Goodbye, Barbara

Having moaned a bit about the slightly reductive definitions of science fiction at the Putting the Science into Fiction (#scificmanc) conference last week, I remembered that I have the original drawing of this cartoon on my wall. It's by Tom Gauld, and was published in the Guardian Review a couple of years ago. I keep meaning to use it as a conversation starter in my lectures.

One of the things that really annoys me is literary fiction authors assuming that genre fiction is easy, and demonstrating their ignorance. But I won't name names today. Instead, I'll just say that David Peace is almost the only one who can do it. He transforms any genre he touches. Read his books.