This week, I've decided to help George Phillies get the word out there about the apolitical National Fantasy Fan Federation (or N3F) and its available fanzines. Since he's welcomed me aboard as a contributor for Tightbeam, I figure it's the least I can do!
Note: George wrote these for a German website that ultimately rejected his submission for BS political reasons. What a shame.
The N3F Review of Books Incorporating Prose Bono
Tell us about your site or zine.
Perhaps the N3F Review of Books Incorporating Prose Bono is a modestly long name for a fanzine. The idea for the N3F Review is entirely my creation. I have the invaluable assistance of long-time Neffer Jean Lamb as Lady High Proofreader, and a large cast of contributors (see next question). We are a fiction review zine, open in length; recent issues have run over 40 pages. We are always looking for more literate, sensible book reviewers.
Who are the people behind your site or zine?
The zine is published by The National Fantasy Fan Federation (founded 1941), the world's oldest continuously extant non-local SF club. Contributors, many of whom have their web sites, now include
Declan Finn http://www.declanfinn.com
Jason P. Hunt http://SciFi4Me.com http://SciFi4Me.tv
Mindy Hunt: http://SciFi4Me.com http://SciFi4Me.tv
Patrick Ijima-Washburn http://patokon.com
Jagi Lamplighter http://SuperversiveSF.com
Jim McCoy http://JimbosSFFreviews.blogspot.com
Chris Nuttall http://ChrisHanger.wordpress.com
Pat Patterson http://Habakkuk21.blogspot.com
George Phillies http://books-by-george.com
Cedar Sanderson: http://www.CedarWrites.com
Steven Simmons
Tamara Wilhite also appears at http://LibertyIslandmag.com
I am always looking for more reviewers, people who will write about the books, not the authors' political beliefs. (Sometimes this becomes challenging.)
Why did you decide to start your site or zine?
First, The National Fantasy Fan and Tightbeam for different reasons have fixed maximum lengths, namely 12 and 32 pages, so the number of book reviews we could publish was too limited. I had more reviews than I could publish. Second, the N3F Review was created to fill a felt but unfulfilled need, namely to generate reviews of every published SF novel. I spent a year contributing to the National Fantasy Fan a list new SF, Fantasy, horror, and occult novels. Ignoring stfnal romance novels, there were readily a hundred of these a month, not counting books from large and independent paper publishers, few of which were being reviewed. In addition, there are a lot of independently published -- indie -- writers whose work could be better. (There are also a lot whose work is superb). To serve these folks, I added Prose Bono (yes, there is a pun in there) to the mix. There are rare volumes of STFnal literary criticism and the history of fandom. Our own Harry Warner, Jr., wrote several of these. Those we also review, under their own heading. Finally, we accidentally acquired a continuing series of excellent author interviews, leaving us in the end with separate fiction, non-fiction, Prose Bono, and literary criticism sections.
What format do you use for your site or zine (blog, e-mail newsletter, PDF zine, paper zine) and why did you choose this format?
The N3F Review is circulated electronically to all N3F members; at latest count, there are over 300 of us. The N3F Review format is PDF, 8.5 x 11", Times New Roman 12 point type (larger for titles and section headings), Front and Second page being the table of contents. One somewhat narrow column appears on each page. Titles, author names, Section headings, and Table of Contents are in scarlet ink; all else are black. Unlike some other fanzines, we deliberately publish absolutely no art.
The fanzine category at the Hugos is one of the oldest, but also the category which consistently gets the lowest number of votes and nominations. So why do you think fanzines and sites are important?
Fanzines are one of the important ways in which fen communicate with each other. Yes, there are also fen who go to conventions, publish web sites and blogs, and the like, but fanzine fandom including efanzines are central to the hobby. They are how we find out what is happening in our wonderful hobby. Having said that, why are there so few votes? Because so few fen are connected in an extensive way to fanzine fandom. That's why the N3F Fanzine Franking Service circulates the zines of other people to all Neffers. I could complain about the extremely well-known fanzine site that refuses to list our zines, but there would be no point to doing that.
In the past twenty years, fanzines have increasingly moved online. What do you think the future of fanzines looks like?
Electronic. Some paper publishers. A few people will take advantage of modern technology to generate full-color fanzines like our Tightbeam, but electronic, especially with increasing shipping costs. I've said all the following before: More and more, fanzines will be ezines. Some paper zines will doubtless continue. There has been an enormous improvement both in the quality of cheap paper printing and in the ease with which web sites and ezines can be produced. If I were to return to 1941 with a copy of Tightbeam, most fen would find it impossible to believe – except for the tell-tale staple – that it was not a top-price prozine.
The four fan categories of the Hugos (best fanzine, fan writer, fan artist and fancast) tend to get less attention than the fiction and dramatic presentation categories. Are there any awesome fanzines, fancasts, fan writers and fan artists you’d like to recommend?
Among fan writers I would note our own Jon Swartz for historical articles and Pat Patterson for book reviews. Our current artists are Alan White, Jose Sanchez, and Angela K. Walker; see covers of Tightbeam for their work. Among fanzines other than our own I would note Bob Jennings’ Fadeaway and Nic Farey’s The Incompleat Register, which incidentally leads you to many other fanzines.
Tightbeam
Tightbeam is the monthly genzine of the National Fantasy Fan Federation. It was founded in 1960; its original title was Hyperspace Tightbeam under editors Walter Coslet, Art Hayes, and Marion Zimmer Bradley. By issue 3, the title was shortened to Tightbeam. Tightbeam has had a complicated history. At some times it was a letter zine or a fiction zine; in one period it was merged with The National Fantasy Fan. In recent years, it’s been a genzine, publishing reviews of anime, comics, fanzines, films, novels, short stories and television programs. The column Food of Famous Authors from the N3F Gourmet Bureau combines a book review, a recipe from that author, and photographs by Cedar Sanderson. Interviews with authors, editors and other pros and fen fill out each issue, which is strictly limited to 32 pages. Tightbeam always has a full page, full color front and back page.
Who are the people behind your site or zine?
The Editors are George Phillies and Jon Swartz.
Regular contributors include Anita Barrios, Justin E. A. Busch, Tom Feller, Declan Finn, Greg Hullender, Jim McCoy, Chris Nuttall, Pat Patterson, Heath Row, Cedar Sanderson, Jessi Silver, Stephanie Souders, and Tamara Wilhite.
Anime Reviews are courtesy Jessi Silver and her site www.s1e1.com. Ms. Silver writes of her site “S1E1 is primarily an outlet for views and reviews on Japanese animated media, and occasionally video games and other entertainment.” Declan Finn’s web page declanfinn.com covers his books, reviews, writing, and more. Jim McCoy’s reviews and more appear at jimbossffreviews.blogspot.com. Chris Nuttall’s essays and writings are seen at chrishanger.wordpress.com and at superversivesf.com. Pat Patterson’s reviews appear on his blog habakkuk21.blogspot.com and also on Good Reads and Amazon.com. Cedar Sanderson’s reviews and other interesting articles appear on her site www.cedarwrites.wordpress.com/ and its culinary extension. Tamara Wilhite’s other essays appear on Liberty Island (libertyislandmag.com). Samuel Lubell originally published his reviews in The WSFA Journal. Anita Barrios is a former middle school ELA and Social Studies teacher. Regular short fiction reviewers Greg Hullender and Eric Wong publish at RocketStackRank.com. Stephanie Souders gives us reviews of western comics
Why did you decide to start your site or zine?
Once again, I did not decide. I inherited a half-century of tradition. A genzine covering all branches of stfnal work was clearly the right direction in which to move. Tightbeam has risen to its current level of quality thanks to the fine work of a dozen more or less regular contributors. The former editor, who had done superb work, felt that he had done what he could, thought we could use a more vigorous letter column, and encouraged me to take over, which I did.
What format do you use for your site or zine (blog, e-mail newsletter, PDF zine, paper zine) and why did you choose this format?
MS-Publisher leads to a PDF. While The National Fantasy Fan uses two columns on each page, Tightbeam uses one. I actually edit four fanzines for the N3F, each with its own color scheme. Titles, authors , and pagination in TNFF are forest green; the same structural material in Tightbeam is dark brown. Tightbeam, like all zines other than TNFF, is only distributed electronically. The basic issues are cost and labor. We do not have anyone who is going to print, collate, and mail 250 copies of an issue to all our members; printing costs would also be astronomical. Electronic distribution lets us circular far more material at an affordable price.
The fanzine category at the Hugos is one of the oldest, but also the category which consistently gets the lowest number of votes and nominations. So why do you think fanzines and sites are important?
Fanzines and web sites are the lifeblood of the hobby. A modest number of fen live close enough to each other to have regular local club meetings, the medical situation permitting. Most fen are only able to contact each other through fanzines, web sites, and social media. Without these, we would all be isolated readers.
In the past twenty years, fanzines have increasingly moved online. What do you think the future of fanzines looks like?
Electronic. A few people will continue to do paper, especially for archival items. There has been an enormous improvement both in the quality of cheap paper printing and in the ease with which web sites and e-zines would be produced. If I were to return to 1941 with a copy of Tightbeam, most fen would find it impossible to believe – except for the tell-tale staple – that it was not a top-price prozine.
The four fan categories of the Hugos (best fanzine, fan writer, fan artist and fancast) tend to get less attention than the fiction and dramatic presentation categories. Are there any awesome fanzines, fancasts, fan writers and fan artists you’d like to recommend?
Among fan writers I would note our own Jon Swartz for historical articles and Pat Patterson for book reviews. Our current artists are Alan White, Jose Sanchez, and Angela K. Walker; see covers of Tightbeam for their work. Among fanzines other than our own I would note Bob Jennings’ Fadeaway and Nic Farey’s The Incompleat Register, which incidentally leads you to many other fanzines.
Eldritch Science
Tell us about your site or zine.
Eldritch Science is the National Fantasy Fan Federation’s fiction magazine. We publish science fiction stories and poetry. For stories, our first preference is stories longer than 8500 words, but we do accept shorter material, especially from winners of the N3F Annual Short Story Contest. We are in principle prepared to publish complete novels, though we don’t expect to do that very often. If you have gone to the trouble of writing a novel that we would accept, you would probably be happier publishing it one way or the other. In addition, we have traditionally published for N3F dues-paying members the cover and opening chapters of their published books, especially books published independently.
Eldritch Science has high editorial standards. We simply do not accept fan fiction as usually defined. You may write stories about the private detective and his faithful amanuensis, but we will not accept stories about Holmes and Watson or Kirk and Spock. We insist the tales be well-written, with an absence of grammatical errors, first or third person past tense, and so forth. We would in principle be open to well-written exotic grammatical tales, for example the recent novel Tracker, but it would have to be very good.
Who are the people behind your site or zine?
A major support for Eldritch Science has been provided by the N3F Annual Short Story Contest, thanks to the heroic support of Jefferson Swycaffer as contest judge. I must also acknowledge Bob Jennings, who is able to find excellent but long-since out-of-copyright stories that are worth reprinting.
There is another meaning for behind, though, namely the people who stand behind you to push you off the cliff. Of course, this is only been done figuratively. I refer in this case to the editors and editrixes of several of the major science fiction publishing houses, who insisted on raiding Eldritch Science in its first incarnation and stealing my writers. They cheated! They paid my writers money!
I first published Eldritch Science several decades ago as a fiction magazine. It got through a half-dozen issues, but at that point other time constraints came into play so I stopped publishing. I decided to revive it for the N3F.
Why did you decide to start your site or zine?
Eldritch Science fills a gap in the range of STFnal publications of the N3F, namely it gives an outlet for our members to publish their fiction and their poems. In fact, we publish one or a couple of poems in almost every issue. We are not quite done filling all gaps in our range of publications, but we are doing much better than we were a few years ago, when we were down to a single zine published quarterly. Indeed, the obvious large gap in our current publications is a news zine.
What format do you use for your site or zine (blog, e-mail newsletter, PDF zine, paper zine) and why did you choose this format?
Eldritch Science is published electronically as PDF files. There really isn’t a good alternative, given that an issue of Eldritch Science could in principle run one or two hundred pages. As with all of our zines, I generate a single copy in paper format for the N3F archives.
The fanzine category at the Hugos is one of the oldest, but also the category which consistently gets the lowest number of votes and nominations. So why do you think fanzines and sites are important?
How else but in the zine format can N3F members share their fiction with each other? That’s why we publish Eldritch Science. Fanzines and sites are how fen communicate with each other about fannish matters. Yes, there are social media, but social media are sites. If there were no fanzines, and no fannish sites, there would be more or less no fandom. Conventions might persist for a while, but without sites new fen would have no way to learn that there are science fiction conventions, let alone when and where they are held. Corresponding to this, if you are a good fan you should strongly consider reading and subscribing to some number of fanzines, and then sending them letters of comment.
In the past twenty years, fanzines have increasingly moved online. What do you think the future of fanzines looks like?
To repeat what I’ve said before, the future of fanzines will be increasingly electronic. People who want to read fanzines printed on paper will get to use their own printers. Undoubtedly, there will still be paper fanzines. There will also to some extent be a transition from blogs and websites to people doing videos. Let me qualify that. For several of the courses I taught in my courses as a university professor (physics, game design) I generated reasonably good videos of my lectures, edited them for various reasons, inserted figures when necessary, and put them up on YouTube. This was an enormous amount of work, so my thought is that if you want a good video it’s not yet going to be extremely easy to do.
The four fan categories of the Hugos (best fanzine, fan writer, fan artist and fancast) tend to get less attention than the fiction and dramatic presentation categories. Are there any awesome fanzines, fancasts, fan writers and fan artists you’d like to recommend?
I’ve answered this before. Of the N3F zines, I would especially note Tightbeam and The N3F Review of Books. I would also note Bob Jennings’ Fadeaway and Nic Farey’s Incompleat Register. For fan writers, I would specifically note Pat Patterson for his heroic effort to review as many books as possible. His reviews are very good. There are few books on fannish history. For the past year, I would note Jon Peterson’s The Elusive Shift on the history of role-playing games
Where can people find you?
phillies@4liberty.net books-by-george.com
Many thanks for this coverage.
ReplyDeleteFanzines are overlooked by the Fen because the zines are the exact opposite of gatekeeping. Literally anyone can put one together, especially the e-versions. So the single mom with two kids who couldn't possibly afford to go to a con can still be part of the SF fan experience. That is not something the gatekeepers are interested in.
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