Fantasy and Science Fiction magazine recently had a giveaway promotion for bloggers. I managed to score one of 15 advance copies of the December issue. Lucky me! As everyone knows I cut my reading teeth on fantasy and science fiction books growing up and keep going back to my true love time and again. This magazine is awesome - I love and have already signed up for a one year subscription which is $34.97 for 6 big issues - Jan/Feb, March/April, June/July, Aug/Sept, Anniversary Oct/Nov and one big issue for December. The magazine started publishing bimonthly with the april/may 2009 issue. Each issue has Novelets and Shorts Stories, plus features book reviews by Charles DeLint, and other authors, a section about curiousities, films and a bit of humor.
The December 2009 is the size of a paperback novel with 258 pages full of short stories and novelets. Not a magazine to read in one sitting. I'm still not done reading all the stories, but have thoroughly enjoyed the ones I have so far. What I found interesting is the editoral by Gordon Van Gelder about a contest they had back in 1980. The magazine had a 30th anniversary contest: Win $2010 in the year 2010 and asked readers to come up with something from science fiction that they thought would be a reality by 2010. They drew a winner and managed to track down the winner who predicted hand held computers. His response is interesting and amusing.
It will take me a while to finish this particular issue, so can see the benefit of bimonthly issues. If you like science fiction and fantasy, I definitely recommend subscribing. And this is totally my unbiased, unpaid, peace, and happiness, I love science fiction opinion.
Check out their website, where you can find all the information about the magazine, the current issues, the departments and even an extensive bibliograghy. Plus they have a blog to check out. Thank you to Mr. Gordon Van Gelder, the editor and his staff for providing me with a copy. It is greatly appreciated.
I love fantasy, sci-fi not so much but how could you go wrong with such a huge magazine??? Sounds like it is totally worth the price..enjoy!
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like something I would like too -- I'll have to look for it.
ReplyDeleteIsn't F&SF awesome? I scored a review copy the last time they ran this promotion, and I loved it. I haven't subscribed, since subscriptions are quite a bit more expensive for Canadians, but now I keep an eye out for it at my bookstore.
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