I'm appearing at the First Fictions event this weekend, at the University of Sussex -- Sunday 22nd Jan. It would be great to see you, if you're there, or thereabouts.

At 4pm I'll be interviewing the superb Elleke Boehmer, both a brilliant literary critic and postcolonial theorist, and an exceptional novelist.

Then, two hours later at 6pm, I'm talking about my most beloved subject, science fiction, sharing the stage with crime writer Andrew Pepper.

After three previous volumes (two of which contained stories by me) Solaris is rising again, thanks to the metaphorical yeast of Ian Whates, that excellent individual. My contribution this time is a story called 'Shall I Tell You The Trouble With Time Travel?' In this story, I tell you, the reader, the trouble with time travel.

[14 Nov: this just in from amazon.com, whose reader reviews are, as we all know, infallible: 'OVERVIEW/ANALYSIS: I first read the Peter Hamilton story ... and the Adam Roberts story which features another crazy explanation of a sf trope, this time the paradoxes of time travel and has the expected superb prose and characters, while not much later I also read the Alastair Reynolds story which contained the author's trademark serious cosmological stuff interspersed with human interest that has made him the leading hard sf voice of our time ... In addition to the trio above, the stories by Eric Brown/Keith Brooke and Jaine Fenn respectively were also excellent ... great prose and characters added these two stories to the A++ top tier ones of the anthology. Overall I would say that Adam Roberts Shall I Tell You the Problem with Time Travel? is my favorite story of the anthology, but all of these five are stories that reminded me again why I love science fiction in the short form too!']

[17 Nov: A signing! A signing in Forbidden Planet, on Saturday 26th November at 1pm!]

[22nd Nov: My last update to this post ... I just saw the SFX review of this volume, sadly not online, which praised the whole thing, and praised my story in particular ('sublimely good ... worth the price of admission alone'). Which is nice.]

Event: Is Science Fiction the only true relevant literary genre today?
7 November 2011
New Scientist and the Waterstones Gower Street Lecture Series present, Is Science Fiction the only truly relevant literary genre today?

Simon Ings, author of Dead Water, will be chairing this panel discussion on the importance and relevance of science fiction as a literary genre in today's modern world.

The panel will include British sci-fi author and three-time nominee of the Arthur C. Clarke Award, Adam Roberts, the director of the Arthur C. Clarke Award, Tom Hunter and John Sutherland, Emeritus Professor of Modern English Literature at UCL and author of the new book Lives of the Novelists.

Tickets are £6 for New Scientist readers and £5 for students. To purchase your tickets visit: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/2361210444/eorg.

Is Science Fiction the only truly relevant literary genre today?
Chaired by Simon Ings
Date: Monday 7th November 2011, 7pm
Location: UCL, London, WC1E 7JG

I'm appearing at the Cheltenham Literary Festival tomorrow (Wednesday) ayt 17:00, in company of the eloquently intelligent Mark Brake. Come along: it would be great to see you! (The event is sponsored by the Wellcome Trust, an excellent organisation, and deserving of our support).

Now, now, you may be saying: that's all very well -- but what will you and Mr Brake be talking about? That's a good question. Come along, I urge you, and find out!

"A truly great European writer, Stanisław Lem (1921-2006) transcends both Polish literature and his chosen genre, science fiction. Best known for his twice-filmed novel Solaris, he was a virtuoso storyteller who packed his writing with philosophy, comedy, and allegory. This evening’s rich celebration features contributions by writers John Gray, Toby Litt, Wojciech Orliński and Adam Roberts, eminent translator Antonia Lloyd-Jones and film makers Ari Folman (currently filming Lem’s The Futurological Congress as follow up to Waltz with Bashir) and The Brothers Quay. Chaired by journalist and critic Rosie Goldsmith."

Out of this world?: Why Science Fiction speaks to us all

Friday 20 May 18.30 -20.00

The British Library Conference Centre

Throughout history, people have asked ‘what if?’. We have always allowed our imaginations to create other worlds as expressions of our wildest dreams, hopes and fears, and so better to understand our own. ‘Science Fiction’ expresses this human need in potent ways, but so does the work of Swift, Lewis Carroll and George Orwell. The story and present state of our speculations are explored by Erik Davis, China Miéville, Adam Roberts and Tricia Sullivan. Chaired by Sam Leith.

Tickets £7.50 / £5 available at http://boxoffice.bl.uk, by calling 01937 546546 (9am-5pm Mon-Fri) or in person at The British Library

Do come! There's lots of other sfnal stuff stuff going on at the BL over the summer, too. And The British Library exhibition ‘Out of this World: Science Fiction but not as you know it’ opens on Friday 20 May as well. Come! I insist!

No, wait: you're looking in the wrong bottom right hand corner ... [Link]

The SFX Summer of SF Reading
Stephen Hunt Adam Roberts, Dan Abnett Graham McNeill, China Mieville Michael Cobley

WATERSTONE'S PICCADILLY
Monday, 10 May 2010, 5:30PM
To celebrate the launch of The SFX Summer of SF Reading we are delighted to host authors from the across the [sic] SF spectrum. Access to the queue is on a first come first served basis, please arrive early to avoid disappointment. The duration of signing is discretionary. To win tickets to an exclusive post signing event please goto http://www.futurecomps.co.uk/sfxevening.

Further details: 020 7851 2400

Forbidden Planet and Gollancz publishing are delighted to bring you one of our now-celebrated, open-format, multi-author signings! At 6pm on Thursday May 13th, Forbidden Planet 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London will be playing host to: -

• Stephen Deas
• M D Lachlan
• John Meaney
• Sarah Pinborough
• Adam Roberts

This is a free-form and open signing, bringing the authors out from behind their tables and giving their readers a chance to meet them and talk to them about their work. An array of fantastic books will be on hand to be picked up and signed – including works by every one of the writers present.

Come!

There have been some other reviews. I was particularly pleased with this David Hebblethwaite review:

I can safely say that New Model Army is like no other book I’ve ever read. I know this because I have no name for the feeling I was left with after I’d finished it. That’s a recommendation, by the way.

That's exactly what I'm trying to do when I write fiction!

London Evening Standard. The best books of the year: our reviewers name the titles that have meant the most to them over the past 12 months.

FRANCIS SPUFFORD I spent this year finishing a book set in Russia, so I was all ready to delight in the charcoal-black satire of Adam Roberts's Soviet UFO novel Yellow Blue Tibia (Gollancz, £12.95), even before it was tipped as a worthier winner of the Booker than anything on the actual shortlist.

May I not sound too Boraty as I say, in reply: 'nice!'. In other news, and also floated first on Twitter, this:

FORBIDDEN PLANET and Gollancz Publishing are delighted to be hosting an open-format, multi-author signing. Five authors, one event – at 6pm on Thursday November 26th, Forbidden Planet 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London will be playing host to: -

• David Devereux
• Paul McAuley
• Justina Robson
• Adam Roberts
• Chris Wooding

To promote the release of Justina’s new book CHASING THE DRAGON, Forbidden Planet and Gollancz Publishing have gathered a host of science fiction and fantasy talent into one event – an event to bring writers and fans together and to promote interest in new and different kinds of fiction.

This is a free-form and open signing, bringing the authors out from behind their tables and giving their readers a chance to meet them and talk to them about their work. An array of fantastic books will be on hand to be picked up and signed – including works by every one of the writers present.

And, as usual with these events, there are likely to be more than a few surprise guests...

...and a subsequent visit to the pub!

Be nice to see you there. Whomsoever 'you' may be.

This has nothing to do with providing myself with work-avoidance fodder, although I have just spent a minute coming up with the following faux-etymology. Twitter. v & n From Latin, tuito 'a taking care of, keeping, guarding, preserving, defense, protection, preservation.'

It was a thoroughly stimulating experience, for me at any rate. The main theme of my thread of the teaching was the relative merits of broadly structuralist/formalis approaches to SFF (such as are, at the moment, probably dominant in the critical culture associated with genre) and the approaches we might call, again broadly, 'poststructuralist'. A very bright class, and lots of interesting interaction.

On the last day we picked a text we had all read -- The Hobbit, it turned out to be -- and discussed how we might write a paper about it. We discussed a wide range of possible angles; and after we'd noted the preponderance of holes in the novel, we talked about that. Rejecting (rightly, I think) a vulgar Freudian decoding ('all the holes are vaginas! And there are swords, too! The swords are penises!') we instead tried out a Deleuze/Guattari 'holey space' reading. After the class I wrote up the paper, and you'll find it here.

[Update: the event went off very well; thanks to Fran for organising it, and everyone who came]

Interesting fact: the event was at the Augustine United Church, on George IV Bridge. Ken Macleod was in the audience, and chatting to him afterwards I discovered that this very church appears in The Night Sessions, as the location for the silent club. So now you know.

Other news: I'll be appearing at the Paris Book Fair, hanging around the booth of the formidable Bragelonne, 15th-16th March, an eventuality occasioned by the imminent appearance of the French translation of Gradisil. I'll also poke my nose in at Orbital Eastercon, just on the Saturday. I may even be on some panels.