Blog
Ahoy, Critterfolk!
New entry Dec 07
Critter Notices
Critters no longer accepting European Union members :(
It's with a heavy heart that I have to announce Critters can no longer accept people in the European Union as members. This is a result of the "GDPR" privacy laws going into effect. I'm a big fan of privacy, and applaud the general idea behind the GDPR, but the way it's implemented forces me to close the door to EU writers. [read more why...]Books from Critters!
Check out Books by Critters for books by your fellow Critterfolk, as well as my list of recommended books for writers.
How to Write SF
The Craft of Writing Science Fiction that Sells by Ben Bova, best-selling author and six-time Hugo Award winner for Best Editor. (This is one of the books your ol' Critter Captain learned from himself, and I highly recommend it.)
(Also via Amazon)
New Book from a Critter Member
**NOW IN
PRINT EDITION
TOO!** Awesome new book,
HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR SPECULATIVE FICTION OPENINGS,
from a Critter member whose unearthed a shard of The Secret
to becoming a pro writer. Really good piece of work.
"...if you're at all concerned about story openings, you'd be nuts not to read what Qualkinbush has to say." —Wil McCarthy, author of BLOOM and THE COLLAPSIUM
P&E Has a New Caretaker!
I'm very happy to announce that P&E has been handed off to a new caretaker! Check out the site for news and such. Hurrah!
Interviewed!
I'm being interviewed live on public radio for Critters 20th birthday. For those who want to listen, it's on the 10am (Mountain time) show on Thursday, 11/19/16, on Colorado Public Radio - www.cpr.org has streaming on the site or it's 90.1 FM in the Denver area. [Interview is done, you can listen on the site]
Free Web Sites
Free web sites for authors (and others) are available at www.nyx.net.
ReAnimus Acquires Advent!
ReAnimus Press is pleased to announce the acquisition of the legendary Advent Publishers! Advent is now a subsidiary of ReAnimus Press, and we will continue to publish Advent's titles under the Advent name. Advent was founded in 1956 by Earl Kemp and others, and has published the likes of James Blish, Hal Clement, Robert Heinlein, Damon Knight, E.E. "Doc" Smith, and many others. Advent's high quality titles have won and been finalists for several Hugo Awards, such as The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy and Heinlein's Children. Watch this space for ebook and print editions of all of Advent's current titles!
Network speeding up
I'm switching the connection over to a new, shiny 10X faster network because of all the load. There might be bits of downtime as your boxes learn new addresses and things. Should be brief. Let me know of any prolonged outages you see.
Preditors & Editors Changeover
With the very sad passing of Dave Kuzminski, who ran P&E, I've taken over the P&E duties. Lots of what I hope are improvements; check it out at pred-ed.com.
Critters Server is Dying has been Replaced
See important details here in my blog. Let me know if you find anything that isn't working right. (Manuscripts are now available for this week, FYI.)
Book Recommendation
THE SIGIL TRILOGY:
The universe is dying from within...
"Great stuff... Really enjoyed it." — SFWA Grandmaster Michael Moorcock
Announcing ReAnimus Press
If you need help making ebooks from manuscripts or print copies—or finding great stuff to read—look no further! An ebook publisher started by your very own Critter Captain. (And with a 12% Affiliate program.) [More]
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FEATURED BOOK
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Statistical Data
Statistics for how different groups of books scored. The upper left of each block is the name of the group (e.g. "Classic SF/F"). The number of books in that category is below, e.g. "N=24". The statistics are from the "desc" program (part of the |STAT package.)
SF/F: ============================================================
N=50
Mean Median Midpoint Geometric Harmonic
22.502 19.750 40.335 18.159 14.151
SD Quart Dev Range SE mean
15.097 8.485 73.330 2.135
Minimum Quartile 1 Quartile 2 Quartile 3 Maximum
3.670 12.000 19.750 28.970 77.000
classic SF/F: ============================================================
N=24
Mean Median Midpoint Geometric Harmonic
29.909 27.000 44.000 26.653 23.903
SD Quart Dev Range SE mean
15.611 7.650 66.000 3.187
Minimum Quartile 1 Quartile 2 Quartile 3 Maximum
11.000 19.350 27.000 34.650 77.000
non-classic SF/F: ============================================================
N=26
Mean Median Midpoint Geometric Harmonic
15.665 14.670 30.250 12.742 10.280
SD Quart Dev Range SE mean
11.012 5.835 53.160 2.160
Minimum Quartile 1 Quartile 2 Quartile 3 Maximum
3.670 8.500 14.670 20.170 56.830
non-SF/F: ============================================================
N=18
Mean Median Midpoint Geometric Harmonic
54.884 60.750 54.085 51.024 46.544
SD Quart Dev Range SE mean
19.269 15.585 67.830 4.542
Minimum Quartile 1 Quartile 2 Quartile 3 Maximum
20.170 34.830 60.750 66.000 88.000
Additional Material
- Common Objections — Gain more insight by reading how others objected
- Quiz and More Quotes — Illustrating relationships or the lack thereof in SF and non-SF, and some for you to guess
- Book Scores — The raw data for the books scored
- Add Your Own Scores — Compute your own and share them, takes just a minute or two
- Statistical Summary — how the different categories scored
- Share Your Thoughts
