Roberson's Interminable Ramble

The wacky cats behind the new zine Space Squid, who were kind enough to include my story "The Trouble with Superman" in their inaugural edition, have started a new podcasting blog, Space Squid's Squidcast. Self-described as "the science fiction zine Margaret Atwood warned you about," it's worth checking out, if only to hear the inestimable Chris Nakashima-Brown read each of his short-shorts from the first issue of the zine. "Barflies," about a washed up veteran of the Kree-Skrull wars, encountered by the narrator in a bar, is a particular favorite of mine.

According to this, my inner fanboy has considerable cause to celebrate:

"Anthony Stewart Head, best known as Giles in TV's Buffy the Vampire Slayer, will guest-star in the upcoming second season of the BBC's hit SF show Doctor Who, the BBC Web site reported. Head will appear in an episode in which the Doctor (David Tennant) battles the evil Krillitanes, the site reported.

The episode will also mark the return of Elisabeth Sladen, who'll be making her first TV appearance as Sarah Jane Smith since 1983.

And the Doctor will also be reunited with his faithful robot dog, K9, last seen as the companion to Tom Baker's Doctor between 1977 to 1981. "

I'm elbow-deep in copy edits and layouts for the fall MonkeyBrain Books titles, which is my only excuse for the infrequence of my recent posts, but I had to take a few moments to write a couple of words about the best comic I've read in ages. Frank Espinosa, who, according to this interview is " is a world-class animator with many credits under his name," including everyging "from re-designing the complete Looney Tunes characters in 1992, to creating series of Looney Tunes US Postage stamps. Ifthat weren't enough, he also designed the Baby Looney Tunes characters." And now he's turned his attention to comics, and to the science fiction genre, and created a work of beauty and genius.

Rocketo is the story of Rocketo Garrison, explorer and mapmaker, two thousand years in the future, in a world almost unrecognizable as our own. Equal parts Jack Kirby's Kamandi and Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon, this is a word of pirates, floating cities, ancient robots, Tiger Men, Fish Men, and more. Only the Mappers, humans who can turn their flesh to steel and operate like human compasses, are able to navigate this strange disjointed world. Earth, now called Lucerne, is known as "The Shattered World."

I'm very grateful that I've already handed in my novel Paragaea: A Planetary Romance, which draws its inspiration from much of the same sources, since I worry that if I hadn't, I'd have my head full of Lucerne while charting the progress of my own characters through their own strange landscape (which, in an earlier draft, was referred to often as "the Broken Earth"). As it is, I'm just glad for the chance to read and admire Espinosa's slowly unfolding epic.

The first issue of Rocketo may have already sold out (I had to weedle and cajole my local comic shop to get a copy for myself), but hopefully Speakeasy will get it back into print quickly. The preview issue, Rocketo #0, was the hit of San Diego Comic Con this year, though I missed my chance to pick up a copy there.

This weekend I'll be a programming participant at ArmadilloCon 27 in Austin, TX.

Here's my schedule, so far as I know it:

Fr2300D Developments in Space Opera
Fri 11:00 PM-Midnight deWitt
Blaschke, Broderick, Minz*, Roberson, Stross
Space opera is one of the earliest forms of science fiction, and in recent years there has been great growth in this area. Why is this happening, where's it going, what's the best stuff, and why is so much of it coming out of the UK?

Sa1300PC Autographing
Sat 1:00 PM-2:00 PM Phoenix Central
Kenner, Nakashima-Brown, Picacio, Roberson, M. Williams

Sa2230ND Reading
Sat 10:30 PM-11:00 PM North deZavala
Chris Roberson

Su1100D Monkeys Vs. Dinosaurs: Who'd Win?
Sun 11:00 AM-Noon deWitt
Cupp, Finn*, Klaw, Lansdale, Roberson, Waldrop
Join this fun and lively discussion!

Su1400R Comic Books Worth Reading
Sun 2:00 PM-3:00 PM Robertson
Antell, Benjamin, Hale, Porter, Roberson*
There's some really good material available these days, and our panelists help you find it.

The good folks at RevolutionSF have just posted a new interview with me, along with a review of Here, There & Everywhere.

Rick Kleffel's Agony Column comes in ahead of the curve with the first review of Adventure, Vol. 1. He seems to like it.

After a too-brief stay in Glasgow for WorldCon, and an even briefer three days in London as a full-fledged tourist, I'm back home again. Thanks to the fact that we were flying American Airlines out of Gatwick, and not British Airways out of Heathrow, we weren't delayed by the caterers' strike, and made it home right on schedule.

It'll be a few days before I'm coherent enough to summarize my trip, but it was well worth the expense, if only to spend a few days drinking with all of my friends, old and new, in the Moat House Bar.

Until such time as I'm able to string a few words together, hopefully the following pictures will fill the gap.

• The Pyr Panel, hosted by the inestimable Lou Anders
• The "Dead Dog" at the Moat House Bar, starring the Greatest Waitress in the World, Lauren!
• Bark Place, Bayswater, London, the street where Roxanne Bonaventure lives
• Forbidden Planet in London, with Here, There & Everywhere prominently displayed
• Allison, John Picacio and I doing the Full Tourist Thing in Trafalgar Square
• Fuzzy shots of late night drinking with Claire Weaver, Mark Roberts, Tom, John, Prof, and the rest of the gang at the Ben Crouch Tavern
• The view of, and from, the London Eye
• Allison and I wandering Kensington Garden
• The crowds surrounding Buckingham Palace (perhaps they thought Michael Jackson was there?)
• Two views of Kim Newman's flat (the last shots before the battery ran out)

Well, in another two hours Allison and I are off to the airport, and somewhere around twelve hours after take-off we'll be wheels down in Glasgow (with a brief stop-over in Chicago). Six nights in Glasgow and then three in London, and then we'll be back again the end of next week. I look forward to seeing lots of folks I haven't seen since WorldCon last year, and meeting as many new folks as possible. Oh, and drinking. Naturally.

I'll hopefully have some news to report on my return. If not, at least a few amusing stories.