SFFWorld News – 2/23/10

SFFWorld News – 2/23/10

1) Vin Diesel will return as night-vision SF tough guy Riddick in the third movie of the Chronicles of Riddick franchise for Universal Pictures. The film will be written and directed by David Twohy, who wrote and directed the first two films, Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. The franchise also spawned a hit videogame series and animated video The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury. The new film will be produced through One Race Films, Diesel’s production company, and Radar Films.

2) Author J.K. Rowling has been named with her publisher in yet another British law suit for copyright infringement by the estate of the late author Adrian Jacobs, based in Australia. The suit claims the fourth Harry Potter novel, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, published in 2000 from Bloomsbury Publishing PLC, copied substantial parts of Jacobs’ 1987 novel The Adventures of Willy the Wizard – No. 1 Livid Land, specifically concerning the idea of a wizarding contest. Bloomsbury has stated that the author’s estate first contacted them in 2004 but was unable to identify any text in the Harry Potter books that was copied from Willy the Wizard, a series of which Rowling claims to have had no knowledge previous to the lawsuit. Previous infringement lawsuits of the Harry Potter books have been dismissed.

3) Dean Koontz’ re-imagining of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the novel Prodigal Son, written with Kevin J. Anderson, will be adapted into a film. The novel focuses on two modern-day New Orleans detective on the trail of a serial killer known as The Surgeon. This attracts the interest of the monster Deucalion, who suspects the killings are the handiwork of his creator, and who fights to stop the madness before an army of engineered undead give New Orleans a new disaster. Producers Ralph Winter, Terry Botwick and 1019 Entertainment are developing the project.

4) The CW network in the States will launch a new t.v. series, Betwixt, based on the novel by Tara Bray Smith. The novel concerns three Oregon teenagers who attend a secret rave party in the woods that instead releases an arcane ritual that reveals their true identities as changelings and drops them in the middle of an other-worldly conflict.

5) The SyFy Channel in the States has announced a release date, April 18, for its new Riverworld miniseries, based on the SF books by Philip Jose Farmer. The mini-series, which might become a regular show, was adapted for this version by Robert Hewitt Wolfe, and stars Tahmoh Penikett and Laura Vandervoort among others.

6) The 2009 Nebula nominees have been announced. They are:

Short Story:

Hooves and the Hovel of Abdel Jameela, Saladin Ahmed
I Remember the Future, Michael A. Burstein
Non-Zero Probabilities, N. K. Jemisin
Spar, Kij Johnson
Going Deep, James Patrick Kelly
Bridesicle, Will McIntosh

Novelette:

The Gambler, Paolo Bacigalupi
Vinegar Peace, or the Wrong-Way Used-Adult
   Orphanage, Michael Bishop
I Needs Must Part, The Policeman Said, Richard Bowes
Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask,
   Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast, Eugie Foster
Divining Light, Ted Kosmatka
A Memory of Wind, Rachel Swirsky

Novella:

The Women of Nell Gwynne’s, Kage Baker
Arkfall, Carolyn Ives Gilman
Act One, Nancy Kress
Shambling Towards Hiroshima, James Morrow
Sublimation Angels, Jason Sanford
The God Engines, John Scalzi

Novel:

The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi
The Love We Share Without Knowing, Christopher Barzak
Flesh and Fire, Laura Anne Gilman
The City & The City, China Miéville
Boneshaker, Cherie Priest
Finch, Jeff VanderMeer

Bradbury Award: Best Dramatic Production:

Star Trek, JJ Abrams
District 9, Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
Avatar, James Cameron
Moon, Duncan Jones and Nathan Parker
Up, Bob Peterson and Pete Docter
Coraline, Henry Selick

Andre Norton Award:

Hotel Under the Sand, Kage Baker
Ice, Sarah Beth Durst
Ash, by Malinda Lo
Eyes Like Stars, Lisa Mantchev
Zoe’s Tale, John Scalzi
When You Reach Me, by Rebecca Stead
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In A
   Ship Of Her Own Making, Catherynne M.
   Valente
Leviathan, Scott Westerfeld

The winners will be announced at the Nebula Awards Banquet, held at the Hilton Cocoa Beach Oceanfront, the weekend of May 14-16 at Cape Canaveral, Florida.

7) The 2009 Bram Stoker Award nominees have been announced by the Horror Writers Association. They are:

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN A NOVEL

• Audrey's Door by Sarah Langan (Harper)
• Patient Zero by Jonathan Maberry (St. Martin's Griffin)
• Quarantined by Joe McKinney (Lachesis Publishing)
• Cursed by Jeremy Shipp (Raw Dog Screaming Press)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN A FIRST NOVEL

• Breathers by S. G. Browne (Broadway Books)
• Solomon's Grave by Daniel G. Keohane (Dragon Moon Press)
• Damnable by Hank Schwaeble (Jove)
• The Little Sleep by Paul Tremblay (Henry Holt)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN LONG FICTION

• "Dreaming Robot Monster" by Mort Castle (Mighty Unclean)
• The Hunger of Empty Vessels by Scott Edelman (Bad Moon Books)
• The Lucid Dreaming by Lisa Morton (Bad Moon Books)
• Doc Good's Traveling Show by Gene O'Neill (Bad Moon Books)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN SHORT FICTION

• "Keeping Watch" by Nate Kenyon (Monstrous: 20 Tales of Giant Creature Terror)
• "The Crossing of Aldo Ray" by Weston Ochse (The Dead That Walk)
• "In the Porches of My Ears" by Norman Prentiss (Postscripts #18)
• "The Night Nurse" by Harry Shannon (Horror Drive-in)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN FICTION COLLECTION

• Martyrs and Monsters by Robert Dunbar (DarkHart Press)
• Got to Kill Them All and Other Stories by Dennis Etchison (Cemetery Dance)
• A Taste of Tenderloin by Gene O'Neill (Apex Book Company)
• In the Closet, Under the Bed by Lee Thomas (Dark Scribe Press)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN ANTHOLOGY (EDITING)

• He is Legend: An Anthology Celebrating Richard Matheson edited by Christopher Conlon (Gauntlet Press)
• Lovecraft Unbound edited by Ellen Datlow (Dark Horse Books)
• Poe edited by Ellen Datlow (Solaris)
• Midnight Walk edited by Lisa Morton (Darkhouse Publishing)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN NONFICTION

• Writers Workshop of Horror by Michael Knost (Woodland Press)
• Cinema Knife Fight by L. L. Soares and Michael Arruda (Fearzone)
• The Stephen King Illustrated Companion by Bev Vincent (Fall River Press)
• Stephen King: The Non-fiction by Rocky Wood and Justin Brook (Cemetery Dance)

SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN POETRY COLLECTION

• Double Visions by Bruce Boston (Dark Regions)
• North Left of Earth by Bruce Boston (Sam's Dot)
• Barfodder by Rain Graves (Cemetery Dance)
• Chimeric Machines by Lucy A. Snyder (Creative Guy Publishing)

8) Shane Black (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,) will be taking on pulp superhero Doc Savage for film, directing and co-writing the screenplay with Anthony Bagarozzi and Chuck Mondry. Doc Savage, an inventor, explorer and crimefighter known as The Man of Bronze, was featured in Doc Savage Magazine from 1933 to 1949.

9) Both show creator Eric Kripke and stars Jensen Ackles and Jared Padelecki toyed with bringing the t.v. fantasy series Supernatural, on the CW network in the States, to a close at the end of its fifth season, but the actors’ contracts ran six seasons and the response to the fifth season’s apocalypse plotline has been so strong that CW has given an early pick-up nod for season six. Kripke and co-show-runner Robert Singer will move to executive producer duties while Sera Gamble, a long time producer and writer with the show, will become the chief show runner. The sixth season about the struggles of the Winchester brothers in a world of ghosts and demons will contain a new storyline, rather than continue the apocalypse plot, which will come to a finale in May.