Jeff VanderMeer is reporting that Richard K. Morgan has won this year's Arthur C. Clarke Award which is given to the best SF novel published each year in the UK (though not necessarily by a British writer).

Morgan won for his book Black Man which was released in the United States undr the title Thirteen.

See also:
Previous winners.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 6:30 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

Tony from StarshipSofa writes in to tell us about some the cool things going on there:

The StarShipSofa podcast is metamorphosing into the StarShipSofa - The Audio Science Fiction Magazine. Following in the great tradition of magazines like Analog, Asimov's and Fantasy and Science Fiction.

Each week the StarShipSofa will deliver a full package of SF related audio material all free including audio fiction, fact audio essays, flash fiction and poetry, all by leading names in the SF field.

Many writers have agreed to let StarShipSofa narrate their works including Ben Bova, Joe Haldeman, Alistair Reynolds and M. John Harrison, to name a few.

There will be two shows per week, the Wednesday show, also know as Aural Delights will contain narrated audio fiction, fact and poerty and the weekend show will be an in depth look into an author's life and work.

This week saw the first of the metamorphosing with the StarShipSofa's Aural Delights show. Fiction was provided by Kage Baker's fantastic story "The Likely Lad," there were two poems by Bruce Boston and Laurel Winter, both winners of the Rhysling Award for SF Poetry. Flash fiction came from a very short but very powerful story called "Repeating The Past" by Peter Watts, author of the SF novel Blindsight.

In the weeks to come Peter Watts will also be delivering a monthly narrated fact article; this part of the show will be called Reality, Remastered.

As for the weekend shows, StarShipSofa has her sights upon writers such as John Scalzi, Robert Charles Wilson and Ken Macleod.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 3:48 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

It's amazing what you can find on the internets these days. Case in point, the following gospel song praising everyone's favorite blatant merchandising move, Ewoks.

As if that weren't bad enough, Chad Vader also gets into the music business, covering that YouTube sensation, 'Chocolate Rain'.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 12:47 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

The annual Free Comic Book Day is coming on Saturday, May 3rd 2008. It's when participating comic book shops across North America and around the world give away comic books absolutely free to anyone who comes into their stores. (Details provided by each retailer.)

The selection of comics includes those from Gold sponsors (including All Star Superman #1, Hellboy/B.P.R.D., Project Superpowers, Transformers Animated, and X-Men) and silver sponsors (including Atomic Robo & Friends, Del Rey & Dabel Brothers Preview (Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files: Welcome To The Jungle, George R. R. Martin's Wild Cards: The Hard Call, And Dean Koontz's Frankenstein: Prodigal Son), Marvel Adventures: Iron Man, and Tiny Titans #1) .

Stop by a store near you!

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 12:15 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

MY RATING:

Cenotaxis is Sean Williams' novella, set in his Astropolis universe, that bridges the gap between the first book, Saturn Returns, and the second book, Earth Ascendant. However, you need not have read Saturn Returns to read Cenotaxis. You'll miss some of the context, but the story, novella really, is rather self contained. The story covers the actions of Imre Bergamasc as he tries to coerce Earth and its people to enlist in his quest to discover the source of the 'Slow Wave', which wreaked havoc on the galactic civilization in Saturn Returns. Things don't go as smoothly as planned, and Imre must face off against an opponent who may, or may not be, God personified.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 1:06 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Free Fiction:
  • Del Rey is offering a free download of first book in Star Wars: Legacy of the Force series: Betrayal by Aaron Allston until midnight on 13 May. (PDF Link) [via SFScope]
  • All Issues of the Escape Velocity Magazine are now offered in the eBook version as free downloads in PDF format.
  • Alan Baxter is serializing his novel A 'Verse Full of Scum, the story of "a galactic Bounty Hunter...and his efforts to track down a rogue magic user who seems to be running as far away as he can, killing anyone that gets in his way.


• At SciFi Wire, John Joseph Adams profiles Jack O'Connell, author of The Resurrectionist.


• Sci-Fi Talk has a 1996 podcast-interview with Timothy Zahn.


• Total Dick-Head has the scoop on the litigation (and hilarious decision) surrounding the missing robot head of Philip K. Dick. [via Alex Irvine]


• Lou Anders' Thoughts on Science Fiction Film & Television has been generating some great discussion on the state of the sf.


• USA Today has an image of the Sleestaks from the upcoming remake of Land of the Lost starring...Will Ferrell.


• Karen @ Spiral Galaxy Reviews finally got to use a Robert Jordan book for the purpose God intended.


• Universal Day of the Jedi lists The Top 10 Sexually Suggestive Lines in the Original Star Wars Trilogy. (Star Wars / A New Hope #9: "Luke, at that speed do you think you'll be able to pull out in time?")

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 1:02 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

As one would hope, there is talk of bacon and cats.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 12:57 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Check out this sweet, but extremely geeky, Star Trek bottle opener, patterned after the original Enterprise, the NCC-1701 (no bloody D). And at only 12 British pounds, you can afford two!
• Shane Coffey at Cellounge to goes to great lengths to support his revealing of the last Cylon on Galactica. Nicely supported with evidence, but I'm not convinced the last Cylon is a major-minor character. I'm not convinced the writers knew when they started this season...
• E! Online has a spoilery entry which covers Heroes (a 'hero' with super speed) and has a few LOST bits. Oh, and Tricia Helfer appears set to guest star on Burn Notice. Awesome.
• Staying with LOST, the Season 4 Blu-Ray and DVD sets will be released on Dec. 9th.

• Yet even more LOST. USA Today recently ran a contest where fans could submit their theories and a lucky few would be critiqued by the producers. Well, the results are in. Check out the "Dharma Chameleon", sans Boy George, to see something that is quite accurate, to quote Lindeloff and Cuse. Or not if you don't want to be spoiled.
• Japanator reviews the re-made Neon Genesis Evangelion movie, You Are (Not) Alone. Time to see if this has fallen off the truck, so to speak.
• Mental Floss gives us 6 sci-fi TV show concepts you didn't see. And they're right, except for Daybreak. I did manage to watch all the episodes after they moved to the web. It was pretty good, if a bit confusing at the end.
• You know the concept well: Soldiers mysteriously abducted from Earth and transported to an alien arena where they must fight to survive. It's been on Star Trek, in books, and even various fighting games. Now, it's going to be a big screen movie with the unexpected title of Arena.

• A&E TV has unveiled their new Andromeda Strain website. It has Daniel Dae Kim and Ricky Schroeder! Tune in on Memorial Day.
• Adult Swim is airing Code Geass episodes before they air on Adult Swim. Cool.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 12:26 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Ursula K. Le Guin reads from her latest novel, Lavinia. The author spoke at Powell's City of Books in Portland, Oregon, on April 22, 2008.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 30, 2008 at 12:18 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

REVIEW SUMMARY: A good collection of original short fiction from a great lineup of writers.

MY RATING:

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: An original fiction anthology containing 15 stories.

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Twelve stories worth reading, two of which were hugely enjoyable.
CONS: One story (the longest in the anthology) did not work for me at all.
BOTTOM LINE: An enjoyable collection of stories.

Editor George Mann opens The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume 2 by explaining the reason behind its publication. In doing so, he captures some of the reasons I enjoy reading short fiction: the jolt of wonder, the single conceit, the bite size morsel, etc. But there's no denying that it's common for a science fiction anthology, whose goal is often to present stories of various flavors, to include stories that do not suit a particular reader's tastes.

And so it was here. The good news is that only a single story failed to entertain. I must fess up to being totally disenchanted with the Michael Moorcock's Jerry Cornelius story. Being the longest story in the book had a noticeable effect on the overall weighted average. Such is the hit-or-miss nature of a short fiction anthology.

The ultimate question, despite some misses, is whether there are more hits. In this case, the answer is a resounding yes. The vast majority of stories in the anthology are good or better. The outstanding entries were "iCity" by Paul Di Filippo and "Sunworld" by Eric Brown. Both of these stories capture the joys that come with anthologies and ultimately help make The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume 2 an enjoyable anthology.

Reviewlettes follow...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 29, 2008 at 12:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Interviews and Profiles:
  • SFF World interviews Kay Kenyon ( A World Too Near): "People just don't get [science fiction]. It's the height of ignorance and snobbery. We are judged by the worst that we produce..."
  • If You're Just Joining Us podcast-interviews Tim Pratt (The Strange Adventures of Rangergirl, Blood Engines, and Poison Sleep). [via SFFaudio]
  • The Guardian interviews Sarah Hall, author of the Arthur C. Clarke Award finalist The Carhullan Army. [via Grasping for the Wind]
  • Locus Online has excerpts from Locus Magazine's April Issue featuring Terry Pratchett and Sarah Monette.


• Free Fiction:
  • "Five Good Things About Meghan Sheedy" by A.M. Dellamonica
  • "Endgames" by Emma Bull. (Episode 6 of Shadow Unit)


• Matthew Hughes is promoting his next Archonate book by giving away electronic copies to folks who commit to reviewing it.


• John Picacio has posted the excellent tribute speech to Michael Moorcock that he presented at the Nebula Awards last weekend.


• At SciFi Weekly, Wil McCarthy dissects the mechanics and maintenance of a real-life Iron Man.


• This is how to tie together a museum exhibit and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.


• Ben Bova asks: What has changed since last gas crisis? [via Greg Lindenberg]


• Audible.com announced the launch of its SF&F audio imprint, Audible Frontiers, a program that includes 25 exclusive audiobooks (including 10 Hugo Award winners), monthly selections by Orson Scott Card, an article from a guest editor (like "Windows on Tomorrow" by Ben Bova).


• Even more posterage for The Dark Knight.


• InfoAddict has a collection of Top 10 Lists From the Distant Future.


• The Voice of Youth Advocates (VOYA) lists The Best Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror 2007 (PDF link). [via Menasha Library]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 29, 2008 at 12:16 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

The text of Daniel Abraham's story "The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics" is now online.

This is the final short fiction nominee to be made available online. For a complete list of short fiction nominees, with links to the corresponding online versions, see our earlier post of 2008 Hugo Award Nominees.

[via John Klima, editor or Logorrhea, the anthology where the story first appeared.]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 28, 2008 at 6:52 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

Tonight is a special Star Wars themed Deal or No Deal, and to put everyone in the mood, we have a special sneak peek at the DoND models in their Slave Princess Leia outfits. Yeowch. Middle-age geeks everywhere should tune in tonight.

And, you're welcome John.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday April 28, 2008 at 3:16 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

The nominees for the Sidewise Awards for Alternate History have been announced:

Best Short Form:

• Elizabeth Bear, "Les Innocents/Lumiere" (in New Amsterdam, Subterranean Press)
• Michael Flynn, "Quaestiones Super Caelo Et Mundo" (in Analog, 7/07)
• Matthew Johnson, "Public Safety" (in Asimov's, 3/07)
• Jess Nevins, "An Alternate History of Chinese Science Fiction" (in No Fear of the Future, May 17, 2007)
• Chris Roberson, "Metal Dragon Year" (in Interzone, 12/07)
• Kristine Kathryn Rusch, "Recovering Apollo 8" (in Asimov's, 2/07)
• John Scalzi, "Missives from Possible Futures #1: Alternate History Search Results" (in Subterranean Magazine, Winter 2007)

• Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policemen's Union (HarperCollins)
• Robert Conroy, 1945: A Novel (Ballantine Books)
• Mary Gentle, Ilario (The Lion's Eye and The Stone Golem) (Eos)
• Jay Lake, Mainspring (Tor Books)
• Sophia McDougall, Rome Burning (Orion)
• Jo Walton, Ha'penny (Tor Books)

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:12 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

The summer movie season is fast approaching, in fact starting this Friday. As usual, Hollywood has scheduled their blockbuster movies for the summer, and this year, the slate is chock full of science fiction and fantasy films. So many, in fact, that starting this week, you could, if you wanted, see a new SF/F movie every Friday through the end of July (with a couple of exceptions). Now that is a lot of movies, but does the SF/F movie fan have reason to celebrate or is this just another summer of cliches and remakes?

We here at SF Signal have put together this handy guide of the summer movies in the hopes of helping you decide, which, if any, you want to see and which to steer clear of. There's even a handy box office quiz at the end so read on!

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:25 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Several weeks ago, I purchased tickets to this year's Nebula Weekend since it was being held within driving distance. I must admit that I bought them in ignorance. I expected it to be more like a convention, with sessions and other related programming set up. Afterwards, I found out that it wasn't like that at all. It was geared more towards the SFWA taking care of business and its members schmoozing at the hotel bar. After some drawn-out indecision I decided not to go. But at the last minute, I decided what the heck. At least I would be able to meet some folks who I only knew through email.

I'm glad I went because it turned out to be a whole load of fun. It was actually a good thing that there were no sessions because that meant more face time with people.

In the order they happened, here are some of the weekend's highlights:

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:22 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Rich Horton has posted the table of contents of his propsed (but unforunately canceled) anthology, Space Opera. Too bad...it looked to be a good one.

1. "Finisterra" by David Moles (F&SF, December)
2. "Pluto Tells All" by John Scalzi (Subterranean, Spring)
3. "The Sands of Titan" by Richard A. Lovett (Analog, June)
4. "Who's Afraid of Wolf 359?" by Ken MacLeod (The New Space Opera)
5. "Trunk and Disorderly" by Charles Stross (Asimov's, January)
6. "Six Lights Off Green Scar" by Gareth L. Powell (Infinity Plus)
7. "The Final Voyage of La Riaza" by Jayme Lynn Blaschke (Interzone, June)
8. "Icarus Beach" by C. W. Johnson (Analog, December)
9. "The Caldera of Good Fortune" by Robert Reed (Asimov's, Oct/Nov)
10. "The Fly and Die Ticket" by Jay Lake (Subterranean, Fall)
11. "Muse of Fire" by Dan Simmons (The New Space Opera)

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:17 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Omnivoracious has a video interview with James and Kathryn Morrow, editors of The SFWA European Hall of Fame.


• Free Fiction:
  • At ManyBooks.net: "What The Left Hand Was Doing" by Randall Garrett (1960).
  • At Apex: "Light Like Knives Dragged Across the Skin" by Paul Jessup.
  • Beam Me Up podcasts "A Small Room in Koboltown" by Michael Swanwick. (Part One and Part Two.)


• Free excerpt: Andy Remic has redesigned his website and has posted an excerpt to Biohell, sequel to War Machine.


• Science & The City has a podcast of physicist Michio Kaku. [via Fred K.]


• The Los Angeles Times has a Michael Chabon essay about the pleasures of reading. "Entertainment has come to mean junk. But its definition also should include everything pleasurable that arises from an encounter with literature." [via Locus Online]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:10 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Disney's movie Lilo and Stitch has already spawned an animated series. Now there's talk of an anime series to be called Stitched!. Possibly in conjunction with the anime, Runat has created this combo radio/CD player based on Stitch's head. It will be available in Japan starting May 1st, and will run about $90. Watch your fingers.
• SciFiChick has the trailer for the upcoming Stargate: Continuum movie. Enjoy.
• If there are any Heroes fans left, you may want to check out Allan Arkush, as he lets loose with some info about season 3. And if you aren't, then there's no reason not to look. Who knows, maybe it will sound interesting enough to bring you back...
• You may have heard that the old TV show Get Smart will be making its big screen debut later this summer. What you didn't know was that there is already a spin-off of that movie. A direct-to-DVD feature called Get Smart’s Bruce and Lloyd Out of Control, about two technicians who work at CONTROL. Why is that interesting? Masi Oka co-stars. I think co-star is the right word to use here.
• ITV has confirmed that they are remaking, or 're-versioning' as they call it, the Patrick McGoohan screw-with-your-head-fest show The Prisoner. Will they stay true to the original's pedigree and create a show that challenges viewers, or will they try to make one more accessible to a wider range of audience (should they?)
• Film School Rejects tells us about The Evolution of TV or: How I Learned to Love Battlestar Galactica. Of course Neil, the author, says this after having viewed only season 1. And I can agree with him here, as season 1 is, by far, the best season of Galactica. Season 4 seems to be wallowing in a pit of self-loathing, throwing a pity party for all the characters. They'd better end this in a cool way.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:05 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

"A tough question, but I do think that Egghead, King Tut, the John Astin Riddler and the Lee Meriwether Catwoman are definitely 'second tier'. Since they have such a complex relationship, for me its really a tossup between the Kitt and Newmar Catwomans (Catwomen?)" - Jvstin

"Julie Newmar for the win! But there were so MANY good villians, it's hard to choose. Otto Premiger as MR. Freeze, Liberace as the pianast and his evil twin, Roddy McDowall as the bookworm, Art Carney as The Archer, the list goes on and on. How they got these people to get onto such a oddball show was a mystery, but I'm glas they did." - Keith

"For me it was the Joker, though I hated the Penguin the most." - General X

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 28, 2008 at 12:00 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America has announced the Nebula Award winners for 2007:

NOVEL: The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon
NOVELLA: "Fountain of Age" by Nancy Kress
NOVELETTE: "The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate" by Ted Chiang
SHORT STORY: "Always" by Karen Joy Fowler
SCRIPT: Pan's Labyrinth by Guillermo del Toro

Andre Norton Award: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

Michael Moorcock was also presented with The Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award.

See also: This year's nominees.
See also: SF Signal's review of the short fiction nominees.

See also: Past Winners

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Posted by John DeNardo at Sunday April 27, 2008 at 7:49 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

It seems fitting that to balance out Nebula Weekend, which honors the best, we should remember this particular bit of footage from Bollywood, which...well...see for yourself...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Sunday April 27, 2008 at 12:15 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Another reader writes in with a story description looking for a title. Do any of our readers out there know the title of this story? It's not much to go on. Consider it a challenge of your science fictional prowess!

I trying to find out if anyone remembers a SF book that I read 15 or 20 years ago, about a sun that becomes aware that it's intelligent and ponders it's existence and finally reaches out to other suns and communicates with them.

- Scott C.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Saturday April 26, 2008 at 12:25 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Artists Bob Eggleton shows off two fantastic covers that he worked on: Shadow of the Scorpion by Neal Asher and a reprint of Heinlein's Farmer in the Sky.


• Free Fiction: "Maps of the Bible" by Jason Sanford (who links to more of his stories).


• Lou Anders shares his thoughts on Science Fiction Film & Television, spurred on by the Popular Mechanics article on Hollywood Sci-Fi's Bronze Age. "It wouldn't be hard to make a list of 100 smart SF films and another list of 100 dumb ones; and the smart ones aren't necessarily the good ones and the dumb ones not necessarily the bad ones."


• Editor Jonathan Strahan updates us on all the projects he is currently juggling. I don't know which one is more juicy: Godlike Machines, Eclipse Two, Wild Thyme, Green Magic: Stories by Jack Vance, The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume 3, The New Space Opera 2, Dreamtime: Legends of Australian Fantasy, Eclipse Three and The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume 4. Wow!


• Nick Mamatas asks: What is Fantatwee? as he talks about the slush pile at Clarkesworld Magazine. "Fantatwee is fantasy with an ellipsis; the implications of the story and its themes are omitted so that the act of reading -- and, I suspect, writing -- is mostly purely palliative." [via Andrew Wheeler]


• Time Traveler Show #26 features a tribute to Arthur C. Clarke.


• Over at SciFiRama, Boris was impressed with a book signing by Richard Morgan.


• The Times Online lists Lisa Tuttle's Top 6 Arthur C. Clarke Award Winners. Sadly, I've read none of these...(Looks at JP.) [via Lit Lists]


• Quite a few genre books make the Telegraph's list of the 50 best cult books. [via Bookninja and When Gravity Fails]


• In case anyone thought Hollywood was heading in the right direction, I offer this bit of surreal news: Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson voices the lead character in an upcoming animated SF comedy called Planet 51 which Johnson describes as a "reverse E.T."


• Slice of SciFi lists The 7 Most Embarrassing Moments in Science Fiction.


• Omigod - Dusty Abell has created an amazing Classic Saturday Morning Cartoon Characters Drawing and has triggered memories I didn't even knew I had. And some I wish I didn't! (What the hell was young Billy Batson doing driving around with some creepy old guy in his camper?) [via Chris Roberson]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Saturday April 26, 2008 at 12:15 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Just a quick reminder to everyone, our Alien Nation: Ultimate Movie Collection giveaway contest is still running. If you want a chance to win a copy of all of the Alien Nation TV movies, send an email, along with your mailing address to:

contest AT sfsignal DOT com

The contest ends at 11:59:59PM CT on Sunday, April 27th (this Sunday), so get to emailing! We had a glut of entries the first, but a trickle since then. Enter if you dare!

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Posted by JP Frantz at Friday April 25, 2008 at 2:01 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

SF/F publisher Tor continues to provide free online versions of books for you pleasure. This week, it's Sun of Suns by Karl Schroeder, a very good read and a whole lot of fun. (See SF Signal review)

More freebies from Tor this week: two brand new desktop wallpapers by Julie Bell and Boris Vallejo.

Get them all now -- they're only available for one week only!

And don't forget to sign to be notified about the free books (in various formats) and wallpapers.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 25, 2008 at 11:01 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 25, 2008 at 12:38 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• FirstShowing.net showcases the new, nice-looking poster for The Dark Knight.


• SFF World interviews Tim Lebbon (Dusk, Dawn and Fallen).


• The Book Show podcast-interviews Ursula K. Le Guin. [via SFFaudio]


• Vimeo has video of Bruce Sterling's March 2007 talk at the Innovations Forum. Remember Spimes?


• Free audio fiction: Escape Pod podcasts Elizabeth Bear's Hugo-nominated "Tideline".


• Fanboy points us to at the way-cool science fiction artwork of Craig Maher.


• Real science: Jack Williamson, Roger Zelazny, C.S. Lewis and Fredric Brown recently had features on Mars named after them


• Bored of Jam sees an uncanny resemblance between Futurama's Dr Zoidberg and Doctor Who's Ood.


• io9 lists Science Fiction Gadgets That Make You Go... Wha?!


• Starwars.com lists 10 Cool Star Wars Posters from Japan. [via Grrl Still Kickin']


• OMG Lists enumerates 8 Fictional Cities You Wouldn't Want to Live in.


• I never imagined Princess Leia would make a fugly list, but...well...check out Topless Robot's lists of The 9 Most Tragically Hideous Female Action Figures Ever.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 25, 2008 at 12:37 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• That quintessential British SF comedy series, Blake's 7, is set to be revived by satellite channel Sky One. Elaine Pyke of Sky One says, "At a time when science fiction shows often discard good story-telling for overblown visual effects - and following the lead of Doctor Who and Battlestar Galactica - the time is ripe for a revival of a show that represents the best traditions of the genre, not to mention one of the best-loved and most successful dramas of all time." Sadly, I've never actually seen any episodes of this show, or Red Dwarf. Is it worth it to find them?
• Staying with the international flavor, any of our New Zealand readers are encouraged to sign this online petition to bring the Sci Fi Channel to New Zealand. And if you are from NZ, let us know!
• In celebration of the upcoming X-Files movie, Fox is releasing yet another X-File compilation DVD set entitled The X-Files: Revelations. The episodes span seasons 1 - 6 and include one of my favorites "Clyde Bruckmans Final Repose".
• Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune, and AZCentral.com, explains how to fix Fox's Terminator series. I think I sort of agree with all of the issues, except the time travel one. Time travel doesn't really bother me, unless and until it becomes too common place (I'm looking at you various Star Trek incarnations).
• Space Westerns and Screenrant offer us competing theories as who is the final cylon on Galactica. At this point, it had better be Lorne Greene...
• Sy Fy Portal asks are networks afraid of the f-word (frak)? Caution, strong language is used in the article, as you might imagine.
• The Fine Brothers bring us the latest in their LOST parody videos, "What will happen next?"
  

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Posted by JP Frantz at Friday April 25, 2008 at 12:20 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

I'm planning a day trip to Austin on Saturday to attend Nebula Weekend. I'm hoping to finally meet some folks who I know only through email. Those of you who are attending: you have been warned! :)

I doubt I'll be taking my computer and live-blogging it, but I will be able to access Twitter from my phone. To that end, there will be a "Twittering the Nebulas" widget on the left sidebar of the homepage during the event. I'm not sure yet if I'll be staying for the awards ceremony. Tune in to see what juicy tidbits of information I send through the Aether!

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 24, 2008 at 4:28 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

The 2008 Locus Award Finalists has been announced:

SF NOVEL

• The Accidental Time Machine by Joe Haldeman (Ace)
• Brasyl by Ian McDonald (Pyr) [See SF Signal review]
• Halting State by Charles Stross (Ace; Orbit UK) [See SF Signal review]
• Spook Country by William Gibson (Putnam; Viking UK)
• The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon (HarperCollins)

• Endless Things by John Crowley (Small Beer Press; Overlook)
• Making Money by Terry Pratchett (Doubleday UK; HarperCollins)
• Pirate Freedom by Gene Wolfe (Tor) [See SF Signal review]
• Territory by Emma Bull (Tor)
• Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay (Viking Canada; Roc)

• Extras by Scott Westerfeld (Simon Pulse; Simon & Schuster UK)
• The H-Bomb Girl by Stephen Baxter (Faber & Faber)
• Magic's Child by Justine Larbalestier (Razorbill)
• Powers by Ursula K. Le Guin (Harcourt; Gollancz)
• Un Lun Dun by China Miéville (Ballantine Del Rey; Macmillan UK)

• City of Bones by Cassandra Clare (Simon & Schuster/McElderry)
• Flora Segunda by Ysabeau S. Wilce (Harcourt)
• Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill (Morrow; Gollancz)
• The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (DAW; Gollancz)
• One for Sorrow by Christopher Barzak (Bantam Spectra)

• The Best of Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet edited by Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant (Ballantine Del Rey)
• The Coyote Road edited by Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling. (Viking)
• The New Space Opera edited by Gardner Dozois & Jonathan Strahan(Eos)
• The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror 2007: Twentieth Annual Collection edited by Ellen Datlow, Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant(St. Martin's)
• The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fourth Annual Collection edited by Gardner Dozois (St. Martin's) [See SF Signal review]

See also: Past winners.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 24, 2008 at 12:51 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

If you're in the Austin, Texas area Friday night (tomorrow) and want to some books signed by a slew of authors, head on down to the Omni Hotel:

From the press release:

Dozens of science fiction and fantasy authors will turn out for a mass autographing session Friday, April 25 from 5:30-8 p.m., kicking off the 2008 Nebula Awards Weekend in Austin by the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, Inc.

The mass autographing session sponsored by Book People will be held in the third floor Longhorn Room of the Omni Austin Hotel Downtown, located at San Jacinto and 8th Street. The session is free and open to the public. Books will be available for purchase, but those seeking signatures are free to bring their own from home.

Authors scheduled to take part in the mass autographing session include 2007 Damon Knight Grand Master honoree Michael Moorcock, Nebula Award Nominees Nancy Kress, Joe Haldeman and Jack McDevitt as well as such notable authors as Joe R. Lansdale, Steven Gould, Walter Jon Williams and Connie Willis. A complete list of participating authors can be found at http://www.sfwa.org/awards/2008/autographing.html.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 24, 2008 at 11:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Judging by the amount of books we receive here at SF Signal (see 2008's list right here), science fiction publishing in doing quite well. Trying to keep up with the flood of new books by well known authors is hard enough, what if you want to find something new and interesting? How do you find that 'underrated' author whose books you have to read? Well, you ask for help! Which is what we did for this week's Mind Meld.

Also I would nominate Olaf Stapledon, writing before the genre was truly formed, but with works like Starmaker and Last and First Men had a scope that has rarely been equaled in all the successive years.

These two are both pretty well known I'd guess, but I can't help thinking more exposure could only be a good thing.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Thursday April 24, 2008 at 12:22 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• SciFi Wire looks at the 85th anniversary of Weird Tales.


• Lois McMaster Bujold (The Sharing Knife) guest-posts at Eos Books.


• Richard K. Morgan asks the sf community: "What the hell is wrong with us?" [via Pat's Fantasy Hotlist and OF Blog of the Fallen, both of whom add interesting commentary]


• The latest The Future And You podcast features David Brin.


• On Alastair Reynold's redesigned website, he says his book, The Prefect, was Klausnered -- that is, given a good review by you-know-who.: "...when I was writing THE PREFECT, and needed a handy index by which to measure the prefects' ability to speed-read, the name 'Klausner' couldn't help but jump to mind. Hence, the throwaway joke on P26 (UK edition)" As might be expected, Klausner's review never mentioned that fact.


• io9 interviews Karen Joy Fowler (Wit's End ).


• Here's an audio Q&A with Minister Faust (From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain), taken from his talk at the University of Alberta. [via Minister Faust]


• Starship Sofa podcasts "Distraction" by Spider Robinson.


• Yesterday was the 2nd annual International Pixel-Stained Technopeasants Day. What does that mean to you? A butt-load of free fiction.


• TV Producer reviews SF: Joseph Mallozzi reviews Jeffrey Ford's The Empire of Ice Cream. Ford also guest-blogged there and offered readers a chance to help him create a short story.


• SyFy Portal looks at Pets in Space.


• GeekAlerts boldly points us toward this old-school Star Trek Medical Tricorder Replica


• Topless Robot lists 6 Movie Stars Who Should Be Batman Villains. Interesting choices...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 24, 2008 at 12:11 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Watch the latest SciFi Dept. as Kevin Maher almost beats Lou Ferrigno at arm wrestling. You would think he would have had better luck bribing him with hot dogs...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 23, 2008 at 12:41 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

Small Beer Press has made Maureen F. McHugh's Mothers & Other Monsters available as a free download via a Creative Commons License.
Here's the table of contents:

1. "Ancestor Money"
2. "In the Air"
3. "The Cost to Be Wise"
4. "The Lincoln Train"
5. "Interview: On Any Given Day"
6. "Oversite"
7. "Wicked"
8. "Laika Comes Back Safe"
9. "Presence"
10. "Eight-Legged Story"
11. "The Beast"
12. "Nekropolis"
13. "Frankenstein's Daughter"
14. The Evil Stepmother: An Essay
15. Author Interview
16. Talking Points

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 23, 2008 at 12:16 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• It's been rumored, rumored and talked about, and now it's official. Fox has renewed The Sarah Connor Chronicles for another season. The order is for thirteen more episodes, that will air at date to be determined. For me, I thought the show was O.K., becoming annoying near the end.
• Continuing their expansion into other media, the Sci Fi Channel and Virgin Comics have announced a second comic title to be released this summer: Superbia. It's billed as "the Justice League meets Wisteria Lane", which I'm not sure is a selling point.
• Stephanie Foster of Mister Article looks at the state of science fiction television and pronounces it 'amazing'. I wouldn't go that far, although Fox is loading up on the SF series for next season. I do, however, agree with the observation that getting people to recognize their favorite show is, or has elemenst of, science fiction meets strenuous resistence. When LOST aired the recent Desmond time travel episode, many people hated it because the SF elements were so overt, instead of in the background. Sigh.
• Thanks to the New York Comic Con, we now know that the live action Star Wars TV show is scheduled to air in 2010. It will focus on the "greasy, seamy underbelly of Star Wars." And no, that doesn't mean Lucas' stomach after a roll in his pile of dough from the prequel movies. Cautiously optimistic here.
• Well well, looks like we have a new SF disaster flick in the works, called Impact. Disaster refers to the genre, not the quality of the show. Of course, since it's a 4-hour mini-series for an unnamed cable channel, you may think it does reflect on the quality. But then there's this, the moon is hit by a piece of a brown dwarf which "triggers a series of anomalies on Earth, including cell phone service interruption, exaggerated tides and the occurrence of sporadic weightlessness." WTF? I think disaster is right on the money.
• The AV Club takes a look at 16 unanswered TV questions. Alf, Mork and Mindy, Journeyman and other SF shows make the list.
• Some tasty LOST info from the New York ComicCon: Lindeloff and Cuse, the exec producers, told the audience that the last scene has already been determined, that season 5 will premier at the end of January 2009! (you bastages!) and that the Orchid Training Video show at last year's San Diego Comic-Con will play a large role in the season finale for this year. Which means I'm expecting a mind blowing, time travel episode of epic proportions. Of course, LOST begins it's push to that finale this Thursday at 10pm ET.
• Fast Company magazine has posted a very cool article called Rebel Alliance: How a small band of sci-fi geeks is leading Hollywood into a new era. Tim Kring, Damon Lindelof and Jesse Alexander are interviewed, and Joss Whedon is name dropped. But are they really leading Hollywood into a 'good SF' new era?
• The script for Joss Whedon's highly anticipate new series, Dollhouse, has been leaked to a choice few. The verdict: awesome. Not really knowing either of those critics involved, I can't comment on their opinions. I can say, however, that if Whedon is involved, I expect great characters and stellar dialog.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Wednesday April 23, 2008 at 12:13 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• SciFi Wire profiles Ekaterina Sedia, editor of the urban fantasy anthology Paper Cities.


• ActuSf interviews Kathryn Kristine Rusch (The Retrieval Artist series).


• World Screen interviews Bonnie Hammer, she who controls the SciFi Channel.


• Editor Jonathan Strahan is tracking over 50+ 2008 sf/f anthologies. Wow. Who says short fiction is dying again? It'd be interesting to see this list sorted by release month.


• Barnes and Nobles' "Meet the Writers" features Karen Joy Fowler and Jim Butcher. Pasts episodes feature Neil Gaiman, Elizabeth Kostova, Susanna Clarke, Christopher Moore, Christopher Paolini, Terry Brooks, Brian Jacques, Eoin Colfer, Holly Black, R. A. Salvatore, and Anne Rice.


• Free Fiction: "Your Collar" by Elizabeth Bear from the latest issue of Subterranean Press magazine.


• While supplies last, Apex is offering Apex issue #2 for a measly buck. It features fiction from James P. Hogan, Athena Workman, Bryn Sparks, and Peter Hagelslag.


• James Bloomer, Niall Harrison, Paul Raven, and Jonathan McCalmont gang-review Matter by Iain Banks.


• SciFi magazine SFX is teaming up with SentForever to become the world's first magazine to be sent into space each month. Considering their logo presentation, I wonder if aliens will think we're all about the S*X. :)


• io9 lists The 5 Types Of Scifi Deus Ex Machinas. What, no mention of The Naked God by Peter F. Hamilton?


• Jeff VanderMeer, he with his finger on the heartbeat of what the public really wants to know, asks authors about which beers they think go best with their books.


• On Earth Day, Karen Burnham talks about reading eBooks and lists some sources for eBook reading.


• Forget Jet Packs! Alex at SciFi Scanner wants to know: Where's my robot butler?


• Popular Mechanics looks at Hollywood Sci-Fi's Bronze Age and asks: Are Comics to Blame? [via Going to the Mat, who offers additional insight.]


• Geeks are Sexy lists 10 Cool Gadgets Every Geek Should Want.


• MTV has Brendan Fraser talking about his almost-role as Superman.


• J.J. Abrams says Cloverfield was meant for the small screen. Funny how he mentions that to coincide with the DVD release and not, say, before the film was in theaters where it caused some viewers (like me) to experience vertigo. Gee, thanks J.J. [via SciFi Scanner]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 23, 2008 at 12:05 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

I jumped off the Battlestar Galactica train a season ago and I haven't looked back. That is, until I caught the first two episodes of this last season to see if the fanboy raving was warranted. It wasn't. What a snoozefest.

So, I echo Chris Roberson's sentiment when I blatantly copy: "Honestly, I think I'd rather watch a whole season of this than the last limping days of BSG..."

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 22, 2008 at 10:21 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

"The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about."
- Oscar Wilde
Irish dramatist, novelist, & poet (1854 - 1900)

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Posted by Scott Shaffer at Tuesday April 22, 2008 at 12:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

It's not that the actors' motions don't come even close to matching the music...it's not that his single-string guitar sounds like a six-string...it's not the contrast of 60's hippies and a 22nd century future...it's not even Spock jamming with the chick who plays the bicycle spokes. No, it's the guy with the big ears that really makes this work.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 22, 2008 at 12:22 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• SCI FI Weekly interviews the prolific Alan Dean Foster (Exceptions to Reality and Quofum, a Commonwealth book).


• The latest Adventures in Scifi Publishing features Cory Doctorow (Little Brother).


• Bibliophile Stalker interviews Jeff VanderMeer (Steampunk).


• Fanboy looks at The Science Fiction Artwork of Stephen Youll.


• Free Fiction: "Carnival Park" by Greg van Eekhout.


• Interzone #216 (also known as The Mundane-SF Issue) has gone to press and is guest-edited by Geoff Ryman, Julian Todd and Trent Walters. It includes fiction from Lavie Tidhar, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, Bille Aul, R.R. Angell, Anil Menon, Élisabeth Vonarbug and Geoff Ryman. Alongside the usual columns and reviews, the issue also includes interviews with Greg Egan and Alastair Reynolds.


• How would you feel if you stumbled upon a three-page autobiography of your life being sold on Amazon for $10? Just ask Jennifer Fallon.


• Marvel is adapting Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game series


• Scientists name their favorite books of all time.


• Howard Waldrop and Lawrence Person review The Forbidden Kingdom


• CNN points us to the photo gallery of a serious SciFi collector. OK, the Han in Carbonite is cool.


• Funny...I have no recollection of the "Must Poop" issue of the Superman comic when I read them in my youth...


• Big Dumb Object shows us Japanese Star Wars Tea Towels. I'm not sure whata tea towel is, but if I was going to get one, it'd have Metal-Bikini Princess Leia on it.


• Heckler Spray lists The Top 6 Disappointing Star Wars Characters. Number 1 is not who you think-think. [via TheForce.Net]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 22, 2008 at 12:19 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

It's that time again everyone. Time to give something away! This time we have a copy of the Alien Nation: Ultimate Movie Collection DVD set to just give away! I know, cool!

So what do you get? Well, first you get all 5 TV movies. The first four have 'Making Of' featurettes and gag reels. All movies have Ken Johnson commentary tracks and still photo galleries. And all this can be yours for the low low price of free. Well, actually, the low low price of an email. We have 1 copy to give away to a lucky reader and all you have to do is email us your name and address (we will delete your address as soon as the contest ends and a winner is picked. We will never use your address for anything else, except to exercise the DELETE function) to:

contest AT sfsignal DOT com (do the replacement move here and send us an email!)

Better get cracking if you want this DVD set. This contest ends on Sunday, April 27th. The winner will be notified on the 28th, and we'll let you know when you can expect your set to be shipped!

Hop to it.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday April 21, 2008 at 9:01 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

The official trailer for the upcoming Batman film looks groovy.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 21, 2008 at 11:34 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

REVIEW SUMMARY: A thought-provoking classic.

MY RATING:

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: George Orr, a man who can alter reality with his dreams, is manipulated by Dr. Haber, a dream specialist.

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Awesome premise; excellent characterizations; great writing.
CONS: None, really, though I was frustrated that this Omnipotent Reader couldn't figure out a way for George to solve his problems.
BOTTOM LINE: An excellent, though-provoking classic.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 21, 2008 at 12:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• The Agony Column audio-interviews Peter F. Hamilton, author of The Dreaming Void.


• The Dragon Page Interviews Justin Gustainis, author of Black Magic Woman. [via SFFaudio]


• James Wallace Harris asks: Is It Time To Remake Blade Runner? and explores the question in-depth. Don't get me started...


• Ann and Jeff VanderMeer begin their science fiction art stint at io9 with this post about Ben Templesmith.


• Editor John Klima sneak peek at the next issue of Electric Velocipede.


• Recently-free fiction at ManyBooks.net: "Daughters of Doom" by Herbert B. Livingston (1939).


• A new batch of recently-free fiction has been posted at the über-resourcefulFree Speculative Fiction Online.


• Wil Wheaton channels Terry Pratchett through Neil Gaiman and gets some writerly reassurance.


• File 770 boldly leads us to fan-produced videos inspired by the animated Star Trek series.


• Solar Flare lists 7 Things Sci-Fi Fans Should Stop Doing.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 21, 2008 at 12:11 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Farscape is the show that just won't die. First Farscape is getting a series of webisodes to air on SciFi.com in the near future. In conjunction with that, Farscape will also receieve a new comic series. Each series will be a set of 4 comics and will 'explore and expand the stories of Farscape'. Good news for fans.
• Sci Fi Japan continues their coverage of Speed Racer in anticipation of the new movie's release on May 9th. This time they look at the beginnings of Speed, or Mach Go Go Go in Japan. Complete with sketches from the show.
• Has The Sarah Connor Chronicles finally been renewed? We've heard rumors before, and while we still have no official word, the rumor from scoop-master extraordinaire Michael Ausiello is that it has been renewed. Good news if true, and Fox is loading up on the SF shows for next season. With that many shows, they can't jack with all of them, can they?
• Helium.com reviews the Sci Fi Shows of the '70's. I had completely forgotten about Fantasy Island, much to my shame (de shame boss, de shame!).
• John at Grasping for the Wind explains how LOST lost me. And if, as John has, you've only seen through season 2, I can certainly understand why. The last part of season 3 and, of course, the new season have put the shine back on.
• Lisa Paitz Spindler lists 13 things I enjoy about Battlestar Galactica. Sadly, none of them is 'The Cylons have a comprehensive and logical plan'.
• TV Guide has posted a really nice interview with Leonard Nimoy and Zachary Quinto about being Spock. It's amazing how much Quinto looks like Spock when in full makeup.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday April 21, 2008 at 12:02 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Here are the results of the latest SF Signal poll.

QUESTION

Which of these books from the "Perfect Library" is your favorite?

RESULTS

"I admit that Foundation may not be the best work, in literary terms, of the list. However, I read the book first out of all of the books on the list, and the power and vision of Asimov's work still resonates with me today." - Jvstin

"For "favorite" I used the 'one I enjoy re-reading the most' criterion. These are all good, but really... nothing from the last twenty years? Nothing? How much time does it take to make something a "classic" anyway?" - Karen Burnham

"1984, Foundation or 2001? Flip a three-sided coin..." - platyjoe

"'1984' was the most influential and 'Brave New World' had the most metaphorical accuracy, but 'Foundation' (I assume this means the whole trilogy) was the most enjoyable. Of course, that's from the perspective of a teenaged sf nerd. Let me re-read them all and I'll give you my adult opinion..." - Matte Lozenge

"Whose perfect library? Basic, yes. But very limited, Tolkien...Lewis....Bradbury...Howard..Keyes....and on and on?
Blessings" - Richard Novak

"I voted for Brave New world, but Day of the Triffids was a very, very close second." - SF Fangirl

"I didn't answer this poll for several days because it was too hard to select just one. Really I'd almost have to include five of these as absolute musts: 1984, Brave New World, 20000 Leagues, Foundation, and 2001, with most of the rest almost-as-musts." - Bryan

"Several years back, when I knew hardly anything of written sf I picked a copy of the Foundation based on thickness and cover art alone. I had no idea. After a few minutes reading my eyes were open wide, my mouth agape. I had no idea there were such things in this world. Since I have reread the book, ohhh a lot. So, I would say that Foundation is my favorite." - General X

Be sure to visit our front page and vote in this week's poll about your favorite villain from the Batman television series!

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 21, 2008 at 12:00 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

No, I'm not talking about Sean Connery's Outland...

Here's a "video-shopped" version of High Noon to make it appear like some futistic old time West. Much coolness. And that "Marshal's bionic eye" bit...nice touch

[via Roberson's Interminable Ramble]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Sunday April 20, 2008 at 11:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

I have a dilemma and I'd like your help. I have amassed a few of books I can't finish because I don't want to spend any more time reading them. Do you want to know about these books? Before you answer, let me explain why I consider it a hard decision.

Here at SFSignal we get a lot of emails from people asking us to review their books. Almost all of the requests are from major publishing houses and are part of the overall book hype machine. I'd like to think I have some integrity and will tell you when I don't like a book, but disliking a book doesn't seem to happen that often. Looking back over all the novels reviewed I reviewed so far this year, none have received less than 3 stars. In some ways I believe it goes to my argument that major publishing houses are unlikely to publish a bad book because 1) they have editors who work with the author to polish a book prior to publication and 2) they don't want to lose money.

But of course, that's not the whole story.

Update: Folks I owe an apology to the reviewers here on this blog. I did not intend to imply that the people here wouldn't tell you when they didn't like a novel. They certainly will and there is a ton of evidence of that here in the archives. I meant this to be about me and my dilemma involving small press/self-published works - not about the other fine folks who review here. I changed the paragraph above to be clearer and (I hope) remove the offensive language (and to be clear, it was offensive - I can only apologize again and humbly state that it was not intentionally so.) - Scott

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Posted by Scott Shaffer at Sunday April 20, 2008 at 8:14 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• John Picacio shows off his way-cool final cover art for the Pyr reprint of Robert Silverberg's Son of Man. See also: The bigger wraparound version.


• Bob Eggleton has supplied color artwork for Subterranean Press' publication of Project Moonbase and Others by Robert A. Heinlein.


• Orson Scott Card has announced Ender's Exile, the next book in the Ender's series.


• Joseph Mallozzi throws reader questions at F. Paul Wilson (The Keep and the Repairman Jack series).


• Nexus Torch examines the question that Alice Sheldon (writing as James Tiptree, Jr.) asks in her story "The Women Men Don't See". Specifically: "How could a woman choose to live among unknown monsters, to say goodbye to her home, her world?"


• Check out the story behind the 1936 John Carter of Mars Animation Project.


• It's official: The character of Tony Stark (played by Iron Man's Robert Downey, Jr.) will have a cameo appearance in The Incredible Hulk.


• Real Science: The Moon's birth changed the length of days on Earth, sez New Scientist. "The collision that formed our moon may have defined the length of our planet's day and set the direction in which it spins."


• Family Guy's Seth MacFarlane is voicing the character of Johann Kraus in Hellboy II. I'd pay good money to see Kraus utter a Stewie Griffin line.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Sunday April 20, 2008 at 12:12 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Not re-enacted by bunnies, but still cool.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Saturday April 19, 2008 at 11:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Eos Books is letting you browse Judge, the sixth and final installment of Karen Traviss' Wess'har Wars.


• At SciFi Wire, John Joseph Adams profiles Barth Anderson, author of The Magician and the Fool.


• At Omnivoracious, Jeff VanderMeer profiles Gwenda Bond on young adult sf and YA sf for adults.


• Kate Elliot's beautifully simple manifesto: Don't Bore Me. Kate is also featured on Scalzi's Big Idea feature.


• Asimov's magazine's website includes content from the June issue, including Sheila Williams' editorial, Robert Silverberg's Reflections: The Death of Gallium, and Peter Heck's book reviews. [via Locus Online]


• Free Audio Fiction: "Come Lady Death" by Peter S. Beagle. [via F&SF Blog]


• In addition to his duties at Futursimic and his own blog, Velcro City Tourist Board, Paul Raven is now also the press/publicity/marketing guy at PS Publishing. Congrats, Paul!


• The Justice League movie has been tabled. Where are the Wonder Twins when you need them?


• Screen Rant has the cool new Hellboy II poster.


• Jason Stoddard lists 5 Big Things Science Fiction Can Do To Improve Its Image.


• J. Michael Straczynski knows what the networks don't know about science fiction. (An MIT Forum transcript.)


• Battlestar Galactica's puppet master, Ronald D. Moore, has signed with United Artists to create and write a SciFi movie trilogy.


• Cool Site of the Day: Robot of the Month. [via Illustration]


• Speaking of robots, Boing Boing points us to this robot celebrity T-shirt.


• The List Universe lists The Top 10 Obscure But Superb Science Fiction Novels. I've read none of these (sad), but own most of them (sadder).

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Posted by John DeNardo at Saturday April 19, 2008 at 12:33 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Perhaps a little theme music to put you in the mood?

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 18, 2008 at 5:32 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

[NOTE: This is a guest review by blogger, author and 'winner' of our Sands of Oblivion contest, Larry Ketchersid. All opinions expresses herein are those of Larry and not necessarily those of the management, staff, families or pets of SF Signal. Although they might be. We may even tell if you ask nicely. Due to various technical issues (read- I'm lazy) this review was not posted under Larry's name but under JP's. See four sentences above.)]

REVIEW SUMMARY: All that you would expect from a SciFi channel monster movie: hokey special effects, bad acting....but, unlike most, this one had an interesting plot plus stars from TV series Serenity and Charmed.

MY RATING: (2 stars from me, 3 stars from my 17 year old son)

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Cecil B. DeMille films The Ten Commandments in the desert around Guadeloupe, California. Mysterious deaths, caused by some kind of curse, cause him to bury the constructed set. Sixty years later, archeologists try to find and move the set because of impending floods, and unearth an ancient Egyptian monster.

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Interesting plot premise, Jayne (Adam Baldwin) and Inara/Adria (Morena Baccarin), an excellent gun-totting redneck retired Army guy as comic relief.
CONS: Special effects reminiscent of Power Rangers or other SciFi Channel monster movies; why is George Kennedy in this movie?;about the worst go-cart chase scene ever; Jayne plays a wussy-man...is there nothing sacred??
BOTTOM LINE: Im glad I didnt pay for it (thanks, SF Signal)but the Egyptian lead in and theme creates an interesting premise; just keep in mind it was free on the SciFi Channel and worth every penny.

My wife enters a lot of contests; last year, she won a trip to the Super Bowl and took me. I told her I won this movie on an SF Signal contest and I'd let her watch it with me to even the score.

After watching it, I'm still in her debt by a large amount and may owe her more.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Friday April 18, 2008 at 9:58 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Nice going, Boy Wonder.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 18, 2008 at 12:29 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• At Onmnivoracious, Jeff VanderMeer offers quick peeks at Liz Williams' Inspector Chen novels and Theodore Judson's The Martian General's Daughter.


• Interviews:
  • ActuSf interviews Karl Schroeder.
  • Author interviews author: Jennifer Rardin (the Jaz Parks series) interviews Robert Buettner (Orphan's Journey).
  • Pat's Fantasy Hotlist interviews Kay Kenyon.
  • Fantasy Book Critic interviews Alan Campbell (Scar Night).
  • Jonathan Strahan interviews Cory Doctorow, a contributor to his original young adult anthology, The Starry Rift.


• The latest issue of The Internet Review of Science Fiction has been posted.


• DonationWare Fiction: "How I Proposed to My Wife: An Alien Sex Story" by John Scalzi. Donations are appreciated and will go to The Lupus Foundation of America. [via Joe Sherry]


• Night Shade Books has posted their 2008 publication schedule.


• Rich Horton lists the tentative table of contents for his Space Opera 2008 anthology. (There will be no 2007 edition, alas.)


• Jeremy Lassen wants to know your favorite Cthulhu story not written by H.P. Lovecraft. [via Jonathan Strahan]


• The next Fantastic Fiction at KGB reading features Jack O'Connell and Ekaterina Sedia.


• Summer Glau is one of Vanity Fair's Vanities Girls. [via Whedonesque]


• Here's a list of Classic SciFi Films of the 60's.


• Topless Robot lists The 10 Worst CG Effects in Movies That Could Afford Better.


• SETI lists 10 Must-Read "First Contact" Novels. What, no room for Carl Sagan's Contact?

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 18, 2008 at 12:12 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Galaxy Press is embarking on an ambitious publishing project called Stories From the Golden Age, a project that will reprint 80 cross-genre Pulp titles written by L. Ron Hubbard. The project will span six years, with the publication of about one book per month.

From the Press Release:

..the Golden Age is again being celebrated, enabling readers to explore the largest series of multiple-genre, pulp fiction novels ever written by a single author -- Stories from the Golden Age published by Los Angeles-based Galaxy Press. The series will include eighty titles with their original artwork to be released over as many months and will showcase some of the era's most evocative and far ranging literary genres penned by explorer, master storyteller and multiple New York Times' best-selling author L. Ron Hubbard.

It was 1938 when the top brass of the New York publishing company Street & Smith asked two of the most established top-line adventure writers of the day, Arthur J. Burkes and L. Ron Hubbard, to begin writing a new kind of science fiction story where people, not machines or gadgets were central to the story. They were introduced to now-legendary editor John W. Campbell, Jr., publisher of Astounding Science Fiction. From that moment on, the Golden Age was in full swing.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 17, 2008 at 12:10 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

MY RATING:

Starcross is Philip Reeve's sequel to his awesome Larklight (SF Signal review) novel for young readers. This time, Art Mumby, his sister Myrtle and their mother travel to the finest sea-bathing resort in the asteroid belt, Starcross. While there, they encounter all manner of strange and interesting things, the least of which is menacing mechanical Punch and Judy machines. The mystery they uncover could spell doom for the British Empire!

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Posted by JP Frantz at Thursday April 17, 2008 at 12:54 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Interviews and Profiles:
  • At SciFi Wire, John Joseph Adams profiles Allen Steele, author of Galaxy Blues.
  • SF Site interviews Patrick Rothfuss (The Name of the Wind).
  • John Scalzi is featured on another Tor podcast, this time talking about The Last Colony.
  • The latest Cult Pop features Lauren Groff (Monsters of Templeton) and Corey Redekop (Shelf Monkey).


• Free Fiction:
  • "A Butterfly in Peking" by Nina Munteanu. [via SF Canada]
  • From ManyBooks.net:
    • "No Moving Parts" by Murray F. Yaco (1960)
    • "Trouble on Titan" by Arthur K. Barnes (1941)


• Cover Pr0n: Tobias Buckell shows off the cool Brian Dow cover for his upcoming collection from Wyrm Publishing, Tides From The New Worlds.


• James Nicoll asks: Are SF Awards an exercise in futility?


• Futile or not, James @ Big Dumb Object has an analysis of the BSFA Award novel shortlists vs. the Clarke Award shortlists.


• Commentary in Fantasy Magazine tells us How To Kill Off A Sense Of Wonder in fantasy (particularly paranormal fantasy). There are some great comments in this thread. I echo the thought that not everything needs to be original. Even so, "original" to the whole of written fiction at large is a much harder obligation to fulfill than "original to me".


• Solar Flare lists 10 Fantasy Books That Should Be Movies.


• Peggy @ Biology in Science Fiction looks at The Depiction of Cloning in the Movies and lists "the best of the bunch, science-wise".


• SciFi Scanner asks: Why Does Sci-Fi Hate Utopia? My answer: Because Utopias are boring and Dystopias rock.


• The new X-Files movie has a name: The X-Files: I Want to Believe.


• Cinematical has the scoop on the big screen adaptation of the comic Atlantis Rising.


• This week's SciFi Dept has Kevin Maher looking at The Five Most Evil Computer Villains. Weren't all of these easily defeated by asking the computer to calculate Pi to the last digit? Oh wait...that was just on Star Trek.


• I'm glad someone else has noticed Bruce Davison's SciFi creds. SciFi Observer showcases Bruce Davison: Great Sci-Fi A-hole.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 17, 2008 at 12:49 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Ah yes, LOST, everyone's favorite convoluted SF TV show. Do you think you know what's going on? Then prove it. USA Today is running a contest for LOST fans whereby you can send in your hypothesis (200 or words or less) for any, or all, of the island mysteries and win a chance to have your hypothesis 'graded' by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse who will tell you if you're supposition is right, wrong, or terribly wrong. The best will be printed in the paper and online, while the best of the best will get the Darlton treatment. I don't think it's possible to sum up the overall mystery in 200 words...
• Amazon's Screening Room continues their celebrity blog postage, this time with an entry by Tim's favorite Galactica character, Boomer. Sorry, I mean Grace Park. You can follow the link above to hear the complete audio interview with Grace. Something I'm sure Tim will do. Repeatedly.
• This past April 2nd part of the creative team behind Eureka attended a chat session at Missouri State University (whether in person or online I can't determine). They cover quite a bit of stuff and not all of it pertaining to Eureka.
• Warbirds is another Sci Fi Original movie debuting this Saturday. This part of the description I like, "the film is set during World War II and blends action and SF". But it quickly devolves into yet another monster movie (YAMM, mmm, yams), "an Air Force colonel being ferried on a secret mission across the Pacific when a pterdodactyl [sic] attack forces his bomber and its all-female crew to land on a remote island". Sigh. So much could be done SF-wise with a WWII movie, and we get pterodactyls. Well, actually, we get 'pterdodactyls' which sound like a cross between dodos and pterodactyls. Not something that sounds menacing.
• The Nickelodean anime show, Avatar: The Last Airbender, seems to be quite popular. So much so that M. Night Shyamalan(a-ding-dong) is adapting it into a live-action movie. Yet another animated show turned into a live-action movie. Supposedly, the TV show was heavily influenced by the creator's love for Hayao Miyazaki. Of course, I don't hold out hope that the movie adaption will be anywhere close to Miyazaki's level.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Thursday April 17, 2008 at 12:10 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

I'm getting excited about the A&E adaptation of Michael Crichton's The Andromeda Strain. I loved the book and enjoyed the 1971 Robert Wise film, and this is looking pretty decent even though they changed some things (as they always do).

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 16, 2008 at 12:22 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

One of the many perennial arguments in the science fiction blogosphere centers on the health of the short fiction market, so we turned the Mind Meld microphone to people in the field and asked them:

The traditional SF magazines are in hospice care waiting to die, and there hasn't been a successful attempt at starting a new print SF magazine in decades. The online markets are loss leaders or labors of love.

And even if they weren't, even if there were actual commercial SF magazines with workable long-term business plans, from an author's point of view the so-called "professional" rates -- that only a handful of markets can afford to pay -- are a joke everyone's heard so often it's not worth groaning at. The penny a word John W. Campbell paid his authors in 1937 would be worth nearly fifteen cents now -- three times more than what most of the "pro" markets are paying. Even Hugo Gernsback's 1926 quarter-cent -- three cents a word in 2008 -- would put him at the top of the semi-pro pack today.

At a nickel a word you could fill every slot in every pro market every month and still not make enough to make the median mortgage payment in Chicago or Baltimore. Nobody's making a living off selling SF short fiction to traditional markets, except maybe Howard Waldrop. There just isn't enough money in the SF short fiction business to pay writers a living wage; there hasn't been since prime-time TV went color, and there never will be again.

Which is not to say the SF short story is dead. There are more places to read short stories, more places to get an SF short story published, than there have ever been. Do good work and you'll get critical acclaim, the respect of your peers, and the right to munch cold cuts in the SFWA suite at Worldcon. You won't make enough money to quit your day job, but then, SF novelists generally don't make enough money to quit their day jobs these days, either.

Meanwhile, if you insist on wanting to know how to make money writing short fiction, talk to Nick Mamatas. But you won't hear much about genre markets.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 16, 2008 at 12:28 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Interviews and Profiles:
  • SciFi Wire profiles John Meaney, author of Bone Song.
  • Bookgasm interviews Ann and Jeff VanderMeer, editors of the upcoming anthology Steampunk.
  • Editor Jonathan Strahan interviews Tricia Sullivan, who contributes a story to his anthology The Starry Rift
  • The latest Tor Podcast features John Scalzi and David Lubar about "literary weenies, stuffed spaceships, and only-children".


• Free Fiction: Space Westerns is serializing "A Man Called Mister Brown" by A.R. Yngve.


• Scott Edelman has the scoop on the career retrospective collection The Worlds of Jack Williamson: A Centennial Tribute to be published by Hafner Press. [via SF Scope]


• Artist Bob Eggleton looks at the evolution of his dinosaur artwork.


• Meanwhile, John Picacio shows us some of the preliminary artwork for Robert Silverberg's Son of Man reprint.


• Did you know there is a connection between J.G. Ballard and children's television?


• Andrew Wheeler sez J.K. Rowling is wrong regarding her recent legal actions against Harry Potter secondary works.


• Dan Ronco says a new Golden Age of Science Fiction is approaching.


• John Clute review The Dreaming Void by Peter F. Hamilton: "So it is good to think we can skip those parts of this introductory volume which seem almost rope-a-dope, as though the author were fending off any pretense he was telling a story until he managed to find out what it was; and that we can skip the punch-drunk I-could-have-been-a-contender bits too, where the tale is finally begun but with so exiguous a loquacity that the content drowns in flannel, much of it consisting of name-check infodumps which reintroduce the reader to interchangeable quasi-immortal heroes and heroines and villains from Peter F. Hamilton's previous sequence--Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained--whose overall venue and macro-story the new sequence re-enters a thousand or so years later, in order, eventually, we assume, to trump it." Yes, I've said that many times.


• Blog of the Day: Zombie Daily, which features a daily zombie drawing by artist Rob Sacchetto.


• SciFi Jungle lists Top 10 Science Fiction Movie Comedies. What, no Waterworld? Hi-yo!


• If Thundercats ever looked like this, I might still be watching it.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 16, 2008 at 12:16 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Editor Jonathan Strahan has a website for The Starry Rift: Tales of New Tomorrows, an original science fiction anthology aimed at young adults that is new this week.

Looking at the table of contents, Scott Westerfeld wins the prize for Best Short Story Title:

1. "Repair Kit" by Stephen Baxter
2. "Anda's Game" by Cory Doctorow
3. "Lost Continent" by Greg Egan
4. "The Dismantled Invention of Fate" by Jeffrey Ford
5. "Orange" by Neil Gaiman
6. "Sundiver Day" by Kathleen Ann Goonan
7. "Cheats" by Gwyneth Jones
8. "An Honest Day's Work" by Margo Lanagan
9. "The Surfer" by Kelly Link
10. "Incomers" by Paul McAuley
11. "The Dust Assassin" by Ian McDonald
12. "Infestation" by Garth Nix
13. "The Star Surgeon's Apprentice" by Alastair Reynolds.
14. "Post-Ironic Stress Syndrome" by Tricia Sullivan
15. "Ass-Hat Magic Spider" by Scott Westerfeld
16. "Pinocchio" by Walter Jon Williams

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 16, 2008 at 12:10 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Ron Moore, of Galactica fame, gets his slot on the roulette wheel that is science fiction on Fox. He has been given the greenlight for a two-hour, back door pilot called Virtuality. The show "is set aboard the starship Phaeton on a 10-year journey to explore a distant solar system. To help the 12 crew members endure the long trip and keep their minds occupied, NASA has equipped the ship with advanced virtual-reality modules, allowing them to assume adventurous identities and go to any place they want. The plan works until a mysterious bug is found in the system". Oh boy, just what we need, an entire series about the holodeck going haywire. Where's Wesley when you need him?
• Candleblog wonders what went wrong with Battlestar Galactica? I don't know, I'm still watching. It's still better than most dreck on TV.
• The season three finale of Dr. Who is this Saturday on BBC America. In anticipation, BBC America is making audio commentary available for the finale featuring David Tennant. You can stream it live or download and listen to it when you watch the show. Cool.
• Micheal L. Wentz loved The Sarah Jane Adventures. Then he goes all crazy and calls Russell T. Davies the Gene Roddenberry of our generation.
• TVShowsOnDVD is reporting that season 2 of the remastered Star Trek series will be available on August 5th. Now that the format wars of the 00's are over, you can expect to see a Blu-Ray version in the near future.
• ABC is confirming that they have, indeed, ordered an additional hour of LOST to air this season. Awesome. Pre-empting LOST for that hack medical drama, Grey's Anatomy? Lame.
• For all you Stargate fans, next time you're in Vegas, be on the lookout for the new Stargate themed slot machine! Seriously, if Sci Fi really wants to expand their brand, why not a science fiction themed casino? Mansquito could be the doorman. The possibilities are endless.
• Two new Clone Wars novels, based on the upcoming animated show, will also be available in audiobook form.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Wednesday April 16, 2008 at 12:05 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Small Beer Press has release John Kessel's short story collection, The Baum Plan for Financial Independence and Other Stories, under a Creative Commons License.

From Small Beer Press:

Today, April 15, 2008, is tax day in the USA and we all need cheering up. We're celebrating at Small Beer Press by publishing John Kessel's first collection of short stories in ten years, The Baum Plan for Financial Independence and Other Stories, as well as releasing it as a free download in a number of completely open formats--with, of course, no Digital Rights Management (DRM).

The Baum Plan includes Kessel's Tiptree Award winning "Stories for Men" (gender inequality meet Fight Club...on the moon), "Pride and Prometheus," a mashup of Frankenstein and Jane Austen, and "Powerless," an amazing mix of pulp fictions, paranoia, and academia.

The Baum Plan is licensed under a Creative Commons (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 license allowing readers to share the stories with friends and generally have at them in any remixing/interpretation/Web 2.0 huddly-cuddly noncommercial manner. The collection is provided in these formats: low-res PDF, HTML, RTF, and text file. We encourage any and all conversions into other formats.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 15, 2008 at 5:12 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

Anime, it's not just for otaku anymore. Following on the news of a live-action version of Akira, the purported live-action remake of Neon Genesis Evangelion and of course the live-action remake of Speed Racer, Variety is reporting the Spielberg's company, DreamWorks, has acquired the rights to remake Ghost in the Shell, in live-action 3D no less. Apparently Spielberg took a personal interest in the project as the movie is 'one of my favorite stories'. I guess that's what releasing Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence gets you.

Now I know there are cynics out there saying, "Wait a minuted, I've already seen this live-action film. It's called The Matrix!" And, yes, The Matrix and Ghost in the Shell share quite a bit of visual and thematic elements. But, and maybe this is just me, after watching most of the spinoffs and such around both of these movies, I find Ghost in the Shell to be more interesting over all. In fact, the TV show based on the movie is one of my favorite SF anime shows ever. The Matrix fell quite a bit with the release of the follow on two movies. So, in a word, I'm quite excited by this news. 3D may be seen as being a over the top, but given some of the scenes in the original move, skydiving from a skyscraper comes to mind, 3D could kick some serious butt, if done well. I guess we'll know how good 3d can be when James Cameron's Avatar comes out.

I've said before that I think Ghost in the Shell is a great movie to adapt for American audiences. The success of The Matrix shows that a more 'philosophical' SF movie will be accepted, but it has to be done right. Hopefully the screenwriters won't make a mess of it, like so many of the recent adaptations of Asian horror movies have turned out to be. I'll be looking forward to this one. Maybe it's time to go back and watch all the GitS stuff...

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Posted by JP Frantz at Tuesday April 15, 2008 at 12:32 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

The fifth and final Hugo-nominated short story, Stephen Baxter's "Last Contact" has been posted at Solaris' website. (Thanks, Mark @ Solaris!)

The list of Free Hugo-Nominated Short Fiction has been updated.

Only one story remains unavailable for free reading: the novelette "The Cambist and Lord Iron: a Fairytale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham, originally published by Bantam in Logorrhea edited by John Klima. Word has it that this last story will available soon...

Stay tuned...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 15, 2008 at 12:15 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

MY RATING:

Physics of the Impossible is Michio Kaku's latest science book and it is heavily influenced by science fictional ideas that may seem impossible, but in reality have definite scientific underpinnings (force fields, starships, FTL, time travel and others). Along the way he classifies these SF-nal ideas into three categories: Type I Impossibility (impossible today, but don't violate laws of physics), Type II (skirt the edges of our understanding, may be possible in centuries or millennia), and Type III (violate our understanding of physics and, if possible, will require a complete re-evaluation of our understanding of physics). If you liked our interview with Mr. Kaku, you'll most definitely enjoy this book.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Tuesday April 15, 2008 at 1:00 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Free Fiction:
  • From ManyBooks.net: The Planet Strappers by Raymond Z. Gallun. FWIW, this was listed on the list of SF Signal's Top 26 SF Books You've Never Read, so now you have no excuse.
  • The Spring 2008 issue of Subterranean Online kicks off with: "Air and Angels" by Beth Bernobich, "By the Liter" by Ekaterina Sedia, and "Stone Eggs" by Adriana Campoy and James P. Blaylock. (There's also an interview with Sherrilyn Kenyon by Alethea Kontis.)


• The winner of this year's James Tiptree, Jr. Award, given to works of SF and fantasy that explore gender roles, is Sarah Hall's The Carhullan Army, published as Daughters of the North in the U.S. (See also: Past winners.) [via Locus Online]


• Over at The Telegraph, Mark Chadbourn looks at The fantastic appeal of fantasy: "The more rational the world gets, the more we demand the irrational in our fiction." [via When Gravity Fails]


• Matt Cheney's latest Strange Horizons column is The Hero, Pulped. It's all about his latest obsession, The Spider. I've bought several of these in paperback and noticed in B&N that they are being reprinted. Not that I buy old pulp paperback that I have no time to read or troll bookstore aisles on weekends...


• The First Book interviews James Van Pelt, author of the collection Summer of the Apocalypse.


• Bibliophile Stalker interviews Sean Wallace, proprietor of Prime Books.


• The Toronto Public Library SF author reading series has some familiar names lined up between April and May: Karl Schroeder, James Alan Gardner, Peter Watts, Kelley Armstrong, Guy Gavriel Kay, Jim Munroe, Cory Doctorow, Nalo Hopkinson, Terence Green, Phyllis Gotlieb, Julie E. Czerneda, Dave Duncan, Edward Willett, and more.


• The latest issue of Concatenation has been posted with new content.


• Roddenberry Productions will be hosting a special online screening of "To Serve All My Days: A Night in 1969," the latest fan-created episode from Star Trek: New Voyages. Roddenberry.com's Sneak Peak Into "1969" contest will run from April 10-28, with 500 winners being chosen to view the online premiere.


• CNN knows what Patrick Stewart does for fun. Hint: It's not Sesame Street Shakespeare, but it's close.


• Cinematical is showing the poster for The Incredible Hulk, which to me, only emphasizes the implausibility of the stretchiness of Bruce Banner's pants.


• Several genre book covers make Smashing Magazine's list of Excellent Book Covers and Paperbacks.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Tuesday April 15, 2008 at 12:53 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

REVIEW SUMMARY: Time-traveling pirates - what is not to love? OK, there isn't really any science fiction in this story, but it is a fun book non the less.

MY RATING:

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Father Chris is more than he appears when he admits to killing a man in his past. The story of how it happened takes you back to the time of real pirates raiding Spanish ships full of treasure from the new world.

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Gene Wolfe is a master storyteller with a command of the English language I can only marvel at. His prose - especially his character's dialog - puts him amongst the best writers of our time, and this book is no exception. Brilliant ending. Generally strong female characters.
CONS: Fans of Wofle's other more complex works might be disappointed by this rather straight-forward tale. Similar premise to Wizard Knight with a similar protagonist.
BOTTOM LINE: Gene Wolfe never stops surprising me with the variety of settings and types of people he writes about. Where will we end up next? I don't know, but I can't wait.

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Posted by Scott Shaffer at Monday April 14, 2008 at 11:25 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

REVIEW SUMMARY: A great showcase of Bacigalupi's unique style and his mastery of short fiction.

MY RATING:

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: A collection of ten stories written by Paolo Bacigalupi. (A limited edition contains an additional story.)

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Nine of the ten stories were good; three of those were outstanding.
CONS: One story dangerously close to being mediocre.
BOTTOM LINE: Clear evidence of Bacigalupi's control over the form of short fiction.

Paolo Bacigalupi is rapidly the ranks of short fiction stardom, collecting accolades and critical acclaim at nearly every turn. Evidence supporting this can be found in his recent ten-story collection, Pump Six and Other Stories, which almost includes his entire short fiction output to date. (Night Shade Books also publishes a limited edition that contains the missing eleventh story, "Small Offerings", which I reviewed in Fast Forward 1.)

One thing is clear: Bacigalupi does not write fiction just for the sake of it. Each story is rooted in one social issue or another. The backdrops he paints are mostly bleak, making the overall collection a tasty smorgasbord of Dystopias. He shows us eco-ravaged futures and technologies that create unique circumstances for the protagonists. While I'm not usually interested in science fiction as social commentary, Bacigalupi writes with a thankfully subtle hand, allowing the reader the take in as much - or as little - as he or she wishes. Furthermore, each of his stories explores a "single conceit", the hallmark of classic short fiction, only as seen through the modern eyes of the socially conscious. The overall quality of the collection is thus fairly strong, with some of these stories garnering Hugo and Nebula nominations.

Reviewlettes of each story follow...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 14, 2008 at 12:29 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

With bowls of popcorn in our laps, my daughter and I sat down to watch the premiere episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures, the spin-off of Doctor Who. Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen) was the sidekick of the third and forth Doctors back in the 70's, way before I was ever introduced to the show. The character also made an appearance in the 2006 episode "School Reunion", at the end of which she sauntered happily off with the robotic dog called K-9.

Here are my initial impressions of the show.
(Cue Leslie Nielson: "I'm sorry...I don't do impressions.")

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 14, 2008 at 12:15 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• All right all you young whippersnappers, listen up. You may be wondering what all the fuss is over the upcoming Speed Racer movie (aside from the unique visuals and car fu). Well, Sci Fi Japan is doing a huge service for those of you who are not familiar with Speed and crew. They've running a series of post, looking at the original Speed Racer anime in all its glory. Marvel you will, especially when you realize there is oh so much more to come.
• Minister Faust offers us his predictions about Galactica's final season. I'm not sure I agree, or disagree really, with any of them. They're just food for thought right now, although I would say the 'time-travel Kobold' theory could be cool, or suck eggs. It would certainly fit into the whole 'all this has happened before' schtick if there are in some sort of closed time loop.
• Apparently cutting records isn't just for the the original Star Trek crew. Chase Masterson, Leeta from DS9, talks about her singing and her second album (among other stuff), to Robo Japan. And just so you know, Brent Spiner has a couple of albums under his belt too.
• Thanks to the afore mentioned Robo Japan, we learn that Privateer Press is developing a collectible miniatures kaiju (that sorta means 'giant monster') game called Monsterpocalypse!. You can follow along at the developer's blog. Please, please, please be like Crush, Crumble and Chomp! (How I miss thee my old Apple ][+ for you had the best games eva: Bilestoad, Choplifter, Karatake)
• Who says nepotism is a bad thing? Not J.J. Abrams, that's for sure. Abrams has tapped LOST producer Jeff Pinkner to be the show runner for his new SF, X-files-ish show Fringe. And what else do we learn? The pilot episode has a $10 million dollar budget (!), and it will be on Fox, which means it will either end after three episodes, or last three seasons too long.
• There was, for a tiny fraction of time, a leaked trailer for the new The Clone Wars movie. Well, Gizmodo, in their quest for all things sensationalistic, found a version with Polish subtitles. Take a look and tell us what you think: good, bad, indifferent?

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday April 14, 2008 at 12:10 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Free fiction:
  • Recently-free fiction at ManyBooks.net: "The Penal Cluster" by Randall Garrett (1957) [Giggles uncontrollably]
  • F&SF points us to free fiction from Daryl Gregory: "Free, and Clear," "The Continuing Adventures of Rocket Boy," and "In the Wheels".
  • Shadow Unit episode 1x05, "Ballistic," co-authored by Sarah Monette, Amanda Downum, Emma Bull, and Elizabeth Bear.
  • "Small Magic" by Jay Lake.
• Interviews and Profiles:
  • USA Today profiles Michael and Jamie Bishop, as does St. Petersburg Times. [via Locus Online]
  • A Dribble of Ink interviews Michael Swanwick: "I'm the only one who can write certain stories which I very much want to read."
  • Fast Forward has posted the video of their interview with Catherine Asaro (The Saga of the Skolian Empire).
  • David Brin is looking towards the future: "We live at a time when change is the foremost, most reliable thing that we know will happen. The most reliable prediction anyone can make is that things won't stay the same."
  • Fantasy Book Critic interviews Kate Elliott (Shadow Gate).


• Jed Hartman is wondering about the best methods for writing made-up words in science fiction and fantasy and why sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.


• After reading Bruce Sterling's Schismatrix Plus, Casey Samulski asks: Can Space Opera be Cyberpunk?


• Matt Jarpe comes to his senses about time travel stories when he is visited by his future self. That'll teach him.


• Speaking of which, Gerry Canavan takes us back to a page of Time Travel Tropes. (I'm looking at you, Jarpe.)


• Alex Holden has built this awesome-looking Steampunk Dalek. [via Neatorama]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 14, 2008 at 12:05 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

"I can't see how you can do Hyperion in a single movie and wind up with anything much better than the mess that the DUNE movie turned out to be." - Paul Weimer

"I would be afraid that they would turn this into a straight 'horror flick'. Horrible monster goes around killing people on by one. Way too deep a novel to make into a movie." - Cash

"Is Sean Connery available?" - platyjoe

"I hated that half of a book. I presume they will film Hyperion and the sequel since Hyperion is a completely incomplete story. BTW... Your polls are a lot less obvious on the left side of your web page. I've been missing a lot of them since you moved them." - SF Fangirl
[John sez: Yeah...we know...and you're not the only one. Our response numbers have been down ever since. This will be addressed soon.]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Monday April 14, 2008 at 12:00 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Free Fiction: Space Platform by Murray Leinster (a.k.a. William F. Jenkins, 1953)


• Nancy Kress considers the craft or writing and art vs. new SF-nal ideas: "I don't have the dazzling ideas of a Bruce Sterling or Charles Stross, and that aspect of SF has never been important to me. How characters interact with the future, what a radical change in setting or technology does to the fabric of human interaction and to a person's sense of his or her place in the universe -- this is what I've always loved best about all literature."


• Our good friend Matt Jarpe (Radio Freefall) is talking crazy-talk, listing 5 reasons why he hates time travel, which is one of my favorite sf tropes. Why, I've got half a mind to whack him upside the head with David Gerrold's time belt. Or, should I have stopped at "I've got half a mind"? Yeah, probably that second one. :)


• In his Naples Daily News column, Ben Bova talks about science-fiction fans, a breed unto themselves: "Why are science-fiction conventions so popular among the fans? I think it's because science-fiction fans often find themselves regarded by the 'mundane' world as oddballs, nerds, weirdos."


• Subterranean Press is publishing a new novel by William Browning Spencer tentatively titled My Sister Natalie: Snake Goddess of the Amazon. If this is anywhere near as good as his short story "Downloading Midnight," then sign me up.


• The Science Fiction and Fantasy discussion group, Beyond_Reality, nabbed Richard Morgan and Kaza Kingsley to talk about their respective books Thirteen (a.k.a. Black Man in the U.K.) and Erec Rex: The Dragon's Eye.


• Sci-Fi Fan Letter lists SF/F stories that begin with characters on a farm, wishing for better things. Bonus points for creating a list with perhaps the most unique topic ever.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Sunday April 13, 2008 at 2:51 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Hugo-winner Joe Haldeman reads from The Accidental Time Machine as part of the Authors@Google series.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Sunday April 13, 2008 at 2:44 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• To promote Michael Chabon's new book, Maps and Legends, McSweeney's is offering a PDF version of Chabon's proposed screenplay for Spider-Man 2. [via GalleyCat]


• Free Fiction:
  • At ManyBooks.net: "The Happy Unfortunate" by Robert Silverberg (1957).
  • "The Inertia of Corpses" by Jay Lake.


• Fred K. tells us that L. Neil Smith and Scott Bieser have an online comic called Roswell, Texas.


• Elizabeth Bear shows off the cool cover of All the Windwracked Stars, her "periapocalyptic noir Norse steampunk technofantasy".


• SFX wants you to vote for your favorite science fiction and fantasy authors.


• Ninja Writer is having online book discussion for award-nominated stories by Ted Chiang and Michael Swanwick.


• John C. Wright is in List Mode, listing his favorite scifi films and books that are re-tellings of the fall of the Roman Empire.


• Speaking of lists, Jason Stoddard lists 5 Small Things Science Fiction Can Do To Improve Its Image.


• More lists! SFFaudio has compiled a listing of Mike Resnick audio fiction, both free and for-fee.


• Three words: Steampunk Star Wars! [via Boing Boing]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Saturday April 12, 2008 at 1:54 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Tonight, the U.S. SciFI Channel is premiering the Doctor Who spin-off, The Sarah Jane Adventures. Unlike the adult-targeted Torchwood spin-off, The Sarah Jane Adventures is aimed at kids.

The Sarah Jane character (played by Elisabeth Sladen) was last seen by U.S. audiences in the 2006 Doctor Who episode "School Reunion" which also featured the robotic dog, K-9. But longtime Who fans will know her as the Doctor's sidekick between 1973 and 1976, alongside John Pertwee and Tom Baker.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 11, 2008 at 6:11 PM
© 2008 SF Signal

Variety is reporting that Tim Kring, creator of Heroes, will be co-authoring an alternative history thriller trilogy to be published by Random House. The Flag of Orpheus trilogy will be co-written with Dale Peck for $3 million, Variety says. The story is about "the abuses of power and moral obligation to resist it" and "revolves around key turning points in late 20th century, including early 1960s drug culture."

The first book in the trilogy, Shift, is due in the Fall of 2009. In a cross-marketing frenzy, each book will be also co-launched with an alternate reality game.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 11, 2008 at 12:35 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

The fifth and final Hugo-nominated novella, Connie Willis' "All Seated on the Ground" has been posted at Asimov's website.

The list of Free Hugo-Nominated Short Fiction has been updated.

Only two-stories remain unavailable for free reading:

1. The novelette "The Cambist and Lord Iron: a Fairytale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham, originally published in John Klima's Logorrhea.
2. The short story "Last Contact" by Stephen Baxter, which appeared in The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume I, edited by George Mann.

[via Science Fiction Awards Watch]

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 11, 2008 at 12:32 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 11, 2008 at 12:20 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• In case any of you were waiting, both Witchblade and Birds of Prey are about to be released on DVD. I never really got into Witchblade, partly because Yancy Butler just kind of annoys me for some reason. And Birds of Prey was here, then gone so I never saw it.
• The writers' strike forced the cancelation of at least 3 hours of this season's LOST. Lindeloff and Cuse have stated they will find ways to spread that missing three hours out over the next few season. Now there is a rumor the ABC may order an additional hour for this season, which I am all for. With only 5 new episodes this season (starting up again April 24th), I'm dreading the long, dark interregnum between the end of this season, and the start of the next. Anything they can do to shorten that is alright with me.
• Amazon's Screening Room Blog has a nice interview with Michael Shanks, Dr. Daniel Jackson from Stargate: SG-1, about the new Stargate: The Ark of Truth movie. (If Stargate is so popular, why did they make a direct to DVD movie again? Heck, even Firefly got a feature film...) There's even a clip!
• In case anyone cares, NBC will be cranking out new Heroes comics, starting April 15th, to celebrate tax filing deadline day! Hooray!

• We now have yet another MMO (massively multiplayer online) game joing that crowded market: Battlestar Galactica! Sadly, you can't play as a Cylon. What's the point to that? This version is being developed by Auran Games, who brought us the harshly criticized MMO Fury. On the other hand, my son loves their Trainz simulator, despite the misspelling.
• And finally, Fantasy Flight Games announced they will be adapting Galactica into a board game. That's right, apparently Sci Fi's threat to move into the gaming space meant both computer/video games and boardgames. I've heard they are planning to turn this into a bits (tons of little plastic pieces) game. Let's hope it's a lot faster than the rules fest that is Twilight Imperium, which is fun even if it took 6 hours to play. Winning makes everything better as they say!
• Here is a cool piece of info from Sci Fi: All season long, each new episode of Galactica will air first, online at Sci Fi.com. So if you just can't wait, you can watch it over lunch. Cool!

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Posted by JP Frantz at Friday April 11, 2008 at 12:15 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• At SciFi Wire, John Joseph Adams profiles Ann Aguirre, author of Grimspace.


• Matt Ruff shows us some cool custom cover art for some of his books.


• This week's free Tor book is The Disunited States of America by Harry Turtledove (have you signed up yet?) and the free wallpaper comes from Shelly Wan and Scott M. Fischer.


• Free Audio Fiction: Escape Pod reads "Schwartz Between the Galaxies" by Robert Silverberg.


• If you are someone who likes to place bets, check out the probabilities calculated by File 770 regarding the short fiction award wins of Michael Swanwick and others.


• The website for WildSidePress got a face lift.


• The South Florida Sun-Sentinel profiles Russell T. Davies and his Doctor Who Empire.


• Guardian Arts Blog says There's more to sci-fi fandom than Star Trek: "Open-minded, curious and polite: the science fiction community should be emulated, not lampooned."


• Over at Jeff VanderMeer's Ecstatic Days, bibliophile guest blogger Matt Staggs talks about getting rid of books...or not. Check out all these biblioholics coming out of the closet. Oh, if only I had that courage...


• SciFi Scanner lists The Most Reluctant Astronauts in Movie History. Poor Don Knotts...he always gets screwed.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Friday April 11, 2008 at 12:11 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Well, "singing" isn't exactly the word I should use...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 10, 2008 at 1:03 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• Kevin Maher at SciFi Scanner's SciFi Dept tells us about Sequels We'll Never See. (Like Reanimator 4!)


• Speaking of Reanimator, the latest Sci-Fi Talk podcast features Jeffrey Combs And Ray Park.


• Free Fiction:
  • "Die! Vampire! Die!" by Hal Duncan (PDF link).
  • Free audio fiction: Rebels of the Red Planet by Charles L. Fontenay, recorded by Paul Campbell in response to the SFFaudio Challenge.


• Free TV Shows: Amazon Unbox is offering free downloads of 3 episodes of Stargate:SG-1: "The Torment of Tantalus" (episode 1.10), "Window of Opportunity" (episode 4.6), and "Lost City, Parts 1 & 2" (episode 7.21 and 7.22). [via Slice of SciFi]


• At SciFi Wire, John Joseph Adams profiles Iain M. Banks, author of the Culture novels.


• Odyssey Writing Workshop has a podcast of Thomas Montelone talking about writing for anthologies.


• Bam! Kapow! tells us Why Superman Will Always Suck. Crazy talk, I tell ya.


• Over at SF Novelists, James Alan Gardner lists reasons that make him stop reading a book. (Short version: The Idiot Move, Diabolus Ex Machina, Overt vs. Covert.)


• Solar Flare lists 10 Science Fiction Books That Should Be Movies.

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Posted by John DeNardo at Thursday April 10, 2008 at 12:42 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

Michio Kaku, commonly referred to as a "popularizer of science", is the Henry Semat Professor of Theoretical Physics at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He is the co-founder of string field theory. He has written several books, including Parallel Worlds and Beyond Einstein, and his bestseller, Hyperspace, was voted one of the best science books of the year by the New York Times and the Washington Post. He is a frequent guest on national TV, and his nationally syndicated radio program is heard in 130 cities. He lives in New York City.

SF Signal had the opportunity to ask Dr. Kaku some questions about his work, science fiction, and his latest book, Physics of the Impossible...

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Posted by John DeNardo at Wednesday April 09, 2008 at 12:29 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• The Comics TV blog watches Serenity and Babylon 5: The Lost Tales. He wonders about the 'certain death' sequence in Serenity where, (SPOILERS!) aside from one totally lame death, all the cast walks away.(/SPOILERS) He also comments on the low budget look of B5. I haven't seen it, but it doesn't surprise me. No one ever gave the show what it deserved in the budget department.
• Is Firefly coming to Blu-Ray? You'd think so after the death of HD DVD. Anyone out there interested in owning 4 different versions?
• Filmonic provides us with a first look at the upcoming supermodel superhero mini-series Scarlett starring Natassia Malthe. I'm sorry, I lost my train of thought. Where was I?
• Sci Fi Cool dishes out some more info on the new Stargate: Universe TV series. It seems that the show will take place on one of the Ancients' ships that is roaming the galaxy, following a second ship that is seeding the galaxy with gates. Sounds kind of Star Trek-ish, but still rather interesting. I may have found a Stargate series that actually interests me.
• Speaking of Stargate, Amazon has three of their favorite episodes available for free, via their Unbox service. You can't beat free (for a short time), and you get to try out the Unbox service to boot. Sorry Mac users, no vids for you.
• MSNBC says that Galactica gets their robots right. According to the experts interviewed, we should expect any aliens we find to be mechanical (So? It's mechanical!) and not the soft, squishy kind of E.T.
• And hoo boy, who cares if they're mechanical, if they all look like the babes of Galactica decked out like Barbarella. You are very welcome Tim.
• The premier episode of Galactica's season 4 achieved some really good ratings, breaking the 2 million viewer mark for the first time in a long time. And they hit their demographic, almost all of the viewers being between 18 and 49. Hey! That includes me!
• Read Express profiles writer Marc Guggenheim (Eli Stone) and delves into his comics background. Guggenheim a creator-owned comic entitled Resurrection about an alien invasion. Sweet.
• Will Comcast save Jericho? As odd as that sounds, it's a possibility, if not likely. Is it even worth saving?
• Is this the worst fight scene ever on TV? I agree it is rather lame...
  

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Posted by JP Frantz at Wednesday April 09, 2008 at 12:15 AM
© 2008 SF Signal

• At B&N Review, Paul DiFilippo looks at the history of space opera through four novels: Space Vulture by Gary K. Wolf and John J. Myers, Pebble in the Sky by Isaac Asimov, Earthblood by Keith Laumer, and The Ruby Dice the latest book in Catherine Asaro's Skolian Empire series. [via Locus Online]


• Publishers Weekly has articles on alternate history, military SF, and Baen Books. [via Locus Online]


• Free Fiction:
  • Free Audio Book: The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks. (Not the absence of the science-fictional "M".) [via Banks' website and UKSF Book News]
  • Free Audio Story: StarShipSofa podcasts "Graves" by Joe Haldeman.
  • Free Online Story: Supernatural mystery So Dark the Night by Cliff Burns. [PDF link]


• Kristine Kathryn Rusch posts her 1994 essay Confessions of an Editor. "I believe in the power of Fiction the way some people believe in the power of God."


• Salon sheds some light on how Slaughterhouse Five was born, gleaned from Vonnegut's posthumous collection , Armageddon in Retrospect. [via Cynical-C Blog]


• Here's Rolling Stone's 40th Anniversary interview with William Gibson. "I find myself less pessimistic than I sometimes imagine I should be."


• Feminist SF rounds a nice collection of feminist sf links.


• File 770 reminds Hugo voters that online voting will be available this year.


• The latest edition of Stephen Euin Cobb's The Future And You podcast features Greg Bear, who talks about "nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, technological immortality, mind uploading, and why he disagrees with some of the expectations of Transhumanists, and most of the expectations of Singularitarians." But wait! There's more! Greag also discusses physics, string theory, life on extrasolar planets, the celebration of Yuri Gagarin's first human flight into space, Sir Arthur C. Clarke, how technology will change future battlefields, and how Russia seems to be heading back into the cold war.

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