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32-463: Jones has written many fantasy novels, mainly for children or young adults, including some that simply rely upon and some that subvert common fantasy motifs. (The) Dark Lord of Derkholm (1998) is one that subverts, and a conceptual sequel. It is set in a fantasy world that maintains the cliches detailed in the Tough Guide for the benefit of commercial tourism from our world. The inside back cover of

64-409: A little predictable. For [the price], this book is recommended." The Tough Guide was a finalist for the 1997 Hugo Award for Best Related Work , and for a World Fantasy Award , year's best special contribution, professional. It was voted third place for a Locus Award , year's best nonfiction book. Dark Lord of Derkholm The Dark Lord of Derkholm , simply Dark Lord of Derkholm in

96-467: A thinly-veiled criticism of the fantasy genre as overly derivative, clichéd, and unimaginative. Alternatively it can be seen as an affectionate study of the themes and ideas that resonate through fantasy writing. The tone is generally tongue-in-cheek, with such explanations as why there are Dark Lords but no Dark Ladies, why casual sex in Fantasyland almost never results in pregnancy, and why male virginity

128-529: Is badly depressed by the apparent death of Kit, and does not carry out any of the Dark Lord's duties, nor eat, sleep, or wash. Pilgrims are camped in the valley, having been barred from the Dark Citadel by Derk, and many denizens of fantasyland (Dragons, Elves and Dwarves) have gathered in the Dark Citadel or its vicinity, by the time Mr. Chesney arrives to assess the situation and determines to levy fines. Deucalion,

160-608: Is convalescing back at Derkholm/The Dark Citadel but his wife, Mara, seems to be on the brink of leaving him, enjoying too much playing the part of the Glamorous Enchantress. Blade and Shona, Derk's human son and daughter, take charge of the Pilgrim Party that Blade was assigned to as the wizard guide. Among other things, they must deal with their own attractions to tourists, and with unwanted affections, and with tourists helplessly in love with each other. The party gets lost in

192-463: Is useless whereas female virginity is highly prized. The first edition Tough Guide (Vista, 1996, ISBN   0-575-60106-X ) was a 223-page paperback. It was reissued in paperback by Gollancz in 1997 and first published in the US by DAW Books in 1998, both in paperback. There was a hardcover Science Fiction Book Club edition in 1999 (US) and Gollancz issued a "mini-hardcover" in 2004 (UK). The Guide

224-905: The Spectrum: The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art series, both the most nominations received by any author/editor and the most nominations without winning. Clute has been nominated seven times and Farah Mendlesohn seven times with one win; Le Guin five times with two wins; Isaac Asimov and Langford four times with one win; and Mike Resnick four times with no wins. The Writing Excuses team, consisting of Brandon Sanderson , Dan Wells , Howard Tayler , Mary Robinette Kowal , and Jordan Sanderson, have been nominated four times and won once. Seven other authors have been nominated three times. Many of these writers, editors, and artists have won Hugos in other categories, from Fan Writer to Best Novel . Hugo Award nominees and winners are chosen by supporting or attending members of

256-415: The 47 nomination years, 249 individuals and 1 organization have had works nominated; 59 people and 1 organization have won, including co-authors and Retro Hugos. John Clute has won four times; once by himself, once with John Grant as a co-author, once with Peter Nicholls , and once with Nicholls, David Langford , and Graham Sleight . Nicholls has won a third time, and Grant has won a second time, sharing

288-478: The Enchantress Mara: Shona and Blade, the former being the older; Kit (black with gold eyes), the oldest griffin and a magic-user; Callette (brown with green-grey wings), who makes all 126 of the Dark Lord's "gizmos" with Mr. Chesney's world's technology; Don (gold), who is a rather forgotten griffin who doesn't really do much special; Lydda (gold), who is a great cook (her food is called "godlike snacks" by

320-495: The Glamorous Enchantress, the evil Dark Lord. It is a devastating show: farmlands are laid waste, people slain, and so on. The head of Wizards University, Querida, determines a way to end the tours. The apparently incompetent wizard Derk will be the next Dark Lord, and his son Blade the Wizard Guide for the final tour. Querida overcomes objections all around and the plan is underway. The Wizard Derk has seven children with his wife

352-625: The Griffin , when Derk's youngest daughter goes for training in magic. Derk and Mara have five griffin children and two human children: Other characters: Jones and The Dark Lord won the 1999 Mythopoeic Fantasy Award, children's section. Thus, the Mythopoeic Society recognized it as the "fantasy ... that best exemplifies 'the spirit of the Inklings ' " among "books for young readers (from Young Adults to picture books for beginning readers), in

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384-553: The Griffin , and the two novels have been called the Derkholm series (which the Internet Speculative Fiction Database (ISFB) does not explicitly link to The Tough Guide ). A fantasy world is dominated by its destructive tourist industry. "Mr. Chesney's Pilgrim Parties" arrange for annual group tours, evidently from our world, to experience all the clichés: wise Wizard Guides, attacks from Leathery-Winged Avians,

416-709: The United States, is a fantasy novel by the British author Diana Wynne Jones , published autumn 1998 in both the U.K. and the U.S. It won the 1999 Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Children's Literature . The novel is a parody , for its setting is a mock high fantasy world, similar to that Jones covered in The Tough Guide to Fantasyland (U.K., 1996), a humorous travel guide on the Rough Guide model. The story continues in Year of

448-639: The annual non-profit World Science Fiction Convention , or Worldcon, and the presentation evening constitutes its central event. The selection process is defined in the World Science Fiction Society Constitution as instant-runoff voting with six nominees, except in the case of a tie. The works on the ballot are the six most-nominated by members that year, with no limit on the number of works that can be nominated. Initial nominations are made by members in January through March, while voting on

480-419: The award with his co-authors Elizabeth L. Humphrey and Pamela D. Scoville. Thomas Disch and Ursula K. Le Guin have also won twice, both without co-authors; no other author has won more than once. The Organization for Transformative Works was the organization that won, for its Archive of Our Own fanwork repository. Cathy and Arnie Fenner have been nominated eight times for their work on writing and editing

512-516: The ballot of six nominations is performed roughly in April through July, subject to change depending on when that year's Worldcon is held. Prior to 2017, the final ballot was five works; it was changed that year to six, with each initial nominator limited to five nominations. Worldcons are generally held near the start of September, and are held in a different city around the world each year. Members are permitted to vote "no award", if they feel that none of

544-550: The book presents itself as a tourist guidebook; its title alludes to the Rough Guides series of such guidebooks. Its conceit is that the fantasy worlds depicted in many fantasy novels, games, and films are identical, although tours visit different places such as provinces of Finland . In an extended metaphor, the readers (or viewers or players) are tourists ; authors are tour guides , and their stories are sight-seeing tours or package holidays to this Fantasyland. Also preceding

576-428: The commercial truth, and burns Derk so badly that he cannot play Dark Lord or help with other arrangements. His children take over. The eldest griffin and most commanding personality among several human and griffin children, Kit takes the lead. With the dragon's help, they manage to settle the Dark Lord's soldiers (Violent and drugged criminals whom Mr. Chesney contracts to get rid of) in permanent camp. Meanwhile, Derk

608-559: The common places, peoples, artifacts, situations, characters and events likely to be found on such a journey – in other words, the archetypes and clichés found in fantasy fiction. The Tough Guide comprises several hundred articles organised alphabetically, ranging from a couple of sentences to a couple of pages. Short entries may convey the nature of the work in some respects (only). There are entries for Dark Lords and what they do, magic swords and where they come from, haunted forests and what they contain, and so on. It can all be read as

640-512: The dragon, helps the demon in Mr. Chesney's pocket escape and return to its mate, the one that Wizard Derk summoned. The gods, which Mr. Chesney had demanded to appear, show up and shrinks him, and leaves with him. The arrival of the Final Pilgrim Party precipitates a showdown and the successful consummation of Querida's plan. Her retirement from the university sets the stage for a sequel, Year of

672-514: The nominees is deserving of the award that year, and in the case that "no award" takes the majority the Hugo is not given in that category. This happened in the Best Related Work category in 2015 and 2016. In the following table, the years correspond to the date of the ceremony, rather than when the work was first published. Each date links to the "year in literature" article corresponding with when

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704-646: The previous calendar year. The Hugo Awards have been described as "a fine showcase for speculative fiction " and "the best known literary award for science fiction writing". It was originally titled the Hugo Award for Best Non-Fiction Book and was first awarded in 1980. In 1999 the Award was retitled to the Hugo Award for Best Related Book, and eligibility was officially expanded to fiction works that were primarily noteworthy for reasons besides their fictional aspects. In 2010,

736-520: The rest of the family") and long-distance flier who plants the Dark Lord's "clues" that lead to his lair; and Elda (also gold), the youngest, with the most cat cells, and who is discovered to be a strong magic user as well. In a meeting about the Pilgrim Parties, High Chancellor Querida takes a wizard, a high priest and a thief to see the Oracles, who determine that the next person the group sees will play

768-456: The revised edition is a 2006 postscript by Jones, "How I Came to Write This Guidebook". While hospitalized in 1994, she and Chris Bell worked on projected entries for The Encyclopedia of Fantasy (Clute & Grant, Orbit Books, 1997). "Our job was to decide whether each entry was necessary, to suggest new ones, to discuss whether some of the entries made sense (many didn't), and to provide examples in support of what each entry said." Unusually,

800-432: The role of the Dark Lord, and the second person will be the Wizard Guide that they need. They meet Wizard Derk, who has taken his son Blade to see the Oracles, who say that he will be coached by Deucalion. Derk undertakes to "evil-fy" his home, Derkholm, for its role as the Dark Lord's capital. He summons a demon to bind there, but it escapes. An ancient dragon mistakes him for a ruling Dark Lord, takes offense when it learns

832-488: The title of the award was again changed, to the Hugo Award for Best Related Work. In addition to the regular Hugo awards, beginning in 1996 Retrospective Hugo Awards, or "Retro Hugos", have been available to be awarded for years 50, 75, or 100 years prior in which no awards were given. The Retro Best Related Work Hugo was awarded for 1954, 50 years later, but had not been awarded for any other year due to insufficient nominations, eventually reappearing in 2020 for 1945. During

864-523: The title page is a phoney list of ten "Other Tough Guides" such as The Tough Guide to Transport in the Multiverse (mostly by Telephone Box ). The Guide proper begins with a generic "Map of Fantasyland", "How to Use This Book", and a key to the marginal symbols ("Identification Symbols"), all preceding the alphabetical catalogue: A, Adept to Z, Zombies (pages 1–234). Along these lines the Guide catalogues many of

896-457: The top edge and a mock rubber stamp "Dark Lord approved!" in the illustration. Jonathan Palmer reviewed The Tough Guide to Fantasyland for Arcane magazine, rating it a 7 out of 10 overall. Palmer comments that "Although there are some audible chuckles to be had, the Guide is not a side-splitter (unlike Henry Root's World of Knowledge , to which it owes a considerable debt), but it is welcome fillip to those who feel that Fantasyland has become

928-537: The tradition of The Hobbit or The Chronicles of Narnia ." Jones previously won the Fantasy Award for The Crown of Dalemark and six of her books were finalists 1986 to 2009. Hugo Award for Best Related Work The Hugo Award for Best Related Work is one of the Hugo Awards given each year for primarily non-fiction works related to science fiction or fantasy, published or translated into English during

960-521: The wastelands, Blade and two tourists get separated from the group, and Shona leads the rest toward Derkholm. Blade's trio discovers a mining and export operation run by Mr. Chesney. The magical properties inherent in plain fantasy earth make it a valuable power source in Chesney's world (ours)! Blade is captured by guards and sent off to fight as a gladiator, where he meets in the arena his griffin brother, Kit, captured in battle. Back at Derkholm, father Derk

992-491: The work was eligible. Entries with a yellow background and an asterisk (*) next to the author's name have won the award; those with a gray background are the nominees on the short-list.   *    Winners and joint winners   +    No winner selected Beginning with the 1996 Worldcon , the World Science Fiction Society created the concept of "Retro Hugos", in which

The Tough Guide to Fantasyland - Misplaced Pages Continue

1024-598: Was heavily revised for the 2006 Firebird / Penguin edition (trade paperback; 2007 hardcover; US only?). The guidebook metaphor was enhanced in many ways: the map was re-done, clip art eliminated, insets included (mimicking contemporary guidebook layout), "Tough Guides" to other non-existent places referenced and listed, and so on. About two dozen symbolic silhouettes in the margin identify "Food" (a fork and knife), "Cliche" (the letter 'C'), and so on. The new front cover design mimicked some guidebooks, with "The Essential Guide to Fantasy Travel (Revised and Updated Edition)" along

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