| John Joseph Adams March 8, 2008 |
About John Joseph Adams
John Joseph Adams is the assistant editor at The Magazine
of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and is the editor of the
forthcoming reprint anthology Wastelands: Stories of the
Apocalypse (Night Shade Books, January 2008).
He has written reviews for Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly,
and Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show and
is the print news correspondent for SCI FI Wire (the news service
of the SCI FI Channel). His non-fiction has also appeared in:
Amazing Stories, The Internet Review of Science Fiction,
Locus Magazine, Novel & Short Story Writers Market,
Science Fiction Weekly, Shimmer, Strange Horizons,
Subterranean Magazine, and Writer’s Digest.
He currently lives in New Jersey. Visit his site at www.
johnjosephadams.com.
John Joseph Adams is the assistant editor at The Magazine
of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and is the editor of the
forthcoming reprint anthology Wastelands: Stories of the
Apocalypse (Night Shade Books, January 2008).
He has written reviews for Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly,
and Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show and
is the print news correspondent for SCI FI Wire (the news service
of the SCI FI Channel). His non-fiction has also appeared in:
Amazing Stories, The Internet Review of Science Fiction,
Locus Magazine, Novel & Short Story Writers Market,
Science Fiction Weekly, Shimmer, Strange Horizons,
Subterranean Magazine, and Writer’s Digest.
He currently lives in New Jersey. Visit his site at www.
johnjosephadams.com.
Post Meeting Write-up
Our March Face the Fiction, with guest John Joseph Adams,
was quite enjoyable and was a fun night.
Todd started the ball rolling by making several announcements
and hogging the microphone - the power goes to his head.
Todd announced the following:
1) the June weekend at Reality's Edge for the Bill Molendyk
Charity Gaming Event. Exact dates, times, details will follow
shortly in a separate special announcement.
2) beginning in April, Drawing A Crowd moves to New Moon
Comics in Little Falls.
3) beginning in April, we will have a new pre-meeting segment,
Whispers from Beyond (7p). This wonderful suggestion came
from Kate Landis! Thanks to Kate.
4) locations for some upcoming Face the Fictions were indicated.
Todd reluctantly handed the microphone over to Steve S who
gave a wonderful introduction for our guest John Joseph
Adams and we officially began the meeting.
John Joseph Adams was an engaging, informative and very at
ease speaker. He quickly realized this group has a lot of fun with
each other and joined in.
Mr. Adams works for Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine,
edited the anthology Wastelands, edited the Pirate issue of
Shimmer and also does interviews for SciFi.com. Busy man.
The meeting opened with our guest telling us about his
beginnings - majored in English in Florida, moved to New Jersey
to look for a job in publishing, and Fantasy & SF magazine got
him. When asked about inspirations, John Joseph admits that
his path to publishing started with an interest in video games. It
was the game Fallout that started his addiction for apocalypse
stories, and another game that started his fascination with pirates.
Gotta admire a man who admits his guilty pleasures, especially
to this group!
Many questions were asked about the Wastelands anthology.
We discovered that he did a lot of reading about the genre
before deciding what he wanted in the anthology. He
differentiates between apocalypse/post-apocalypse and the
various ways these stories are handled. He prefers the "hopeful
ending" apocalypse. He discussed the concept of people not
using technology as being the ones who will be the survivors.
He even gave a shout out to the SCA (much to the delight of
Ana & Brian). Can John Joseph endear himself or what!
Thom, yet again, had to offer his belief that the Flintstones are
indeed a post-apocalyptic family. The order of the stories in the
book gave him some difficulty. He wanted a nice balance. He
didn't want too many of the darker stories together. He went
mostly by feel, and tried to separate darker stories with "lighter"
ones for balance. The number of stories/words was a random
pick. He felt 150,000 words would be easier for a first-time
editor to pitch. He also admitted that Wastelands was
exceeding sales expectations - it's selling like mad and going into
a third reprint! Pretty cool.
John Joseph also spoke about the Pirate issue of Shimmer.
He told us he wanted a broad interpretation of "pirate" for the
issue - some historical pirates, but also contemporary, techno, etc.
for a nice range. He really liked that submissions for the Pirate
issue were anonymous. This way, you choose the story for the
story.
We found out he is not a disciplined writer, as he put it, "the
Internet is distracting!" He has to have a deadline. He's a
self-professed "movie snob" and feels that no movie stands out in
the apocalyptic genre. One of his favorite movies, 12 Monkeys,
comes the closest to using good elements of the apocalypse
genre in his humble opinion. Someone brought up Doomsday.
Mr. Adam's response was funny, "yeah, I thought this might be
good until I saw the crazy biker punks - not good, not good.
What is it with the biker punks in these movies?!" He also noted
there has been a resurgence of British apocalypse stories making
the rounds.
We took a brief break, converged upon our guest pens & books
in hand, he didn't even flinch! When Todd corralled us back into
our seats, John Joseph read from Wastelands for us. He was
asked what his all time favorite book was. With no hesitation, he
said The Stars, My Destination by Alfred Bester. He described it as
a revenge story, hmm. Other good reads he's enjoyed - Beyond
Armageddon, Long Loud Silence, The Last Babylon, No Earth
Abides and A Canticle for Leibowitz.
Mr. Adams ended the meeting by telling us about his
upcoming books. Coming in August is Seeds of Change, an
original anthology collection. In September/October brings us
the tentatively titled The Living Dead (he wanted to call it No
Room in Hell but the powers that be didn't agree. He guesses
they felt it didn't scream ZOMBIE enough). Yes, this anthology is
about Zombies and we are all waiting for this one.
We cleaned up and headed over to Suburban Diner, with our
guest, to continue the fun. Cool guest that John Joseph was,
we told him he had to pay, and he still came to the diner. We
had a great time at the diner and Paul took several photos.
What didn't we talk about! You had to see us trying to talk to
each, about 20 of us ventured to the diner. I guess it's a good
thing about that many of us went home after the meeting - no
way all of us would've fit. Next month brings a very special
guest, international best-selling author Lincoln Child!! We're not
sure who's more excited, Robin, the GM at Borders or us. Please
join us next month for Lincoln Child.
The Stars, My Destination by Alfred Bester (1956; also called
Tiger! Tiger!) is a classic. It's a retelling of The Count of Monte
Cristo in an interplanetary society in which teleportation is
commonplace.
P.S.: The post-armageddon novels Adams mentioned are: Alas,
Babylon (1959) by Pat Frank; Earth Abides (1949) by George R.
Stewart; and A Canticle for Leibowitz (1960) by Walter M. Miller,
Jr.
Our March Face the Fiction, with guest John Joseph Adams,
was quite enjoyable and was a fun night.
Todd started the ball rolling by making several announcements
and hogging the microphone - the power goes to his head.
Todd announced the following:
1) the June weekend at Reality's Edge for the Bill Molendyk
Charity Gaming Event. Exact dates, times, details will follow
shortly in a separate special announcement.
2) beginning in April, Drawing A Crowd moves to New Moon
Comics in Little Falls.
3) beginning in April, we will have a new pre-meeting segment,
Whispers from Beyond (7p). This wonderful suggestion came
from Kate Landis! Thanks to Kate.
4) locations for some upcoming Face the Fictions were indicated.
Todd reluctantly handed the microphone over to Steve S who
gave a wonderful introduction for our guest John Joseph
Adams and we officially began the meeting.
John Joseph Adams was an engaging, informative and very at
ease speaker. He quickly realized this group has a lot of fun with
each other and joined in.
Mr. Adams works for Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine,
edited the anthology Wastelands, edited the Pirate issue of
Shimmer and also does interviews for SciFi.com. Busy man.
The meeting opened with our guest telling us about his
beginnings - majored in English in Florida, moved to New Jersey
to look for a job in publishing, and Fantasy & SF magazine got
him. When asked about inspirations, John Joseph admits that
his path to publishing started with an interest in video games. It
was the game Fallout that started his addiction for apocalypse
stories, and another game that started his fascination with pirates.
Gotta admire a man who admits his guilty pleasures, especially
to this group!
Many questions were asked about the Wastelands anthology.
We discovered that he did a lot of reading about the genre
before deciding what he wanted in the anthology. He
differentiates between apocalypse/post-apocalypse and the
various ways these stories are handled. He prefers the "hopeful
ending" apocalypse. He discussed the concept of people not
using technology as being the ones who will be the survivors.
He even gave a shout out to the SCA (much to the delight of
Ana & Brian). Can John Joseph endear himself or what!
Thom, yet again, had to offer his belief that the Flintstones are
indeed a post-apocalyptic family. The order of the stories in the
book gave him some difficulty. He wanted a nice balance. He
didn't want too many of the darker stories together. He went
mostly by feel, and tried to separate darker stories with "lighter"
ones for balance. The number of stories/words was a random
pick. He felt 150,000 words would be easier for a first-time
editor to pitch. He also admitted that Wastelands was
exceeding sales expectations - it's selling like mad and going into
a third reprint! Pretty cool.
John Joseph also spoke about the Pirate issue of Shimmer.
He told us he wanted a broad interpretation of "pirate" for the
issue - some historical pirates, but also contemporary, techno, etc.
for a nice range. He really liked that submissions for the Pirate
issue were anonymous. This way, you choose the story for the
story.
We found out he is not a disciplined writer, as he put it, "the
Internet is distracting!" He has to have a deadline. He's a
self-professed "movie snob" and feels that no movie stands out in
the apocalyptic genre. One of his favorite movies, 12 Monkeys,
comes the closest to using good elements of the apocalypse
genre in his humble opinion. Someone brought up Doomsday.
Mr. Adam's response was funny, "yeah, I thought this might be
good until I saw the crazy biker punks - not good, not good.
What is it with the biker punks in these movies?!" He also noted
there has been a resurgence of British apocalypse stories making
the rounds.
We took a brief break, converged upon our guest pens & books
in hand, he didn't even flinch! When Todd corralled us back into
our seats, John Joseph read from Wastelands for us. He was
asked what his all time favorite book was. With no hesitation, he
said The Stars, My Destination by Alfred Bester. He described it as
a revenge story, hmm. Other good reads he's enjoyed - Beyond
Armageddon, Long Loud Silence, The Last Babylon, No Earth
Abides and A Canticle for Leibowitz.
Mr. Adams ended the meeting by telling us about his
upcoming books. Coming in August is Seeds of Change, an
original anthology collection. In September/October brings us
the tentatively titled The Living Dead (he wanted to call it No
Room in Hell but the powers that be didn't agree. He guesses
they felt it didn't scream ZOMBIE enough). Yes, this anthology is
about Zombies and we are all waiting for this one.
We cleaned up and headed over to Suburban Diner, with our
guest, to continue the fun. Cool guest that John Joseph was,
we told him he had to pay, and he still came to the diner. We
had a great time at the diner and Paul took several photos.
What didn't we talk about! You had to see us trying to talk to
each, about 20 of us ventured to the diner. I guess it's a good
thing about that many of us went home after the meeting - no
way all of us would've fit. Next month brings a very special
guest, international best-selling author Lincoln Child!! We're not
sure who's more excited, Robin, the GM at Borders or us. Please
join us next month for Lincoln Child.
The Stars, My Destination by Alfred Bester (1956; also called
Tiger! Tiger!) is a classic. It's a retelling of The Count of Monte
Cristo in an interplanetary society in which teleportation is
commonplace.
P.S.: The post-armageddon novels Adams mentioned are: Alas,
Babylon (1959) by Pat Frank; Earth Abides (1949) by George R.
Stewart; and A Canticle for Leibowitz (1960) by Walter M. Miller,
Jr.
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