"It was a dark and stormy night…" A Wrinkle in Time does begin with exactly that line, perhaps the most mocked opening line in literary history and certainly the most famous, courtesy of Snoopy's eternally-rejected novel (and originally from the not-quite-as-bad-as-his-rep Edward Bulwer-Lytton). But for A Wrinkle in Time, it's the perfect opening line and helps set the stage, as well as foreshadowing the story to come; for there is indeed a dark and stormy time ahead for Meg Murry, high-school student (about [ Continue reading... ]
On My Shelves: Pacific Rim
September 11, 2013 By 2 Comments
Giant robots versus giant monsters. Done awesomely. I could pretty much end my review there, as it says all the important things right up front. But that would be probably overly short, and maybe just copy-and-pasting "GIANT ROBOTS versus GIANT MONSTERS" would get a little boring. Oh, and technically the title of this post should be "Going to be On My Shelves", I suppose, because I haven't got it yet. When I saw the trailers for Pacific Rim, I knew I'd be going to see it. But I still braced myself for [ Continue reading... ]
On My Shelves: Hal Clement and _Iceworld_
September 9, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Hal Clement (Harry Stubbs) was famous throughout the Golden Age and beyond as one of the patron saints of hard science fiction. While he would allow for the existence of an FTL drive to get his protagonists to some particular location, Clement's works were almost entirely focused on constructing worlds that, as far as we knew, didn't exist – but could exist, based on what we knew, and from these hard-edged foundations build stories of first contact, of investigation, of exploration, and of friendship across the boundaries of [ Continue reading... ]
Under the Influence: Lord of the Flies
September 6, 2013 By 19 Comments
For those who know me, this entry's title may come as a shock. "Ryk, you hated Lord of the Flies! How can you list it as an influence?" Well, sometimes things that really suck can influence you, too. For those (fortunately) unfamiliar with Lord of the Flies, it is something of a deconstruction of the "shipwrecked people" subgenre of stories (codified by Robinson Crusoe, Swiss Family Robinson, and The Mysterious Island) and often said to be specifically a response to The Coral Island. In it, a number of British [ Continue reading... ]
On My Shelves: The Incredibles
September 4, 2013 By 6 Comments
There are very few movies – or, indeed, stories of any sort – which approach perfection. The Incredibles, Pixar's superhero-themed offering, is one of those few. Make no mistake – most of Pixar's work has been stellar, and even their worst products have managed to be entertaining. This is a track record unmatched by any other studio I can think of. But even within Pixar's oeuvre, The Incredibles stands out. I remember seeing the original advertisements – teasers – featuring Mr. Incredible getting a call from "the red [ Continue reading... ]
Under the Influence: Eric Frank Russell
September 2, 2013 By 3 Comments
There may be no other author who I can sincerely say has had a direct influence on me as a writer through as few works as Eric Frank Russell. While I have since read quite a few of his works – the Jay Score stories, "MacHinery", "Now Inhale", and others – his actual influence on me comes from two short stories: "Legwork" and "Hobbyist". "Hobbyist" is the story of Steve Anders, an exploration pilot whose ship encounters a spatial disturbance of immense power, throwing him so far from home that by the time he finds a [ Continue reading... ]
On My Shelves: Support Your Local Wizard (Diane Duane’s Young Wizards series)
August 23, 2013 By 16 Comments
I had read the first book, and part of the second, of this trilogy (So You Want to be a Wizard, Deep Wizardry, and High Wizardry) many years ago, but recently I picked up this omnibus and read it to my son Gabriel. The basic concept of the series is that wizards have a task of supporting the basic order of the universe, in essence attempting to minimize or even reverse entropy. Nita Callahan is a young girl (12 to early teens) whose major love is reading, and who runs across a strange book titled "So You Want [ Continue reading... ]
On My Shelves: The Paper Dragon
August 21, 2013 By 3 Comments
This is undoubtedly the shortest book I've yet reviewed, a children's picture book which has been a favorite of all my kids. The Paper Dragon, like another I will discuss at some point (Shibumi and the Kitemaker, by Mercer Mayer), tells a fictional tale in the style of older storytelling traditions of the Eastern countries such as China and Japan (or, at least, if this particular tale is a real folktale, I can't find reference to it other than this book). In the story, a painter by the name of Mi Fei is chosen by his [ Continue reading... ]
Women and the Adventurer’s Census (Kicking Ass and Taking Names)
August 19, 2013 By 9 Comments
I've on occasion been asked "what made you decide to have a woman as your main action character?", or something to that effect. Honestly, I don't really work that way. I don't sit down and say "Hey, I should write a story with a character that is X". I think of some neat story idea, and the characters I create are the ones that fit the story. That said, I suppose the fact is that it would never have occurred to me NOT to have at least some of my stories with truly kickass heroines. Looking over my books published thus [ Continue reading... ]
Spheres of Influence: Chapter 29
August 16, 2013 By 34 Comments
And we reach the end of the snippets that I'm doing for this book! Wu Kung's doing his bodyguard thing with Ariane out and about... ----- Chapter 29. A smell of caution and deviousness preceded the voice, so Wu was already turning in that direction when Oscar Naraj, dressed in one of his more conservative white suits, spoke. "Good morning, Captain Austin. You seem to be going out early." "Ambassador." Ariane nodded to him. She smells a lot less cautious around him these days. I really have [ Continue reading... ]
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