‘Gram’s Gift,’ a Faceless Sons story, reprint coming to Residential Aliens … February 26, 2010
Posted by Steve in Fiction.Tags: Fantasy, Fiction, Literature, Science Fiction, Short Stories, Sword & Sorcery, Writing
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Keep your eyes peeled for Residential Aliens, print issue 2.
That issue will include a sword-and-sorcery story from me called Gram’s Gift. The piece is part of my Faceless Sons cycle, in which I recount the exploits of three masked brothers who hunt down the demons unleashed by their power-mad father. Another Faceless Sons tale, The Mask Oath, appeared in the Rogue Blades Entertainment anthology “The Return of the Sword,” where you might also have enjoyed stories from TW Williams, Ty Johnston, S.C. Bryce, Bill Ward, James Enge, Bruce Durham and other names you ought to recognize if you love sword-and-sorcery .
What’s that? You thought sword-and-sorcery died with Robert E. Howard and Karl Edward Wagner? C’mon … try to keep up. The authors noted above, and others, are producing a lot of fun stuff. I’m glad to see my work tucked in there with theirs.
Gram’s Gift appeared way back when in Amazing Journeys Magazine , volume 2 issue 9, but editor Residential Aliens publisher Lyn Perry thought it would work for his new print venture. I’m real happy to see Lyn try his hand at a print magazine, and doubly glad to have one of my stories appear in his project.
If you like the swords and the sorcery, by all means give Lyn’s project a look.
– Steve
Review: “The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein” by Peter Ackroyd February 22, 2010
Posted by Steve in Books, Fiction, Reviews.Tags: Books, Fantasy, Fiction, Frankenstein, Horror, Literature, Novels, Reviews, Science Fiction, Writing
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I really wanted to like this book.
My fiction reading has slowed to a snail’s pace, and I thought this book might get me back into it in a big way. I am a fan of Mary Shelley’s excellent “Frankenstein,” a fabulous blend of Gothic horror, science fiction and weighty themes. I thought a new take on this classic would be entertaining, if done well, and I thought there was enough meat on that particular story’s bones for an author to carve out new territory and still be faithful to the original.
Indeed, Ackroyd has done that, in a sensible and somewhat clever way. I also enjoyed his glimpses of literary figures of the time, especially Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron, both of whom were involved in that famed night of ghost-tale spinning that led Mary Shelley to write her novel.
The problem, though, is that Ackroyd’s clever plot trick and those voyeuristic portraits of the people behind the poems are about all this book has to offer. Ackroyd certainly doesn’t explore the weighty themes tackled by Shelley — what does the Creator owe the created? Should we do things just because science gives us the power? Are there places rational investigation should not go? Nor does he replace those themes with deeply etched themes of his own. He just sort of races through the tale, in a hurry to get to his big “surprise ending.” I won’t toss out a spoiler here, but I figured out the mystery less than a third of the way through the book, and not even a fairly well placed red herring threw me off course.
The book did not work for me on a suspense or horror level, either. Although there are one or two fairly disturbing scenes, they are disturbing more in a “why did he write THAT?” way, rather than in an “organic to the plot” way. Also, because there is a rather longish stretch of the book in which Victor seems almost to have forgotten the flesh golem pursuing him, those moments sort of stick out all the more. Once somone has seen what Victor has seen, he ought to remain disturbed throughout the rest of the book, in my not-so-humble opinion.
If you are a real Frankenstein fan or a true horror tale geek, you probably ought to read this one just so you can discuss it intelligently at parties. It won’t take you long, either; Ackroyd’s prose is breezy enough. If you have only a passing interest in mad scientists who animate the dead, pass this up.
I welcome thoughts, rebuttals, book suggestions, etc.
– Steve
“Hope” — Alex Lifeson December 16, 2009
Posted by Steve in Music.Tags: Music
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Enjoy this …
Who else wants a solo acoustic guitar album from this guy?
Here’s another YouTube video on this. It didn’t include a code for embedding, but if you follow the link you’ll be rewarded with a closer view of Alex’s hands as he plays this. I wish the videos sounded as nice as the recording on “Snakes & Arrows,” which I highly recommend.
– Steve
Review: “Tunnel in the Sky” — by Robert A. Heinlein December 14, 2009
Posted by Steve in Books, Fiction, Reviews.Tags: Books, Reviews, Science Fiction, Writing
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Most of what I’ve read in the past year or so has been non-fiction (or occasionally fiction masquerading as non-fiction …), as fodder for my current events news column.
Having put aside the column recently, I found myself looking for something to read and determined to read something just for fun. My wife popped out a quote from Robert A. Heinlein over on Facebook, and I thought, “That’s the ticket. I haven’t read Heinlein in 10 years, I’ll bet.”
My first thought was to reacquaint myself with “Stranger in a Strange Land” or “Time Enough for Love” or “Starship Troopers,” some of my favorites. But once I got to the shelf, I found “Tunnel in the Sky,” a Heinlein I had not read previously. So I snatched it up.
It was worth the read. I’ll call this one “science fantasy” as opposed to “science fiction,” as there really isn’t much plausibility in the premise, which relies upon interstellar stargates that transport people and goods from one world to another instantly. Don’t let that put you off, however; Heinlein uses this set-up the same way “Star Trek” uses transporters — as a means to quickly get interesting characters into interesting places to solve interesting problems.
In this case, a group of students is sent to another world to test their survival skills and, or course, things go horribly wrong. Once the stargate plot element gets left behind, the story is much more of a wilderness drama, with political overtones.
“Tunnel” is a breezy read, told in solid if not sparkling prose (too often marred by typos in my copy). The book provides its share of Heinlein’s trademark quotable tough-talk one-liners, of course.
One thing I really liked was the way the story shifted directions; each time it seemed things were settled, Heinlein changed gears in a believable way. Heroes and villains alike are portrayed with a level of complexity that another author might not have attempted in what is essentially an action/adventure story. It could have been a simple “shoot the monsters” tale, but it ends up being something more.
Not too much more, though; the book isn’t particularly preachy or anything. It’s not quite as overtly political as “Starship Troopers,” for instance. Call it a good old-school science fantasy adventure that will leave you with some things to think about afterward, if you wish.
– Steve
The least attentive Federation outpost, ever … November 24, 2009
Posted by Steve in Fiction, Movies.Tags: Fiction, Movies, Star Trek, Writing
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First off, “Star Trek” with Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg, et al., is a lot of fun and an awesome movie and I plan to watch it again and again.
But my wife calls me “The Plot King” and my friend TW often praises my bullshit detector when it comes to fiction plots, so when I see a plot problem I can’t keep myself from jumping on it. So …
SPOILERS BELOW … SPOILERS BELOW … SPOILERS BELOW …
One bit of “Star Trek” that bugged me was the sequence in which Kirk, marooned on a small planet in the Vulcan system, runs into the Future Spock AND the Present Montgomery Scott. I know, I know … you think I’m about to harp on the convenience of that little coincidence, right? Wrong. Yeah, it’s too convenient, yeah I’d have handled it differently if I’d written it, but it is what it is and at least the movie kept moving swiftly forward.
No, my problem is with that Federation outpost to which Scotty was exiled in the first place, because I can’t figure out why it was there.
The planet, as we plainly see when Future Spock explains his presence there to Kirk, is close enough to Vulcan that a person can see Vulcan looming like a large moon in the sky. So … why doesn’t Scotty, who is on the same little planet near Vulcan in a facility full of sophisticated Federation gear, seem to notice or care that Vulcan has just been gobbled up by an artificial black hole?
Were there no tell-tale alarms in the place? Does this outpost not monitor anything? There was a large-scale space battle in this system, for crying out loud. Federation ships turned into space scrap left and right. Scotty had the best seat in the house for the whole thing, and presumably could monitor all the communications from the battle. He was in a position to see things that perhaps could not be seen from Vulcan’s surface. He certainly should have been able to fill in knowledge gaps for the Federation fleet BEFORE it got blasted to smithereens. (“Federation outpost, this is Captain Pike, U.S.S. Enterprise. What’s the situation?”)
And then there’s this: He’s Montgomery Scott, damn it, and he’s apparently got a nifty transporter on site. I’m thinking Scotty should have been able to use that thing to save at least some Federation crew members, or some key Vulcan personnel, or even turn the transporter into a weapon against the Romulans.
Billions died within sight of Scotty’s station. But what does Scotty want to talk about when Kirk and Future Spock arrive? He’d like a sandwich.
C’mon, scriptwriters. No one builds a fancy Federation outpost on an icy planet with big monsters just to make a scriptwriter’s life easier. That outpost has to be doing something. Apparently, though, this one wasn’t monitoring nearby space or relaying communications. It wasn’t even listed in the Enterprise’s computers, as far as I can tell. Heck, it apparently wasn’t even adequately feeding its two personnel.
I see one bright spot, though. This outpost world in all likelihood was in orbit around Vulcan. Otherwise, the imploding planet would not have looked so large from the surface. So, with Vulcan gone, this entirely useless waste of Federation resources may be spinning its way to a fiery death in Vulcan’s sun.
– Steve
