SF Mistressworks

[altariel]

There's been a lot of discussion in recent months about the lack of visibility of women sf writers, particularly within the British context, and the ease with which classic sf texts by women can disappear.

Some of this discussion is linked from this post by Nicola Griffith, where she also suggests taking a pledge "to make a considerable and consistent effort to mention women's work which, consciously or unconsciously, has been suppressed". She calls this the Russ Pledge.

I'm not really interested in opening that debate here, rather simply to give some context for a great project that emerged from all the discussion: the SF Mistressworks blog. From the blog's FAQ:

This blog aims to be a resource providing reviews of science fiction books by women writers. It will demonstrate that:

a) women have been writing science fiction since the genre’s beginnings,

b) many of their books should qualify as classics, and

c) many of their books are, in fact, better than “classics” by their male counterparts, and have at least aged better.

The blog (run by Ian Sales), has been running since the start of June, averaging three reviews a week (switching soon to two), and already has built up a sizeable selection of reviews of books by more than 40 authors.

But it could really do with wider participation. If you think you'd like to review something (min. 500 words), do take a look at the site, and the FAQ, and consider contributing.

Comments

[altariel.livejournal.com]

:-D Yes, sf books written by women, reviews by all willing and interested parties!

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

Having now read a couple of reviews of novels that I've read myself it's (1) reminded me of just how long a 500 word review is and (2) shown me that the reviews are far better and more penetrative than anything that I would be likely to produce. Combining that with the fact that my memory is now so bad that I could only produce a worthwhile review of a book within a week or two of having read it, I'm afraid that the chance of my writing any reviews is pretty slim.

Incidentally a couple of my all-time favourite SF short stories are by female writers (and I can still remember them pretty well many years after reading them), but the mention of "books" rather than "stories" in points b and c in the FAQ suggests that only reviews of novels - or conceivably short story anthologies by a single writer - are wanted. Also a 500 word review would be rather disproportionate for a short story.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Yes, 500 words is quite a lot. Hope you enjoy reading there, at any rate!