Re: What SF is written and read?


"Jacey Bedford" <lookinsig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:adA0HYDJa9qEFwoQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In message <12aldi58h9u3va7@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Patricia C. Wrede
<pwrede6492@xxxxxxx> writes

"Morgan Ohlson" <morgan.ohlson@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:18vhagv12f2wh.1nj2762wqpcsd.dlg@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Perhaps a somewhat strange header... But, do people tend to read the
same
kinds of scifi that is actually written?

It's kind of hard to read SF or anything else that *hasn't* been written.
Unless you have a time machine? :)

Are you really trying to ask "Do you read the same kind of stuff that you
write?"

I think I understood the question is more... 'Of all the SF books being
written which types are most likely to be published and widely read?'

Good ones? Whatever the editors are buying when you finish it?

i.e. is there any point in writing an alternative future history if the
only things being read in any quantity are 'aliens invade earth' novels?

Which would make it yet another way of trying to get at "What should I write
if I want to write for the market?" I didn't think that was where it was
going, but I couldn't quite figure out whether it was supposed to be a
personal question (that is, "Do you read the same kind of stuff that you
write?") or whether it was trying to get at some more general question, like
"Are there certain types of fiction that are fun to write but boring to
read?" Which would still be a lot more about the writer than the market,
come to think about it.

I'm not sure that's an easy question to answer because there must be
precious little data on the number of books being written that don't get
sold, published and read, other than maybe feedback from slushpile readers
about the themes they reject.

Given what I know about slush piles, 90% of the rejects don't get read far
enough to figure out what the theme or the plot *is*, which would make
compiling statistics kind of hard.

It would be interesting to know which are the most popular themes of SF
(science fiction and fantasy) that are being read today and what the new
trends seem to be. Is that type of info available to SFWA members?

No more nor less than anyone else, I think; you're talking sales statistics,
which you could put together from Amazon and/or maybe some of the larger
newspapers, if you were so inclined. But I haven't been a member of SFWA
for years -- my renewal check got lost in the mail one year, and that was
when they were switching executive secretaries, so my re-application got
forwarded about six times and then returned, and after one abortive attempt
to make the website application work, I just gave up. But I'll probably
re-up one of these days; it's a good way to stay in touch with what's going
on in the business generally.

Patricia C. Wrede


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