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Service Model – Tchaikovsky (2024)
I liked the story and the writing, though I think it didn’t go anywhere memorable in the end. The start of it, the first few chapters, I found the strongest and most engaging. There is a strong surreal comic element (with a Jeeves and Wooster setting) that works well. The story keeps moving and never… Continue reading
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(DNF) Kraken – Miéville (2010)
The prose has a signature. I think I read the book as far as I did in large part because I liked how it was written. I’ve read City and the City, and like in that book, the author has a particular, engaging style. The story starts out in the normal world but there are… Continue reading
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Future Boy – Fox and Fortenberry (2025)
No writing lessons here. Just a note to say, if you are a Back To The Future fan, you will like this book. It is written with not to much self-laudation and focuses on the time Fox was working days on “Family Ties” and nights on “Back to the Future”. It’s an easy read, has… Continue reading
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The Dragon never Sleeps – Cook (1988)
(DNF at 65% for unknown reasons) This is “Dune”-ish SF, which in turn is feudal SF. There are great houses that compete for supremacy. There are dark forces, spies, traitors, clones, colorful villains, elite knights of an ancient order and ghost ships. The ideas are fantastical and great. I especially liked the description of hyperspace… Continue reading
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The Gods Themselves – Asimov (1972)
The story is classic Asimov. There is a strong scent of chemistry running through it. There are clashing scientists, there are bureaucrats, and there is the big science idea and its impact on the world. There is at least one dame. This is what we call hard SF now (perhaps ideas SF). Like all great… Continue reading
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(DNF) The Stars My Destination – Bester (1956)
This is 1950s sci fi safari adventure. It’s not amazing, but it flows well, very readable, but it just didn’t click long term with me, and I checked out a third of the way through. There is a very interesting treatment of teleportation at the start of the book, and that is well worth reading.… Continue reading
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Darwin’s Radio – Bear (1999)
I think this is a very good science fiction book. It picks a big idea in known science, makes it bigger and builds a mystery story around it full of scientists, corporations, politicians and the lay public. If you don’t hate genomics you should read it (and you can skip the info dumps anyway). The… Continue reading
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The Boroughs – Addiss and Matthews (2026)
The plot isn’t spectacular, the ideas aren’t novel (like at all), and the ending doesn’t track, but there’s a nice turnaround at the 3/4 mark. The acting and the mood are SUPERB throughout. #tv #scifi #horror #review Continue reading
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The man who folded himself – Gerrold (1973)
This time travel story started strong with great technique, ideas and plot, but got lost at the half way mark and never made it back. As a decently spoiler free warning: vast quantities of words are dedicated to describing and debating a particular aspect of sexuality and sexual exploration. There are a few other novel… Continue reading
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Chess with a Dragon – Gerrold (1988)
This is a fast paced, more twists than a twizzler, science fiction caper that packs a lot into its small size. Written from a rotating gallery of viewpoints it starts incomprehensibly and gets clearer as it goes along, effectively mirroring our own growing awareness of just what the hell humanity has gotten itself in to.… Continue reading
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Gateway (Hechee #1) – Pohl (1977)
I came to this book because someone claimed the Hechee series was the best depiction of aliens they had read. I am no longer taking recommendations from that person.I spent the whole book going “When are we gonna see some action?” At the 99% mark I was like, “OK, maybe these last five pages will… Continue reading
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The princess, the crone, and the dung-cart knight – Morris (2004)
This was an immensely enjoyable book for both my (pre)teen daughter and me as I read it to her at bedtime. I found it continuously engaging, delightful, emotional and having unexpected depth. In some ways it is unsophisticated in it’s character development, but no less powerful for that. This is one of those books that… Continue reading
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Stargate SG1: Solitudes (S1E18)
(Spoilers) This is a tougher, darker and deeper episode than most. It relies entirely on acting and writing for its effect. Props and effects are almost absent. It deals with some tough situations: claustrophobia, being shipwrecked, being lost, frostbite, freezing to death, starving to death not knowing what happened to close friends, feeling helpless against… Continue reading
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Lord of Light – Zelazny (1967)
The story starts strong, with an intriguing premise, fast flow, world, cast of characters and striking writing style. The last quarter of the novel is disappointing: it goes on too long, the writing is weak and it waters down the payoff. Stylistically the writing feels like someone had read a translation of the Ramayana and… Continue reading
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The Windup Girl – Paolo Bacigalupi (2009)
(As usual, spoilers galore) Good: World building The story is excellent at building a far east colonial island vibe with a post apocalyptic post fossil fuels backdrop. This is the first time I’ve read an explorations of a spring powered society (Spring Punk? Tension Punk? Hookes Punk?) and it was quite fun. The book does… Continue reading
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The hair carpet weavers – Eschbach (1995/2005)
This was a great read. It’s a well done classical “campfire story”: Eschbach keeps plugging away throwing puzzle piece after puzzle piece on the table, each containing an intriguing and increasingly unhinged fragment of the picture until, at the final chapter, the whole image is revealed to us. It is science fiction with an element… Continue reading
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The City and The City – Mieville (2009)
A detective story with a major fantastical element that is kind of parallel worlds but then not, I really liked how the fantastical element is gradually built up from a subtle first hint to a complete world. Not happy with the ending which seemed to be too much light and noise, but a book well… Continue reading
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Freeze-Frame Revolution – Watts (2018)
Freeze-Frame Revolution is a “Hard SF” novella that I didn’t enjoy that much. It starts out with some interesting premises and promises but gradually fizzles out. Having liked the sounds and words of Blindsight (though a tiny bit let down by the end of the story), I decided to give Freeze-Frame Revolution a go. The… Continue reading
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Blindsight – Watts (2006)
I enjoyed reading and thinking through this book immensely, despite an anti-climactic and overly vague ending. It is definitely an “ideas” science fiction book rather than a world building or plot or character driven one, so it might not be for everyone. The ideas are fabulous, prodigious and completely undeveloped. The sudden and frequent info… Continue reading
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A long way to a small angry planet – Chambers (2014)
Though this book is very popular, it just wasn’t for me. #bookreview #writing Continue reading
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Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny – 2023
I enjoyed this much more than the previous movies but the enjoyable part came perhaps on the final third of the movie. (SPOILERS) I only really began to enjoy it when the time travel device becomes a bigger part of it all. And to be very precise, I only started really enjoying the movie when… Continue reading
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Mechanics: Organizing novel files (2)
(This is an iteration on my previous workflow. This post will make no sense and have no interest for most people. This is just me figuring out a better workflow for myself after several years of working.) tl;dr: New workflow The whole manuscript is one markdown file I use the neovim editor with the outline… Continue reading
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Robot mop (Qrevo S) review
The robot mop has been a good addition to the cleaning routines at home #roborock #irobot #mop Continue reading
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Borne – VanderMeer (2017)
Borne left me better for having read it, and that is all I ask of the journey. For most of the time I was reading it, though, I did not know what to do with it. It wasn’t really science fiction and it was pretty surreal and a bit tongue in cheek (I thought). For… Continue reading
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Way Station – Simak (1964)
I really enjoyed this book. Let’s dive into some writing lessons (Many spoilers) Simak starts with an info dump / prologue. Theoretically, this is awful, right? But Simak disguises this as a gripping dialog between two characters. One is a scientist, and is a stand in for us the reader. The other is a spy(ish)… Continue reading
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Snow Crash – Stephenson (1992)
Snow Crash starts with a sassy, sly tone that promises a book both fun and fast. Sadly for me, the book grew from an entertaining cutesy precocious preteen into an annoying teenager that chews gum, pops bubbles, and says “whatever” to everything you say. The sassiness got old, the slyness lost its innocence and the… Continue reading
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Kobo Libra Colour: Field Notes from a scribbler
The Libra Colour and a good book coincided to revive a precious part of me: the scribbler and I am really, really happy. Yes, there are small issues with palm rejection. and bugs in the annotation feature, but I unreservedly recommend the device to scribblers. I scribble prolifically in my physical books. When I got… Continue reading
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Kobo Libra Colour: My opinions
The Kobo Libra Colour is a great fit for readers (and authors) who want to mainly read and make margin notes and journal a bit here and there. Yes, the screen is a bit dark but, in contrast to the online histrionics, it’s not an issue for me. The margin notes have a palm rejection… Continue reading
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Foundation – Asimov (1951)
This book is a collection of separate stories set in the same universe. The stories are heavy on exposition, describe somewhat simple minded political maneuvering, and have repetitive ideas and plots. I enjoyed parts of the first and last stories but overall they do not stand well by themselves and they do not stand well… Continue reading
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Mechanics: Organizing novel files
(This post will make no sense for most people. This is just me figuring out a better workflow for myself after several years of working.) New workflow Each chapter gets a memorable nick-name, like fluffy-lama.md I’ll make no attempt to make a descriptive chapter name, because the focus of chapters changes quite often. A master… Continue reading
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Story openings and “You Can Call Me Al.”
I had already listened over a hundred times to Paul Simon’s “You Can Call Me Al”, before I got the itch to figure out what all those disjointed lyrics meant. Paul himself has a famous explanation for the words which I find a bit forced. I think it should be OK for creative people, especially… Continue reading
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Room to maneuver: Book series planning (II)
In a burst of uncharacteristic industry I produced a set of outlines for a series of books I planned as a follow up to my current one. My experience with outlines and Book I was that the outline I started with was completely different from the story I ended up with: I went back and… Continue reading
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The murky definition of “First draft”
I’ve completed yet another first draft. This is a first draft mostly because I think the story is complete and most of the scenes have been written. It is a first draft because none of the chapters (except perhaps the first few) have been worked over repeatedly. It’s a first draft because it’s still a… Continue reading
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Experimenting with a new writing strategy
Seeing how I used outlines and how I actually write, I have an experiment I want to try for my next book. I like to extemporize and not stick to an outline. I will start off with an outline and then, instead of going chapter by chapter, I will attempt to grow the whole outline… Continue reading
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The Spy Who Came in from the Cold – le Carré (1963)
(Spoilers) This is a George Smiley novel the same way Superman is a Marlon Brando film. Smiley makes cameo appearances, is hinted to be the hand behind the curtain, but it really is told from the viewpoint of a new character. In terms of style, there is the occasional rapid switching of point of view… Continue reading
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A murder of quality – le Carré (1962)
This book had a very (Agatha) Christean feel to it with Smiley taking on the role of Hercule Poirot with the little grey cells. Little clues here and there, finally adding up in the end. It is fluidly written, with minimal exposition, though the author can not resist a bit of allegory here and there… Continue reading
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Call for the Dead – le Carré (1961)
The book is well written. It is, perhaps, even technically better than Tinker, Tailor (odd, given that Tinker came later). Tinker, however, has more style and is more challenging to read in a good way. Call for the Dead is linear and easier to follow though there are still the shifts of view that are… Continue reading
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Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy – le Carré (1974)
(Minor thematic spoilers) This engagingly written story is told in a characteristic way and holds great writing lessons for us. Instead of being overly analytic as I tend to be and making short notes under a gazillion headings, I will focus on one aspect of the writing that I found impressive: the fluid use of… Continue reading
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Jennifer Morgue – Stross, 2006
(DNF, Some spoilers) – I enjoyed the Atrocity Archives and so I thought I’d give Jennifer Morgue a spin. I had the same enjoyment of it, until, unexpectedly and inexplicably, it resorted to hard core pornography. Thankfully this happens early, when I was invested, but not too invested in it. I looked at the other… Continue reading
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Unfrosted (2024)
(I don’t know if you can really spoil this movie, but you have been warned). Unfrosted is a genuinely empty, forgettable yet enjoyable movie, much like the topic matter it centers around. I watched it start-to-finish, chuckled a few times and didn’t feel anything when it ended. It’s not a bad way to spend an… Continue reading
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Stargate Universe (2009 – up to S1E12)
(Spoilers for S1) SGU, like SG:1 before it, is a series that stands on the writing and characterization rather than just the visuals and so it is worth examining it to learn story telling lessons. General story telling notes The deserted island (Alien spaceship) with unexplored dungeons (closed off sections – also used in SG… Continue reading
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5ive days to midnight (2004)
This time travel/alternate time lines sci-fi thriller/romance starts off well, explores the predestination paradox with a creative bit of whodunit mixed in, but gradually botches it by trying too hard to throw sand in our eyes as the end draws neigh. (Spoilers throughout). 5ive days starts strong: In some kind of weird dreamlike prelude we… Continue reading
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Why are the aliens always invading us?
(Major spoilers to 3 body problem in intro) I slogged through to episode 3 of 3 Body Problem before getting truly tired of hitting the fast forward button. I went and found a article that summarized the story line. Apparently “The Aliens” have an inhospitable home planet, and as soon as they hear from us,… Continue reading
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Orion and the Dark (2024)
(Several spoilers) The movie tackles the issue of anxiety in general and uses the example of anxiety over darkness (that often manifests at bedtime) in particular. It starts to deal with the complexity of the topic but peters out half way. The ending is uneven and unsuccessful in some senses, but the whole of it… Continue reading
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Star Trek: The Director’s Edition
There will be no writing lessons drawn here. This is a determinedly visual treat. I’m also not reviewing the whole movie, though, personally, I like it a lot, and I don’t get the hate for it. It is perhaps the most cerebral of the Star Trek movies. There is no traditional baddie and Kirk doesn’t… Continue reading
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Cowboy Bebop
In the end, every story rests on the characters. I enjoyed the episodes where I could see the characters developing, showing new weaknesses, understanding each other and so on. When that began to thin out #scifi #tv Continue reading
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Notes on the first 30 min of “3 Body Problem” (Netflix 2024)
(Yes, that’s how far I got for now.) The “3 Body Problem” starts out dramatically and graphically gory. A dead scientist is found with his eyes gouged out. The gouged out eyes are shown in graphic detail. Another scientist commits suicide by jumping into a deep pool (The set resembles the Super-Kamiokande facility). We flash… Continue reading
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Notes on Revelation Space – Reynolds (2000)
(I DNFd this 16% of the way in. I didn’t take away any new writing lessons from it. It’s possibly typical writing for late twentieth century science fiction.) My main takeaway is that your reader has to be invested in at least one of : character, plot and world, if not all three. In this… Continue reading
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Notes on the flawed replication of stolen material
A.I. generated art relies on a digitized human art corpus. A.I. writing replicates existing patterns, lacking genuine context. It produces technically good but contextually shallow work, potentially flooding the market with cheap imitations. This combinatorial creativity lacks originality and taste, serving utility over genuine creativity. The influx of A.I. art concerns the dilution of true… Continue reading
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Crossplot (1969)
Crossplot is a wild caper involving Roger Moore, an actress I was convinced was Gina Lollobrigida, leggy girls in mini-dresses and a damn good helicopter stunt pilot. And a plot. I think there is a plot somewhere. What’s not to like! We open with some guy being tossed off a bridge and his female companion… Continue reading
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License plate numbers in The Avengers
I was watching an episode of The Avengers and while admiring a sporty car model wondered idly about its license plate. I like old TV shows and movies and one of the things I always remark to myself is that “That’s real!” by which I mean – if a car was driving by, it was… Continue reading
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The Night Agent (2023)
I picked this because it gave off John le Carre vibes. I’ve watched two episodes so far. Will I keep watching? I don’t know. When a series starts trying too hard in episode one, I don’t have confidence in the writers. Story telling lessons (Spoilers galore) Works: Ingenue vs the Expert Skilled person vs unskilled… Continue reading
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To Say Nothing of the Dog – Connie Willis (1997)
My reaction to this book is a striking example of how our tastes change. I first read this book in 2001 and I absolutely loved it. I am a fan of Three men in a boat, and to find a science fiction comedy riffing off that was delightful. I took it up again, two decades… Continue reading
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To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee (1960)
It’s a book I read every five years or so. I forget when I first read it. I remember watching the movie in middle school. I remember it being a wonderful movie and I remember one of my classmates cracking a joke (“Ah, Ham! Its what we need right now”) when Scout was walking with… Continue reading
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Story telling lessons from StarGate:SG-1
I became a Stargate:SG1 super fan a few weeks ago. In between binging all the seasons I’ve tried to understand what makes this twenty year old series (mostly) extremely good and can we take away lessons for the written word? Many episodes start with an impossible problem Many episodes start with a drastic break from… Continue reading
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I’m in too deep. Send help!
I’m on draft 3. Apparently that’s the dangerous draft, because I’m getting ideas for major restructuring of the work. The smaller things, like breaking a chapter in two and moving another chapter in between are easy to do and test. The bigger things, like “make this happen before”, “tweak the plot to make motivations more… Continue reading
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My failures with “The Expanse”
I really wanted to like The Expanse. The problem is I only have a 30min or so slot to sit down and watch something, and the expanse is, sadly, not in the league of, say, “Stargate SG 1” that packs a good wallop even within 30min. Every time I get my 30min slot and I… Continue reading
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Singularity Sky – Stross (2003)
Singularity Sky starts out strong, devolves into cliches and ends rather tamely. It has elements of hard science fiction, space military fiction, espionage thriller, a dash of steam punk with a minor sprinkling of erotica and occasional forays into the absurd. Oddly, it is these few, almost psychotic, forays into absurdism where the book is… Continue reading
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A second chance for yesterday – Sinn (2023)
The core concept is rather fun. A company has invented a device that can “rewind” (via time travel) the last few seconds of your life and is selling it as an online service. Ground Hog day as a Service as it were. In this respect this book is very much stuck in a San Fransisco… Continue reading
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The Lighthouse of Kuiper – Rensing (2023)
I’m angry at this book. I really wanted to like it, but I did not finish it. I started to get restless at the 15% mark and at the 17% mark I skipped ahead to 20% to see if anything improved and it didn’t and I gave up. Of the recent science fiction I have… Continue reading
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Fractal Noise – Paolini (2023)
Before reading this book it is important to know that it is very much a “it’s the journey, not the destination” type of story. The crew of a mining ship discover a giant, perfectly round hole on a planet emitting a powerful radio signal. They undertake an expedition to investigate the hole. The whole book… Continue reading
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The Past Trader – Donohoo (2023)
This is a financial thriller with a time travel core (A “What if I could go back in time and buy APPL?” class of story). It has a cool big idea, and builds a very character and event driven story around it. I was pretty engaged with the book until about the 90% mark. At… Continue reading
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Dreaming of a Hopeful Death – Mori (2023)
I DFNd this book and struggled to decide what kind of recommendation to give it. It is poetically written and it has breathtakingly grand ideas. If you are into “traditional hard science fiction” and willing to skip character and plot development for some imaginative exposition, you may like this book. For me, what I considered… Continue reading
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Tricking myself out of a writing slump
I had built up a decent writing routine: every night, for at least 20 minutes. As is normal, it wasn’t every night that I could do it, but I set that target and got close to it. Then I got sick. It was an ordinary everyday illness, but it lingered a bit (still does) and… Continue reading
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The Lucky Starman – Alexander (2023)
This is a well paced, entertaining, page turning action story. Genre wise, the first 30% of the book is Space Opera-ish, the next 30% pseduo-western and the last 40% 20th century military fiction. These last two sections have an “alternate history” or “time traveller from the future” flavor. The cover (a hand holding a skull… Continue reading
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Infinity Gate – Carey (2023)
This is a very exposition heavy multiple universes story. Die hard fans of hard science fiction may enjoy parts and aspects of the story but most of the science is heavily hand-waved and some of the story lacks consistency. The writing has a distance to the main characters that makes it hard to empathize with… Continue reading
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A more productive writing warmup ritual
In one of Brandon Sanderson’s lectures [1] he mentions that he spends a certain amount of time in a writing session warming up and if this warm up time is interrupted he has to start afresh. On most days, I have this issue too. I have two designated writing times: my “official” writing time which… Continue reading
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Good Omens (The TV series) – 2019
Great start, good middle, uneven, slightly too long, highly predictable and, dare I say, mediocre, ending. They didn’t stick the landing, but it was a 9.5 for the rest. The friendship between the Angel and Crowley is the centerpiece of the story and I really, really liked it. The rest is, quite rightly, a backdrop… Continue reading
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THE BALLAD OF BETA-2 – Delaney (1964)
It’s great ’60s science fiction but this kind of concept doesn’t grab me any more. I picked this on a recommendation from Peat Long. It is novella length with fluid writing which made for easy reading to the end. It has an engaging mix of narratives, with third person close for the “present time” thread… Continue reading
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Top gun: part deux – The usual suspects (2022)
My spouse and I, imprinted on TopGun, enjoyed Maverick with our hearts. But to do this I had to first switch off my brain and then I just enjoyed the ride. Go watch this. If you are of a certain age you know you want to. Spoilers follow The nostalgia is strong with this one.… Continue reading
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Saint Jack – Bogdanovich (1979)
I watched this movie all the way to the end, not because it was a thrill a minute, not because I wanted to know what happened next, but because of the world. It was realistic but surreal, ugly but beautiful, familiar but strange. Ben Gazzara plays Jack Flowers very, very well. And Jack Flowers is… Continue reading
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Star Wars: Andor
It took me several episodes to catch on that the man’s name was Andor, not the planet he was on. It took me several episodes to catch on that the scene with the aboriginals and the crashed spaceship was not a flashback from his life, but something happening now. Or perhaps I’ve mixed that up… Continue reading
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The Color of Magic – Pratchett (1983)
The writing style is whimsically humorous in the vein of P.G. Woodehouse or Jerome K. Jerome, which is a fine thing. The plot moves along. The story felt a little disjointed and, for now, I DNFd at Part 3 (Wyrmberg) because I picked up a more compelling non-fiction book (Why does E=mc^2) and want to… Continue reading
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D.U.D.E (I mean Free Guy)
Freeguy is the movie we all needed in the middle of the pandemic. Ryan Reynolds was born for his role. I think I laughed nonstop. I don’t need to do a more thorough review: if you are looking for a movie to lift your spirits, this is it. The three funniest characters in movies, ever,… Continue reading
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Who benefits from Twitter bankruptcy?
An individual bought Twitter (took the company private). This individual seems to be taking direct product and user facing decisions (pushing new features, blocking particular accounts, changing community policies) which appear to be spectacularly unhelpful for the business. If we exclude the substantial possibility that such acts are driven by incompetence, there remains a small… Continue reading
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The big cut
The cut is done! I’ve taken 35000 words from the end of book one and set them free, sorry, recaptured them as book two. They won’t form the start of book two: they are probably nuclei for middle and end chapters. The first book will end with some questions answered and fresh ones open, which… Continue reading
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The answer is more pain.
I stopped for a moment to reflect why the current chapter was being such a slog. A bad slog. The trouble wasn’t finding the right words, or imagery, or dialog: that’s a good slog, that’s the challenge of writing. No, it was just BORING. If it was boring to write, very likely it is gonna… Continue reading
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Alien Invasion: S.U.M.1 – Pasquariello (2017)
Closer to psychological thriller than plain old alien dystopian sci-fi, it is not all it could be, and is too slow at the start, too fast at the end, and the twist delivered too slowly to not see it coming, but it at least tries to be innovative. The acting is serviceable, the dialog is… Continue reading
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Moonfall – Emmerlich (2022)
I’m split about Moonfall. I say, cut out the entire first hour, cut out Halle Berry, keep the Brit and the Mexican: they put some heart into it. I don’t care about the rest. The last hour is imaginative and fun and perhaps even bold. The concepts are not particularly novel, but the visuals are… Continue reading
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Beyond the infinite two minutes – Yamaguchi (2020)
Easily makes it to my list of favorite cosy / smart / artsy / sci-fi / (with a dash of rom-com) movies. In fact, I don’t think any movie has ever hit so many spots for me, so it’s probably in a class all by itself. I won’t spoil it for you: if you like… Continue reading
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I can only write on the train
I have observed for a while that I write best in the middle of a crowd that I don’t have to pay attention to. On my morning commute, I write on the train, blocking out everyone else. When I am waiting for my kid at Saturday school, I can block out the zillion conversations in… Continue reading
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Blocked (again)
Been blocked on my story for a while now, perhaps even two weeks. I got sick, the kiddo started school other even weaker excuses blah blah, but the bottom line is that I got stuck. I’m in the dreaded muddled middle and getting bogged down in the trenches. I couldn’t get myself unstuck by writing… Continue reading
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Tracking and Revenge: Nit-picking Obi-Wan
(Spoilers to Star Wars and Obi-Wan) I was enjoying the dark moodiness of the new Obi-Wan Kenobi series until the twisted sister, or whatever she’s called, got an extension on her contract. My annoyance with the story started earlier when someone, once again, got tracked all the way back to their secret base. My annoyance… Continue reading
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The Phantom Menace – Lucas (1999)
I think this was the first time I watched this movie. Or perhaps it was so unmemorable, I forgot I had watched it before. My 8 year old kid loved parts of it. Perhaps that is the correct age to enjoy it. As a grownup all I could think of was the terrible acting, the… Continue reading
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Ella Minnow Pea – Dunn (2001)
It was only when I said the title aloud to my spouse that I realized that it sounds like “LMNOP”. This novel is full of such delightful and often subtle word play and word jokes. Even the structure of the novel can be considered a (meta) pun, since it is about the letters of the… Continue reading
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Mired in draft2
I’m in a sluggish place right now. I have an opening, a bit of a middle and tatters of an end. I’ve called it draft1 for a while but I didn’t quite finish the story, so I don’t know what it is. It’s a painting with the top half needing some work but recognizable, a… Continue reading
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Love and Monsters – O’Brian, Greenblatt, Henwick, Rooker (2020)
A truly lovely post-apocalyptic horror/romance/action/comedy with an uplifting end. Simple, well-paced plot with the right amount of unpredictability, simple, lovable characters with predictable and comfortable development, very tautly created atmosphere and style and remarkably good monsters. It is a road-trip story, a coming of age story, a love story, a buddy story, a boy meets… Continue reading
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Inversions – Banks (1998)
This is an engaging tale of palace intrigue set in a medieval world laced with the lightest of supernatural touches. While it may technically be classified as science fiction since the world seems to be not Earth, this is irrelevant to the story. The supernatural touch is light but pivotal to the story and in… Continue reading
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Ukraine is the leader of the free world
(Writing is often our refuge from the real world. This post is not about writing but about the real world. Feel free to skip it.) I live a million miles from the Russian mass murder of Ukrainians but I have some thoughts on this. None of what I write here will change the outcome of… Continue reading
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Breakfast at Tiffany’s – Capote (1958)
This is a truly excellent book and you must read it. It is a very human story, riveting up to the last word, and one of the few stories I have read that never flags even for a moment. It is also a story that is rich in instruction for authors on how to write.… Continue reading
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Filter words, schmilter words.
Word on the street is that only n00bs use filter (or veil) words and skilled writers carefully avoid them. What are filter words? Here is an example: “She heard a sound behind her and turned around. There was Mrs Whatsit scrambling over the wall.” What is wrong with this? The internet is full of explanations.… Continue reading
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Gratuitous LEGO nostalgia
This post is completely meaningless except for a vanishingly tiny number of people. I really don’t know why I made it. 1986 I spent hours looking at 6780 (XT Starship) because of the light and sound (and all the new pieces) and 6783 because it was so freaking big! I wanted 6940 for the slanting… Continue reading
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Planning out a series of books
“No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.” – Robert Frost Collected Poems (1939) I have discovered that I am a discovery writer. The first draft of my current work ended up being light years away from my original outline. The story changed organically as I got to understand the characters and the plot… Continue reading
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Automata – Harris, Jones, Taylor (2018)
I’m a sucker for the old timey Sam Spade, detective noire trope. Mix-in a robot-buddy and SOLD. Automata is a feel good, cyber-noire tale set in an alternate history 1920s cyber-prohibition US. I give it 4.5 robot heads out of 5. Much, much better than most of the trash that is labeled science fiction these… Continue reading
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You can break physics, but not psychology
I don’t normally watch or read a lot of fantasy because the glaring holes in the world bother me, but like everyone else, good writing/directing will draw me into any book or movie. So here I am, a person who hates fantasy, enjoying Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Slayer (2012), a movie where Abe is a Vampire… Continue reading
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Progress Report: Draft 2 34k/96k
Wow, it sure doesn’t feel like I’m a third of the way through but the word count suggests so. I’ve left one chapter behind because I thought of a cool treatment for it and started a from scratch rewrite, found it tough going and am letting it simmer on the back burner. This chapter will… Continue reading
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Encounter – Ahmed, Spencer, Gavankar, Chauhan, Geddada (2021)
Spoilers galore Encounter has the best opening sequence of a SF movie I’ve seen for a long time. Most National Geographic specials aren’t that good or convincing. It’s worth watching for those 2 minutes alone. The nearest thing that comes to mind is Inner Space (1987), and this is way, way better than that. If… Continue reading
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An ode to the Oculus Quest 2
My spouse got me an Oculus Quest 2 for Christmas this year and realized my lifetime dream of experiencing Virtual Reality (VR). (Yes, I opened it early.) In short, I’m sold. I’m a fan. I live in the future. The Quest 2 is the only VR setup I’ve ever tried and I have nothing but… Continue reading
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The 13th Vote – Gavin (2020)
The 13th Vote is a tale of murder and political intrigue set against a faintly science-fictional backdrop. While it is a tad long, and does not delve too deeply into any one genre, it is an entertaining and engaging read with a sweeping story spanning generations and locales and told from multiple and often conflicting… Continue reading
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