A science fiction blog featuring science fiction book reviews and with frequent ramblings on fantasy, computers and the web.
Harriet Klausner reviewed Quicksilver and gave it 5 stars. I know, how improbable is that. She never likes any book. Oh wait, that’s John and Scott recommended books. Sorry.
Anyhow, I’ll be picking this up in anticipation of the Austin trip and booksigning! Woo hoo!
The Technovelgy site has a database of which SF authors invented which technology in which novel.
For example, there is the Time Dingbat, Diabological Armory and the Butcher Plant (A plant that grows steaks). Mmmm…steaks…
That’s gotta be better than a pickle plant!
So, I’m out trolling for newsfeeds and I see that one is syndicated by…Will Wheaton. Finally an answer to the question “Is there a way I can be notified about the goings-on in Wil Wheaton’s life just seconds after they happen?”
One of his entries refers to an interview he gave to Millionaire Playboy. I know I shouldn’t have, but I think I actually found the article to be entertaining.
Straight out of Minority Report comes this article: ‘Electronic paper’ has potential to show movies
This article, The Most Significant SF & Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years, 1953-2002, is from…the SF Book Club. Oddly, they do not list the criteria by which selections were chosen. There is one title, On the Beach by Nevil Shute, that I’ve never heard of.
See the Locus article entitled Singing the Body Electric.
And the scary part is, I actually own a copy of Edgar Winter’s Mission Earth CD. Yikes!
From rec.arts.sf.written Frequently Asked Questions
Pronunciation of Cherryh
C. J. Cherryh’s original last name was Cherry. The terminal H is
silent. The H was added because her first editor thought that Cherry
sounded too much like a romance writer. Her brother, artist David
Cherry, retains the original spelling.
REVIEW SUMMARY: A well written, humorous, action-packed story, if you ignore the parts dealing with the whole Sumerian legend stuff.
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Near-future, sword-wielding pizza deliveryman/hacker tracks down the people who infected his friend with the ?snow-crash? virus.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Vivid writing; successful blend of science fiction and humor; cool vision of the near future; a quick read.
CONS: A bit heavy on the Sumerian mythology.
BOTTOM LINE: A fun, well-written read with some great action sequences.
John posted this link earlier that lists the upcoming mid-season SF shows. Its part of SciFi Weekly’s two part SF TV Preview. There’s a lot of stuff here. I didn’t realize how much SF is on TV, or how much of it is crap. Let’s take a trip through the upcoming season and see what’s what.
…but I gotta say that in Episode III, Anakin is looking much less like he lives on Dawson’s Creek. However, he is looking way more like an 80′s rock star.
Science Fiction Weekly lists some interesting (but unscheduled) mid-season replacements for the upcoming fall TV season including:
GameSpy reviews Greyhawk Adventures: The Temple of Elemental Evil. Looks like it’s a good game, but no multiplayer? Oh, maybe this will sway Kevin et al. to purchase the new 3.5 rulebooks!
Not….
SFRevu takes a shot at defining “space opera” as a genre, in Space Opera Redefined.
Looking at the list of the contemporary space opera books, I’d have to say that, IMO, those books are the ones I consider SF first, and space opera second, if at all. I’m not sure I’d classify The Book of the New Sun as opera. To me, space opera takes place in, well, space, and has characters flying around in space ships blasting the hell out of each other. Night’s Dawn Trilogy anyone? In other words, action uber alle, story secondary, good characters and/or lack of SF cliches last. Of course, Night’s Dawn is a heckuva series and very enjoyable. Even with the ending….
So my Friday movie pick for the 4Q outing was Matrix reloaded. After hearing so-so reactions from others, I was expecting a so-so movie. But I gotta tell ya’, I was loving it! It had cool SciFi elements and action to boot. The special effects were just pretty to watch. I was really enjoying it.
That is, until the projector broke with 20-30 minutes to go. I guess that’s what you get for a buck fifty. Oh, wanna see the whole movie, that’ll be eight dollars please. Bummer.
Golden Boy I am not.
Ain’t It Cool News has a rumor that everyone’s favorite penguin will be coming back for a weekly comic strip, starting in November, and in a movie. That’s right, Berkeley Breathed will be bringing Opus, at least, back to life! Woo hoo! I wasn’t a huge fan of Outland, but anything is better than the crap on the comics page now. Bill Watterson, are you listening?
S2 Games | Savage: The Battle for Newerth is a new computer game I just discovered at Gamespot. It looks to be a blend between an RTS and FPS. And, I think, its multiplayer only. Now the cool part is, each side has one guy, the commander, who is in the RTS mode and commands everyone else, in FPS, to go off and do things. Your side gets points for accomplishing tasks and the commander can then allocate those points to the people under him. These points can be spent on armor, weapons or other stuff, like to ability to command other units. Sounds interesting and the very least. And, it looks really good too. And and and, its only $40. And! you can download it over the web and get a CD key as well. A practice more companies should go to as broadband access becomes more prevalent.
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom is a novel by Cory Doctorow. I’ve heard good things about it and I put it on my Amazon Wish List.
Today I saw that Doctorow has made this novel, and his short story collection, available for free download! And, as if that isn’t cool enough, Docotorow is also a blogger. Check out his site at BoingBoing.NET.
Its that time again, my weekly (or thereabouts) roundup of Anime that I’ve watched. This time, I have only two that I’ve seen. I blame Stacy for not giving me more stuff to watch.
On with the show!
From Locus Mag:
Austin, Bookpeople (603 North Lamar)
Wed 1 Oct 2003, 7 p.m.: Neal Stephenson (Quicksilver) reads and signs
This site offers bibliographies and series sequences of SF and fantasy authors
As you can see, we’ve redesigned the site somewhat. Mostly, just the main page so far. We’ll be working on the comments and such today as well. This will, hopefully, remove the rendering bug under IE 6 and the site will display properly. Or, rather, IE will display it properly. The site was coded correctly. 
Comments and feedback appreciated.
The Management
REVIEW SUMMARY: Stories ranging from boring to excellent
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Collection of ten war-themed short stories.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Some stories were hugely entertaining.
CONS: Some stories weren?t.
BOTTOM LINE: A good selection of future war stories
Enter the Matrix. And bring your ping pong paddle.
