(art by Lekan Jeyifo from his website, Vigilism.  His work, depicting Lagos in 2081AD, is beautiful.  Go over to his site and check it out.)

A wonderful website called Islam and Science Fiction has some great articles about the appearance of Islam in science fiction, some great author bios of Muslim science fiction authors, and links to an anthology, A Mosque Among the Stars among other things.

Written by Muhammad Aurangzeb Ahmad the spare site is thoughtful and engaging.  Mostly his blogged thoughts, his search for Islam in among the science fiction, he also reprints some good blogposts from others–one in particular:

Better Representing Muslims: a Few ideas by Robert Rath (reprinted from the Escapist with permission)–which asks the gaming community, especially, to try some new tropes when representing Muslims in shooter games.

Modern Warfare would probably be a little different were it actually written by a Muslim – or even if the team brought on a cultural expert. The fact is, we really love to talk about consulting military veterans when putting together military shooters, but those guys are rarely cultural experts and they always look at a country from the perspective of an outsider. It could really help to bring someone in who really knows a country, rather than has seen it primarily through a gun sight or a camera lens. Someone who can give the environments and people a greater sense of authenticity or suggest a plotline other than ERMAHGERD NUCLEAR MISSILES GO AMERICA SHOOT EVERYTHING THAT MOVES. Perhaps taking down an underground militant network that’s been targeting Afghan leaders or hunting a particularly talented bomb-maker. Or maybe Nathan Drake’s next adventure will put him on the side of the Jordanian police, tracking down a stolen artifact.

That is, of course, if we’re truly as interested in “realism” as we say we are. I suspect when studio PR reps use that word, what they really mean are “realistic guns.” These days, we spend more energy making a gun true to life than we spend on the person in its crosshairs.

Ahmad, though, has a lot of great blogposts on finding Islam in Science Fiction in many places–like Deviant Art, or io9, or other places on the web.

He also has helped produce the anthology, A Mosque Among the Stars—this link will take you to the Amazon page where you can kindle it.