car in Mad Max: Fury Road explained.
  

Writing, publishing and promotion:

• Paulo Coelho shares some advice for writers.
• Alastair Reynolds discusses changing and growing as a writer. 
• Elena Linville points out that the more you write, the better you get.
• E.R. Baine explains why she writes. 
• Cal Moriarty discusses creating great characters. 
• Damien Walter talks about the big and the small story.
• David Hair discusses juggling YA and adult fantasy writing. 
• Chris Winkle shares seven worldbuilding sins. 
• James L. Sutter explains what roleplaying can teach writers.
  
• David Neth attempts to answer the question when a book is good enough.
• Kenda Montgomery talks about book cover design. 
• Stuart J. Whitmore discusses promoting your  books via Project Wonderful.

Interviews:

• Jan Edwards interviews Freda Warrington.
• Alyssa Rosenberg interviews John Scalzi. 
• Helen Oyeyemi interviews Kelly Link. 
• Rachel Cordasco interviews Peter Clines.
• Ch'kara Silverwolf interviews M.S. Fowle. 

Reviews:

• Floyd Looney reviews Mindguard by Andrei Cherascu. 
• Michael Patrick Hicks reviews A Shroud of Night and Tears by Lucas Bale.
• Brad K. Horner reviews Flight of the Kikayon by K.E. James a.k.a. Kary English.
• Elena Linville reviews Radiant by Karina Sumner-Smith. 
• Ceridwen Christensen reviews Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie. 
• Steven Shaviro reviews Elysium by Jennifer Marie Brissett.
• James Nicoll reviews the collected editorials of John W. Campbell.
• Kim Newman reviews the movie San Andreas.
  

Crowdfunding:

• Silicon Heart, a graphic novel by Sam Roads and Kat Nicholson, is looking for funding. 
• Adam Nimoy, son of Leonard Nimoy, needs help to fund a documentary about his father.
• Natalie Luhrs is reading and livetweeting The War in Heaven by Theodore Beale a.k.a. Vox Day for charity.

Con reports:

• Janelle Asselin reports on a "Women in Comics" panel at Denver ComicCon that did not include any women.
• Brian Olsen shares his experiences at Book Con 2015 in New York City.
• Charles Payseur shares his experiences at Wiscon in Madison, Wisconsin.
  

Science and technology:

• The Solar Impulse plane will cross the Pacific powered only by the sun.
• Sally Ride had to explain female hygiene to male NASA scientists.
• Adding an iron fish to a cookpot can help to treat anaemia.

Free online fiction:

• "The Warriors, the Mothers, the Drowned" by Kay Chronister in Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
• "Die, Susan, Die" by Susan Jane Bigelow at io9. 
• "In Libres" by Elizabeth Bear in Uncanny Magazine. 
• "Marcie's Waffles Are the Best in Town" by Sunil Patel in Flash Fiction Online. 
• "Trigger" by Courtney Alameda at Tor.com
• "Nutty Nuggets" by Will McLean.
• "Alice" by Floyd Looney.
• "Mission to Valour", part 54 of Musketeer Space by Tansy Rayner Roberts.
• Chapter 3 of "Those Not Forgotten", part 86 of The Descendants by Landon Porter. 

Odds and ends: 

• Watch the first five minutes of the TV series The Whispers, based on the Ray Bradbury story "Zero Hour" (US only).
• Godzilla has been made an official Japanese citizen.