The Coode Street Podcast

On the eve of the publication of her new adult science fiction novel, Lagoon, the wonderful Nnedi Okorafor joins our intrepid podcasts to discuss the evolution of the book, what she's been working on since we last spoke in April 2012, Nigerian literature, and much more. As always, our thanks to Nnedi and we hope you all enjoy the podcast. Other books mentioned in the podcast: Wizard of the Crow, Ngugi wa Thiong'o Lagos 2060, Ayodele Arigbabu (ed.) NB: This post was retitled from Lagoon and Nigerian Fiction to more correctly reflect the content of the podcast.="">

As always, we get everything the wrong way round. Having just returned from the glades of Florida, a land of mocktails and alligators, Gary joins Jonathan to discuss the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts, nominating for the Hugo Awards, and the career of the late Lucius Shepard (which they should have started with, as you'll discover if your patience holds out). As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast!

This week Gary is in Florida at the International Conference in the Arts where he is joined by Steven Erikson, author of the bestselling 'Malazan Empire' series of epic fantasy novels, and Ian McDonald, author of River of Gods, Dervish House, and the Planesrunner series.  The sound quality is not ideal, but the conversation is fascinating, and a rare one Jonathan gets to experience as a Coode St listener. As always, our sincere thanks to Steven Erikson and Ian McDonald for being part of the podcast. We hope you enjoy the episode. See you next week!

This week Jonathan and Gary are joined by Nebula Award winning writer Eileen Gunn to discuss her new short story collection, Questionable Practices, her upcoming article for the Smithsonion magazine on the purpose of science fiction, her novel in progress(!), and much, much more. As always, our sincere thanks to Eileen for being part of the podcast. We hope you enjoy the episode. See you next week!

Battling the fickle beast that is Skype, this week Jonathan and Gary talk to Kelley Eskridge and Nicola Griffith about the recently released Nebula ballot and what it might say about SF today, Nicola's recent novel Hild, Kelley's novel Solitaire, science fiction as a way of reading, language, politics and a lot more. In many ways this episode isn't so much a conversation, as what feels like the beginning of a long and interesting one to be continued at conventions and elsewhere in the future. As always, our sincere thanks to Kelley and Nicola for making time to appear on the podcast and for being such interesting and engaging guests.  As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast!

Faced with another relentless summer's day in Perth and icy Chicago winter evening, Jonathan and Gary turn to long-time friends of the podcast James Bradley, Garth Nix, and Sean Williams, luxuriating in a cool Sydney summer afternoon, to discuss Australian fiction, young adult fiction, and the works of Neville Shute in a wide-ranging conversation that is only occasionally interrupted by the vagaries of Skype. As always, our thinks to James, Garth and Sean, and we hope you enjoy the podcast!

With a new season of the Coode Street Podcast well under way, Gary and Jonathan connected up between the icy wilds of Chicago and the sunny streets of Melbourne, to discuss "importance" in science fiction. What does "important" mean anyway, what works are "important" and so on.   As always, we hope you enjoy the discussion!

As snow and ice freeze the North American heartlands, long-time friend of the podcast Kij Johnson agreed to travel across a frozen Kansas City to find a place where she could Skype in to the Waldorf Room to join Gary and Jonathan in discussion.  This time Gary threw out a question to kick start the discussion: which science fiction writer is most likely to win the Booker Prize, and which one is most likely to top the New York Times and Amazon bestseller lists? It proved a good start to a thoughtful discussion that wandered far and wide, although we’d contend not much rambling happened this week. As always, we’d like to thank Kij for joining us, and hope you enjoy the podcast. Next week Jonathan travels to Melbourne, so who knows what will happen there!

Every February US science fiction and fantasy industry trade journal Locus  publishes an annual 'Year in Review" issue that includes overviews, summaries, reports and an eagerly awaited 'Recommended Reading List'.  With the February issue safely complete and either already in eager digital reader's inboxes or winging its way to them in print courtesy of international postal services, and with the 2013 Recommended Reading List available to read on the Locus website, editor-in-chief Liza Groen Trombi joins Gary and Jonathan on the podcast to discuss the year in review issue, the Recommended Reading List, and what it means to try to produce an annual summary of SF/F in 2014. As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast. See you next week!

It's been a long time since the last episode. In late November Jonathan and Gary sat down to record a final episode before commencing a lengthy hiatus.  After nearly two months, though, normal service returns! This week Jonathan and Gary announce the winner and shortlist for the 2014 Crawford Award, begin thinking about Loncon3 (the 2014 World SF Convention), and discuss the books they're looking forward to in 2014.  Lists will be added, but these are the books Jonathan's Looking Forward to in 2014:Wolves, Simon Ings (Gollancz, January) Annihilation, Jeff VanderMeer (FSG, February) The Best of Ian McDonald, Ian McDonald (PS Publishing, April) The Cuckoo Song, Frances Hardinge (Macmillan, May) The Memory Garden, M. Rickert (Sourcebooks, May) Beautiful Blood, Lucius Shepard (Subterranean, June) Academic Exercises, K.J. Parker (Subterranean, August) War Dogs, Greg Bear (Gollancz, August) The Water Knife, Paolo Bacigalupi (Little Brown, September) Echopraxia, Peter Watts (Tor Books, September) with a bonus title

Neil Gaiman is always wonderful to sit down and talk to about how great stories are created, and is always ready to discuss how the great writers of the past have influenced him and his work.  During an extra special episode of the Coode Street Podcast, Neil joins Gary and Jonathan in a rare quiet moment at the Brighton World Fantasy Convention, to discuss the work of the late great R.A. Lafferty.  Lafferty is one of fiction's great originals, a teller of tall and extraordinary tales that puzzle and delight. The timing for this conversation was perfect, with the first volume of the Collected Stories of R.A. Lafferty just about to appear from Centipede Press. We would like to thank Neil for making time in what was an incredibly busy schedule for this conversation, and thank you all for supporting the podcast during 2013. This is the final Coode Street episode for 2013. We'll be back in late January with more endless rambling. Till then, safe and happy holidays to you all!!

This October the Coode Street commentary team travelled to Brighton, England for the 2013 World Fantasy Convention. In amongst too much drinking and late night conversation, they managed to record two engaging conversations for your enjoyment. The first of these was with long-time Coode Street favourite, Paul McAuley.  Over the period of about an hour, while hotel airconditioning worked hard to overcompensate for a mild UK autumn, hard science fiction, the state of science and much, more was discussed. Our sincere thanks to Paul for his time. As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast. Next week: Neil Gaiman discusses R.A. Lafferty.

After an unexpected break the Coode Street Podcast returns to discuss the use of terminology in genre, Linda Nagata’s recent io9 article on hard SF, and other things large and small.  Assuming nothing unexpected happens, this episode marks the final official recording session for the podcast before our long holiday hiatus. New episodes recorded in Brighton will appear December 7 (169) and December 14 (170).  We will be running a series of classic repeats that have been chosen by long-time listener Cat Sparks to hopefully entertain you during the hiatus and will return in late January energised and ready for an exciting year.  In the meantime we wish you, your family, your friends and everyone else a safe and happy holiday season and a wonderful 2014!

This week our two commentators, emerging from the pall of jetlag and the reality of impending deadlines, turn their attentions to what is intrinsic to science fiction as a genre, what SF & fantasy has in common with historical fiction, the terrible burden of having to read lots of books, and Nicola Griffith's acclaimed sixth novel Hild.  There is also, towards the end of the episode, a brief discussion of issues related to this year's World Fantasy Convention, which are outlined in greater depth and with more intelligence over at Cheryl Morgan's blog. We also want to remind listeners that we will be going on hiatus for four weeks, starting 14 December 2013 and returning 18 January 2014. As always, we hope you enjoy the episode.

A re-upload of the most recent episode. The previous version omitted 2-3 mins from the end of the file. Apologies for any inconvenience.

Warning: This Podcast Contains Incoherent Rambling.  Freshly returned from the 2013 World Fantasy Convention in Brighton, England, our intrepid podcasters peer through a veil of jetlag to discuss the World Fantasy Awards and the happenings of what was a wholly memorable trip. As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast.

While our intrepid podcasters brave the wilds of London, a new episode for you (hopefully)! With no specific topic in mind, and having sent a greeting to Sleepless in Wagga, Gary and Jonathan answer questions: from Guy in Toronto about single malt whisky; from Fred in New Jersey on: Clifford Simak. Cordwainer Smith. Fritz Leiber. Are they forgotten?; Agents of SHIELD; and making a pitch for a Greg Egan retrospective short story collection; and from Michael about how crowd-funding has changed the anthology market. All in all, thanks to the friends of the podcast, it made for an interesting and entertaining episode. We hope you enjoy it. We'll be back soon!

In which the Coode Street team philosophize about the nature of science fiction, what the future means, whether it is inevitable or knowable, and what that means for science fiction.  Other matters are also discussed. As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast.

In the run up to the World Fantasy Convention in Brighton our podcasting heroes are keeping it pretty much one-on-one, with no guest again this week.  In amongst other rambling, Gary and Jonathan they talk about some overlooked books of 2013 (Gary had a list), what "overlooked" means, and how a book gets to be noticed in the first place.  As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast!

This week, just following the publication of her major short story collection How the World Became Quiet, we are joined by Nebula Award and SFWA Vice President Rachel Swirsky to discuss writing short stories, the business of science fiction and much more. As always, we would like to thank Rachel for joining us, and hope you enjoy the podcast!