From the pen of science fiction writer John Wright comes a sequel to A.E. van Vogt's The World of Null-A and The Pawns (or Players, depending on your edition) of Null-A (the less said about Null-A Three, the better). Will Null-A Continuum fare better than Kevin J. Anderson's sequel to van Vogt's classic Slan? I hope so.

The mystery, however...how come Tor/Orb came out with a handsome trade paperback of The World of Null-A but has not, several years later, done the same with The Players of Null-A. I see them out with Voyage of the Space Beagle this month...

It has been a long time since I've read Slan or the two Null-A books; I'll toss them on to Mount Toberead before getting into the sequels by these two puppies.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 01:01 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 133 words, total size 1 kb.

In 1971, science fiction lost of its greatest advocates on this day.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 05:43 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 16 words, total size 1 kb.

A most excellent movie!

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:57 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 6 words, total size 1 kb.

"Now, I go to spread happiness to the rest of the station. It is a terrible responsibility but I have learned to live with it." (Peter Jurasik as Londo Mollari, A Voice in the Wilderness, Part I)

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 02:56 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 41 words, total size 1 kb.

Equal rights for apes.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:57 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 14 words, total size 1 kb.

Ansible 252 is up!

There was even a role-playing game that utilized strangely shaped polyhedral dice, minute but over priced models, and rulebooks the size of bibles. This was aimed at pale young men who mumbled self-consciously, washed infrequently, and never got picked for the stone-skimming team—and it was, frankly, a disappointment. (David Bilsborough, A Fire in the North, 200

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 10:14 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 62 words, total size 1 kb.

I have been informed by Mr. David Drake that I will be appearing in the next Lt. Leary novel, commanding a cruiser.

If I die, I hope I do so gloriously, in accordance with the finest traditions of the RCN!!!!

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 03:02 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 46 words, total size 1 kb.

Just when you thought you knew somebody...it looks like Regulus is a binary star! Time to start rewriting a lot of science fiction stories!

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:56 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 34 words, total size 1 kb.

David Drake; Lt. Leary, Commanding (Baen Books; 2000; ISBN 0-671-57875-8; cover by Stephen Hickman).

(Read the entire book online, or download it, for free!)

Lt. Leary, Commanding is the second volume in Drake's RCN Series. (For an account of how I came to read the first volume, see this previous post, for a note by David Drake on the series, see this link.) Leary is involved in repairing and refitting the ship the ship he (ahem) acquired in With the Lightnings when he is called on to take command and participate in a mission to a neighboring planet. The mission is muddied by political intrigue, both on his planet, on an intermediate planet (where a side adventure resembles the events of the short precursor story, A Grand Tour, which appeared in the Honor Harrington-related collection More Than Honor), and on the planet his mission originally was aiming for. Toss in a cranky fleet commander, a gang of pirates, and a small private war and top it all off with a nice fleet action and you have some of the finest writing that Patrick O'Brian never did.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:48 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 190 words, total size 2 kb.

David Drake: The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Volume One (Night Shade Books; 2006; ISBN 978-1-892389-69-5; cover by John Berkey).

David Drake: The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Volume Two (Night Shade Books; 2006; ISBN 978-1-892389-73-2; cover by John Berkey).

David Drake: The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Volume Three (Night Shade Books; 2007; ISBN 978-1-892389-80-0; cover by David Martin).

As I read more and more of David Drake's books, I find that I did him something of a disservice in my earlier review of this series. It is only after going through the series, hearing a couple of interviews with him, and reading a chunk of additional tales (of varying lengths) that I see how lightly I dismissed his work.

And for that, I apologize.

more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:03 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 1079 words, total size 7 kb.

Yes, folks, even the end of the world can be funny. But you have to have been in a unit with a new butterbar to really appreciate something like this.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:04 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 38 words, total size 1 kb.

Some nice pictures of early...valves...I mean, tubes! Great stuff, reminds me of my grandfather's amateur radio setup. More nifty stuff here, as well. You can find an occasional supplier, but it is becoming more difficult. more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 11:20 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 144 words, total size 1 kb.

Kim Stanley Robinson is a sad, bitter, depressing man.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:38 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 13 words, total size 1 kb.

I would advise against consuming liquids near a keyboard while reading John Ringo's AAR on RavenCon 2006.

Oh my aching sides...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 11:15 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 29 words, total size 1 kb.

David Drake has released a new issue of his newsletter, outlining various projects. Possibly the most interesting item for me is... more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:58 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 219 words, total size 2 kb.

John Ringo: A Hymn Before Battle (Baen Books, 2001, ISBN 978-1-4165-3321-4; cover by Patrick Turner).

I had read this volume once previously, but picked it up again as I'm trying (desperately!) to catch up on the various series that I keep accumulating. Alas, with somebody like John Ringo (as with several other authors from Baen Books) this is proving difficult...since many churn these puppies out faster than I can consume them. Someday, someday... more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:07 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 298 words, total size 2 kb.

Harlan Ellison and Isaac Asimov: I, Robot: The Illustrated Screenplay (Warner Books; 1994; ISBN 0-446-67062-6; illustrated by Mark Zug).

Inspired by this podcast mentioned by the folks at SF Signal, I hauled this book down for another read. I had read it once before, enjoyed the two introductions (one by Asimov, one by Ellison) immensely, but had kind of been left cold by the rest...I found the form (a screenplay) hard to handle.

This time around, I must have been in the right mindset. Because I found this to be the greatest science fiction movie never made. more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:32 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 573 words, total size 5 kb.

Another month, another Ansible!

Ah, the wonder of it all...

Moshe Feder listens in: 'I heard an interview on our local public radio station's "Leonard Lopate" talk show with a guy named Toby Barlow who's written a new novel about werewolves in LA, called Sharp Teeth. [...] I was immediately wondering how the heck Harper's publicist managed to book him with Lopate, who usually interviews authors of literary fiction and serious nonfiction. Then Leonard comes on and starts saying that the guy has written a novel "unlike anything we've seen before" and I'm practically sputtering at the radio that there are dozens of novels about werewolves around these days. I'm assuming, of course, that it's another case of mainstream media being ignorant of SF and fantasy, as when all the reviewers praised The Truman Show for its "original" concept. But then he adds the kicker: the novel is written in free verse; it's an epic poem. At that point, all I could do was shut up, listen, and crank my jaw back into position.'

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 02:33 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 177 words, total size 1 kb.

A while back I came across a list of movies, books and other entertainment items on the International Space Station. I forwarded that list to Baen Books, as I noticed that a good chunk of the titles involved were from that publisher.

Somewhat jokingly I suggested that, in the spirit of their programs to give free books to members of the military and free books to disabled readers, they ought to give free books to the crew of the ISS.

Gee...maybe I should have suggested they give me a book contract. Because it appears they listened to me!

(I can't complain. They get free books, and I got a free Baen Books apron and a bunch of bookmarks and a sheet of autographed bookplates!)

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:47 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 134 words, total size 1 kb.

...Did anybody feel the need to remake The Andromeda Strain? I'll watch it from end to end later, but the ten or so minutes I saw were...uninspiring...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:13 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 31 words, total size 1 kb.