Weekend Reading:

The line-up for Ellen Datlow, Kelly Link and Gavin Grant's The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror anthology has been posted over at Jeff Ford's blog, and I'm sure elsewhere.  Looks very strong!

Locus has posted a list of 2006 books (SF) by editor, which is very educational.  (The list was created for those voting in the "Editor - Long Form" category of the Hugos.)

After following Ed Champion's disdain with the New York Times Book Review, I almost feel guilty about linking there.  However, they recently reviewed some books I'm very excited about: Paul Auster's new novel, Travels in the Scriptorium, and Mayra Montero's Dancing to 'Almendra'.  Also, here is an analysis of the state of the crime novel.

Read "The Ecstasy of Influence," an essay by Jonathan Lethem in Harper's about issues of artistic influence and the appropriation of those influences in one's own work.  And then read Terri Windling's response, which is basically an affirmation of Lethem's points.  [Via Gwenda Bond]

Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine has made the stories from the 'zine on the preliminary Nebula ballot available online.  [Via SF Signal]

Dan Green at The Reading Experience writes about the marginalization of the academy, jumping off from a quote from Ron Silliman about the evolution of critical writing about poetry from the academy back "to the poets themselves."  I've had fun talking about this with my academic friends.

And in response to The Guardian's feature on writers' workspaces, which I linked to below, Matt Cheney has posted pictures of his own workspace ("Chaos comforts me. ... I'm good with piles.  I understand their logic."), which more closely resembles my own mess of a desk.