Monday, April 30, 2007

 

I Don't Like Mondays

Me and the Boomtown Rats, I guess. Geldof and company might have had their own reasons, but me, I hate the fuckers because I can't seem to write for a damn on them. And today was doubly craptastic because I was starting a new chapter, which picks up after a gap of several years from the last bit of writing I did last week, requiring quite a bit of scene-setting which always means for a slow start. And thirdly, we had a house-full of house-guests all weekend, with the last of them leaving this morning a few hours into my working day, and while it meant I had an excuse to go have breakfast with my mom and sisters (they had pancakes and migas, I had biscuits and sausage... mmm-mmm!), there were two serious auto accidents en route--two--that ended up adding almost an hour onto my travel time all together. All of which adds up to me having an all-around sucky day.

Feh. Is it Tuesday yet?

Sunday, April 29, 2007

 

Superman: Doomsday

Head over to IMDB and watch the trailer for Bruce Timm's new direct-to-DVD Superman: Doomsday, loosely based on the Death of Superman arc from the early 90s comics.

Saturday, April 28, 2007

 

Star Wars Cellphone

I find your ringtone... disturbing.


Friday, April 27, 2007

 

Flashing Eyes

I can't tell if this is proof that demons dwell within my daughter, or that Georgia's metagene (or x-gene, if you like) is about to become active and she's going to hit me with some optic blasts. Either way, nice sneer, right?


 

Flagpole Sitta

(via) I've watched this three times now, without even really realizing it. A bunch of kids at an evidently well-funded office mess around after work, making an impromptu and absolutely fabulous video to Harvey Danger's Flagpole Sitta. Completely infectious fun. Watch for more than a few seconds, and you'll see what I mean.


Man, I never even dreamed of working at a place anything like that when I was a kid. The closest I got was a few months working in a bakery after I graduated from college, spending a lot of time with my coworkers getting stoned and making lots and lots of cookies to eat ourselves, then going over to the arcade to play air hockey for a while. (Yes, I made good use of that summa cum laude BA, didn't I?)

 

Christopher Bird Should Write The Legion

I've been following his posts the last few weeks, and really enjoying them, but the last handful of reasons why Christopher Bird should write the Legion of Super-Heroes have completely sold me. The blogger behind Tetsubo Productions (responsible for the terrific remixes of Marvel's Civil War and others) is campaigning to get the gig scripting DC Comics long-running (and long-troubled) future science fiction comic, Legion of Super-Heroes. Consider this a vote in favor.

This was the post, by the way, that finally made me say, "Hell, I want to read that comic, right goddamned now!"

 

Guitar Friday

Stainless Steel Droppings points to this incredible video by guitar virtuoso Kaki King. It freaks me out.

I'm reminded a little bit of Josh Alan (Friedman, brother of cartoonist Drew Friedman, with whom he's collaborated).

And here's Josh Alan performing with Michael Price and Robert Crumb at the late, lamented Dallas Fantasy Fair in 1991. Now that was a convention.

For that matter, I'm a little reminded of Ani DiFranco.

Thursday, April 26, 2007

 

Drunk Monkeys

(via) That's right, you heard me.


Drunk monkeys.

 

Savior of the Universe

Check this out.



That's the Alex Ross illustration for the upcoming Flash Gordon: Savior of the Universe Edition DVD due out in August of this year. See here for more. Come on, it's Sam Jones, Max von Sydow, Topol, Timothy Dalton, Peter Wyngarde, Brian Blessed (with wings, no less), and fucking Queen on the soundtrack! Now with an awesome Alex Ross cover, to boot. What's not to want?!

 

Spoiler Alert

What's the point of reading fiction?

Cat and Girl know...


Tuesday, April 24, 2007

 

The Journey Begins

(via) As the Bad Astronomer points out, this is exactly what NASA should be doing more of. But as one of his commenters points out, it needs to be where people can actually see it. As BAB suggests, these things should be playing as trailers at theaters before SF films. Maybe then we'd get some widespread popular support for the space program going again.


That said, like one of BAB's commenters says, I have serious doubts about the utility of another Moon mission. Come on, folks! Let's go to Mars already! Fast, cheap, and out of control...

 

Signing at Austin Books

Just a quick note to say that if you're a) in the Austin area, b) want to pick up a copy of my novel X-Men: The Return, and c) want me to deface it for you, stop by Austin Books tomorrow, Wednesday April 25 between 5:00 and 7:00 PM, and I'll be happy to do so. Of course, I'll probably be behind the counter reading my new Agents of Atlas hardcover, so it might not be easy to get my attention, but I'm sure Brad and the gang can always throw things at my head until I snap out of it.

Monday, April 23, 2007

 

X-Men: The Return

This past weekend I discovered that X-Men: The Return is on shelves now in bookstores and comic shops all over. How about that?



The project was a dream come true. Getting to write characters I grew up reading, edited by my good friend Jennifer Heddle, and with a cover by John Picacio. I got to spend a few weeks reading comics, crack my knuckles, and pound out a novel pulp-style (I ended up writing the book in thirteen days over the course of two weeks and two days, taking a weekend off in the middle to attend a convention). Hugely satisfying. In the process, I gained real respect for the work of Chris Claremont, who wrote all of those terrific X-Men stories I grew up on (as well as great work in Iron Fist, Marvel Team-Up, Ms Marvel, New Mutants, and a dozen other titles besides); I don't remember who I'd originally intended to dedicate the book to, but by the time I started writing, it could only have been dedicated to Claremont.

The book slots in neatly to the X-Men continuity in the late 80s, just before things got really strange, and addresses one of my favorite dangling plot threads: Bermuda Island, a forgotten city built by a Cthuloid pre-human culture that Magneto yanked up from the bottom of the Bermuda Triangle, and which the X-Men used as their headquarters for about fifteen minutes. The Return explains just who built the city, and when, and recounts what happens when they come back from a long vacation and find that their housepets have taken over the whole damned planet.

I wrote an Author's Note for the book, but the version that ended up getting printed was trimmed a bit for space. Here's the full text of it, with all of my irrelevant rambles included.
Author's Note

I’ve been researching this novel for the last twenty-five years.

I was a DC Comics kid. My favorites were Superman, Green Lantern, and the Legion of Super-Heroes. I suppose the science fiction aspects of all three titles appealed to me, and the breadth and depth of their respective mythologies.

Then, in September, 1981, I happened to pick up a copy of The Uncanny X-Men #152 off the stand at my local comic book shop. I’d just turned eleven years old, was only a few weeks into the sixth grade, and I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Looking back, I’m not sure what spurred me to pick it up. I think I may have seen an ad for the title in one of Marvel’s Star Wars comics (science fiction, again), showing the original X-Men posed next to the “new” X-Men, with Cyclops and Professor X in the middle, bridging the gap. The strange looking characters had fascinated me, and I remember distinctly wondering just what the heck they were all about.

Reading that issue for the first time, I had no idea who anybody was. To complicate matters, it was the second part of a two part story, in which Kitty Pryde had been sent away to attend the Massachusetts Academy by her mind-controlled parents, Emma Frost had switched bodies with Storm, and the Hellfire Club had made prisoners of all the X-Men inside the Xavier Mansion. So the story begins with Kitty and a blonde haired telepath claiming to be Ororo Munroe on the run, while a white haired African woman claiming to be the White Queen swans around with Sebastian Shaw. I was confusion, incarnate, but it didn’t matter. These were mysteries to be solved, questions to be puzzled out. I was deeply, madly in love with Kitty Pryde, and wished I were one of the X-Men, too.

In the months that followed, I bought all of the back issues I could lay my hands on. I traded the paltry few Spider-Man comics I had for the Claremont-Byrne X-Men my friend Chris Cannon had in his collection, including the landmark “Days of Future Past” two-parter. The next year, the two volume X-Men Companion series, edited by Peter Sanderson and published by Fantagraphics Books, provided an invaluable roadmap to the history of the characters, featuring interviews with all of the creators who’d worked on the series from Roy Thomas forward. Then I chanced upon a reprint of Giant Sized X-Men #1, reformatted as a mass market paperback, and my education was nearly complete. By the time Marvel produced a trade paperback collection of the whole danged Dark Phoenix storyline, a year or so later, I was an expert.

For most of the 80s, I bought every comic featuring the X-Men I could lay hands on. Every one-shot, every graphic novel, every spin-off, miniseries, crossover, and guest appearance. And nearly all of them written by one man: Chris Claremont. Along with his cocreators, most notably Dave Cockrum, John Byrne, Paul Smith, John Romita, Jr., Bob McLeod, and Bill Sienkiewicz, Claremont was responsible for an inordinate amount of my reading material during junior high and high school, and between his X-Men and Paul Levitz and Keith Giffen’s Legion of Super-Heroes, I imagine that I spent more time thinking about super-heroes and their fictional worlds than I did anything I was supposedly studying in class.

These last few years, having been away for some time, in the aisles of Austin Books I’ve been reintroduced to the X-Men through the talents of people like Joss Whedon, John Cassaday, Grant Morrison, and Frank Quitely. These were guys who clearly read all the same comics I did as a kid, and their takes on the X-Men reminded me of what I so loved about the characters in the first place. I dug up my old back issues, picked up the fantastic Essential compilations that Marvel has been producing, and fell in love with the X-Men all over again.

I am incredibly grateful to Pocket Books and Marvel for allowing me the opportunity to dive back into the world of the X-Men again, if only briefly, and to my friend and editor Jennifer Heddle for making it possible. The weeks and months I spent working on this project—and the grueling “research” involved in reading and rereading huge stacks of cherished comics—have given me a new appreciation for the care and attention that Claremont and his collaborators put into constructing the X-Men and the world they inhabit. Having the chance to write a story featuring characters whose adventures I’ve been enjoying for a quarter century has been a childhood ambition fulfilled, and seeing them brought so masterfully to life under the brush of my friend John Picacio for the cover has only served to make the experience that much better.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a few more stacks of “research” that I plan to enjoy before I’m done.
As you can see from the thumbnail above, the book has an absolutely gorgeous cover by my pal John Picacio, which makes it a shame that the book is likely to be spine-out in most stores. If you get a chance to turn them face out, as you roam through your local book store(s), by all means do so, to share the love.

Sunday, April 22, 2007

 

"The Famous Ape"

In honor of International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day, here is the complete text of my short story "The Famous Ape," which originally appeared in JM Lofficier's Tales of the Shadowmen: Danse Macabre.


The Famous Ape
by Chris Roberson

When the ape boarded the train in Comrade Olur Station, he’d given his name as Thomas Recorde. If the use of the surname, an antiquated pre-republic custom, had raised any eyebrows, no one had seen fit to comment on it.

There were half a dozen other ape passengers on the mostly empty train, all in suits of clothes as threadbare as those Thomas wore, but they sat far apart from one another, not speaking, trying not to make eye contact. The only words spoken were exchanged with the elephant who made his ponderous way down the aisle, checking everyone’s papers as the train steamed away from the station, leaving Olurgrad behind.

Thomas, for his part, kept his attention focused on the tarnished scrollwork on the cabin wall, studying it with the avid attention of one with nothing better to do. This had once been an imperial train, before the Animalist revolution, and while it had been rechristened The Glorious Battle of the Windmill by the new government, its interior was still decorated with images of the Twelve Virtues. Thomas recalled the day at court, years before, when the old elephant king had issued the decree that the Virtues should be emblazoned on all imperial property, commemorating a particularly portentous dream. The decree, of course, held as much weight now as any of the old king’s numerous fancies, which was to say none at all, but while the images were faded, the figures themselves could still be discerned. This winged elephant, with his shield and saber, must represent Courage. This, with his saw, Perseverance, and this one Learning with his candle, and this Patience with his timepiece.

There were more, Thomas guessed, at the front of the car, but they were masked by the draped flag of Olurgrad, blazoned with a pair of white tusts on a field of green. There was some symbolism to that, Thomas was sure, the image of old imperial virtue being obscured by pious Animalist patriotism; but just what the symbol signified, he could not say, and did not much care.

Thomas had had his fill of piousness, and of patriotism. He’d seen his first blue sky in years that morning, the horizons of his world for long decades limited by lifeless gray walls. But any joy he might have taken from his first impressions of freedom were marred by the noise of the parade. He and the other political prisoners had been cleaned up, dressed in the same suits in which they’d been arrested years before, and marched out to Green Square to be put on display. It was Midsummer Day, the anniversary of the first Animalist revolution. There’d been a full martial parade, the ranks of the elephant army marching in time, the crowds singing Beast of the World in patriotic unison, if not entirely on key. The cannons of Fort Hatchibombotar were fired in salute, and then Comrade Poutifour had taken the podium. The first citizen of the nation, as well as the last surviving leader of the revolution, the old elephant had been turned out with martial splendor, the ribbon of the Order of the Green Banner dangling from his left ear, his tusks polished to a mirror sheen. He delivered a rousing speech on the recent successes of the various Animal Committees—the minor victories of the Sharp Tusks Movement and the Clean Tails League, the advances of the Wild Comrades’ Re-Education Committee to uplift the primitive elephants of the veldt.

Then Comrade Poutifour had turned the crowd’s attention to Thomas and the other political prisoners. A great show was being made of this exchange with the ape republic, and while the text of Poutifour’s speech spoke of it as representing an improvement in the relations between the two great powers, the clear subtext, thinly-veiled, was that the apes were fast losing the long-standing cold war, and that the elephants would assuredly be the ultimate victors.

When the first citizen had concluded his remarked, as the day was ending, the ape prisoners were ushered unceremoniously to Comrade Olur Station, put on the train, and sent on their way.

Built in the days when both ape and elephant were ruled by kings, the old railway line was once a vital artery of traffic between the two nations. Even when the apes ousted their king, and instituted the republic, regular rail service was continued. It was only with the advent of the First Forest War that the trains stopped running, and after the elephant withdrew from the conflict when the Animalists seized power, it seemed for a time that the trains might never run again. Now, it seemed, service had been resumed, however limited the basis. What that presaged for the future, Thomas was not sure. He had been out of touch with internal politics for some considerable time.

Thomas remembered the first time he’d ridden this line, when he’d gone as a young ape to Celesteville, and the court of the elephant king. Now, a lifetime later, he made that trip in reverse, finally returning home.

The train rumbled along through the night, making its steady way through the Ituri Rainforest, skirting the border between Karunda and the Congo. It passed unnoticed through lands dominated by human tribes, first that of the Ba Baoro’m, and then the Bansutos, who did not sense the passing of the specially camouflaged train.

As dawn broke, the train finally approached its destination. Just east of the Omwamwi Falls, it entered a hidden tunnel, passed briefly through a midnight-dark tunnel, and came out the other side in the valley hemmed on all sides by mountains. There, before them, lay the sprawl of the ape republic, with Gorilla City at its center.

The other passengers seemed to come alive, as the train pulled into Monkeyville Station, their eyes widening, gradual smiles pulling at the corners of their wide ape mouths. Were they hoping to see family waiting to greet them? Friends? Or were they simply overcome by the emotion of returning home, after so long a delay?

Thomas knew that if anyone was waiting for him, it would not be family, and it would not be friends.

The train came to a stop, and the passengers queued to climb down to the platform. Thomas hung back, looking for any opportunity. The train’s crew had readily accepted it when he’d identified himself as Thomas Recorde on boarding, and the elephant who checked their papers was too bored to notice the discrepancy, but Thomas knew that his imposture would not stand up under the close scrutiny of the ape republic’s authorities. The fact that he used his birth name as an assumed identity, while perhaps ironic, did little to ensure that he would escape the inevitable consequences that would follow the discovery of the name under which he was better known. Famous, in fact. Or infamous, to be precise.

As it happened, he needn’t have worried. Just as it came time for Thomas to disembark, one of the apes who’d preceded him off the train went into a bout of histrionics on returning to his native soil, hooting loudly like one of their primitive cousins in the jungle, dropping to all fours, and kissing with prehensile lips the very flagstones of the Gorilla City pavement. While all eyes were on this rather dramatic performance, Thomas slipped away into the milling crowd of the train station, seemingly undetected by the uniformed officers waiting to receive the returned prisoners.

Thomas had a moment of brief panic, as he glanced back and his eyes met those of an ape in a wide-brimmed yellow hat, a yellow raincoat draped over his long forearm. From his position, and posture, it was clear that the ape in the yellow hat was some superior to the uniformed officers.

His heart pounding in his chest, Thomas willed himself to break eye contact. Passing a news kiosk, he stopped walking, reasoning that he would look less like someone attempting to flee if he was no longer moving. Forcing himself to act as calm and naturally as was possible, he picked up a copy of the Gorilla City Gazette.

“Is this even real?” asked the she-ape behind the counter, narrowing her eyes and looking close at the rumpled republic banknote Thomas had produced. She peered at the date. “This thing is older than I am.”

Thomas gave a lopsided grin that didn’t reach his eyes, and answered only with a shrug.

“Whatever,” the she-ape replied with a shrug of her own, and rang up Thomas’s change.

Sliding the coins in his pocket, Thomas tucked the folded paper under his arm, and casually glanced back over his shoulder. The attentions of the ape in the yellow hat were elsewhere, his back turned to Thomas.

As the pounding of his heart gradually slowed its pace, Thomas walked out of the Monkeyville Station, into a brief and clear Gorilla City morning.

It had been a lifetime since he’d been back, and Thomas had no notion where to go. All he knew was that he wanted to be away from the station. He hurried to the cab stand on the corner, hopped in the backseat of the first car in line, and shut the door behind him.

“City Center, please,” Thomas said.

The ape in the front seat, a weathered old silverback, glanced in the review mirror, his eyes narrowed beneath the brim of his cap. “You mean downtown?”

Oui,” Thomas said, and then cursed himself inwardly. “That is, yes.”

The driver shook his head, but pulled away from the curb, merging into traffic.

Throughout the drive, not a word was exchanged between them, but at every stop the drive would stare intently through the mirror at Thomas, eying him with clear suspicion. Was he reacting to Thomas referring to a district of the city by a name not used since the days of the old king? Or to the Gallic accent which Thomas could not hide, having spoken nothing but the elephants’ French for decades?

In silence, they reached the center of the city. Thomas paid the fare, his ancient bills eliciting the same response from the drive that they had from the newsvendor. His suspicions aside, however, the driver was happy to keep the change, and pulled away from the corner and back into traffic without a backwards glance.

The sun had risen high enough in the east that the light now spilled between the close-packed buildings at the city’s center. Thomas’s shadow reached out an impossible distance before him as he walked, touching the buildings on the street’s far side. His stomach grumbled, and Thomas realized absently that he’d not had a bite to eat since leaving the prison in Olurgrad the morning before. He was unexpectedly famished.

In the shadow of a building that, in Thomas’s youth, had been the office of the exchequer, but which now appeared to be an art museum of some stripe, was a small sidewalk café, tables under white clothes, straight-backed chairs with well-upholstered seats, shade umbrellas still folded from the night before. Thomas found a seat at the table farthest from the street, the stones of the building wall behind him cool through the thin fabric of his antique suit, and waved the waiter over.

Thomas ordered a pot of tea and a basket of fresh bread, doing his best to adopt the lost accent of his youth and failing. The waiter, though, subtler than the cabdriver had been, narrowed his eyes only slightly when confirming Thomas’s order, and then left him with a tight, professional smile.

When his tea arrived, poured steaming into a delicate porcelain mug, Thomas spread the newspaper out before him, and read the news of the day.

President Solovar was up for reelection again. From what Thomas read, it appeared that the main opposition in the impending election came from two corners: Mohor’s Anthar Primitivists on the one side, and the Force of Mind Party led by Grodd on the other. The article contended, however, that early polls indicated that Solovar would carry the day.

None of the names meant anything to Thomas. The last time he’d had reliable news of home, Huc had still been president of the republic, and he’d never heard of the Anthar Primitivists or the Force of Mind Party, nor of Mohor or Grodd, whoever they might be. He might as well have been reading about some unknown, foreign country.

Which, in many respects, he was. It had been a lifetime or more since the death of God and the ouster of the old king, and the country had clearly changed in ways that he early republic could never have guessed. When Thomas had left for Celesteville, sent to do Red Peter’s bidding, General Huc was newly elected, the first president of the republic. Now, the old general was surely dead, and an unknown set of players had taken to the political stage.

Thomas shut tight his eyes, remembering evenings at the Huc family home in his younger days. He’d been betrothed to the general’s daughter, Isabelle, when it came time for him to leave. But the general had felt his daughter too young to marry, and so Thomas and Isabelle had promised to wait until Thomas returned from his assignment in the elephant nation. When war had broken out, and Thomas’s stay in the court of the elephant king had been extended, he consoled himself in the knowledge that the war could not last forever, and that eventually his name was be cleared at home, and he and Isabelle would be reunited. Then the Animalists had overthrown the elephant king, and jailed Thomas as a counter-revolutionary, and a lifetime had passed. For all he knew, Isabelle was dead as well, buried beside her father in the Huc family crypt.

Thomas’s stomach roiled, and he angrily turned the page, looking for some relief from memory and politics. He sought solace in the entertainment sections, and failed to find it.

At the top of the page was a review of a new drama, entitled simply Princess Flora. The work of a rising young ape playwright, the drama was apparently based on rumors that the elephant princess, daughter to the old king, had survived the purges in the first days of the Animalist revolution, and had emigrated first to Europe, and then to the United States. The reviewer called Princess Flora a masterwork, an uplifting story of the indomitable animal spirit, of perseverance in the face of overwhelming odds.

It was all nonsense. Nothing but fiction, whatever the playwright or the reviewer might think. Thomas knew first hand. He’d been there, had counted the bodies as they were dragged one by one from the king’s summer home. There was no chance that any of the royal family had escaped that bloody retribution, not even sweet, simple, blameless Flora. She may have been possessed of an indomitable spirit, but when facing the overwhelming odds of a firing squad, even that brave young elephant had not persevered.

Not politics, nor entertainment, then. Perhaps in the pages of the editorials he might find some escape, some relief. But no.

The paper’s back page was dominated by a single editorial, a lengthy missive excoriating the present government for allowing the return of the traitor Zephir to Gorilla City. There may have been implicit in the condemnation some message of support for one of the opposition candidates, either Mohor or Grodd, but such subtleties were beyond Thomas. He could only stare fixated at the name written so often in smudged black ink, and the atrocities and crimes so often attached to it. Zephir. The Traitor.

Eyes wide, Thomas looked up from the paper. On the far side of the patio, the waiter was in close conversation with a silverback ape in a fine suit, whispering in low voices while pointing in Thomas’s direction. Suppressing the urge to panic, Thomas dropped a handful of rumpled republic notes on the table, and hurried from the café, his basket of breads untouched, his tea left still steaming in its mug.

Thomas walked at speed up the street, turned a corner, turned another corner, and promptly got lost. The city of his childhood seemed to have consumed and digested by another, and while bits and pieces could be matched to his memory, most was as unrecognizable as the names in the morning paper. Still he kept walking, aimlessly, as quickly as possibly without looking as though he were running. He resisted the temptation to look behind him, convinced that at any moment he would be recognized.

He walked down a narrow street, towering buildings crowding on either side, in deep shadows, the light of the morning sun completely obscured. Then he turned a corner blindly, and found himself in a different world.

He had reached the geographic center of the city. Once known as Kensington Gardens, it had been renamed after the death of God as Moreau Park. Thomas remembered the dedication ceremony, as clear as though it had been the day before. Isabelle had stood by his side, hand-in-hand, and they’d wondered aloud what the future would bring, now that God was no longer among them. That was before the ouster of the old king, when Isabelle’s father had simply been the head of the ape army, but even that, too, would soon change. It had been a strange, heady time, as all of the carefully crafted illusions so precious to the old order were one by one chiseled away, and a new, fresh-minted future revealed.

Thomas passed under the arch at the park’s entrance, the bronze now tarnished a greenish-brown. A walking path stretched out before him, curving slightly to the west, while to his left stood an obelisk, with rows of cages arranged beyond. A zoo of some sort, it seemed.

Walking closer, Thomas was able to read the plaque set on the obelisk’s face. Provided by the Gorilla City Humane Society, the plaque listed the names of all the mutants and sports which had been successfully reintegrated into human populations, with new identities and histories. Kaspa, Zembla, and Ka-Zar. Nyoka, Sheena, and Jann. The list went on and on.

Beneath the sign was a piece of weathered paper in a metal frame, a less grand notice. It said that in the cages beyond were those unfortunates who had not yet been “successfully retrained,” and who remained on as wards of the state.

Thomas winced, despite himself. He knew what the notice meant, knew it had nothing to do with his past circumstances, but the resonances were too close to be ignored. Steeling himself, he rounded the obelisk, walking down the promenade, passing each of the cages in turn.

From time to time, the genetic engineering which granted the apes of Gorilla City intelligence and abilities in advance of their more primitive jungle cousins, went awry, leading to the birth of, to be charitable, “undesirables.” Most of these displays commingled characteristics of an ape and the human from which the engineered genes had been drawn. Most often, these sports gave the appearance of being entirely human on the outside, while on the inside being as savage and unsophisticated as the most primitive jungle gorilla. These sad creatures belonged truly to neither world, human or ape, falling somewhere in between.

When Thomas had been a child, the order of the day was to eject these unfortunates from polite society, casting them out into the wilderness, like Spartans abandoning unwanted children to the elements. The hardiest of the sports, though, survived, taking refuge in the caves above the city. Thomas had heard campfire stories in his youngest years about these strange ape-men, and what became of them in the wild. In the years since, more forward-thinking citizens of Gorilla City had evidently objected to this admittedly cruel treatment, and sought other solutions to the problem. And it seemed that they’d had some measure of success, having found ways to reintegrate the ape-men into the human populations.

What remained in these cages, then, were those sports too primitive ever to be retrained, too much animal ever to pass as man, too much man ever to live among the animals. Thomas paused by one cage, inside of which hulked an ancient silverback ape-man, wrinkled and bent. A sign on the cage door indicated that his name was “Malb’yat.” Thomas peered in, his heart going out to the sad, hunched creature in the cage, remembering the years he himself spent in a room no larger, no more amenable.

The old ape-man looked up, his watery eyes meeting Thomas’s. He reached up a wrinkled hand, gnarled into a claw, and in a plaintive voice said, “Where? Where Balza?”

Thomas shook his head, sadly. He had no notion what a “Balza” was, nor had any confidence that the poor creature would understand the answer, if he had. He turned, and continued down the promenade.

Beyond the zoo, Thomas came to a statue atop a high pedestal. In cast bronze, it depicted a creature with the face of a man, and a body that intermingled aspects of man and gorilla, wearing an open shirt and loincloth. It was a familiar figure, and one which had haunted Thomas’s dreams throughout childhood.

The strange man-ape depicted in the statue had insisted that his creations call him “God,” and it had not been until after his death that the gorillas had learned the name by which he’d once been known to his fellow humans. The apes of Gorilla City, like the elephants of Olurgrad and the rhinoceroses of Rataxesburg, all owed their intelligence to Francis Arnaud Moreau, as did the animals on whom he’d originally experimented while still living in England, whose descendants on Manor Farm had originated the doctrine of Animalism.

It was unknown how God had come to resemble his fellow man so little, but it was rumored that his strange appearance was the result of self-administered gene therapies. The story went that he’d once suffered near-fatal injuries on an island in the Pacific Ocean, before coming to Africa, and had been left for dead by earlier creations. The introduction of genetic material from healthy apes to his system had healed his injuries, but in time the gorilla genes began to breed true, and with each passing year he became less and less man, more and more ape. Like the unfortunate sports in reverse, in time he was little more than a man trapped in an ape’s body.

Which, it could be said, was true of every ape in Gorilla City, to some extent. But most found it distasteful to dwell on the question of just where all the gene in their makeup originated.

Of course, only a generation after his passing, there were already those who questioned the existence of God altogether, dismissing any talk of genetic manipulation or design, and insisting that the intelligent species of apes, elephants, rhinoceroses, and others had arisen naturally, by process of evolution. But so far as Thomas knew, those who held such notions were still few in number, and regarded as no more than cranks and zealots by the scientific establishment.

Thomas continued on past the statue, following a tree-lined path that curved off to the right. The weather that morning was mild, though the sky was clear and the sun was bright in the east. A she-ape in some sort of athletic suit jogged by, singing softly along with the music faintly audible from the large headphones over her ears. In the opposite direction came an older ape on a bicycle, a young chimp riding along beside, balanced precariously on a cycle still outfitted with training wheels. In the distance, Thomas could hear the sounds of a group of juvenile apes playing soccer in an open field, while a young she-ape and her mother could be seen flying a kite nearby.

Each time another ape passed, Thomas felt sure that he would be discovered, but no one seemed to pay him any mind. He was anonymous, it seemed, just another old ape in an ancient suit, like the vagrants rummaging through the trash bins, or asleep on the park benches. Is that were he would end up, after all this time? As another of their number, the faceless and anonymous street dwellers?

Hunger and fatigue worked at him. He’d walked already this morning more than he had in years, and with no food in his belly, and having had only fitful sleep in the train car the night before, his energy was flagging badly. Finding an unoccupied park bench, he sat down to rest a moment. Sighing deeply, feeling the aches in his long underused muscles, he closed his eyes, thoughtfully.

When he opened them again, the quality of the light had changed. He must have fallen asleep without realizing it, the sun climbing higher in the sky as he slept. More than that, though, he discovered that he was not alone, feeling the presence of another on the bench beside him.

Thomas turned his head, startled.

There, sitting beside him, was an ape of advancing years, wearing a yellow trench-coat and matching wide-brimmed hat. Eye half-lidded, he puffed contentedly on the pipe clenched between his teeth, elbows draped casually over the back of the bench.

It was the ape that Thomas had seen at the train station that morning, directing the movements of the uniformed officers.

Thomas’s heart pounded in his chest. He was too frightened even to move. He’d been discovered, clearly. Could he run? Was there any point in trying? Where would he go?

“Look there,” the ape in the yellow hat said casually, still not looking in Thomas’s direction. He took the pipe from between his teeth, and pointed with its stem to a point above the tree line. Thomas, swallowing hard, looked in the direction indicated, and just visible over the treetops could see the ramparts and towers of an imposing structure hulking over the city, styled as a medieval castle. “Do you recall when, as young apes, we’d whisper behind our hands, referring to that monstrosity as the House of Pain? You might find it amusing to learn that, with God long dead and the castle remade into the presidential palace, there are many who feel it deserves that childish name better than it ever did before.”

Thomas narrowed his eyes, looking at the other ape carefully. There was something about the curve of his jaw, something about the quality of his voice that was hauntingly familiar. As if...

“George?” Thomas said, recognition dawning.

“Hello, Zephir, my old friend.” The other ape turned to him, smiling. “It’s good to see you again.”

Confused emotions swirled in Thomas. A smile came unbidden to his lips, but within he still felt the fear of discovery, the vertiginous tremble of uncertainty.

“I would have thought you were still in America,” he replied, at length.

George returned the pipe to his mouth, puffing deeply. Then, the smoke curling from the corner of his smile, he chuckled. “No, I grew weary of adventures, I’m afraid. A young ape named Bonzo was given the task of watching the Americans, and I was brought home.” He paused, and a cloud passed momentarily across his features. “Too late to see our old teacher Red Peter again, but not too late to be offered his vacated seat at the head of the intelligence services.”

Thomas nodded, appreciatively, lips pursed thoughtfully. “So you’re the head ape, now?” He was genuinely impressed. “And the intelligence services still persist, as they did when we were young?”

George inspected the contents of his pipe’s bowl, and then overturning it tapped out the ashes onto the ground between his feet, knocking the pipe against the palm of his hand. “There is a remarkable inertia to such systems, my friend. There have been precious few changes made to the spy apparatus since it was first instituted by Wolsey under the old king, as I’m sure you’ll recall. When Colonel Aristobald took charge under the new republic, he did little more than change the names and titles on the doors. And when Wolsey’s first operative and protégé Red Peter returned from the field to take charge upon the death of Aristobald during the First Forest War, he reversed the few changes that Aristobald had made. When I took control, I saw no reason to muddy the waters with unnecessary changes.”

“Hmph.” Thomas shook his head, ruefully, the smile fading from his lips. “Red Peter,” he repeated. “That old bastard.”

“That he was,” George agreed, pulling a pouch of tobacco from a pocket, and refilling the pipe’s bowl. “And the finest mind I’ve ever encountered.”

“I don’t recall you speaking of him so highly when we were his pupils.” Thomas snarled momentarily, and then his expression softened, as he remembered fonder memories. “In fact,” he went on, smiling, “I distinctly recall you mocking Emily mercilessly for praising him on rare occasion. If she hadn’t been sent on assignment to England when she was, I was sure you’d murder each other. Or fall in love. One of the two.”

George damped down the tobacco into the pipe with the tip of his thumb, and smiled. “It is a thin line, to be sure.”

“Whatever became of Emily, anyway?” Thomas asked.

George’s smile froze, and he was silent for a moment, striking a match and sucking its flame into the pipe. When the tobacco began to burn, he shook out the match, and in somber tones, replied. “She fell in love with a human. It... ended badly.”

Thomas nodded. “Such things usually do.” He paused. “And what about...?” He broke off, and swallowed hard. “What about Isabelle?”

George glanced over, blowing out a stream of smoke. He opened his mouth to answer, but Thomas interrupted before he was able to speak.

“No, don’t tell me,” he said, hurriedly. “I... I’d rather not know, I think.”

George nodded, and returned the pipe to his mouth.

“So,” Thomas said, brightening slightly. “You’re the new spymaster, are you? I assume you’ve a new crop of intelligencers you’re carefully cultivating, eh?”

“Of course.” George smiled. “You’d scarcely believe how young these apes seem, when they come to me. I recall you, Emily, and I were most fully grown when Red Peter recruited us for the intelligences services, but if we were anything like as old as Chim-Chim, Magilla, Bear, and Grape, we must have been scarcely babes in arms.”

“These are their names, your young protégés?” Thomas’s eyes bobbled. “They sound more like circus performers than civilized apes.”

George chuckled. “Ah, but were those of our generation any better? Back when God was in his castle, Henry still on his throne, and this city was still called London, I was George Boleyn, Emily was Emlia Bassano...”

“And I was Zephir.”

“I suppose.” George chose not to remark on the interruption. “But only among friend, Thomas.

It was true. Even before the ouster of the old king, it had never been Thomas, only Zephir; his father, Robert Recorde, had four sons and five daughters, who were seldom if ever called by their given names, but instead known as the Four Winds and Five Wandering Stars. With the coming of the republic, and the abolition of the names bestowed by God, he’d simply made it official, and Thomas Recorde became Zephir.

He wondered what had become of his three brothers, and of his five sisters. He’d heard from his mother once, in the days of the First Forest War. His seeming betrayal of the republic, siding with the elephants, had broken his father’s heart, she said. So far as the family as concerned, the letter had read, brother Zephir was already dead.

“My parents are dead and buried, I suppose,” Thomas said aloud, musing. “I’d always hoped to square things with them, to let them know that their son wasn’t really a traitor. But then...” Thomas trailed off, his eyes unfocused.

“I was in America when I heard about the revolution, and about your being imprisoned. It... It just made me sick that I wasn’t able to do anything to help back then.”

Thomas took a deep breath, and gave a limp shrug. “You shouldn’t blame yourself. I suppose it isn’t anyone’s fault but my own. I should have known something was in the wind when the Old Lady was assassinated by the cabal of Fandango, Capoulosse, and Podular. They hoped to rid themselves of her influence over the king, you see, taking her place in the king’s favor. But it was only a short while afterwards that Hatchibombotar, Olur, and Poutifour sprung their revolution. If I’d been any sort of spy I’d have seen it coming, but I’d allowed myself to get too close to the royal family, and saw nothing of what was happening with the common elephants outside the palace walls.” He paused, his lips drawn into a tight line. “More’s the pity.”

“There was a war on, Zephir,” George replied. “And you were doing your duty. When the elephant king and the ape republic went to war, you were perfectly positioned to act as our eyes and ears in the enemy court.”

“Yes, but only by posing as an enemy myself, a traitor to my own people.”

“You were an invaluable source of information during the First Forest War. I’ve seen your reports myself, since taking Red Peter’s job. The republic might well have lost the war to the elephants in those early days, if not for you.”

“Yes,” Thomas said hotly, eyes flashing, “and what was my thanks for it? A lifetime rotting in an elephant jail.”

George reached out and placed a hand on Thomas’s shoulder, his expression grave. “Zephir, you must know that was one of the hardest decisions that Red Peter ever had to make. But for the gorillas to claim you as one of their own, to prove your innocence, would have been to expose our entire network of informants. The elephants had to believe you were really a traitor.”

“And our own people, George?” Thomas tugged the folded newspaper from his pocket, brandishing it at the yellow-hat wearing ape. “They had to believe it still, as well?”

George lowered his gaze. “I’m sorry, Zephir. There just wasn’t any other way.”

Thomas threw the paper to the ground, and leapt to his feet. “I was abandoned, George! Left to the tender mercy of the Animalists! And now freed only because the elephants have found some use for me as a bargaining chip, tossed in with a bunch of other anonymous political prisoners.”

George looked up at him, surprised. “You mean, you didn’t know?”

Thomas narrowed his eyes, arms crossed over his chest. “Didn’t know what?”

George shook his head, sadly. “Oh, Zephir. It was at my urging that Solovar arranged for the release of the apes held by the elephants. We had to offer Olurgrad a raft of political concessions to close the deal, but I knew that no price would be too high. Not when the bill had come due, all these years later.”

Thomas opened his mouth, and closed it again. His eyes widened. Finally, he said, “You did this?”

“Zephir,” George sighed, “I’ve been laboring ceaselessly since I took office to get you released. In fact, I’ve done little else for the last few years but investigate every possible angle. This was just the first to bear fruit.”

“But... but...” Thomas was taken aback.

“Unfortunately,” George continued with remorse, “I’ve been unable to convince Solovar that your name should be cleared publicly. At least not yet. All of Red Peters files from those days have been sealed, by the president’s order, until the end of the century. His position—with which I disagree, but my voice carries little weight—is that with tensions easing with the elephants, and hope for reconciliation on the horizon, it wouldn’t do to reopen old wounds, and to remind them that relations between our two countries were not always so genial.”

Thomas set his jaw, eyes narrowed. “So I’m to remain a traitor.” It was a statement, not a question, demanding no answer. “Hated by my countrymen.”

“I’m afraid that those who remember the name of Zephir, yes, will likely hate his memory.” George paused, and gave a sly smile. “But who remembers that there was ever a Thomas Recorde, my friend? I doubt there’s more than a handful still living who remember that the famous Zephir was once called by that name, and one of them stands before you.”

Thomas shifted uneasily, averting his gaze. “This is not how I foresaw my homecoming, when I left for Celesteville, all those years ago.”

George climbed to his feet, slipping his pipe into his pocket. He stepped to Thomas’s side, and put a hand on his shoulder. “Come work with me, friend. There’s a place for Thomas Recorde at the intelligences services, even if there isn’t one for Zephir. I can use someone with your experience to help train my students, to increase their chances of surviving in the field.”

“I don’t know...” Thomas began, uneasily.

“You don’t have to decide right away,” George hastened to add. “We will discuss it further over dinner tonight. I’ve invited someone to join us, by the way. Another of those who remember the name of Thomas Recorde, but who hold no grudge against the name Zephir, for all of that.”

Thomas looked up and met George’s eyes, confused.

“Have you forgotten, old friend?” George asked. “Isabelle was a young ape with us, too, and has never forgotten the name to which you were born.”

“I-Isabelle,” Thomas repeated, his tone breathless.

George tightened his companionly grip on Thomas’s shoulder, and nodded. “She waited for you. All of these years. She waited.”

Thomas tried to reply, but couldn’t think of the words to say.

“Come on, Thomas Recorde,” George said, taking him by the arm. “It’s time to go home.”

(c) 2006 MonkeyBrain, Inc.

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Saturday, April 21, 2007

 

"Banned" XBox Spot

(via) Apparently Microsoft, probably under the advice of counsel, has declined from airing this spot for the XBox (though there's some suspicion that may be a marketing ploy in its own right). You can see why, but it's still an incredibly clever spot.


 

Challenge of the Super-Duper Friends

Not as funny as it should be for some reason, but I think the animators did a good job of aping the source material.


Check out the site for more.

Friday, April 20, 2007

 

Locus Award Finalists

Well, the Locus Award Finalists have been announced, and it looks like MonkeyBrain Books has three horses in the race (and two in the same category!).

In the Best Non-Fiction category, we find Blood & Thunder: The Life & Art of Robert E. Howard by Mark Finn, and Myths for the Modern Age: Philip José Farmer's Wold Newton Universe edited by Win Scott Eckert. And in Best Art Book we find, naturally, Cover Story: The Art of John Picacio by the man himself (who also earns a nod in the Best Artist category).

Winners will be announced in June at the Locus Awards Ceremony in Seattle, June 16th, during the Science Fiction Museum's Hall of Fame weekend. See Locus Online for details.

 

Le Frelon Vert

Looking for something else entirely last night I stumbled on this Green Hornet fanfilm from France (in English, though apparently dubbed). Of course, "fanfilm" is somewhat misleading, as this appears to have made with the license holder's permission, and the cast and crew seem to be working film professionals. Green Hornet and Kato are portrayed by actor/stuntmen who definitely seem to know what they're doing, action-wise. My guess is that this was made as someone's directoral calling card. But hey, we get a nice little Green Hornet short film out of the deal!



It's not the best thing I've ever seen, but it's sure not bad. For "fanfilm," though, it's definitely right up near the top. Worth checking out (but ignore the voice over at the beginning and end, which is not so good...)

 

A Father's Words

I am just amazed by Mike Bishop's strength and composure. Paul Di Filippo has posted his message on the loss of his son, Jamie. The rest of us can only hope to have that kind of dignity in such circumstances.

 

Best Short Novels: 2007

The TOC has been announced and the book is shipping this month, so I suppose it's kosher to mention here.


To find the best short novels of any given year, you have to read through dozens of genre magazines, anthologies and other media. And that makes it difficult for the ordinary reader to see them all. But for this fourth book in our exclusive annual series, editor Jonathan Strahan took on the job, compiling his choices for the best short novels of 2006—five science fiction and three fantasy stories by Kage Baker, Robert Reed, Chris Roberson, Robert Charles Wilson, Ysabeau Wilce, Michael Swanwick, Cory Doctorow and Jeffrey Ford.

A story sampling…
• The grass is always greener “Where the Golden Apples Grow,” and nothing could be truer for two Martian kids—a farmer's son and an ice-hauler's boy—who dream of living each other's lives.
• A device called the ripper has opened up a vast number of parallel worlds to polygamous pioneers, but ecologically-minded Kala refuses to be one of “A Billion Eves.”
• “The Voyage of Night Shining White” is a harrowing one for Celestial Empire Captain Zheng Yi and his crew, as they attempt to repair—and survive—a reactor failure on their way to Mars.
• Taking place in an IndustriaI Age future, “Julian: A Christmas Story” recounts the tale of two boys whose friendship is threatened by the plans of Julian's uncle—the tyrannical President of America's ruling Dominion.
• Set in a fun-house alternate California, “The Lineaments of Gratified Desire” finds big-hair rocker Hardhands taking ever greater magickal risks to get back Tiny Doom, his four-year-old wife, whom he's managed to lose on the most riotous night of the year.
• Caught in a High Elf's plan to overthrow the nobility of “Lord Weary's Empire,” an outcast struggles against a set of circumstances that are not what they seem.
• “After the Siege” of a near-future Eastern European city—a city infested with bio-engineered “zombies”—a young woman sees a way to use an act of charity to win the infowar for her side.
• Three kids growing up in “Botch Town” are haunted by strange events and a mystery man they think may be the devil.

Here they are—compelling, original, thought-provoking novellas—the state of the art in one enthralling volume.
You may remember that I blogged about this collection before, and commented that Stephan Martiniere's cover originally intended for The Voyage of Night Shining White ended up being used here instead. So you could say, if you were of a mind to, that since my novella is in the collection, and the cover painted for my novella is on the cover, that I've got the cover to the collection. Of course, that's just semantics, but it warms my heart a bit to think that way, at least for a brief moment.

But check out that lineup, people! Baker, Reed, Wilson, Wilce, Swanwick, Doctorow, Ford, and me? How the heck did that happen?

Of course, if you'd like to get my brilliance without all these other jokers muddying up the stew, you could always pick up the PS edition of Night Shining White, which is still available. And with a nifty introduction by John Meaney to boot. Heck, buy both of them and make everybody happy!

 

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

(via) The latest in what seems to be an ongoing series of Star Trek-related video mashups I keep posting.


 

Robofalcons run amok, film at 11

I don't know about you guys, but this seems like a recipe for disaster to me.
A flock of robotic falcons has been dispatched to tackle an influx of obese pigeons who are increasing in number and size thanks to an unnatural diet of fastfood.

The mechanical birds -- called 'Robops' -- have been placed on rooftop locations around the British city of Liverpool, and will flap their wings and squawk loudly to scare the problem pigeons away.

The initiative was launched to deal with the birds who are now considered a nuisance in the city, flying at people and leaving droppings everywhere, Liverpool council said.
Now honestly, how long before the robofalcons exceed the parameters of their programming, eliminate the pigeons, and start going after people instead?!

Thursday, April 19, 2007

 

More Moleskine

Speaking of Moleskines, check out what Mattias Adolfsson does with his. Very awesome.


 

Moleskine

I've got about a hundred pages to go in my current Moleskine notebook, and have started worrying about when I need to pick up another. Last year I blew a gift certificate Allison got at work on a stack of new Moleskines at Book People (I always use 3.5 x 5.5 "pocket ruled notebook" myself), so I never really had to worry about where the next one was coming from, since they were stacked up on top of the working shelves in my office. I started the last one early in March, though, and have already filled it almost halfway, so unless my speed of notetaking changes in the next little while, I'll probably be needing a new one by May or June (and probably early since I'll be taking a trip in early May, and always take more notes on flights or waiting in coffee shops than I do at home). But it seems like there's got to be a better way of getting them than just buying them from the impulse-buy racks of bookstores. Looking online, though, I'm not finding any deals that are tremendously better. Even if I buy a case of them from this joint I only end up saving a couple of bucks, and none of the other online vendors' bulk deals are much better, if at all. Why is it with every other consumable on the market there's always some guy out to undercut the competition and sell at only a few points above wholesale, somewhere online, but with Moleskines everyone sells pretty much exactly at the manufacturer's suggested retail price? Is it because there's such a thing as a "Moleskine retailers", and undercutting the competition would put them in dutch with the supplier? Who knows?

In searching, though, I found this site of Moleskine hacks, some of which are really clever. (And clearly, lots of people take their Moleskines very seriously.) Which reminds me that I really need to get about labelling the spines of my notebooks, which is long-overdue. Last year Sarah Monette wrote a bit about her ritual when finishing a Moleskine, which includes labelling the spine and numbering the pages, which immediately struck me as a genius idea. When I was working on End of the Century, I wasted hours digging through a year's worth of notebooks hunting for various bits and pieces, during which the thought of some sort of index to the notebooks seemed a very appealing notion.

I'm also reminded of Jim Woodring's pop-up Moleskines, which have been talked about a bit online in the last few days.

Anybody else addicted to their Moleskine? Or have brand loyalty to some other flavor of notebook?

(And in case there was anyone wondering, I only use my Uni-ball Vision Elite, bold and black, to write in my notebooks. As I was explaining to Stephen Jones in Toronto a few weeks ago, the Vision Elite is the Cadillac of disposable ballpoints, and I'm armwrestle anyone who says differently.)

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

 

The F.N.G.R.

As always, don't ask, just watch.



I'll have to check out more of Nick Gibbons's stuff. Space Zones and Aqua Rangers look well worth investigating.

 

Decade

Here's what I said on this day, last year:
Nine years ago today, at a Ben Folds Five concert at the late, lamented Liberty Lunch, I met my now-wife Allison Baker. I thought she was a knockout, and she suspected I was gay. Two days later we met for drinks, and five days after that we went out for a proper date. She stayed the night, and never left.

Somewhere in there, we were sitting on my crummy couch, smoking Camel Lights, drinking Pepsi (my two passions, for most of my adult life, both sadly now relegated to special occasions), and watching Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, which she'd never seen. It was probably "The Visitor," the series' best episode, but I can't say for certain. When the credits rolled, I got up to eject the tape, sure that she'd be ready to move onto something else, and glad that she'd been patient enough to sit through one episode. I was halfway across the floor when she said, "Do you have any more?" I knew, right then, that I would marry her. We ended up watching nothing but DS9 for days, which only served to seal the deal.
Nine years plus one year equals ten years. That's a decade, unless my math is mistaken. It's been a decade since I met Allison, and a little over seven years since I tricked her into marrying me. How about that?

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

 

Calling Hal Duncan (3D Time)

Sean Williams sent me this little gem, an article on a paper that suggests that time might be three dimensional, after all.
In a recent study, mathematician George Sparling of the University of Pittsburgh examines a fundamental question pondered since the time of Pythagoras, and still vexing scientists today: what is the nature of space and time? After analyzing different perspectives, Sparling offers an alternative idea: space-time may have six dimensions, with the extra two being time-like.
Familar to readers of Hal Duncan's Book of All Hours, no? As he said in a recent interview,
"There's an idea of 3D time that underpins VELLUM, an idea that as well as the forward-and-back linear time we're aware of, there's a side-to-side of parallel worlds, and an up-and-down of realities which work by different metaphysics entirely."
I doubt very seriously that Sparling's math is suggesting anything like the world of Vellum and Ink, but it's a nice little bit of symmetry between speculation and science, isn't it?

 

Zeppy the pedal-powered airship

(via) How awesome is this?


 

The Protagonist's Desire

Zander Cannon talks on his blog a bit about a talk Scott McCloud gave recently at Dreamhaven Books, about his current obsession. Namely, the central mechanism of any storytelling machine: "Every story begins at the beginning of a character's desire, and ends at the resolution of that desire."

This isn't, as Cannon points out, a new or revolutionary notion, but it's one that any storyteller needs to be reminded of, from time to time. The way Todd Alcott puts it in his insightful analyses is "What does the protagonist want?" (Check out his evisceration of The Phantom Menace for a good example of what not to do.)

In many of the stories I attempted as an aspiring writer, I managed to work in a bit of protagonist desire, but it was only instinctual, aping the structures of more successful stories by people who actually knew what they were doing, unlike me. It's really only been the last few years that I've intellectualized these kinds of storytelling requirements, and I can see the diference in the resulting stories. It's easy to forget, though, when getting wrapped up in world building or plot mechanics or big sfnal ideas, to stop and consider, "What does the protagonist want?" Whenever possible, these days, I ask the question first, and proceed from there. But it never hurts to be reminded.

 

Fox News = Irrelevant

This is some shit right here. I don't mind coming to bury Vonnegut, not to praise him, but this hatchet job of an obit really goes out of its way to find negative things to say about the guy.

Monday, April 16, 2007

 

Space Opera in Oz

Despite the fact that all of the Australians in my acquaintance seem fixated on the seabreeze, which strikes me as a notably emasculine cocktail (me, I blame Garth Nix, who seems to be the instigator here), they do seem to know a thing or two about space opera. Jonathan Strahan and Sean Williams weigh in on the subject in this piece, and both have clever things to say. (And Sean even gets a plug in for Cenotaxis, to boot.) Go check it out, won't you?

 

Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - "Thou Shalt Always Kill"

If Warren Ellis is late to this party, I'm not sure what that makes me. But I'm here now, I suppose...



There's a few cultural references here that might not make sense to all North Americans, but the basics come across just fine.

 

Mark Tatulli's Lio - "Fun Time Funnies"

I've bumped into Mark Tatulli's Lio comic strip a time or two over the last few weeks, but yesterday's strip was the one to finally sell me on it. Might well be the best comic strip currently in syndication. There's even an RSS feed.


Saturday, April 14, 2007

 

The Landlord

(via) Don't ask, just watch it.

Friday, April 13, 2007

 

Trek meets Python

(via) A nice little mash-up.


Thursday, April 12, 2007

 

Zeppelins South

I can't help but feel that this expedition runs the serious risk of encountering some serious nameless horrors down there on the Antarctic ice.
"In 2008, scientists will, for the very first time, create a continual profile of ice thickness in the Artic, extending from the Canadian coast across the North Pole to Siberia. At the core of the project lies the crossing of the North Pole by zeppelin. The airship will be equipped with an electromagnetic sensor developed at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, one of the 15 research centres within the Helmholtz Association. The sensational project of French physician Jean-Louis Etienne is financed by the French oil company Total and will be presented in Berlin on April 5."
Just a feeling, is all...

 

Vonnegut's Creative Writing 101

I'd completely forgotten about Vonnegut's creative writing advice, until this Frederator Studios post reminded me. Here it is, if you've forgotten, as well.
"Now lend me your ears. Here is Creative Writing 101:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.
5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them—in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

The greatest American short story writer of my generation was Flannery O’Connor(1925-1964). She broke practically every one of my rules but the first. Great writers tend to do that."
All well worth remembering.

 

Everything was beautiful, nothing hurt

Kurt Vonnegut has died. For reasons which now escape me, I derived a considerable amount of comfort from his novels in my darkest hours, in particular Cat's Cradle and Breakfast of Champions, neither of which are particularly comforting books. I had the great good fortune to hear him speak on the campus of the University of Texas while I was a student there. He was responsible for distorting the shape of my thoughts in ways I'll probably never be able to fully appreciate. (For example, I adopted his disdain for military pilots for years without realizing the source of my unfounded antipathy.) Vonnegut was a deeply pessimistic dude, who in later years seemed to me even less able to see any ray of hope, but for some reason I derived a kind of boundless optimism from the experience of reading his books.

I often think in terms of Vonnegut plots. Just yesterday at lunch I described a plot contrivance of mine as being an immitation of Mother Night. And I'd be surprised if there wasn't a little of Bokonon in the beliefs of the inhabitants of Kovoko-ko-te'maroa.

I think my favorite Vonnegut novel may be one of the less regarded ones, Slapstick. It was the subject of a truly horrific film adaptation starring Jerry Lewis and Madeline Kahn, but don't hold that against it. I think that Slapstick comes closest to espousing Vonnegut's view of how humanity should best be organized, at least based on the essays I read and the talks I heard. That it's housed in this silly story about a pair of superintelligent twins who are imbeciles when separated is just part of the charm.

Vonnegut will be missed. But then, his books aren't going anywhere. Maybe I'll have to read Slapstick or Cat's Cradle again, one of these days.

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

 

Locus Poll

If you haven't already, head over and fill out the Locus Poll. Anyone can vote, Locus subscribers and nonsubscribers alike. There's all sorts of good stuff to choose from in the nonfiction category (for example, Eckert's Myths for the Modern Age and Finn's Blood & Thunder) in the collection category (Newman's The Man from the Diogenes Club) and the Art Book category (Picacio's Cover Story). You might even select MonkeyBrain Books in the list of Book Publishers. And hey, look at that. My own The Voyage of Night Shining White is on the list in the Novella category. What do you think of that?

 

MonkeyBrain Books site update

We've finally updated the MonkeyBrain Books site with our full 2007 publishing lineup. We've also sent a mail out to our Yahoo announcements list for the first time, assuming that I haven't fouled up the sending of it. Here's the text of the update, in case anyone's interested.
Embarrassingly, this is the first time that we've sent a message to our update list. Shame on us. We promise to try harder.

The big news around the palatial offices of MonkeyBrain Books these days is John Picacio's well-deserved Hugo nod in the Best Related Book category for his COVER STORY: THE ART OF JOHN PICACIO. This, in addition to his *third* nomination in the Best Artist category. Well done, John!

Of less earth-shattering proportions is the news that we have finally updated our sad, lumpen website with our full 2007 publishing schedule. Please accent this in lieu of the long-needed, long-desired complete overhaul of the site that we've been contemplating for some long while. Soon, we promise. Soon. 2009, perhaps?

In addition to the second Diogenes Club collection from the inestimable Kim Newman, and the first US edition of Paul Cornell's remarkable BRITISH SUMMERTIME, we're proud to unveil the first in our forthcoming line of original trade paperback novellas, affordably priced at $9.95. These first two entries, from New York Times bestseller Sean Williams and the simply amazing Hal Duncan, will be joined in 2008 with original novellas from Jay Lake and Elizabeth Bear.

Also on tap for 2008 are IMPOSSIBLE TERRITORIES, Jess Nevins's latest companion to the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, a reprint of Philip José Farmer's classic alternate history novel, TWO HAWKS FROM EARTH, and Win Scott Eckert's CROSSOVERS: A POP CULTURE CHRONOLOGY.

What else could you ask for? Well, we're working on *that*, too...

Chris Roberson & Allison Baker
MonkeyBrain Books
www.monkeybrainbooks.com

Monday, April 09, 2007

 

9Tail Fox

Check out the pure awesomeness that is the cover of Night Shade Books forthcoming edition of Jon Courtenay Grimwood's 9Tail Fox.


Bobby Zha is a sergeant in the San Francisco Police Department. His years on the force have made him numb to the world, and the people around him, including his wife and daughter. His sudden and unexplained murder leaves his family reeling, and the SFPD bewildered. But nobody is more bewildered then Sergeant Zha, when a nine-tailed celestial fox comes to him at the moment of his death, and tells him he has one chance to put things right.

Now he’s trying to solve his own murder; trying to understand why he has been resurrected in another man’s body;and trying to repair the shattered pieces of his family’s life. But his time seems to be running out...
Jeremy Lassen and Claudia Noble did a tremendous job on the design of this one. And Jeremy's been kind enough to share the pulp cover which inspired the approach.



How cool is that?

Saturday, April 07, 2007

 

Chumley's Closed Indefinitely

(via) I'd hoped to visit my favorite speak-easy and firefighters bar when I was in NYC for BEA in June, but it looks like it won't be in the cards.
Chumley's, which has operated at 86 Bedford Street since 1922, though by some accounts as early as 1831, will not be torn down, as had looked like a real possibility yesterday afternoon. Official reports are that the chimney in the bar area of the venue separated from an interior wall and collapsed. At this time "demolition of the building is not being considered," per an official statement from the NYC Building Department. When the collapse occurred, construction workers were inside Chumley's and doing repairs of an unknown type without a permit. Violations for working with out a permit have been issued. Now, a shoring company has been hired to repair the damage, after which time inspectors will assess the integrity of the building. While the work is done Chumley's will be closed.
I'd hoped to introduce my new masters at Solaris to the somewhat quirky charm of the joint, but I guess we'll have to settle for the Latin Jetsons vibe of Sushi Samba a few blocks away. But hey, flash fried crabs!

Friday, April 06, 2007

 

Best Job Ever

I've got the best job in the world. Want to know why? It's not that for work I flew to Toronto last week and drank with interesting, clever people for four days. It's not that I spent the last two days looking over the text of Paul Cornell's very excellent British Summertime. It's that I have in my hands a brand new Kim Newman novella which, so far as I know, no one but Kim and I have seen. Which opens with Richard Jeperson and Derek Leech coming face to face, and goes on from there.

Now, tell me I don't have the best job ever...

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

 

Ratatouille, full trailer

It is what is says on the label.


 

Almost Human

Only just now getting over the convention crud that settled in sometime between the Dead Dog on Sunday night at WHC and Monday night when we finally finished up twelve hours of travel, by plane and car, and were home. It wasn't until Tuesday afternoon that I thought to check my temperature, and discovered that I'd felt feverish becuase I actually had a fever. Go figure. Cue moaning and coughing and generally useless blithering.

All of which, in case you didn't know, is the sign of a terrific convention. Steve, Mandy, and Amanda put on one hell of a show this year. May well be the best convention I've ever attended.

Lots of good news from the show, or while we were there, that I'll be processing and talking about in the near future, but in the short term, just putting my hand up for a moment, to say I still live, and am approaching human again. Almost.

Oh, and John Picacio and MonkeyBrain Books have a horse in the Hugo race, with Cover Story's Best Related Book nod. And our brothers Lou Anders and Picacio have been singled out their ownselves, too, for Best Professional Editor - Long Form and Best Artist respectively. How cool is that?

Okay, off to moan and cough some more.

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