Showrunner of your story, captain of your soul

"Think anybody these days would disregard George RR Martin or JK Rowling on the subject of typeface or cover design? That’s even if they could. Jonny Geller wrote for The Bookseller recently about how Susanna Clarke’s deal for the miniseries of Jonathan Strange and Mister Norrell gives her more control than the original film deal twelve years ago. That’s not a concession, not a sop to the author’s preening ego. It’s a win-win. An author like Ms Clarke, as demiurge of their story universe, sits at the heart of its sun. From there, everything is illuminated. By comparison, anybody else can only know half as much – and most of that will be wrong."

This week I began a regular column in The Bookseller. My first piece (excerpt above) is about the role of the writer as creative champion of a project - whether book, comic, videogame, TV show or movie. (Or radio play, I guess - gimme a break, you know how hard it is being a Renaissance Man these days?) Pop over and take a look. Leave a comment. Debate is good, and remember there are no right answers.

iPad news

No, not that iPad news. You'll have to hang on just a short while longer before we can bring you that. But while you're waiting to hear when the green comet is going to light up the App Store (soon, very soon) you might be interested in this report on Russ Nicholson's blog about the Fabled Lands game coming on iPad.

Fabled Lands was a series of connected swords-n-sorcery gamebooks I wrote with Jamie Thomson back in the 1990s. We don't usually cover that branch of the fantasy family tree around here. We're more into Dunsany and John Collier than Feist and Gemmell. But if you allow that the point of contact between those two extremes might be authors like Moorcock, Whitbourn, Tim Powers and Susanna Clarke then possibly there's a line of connection to be drawn.

And while I'm on the subject of fantasy, there are interesting stirrings of something fresh in the genre, in the form of a movement called the New Weird. Okay, not really all that fresh (other than in name) as you can trace it back to In Viriconium, indeed to Gormenghast, and thence back to Gothic literature. But that dark, spicy strain of fantasy is enjoying a bit of a renewal of late. I like it because it brings a little of SF's progressiveness and naturalism to a genre that is often stilted, twee, contemptibly conservative, and slavishly adherent to familiar tropes. (Although if you like all those elven council sagas don't let me put you off.) The New Weird, though, is a bit grungier and rather more likely to shake your world-view than reinforce it. If it sounds like it might be your tincture of opium, you could do worse than start with this manifesto by Paul Charles Smith.

None of which applies to Fabled Lands, I hasten to add, which is unreconstructed FRP-style adventure as it existed in the heyday of gamebooks. Coming soon to an iPad near you.

The Friends of English Magic

Possibly my favourite fantasy novel of all time (and certainly my favourite fantasy novel not written by Jack Vance) is Susanna Clarke's masterpiece Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. So it was a jolly nice surprise this week to come across the news that the movie is set for 2010. And the script is by Christopher Hampton and Julian Fellowes. I don't know how a 780-page book can be turned into a movie, but if anybody can pull it off, they can.

Strange and wondrous coincidences now abound. Remember I was telling you about my friend Mike Levy recently? Okay, well he's over in London tomorrow to meet with Ileen Maisel, whose company Amber Entertainment controls the JS&MN movie rights. And then it turns out that Tom Fickling, son of the DFC publisher and our unofficial editor (and much-appreciated moral support) on the first part of the Mirabilis story, also now works at Amber Entertainment. If those guys get involved in the movie then I'm really encouraged.

I'm still not sure that JS&MN needs to be a movie, or that something as big and complex can work as a movie (look at Watchmen) but it'll be interesting.

So, who do you like for the leads?