Are These Stories Or Just Stuttering Sentences?

Wired have posted an interesting article on stories of six words or less. They asked sci-fi, fantasy, and horror writers from the realms of books, TV, movies, and games to take a shot themselves at something which Hemingway had done: (”For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”) which he is dubbed as saying was his best work.

Other noterieties include Joss Whedon, Stan Lee, Rudy Rucker, Charles Stross, Gregory Macguire, Margeret Atwood, Alan Moore, David Brin, Eileen Gunn and William Shatner.

My favourite is from Alan Moore: “Machine. Unexpectedly, I’d invented a time”

Scheherazade #28
Reviewed By Gareth D Jones

Scheherazade is a glossy looking magazine whose editors have sadly announced that they will be producing only two more issues. That’s obviously not because they have run out of steam however, as this special SF issue is packed with a fabulous selection of stories. Whether the magazine will continue under new management has yet to be announced.

At Cliché’s Bar is a story for SF connoisseurs by Larry Matthews. It boasts an amazing amount of cliché’s per paragraph and is set in that classic location: the interplanetary bar. Great fun to spot all the references.

A total contrast is Laura’s Knot by Neal Asher. It’s the disturbing story of a woman who’s memory has been tied in knots, and her traumatic attempt to recall her past. Evocative description ties in with jarring flashbacks to create a well executed piece.

Karen Traviss gives us Agent of God, not the story of an avenging crusader, but of a literary agent. A brief and light hearted epilogue to a much longer work!

A Token of our esteem 2298 AD is an enjoyable piece of space opera by Lyn McConchie. It effectively contrasts the attitudes and cultures of a scheming trader with the seemingly naïve inhabitants of a ‘barbaric’ planet. You know that something is up, but you’ll be hard pressed to figure it out before the excellent conclusion.

It’s a very politically correct future in David Murphy’s Cool Tiled Floors, where even the football team you support is regulated. An effectively ironic tale that throws in some uncomfortable background for the protagonist and makes you wonder if it could really happen. A slightly worrying thought.

An old conspiracy theory is given another airing in Vaughan Stanger’s Sons of the Earth, as two old friends reminisce about the old days. Short, but thoughtful.

Trevor Denyor has obviously had great fun creating his octopus-like character searching for others of his kind in Landfall. It manages to combine a bit of mysticism and romance into a gloomy tale of the far future.

There’s some nice psychological sketching in Daddy’s Home by Nigel Brown, a title that only now as I’m writing this I realise has more than one meaning. I had an idea what was causing the strange symptoms that gradually debilitate and isolate the eponymous dad, but the end still left me smiling, in a disturbed kind of way.

In The Lord’s Work by Andy Oldfield you’ll think you have the story I was expecting from Agent of God, as a mysterious figure journeys to the next village on his one man mission. I was still wrong.

The last two stories in the magazine seem to continue a similar theme. The Mission by Simon Morden is a medieval tale of two enemy soldiers, one human, one not, who form an uneasy alliance in their quest for truth. In the tradition of Enemy Mine their preconceptions are challenged as their well-written relationship develops. A fine addition to the issue.

Finally, Martin Taulbut’s The Pagans is set in a future where there is only one state religion and an android investigator is sent undercover to infiltrate a group of druids. The non-judgemental attitude of the android is perfect for telling the story while remaining detached from any ethical dilemmas, and the mixture of high tech gadgets and a familiar English backdrop makes a pleasing combination.

There’s also an in depth and enlightening interview with Brian Stableford to round out a magazine that looks good and reads well.

Speculative Fiction Gets An Addition

Terry Martin and his team are busy working on issue zero, the promo issue, of a new speculative fiction magazine entitled Murky Depths.

Their website has this introduction: Murky Depths is a new magazine with a difference, featuring top quality speculative fiction with sprinklings of horror and fantasy that push the boundaries of science fiction. Each story will be complimented with its own unique artwork. Alongside the straight prose will also be cutting edge graphic stories. Articles across the genres and mixed disciplines will add authority, humour and maybe a little controversy.

Terry also mentioned that it’s UK based, although half the team are over the other side of the pond, in the States. At the moment it’s print only (is this a bad thing!) and you can get more information from the Murky Depths site.

And of course, we’ll review it once it’s out.

Episode 8 of Paul Levinson’s Light On Light Through podcast.

Episode 8 is entitled “Time Travel in Fiction and Fact” and I believe it features a brief clip and free MP3s of his Edgar-nominated radioplay, The Chronology Protection
Case.

It’s also available on iTunes.

Well worth a listen.

Q) Do you happen to know the name of a show I watched in the early 70’s as a child, all I remember was a ship with 6 or 8 semispheres that were little worlds and a man and woman trying to get to the other end!

A) This one has us stumped, we have absolutely no idea to be honest. If it’s a 70s movie it’s probably called, The Ship In Space” or something.

Click, joystick left, click joystick right…

…dodgy black sheet with pin pricks in, with light shining through to make stars.. beep…

Nice flares. Nice solar flares too.

Anyone have any ideas - it must ring a bell with someone!

Forbidden Planet are now doing Gift Certificates.

These are a really quick and easy way of giving to your beloved scifi/fantasy enthusiast!!

Funky.

Q) Hello, I have a basic easy question. What is a parasite or creature that takes over the mind of a host? A good example is the movie “Slither“.

A) I’m thinking that you’ve answered the question already - parasite: an organism that lives on or in an organism of another species, known as the host, from the body of which it obtains nutriment.

Or maybe it’s called The Brain Inserting, Juice Extracting, Bed Down, Free Party, Get Down And Boogie Organism.

Maybe not: it’s a parasite.

Kim Stanley Robinson on Hour of the Wolf

From Andy Porter and Roy Gray.

On recording from CapClave, Kim Stanley Robinson performs two readings. The first is from his novel, Fifty Degrees Below, and the second from the forthcoming sequel, Sixty Days and Counting.

This to be broadcast Saturday, November 4, between 5 and 7 AM on WBAI, 99.5 FM as part of Jim Freund’s radio program, Hour of the Wolf. The show is also streamed at http://stream.wbai.org/ and available ‘on-demand’ afterward. Go to http://www.hourwolf.com/toc.html a day or so after the broadcast, and I’ll have the link up by then.

Speaking of which, last week’s show was never aired, since our transmitter was kaput. However, guests Sarah Langan and JT Petty were troupers. We began recording the interview, only to discover trough listener calls that we were actually streaming online.

To hear this phantom show, click on this link: http://archive.wbai.org/pls.php?mp3fil=8717
After the intro, skip past the first 40 minutes, and you’ll come into the program midway, just as I turned on the mics. Most surreal, but an interesting discussion about
the nature of the horror genre(s).

Jupiter XIV 14
Reviewed By Gareth D Jones

Ah, what a bittersweet tale we have to start this edition of Jupiter! The mouse, among other things, made me wonder whether Monte Davis received inspiration for The Truth About Watermelon Seeds from the classic Flowers for Algernon? There’s excellent attention to the psychological makeup of the protagonist as he drives through the nights looking for meteorites to sell. The tale does start off rather slowly; I was on page 3 wondering when something was going to happen, before Something Did. It’s a bit of an astronomical coincidence, but as long as you’re happy to overlook it as a deus ex machina then the rest of the story is rather wonderful.

Jonathan Gillespie’s From a Cleft in the Rock centres on a tribe of religious insects living underground and threatened by mysterious giants. Their precarious existence is developed well, but as the tale is told in the first person it rather limits the viewpoint. Because of this I was left slightly puzzled as to the significance of the conclusion, but enjoyed it nonetheless.

There was one slight irritation with The Walking Distances by Thomas Lee Joseph Smith, namely that the main character is called Tom Smith. Either the author couldn’t think of a different name, or it’s an attempt to make us think it a true story; either way it was unnecessary. That’s my only complaint, however, against this story of a man investigating mysterious sounds in the wilderness in the middle of the night. There’s a satisfying blend of anticipation and suspense, with a spot of mania thrown in, and an intriguing conclusion.

Robert Parsons gives us a Martian archaeologist investigating The Roots of Martian Civilisation as that same civilisation crumbles around him. There’s a very clever concept used in the story of a recording device that relies on up to a dozen senses, rather than just sound. How the Martian uses these senses to understand his world, as well as make recordings, is well thought out and reminded me of the kind of thing you might expect from one of David Brin’s Uplift novels.

Wreck, Slash, Burn by Christine Ong Muslim is an odd yet entertaining story of what your household robots might be discussing as you sleep. At only one page it’s more of a vignette than a story, but I found it endearing in a daft kind of way.

A spaceman stranded on an uncivilised world is the basis for the Hitchhiker’s Guide style story Stranded by Jason Gaskell; there’s even a character called Arthur. It’s hugely enjoyable, assuming you like that kind of thing, which I do, full of great characters and bizarre happenings. The highlight of the magazine for me.

The Thirteenth Brigade by Manda Benson goes for a different style of humour altogether: dumb spacemen and flatulence jokes. Not really my sense of humour, but there are some great concepts nonetheless. The thirteenth brigade is a troop of bioengineered cockroaches used in space exploration. A brilliant idea, I thought, initially expecting a bit of hard-SF action. There is some of that, including an ingenious gas-propelled pogo stick for travelling the icy wastes of Ganymede, and the ending is perfect.

There are poems too, not to be forgotten, but I couldn’t tell you how good they are; I have no idea. The layout and font of the magazine is nice and clear and the A5 size makes it perfect for drinking with a cup of tea!

It is with a great deal of sorrow that I report that Nelson Slade Bond has died today, November 4, 2006.

To quote from the note I’ve just received from Lynn and Kit, his sons:
“Nelson was suffering for some severe heart valve problems that led to a series of complications before his death. He was loved and will be missed. Any and all arrangements will be reported later.”

We’ve lost another of the giants. May the earth rest lightly on him.

Bud Webster

Nelson Slade Bond stands as one of the significant writers of fantasy and science fiction of the 20th century. During the Golden Age of SciFi he wrote over 250 short stories for the colorful pulp magazines of the day. He later adapted many of his stories for radio and television, as well as producing many original scripts.