Featured Reference Book
Infinite Worlds: The Realms of Speculative Fiction
By Jerry Cornelius
What recent activities have been going on at Infinite Worlds that SciFi fans would totally dig?
We try to keep something happening regularly at Infinite Worlds for scifi and fantasy fans! We regularly have discussions, ongoing trivia games, the latest news and views and the occasional review. I guess the activity that might most interest fanfic fans is the 10 Facts series, where members are encouraged to contribute a snippet of information about a given subject. Over the months it's been running we've mixed up topics that are the subject of fanfic here at Pan such as Star Trek, Star Wars, Dune, and Doctor Who, with SF luminaries Jules Verne, Clarke and Asimov and subjects like cyberpunk. Unsurprisingly the fanfic-ish topics get the most takers *chuckles* but I think all of the topics have garnered some really interesting facts.
This issue of the Pan Historian is all about FanFic and there's a ton of it in SciFi. How does Infinite Worlds help support all the Pan FanFic novels?
Yes, at Pan fanfic is by no means unique to the SF genre - you can find it now even in the least obvious genres such as Western - but ironically the SF genre has the highest proportion of it. As I type this, an astonishing 13 of Pan's 23 SF novels are fanfic-based, including all the new ones created so far this year, which I guess is why you chose to feature SF in a fanfic edition - they're almost becoming synonymous at Pan! *chuckles*
Maybe I'm wrong, but I think most fanfic novels probably don't require informational support in the same way as an original novel might - by their very nature, they come with their own canon and ready-made histories and realities, at least. However fanfic writers can (and some do) come along to Infinite Worlds to chat about a broader range of SFF topics, or join in with the trivia and 10 Facts. Infinite Worlds covers many different aspects of science fiction and fantasy in literature, film, TV and other media, and also dabbles in science fact and tips on writing SFF - so I hope most people who dig science fiction might find something interesting or inspiring out of it all! *grin*.
Supporting whatever trends the novels follow is mutually helpful, especially if the support is reciprocal, but of course that's only a wee bit of any reference book's own overall raison d'être. Infinite Worlds' purpose is to provide a stand-alone place where anyone who is interested in any aspect of SF or fantasy, whether they write in a SFF novel or not, might find discussion, information and a bit of skiffy fun.
Looking ahead to the future (and isn't that what SF is all about?) - although the majority of Pan SF novels are now fanfic and it's fanfic-type topics that garner the most interest at IW, science fiction is still a diverse and limitless genre with new ideas bubbling up all the time (at least literature still is - nowdays the movie world in general seems to have fallen into the re-make black hole). When I first got involved in the genre at Pan five years ago, the focus was on original fic, and there was very little fanfic; nowdays fanfic makes up the bulk of the genre here. But in another five years - who knows what trend we'll be seeing? *laughs*. It'll still be science fiction, Jim, even if maybe not as we know it now. Whatever, I hope Infinite Worlds will still be there to see its latest evolution!
