SF Addict

Discovered Authors 2011

2012-01-29T15:05:00.002Z

Not many new discoveries last year, but then I didnt get much reading done, slowly, towards the end of the year, going off SF altogether, with more and more books unfinished- I just seem to lose interest as the year progressed!
Hopefully things will pick up again (just started a big Heinlein book!) but in the meantime here's the list of newly discovered authors from 2011.

First up a very strange horror tale from William Hope Hodgson.
House on the Borderland is a very odd tale indeed, starting off reading like classic early 20th century horror, but soon taking an odd turn! Good stuff though!

Next up a couple of stories from adopted american Algis Budrys. I remember him for his lost-identity film Who? from the 70s but never found any of his SF works, till now! I found a couple of his stories available for free download online and gave them a read.
Algis Budrys stories
Interesting and thought provoking tales!

Many may be familiar with Walter M Miller for his seminal tale A Canticle for Leibowitz, which I've yet to read, but here is a short story, which I found quite touching!
Walter M Miller

A change of scene next with a classic haunted house story from I Am Legend author Richard Matheson. I never knew he wrote horror so when I found Hell House and read about it I had to give it a go, and it didnt dissapoint! Quality horror!

Finally another quite chilling horror story, this time with sexual themes.
The Entity is a story of demonic possesion in which a mother in her 30s is possesed repeatedly at night by someone, or something, who ritually rapes her and threatens to drive her insane! I was unsure of this book but it was on my partner's shelf for ages, and I thought I'd give it a read before it went on bookmooch. I quite enjoyed it actually, and i believe a movie was made of it in the 80s.

Thats it, here's for some prosperous reading in 2012!

Shoot the Moon!

2011-09-17T23:39:00.002+01:00

What a quirky little book! The synopsis sounds ridiculous by today's standards; design a 900 foot cannon to shoot a huge ball to the moon using cotton impreganted with some highly flammable substance as 'fuel' (called Pyroxite)
And yet the book is laced with good sound science that one would expect to find in a modern hard SF book! The distance to the moon is known as is its orbital velocity and details such as the apogee and perigee of the moon are figured into the itineray. Its all jolly good fun with a mild poke at the Americans-even though the main characters are American and it reads as if written by an American, at times one detects the odd poke at the 'Yankees' as Verne's character refers to his colleagues.

A group called the Gun Club form with the intention of making bigger and better arms, but when peace is declared its members feel somehow deprived of an enemy to fight and so must look elsewhere. Then up pops the idea of a huge gun, bigger than anything they have seen before, and it will be used to fire a cannon at the moon to gain relations with the selenites up there (i.e. colonise!) and plant the American flag declaring the world theirs! But thats how people thought back in the day, and bear in mind this was written over 100 years before the 1969 moon landing!

All in all quite incredible and great fun!
Oh, as a sidenote I have now read all the books featured in this blog's banner! :D

The Entity by Frank de Felitta

2011-09-04T11:00:00.008+01:00

This book has been on my partner's shelf for as long as I've known her, and I always imagined it to be a poor, cheap horror story, especially as she asked me to list it on bookmooch.com. But then I read it, and wow, it was quite good actually!

I've never heard of the author before, and he hasnt writtten a great deal but this is well written, with authority. Yes it has sexual scenes which everyone talks about but the story within is great! And creeepy!
You begin to wonder, is the entity real or is it all a psychosis?
I recommend you read it and find out.

Hell House!

2011-08-19T16:50:00.007+01:00

This is a story about an old haunted family house led by maniacal Emeric Belasco, who would lure people into his house and engage in orgies and wild parties. Many died at his hand and years after Belasco's own death his spirit infests the place. Dr Barret along with his wife, a medium and a previous resident who survived are sent in to investigate and 'cleanse' the house once and for all...

I wasnt sure I'd like this as I'd not read this author before and I always associate him with SF (he's responsible for I Am Legend as well as the excellent B-movie from the 50s The Incredible Shrinking Man) but I can honestly say I enjoyed it! Its a typical haunted house horror story, maybe nothing new but, well it was written in the 70s when Hammer House of Horror was regularly on our TV screens, and Hell House is a prime example of that genre.
Good creepy stuff!

A bad case of Asimov followed by a dose of horror

2011-08-07T14:00:00.008+01:00

I tried in vain to read Asimov's The Gods Themselves but I got to the second part and gave up! Its my second attempt at this book but life is too short!
Basically its about the discovery of an alternate universe in which tungsten becomes very important to its inhabitants and a way for our side to get free energy. Its in 3 parts, the first part involves the duscovery that a piece of tungsten has been transformed into a radioactive substance. The second part deals with the aliens on the other side. Sounds interesting but I found it interminally dull! And awkward!

I liked very much his robot novels and stories, but didnt like his Foundation books at all. I did enjoy his time travel novel End of Eternity though!

Anyway time for something completely different.
I started Hellhouse by Richard Matheson, the guy ultimately responsible for the movie I Am Legend as well as 50s movie The Incredible Shrinking Man. Review will follow...

A Mother's Love-not!

2011-06-29T18:34:00.004+01:00

Just finished For Love of Mother-not, the prelude to the Pip and Flinx/Commonwealth books by Alan Dean Foster which was written in the early 80s. Foster's first novel, in 1972, was The Tar-Aiym Krang and is very much a hard SF space opera type romp. He later expanded the universe it is set in by adding more books in a series, and then he decided to write a kind of prequel, a book to explain how Flinx, and his mini dragon, came about.

For those not familiar with the series Flinx is a young lad with a Talent. He can perceive the emotions of those around him and detect someone's presence or change of mood, and he is accompanied by Pip, a kind of flying snake which shares a similar talent in as much as it can detect when Flink is angry at someone or in trouble. The story is set on one planet, Moth, but the other books are much more set in space, with various alien cultures- rather in the vein of Larry Niven's Ringworld.

Despite reading like a young adult's fantasy at times this book is a fun tale with decent characters and is a good introduction to the series.

A big trip, up yonder!

2011-06-26T21:44:00.003+01:00

Last night I read a short story by Kurt Vonnegut, and I enjoyed it.
Big Trip Up Yonder (1954) is about a time in the future in which a drug has been developed that prevents aging. A family is sharing a house and its a family made up of generations, so there's grand sons, great grand sons, great nephews and nieces etc and at the head is Gramps, who's pushing 150. Its quite a humorous tale as the real old guys call their 60 and 80 year old comapnions 'kids', but also there's conflict between the groups and eventually it comes to a head and the group is seperated. Gramps goes missing and the rest end up in a care home which isnt half as bad as they'd feared, but Gramps gets the last laugh!

I've tried to read a Vonnegut novel years ago but failed and never tried again, but this story made me smile in the wee hours(well, midnight!)

A Bob Shaw mooch!

2011-05-06T18:00:00.004+01:00

This came up bookmooch.com and I thought it sounded fabulous!

A Heinlein fail!

2011-04-16T12:11:00.004+01:00

Tried to read Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, a book about a colony on the moon in the 2050s, trying to get trade embargos and such with Earth lifted. It sounds good but I found the writing style awkward and choppy, with verbs omitted, kind of like how teenagers tend to talk on facebook. No The and A, so instead of saying It gets very annoying, very quickly, we get Gets annoying quickly, or Went to computer room, no-one there.
Plus there are lots of politicing which reminded me of Asimov's dreary Foundation saga.
On the whole I found the book tedious and boring, or as Heinlein would say in this book, "found book tedious, boring..." Which is annoying because I like Heinlein's stuff; have read and enjoyed Stranger in a Strange Land, Waldo, Magic Inc, The Puppet Masters and a few others, but this one just did my head in!
Yawn...gonna read some Alan Dean Foster instead...

A touching story!

2011-04-04T11:20:00.007+01:00

Just read Death of a Spaceman by Walter M. Miller
An old spacer reaches the end of his career but wants to witness one more launch...
Story here

Miller is well known for his novel A Canticle for Leibowitz which I've yet to read- in fact he is yet another new discovery for me!

Discovered an author-Algis Budrys

2011-04-02T19:48:00.006+01:00

Now I'd heard of this author years ago but never read any of his stuff. Some may vaguely remember a 70s sci fi film called Who?- it was based on one of his books.
Anyway I found a couple of stories on Project Gutenberg and downloaded them to read, which I just have.

Citadel can be found here
Citadel
and concerns itself with colonisation of the Galaxy and the creation of a safe haven where alien races can meet on neutral territory.

Stoker and the Stars is a shorter story, about 15 pages on my reader, and is about an enemy race and one man's intervention to bring a kind of peace.
The author seems big on alienation and repatriation!
You can get that here
Stoker and the Stars

Some information on the author:
Algis Budrys

Its windy out there!

2011-03-28T10:12:00.003+01:00

Just finished The Wind From Nowhere by J. G. Ballard.
Basically a strange wind comes out of the blue and keeps on accelerating until its travelling about 250 mph, the people having to build shelters underground. This is Ballard's first novel from 1961. I've read in the past two of his books from the 60s but this is quite a simple book compared to say The Drowned World. I felt this book concentrated too much on the characters- I'd have like to have seen the environment explored further. And then at the close of the book it just ends!
Not bad but lacking depth.

A bit Grey around the Beard!

2011-03-15T11:21:00.006Z

Just finished Greybeard, an early post apocalyptic book by Brian Aldiss.
I read this years ago, or tried to but I didnt get it at the time and probably didnt finish it back then. This time however I found it very enjoyable!
Basically its set in about the 2030s, 50 years after a nuclear accident when bombs were set off in space, causing a catastrophic disruption in the Van Allen belts that surround the Earth and protect us from olar radiation.. This 'accident' resulted in radiation from the sun briefly reaching the Earth which rendered the human ace sterile. At the time the book opens the human race is represented by the elderly, eeking out a living pottering around Oxford and London, looking for, and on guard against, others. There are rumours of new children born but it seems to be all myths perpetuated by deranged old lunatics, or is it?.....

Re-reading after all these year I would heartily recommend this if you are a fan of post-apocalyptic works- in fact I'd go so far as to say this is the best Aldiss book I've read so far!

A very strange book!

2011-03-07T20:19:00.004Z

Last book I read was a classic weird tale by William Hope Hodgson.

When I downloaded House on the Borderland (1908) I was expecting a gothic horror tale, and at first it did fit into that kind of gothic horror mold, but then it changed, and became something quite strange! Basically its a tale about an old manuscript discovered in an old house, kind of a journal which describes the character's adventures in and around the house. There is a strange pit in the garden which also leads to the house's cellar. There are strange 'swine faced beasts' and a journey into space! I'm not quite sure where this story fits genre wise but it was quite entertaining! Think Edgar Allan Poe meets the Time Machine meets the stargate sequence in 2001 A space Odyssey! Odd but fun!

Discovered authors: 2010

2011-02-28T13:45:00.008Z

Not been on here for a while and as well as the flu I had a bit of a reading disaster during the Christmas period where I lost all interest (I didnt finish a Arthur C. Clarke book I was trying to read!) But hopefully I'm back on the horse as they say!

Anyway here's a list of authors I discovered for the first time last year.

To begin with there was The Keep, a WWII horror by F. Paul Wilson, which I quite enjoyed. I hope to read other books by this little known author!

Then there was a short SF story by Tony Ballantyne which I read in a new anthology,(The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction (Solaris, 2007)) quite good, but I've not come across this author since.

Then finally I got to read a book by Neal Asher,an author of fast paced SF I'd heard a lot about on the SFFChronicles forum. I found one of his stories in the above mentioned anthology so went on the hunt, and found Prador Moon in the library and enjoyed it immensely!

Next I read a well known female author I'd heard a lot about but never, until now, got round to reading- Ursula K. LeGuin.
I had a couple of her paperbacks from Bookmooch.com and read them, or tried to. Trouble is although her work is SF, it reads very much like fantasy (at least these early works do) and the writing style was quite odd in places. As such I didnt finish the second one, (City of Illusions) I'd just had enough!

Then I got an e-book reader and that opened up a whole world of free classics, most of which I wouldnt find in a library! As such I set to reading The Purple Cloud, a 1901 post apocalyptic tale by british author M.P.Shiel, which I downloaded for free from The Purple Cloud at Project Gutenberg

Going back further in SF's history I then downloaded Edison's Conquest of Mars, an official sequel to H.G. Wells's War of the Worlds written by Garret P. Serviss in 1898 which was brilliant, if totally different to what Wells would have written!

Then from 1901 I read A Honeymoon in Space by George Griffith which was fun!

Next up, and a change of direction, I read The City of the Singing Flame, a sort of Lovecraftian horror cum SF tale by Clarke Ashton Smith. You can read that for free here: Clark Ashton Smith portal

More early supernatural stuff from from Ambrose Bierce with his brilliant short horror, An Occurence at Owl Creek.

Then I found some stories by legendary Irish horor meister J. Sheridan Le Fanu. Carmilla is a pre-Dracula horror tale concerning itself with a vampiress!

I then found a really early horror tale,The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole, dating from 1764 this was the earliest piece of fiction I've ever read!

Finishing up with some short stories from Rudyard Kipling, that is my list of discovered authors from 2010!

Bob Shaw goes vertical!

2010-12-20T20:43:00.006Z

I had planned to finish this book earlier but I got the flu with a raging fever and it knocked me sideways. As a result it interfered with my reading (amongst other things like work, and the kids) so a short novel ended up taking flipping ages! (OK 12 days!)
Anyhoo its basically a story about how the invention of personal flight suits years ago has given everyone their own personal freedom of the skies (theyre called CG harnesses-Counter Gravity which sounds a little like the devices Neal Asher describes in his books!)
Due to the easy availability and cheapness of such devices airline travel has been abandoned as no longer cost effective and the sky is full of people, navigating by glowing lines called Bilasers. Some businesses use the bilaser technology to advertise their product in the form of huge glowing ethereal banners-sounds a bit Bladerunner-ish!
Amongst all this is Air Police Officer Rob Hasson (Bob Shaw?) who due to an accident years before has had to hand in his CG harness and badge and try to hide away from the public eye, changing his name slightly. He moves to Canada where he meets another Air Police Officer (Werry) who knows Hasson from years before, and who takes him under his wing. There are funny episodes where Hasson gets to meet Werry's family who are less than taken with Hasson's stiff British ways! Werry also has a blind son who loves to idea of flying and looks forward to seeing again after a 2 year long medical procedure.
It turns out some young dudes are having drug parties on the roof of one of the buildings and generally causing havoc-the locals are unhappy with the way things are being handled and blame Werry before taking things into their own hands. Things come to a head and Hasson must prepare himself to resume his former duties.....
Its a short little tale (158 pages) and if this were any other author I would say nothing much happens in the book but it seeems Shaw enjoys injecting humour into his books. So even in scenes where nothing much IS happening things are enlivened by Shaw's cheeky humour and joie de vivre. I have this image of him smiling constantly while writing this book- a happy chappy indeed! I also discovered that it has an alternative title of Terminal velocity, which does sound a better title for an SF novel!

This is only my 3rd Shaw read (previous being Palace of Eternity and Fire Pattern) but it certainly wont be the last!!

Happy Birthday Sir Arthur!

2010-12-16T10:03:00.002Z

Arthur C. Clarke would be 93 today (day after my own birthday!)
Now, I had planned to start reading his novel Childhood's End today but due to getting a bout of flu I haven't finished Bob Shaw's Vertigo yet(report on that book coming soon)
So, Happy Birthday Sir Arthur, you still manage to inspire from your place amongst the stars!

People are dying to visit Earth in this book!

2010-12-08T16:26:00.001Z

Cemetery World is a short 1973 novel by Clifford D. Simak.
Simak was born in 1904 and came late to SF, working as a newspaperman for most of life. Upon retiring he turned to writing and soon amassed a wealth of stories and novels.
Simak's fiction has been described as 'pastoral', focussing on and driven by the natural world. Often it is the environment in which the conflict occurs that takes centre stage rather than the event itself, with more of a human element than a technological one, and although I've only read a few of his works this impression does come across! When you consider the area in which he lived, (Wisconsin and Minneapolis) surrounded by fantastic scenery it is no wonder really!

In Cemetery World we discover a future Earth which has become the cemetery of the title, the richest people having their remains interred there. Along comes Fletcher Carson, his giant robot companion Elmer and a huge robotic creation called Bronco with a plan to create a mulitmedia work of art based around non-Cemetery parts of Earth. Carson seeks to find out as much as he can about the forgotten aspect of the planet but is met with opposition from the corporate leaders of Cemetery, and soon finds himself pursued by strange ghost-like beings and robotic wolves, determined to discourage Carson from his pursuit.

I read this a few years ago but it didnt make much impression on me. However this second time around I found it very engaging and am glad I kept the book on my shelf!

AIs and Runcibe spoons ahoy!

2010-12-01T16:55:00.001Z

Gridlinked is my second Neal Asher read-earlier in the year I read 2006's Prador Moon, but this book, though similar, is somewhat different. While that other book deals with the nasty crab-like Prador and the military's attempts to deal with them, this book is about an agent with the Earth Central Security (ECS), name of Ian Cormac. It dates from 2001 and is the first Cormack novel. I enjoyed Prador Moon immensely-it was all fast action, kill the bugs, get home safely kind of stuff, but Gridlinked is a much slower paced read. Both books feature similar technologies, AIs, runcibles etc, but Gridlinked focusses on Cormack's mission, chasing mercenaries (and one mercenary in particular) half way around the galaxy. The book has been described as a far-future James Bond type story but the story deviates from different viewpoints-that of Cormack and that of Pelter and co., and is less focussed on the agent himself. Basically people in this time have AIs implanted in their skulls, which gives them an interactive live network allowing them to recieve information instantly and act upon it. Unfortunately Cormack is instructed to disconnect himself from the 'grid' and so although the book is called Gridlinked, Cormack spends most of the time out of it!
I didnt enjoy the book as much as Prador Moon and a lot of that is to do with size-the books is 521 pages long and my reading time is scarce, and while the beginning is promising, the middle section seems to ramble a bit-for me there wasnt enough focus on Cormack. I wanted to see him kick ass and do his stuff but it was much more subtle. The last 200 pages picked up and I'm glad I stuck with it as it got quite interesting and 'fighty'. The only thing is towards the very end I found myself scratching my head-I wasnt sure just who or what the Dragon was and the Maker wasnt described at all-was he defeated, I'm not sure! Overall though a fun romp through time and space-(I could use one of them runcibles!)-but I found it just a little too long-350 pages would have sufficed or more stuff for Cormack to do in the middle would have been nice!

The next book in the Cormack series, Line of Polity, sounds quite different-I just have to find it in my library.....

Sticks and Stones....

2010-11-10T20:42:00.001Z

Strength of Stones is an early SF novel by Hard SF author Greg Bear, and one which I thought I'd read years ago. I have a paperback copy on my bookshelf so I thought I'd reacquaint myself with it. Only trouble is upon reading it I didnt recognise any of it! Now Bear is one of those authors I've enjoyed in the past-his 1985 novel Blood Music is a tour de force piece, real movie material if ever there was one! (some argue its an early example of cyber Punk but I 'm not sure).
Strength of Stones however is a different kettle of fish! It was written only 4 years before yet it couldnt be more different in style. Basically it concerns a planet that aeons ago was settled and colonised by various religious groups-Moslems, Christians, Catholics, etc. They named the planet God-Does-Battle and it features cities that are sentient and that can move around the planet. Years after they were created by the architect Robert Kahn, the cities kicked out the humans on the ground they were unclean,impure; humans engaged in procreation and the computers that controlled the cities considered that a weakness, a failing. It all sounds good but well I struggled halfway through. The book has no chapters in the normal sense-it is divided into 3 parts, Part One, called Mandala, 3451 A.D., introduces some of the characters. Then after 54 pages and 10 years Part One ends and Part Two begins, new characters with no real explanation as to what happened to what I thought was the main character! Then follows a long mission to find out what happened to the cities, why the people were thrown out etc, and just who this Robert Kahn was. Then the next part begins 100 years later and that first 'main character' returns. That kind of left me scratching my head and I had to check the timeline again to make sure I'd read the dates right! This was undoubtedly a good story, full of big ideas, but well, the religion got in the way for me and when the book ended I was left thinking, what just happened?!
As I said earlier I've read and enjoyed quite a few Greg Bear books-he's one of the most highly regarded authors in the field (he's the nephew of Poul Anderson no less!) But I guess every author has an off day, and this was his! Plus it does date from 1981 and is only his second novel -before this one there is 1979's Hegira, another rites-of-passage tale on a strange world-and the first Bear book I read. (Near the start I mentioned that I didnt recognise the events in the book-I must have borrowed it from the library, tried to read it and lost interest!)

So if you've not read this author but would like to discover him ( a worthy exploit) I would recommend the afore mentioned Blood Music or Beyond Heaven's River. Many will say the Eon series but as I've yet to read those I cant comment. Oh and any fans of the Halo games might be interested to know that Bear has a novellisation planned for 2011!

Something Wicked This Way Comes

2010-10-31T19:01:00.005Z

I've had this Ray Bradbury book on my shelf for a few years now and it being the Halloween season and the book being set in October I decided to give it a read.

A mysterious carnival appears in a sleepy town one night and 2 young boys become involved in some strange goings on, but are unable to tell anyone because, well, its that tiome of year and theyre just a couple of young impressionable kids right?

The story itself is a fantastic idea, such potential for a great novel. Unfortunately Bradbury decided to dress up this 1963 novel with fancy prose and long sentences without any kind of punctuation at all interspersed with odd made up words and phrases that dont make sense! You can take a breath now!
In some ways the story resembles something Stephen King might write-unfortunately he didnt write it!
Many praise this novel but for me its a case of a good idea spoiled by dodgy writing!

Oh, Happy Halloween / Samhain everyone!

The Shunned House by Lovecraft

2010-10-27T21:28:00.001+01:00

I've only read a few HPL pieces but this one is the creepiest so far! The story is about a house which, though not haunted is plagued by a strange events caused by some presence. Most of the original family that lived there, the Harris family, died one by one under strange circumstances until it was decided not to rent the house any further. Then, years later, our narrator takes up the case and begins to investigate this shunned dwelling, unearthing the secrets therein and finally deciding to do something about it. The first chapter read like an Introduction to the story; on the edition I read there was no Chapter 1, so when the 'Introduction' ends, which mentions a discourse with Edgar Alan Poe on the said house, I come to Chapter 2 and realise my mistake!
So it seems that the story is going to read like a documentary and in some ways it does (there is virtually no dialogue), but even so it is a creepy tale, one I can definitely recommend as an introduction to Lovecraft's work.

The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole

2010-10-20T16:05:00.002+01:00

This short tale was written in 1764 and is the earliest piece of fiction I've read so far. The tale, concerning the heritage of a castle and the owner's dire need to keep it within his family, is reckoned to be the first gothic horror. Funny thing is, apart from a few odd incidents there's little that says horror in this tale. Still it was entertaining enough, and despite its age very easy to read!

Now onto The Shunned House, a short tale by H. P. Lovecraft.

More early stuff, but not SF....

2010-10-11T17:18:00.004+01:00

I've long had a fascination with gothic horror, Poe being the main target (the only author of such works I've read, till now!)
Anyway I found a lot of classics from Project Gutenberg and Manybooks.net and so downloaded a few to my reader.

First off I read Carmilla by Irish author J. Sheridan Le Fanu, which is a vampire story written before Bram Stoker's Dracula, and which probably influenced that author, and others!
It is the tale of a young girl living in a town in which a number of people have fallen foul of some strange illness. Later a young lady comes into the care of her family home, her name is Camilla and she has a strange secret....
I then read a couple of his other stories, Green Tea about a strange psychological transformation bought on by the imbibement of said liquid-though not nearly as exciting as it sounds! I followed this with Mr Justice Harbottle, a rather dull story from this author about a judge who seems to go inexplicably insane! The language and grammar in these early works takes some getting used to, and the stories tend to begin with a long prologue in which the narrator explains his becoming aware of the events depicted within after receiving some manuscript or other communicationg-a common device in early fiction.
I then read my first Clark Ashton Smith story, The City of the Singing Flame, an odd story of travel through time and space to another dimension. Its kind of a dark fantasy although reading it I got the impression the author was interested in science fiction as well as horror (he was known as a follower of H.P. Lovecraft). I found that story on a site devoted to the man: Eldritch Dark,The Sanctum of Clark Ashton Smith

I'm now about to read a short story by Ambrose Bierce called An Occurance at Owl Creek. Set during the American Civil War it concerns itself with Peyton Farquhar, a Confederate sympathizer condemned to death by hanging upon the Owl Creek Bridge of the title. However all is not as it seems.....

Master of the World! Jules Verne's swan song!

2010-09-26T18:10:00.005+01:00

"Let no one attempt to seize or stop me. It is, and will be, utterly impossible. Whatever injury anyone attempts against me, I will return a hundredfold.As to the money which is offered me, I despise it! I have no need of it. Moreover, on the day when it pleases me to have millions, or billions, I have but to reach out my hand and take them. Let both the Old and the New World realize this: They can accomplish nothing against me; I can accomplish anything against them. I sign this letter: The Master of the World."

Another good read from Verne! This one was his final novel written in 1904 and is actually a sequel to an earlier novel called The Clipper of the Clouds (aka Robur the Conqueror). I only discovered this when part way through I found out the name of the antagonist-Robur! The great inventor Robur zooms across the Americas in first a car that can travel at least 150 miles per hour, putting the current speed of about 80 m.p.h to shame in a car race! Then an equally fast boat is seen; later still a submarine, and then an airplane! The protagonist of this story, Strock, a police investigator, soon gets the idea that these 3 vehicles are one and the same.
In the previous story, Robur determined to show to the world that heavier-than-air craft was the way forward, and during an exposition in which a great air balloon was shown to the world, Robur produced his offering, a dirigible type craft propelled not by lighter-than-air gas but by engines with propellers (air screws), and with this he overtook the balloon causing its occupants to crash to the ground. This event is alluded to in this later work as a kind of re-cap. Not having read the earlier book it was a bit of a surprise but having said that I didnt feel that I should need to have read that earlier work-the work stands alone!
Anyway I found the book quite entertaining and fast paced and is my third Verne novel so far.

My review of 20,000 Leagues under the sea can be found here

The wonderful naiveté of early SF

2010-09-20T17:03:00.003+01:00

Anyone coming to vintage SF for the first time, that is stories from way before golden age, may get a few surprises! With the odd exception of works like Wells's The War of the Worlds one may appear to see bad science or incredible naivete! For example it seems everyone in 1900 expects to find water and vegetation on the Moon-and Mars of course is quite breathable, just a bit cold! Reading these stories today raises a chuckle or two- I mean just how could they imagine such 'silly' scenarios? But then one must realise that back then science was in its infancy-especially astrophysics! They didn't know what the moon was made of-even Clarke in his 1961 book A Fall of Moondust had to make an educated guess and got it slightly wrong! (great book by the way!) Of course I've always maintained that its not SF's job to predict the future!

But even so when you read these really early works set in space you can't help smiling!
The book I'm reading now, George Griffith's A Honeymoon in Space (1901) is a joyous romp into outer space aboard the ingeniously powered Astronef, first landing on the moon for breakfast. They have spacesuits (called 'breathing dresses'-how wonderful!) But to check for air the captain lights a match!

Later, when approaching Mars they make ready their revolvers, while still in space, just in case! And once on the red planet the captain removes his helmet for a sniff! Going by what we know today I have to stop myself thinking that surely, if they had the technology to venture into space, and are aware of celestial mechanics,orbits and such, as indeed many of the authors were, then surely they would also have an inkling of the atmospheric conditions of at least the moon!

Garrett P Serviss follows up Wells's book by visiting a lushly vegetated Mars peopled by 15 foot giant humanoids-totally in contrast to Wells's original concept! And a little later we have Edgar Rice Burroughs's Barsoom books which presents an image of Mars which is even further from the truth! The funny thing is that at the time they were seen as SF-but nowadays they read as fantasy-like Conan on another world!

Its fascinating how time, and progress, changes our perception of SF! (Incidentally, reading these early works does prepare you for their modern equivalent-Steampunk!)
Enjoy these books and stories, but keep the salt pot handy

A return to Mars!

2010-09-15T20:39:00.006+01:00

But not by Wells!

Edison's Conquest of Mars (1898)

This 'sequel to The War of the Worlds' was written in the same year as Wells' marvellous tale but by another author-Garrett P. Serviss.

Serviss was an astronomer and scientist who wrote many non-fiction works on astronomy, both for beginners and the more advanced astronomer-think of him as an early Sir Patrick Moore! (who himself has written SF!)
Anyway the premise of this story is that an American contingent decide to make a trip to Mars before the Martians can return for a second attack, and needing the ships to make the trip they turn to inventor Thomas Edison to design the ships- also serving as a pilot. On the way they make an odd discovery on an asteroid that would surely have a great effect on Earth's economy! Also they discover a race of giants living on a well known asteroid-very bizarre!
Despite the subtitle 'the sequel to H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds' the two novels couldn't be more different! While Wells's martians were 'mere round bodies with no arms nor legs-quite repulsive', Serviss describes them as giant humanoids 15 feet in height with larger heads, 4 limbs like humans, the heads having odd bumps depending on their role-warriors or scientists, a deliniation that reminded me of the lives of Bees!
Also his Mars is a watery place not much different to Earth, rather than the dry barren world of the former book-in Serviss's book it is somewhat reminiscent of Edgar Rice Burrough's Barsoom.

Despite such differences and a certain naivete (the crew have no radio, and the individual ships must communicate with each other via flags and lights!) it made for a good read with decent science, and at times it is amazing that it was written before 1900!
If you fancy reading it you can get it here, free:
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19141
The copy I downloaded though, with images, had a glitch in as much as some of the images overlaid the text making it hard to read where such an image appeared-the html-ePub conversion being done with errors. Of course it is possible to get it without the images.

No-one would have believed.....

2010-09-10T13:25:00.004+01:00

	Just finished The War of the Worlds by H.G.Wells-and enjoyed it very much, as I knew I would, though I was quite surprised by the brevity of the novel, 164 pages in the collection I have it in (H.G.Wells, the Complete Fiction volume I)-I always imagined it would be a doorstop of a book! We all are familiar with this story from the movies but how many have actually read the book? I have to say that no movie thus far produced is close to the ideas and story set forth in this book. The aliens themselves are described briefly in passing with little detail yet are truly alien (no body, just a large round head with a large eyed face and a single large auditory receptor at the back) but it is the machines in which they ravage London and its surrounds that take centre stage. In the book, unlike the movies, they are gargantuan tripods, setting the earth afire with Heat Rays and black dust, trampling all underfoot somewhat in the manner of the At-Ats in Star Wars, only much larger! At one point later in the story it almost becomes a last-man-alive story as our hero makes his way across a ravaged and dead London, all about him death and decay and the prospect of a lost humanity-quite eerie at that point! There's also a degree of scientific scrutiny-Wells was not just a fantasist-he knew his stuff, or at least where to get the latest scientific information from, and used it well here. For a novel written in 1898 the depictions of events and of mars itself are quite relevant and accurate, given the state of scientific progress at the time! Mars is no wild frontier as found in Edgar Rice Burrough's adventures, but a cold, dusty world. Excellent!

The Purple Cloud by M.P.Shiel

2010-09-05T16:09:00.005+01:00

This is a 'last man alive' story written in 1901 by English author Matthew Phipps Shiel (1865 -1947) but is also a story of paranoia and what changes come over a person when faced with the reality of loneliness.
(This is an e-book, downloaded from Project Gutenberg http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/11229 )

After earning a place aboard an expedition to reach the north pole, Adam Jeffson becomes isolated when one by one his team mates die, not from the cold but from some strange purple-hued vapour, notable for its smell of peach blossoms. As our explorer makes his way alone across the frozen wastes he encounters many ships, each one drifting aimlessly with dead crew-he eventually realises he is all alone!
He takes his ship, the Boreal, further and further south encountering further devastation eventually reaching England and his own home, now empty and cold. The bodies, both human and animal, he encounters are notable for being strangely preserved-(tied to the the unusual smell perhaps?)-there is no decay, no disease, just inanimateness all around!
With various methods Jeffson makes his way around the world, his manner and attire changing as he goes.

I found the writing quite accessible for such an early book -some of the usage was a bit odd compared to modern English and I had to make use of the dictionary on my phone a few times but on the whole it was easily digestible,somewhat reminding me of Jack London, and I quite enjoyed it!

A new way to read books!

2010-08-28T18:09:00.003+01:00

I finally got myself a book reader, purchased used from C-EX for £95. Normal price is £140 or £99 from Waterstones, if you can find any in stock!
(Well actually this will be my Christmas present, come early)

Its a Sony PRS-300, their base model so theres no Wi-Fi or 3G, not that I need any of that! Its a book reader, it reads books, what other features do you need??
I've never tried one before and having read e-books previously on my phone or the Nintendo DS I had no idea what to expect. Unlike phones and such the screen is matt,a bit like a LCD TV screen, and rather than being backlit its rather like an old digital watch readout only MUCH much better! I tested it by opening the curtain when the sun came out and, well, it was just like a paperback-rather than blotting out the image as it would do on a phone, forcing you to cover the screen to see what was there, it just kind of made it easier to read! The technology in those E-ink displays is fantastic!
Also the device is very lightweight-just like holding a small paperback really! Also unlike a certain other reader it supports Epub format, so there's lots of free books for me to read from Project Gutenberg!
It can hold 350 books (based on a 1MB ebook-many are much smaller files!) with 6800 page turns-thats 2 weeks of reading on one charge, or 10-15 books!!
Fabulous!
Currently reading The Purple Cloud by M.P.Shiel on it.

2010 a Clarke Odyssey continued

2010-08-18T12:12:00.002+01:00

A while ago I planned to read 2001 A Space Odyssey up to the point where something happens to one of the crew. (Spoiler evasion for those who havent read it),then I would jump to 3001 the Final Odyssey to continue his story. When done I'd jump back to the rest of 2001 and then end the journey with 2010,Odyssey II-the year we make contact-marking this year's SF coincidence nicely! Well I'm part way through that journey now and its been fun, and even though I've read 2001 countless times I never tire of it!
Open the pod-bay doors HAL!

Tau Zero by Poul Anderson

2010-08-07T20:51:00.002+01:00

I just read this novel and I can honsetly say this is my kind of SF! Sure there are one or two head-scratching moments (SQR) I-v2/c2 where v=the ship's velocity and c=speed of light) but you can let them ride over your head and enjoy what is essentially a human story; it sounds like a corny back-of-the-book blurb but it is a story of a voyage, a journey across time and space, a story of teamwork and the rewards it brings. But also it is, as a fellow Goodreads contributor, mindblowing!
Basically 50 men and women are chosen for a mission to find a new home around a star in Virgo, and to do so they must travel at as close to c as possible-they gradually get faster and faster but then the ship Leonora Christine, develops a fault meaning they will be unable to decelerate should they reach their destination. They build up a huge velocity and see the universe around them evolving at a staggering rate-months pass on the ship while millenia pass by outside. When the fault is discovered they face a decision, keep speeding ahead in the hope they find a new home eventually or give up and commit mass suicide-it is essentuially a story of survival against the odds.

It is huge conceptually and yet it makes for compelling reading. Definitely a keeper and the kind of book to get you back into SF if you've been away from it!

Second Variety by Philip K Dick

2010-07-25T15:11:00.006+01:00

Just read this as a webpage on my Blackberry (downloaded from Project Gutenberg) Second Variety at Project Gutenberg
Basically its kind of a cold war scenario story but set in the future with once again the Russians depicted as the bad guys (yawn)
The story itself is actually quite good and was published in May 1953, an early piece of PKD before he discovered drugs and messed his stories up.
Basically its one of Dick's many stories in which nuclear war has left the Earth's surface as an uninhabitable, gray ash pile, and the only things remaining are killer robots called 'Claws'.

The header of the story reads:
The claws were bad enough in the first place—nasty, crawling little death-robots. But when they began to imitate their creators, it was time for the human race to make peace—if it could!

Free book!!

2010-07-16T22:40:00.000+01:00

Now this is cool! You buy issue 198 of SFX and there's a voucher inside. Take it to Waterstones and you can claim a free pb copy of House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds! That'll do me!

Free book with SFX #198

Hothouse

2010-07-10T16:13:00.008+01:00

Now onto a classic by English author Brian Aldiss. I read this book some years ago and I believe I enjoyed it. Written in 1960, originally as a magazine series it was re-issued by Penguin last year and so I bought a copy from Waterstones, and now its time for a re-read!
Basically its about the Earth a million years from now, when it has stopped spinning and is tidally locked with the moon, and in fact connected to the moon by giant spider webs.
The main group of organisms in the book are the plants-it is like being in a giant

greenhouse, with insects crawling all over it and humanity stuck in the middle, no longer the dominant species.

When you read about it it does sound like fantasy but when you actually read it you realise it is SF, just very out there SF! And who knows what the world will be like in a million years time!

The Moon is Hell!

2010-07-04T18:23:00.005+01:00

Not been reading much of late, got kind of bored with SF, and being rather busy and fed up of the heat,the World Cup and annoying chavvy neighbours - I needed a break, and it took me ages to re-read Rendezvous with Rama. I've also been busy with photography and other things, and have been working on a few other blogs.
But now I'm back on the horse as it were and am going to start on a slim paperback by the late great John W. Campbell Jr.
Who you may ask? Well some may know him as the editor of Astounding Science Fiction back in the 1930s and 40s and as promoter of early SF in general, garnering the likes of Asimov and Heinlein. But he was also a damn good SF writer himself! He wrote a story called Who Goes There-many may be familiar with the 1981 John Carpenter film The Thing, which was based on that old story!
Anyway this book (awful cover pic!) concerns itself with a moon mission and was written in 1951, taking the form of a journal, with chapters being like diary entries. Could be fun....

Fun it wasnt-far from it in fact! I found it very dull and boring as there is no dialogue or character interaction at all. I got halfway through and had had enough!

Discovered authors: 2009

2010-05-12T16:17:00.007+01:00

Here is a list of authors that were new to me last year,in alphabetic order, quite a few actually, and many I want to revisit sometime! (See the links on the left of the homepage for websites pertaining to each author, a link added as I read an author.)

Iain M Banks-I always imagined that Consider Phlebas, his first SF novel, would be hard going and so put off reading it for years but you know what, it was quite easy reading and well, was rather superb! Will definitely revist this author-his space opera depiction is lavish with great characters!
Samuel R Delany- a classic author but not one I was familiar with, and I picked up The Jewels of Aptor from a second hand book store not knowing it was his first novel! I didnt know what to expect and well, I was a bit non plussed. It was an ok story but read very much like a fantasy author trying to do SF. Will look out for his later novel Nova though.
Joe Haldeman-this is an author I'd never heard of, but I read a review of The forever War on the SFF Chronicles forum and tracked down a copy from the library. Many compare it to Starship Troopers but well I've never read that Heinlein book and the film was, well, OK I suppose. But Forever War is a superb example of Military SF.
Jack London-I'd heard things about this vintage author and I'm sure I'd seen a film of White Fang years ago but never came across any of his books anywhere! I got a copy on The 100 Classic Novels on the Nintendo DS and read it, finding his knowledge of dog behaviour to be enlightening! Great story telling too, in this and the novella Call of the Wild.
H P Lovecraft- a much hyped and oft talked about author of surreal horror-I'd been dying to find an example of his stuff for years and finally found a copy of Dagon and Other Macabre Tales to read. Not brilliant to be honest, probably because I was expecting the scary Chthulu stuff and this book was nothing of the sort. It was good, some neat stories but only one pearler (Herbert West-re-animator, a must read!)
Still hunting for some Chthulu!
E.E."Doc" Smith-Smith is a classic SF author, widely held as the father of space opera, without whom etc etc. I had a few of his Lensman books on my shelf but wanted to go to the start and so tracked down a copy of Triplanetary, and was rather disappointed! OK so its a book put together in the 1920s and so I can forgive the maybe sexist and puritanical attitude which was prevalent at the time but what I couldnt forgive was the lack of excitement! I was expecting so much and got so little. Oh well, I've been told things do pick up later in the series so onto the next Lensman book sometime....
Jack Vance-another author I'd heard lots of stuff about and so was interested in but never actuall read. I have a set of his "Planet of Adventure" books on my shelf but wanted to read the widely lauded Emphyrio instead, and kind of got to wishing I hadnt bothered! The first half plods along,and reads very much like a fantasy, which put me right off as I was expecting SF! The second half gets going and some SF elements are introduced but for me it was too little too late.

Well thats my list from 2009;so far this year there's only been two new SF authors - Neal Asher and Ursula (K) Le Guin. Here's to more discoveries!
*Incidentally clicking on my Labels will take you to the work by the author mentioned, handy tool!

A Rendezvous with Rama

2010-05-02T14:26:00.003+01:00

Just began this last night-I've read it at least twice before but it remains a classic!
Basically a large body,presumed to be an asteroid, is discovered near Jupiter in 2131 and gven the designation 31/439 after the year of discovery and order of discovery.
However upon further probing by earth and space based telescopes it is discovered that the object is an unusal asteroid. For a start it is doesnt have a regular orbit, is about 40 kilometeres across and yet has a rotation period of about 4 days! The object is spinning very fast!
Soon it is given the name Rama after a Hindu god and an expedition is sent out to meet it and find out just what it is....
I first read this many years ago and although it was written in 1973 it remains compelling with good science and not bad characters.
There were 3 sequels to the book but really you don't need to bother (indeed some will say you shouldnt bother, as they're mostly written by Gentry Lee) but this fine book stands the test of time and deserves to be appreciated in its own right!
Enjoy!

Exiled on a cold planet

2010-04-25T12:41:00.007+01:00

Just finished reading Planet of Exile, a book by Ursula K Le Guin, and part of her 'Hainish Cycle' from the 1960s

This was my first encounter with Le Guin and although its a short book (126 pages) it was a struggle to finish to be honest!

Basically its set on a planet that has a strange cycle in which each year is sixty earth years and days are counted in Moonphases-the moon and the planet are locked in a strange cosmic dance and the whole system travels around the sun once in 60 years. The start of the year is a long springtime and at the end a harsh winter comes, the snow falling so heavily as to render the landscape a total white out.
There are snowghouls out there (which we never get to meet) and the mysterious Graal which, at the end of each year travel up from the south and invade the natives who form the focal point of the story. The people are divided into two groups; the natives (the hilfs) and the colonists from Earth (Farborn) who arrived at the planet aeons ago and are black skinned-not sure if that is meant to be significant but maybe it was some political statement from the 60s. When the Earth colonists first discovered the natives they named them HILF, an acronym of High Intelligent Life Form-it sounds very SF but the book is more like fantasy with magic and mindspeech rather than tech and telepathy.

It all sounds promising but her writing style in this book is somewhat clunky and odd in parts and the characters just not that interesting or engaging. Just not a lot happened really! This one will be going back on Bookmooch.

I have City of Illusions and Left Hand of Darkness on my shelf too-just hope things improve with those two.

Techno astronomy!

2010-04-18T12:54:00.006+01:00

I took a photo of the Moon and Venus last night from the back garden, hand held, and then thought, hmm, a bit late for Venus surely.

So then having uploaded the image I remember I had Google Sky Maps on my G1 phone so booted it up, and sure enough....

Iain Banks's study

2010-04-09T11:56:00.004+01:00

Just found this cool video on the tube of you-great stuff!

I got fooled!

2010-04-05T17:16:00.007+01:00

I received a link to a cool and fun piece of 2001 memorabilia and I thought, hmmm I want that!
Today my other half checked it on the PC, looking to maybe getting it for me to discover it was an April Fools!
http://www.thinkgeek.com/brain/whereisit.cgi?t=2001&x=6&y=3

Gutted!

I love this from the site:

"Deep in the heart of Aisle 7 (the action figure aisle), all throughout the 70's, 80's, and 90's, something waited. No one knew it was there, until toy stores began their turn of the century renovations. Then the Monolith Action Figure was discovered (the first given the name "TRU-1"). What was it for? Where did it come from? Why wouldn't its barcode scan? No one knew. And no one knows to this day."

2010 a Clarke Odyssey!

2010-03-21T11:33:00.008Z

Continuing to mark the passing of my favourite author and science writer I'm reading his 2001 anthology The Space Trilogy. This contains 3 early novels, the first of which is 1952's Islands in the Sky which I read last year and you can read about Here

It also contains The Sands of Mars which is one of the few novels of Clarke's I've never read! I read somewhere that Jimi Hendrix really 'dug' this 1951 book! Martin Gibson is a science fiction writer and he decides to spend his money on a trip to the red planet which is now becoming colonised. Gibson seems lacking in knowledge of space travel and how things work up there and so Jimmy, a young apprentice, is assigned as Gibson's teacher as it were. The two become friends and soon Gibson is accepted as part of the group (at first he is looked down upon, as just another writer of space adventures). He is invited along on a mission across the planet in a jet and after an accident discovers something going on and decides to investigate. It seems there are plans afoot that could affect the future of both Earth and Mars.
Sands is a great little story but you can really tell its an early Clarke! Apart from Mars's strange (to us) geology, sorry aerology, it was notable for me in using the old form of the word connection, with an x! I think the last time I saw the word 'connexion' was in a Dickens novel!
Still, all good stuff with drama (a sandstorm), adventure (young Jimmy being amazed by Mars's aerology) and humour, not to mention a bit of relationship controversy!

The final book is Earthlight from 1955 which I read a couple of years ago and which depicts an early space battle on the moon!
The volume itself contains some interesting side pieces-a general introduction written in 2001 and Forwards by Clarke and others.

A tour of Arthur C Clarke's office

2010-03-19T11:00:00.002Z

I just came across this and thought I'd share it on this day, the second anniversary of the great man's passing-I will admit it brought a tear to my eye!

Arthur C Clarke's Office: Colombo, Sri Lanka from Sam Coley on Vimeo.

Farewell Sir Arthur!

Time for some Aldiss stories

2010-03-14T11:28:00.020Z

Last night I began reading The Canopy of Time, a collection of 11 stories from 1959 (previously known as Galaxies Like Grains of Sand). This NEL edition from the '70s has a rather nice Bruce Pennington cover.
To quote Aldiss "they are all slices off the enormous carcass of the future, arranged chronologically from a date a century or two ahead, right up to the end of the galaxy"
The stories tentatively chronicle the future of mankind, short pieces between each story forming a tenuous connection.
The first one, Three's A Cloud, didnt really impress me-I think it just went over my head. It seemed to be set in present time and was about a quiet,semi reclusive guy who uncharacteristically befriends a couple he sees in a pub, and it seems he and they are a gestalt entity-very strange!
The next one, All The World's Tears was much more satisfying, being about a far future time in which mankind has turned against Nature and now everything from the bee's pollination to the weather is minutely controlled, and people have become afraid of one another. Unable to breed normally they use a Mating Centre. One man rebels...
Who Can Replace a Man? portays a future of sentient serving machines in which man is dying out. It poses a question, if a machine fails it can be replaced, but if a man dies, well, who can replace a man?
The next story, Blighted Profile concerns Chun Hwa, an old man living in a post apocalyptic era longing for better,greener times. There are time machines but they can only take you to the past. Hwa is determined to visit the future at any cost…
Judas Danced was an odd one! I was scratching my head thru it until I neared the end and I had an 'Oh I see!' moment! Basically its about Alexander Abel Yo,a guy accused of murdering Parowen Scryban over and over, each time the victim is restored to life by using the time machines. Abel Yo's depiction is quite bizarre and I kept thinking, is he mad or was Aldiss on drugs or what? Very confusing until the very end.
The eponymous character in O Ishrail! tells of how he is witness to an alien race and how a war is being waged in a neighbouring galaxy. No-one believes his story and, considered insane he is taken aboard a Mental Hospital ship. Only one man, Davi Dael believes Ishrail, but how to prove the man's story?
Incentive follows on from where O Ishrail left off, albeit with different characters (and lemmings!)
Ferro Westerby is part of the Isolationists, a group fihting to keep Earth independant of the Multi-Planet Federation. An almost unpronounceable Jandanagger Laterobinson is the enigmatic leader of the Federation and he sets out to convince Westerby that it is in Earth's best interest to become a part of the Galactic group. Laterobinson's race speak a language called Galingula which is also a method of travelling thru the galaxy. Parts of this story are reminiscent of Asimov's Foundation unfortunately, with political rangling which goes over my head! And one scene reminded me of a scene from the Lawnmower Man or the Matrix-Laterobinson has a device that the user wears like a helmet and it allows the wearer to enter a different world-it is like an early description of Virtual Reality! Sounds great but this being an Aldiss story its all vague ideas with little substance. Nothing concrete.
Gene Hive is much better. A man is injured and a woman doctor comes to his aid. In doing so they meld into one another,and then begin absorbing other people (and animals) into a large amoeba-like entity. But only those humans who believe themselves to be part of nature can be absorbed;only those who know the language of Galingua. A very odd story that somewhat reminded me of Greg Bear's excellent novel Blood Music
Secret of a Mighty City was one of those neither here or there stories, rather like water-tasteless- only unlike water its not essential to life!
Basically it was about a 3D film-a Solid- being made about the city Nunion (in previous stories the city was called Union, then New Union) but nothing really happens and I was left feeling, What was the point of that?? Great title, pointless story!
The penultimate story, They Shall Inherit was one of the better ones! It concerns an age in which genetic modification is commonplace and presents two different characters. Tedden,on Earth is experimenting on enhancing humans, and Djjket, part of another faction off world experimenting on animals. Each finds the others work repulsive and morally wrong-Tedden shows the other a creche in which new born babies are able to stand upright, while Djjket has a 'portcase' which is like an automaton derived from camel genes. Each is shocked by what they see. The story builds until a very dramatic and disturbing conclusion, which reminded me of something from Tales of the Unexpected, or a story you might find in a horror compilation,perhaps by Ramsey Campbell or Ray Bradbury. The amazing part is that this story was writteen in the 50s and yet clearly Aldiss shows us the inner workings of genetic material with a hint of the DNA structure! All new and exciting back in the day! Very good that one!
The final Visiting Amoeba,is by far the longest and in fact is better described as a novella-it is divided up into 8 chapters! Basically a man comes across a strange planet between galaxies where space should be empty,and then dies. The new man then goes on a mission to warn the humans of an impending event-the only way to do this is to rally opposing forces to unite against a 'common enemy',which is really a trick to get both sides united in a common front to resolve this event. Its a hard story to review without giving too much away and is rather quite good- I felt that this one would have made a good novel.
The collection over all is quite uneven,some stories rather bland,some quite good,and insightful for 1959.

Another DNF!

2010-03-13T11:15:00.002Z

That is, Did Not Finish!
This time I'm really annoyed with myself because its an Alastair Reynolds novel!
I picked up his 2007 novel The Prefect from the library as others had said good things about it, so I thought I'd give it a go. At first it sounded interesting but it soon became apparent that were was a lot of politicing in the novel, centred around the Panoply, which is kind of an ethical policing group. At first I thought, ah that sounds like Neal Asher's Polity, but in this case its all talk, no action.
I hate not being able to get into a book but at page 90, with the thought of another 300 odd pages to go, I just couldnt go any further, I'd had enough. Not only is there a lot of politics involved but also diverse threads that I just couldnt get a handle on.
I was looking forward to another AR book because,unlike many, I thought his 'Pushing Ice' was superb-must re-read that!

My first story!

2010-03-09T12:00:00.001Z

An idea came to me one night while walking the dog. I've always loved trees and there is a long tradition of creepy stories concerning them,and I came up with my own....
I Don't Have a Wooden Heart

Island life...

2010-03-02T10:50:00.006Z

Next up, a book by Greg Egan, an Australian author I've tried before but failed. (Permutation City, need to re-try that one)
This one, Teranesia, is about a tiny island and a 9 year old boy named Prabir Suresh, and his discoveries there. His parents are entomologists studying the buttterflies on the island but the boy, bored, begins to imagine his own creatures living there. Years later his younger sister Maddy returns with news of strange new insects and plants on the island, and Prabir, now an adult, must investigate...
Strange cover by Rebecca Devereux, not the best I've seen!
Cant quite pin this book down-its not SF even tho its set partly in 2012, but its not fantasy either, and yet its not quite a contemporary novel. I suppose one could categorise it with the likes of Empire of the Sun, I'm not sure.
It is an enjoyable story though, very much easy reading-so far...
One interesting thing about this book is it was originally published in 1995, before the internet was established (wasnt that 1997?), and yet the author describes the net, websites, message boards and laptops!
Well I'm just past halfway thru and I'm bored! Sure this one is easy reading but its just so well, dull! I find myself constantly waiting for something to happen!
Time to crack out a Alastair Reynolds book I borrowed from the library!

Watch out for flying Crab paste!

2010-02-26T12:32:00.007Z

Finally, I get to read a Neal Asher book! I've been dying to get hold of one of these books for ages but my library never had any in, or if they did it was one novel and it didnt hang around, and I'd be already in the middle of a book so wouldnt get another book out. Yesterday though it all came together. Nothing reading and a trip to the town library. I'd checked on the library's website the night before and amazingly 3 novels were listed as On Shelf-could it be? Was my library actually going to prove useful?
Indeed it was! The library had had a facelift with a new expanded SF section (listed as rack one:Science Fiction, rack two, Paranormal Fiction, rack 3 Fantasy etc, even though all the books were just listed alphabetically and by Dewey numbers.) Anyway, there at the start under A, was Aldiss, Asimov and Asher! Big bold hardbacks, 3 in a row (a third one was found on its own further down, the collection 'The Gabble and Other Stories' which I might just have to buy!) Eyeing up the weighty tomes I decided on the slimmest as an introduction to the man's work-reading time is precious and slim for me! And so I came out with Prador Moon, which as it turns out is the first in the Polity series, published in 2006!
I say I was tentative in choosing which one to read but having already read about Mr Asher's books in reviews on the SFF Chronicles forum, (he is a member there) as well as on Fantastic Fiction ,not to mention the author's blog, The Skinner, I felt pretty sure I wasnt gonna be disappointed, and after just one chapter I can happily report I was right! This is fast paced gripping stuff, very 'now', very big and very fun!
BTW, if you're wondering about the crab reference, well the Prador are described as large,crab like aliens, rather nasty in fact!
I believe things get a bit gory later on too-I shall report.....
Well, after 4 days I finished the book which is incredibly fast for me-just shows how un-put downable it is! Excellent story, will definitely be reading more by this author!
And yes, it got a bit gory ;)

'My' town in print!

2010-02-24T23:55:00.002Z

Earlier when reading a story in The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction (Solaris, 2007) called 'Third Person' by Tony Ballantyne I did a double take at the mention of my adopted town name:
"Hey!" he said, turning to the young couple at the next table. "Is that a north eastern accent?"
"Yes," said the young man delightedly. "We're from Darlington."
"What a coincidence! My grandparents were from Darlington. I used to go there as a child. Is that shop still there on the High Street? The one that sold all those nice sweets?"…
Well i'm not sure which shop is referred to but there is no High Street as such. There is a High Row however, which is like the open shopping arcade in the town centre with a row of shop, and steps leading to the road cum bus route. The author hails from Bolton which is not too far from here so maybe he visited the area some time!
Who else has fallen upon their town or village name in a story or book?

A change from SF and a Nazi surprise!

2010-02-15T18:08:00.008Z

I'm nearly halfway thru The Keep The Keep by F. Paul Wilson. Its my first book by him (the author's first novel, writt in 1981) and its rather good sofar!
Basically its about a fort in Romania that is occupied by the German soldiers in 1941 under Captain Woermann, and is used as an outpost to keep an eye on the distribution of fuel; i.e. to make sure they get most of it! Anyway someone, or something is killing off the soldiers one at a time, at night, and so an S.S. officer is called in to investigate. Woermann is unhappy with the Nazi regime and despises the methods used by the S.S. to get information from the villagers, not to mention their treatment of the Jewish community! This creates tension between the two men as well as a nice conflict in the story as a background to the other nasty stuff going on. I'm kind of thinking, what's worse, this beast on the loose or the SS!
Apparently a movie was made of this book but I've never seen it and it seems it never got put onto DVD-the only DVD copies are bootlegs!

2001 on Blu Ray!

2010-02-01T21:16:00.005Z

I'm really pleased to have this! Not only do I now have the film in Hi Def but also there's all the extras. There's the Making Of with contributions aplenty from Clarke, Kubrick, Trumbull, even Keir Dullea is in there sharing his thoughts on playing Dave!
Theres also features on how filmmakers have been inspired by the film, and Kubrick's vision, as well as an audio interview with Kubrick made in 1966! Superb!

Its about Time!

2010-02-01T18:10:00.005Z

Next up 'The Masks of Time' by Robert Silverberg! Its been ages since I read any Silverberg, and this is a book from 1968, re-released in 2002 as part of Gollancz's Collector's Series with some neat Jim Burns artwork.
Basically its about a guy named Vornan 19 who appears out of nowehere in Rome on Christmas Day 1998-the book begins in 1999 on the eve of the Millenium and a little back story is explained. The visitor claims to be from a thousand years in the future and his arrival, stark naked, in Rome, near Christmas, causes quite a stir...

I didnt finish this book-just couldnt get into it,too much waffle!

A better SF mag!

2010-01-28T12:36:00.002Z

OK so I'd read a bit of SFX but got fed up with all the vampire/werewolf and zombie references-It may be a one off duff issue but where's the SF guys?? Anyway I came across Sci-Fi Now in Smith's and bought a copy. Its early days yet but it looks much more like kind of thing. It has SF in it for a start and even references a well known SF classic-Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card which is on my wishlist. Its not as good as Deathray but its not bad!
I even joined the forum!
Sci-Fi Now Forum

Bring on the Deluge!

2010-01-25T13:55:00.009Z

and so onto book three, which compared to the previous 2 books is nearly new- it says on the cover First UK edition and I was missing this final book for years-I managed to get this one from Bookmooch.com!
This book begins by seeming a lot more SF than the previous two as it mentions other worlds in the Humanx Commonwealth including the planet Moth which features in one or more of his Pip and Flinx novels!

Well what a ride! This one is definitely more SF than the previous 2.

The Tran, the natives of the planet Tran ky-ky, are a race of cat/bearlike beings (they are referred to as being Felursine) living on a planet formed largely of ice, with virtually no metal so therefore seem rather medieval. They've never seen a space ship till Ethan Fortune and his crew crash land on the planet in the first book, so things move along very much how a fantasy series does-until this third book comes along! I wont reveal anymore so as not to spoil it but it was a great finish, with a nice surprise for Ethan!
Good one!

End of Deathray magazine!

2010-01-17T16:51:00.002Z

Oh man, just as I find a good SF magazine it folds! :

"British science fiction magazine Death Ray is to cease publication after its 21st issue (October 2009). The news broke today that due to the credit crunch and the separation of the magazine's publishers, Blackfish, from their parent company, Rebellion, it was no longer viable to carry on with either Death Ray or its sister magazine, Filmstar. However, there is a very slim ray of hope that another company may pick up the magazine, or the publishers may be able to remount publication at some point in the future.
Death Ray launched in May 2007, just one month after Imagine Publishing's SciFiNow. The near-simultaneous launch of two new SF magazines was a surprising move, since Future's SFX had been the sole science fiction glossy magazine on the shelves for some considerable time, whilst two older SF titles, TV Zone and Starburst, had both folded in 2008."

Moulokin Rouge

2010-01-15T14:19:00.003Z

and book two is Mission to Moulokin, which I began last night. The original book was written in 1974 and this sequel was published 5 years later. Unlike the first volume there's a map which makes it look even more like a fantasy (was Foster thinking of 'Spellsinger' at the time?)
Another great adventure with Ethan From Fortune and friends. One thing about these books I've noticed is that the subject in the title, in this case the city of Moloukin, doesnt feature until we're well past the halfway mark, but even so the books are quickly paced and make for fun reading, especially if you dont mind fantasy-hard SF fans probably wont get as much out of the books as they might from say Alastair Reynolds or Stephen Baxter but theyre worth a read I think.

A slice of Ice

2010-01-06T10:31:00.004Z

Next up the first of a trilogy by Alan Dean Foster. Icerigger has been on my shelf for ages now and I finally managed to find book 3 so now I'm going to delve into the world of Ethan Frone Fortune, and his sidekick Skua September on the planet called Tran-Ky-Ky which has a trading outpost called Brass Monkey! Sounds fun!
WellI finished the book yesterday (14th Jan), and it was another fun journey thanks to Mr Foster! The cover calls it 'space opera' but I wouldnt use that definition for this book-its more a planetary adventure, a voyage of discovery that reads rather like science fantasy a la Anne McCaffrey's Dragons Dawn (1988). In other words its like a fantasy adventure with SF elements. Overall, very good and now onto book two....

Earthquakes!!

2009-12-20T15:21:00.003Z

Next up, following on nicely from the James Blish environmental disaster story in 3 For Tomorrow below I'm going to read Richter 10 by Arthur C.Clarke and Mike McQuay. OK so Clarke only provided an 800 page synopsis and the author MQuay died just after the book was complete, but I'll give it a go!
Well I finished this book yesterday (5 January) and it wasnt bad. The first part of the book introduces the characters-Lewis Crane, the emotionally scarred and partially disabled seismologist who survives an Earthquake attack aged 7 in 1997, his asistant Dan Newcombe who is working on his own project, and Lanie King, the de facto love interest. We also meet Islamic fundamentalists and Chinese enterpeneurs and the middle section gets a bit bogged down with politicing-I was beginning to get bored with it all-but then it picked up as more Earthquakes were predicted and Crane's staus became ever more elevated as we enter the mid 21st century. Things get heated up quickly until we reach the strangely uplifting conclusion. Not a bad read-certainly better than I was expecting!

Another cool book haul!

2009-12-18T12:44:00.001Z

Got this from bookmooch this morning-possibly my last book haul for 2009!

Vertigo by Bob Shaw

3 nice book hauls!

2009-12-17T12:08:00.003Z

Took a trip into town yesterday to spend some of my birthday money and droped into the book stall on the market! After a good rummage I found a couple of classic SF paperbacks, Tau Zero by Poul Anderson which I've been after for ages and The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin, an author I've yet to read! Deciding I was done I turned around and saw a huge book with the name Arthur C Clarke on it, it was The Snows of Olympus and I had to have it!

Quite appropriate as it would have been his 92nd birthday yesterday!
Long live Sir Arthur!

3 Tomorrows!

2009-12-14T16:02:00.003Z

Next up an anthology based on an idea by Clarke, an idea of how our future might go drastically wrong!
In this book we have 3 novellas; How it was When the Past Went Away by Robert Silverberg, The Eve of RUMOKO by Roger Zelazny and We All Die Naked by James Blish
The Zelazny piece.will be the first work of his I've read.
Well I read the Silverberg story, very good story about a city brought to its knees by an amnesia epidemic!

Now onto the Zelazny piece...which has a strange, fast paced style similar to the Stainless Steel Rat books of Harry Harisson-but the dialogue is very choppy-I'm not sure I enjoyed that one.
Then Blish's We All Die Naked. It seems they saved the best till last with this book-it is a true Earth disaster story with a very abrupt and unusual ending!

The Palace of Eternity

2009-10-18T11:38:00.001+01:00

Next up is a book I knew nothing about until someone mentioned it on SFF Chrons Forum. I got curious and managed to find one on BookMooch. I've only read one Bob Shaw book before, Fire Pattern which is about spontaneous human combustion or SHC.

This book is totally different and is set in the distant future, when humanity has spread over many star systems in faster than light ships called "Butterfly Ships" named for the shape of the intense magnetic fields which spread for hundreds of miles around them.

The writing in this book is fabulous,very stylish-definitely a keeper! I'll be keeping my eye open for more from this under-rated author!

A bit of Lovecraft

2009-09-16T14:26:00.001+01:00

I've never managed to find any Lovecraft and yet everyone raves about his works, so I was amazed when a copy became available on bookhopper!

The book is called 'Dagon and Other Macabre Tales' and so far I've read the first, and title, story. Quite a short story at about 7 pages and not nearly as scary as I was expecting!
Well this was an interesting journey! Though most of the stories in this volume were pretty unremarkable there were one or two gems. The title story is quite creepy, if far too short,but there's a much longer story in there called Herbert West, Re-animator which makes it worth owning this book! Its creepy and humorous at once!

Wild dogs and americans...

2009-09-05T21:01:00.001+01:00

Next up another Jack London story, again on the Nintendo DS. This time the much shorter Call of the Wild written 5 years earlier in 1900. This is a story about a dog named Buck and his adventures in the Klondike gold fields.
Another enjoyable dog story from Mr London. I suppose I should have read this novella first but it was only after I was halfway through White Fang that I realised that this story was part of the '100 classic Novels for the DS'!

A Wolf's Tale!

2009-08-15T11:40:00.003+01:00

Now for something completely different!
I'm now reading White Fang by Jack London, reading it on my Nintendo DS so no pic, and am enjoying it so far!
This was quite an interesting read. Not your average animal tale but one written with panache. When reading the book and seeing the world through the wolf's eyes you get the feeling the author spent time studying wolves, as well as a good deal of time around dogs!

The birth of Space Opera!

2009-07-30T12:48:00.002+01:00

Now reading Triplanetary, the 'first' Lensman book by E.E. 'Doc' Smith, a food technician turneed SF writer!

This book originally appeared as a serieal in early magazing amazing stories in 1934 and was put into novel form later. There are two forms of this book it seems. The most common version has extra material dealing with Earth history. Thankfully the edition I'm reading, a 2007 copy from Wildside Books, has this extra material omitted.

There is news that a TV series is planned based on these books(there were provisionally 6 in the series), produced by the guy who gave us Babylon Five!

Well this book took me by surprise! It wasnt what I was expecting at all. I found it quite tedious past the halfway mark, but stuck with it and kind of enjoyed it in the end. I've been informed that its not the best Lensman book by far so there is the hope that things get better with the rest of the series!

An early Clarke

2009-07-23T09:59:00.005+01:00

Next up is Islands in the Sky, an early novel from Arthur C. Clarke.
16 year old Roy Malcolm wins a TV quiz, the prize being a trip to anyhere on Earth. Being a clever kid he reasons that the low-Earth orbits of the space stations are technically still part of Earth and so he gets the trip of a lifetime, becoming part of the crew aboard the Inner Station. During his stay young Malcolm will encounter everything from a space voyage, gun smuggling pirates, the making of a TV show in space and a monster in a lab! All gripping stuff with each short chapter ending on a cliff,keeping the reader interested!

Its actually a juvennile novel, aimed at '11 and over' and yet its not childish in its writing, and although a lot of the facts are now out of date (it was written in the early '50s!) there's a lot of stuff in here thats still very relevant!
For a juvennile book we get a good idea of what its like up there in space-not your average kids book (though the kids were probably different in the 50s!)

Fabulous!

Emphyrio!!

2009-07-08T20:34:00.001+01:00

Next up a classic from a lesser known SF and Fantasy author, Jack Vance.

Vance had his own breed of SF that as far as I can make out is strongly influenced by fantasy, but as I've not read any of his books I can't comment.

Well I was not that impressed with this book at all. The first half is very much fantasy-I didnt see it as SF at all, then just after the halfway point it changed and became an SF adventure. Much better but by then it was too late.

Not bad but not brilliant either.

There'll be tears....

2009-06-28T20:13:00.001+01:00

Next up another Philip K Dick novel, this time one of his more famous efforts.

'Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said' is from 1974 and is about a well known and highly respected TV star and singer whose records are suddenly erased, making him a man with no identity,living in a police state where everyone is closely monitored.

The writing in this book, as a contrast to other PKD books I've read, is very clear, direct, accessible, and deals with the protagonist's mission to get his identity back and his life back on track. He has gone from being a household name, on everyone's TV screens daily, to being a nobody, a face in the crowd and then a suspect. The novel deals with paranoia, confusion, and the dangers of drug abuse. But also it is somewhat prophetic.

Though it was written in 1974 there is mention of Gridders, people addicted to communicating and engaging in sexual deviancy via a phone line, who spend so much time in that activity that they become mentally ill or worse. Surely that is a foretaste of the internet! The people are an early form of net junkie! (Cyber sex?) So does that mean its an early taste of cyber-punk?

As usual with Dick there are moments where he deals with sex and drugs, particularly the latter half which made me feel he was obsessed with those themes!
But on the whole this was a fabulous book, I really enjoyed it, easily the best PKD read so far, and i would strongly recommend it!

From the Golden Age of SF.....

2009-06-22T22:29:00.001+01:00

...comes a classic space travel story from Canadian A.E van Vogt.

The Voyage of the Space Beagle is a fix up, that is a novel put together from stories previously published in magazine format,in this case Astounding Stories. Asimov follwed a similar path with his Foundation novels. This book concerns a group of explorers travelling through space,encountering strange lifeforms, very much in the mould of Star Trek which would come much later.

Also part of the book is said to have been the inspiration for the movie Alien. In fact there was a lawsuit involved,van Vogt settling out of court apparently.

By the way, I have read Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle many years ago-this is not a sequel ;)

Well now that I've read it all that I'll add is I loved this book! There were parts of the book that were a bit wooden in the descriptions but well, this IS golden age stuff (the stories were first published in a magazine in the 1940s,and 'assembled' in book form in 1950)
Superb read!

Healing pots with Philip K Dick!

2009-06-18T13:31:00.001+01:00

Next up another library find, Galactic Pot Healer by Philip K Dick, which has to be one of the strangest titles for a SF book ever!

But then again the man wrote a book called Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep which thankfully got filmed as Bladerunner!

Dick is a cult figure in the US and I've yet to find a book of his I can really gel with. He deals more in the softer sciences and often uses strange devices in his stories to drive the story along. This one is a story about a pot healer in the futuure, that is a mender of broken ceramics who is called upon to work on a projext on Plowman's Planet,inhabited by strange creatures,one of whom are called the Glimmung.
Hmmm I was left with a sense of 'what the hell is going in in Dick's mind when he wrote this!'
There's an engaging adventure in there but its hidden amongst his pseudo-scientific ramblings. And at end I was left thinking, what was the point of this book?
I'm not done with PKD yet though, I will come back to him....

Discovering a classic!

2009-06-12T15:17:00.002+01:00

While at the library the other day I came across The forever War by Joe Haldeman, a book I'd heard of before, often spoken highly of but which I'd never managed to find. I had to give it a read!(It won major awards upon publication)

Its kind of military SF. Many people make allusions to the Vienam War but for me it seems closer to Starship Troopers (I've not read that book by Heinlein but I have seen the film). It was written in 1974 and originally serialized in Analog magazine with the central part changed-this version I am reading restores the story to the authors original. Only read a few chapters so far but its shaping up nicely!

This book is a war story that covers both space and time.
William Mandella is a soldier drafted in to fight an ongoing war with an alien race known as the Taurans. They're called Taurans because, well, "Aldebaraniams is a ,little hard to handle!" That is from the book and is just one example of the subtle humour that runs throught this book.

Dont read this book expecting big space battles, this is no space opera; its far more significant than that! There are battle scenes against the Taurans but its far more than a simple war story; its about the human condition as much as anything else, about relationships and evolution (the character was born in the 1970s and the book ends in the 32nd century!!)
I may be making it sound boring but thats because I'm not too good at reviewing a book without giving away spoilers! There's some fun and interesting tech in this book. Like organ regeneration, the depiction of which was particularly good because it is a total surprise to the main character Mandella!

Joe Haldeman is a Vietnam vet and it shows, but he is also a physicist and astronomer which makes for good science throughout the book without being heavy or inaccessible to the lay person.

The story is at times brutal, at times funny, and the rest of the time a wonderful study on the nature of humanity and the perils and pointlessness of war and I enjoyed it far more than I expected to, and I loved the ending!

There are two sequels to this book but I dont need to read them. All the story you need is in this one book!

A new Aldiss novel

2009-05-29T13:45:00.001+01:00

As well as dipping into Aldiss's first short story collection, 'Space Time and Nathaniel', I am also reading HARM, which I borrowed from the library.

A rather unusual book, at first it doesnt sound like science fiction at all yet I've seen it compared to Bradbury's 'Fahrenheit 451' or Dick's 'A Scanner Darkly' on various review sites.

Basically its about Paul,a muslim SF writer who is arrested by the Hostile Activities Research Ministry(HARM) because he wrote a book in which two characters joke about the assissination of the Prime Minister.
He is thrown into a prison in Syria I think(Paul is not sure where he is) and after a rough and often violent interrogation his mind begins to wander and he imagines another world, a planet called Stygia populated by an insect like race,colonised by a cult like group with a ruthless and charismatic leader. As Paul's imprisonment continues his mind spends more time on Stygia than the here and now and the lines begin to blur....
This one is definitely not one for the kids-there are many violent scenes and strong language-the imprisoners are reminiscent of the Gestapo!
Strangely the cover has the author's name shown in his usual incarnation,Brian Aldiss but inside, on the fly page and at the top of each page, the middle initial W is added, something that Brian dropped from his name years ago.
Having finished I can say that this was not an easy read for me. Apart from the often violent depictions in the prison(tho to be honest the scenes as depicted were fairly mild compared to many films I've seen) there's the fact that book exists on two seperate threads and it was rather like reading two books at once. There were parts of it that were well written, as I'd expect from Aldiss, but on the whole it didn't work for me.

A first novel by a major author!

2009-05-20T20:21:00.002+01:00

Now I'm onto 'The Jewels of Aptor' by Samuel R Delany. It was written in 1961 and as well as being the author's first novel it is also the first book of his I've read.

It initially sounds like a fantasy adventure story, being about basically a jewel quest to appease a high priestess but is apparently set after a nuclear holocaust.

Well I found this book OK once the characters and the mission had been established. Some interesting post~apocalypse ideas here but I found the writing a bit odd in places. I wasnt sure if it were typos or idiosyncracies of Delany's style. Apparently thats typical of Delany and things only get stranger.
An OK book, but not really a keeper.

A Modern Classic?

2009-03-30T14:37:00.001+01:00

Time for a much more modern book,albeit one written in 1987!

This is Iain M Banks' first SF novel (and the first of his Culture books) and although I've just started it I'm enjoying it-its good space opera somewhat reminiscent of Alan Dean Foster's Thranx books or Larry Niven's Ringworld. Good stuff, and quite accessible!

Well I finished it, took me a while but it was well worth it! My initial comparisons with ADF's or Niven's books stil holds, though the stuff in 'Consider' is much more hard edged, with a different lyrical approach, probably down to the fact that the author is British! Life with Horza is rough, its tough and often dirty but thats how life often is!
On the whole this is brilliantly written book, and even though it was written in 1987 its very 'now'!
Will definitely be reading more of his SF books in the future!

Going further back in time....

2009-02-23T21:11:00.002Z

I thought I'd give Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea a go.(Publication date 1870,Published in English 1872)

I don't have a hard copy myself but I have it in electronic form as part of the '100 Classic Novels' on the Nintendo DS.
Verne was a French author and was in fact the first professional science fiction author, the only one of his books that I've read is 'Journey to the Centre of the Earth' in a Cassell Children's Illustrated edition that I was given as a child and still have. I'm not sure what 20,000 Leagues is like but I've been informed it can be dull. Oh well,we'll see!

Well I've just finished it. Has taken me a while but that's more down to me than the book. It certainly was a slow read and nothing like any movie version I've seen. One might say that not much happens and its not really very 'SF' but on the whole I quite enjoyed the ride!

The Kraken Wakes

2009-02-02T17:05:00.001Z

Sticking with Wyndham I thought I'd give this novel from 1953 a go. I have tried to read it before but for some reason gave it up.

Well I think I know why I gave up before-its not so much the content but the style. His writing in this is quite heavy and over elaborate. The book is divided into 3 parts and things only really get going part way through the second part. It plods along with little excitement and well, I was glad when I'd finished it! If this had been my first Wyndham book I probably would be put off picking up any others!
An interesting idea handled poorly!

The year begins with something from the late 50s!

2009-01-21T14:33:00.001Z

This year I begin my adventures in the world of SF with John Wyndham's The Midwich Cuckoos. I've only read one Wyndham book previously, The Day of the Triffids which believe me is nothing like the film, but I got this book from Bookmooch (click to see my books listed there) and thought I'd give it a go.

It was written in 1957, the year Sputnik was launched,but it reads rather like how I would imagine a H.G.Wells story would. Its seems to be like what I might call 'quiet SF' -it doesnt shout its story from the rooftops but is just good writing in an easy style.

It concerns itself with a quiet country village that suddenly becomes changed by something out of the ordinary happening-in some ways it resembles the novella by Brian Aldiss, the Saliva Tree, which is a homage to H G Wells.
Well, I finally finished it!(I'm a slow reader, I rarely get the time to myself, not that I'm complaining!)
It was an OK read, not exactly thrillling, kind of quiet SF, which I believe is typical of the author-understated. It got a bit of a chore in parts, being written in the 50s the language was a bit long winded compared to modern standards but it was reasonably entertaining.
This book formed the basis of the horror movie 'Village of the Damned'
Not bad!