xposted to alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer,alt.tv.angel

On Tue, 5 Feb 2008 13:11:20 -0800 (PST), Gary Thompson wrote:

> Posted about this in rec.arts.sf.written, and didn't hink to crosspost
> it here. Fantasy author Steven Brust (author of the Vlad Taltos
> series among other things) has finished a fanfic set in the Firefly
> universe. Check it out here:
>
> http://dreamcafe.com/firefly.html

For those who don't know about this Brust wrote this off his own back
intending to sell it as a tie in novel because he loved the show.
Obviously it couldn't be sold.

Brust is the author of one of the best modern fantasy series, the vlad
taltos series. Its a bit different to most fantasy series in that it
isn't a fantasy epic but more a series of detective or crime type novels
set in a fantasy world. The main character Vlad Taltos starts off the
series as an organised crime assassin/don. There are overtones of a
larger story occurring across the whole series (which is incomplete) but
the tone certainly isn't epic. The tone of the series is what Brust fans
like to call first person smartass, which obviously implies that Firefly
is a perfect vehicle for his voice.

He's written a second series set in the same world, only thousands of
years earlier, which is a pastiche of the Three Musketeers books. Its the
series that begins with The Phoenix Guards.

--
"Indiscriminate niceness is overrated" - House

Ian Galbraith wrote:
> xposted to alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer,alt.tv.angel
>
> On Tue, 5 Feb 2008 13:11:20 -0800 (PST), Gary Thompson wrote:
>
>> Posted about this in rec.arts.sf.written, and didn't hink to crosspost
>> it here. Fantasy author Steven Brust (author of the Vlad Taltos
>> series among other things) has finished a fanfic set in the Firefly
>> universe. Check it out here:
>>
>> http://dreamcafe.com/firefly.html
>
> For those who don't know about this Brust wrote this off his own back
> intending to sell it as a tie in novel because he loved the show.
> Obviously it couldn't be sold.

IMO (and experience,) writing an entire tie-in novel on spec is an
excellent example of a waste of time unless you *do* plan on posting it
as fanfic. I did the same thing (well, except for the posting part)
back in the mid 70s, with a comic series which shall remain nameless,
and couldn't even get the thing looked at. Instead, the publishers went
with an established sci-fi author (which I can understand) who wrote
*such* a piece of crap that it almost ruined the original for me. What
irks me is that I've read some of that author's other works and - while
he's not a favorite of mine - they were okay. I'm reasonably sure he
could have done a better job if not for what appears to have been a
"grab the money and run" attitude coupled with a complete lack of
respect for the source material, which, by and large, was better written
than those adaptations.

--
Rowan Hawthorn

"Occasionally, I'm callous and strange." - Willow Rosenberg, "Buffy the
Vampire Slayer"

Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
> On Feb 5, 6:02 pm, Rowan Hawthorn <rowan_hawth...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> Ian Galbraith wrote:
>>> xposted to alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer,alt.tv.angel
>>> On Tue, 5 Feb 2008 13:11:20 -0800 (PST), Gary Thompson wrote:
>>>> Posted about this in rec.arts.sf.written, and didn't hink to crosspost
>>>> it here. Fantasy author Steven Brust (author of the Vlad Taltos
>>>> series among other things) has finished a fanfic set in the Firefly
>>>> universe. Check it out here:
>>>> http://dreamcafe.com/firefly.html
>>> For those who don't know about this Brust wrote this off his own back
>>> intending to sell it as a tie in novel because he loved the show.
>>> Obviously it couldn't be sold.
>> IMO (and experience,) writing an entire tie-in novel on spec is an
>> excellent example of a waste of time unless you *do* plan on posting it
>> as fanfic. I did the same thing (well, except for the posting part)
>> back in the mid 70s, with a comic series which shall remain nameless,
>> and couldn't even get the thing looked at. Instead, the publishers went
>> with an established sci-fi author (which I can understand) who wrote
>> *such* a piece of crap that it almost ruined the original for me. What
>> irks me is that I've read some of that author's other works and - while
>> he's not a favorite of mine - they were okay. I'm reasonably sure he
>> could have done a better job if not for what appears to have been a
>> "grab the money and run" attitude coupled with a complete lack of
>> respect for the source material, which, by and large, was better written
>> than those adaptations.
>
> There's no inherent reason media tie-ins can't be as good as wholly
> "original" work,

Of course not. The "Modesty Blaise" series is proof of that. Of
course, they're written by the original comic author, but still...

> but perhaps because of the cash-in to quality ratio,
> it's assumed that they're a lower level of literature than even the
> maligned "genre" novel. I know about the stigma attached to playing
> in someone else's universe, because I feel it myself. Although I
> should know better, neither "official" nor "unofficial" fanfic feels
> like "real" writing. Again, the higher crap:quality ratio (which is
> itself secondary to the larger population of stuff that can get
> published/widely distributed). I almost got over my prejudices when I
> was reading Timothy Zahn's _Star Wars_ tie-ins, but then I "moved on"
> to his non-SW work and am anxious to let people know that, like Brust,
> he's a good "real" author.
>
> -"A" "O" "Q"

I've read a few that were quite well done; some of James Blish's "Star
Trek" adaptations, for instance. Pity that all of those authors don't
make the same effort.

--
Rowan Hawthorn

"Occasionally, I'm callous and strange." - Willow Rosenberg, "Buffy the
Vampire Slayer"