After all the discussion recently about review coverage of women writing science fiction and fantasy and the female bloggers writing about these genres, I decided to dedicate the month of April to the women of science fiction and fantasy. Though I’m interested in the discussion overall, instead of talking about it more I’m choosing to make my contribution to addressing the issue by highlighting the women who are writing and reading SF&F.  Throughout the month I’ll have authors, book bloggers, and other commentators making guest posts.  While some of my guests will be discussing the subject itself, it’s not required to participate; the goal is just to get some interesting people, thoughts, and books all in one place.

This particular subject is one I’ve felt pretty strongly about for a while now. A few years ago, I noticed that most of the fantasy and science fiction books being talked about on many blogs and forums were written by men and started questioning whether or not there was a significant number of women writing these genres. Since then, I’ve of course found that there are many female authors of fantasy and science fiction books and it’s become very important to me to make sure their work is recognized and discussed. Usually I just do this quietly by reading and reviewing a lot of books written by women, but after the topic came up again I decided I wanted to do more to showcase the many women who are writing and reviewing all kinds of different types of fantasy and science fiction. So I started asking around to see if there was any interest in being a part of this and have spent the past 2 or 3 weeks gathering volunteers and posts.  (Yes, this is why my other posting has slowed down this month – but it will all be worth it, I promise!)

There will be more to come later, but I wanted to let everybody know what’s coming over the course of the next month.  Next week I’ll be kicking things off and we’ll have some great posts from people including Nancy Kress, Elizabeth Bear, and Carol Berg!