February 2006
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| Posted by John on Tuesday February 28, 2006 - 4:00 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
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| Posted by John on Monday February 27, 2006 - 11:11 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
In his Wired article Forget Film, Games Do Sci-Fi Best, Clive Thompson claims that the Star Wars universe is better realized in games than in the movies. I tend to agree with that statement and would also include (from what I hear) the Star Wars books as well. There is much more room for exploration in games and books than in the few Star Wars movies that exist.
But then Thompson goes a step further and claims that all science fiction is better realized in games than in film.
Why were the games so comparatively good? A cynic would say it's because Lucas probably isn't as closely involved in the games, so his young designers aren't hampered by his inane creative decisions. But I actually suspect it's deeper than that. I think it's because games are beginning to rival film -- and even eclipse it -- as the prime vehicle for sci-fi and fantasy.An interesting observation, to be sure. It doesn't help that a large majority of sci-fi films aren't very good.
Thompson doesn't mention the book medium much. I suspect he's more of a gamer than a reader, whereas I am the opposite. Personally, I prefer the world-building of books better than movies. I find it exercises my imagination more than the lazy "here-you-go" visuals of movies. That said, I do enjoy the eye-candy of movies like Star Wars and Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.
All of which raises the question that asks if film is somehow just a poor medium altogether for science fiction concepts. Is this an explanation of all the poor sci-fi films out there?
I say "No" is the answer. There are some really great sci-fi films out there which dispel that belief - enough of them that it cannot be a fluke. True, the good movies are few and far between. But I think that rather than this being the result of film being a poor medium, it's just a plethora of bad filmmaking.
What do you think? Is film a poor medium for science fiction?
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| Posted by John on Monday February 27, 2006 - 11:22 AM
| Category: Games, Movies
| © 2006 SF Signal
[Editor's Note: The following review is by guest reviewer Chris Hibbard.]
REVIEW SUMMARY: The new material in this reprint does not add anything significant to the story but this is still an engaging read.
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Re-release of Orson Scott Card's 1979 "classic": a tale of a radical regenerative running amok on an imprisoned planet, collecting super powers along the way and searching for redemption and significance.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Interesting plot that moves along nicely; like the movies X-Men or Spiderman, part of the draw is the character learning new powers.
CONS: This re-release was advertised to have 10% new material but doesn't add much to the story.
BOTTOM LINE: An engaging read whether you buy the original or the reprint.
Ok, so the smut added to the first chapter was new (please Orson, I don't need a description of a radical regenerative man who just grew breasts feeling aroused at his doctor's examining them). Other than that, I had to dig out my original to find any difference at all. The few descriptive changes did show the voice of a more mature writer, and I'll admit made for better reading, but they were hard to spot even for a re-reader like me.
Ok, to the story: Thousands of years ago there was a bid made to take over the universe by sixty-some recalcitrants who were banished to a planet lacking significant metal ores. The rebellionists' families have only one contact with the outside universe: devices to trade whatever they can for metal. Our hero, the crown prince Lanik belongs to a family who slices spare body parts from their mutant children and shoves them into the transporter-device in trade for iron. But peace in Utopia doesn't last! Lanik is found to be a "rad" and starts growing body parts uncontrollably. Instead of sending him to the pens for parts-harvesting, his father sands him on a diplomatic mission that is actually banishment.
In short, he visits a handful of the warring families in disguise and learns their secret super powers. By the end of the book he can speed or slow time in an unlimited fashion, draw energy from the sun and neither eat nor breathe, control the earth and rocks or heal others through learned mental powers, and regenerate any body part you might choose to hack from him. He doesn't use his super powers to gain fame and fortune though, oh no; this guy is out to save the world.
It might sounds stupid (and it is) but it's still an interesting read. It's a first-person novel so the plot has no parallel devices, but still manages to be surprisingly engaging (though not quite as much as Ender's Game). Lanik starts his journey as a prideful, privileged teenager but matures through his experiences into a caring, humble adult, willing to give up his slice of the pie for the greater good. I wouldn't call the book "dark", but maybe a little melancholy. I think any radical regenerative would give it 3 out of 5 thumbs up.
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| Posted by John on Monday February 27, 2006 - 8:48 AM
| Category: Book Review
| © 2006 SF Signal
| (55 total votes) |
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| Posted by John on Monday February 27, 2006 - 12:00 AM
| Category: Polls
| © 2006 SF Signal
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| Posted by John on Sunday February 26, 2006 - 5:56 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
REVIEW SUMMARY: Another literary experiment that failed to impress.
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Brief portraits of 253 train passengers.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Intriguing concept; easy to read piecemeal.
CONS: Not very interesting.
BOTTOM LINE: More literary experiment than entertainment.
I'm not sure how I stumbled across Geoff Ryman's 253 - The Print Remix. I guess I heard some positive buzz about it somewhere. I remember looking for it and finally picked it up a few years ago because the idea sounded so intriguing.
There is no story here at all, just a brief background. Imagine a seven-car passenger in London on a seven-minute ride between stops. Each of the seven cars seats 36 passengers. A fully occupied train, including driver, holds 253 people. The book devotes one page and exactly 253 words to describe several attributes about each character including appearance, secrets and thoughts. Oh, one bit of drama: the driver is asleep at the dead man's switch.
As the introduction of the book explains, 253 is meant to appeal to the "Nosey-Parker" inside of us. I admit I found this idea appealing because I'm one of those people who used to like people-watching at airports. (You gotta be at the airport anyway, what else are you gonna do?) I always enjoyed the brief glimpses of people's lives: grandparents meeting grandchildren for the first time; long-separated sweethearts; awkward reunions; people who you can tell just don't get along. Why is he in such a hurry? What was she thinking when she bought that butt-ugly suitcase?
I figured that 253 would just be a book version of that same mellow activity. And I suppose it is in most respects, except that the experience is not quite the same. I knew there was no plot to speak of, but reading these passages was mostly boring, so much so in fact that I could not bring myself to finish the book. (I tried. The super-short "chapters" make it easy to read piecemeal.) The occasional good parts of the book weren't really all that good at all; they just seemed that way by comparison to the other even-slower parts. I found the numerous car maps and footnotes to be slightly more entertaining than the prose itself - a bad sign. It was hard to make any fair opinion of the "characters" as 253 words was apparently inadequate to do so.
I guess I just have to chalk up another literary experiment that failed to entertain me. For the curious, the writing style is an example of "oulipo", where literature is considered a game of language rather than a means of representing the world and usually involves some form of mathematics or numbers to create art. Oulipo was used in Thomas Disch's classic novel 334 and, unfortunately, I wasn't too enamored over that one either. Ryman's 253 left me with the same impression: This was more literary experiment than it was entertainment.
But don't take my word for it, see for yourself. The complete text of 253 is available online, but without the book's subtitle, The Print Remix.
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| Posted by John on Saturday February 25, 2006 - 10:09 PM
| Category: Book Review
| © 2006 SF Signal
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| Posted by John on Friday February 24, 2006 - 10:08 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
The final ballot for the SFWA Nebula Awards has been posted. (And I am confused. The post says they are the 2005 Nebulas. Is this a typo? Last year's awards, held in 2005, were called the 2005 Nebula awards even though they awarded works from 2004. Shouldn't this year be the 2006 Nebula Awards?) Anyway, here are the nominees:
Novels
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| Posted by John on Friday February 24, 2006 - 10:06 PM
| Category: Awards
| © 2006 SF Signal
I'm finally (don't get me started) getting around to reading the February 2006 "Year in Review" issue of Locus Magazine. The many perspectives of the Recommended Reading sections are fun because they point out all the cool science fiction published last year. It's nice to see books I've read. It's not so nice to see all the books I want to read but don't have time for.
The 2005 Books Summary article is, as usual, comprehensive, interesting and full of fun figures, like the Total Books Published by SF Imprint in 2005. (The "by SF Imprint" table is more telling about SF than the "by Publisher" table since it focuses on the SF.) Here are the Top 10 with their respective book count totals.
Top 10 Total Books Published by SF Imprint in 2005
To add data to last year's post which asked if too many books were being published, in 2005 there were 2,516 genre books published. In 2004, there 2550 - that's the first decline in 4 years.
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| Posted by John on Friday February 24, 2006 - 1:47 AM
| Category: Books
| © 2006 SF Signal
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| Posted by John on Thursday February 23, 2006 - 10:48 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
Australian magazine Cosmos is making its science fiction stories available online. Titles up so far:
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| Posted by John on Thursday February 23, 2006 - 10:34 PM
| Category: Web Sites
| © 2006 SF Signal
While I still like the new Battlestar Galactica, I must admit that some of the more recent episodes have, well, kind of sucked. As a public service to BG fans, I'd like to offer my suggestions to Ronald D. Moore on the:
Top 10 Things I'd Like to See on Battlestar Galactica
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| Posted by John on Thursday February 23, 2006 - 7:54 PM
| Category: TV
| © 2006 SF Signal
Cinescape and Scifi.com are reporting that ABC has given the go ahead for a new anthology series called Masters of Science Fiction. The show will feature stories based on the works of "well-known authors" like Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov and Harlan Ellison. Source works cited are Ellison's "The Discarded" and Asimov's "The Last Question." The order is for four episodes, though six will likely be filmed. Michael Tolkin is set to direct.
Sweet! I guess the Showtime production of this that was reported back in August 2005 never came to pass. I'm glad to see this has the go-ahead. Even better: it's on a channel I get!
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| Posted by John on Thursday February 23, 2006 - 9:38 AM
| Category: TV
| © 2006 SF Signal
It looks like ibooks, publisher of genre fiction (among other things) has filed for bankruptcy. This is troublesome for many reasons, mostly dealing with one less avenue of genre fiction, but two other (admittedly selfish) reasons spring immediately to my mind.
First and foremost, the fate of the Science Fiction: Best of 2005 and Fantasy: Best of 2005 anthologies edited by Jonathan Strahan and Karen Haber are up in the air, even though I have no doubt they will eventually see publication. I liked the 2003 and 2004 versions and think it's a worthwhile series among the plethora of Year's Best anthologies. (Another selfish reason: more stories for my short-story-a-day project.)
From a book-cover-loving fanboy perspective, this is a bummer because ibooks' covers always caught my attention. It was iBooks attractive cover that brought Robert Silverberg's outstanding book Nightwings to the top of my reading pile not too long ago. (Not that I judge a book by its cover or anything...)
[Via Strahan's Notes from Coode Street]
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| Posted by John on Wednesday February 22, 2006 - 9:28 PM
| Category: Books
| © 2006 SF Signal
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| Posted by John on Tuesday February 21, 2006 - 6:02 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
Sometimes I feel like I missed the boat on all the cool stuff life has to offer. Or maybe it's more accurate to say I'm behind the wave. Many colleges today offer courses in science fiction. Imagine that! Getting to discuss and learn about science fiction while earning college credit! That sure beats the lame electives from which I was forced to choose.
Professor Courtney Brown PhD of Georgia's Emory University is offering a Political Science course entitled Science Fiction and Politics and he's making the lectures available as a podcast. Available lectures ready for download include Foundation (parts 1 and 2), Foundation And Empire and Second Foundation by Isaac Asimov , Brave New World (parts 1 and 2) by Aldous Huxley (parts 1 and 2) and The Left Hand Of Darkness (part 1) by Ursula K. Le Guin.
[via SFF Audio]
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| Posted by John on Tuesday February 21, 2006 - 1:51 PM
| Category: Web Sites
| © 2006 SF Signal
REVIEW SUMMARY: Not bad, but did not meet my high expectations.
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: The Commonwealth defends itself against the hostile alien Primes and looks for the mysterious Starflyer alien that started the war.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Distinct characterizations; exciting action sequences and climaxes.
CONS: Slow start; weaker first half; unnecessary world building.
BOTTOM LINE: Worth the read if you liked the awesome Pandora's Star but don't expect the same caliber of story.
The dangerous part about liking a book so much is that its sequel has much to live up to. After reading Peter F. Hamilton's awesome Pandora's Star, my expectations were set fairly high for Judas Unchained and while the book had its moments, it failed to meet the previously-set high standards.
An 800+ page space opera sequel made up of multiple sub-plots and even more characters is hard to summarize, but I'll try. In Pandora's Star, a barrier is discovered around the sun of a remote system. When a ship is sent to investigate, the barrier disappears and a hostile alien race known as the Prime are released, free to follow their narrowly-focused ideals of life and obliterate every other being found in the Intersolar Commonwealth, a group of populated planets in the 24th century whose colonization was made possible through the use of wormhole technology.
Judas Unchained focuses not so much on defending against the Prime (although there are plenty of sections that do) as it does on The Guardians of Selfhood, a xenophobic terrorist cult led by Bradley Johansson. The Guardians maintain that an alien-in-hiding known as the Starflyer is set on destroying the human race and has unleashed the Prime to do just that. Johansson and company (including ex-radical Adam Elvin) are convinced that key people in the government (led by President Elaine Doi and senators like Justine Burnelli) are being controlled by the Starflyer. Johansson and Co. is being pursued by Paula Myo, formerly of the Commonwealth's Serious Crimes division until she started believing in the Starflyer. Meanwhile, the newly formed Navy, led by expert pilot Admiral Wilson Kime, is trying to deal with further Prime attacks and must consider the use of genocidal weapons.
Given the number of sub-plots in Judas Unchained, I'd say that's a very brief summary. The story got off to a slow start, though it's unclear if that's a decision to offset the rapid paced ending of the previous book (as if the two are meant to be read in succession) or if it's meant to be a slow buildup of suspense. I tend to believe it is the former explanation since there is not much handholding to ease the newbie reader into the plot. Sadly, the effect is that the sense of emergency and danger so wonderfully laid out by the end of the first book is essentially extinguished.
In Judas Unchained, there is an inordinate amount of world-building. While this was welcome in Pandora's Star as it helped define the universe, here it was just unnecessary and even intrusive. This seems ironic coming from me since the world-building was what I loved so much about the previous work. But since all of the building and plot setup was already done before, the inclusion of so much more of it seemed like overkill.
Much of the first half of the book also involves characters moving around and spying on each other in attempt to uncover the Starflyer and his agents. This caused me some dismay. Throughout the bulk of Pandora's Star, the Starflyer is portrayed as a non-entity; a false cause through which Johansson can control his followers. Yet in Judas Unchained, it is seemingly a common belief that the Starflyer alien is, in fact, real and not just a figment of Johansson's delusions. True, the end of the previous book did show evidence that the Starflyer might indeed be real (witness Paula Myo's turnaround) and several characters in Judas Unchained still need convincing. Nonetheless, the assumption that the Starflyer exists at all seems unwarranted (its inclusion in the Dramatis Personae listing notwithstanding). This tended to drag down the first half of the book even when there were some bright spots including some planet-side military action on a Prime-occupied planet.
The second half of the book was much stronger and mostly returned to its former glory. This was when the separate story lines undergo their respective mini-climaxes and when the war with the alien species known as Prime picks up again. Here we get to see glorious space battles, ulterior motives, chases, killing and (by then) much needed action. The latter parts of the book were seriously page-turning.
All the characters from the previous book return, though with the memory-store and rejuvenation technology, this should be no surprise. As can be expected in space opera, some characters are not what they appear to be. The fun was in trying to figure out who were agents of the Starflyer. As before, all the characters are distinct and memorable, a very impressive feat with a cast of characters this large. Meallanie Rescorai, Unisphere personality and agent for an artificial intelligence of unknown alignment, plays a larger role in this story than before, maybe to offset that Wilson Kime's wife, Anna, a decidedly tough gal in the previous book, assumes the role of the quiet wife this time around.
I did find one character's storyline odd: hippie wormhole creator Ozzie Isaac spends even more time traipsing around the mysterious Silfen paths where he eventually (finally) learns something useful: the identity of the creators of the Prime world barrier. Unfortunately, that information is of almost no use and Ozzie just becomes the voice of pacifism when he learns of the planned genocide against the Prime. That made about as much sense as using the wormhole technology to ferry people to the safety of the future, but not to eradicate the Prime threat. On the bright side, Ozzie's pacifism leads him into one of the books final lively climaxes. Another of the book's climaxes involves an exciting, lengthy, multi-world chase to catch the Starflyer, a chase made even more dramatic since it teamed up previously warring factions.
To be fair here, Hamilton had high expectations to live up to. I loved Pandora's Star and highly recommend it. And if you read that, you're going to want to see how it ends. My advice when you do: don't fall into the trap of expecting too much.
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| Posted by John on Tuesday February 21, 2006 - 12:58 AM
| Category: Book Review
| © 2006 SF Signal
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| Posted by John on Monday February 20, 2006 - 11:01 PM
| Category: Tidbits
| © 2006 SF Signal
I find that length is a book characteristic whose variety keeps interest levels up. Or, put another way, I like to switch between reading shorter stories or books with longer works.
I am currently reading Peter F. Hamilton's Judas Unchained which is as just about long as its predecessor, Pandora's Star. Clocking in at 800+ pages, it's one of those books that take longer to read than your average science fiction book. (Fantasy books, of course, are a different matter. The law requires fantasy books, especially quest fantasies, to be a minimum of 800 pages. Violation of this law results in much finger-pointing and ridicule.)
It may be partly because of my experience with Judas Unchained (more on that when I post my review), but I find myself (as I often do when reading longer works) wanting to read something shorter next time. In fact, I've even gone so far as to pull out a few shorter books from the "archives" (which I sometimes refer to as "the boxes that litter my home"). I'm acquiring the taste for the short, sharp shock of, say, Clifford Simak's The Trouble with Tycho, his novella packaged in an easily-digestible book form. I also have Edgar Rice Burroughs' Beyond the Farthest Star on tap, a collection of two serialized novels. It's not that I'm trying to keep my book count high, but I do find that consuming shorter works more frequently means there are more places I can visit with my imagination.
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| Posted by John on Monday February 20, 2006 - 12:53 AM
| Category: Books
| © 2006 SF Signal
| (59 total votes) |
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