24 I Grow Old, I Shall Wear My Pixels Scrolled

Posted on April 29, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) DEAD SCIENCE FOR YOUR ENTERTAINMENT. James Davis Nicoll brings us “Five SF Novels Inspired by Disproven Scientific Theories” at Reactor.

The history of science is filled with beautiful hypotheses slain by ugly facts. The tendency of the universe to disregard the professional needs of hard-working scientists is something about which little can be done¹. In fact, disproof is a vital and necessary element for scientific progress, no matter how vexing it must have been to Thomas Gold². However, in that interval between hypothesis and disproof, a sufficiently enticing model can inspire intriguing science fiction stories.

Here’s one of his exhibits:

Quicksand Moon Dust

Prior to space probes landing on the Moon, the precise nature of the lunar surface was unknown. Among the contending models was Thomas Gold’s⁴ proposal that the lunar surface could be covered in a layer of fine dust. Depending on the properties and the depth, the layer might act like quicksand⁵. As it happens, the lunar surface is dusty, but visitors do not have to worry about sinking into it. That is the only good news. Lunar dust is actually much nastier than Gold envisioned. Abrasive lunar dust is a hazard to machines and humans alike.

Arthur C. Clark’s A Fall of Moondust (1961) embraced the most extreme case of Gold’s model. Deep dry dust seas are traversed by lunar boats conveying tourists. A mishap strands a boat deep beneath the lunar surface. Will rescuers locate and retrieve the tourists in time, or will they smother or be boiled in their own body heat⁶?

(2a) KGB. Fantastic Fiction at KGB reading series hosts Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel present John Wiswell and Anya Johanna DeNiro on Wednesday, May 8, 2024 at 7:00 p.m. Eastern. KGB Bar (85 East 4th Street, New York, NY 10003; Just off 2nd Ave, upstairs.)

JOHN WISWELL

John Wiswell’s novel Someone You Can Build A Nest In was published by DAW Books in April and received starred reviews in Library Journal and BookPage, and was named one of the Best of the Best in SFF for 2024 by Ingram. His short fiction has won the Nebula Award and Locus Award, and been a finalist for the Hugo, British Fantasy, and World Fantasy Awards. His fiction has been translated into ten languages. He teaches for Clarion West and for the Rambo Academy. More about him can be found at https://linktr.ee/johnwiswell.

ANYA JOHANNA DENIRO

Anya Johanna DeNiro is the author of the short novel OKPsyche from Small Beer Press and City of a Thousand Feelings from Aqueduct Press, which was on the Honor Roll for the Otherwise Award. She has also been a finalist for the Sturgeon Award and the Crawford Award, and shortlisted for the O. Henry Award. She lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

(2b) IT WASN’T FOR THE TUXEDO. “But Why a Penguin?” wonders JSTOR Daily.

Historian Richard Hornsey writes that Penguin publisher Allen Lane had an avowedly “leftist vision of social-democratic progress.” Lane aimed for a democratizing public sphere with an “engaged public readership,” though one perhaps not as left-left as the contemporary Left Book Club (1936–1948). What Lane used to reach these ends was pure capitalism: “the techniques of mass production, distribution, and retail.”

And an adorable black-and-white flightless bird.

“Choosing a brand character, and specifically a penguin, allowed [Lane] to appropriate the utopian dynamic of mass consumption and mold it to fit his own progressive cultural project,” writes Hornsey….

(3) THEY SAY IT AIN’T SO. “Avengers Directors Say Marvel Flops Aren’t Superhero Fatigue” in Variety.

…“There’s a big generational divide about how you consume media,” [filmmaker Joe Russo] continued. “There’s a generation that’s used to appointment viewing and going to a theater on a certain date to see something, but it’s aging out. Meanwhile the new generation are ‘I want it now, I want to process it now’, then moving onto the next thing, which they process whilst doing two other things at the same time. You know, it’s a very different moment in time than it’s ever been. And so I think everyone, including Marvel, is experiencing the same thing, this transition. And I think that really is probably what’s at play more than anything else.”…

(4) GOT ENOUGH FINGERS? The Mary Sue is ready in case you were about to ask “Just How Many ‘Planet Of The Apes’ Films Are There, Anyway?”

…Counting Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, which premieres next month, there are 10 total films set in the varying canons of Planet of the Apes.

Things kicked off with the original Planet of the Apes movie back in 1968; that film would go on to spawn four sequels, Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971), Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972), and Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)…

(5) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

Born April 29, 1908 — Jack Williamson. (Died 2006.)

By Paul Weimer: Jack Williamson. What does one say about an author who had been published continuously from the 1920’s up to the 2000s? Resilience. Staying power? An inexhaustible imagination?

All of these, and more, I say.

I first came across Williamson in the large collection of works that my elder brother, whom I think I’ve mentioned before got me into science fiction in the first place, had. That was The Humanoids, which includes his novelette “With Folded Hands”, a dystopia of unthinking robots and servitors gaining sentience, and basically (although expressed as “the Prime Directive”) following Isaac Asimov’s Law of Robotics and moving to take over the world, in an effort to protect humanity. It’s definitely a horror dystopic takeover of the world, as humans who resist the Mechanicals are taken away and lobotomized to prevent them disrupting the new society. And it’s an unhappy ending, as Underhill, our main character, and Sledge, the original creator of the Mechanicals, ultimately fail in stopping the takeover.

I’d read 1984 and Brave New World at this point, but to have a straight up science fiction story defy what was to me the cardinal trope of “the good guys must WIN” made an impression on me. Over the next decades, I encountered Williamson’s work time and again, since his prolific output meant that his works kept showing up in back corners of libraries, a story here and there in a collection, and the original book I read always simmered in my mind. This was an author with power and verve and not afraid to take chances.

Stonehenge Gate, his last novel, naturally, I had to read, and it was much of the “old time religion” of Williamson’s work that did feel something of a throwback to earlier models and eras of science fiction, but it charmed me all the same. And how could I resist a novel with a premise of a few friends basically finding a Stargate in the middle of the Sahara (the titular Stonehenge Gate) and going through to find out what was on the other side? The novel winds up pulling in elements of revolution, the origin of life on Earth and in general a cracking adventure running across multiple worlds and encountering some very strange alien species. It’s a fine capstone to an extensive and abiding body of work.

But it is The Legion of Time that really sticks out for me, even more than The Legion of Space (Space adventure), or Darker Than You Think (lycanthropes!) or his return to exploring dystopias in the Starchild books. The Legion of Time, which consists of a pair of stories, is the codifying pieces of science fiction for the idea of a Time War. Poul Anderson, the “Temporal Cold War” of Star Trek, The Big Time, Travelers, and Loki all owe a huge debt of gratitude to Williamson and coming up with the idea of multiple futures and factions in the future trying to influence the past to make their version of the timeline be the official and real one. There is also a Larry Niven Svetz story where he runs into someone trying to change the timeline from Svetz’s crapsack future (which he inadvertently created) back to the future that he is from, the nuclear war hellscape better than Svetz’s world.

The Legion of Time itself centers on a single choice, a “Jonbar Hinge”, where events are manipulated to make one young boy’s choice to either lead the world into a world of superscience and technology and freedom, or into a dread and horrible dystopia (once again, Williamson with the dystopias) where force and brutality are backed up by darker versions of the superscience of the original world. We also get a love story of sorts, as our hero Lanning feels both for Lethonee, the ruler of the utopia superscience state, and also feels attraction for the femme fatale Sorainya. And yet, even so, even as Sorianya is clearly the “Villainess”, Lethonee in her own way is as determined and forthright to make her version of the future come about as her darker duplicate. But the choice of worlds, and which of these two futures is the better for humanity, is always clear. Williamson makes no bones about being clear eyed about the dangers of dystopias and how one must risk much in order to keep them from coming about. One might not always succeed (see The Humanoids) but one must always try.

Long live his work!

(6) COMICS SECTION.

Bizarro features a fantasy medical breakthrough, or is it breakdown?
Eek! lets us witness an awkward dinner conversation.
Thatababy honors Trina Robbins.
Pardon My Planet comments on timing and the medical supply chain, after a fashion.

(7) GET OUT. “The Best Escape Rooms in the World Have a Global Competition” at Atlas Obscura.

…Escape rooms might seem like casual entertainment, but there’s actually science and a very serious global competition involved. Called Top Escape Rooms Project Enthusiasts’ Choice Awards (TERPECA), the competition gives annual awards for the best escape rooms in the world.

Nominated rooms include games like 60 Seconds to Escape in Gurnee, Illinois, involving skeletons popping out at people down hallways, or Madness Toledo in Spain, featuring biohazard spills, unleashed monsters, and a huge Alien-esque creature taking up most of a room, ready to mow participants down with its toothy jaws. Diego Esteban, the owner of Madness, describes the competition as “the Oscars of escape rooms.”…

… [There] is a surprising amount of science that goes into creating them. A methodology called Escape Room Theory dictates how escape rooms are designed and built. The theory consists of a series of “rules” designers are encouraged to follow—like ensuring each item is used only once (or there’s only one answer to a specific puzzle), making individual puzzles solvable in five minutes or less, and allowing for non-linear puzzles, meaning that one item in a room doesn’t necessarily solve the puzzle you work on in another room. The goal is ultimately to not frustrate participants or lead them down a road that’s tedious or unsolvable….

(8) SCORES 9 OUT OF 10. Nerds of a Feather’s Haley in “Review: Calypso by Oliver K. Langmead” tells why —

This awe-inspiring and utterly beautiful novel told in verse will make you think, feel, and wonder why there aren’t more contemporary authors writing sci-fi that is both full of ideas and jaw-droppingly well written….

(9) A HUGO FINALIST. In “Hugo 24 Novel: The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty”, reviewer Camestros Felapton says he can’t wait for the sequels.

Time to set sail for adventure! Yeah, people we’ve got a map in the front of the book, we’ve got a retired legendary pirate captain pulled out of retirement for just one last job, we’ve got a crew of talented misfits and we have a truly evil magician after a magical relic. Djinn, monsters, magic, all we need is some Ray Harryhausen stop-motion monsters and a great time is guaranteed….

(10) COLONIZING BINARY SYSTEMS. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] Life around a binary system is fairly common and SF sub-trope, the classic example being the two suns setting in Star Wars.

Indeed, in real life we have already found planets orbiting two stars.

This weekend, futurologist Isaac Arthur looked at the possibility of colonizing such worlds…

There are billions of binary star systems in our galaxy, including many of those stars closest to us. Can such systems host life, and what would it be like to live under two suns?

[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, Teddy Harvia, Kathy Sullivan, Mike Kennedy, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Lis Carey.]

Pixel Scroll 4/28/24 Pixels Make The World Scroll Down

Posted on April 28, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) NO, NO, NOT ROGOV! Annalee Newitz calls Paul Linebarger (aka Cordwainer Smith) “The Sci-Fi Writer Who Invented Conspiracy Theory” in The Atlantic.

…Linebarger, who died of a heart attack in 1966 at age 53, could not have predicted that tropes from his sci-fi stories about mind control and techno-authoritarianism would shape 21st-century American political rhetoric. But the persistence of his ideas is far from accidental, because Linebarger wasn’t just a writer and soldier. He was an anti-communist intelligence operative who helped define U.S. psychological operations, or psyops, during World War II and the Cold War. His essential insight was that the most effective psychological warfare is storytelling. Linebarger saw psyops as an emotionally intense, persuasive form of fiction—and, to him, no genre engaged people’s imagination better than science fiction.

I pored over Linebarger’s personal papers at the Hoover Institution propaganda collection while researching my forthcoming book, Stories Are Weapons: Psychological Warfare and the American Mind. Boxes of his studies on the politics of China and Southeast Asia are filed alongside his fiction manuscripts and unpublished musings on psychology. Here, I realized, was an origin story for modern conspiracy politics, which blur the line between sci-fi plots and American patriotism—they came from a psywar operative. Put another way, an agent of what some would now call the “deep state” had devised the far-out stories that politicians like Greene use to condemn it. Perhaps, if she and others knew this, they might not be so eager to blame space lasers and vaccine microchips for what ails our nation….

(2) WESTERCON 76 UTAH HOTEL RESERVATIONS OPEN. [Item by Kevin Standlee.] Westercon 76 has updated their hotel/venue web page with their hotel booking information. I published a post on the Westercon.org site about it{ “Westercon 76 Utah Opens Hotel Reservations”.

The short version is “use the link on the convention hotel/venue page” or “use group code WET when booking through Hilton.com.

(3) MAKING BOOK. These suspects are from the nation, not the U.S. state — “Georgians arrested over cross-Europe thefts of rare library books”. The Guardian tells how the crime was committed.

Police have arrested nine Georgians suspected of running a sophisticated criminal operation stealing valuable antique books – including an original Alexander Pushkin manuscript – from national libraries across Europe.

Shelves of 19th-century Russian-language literature had been ransacked over two years across several countries and replaced with fakes, Europol, the EU police agency, revealed on Thursday.

The University of Warsaw, which was among the targets, last year reported the theft of first editions of works by the influential authors Pushkin and Nikolai Gogol.

Europol said the suspects allegedly sometimes posed as academics to gain access to the books in order to make counterfeits of “outstanding quality”.

While in the reading rooms “they would meticulously measure the books and take photographs before handing them back” – only to return days, weeks or months later to swap them with near perfect copies.

In other cases they “relied on a more crude approach” and simply staked out the collection in national libraries, decided what was of interest and later broke in and stole the books, police said….

(4) MARK D. BRIGHT (1955-2024). Black comics creator Mark D. Bright died March 27. The Comics Journal’s in-depth tribute begins:

Issue #257 of DC’s House of Mystery wasn’t short on talent when it hit the stands in late 1977. Like all issues of that horror anthology, it had its fair share of clunkers, but you couldn’t fault the art team. Joe Orlando (on the cover), Ernie Chan, Michael Golden, Arthur Suydam… and in between these heavy hitters was a three-pager by a newcomer named Mark D. Bright, raised in Montclair, NJ, and not yet a graduate of the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. He would have other names in credit boxes throughout the years: M.D. Bright, “Doc” Bright, but a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Bright would go on to a long and storied career, doing well-regarded work for both Marvel and DC throughout the 1980s and 1990s. He was also the co-creator of Icon with Dwayne McDuffie, one of the cornerstones of Milestone Comics, and co-creator of the oddball superhero comedy series Quantum and Woody with frequent collaborator Christopher Priest. Bright passed away on March 27, 2024, leaving the world of comics a much poorer place….

(5) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

Born April 28, 1948 — Terry Pratchett. (Died 2015.)

By Paul Weimer: It took a second bite at the apple for me to fall for the works of Terry Pratchett. My first attempt was in the 90’s, when I had vaguely heard about his work, and picked up The Color/Colour of Magic. I thought it was fine and I also tried the Light Fantastic and Sourcery. But it really didn’t gel for me. I thought at the time Pratchett was an okay writer, and maybe the humor wasn’t quite what I was looking for in fantasy at the time. (To be fair, the humor in those early Discworld novels is a lot broader than the later more refined ones).

It took over a decade and my late friend Scott to get me to try Pratchett again. Scott was passionate about a number of writers. Zelazny, which we had in common. Lois M. Bujold, which we also had in common. Michael Scott Rohan. And Terry Pratchett. Scott encouraged me and “talked me through” finding where I would best enjoy Pratchett’s oeuvre. I found an affinity for Pyramids (and the best Mathematician on all of Discworld), but when it came to The Night Watch, I really started understanding the Discworld Project and what it was doing. From then on, Pratchett was on auto-buy. Vimes and company remained my favorite, although The Librarian is probably my single favorite minor character, if only for the fantastic idea of L-Space.

Beyond Discworld, there is also Good Omens of course, and also the Long Earth series. The latter feels a lot more the work of his co-author Stephen Baxter than Pratchett but there are moments, scenes, images where the utter magic of Terry Pratchett’s work and writing and humanism comes through.

One of my not-in-a-Pratchett bits that involves Pratchett is a bit in the late Vernor Vinge’s Rainbows End. In that novel, in its (now a) alternate history, Pratchett went on to write many many more Discworld novels, and became so popular that people would use VR to cosplay as being from the new area of the Discworld these imaginary novels were set (basically an entrepot more along the lines of Alexandria, Egypt). I could wish, Zelazny style, to walk into that world and bring home copies of those “lost” Pratchett novels. I would love to read them.

And, sadly I never got to meet him in person. My loss.

Happy birthday.

(6) COMICS SECTION.

Off the Mark agrees that there’s always leftovers.
Bizarro takes us inside a reactive museum.

(7) DOUBLE FEATURE. The Flights of Fantasy Film Festival will show The War of The Worlds (1953 — 4K Restoration) and ten of the Best George Pal Oscar-Winning Puppetoons (restored in Technicolor®) at the Historic 1931 Regency Westwood Theater in LA on Wednesday, May 22 at 7:00 p.m. Tickets at the link.

Scheduled to appear are special guests director Joe Dante (Gremlins), Ann Robinson (star of War of the Worlds), and director-producer Arnold Leibovit (The Puppetoon Movie, The Time Machine 2002). These distinguished guests will offer their unique perspectives and insights, sharing behind-the-scenes stories and discussing the lasting impact of George Pal’s work on the world of cinema. Maxwell DeMille (master of ceremonies) is a prominent figure in reviving old Hollywood glamour through vintage-themed events. His commitment to authenticity has made him a leading figure in the vintage entertainment scene, and he also hosts film screenings and lectures on classic Hollywood culture.

(8) PRODUCTS LAUNCH. Gizmodo promises “Lego’s Gorgeous New Space Sets Shoot You Into the Stars”.

…This morning Lego revealed two more entries in its 2024 campaign to bring the ethos of its classic space sets across its various lines: for Lego Art, there’s a beautiful, buildable recreation of the Milky Way, containing 3,091 pieces for you to build into a technicolor spiral galaxy and hang on your wall. For those looking for something a little less macro-scaled, but still high on detail, the new 3,601-piece Artemis Launch System, part of the Lego Icons series, includes a mobile launch tower, a rocket support and crew bridge, and then of course a multistage rocket, complete with 2 solid-fuel boosters. The model also even includes a small brick-built recreation of the ESA Orion spacecraft, which can be put into the rocket or as part of a separate display stand, highlighting Artemis’ mission to further explore the Moon….

See photo galleries of both at the Lego website:

(9) METAL DETECTIVE. “Spacecraft approaches metal object zooming around Earth, snaps footage” – at Mashable.

A spacecraft has carefully approached and imaged a large hunk of metal orbiting Earth — a step in tackling humanity’s mounting space junk woes.

The delicate space mission, undertaken by the Japanese satellite technology company Astroscale, used its ADRAS-J satellite to travel within several hundred meters of an abandoned section of a noncommunicative, derelict rocket, proving it could safely observe in such close proximity…

???? NEWS: Pics or it didn't happen. Behold, the world’s first image of space debris captured through rendezvous and proximity operations during our ADRAS-J mission. #ShowtheWayADRASJ https://t.co/amnv7UIQka pic.twitter.com/CKalYTpTuJ
— Astroscale (@astroscale_HQ) April 26, 2024

(10) PIGS NOT QUITE IN SPACE. William Shatner has taken this flight before – a clip from a 1996 Muppets Tonight episode. Watch it on YouTube.

[Thanks to Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Jeffrey Smith, Kevin Standlee, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, Teddy Harvia, Kathy Sullivan, and Mike Kennedy for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Jayn.]

Pixel Scroll 4/27/24 Pixel, Pixel, Scroll And Stumble. File Churn And Cauldron Double

Posted on April 27, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) DEAD PLASTIC. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] What would you do if the world suddenly ran out of digital money?

With some parts of Worldcon fandom (such as publications policy increasingly becoming digital myopically to the exclusion of all else), this is a very topical subject. Of course sercon trufans know that the current trend is to be abhorred: they’ve read the likes of Brunner, Gibson and Orwell).

The past couple of decades, SF has on occasion looked at digital privilege, monitoring and so forth, as well as social reactions against it (Max Headroom’s Blank Reg for example). So the new BBC Radio 4 drama series, that had its first episode this week, is timely. It envisages a near-present day in which suddenly all debit and credit cards stop working. The phenomena is not local, or national, but global….!

“Money Gone, Money Gone – 1. ‘Insufficient Funds’” (Episode 1 of 5)

Valentine’s Day 2025. The UK awakes to financial catastrophe and no one can access any money. Ross sees opportunity as the country descends into chaos, but Grace has picked the worst day run away.

A fast-paced satirical drama starring Robert Bathurst (Cold Feet, Toast of London), Charlotte Richie (Ghosts, Call the Midwife), Aaron Heffernan (War of the Worlds, Brassic) and Josette Simon (Wonder Woman, Blakes 7).

(2) HANGING OUT ONLINE. John Scalzi, in “One Year of Bluesky”, assesses the social media platform for his Whatever readers.

…Now, the flip side of this is you can’t just sit back and let Bluesky happen to you. You have to engage with it — actual engagement! Not the kind where an algorithm pokes you with a stick! — or you’re going to be bored. It’s not an endless TikTok firehose where all you have to do is put yourself in its path. It’s a spigot, and you control how much or how little you get. Everyone says they want that, but it turns out a lot of people kinda like the firehose instead.

The other aspect of Bluesky being algorithm-free (and still being relatively small; its user base currently sits at 5.5 million) is that it’s not great for being famous or being an influencer, or being a troll. I think the Bluesky technical and cultural schema confuses the famous and/or influencer and/or shitty people who come onto the service to be famous, or to influence, or to be shitty for clicks. You can’t game an algorithm to go viral, and the sort of marketing that works on other social media works less well on Bluesky, and even if it did work that way, there aren’t hundreds of millions of people to broadcast at. You can try to do all these things on Bluesky, obviously. But Instagram and TikTok and Threads and the former Twitter are all still there, and much easier to game and influence and troll. People who come to Bluesky to do those things don’t seem to stay very long.

Which is a feature, not a bug, for me, and comports with how I want to do social media….

(3) A FURRY APOCALYPSE. Maya St. Clair evangelizes for a comedy film in “Would You Survive HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS?”

…Humanity, thanks to industrialized agriculture and the highway, now possesses the upper hand. But underneath it all, one sometimes senses a vague, sublimated longing to return to more survivalist times. Plexiglass Paul Bunyans and the Giant Musky dot the landscape, standing in shared reverence to older struggles of brute force, consumption, survival. On the radio, Gordon Lightfoot reminds us that even the sunny Great Lakes are biding their time to kill us. And this year we have Hundreds of Beavers, a two-hour slapstick tour de force that gleefully revives the hairy, primordial struggle of the old Midwest. In Moby-Dick, Herman Melville chronicled the “universal cannibalism of the sea”; Hundreds of Beavers brings us, at last, the universal cannibalism of Green Bay, Wisconsin….

“Hundreds of Beavers Official Trailer”.

In this 19th century, supernatural comedy, a drunken applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America’s greatest fur trapper when he loses his whole operation in a fire and is stranded in the wilderness. Now facing starvation, he must survive in a surreal winter landscape surrounded by Hundreds of Beavers – all played by actors in full-sized beaver costumes. Using nothing but his dim wits, he develops increasingly complex traps to battle the beavers and win the hand of a mischievous lover.

(4) RAY DALEY (1969-2024). Author Ray Daley died April 19 following a heart attack on March 28. His earliest sff was self-published beginning in 2012. His work included the collection A Year Of Living Bradbury; 52 Stories Inspired By Ray Bradbury (2014).

His first blog post in 2012 was charmingly frank:

…I can be a bit anal about wanting to be as factual as I can be, to the point where it actually gets in the way of the storytelling. I actually came across this problem when I wrote my first story I decided to sell. I had a great idea but the facts ruined it so I had to go with my own reality on that occasion….

(5) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born April 27, 1963 — Russell T. Davies, 61. Let’s talk about the man who in large part made the revival of Doctor Who possible, Russell T. Davies.

He was both the showrunner and head writer for the revival of the Doctor Who for the first five years. His last episode was the Tenth Doctor’s “The End of Time” which he wrote and executive produced. He wrote thirty-one episodes during his tenure.

But let’s go back in time to his earlier series.

His Dark Season children’s series had three young teenagers in a contemporary secondary school who discover a plot by the villain Mr Eldritch to take over the world using school computers. The next three episodes focus on a new villain: the archaeologist Miss Pendragon who becomes a part of the ancient supercomputer Behemoth. The two distinct plot elements who later converge when Pendragon crashes through the school stage as Eldritch walks into the auditorium.

Following up on that would be Century Falls which tells the story of teenager Tess Hunter and her mother, who move to the seemingly idyllic rural village of Century Falls, only to find that it hides many powerful secrets. Something dark has happened here and it will take her to bring it out into the light.

And then there’s The Second Coming which gave BBC the vapours (spelling there deliberately used) It concerns a video store worker by the name Steve Baxter, played by Christopher Eccleston, who realizes he is in fact the Son of God that has but a few days to find the human race’s Third Testament and thus avert the Apocalypse. It ran on Channel 4 with major changes from what Davies originally envisioned.

Torchwood was his first post-Who series and I think it was brilliant early on. From my perspective, the characters, the setting and the storyline was quite amazing. No, not every story was great but over the first two seasons were well-worth watching. Now keep in mind that of the first two series, Davies wrote only the première episode but was the showrunner with Christopher Chibnall. The last two series, “Children of Earth” and “Miracle Day” I cared not for at all.

Then he would do the Sarah Jane Adventures, technically a children’s series but I saw it and it was lovely for everyone. A spin-off of Doctor Who with the companion Sarah Jane played by Elizabeth Sladen. He would be one of five, yes five, executive producers here.

Now living in modern-day Ealing, London, she investigates extraterrestrial matters and protects Earth against alien threats with a group of teenage accomplices. It ran five series with a sixth planned until she passed on from pancreatic cancer.

Davies made a cameo appearance in The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot. Haven’t seen it? What are you waiting for?

So Davies has now returned as Doctor Who’s showrunner. He of course cast Rwandan–Scottish actor Ncuti Gatwa for the Fifteenth Doctor. Or was the Fourteenth Doctor originally? Only Davies knows. Or did a week later. Time is a cool thing.

I’m reasonably sure that covers his genre work.

(6) COMICS SECTION.

The Far Side proves even a Western showdown has a logical order.
Tom Gauld’s cartoon has a bit more edge than usual!

My cartoon for this weekend’s @GuardianBooks #illusion #writing #goodreads pic.twitter.com/Cyr8iOFGEa
— Tom Gauld (@tomgauld) April 27, 2024

Nathan W. Pyle takes us to a lawn belongings transfer.

pic.twitter.com/O5vUpqiX4W
— Nathan W Pyle (@nathanwpyle) April 27, 2024

(7) FALLOUT UNSHELTERED. Inverse reveals “How Amazon’s Best New Sci-Fi Show Built Its Massive Post-Apocalyptic World”.

… Though this may be an entirely new saga, there is no question that it is set within the all-too recognizable world of the Fallout series. In fact, Nolan was committed to bringing this vast universe to life as faithfully and precisely as possible — and this daunting task fell on the shoulders of production designer Howard Cummings and costume designer Amy Westcott….

… And so, Cummings and Westcott dove into the vast world of Fallout. Neither being self-proclaimed “gamers,” this involved a mountain of research….

…The more he watched and listened to the fans, the more detail he discovered within the universe. “It all has such history. It’s crazy — I used to turn on my phone and just fall asleep listening to the history of Fallout.”

Cummings became so familiar with the look and feel of Fallout that Bethesda Games, the company responsible for the series, essentially “let [him] go” do his thing, he says. “But I had to go to them when we were creating new stuff, because I wanted to make sure it was right. I knew that fans would sit there and go through it all and find every friggin’ Easter egg!”

Bethesda collaborated with Cummings, helping him craft many new crucial pieces of Fallout lore — perhaps most excitingly, a map showing the locations of every single Vault in America. It is this mixture of ultra precise replication paired with thoughtful new creation that makes the design of the series a feat in world-building and a surefire hit with fans and newcomers alike.

(8) GAIMAN FILM PROJECT. “Neil Gaiman Teams With Graphic India For Animated Pic ‘Cinnamon’” reports Deadline.

New York Times best-selling author Neil Gaiman is teaming with Graphic India for the English-language animated movie, Cinnamon.

Based on a short story written by Gaiman, the screenplay is being adapted by the Coraline author and leading Indian animation writer and creator, Sharad Devarajan (The Legend of Hanuman; Baahubali: The Lost Legends) with Sarena Khan and Sujatha SV. Indian animator Jeevan J. Kang is set to direct.

Blurb for project: Born with pearl eyes that render her blind to the physical world, Cinnamon’s destiny is shaped forever when a mysterious talking tiger appears. Offering to lead her through the wonders and trials of the wild, Cinnamon begins a perilous adventure that will shape her path and test her resolve. She enters a hidden realm where the line between the mundane and the mystical is as thin as a whisper and where the ancient wisdom of India breathes life into a jungle thrumming with secrets….

(9) IMAGINARY WEALTH. [Item by Mike Kennedy.] OK, it’s mostly guesswork. But it’s still interesting to see these extremely rich fictional characters ranked and to see that none of them would be so rich as to be completely out of line in the modern world. Only the top 2 crack the $50B mark, leaving them way, way behind in the race for the richest person in the world (for which they’d have to be worth over 4 times that much). “15 Richest Fictional Characters Of All Time” at The Richest. The ladder runs from Jay Gatsby to Scrooge McDuck, with a surprising number of sff characters in between.

2 – SMAUG

Smaug’s Net Worth: $54.1 Billion

The Hobbit’s very own dragon Smaug never speaks a word, but has managed to invade the town of Dale, which happens to be sitting on a pile of gold.

Some sources have placed Smaug’s net worth as high as $62 billion dollars, with $54.1 billion deemed a “conservative estimate.”

(10) I DIDN’T KNOW IT WAS MISSING. Dan Monroe wants to know “Whatever Happened to the BLACK HOLE?”

[Thanks to Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Lise Andreasen, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, Teddy Harvia, and Kathy Sullivan for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day JeffWarner.]

Pixel Scroll 4/26/24 A Pixel Lives Forever, But Not So Files And Scrolls

Posted on April 26, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) NOBODY’S HOME. [Item by Steven French.] Extract from a new book in that old chestnut, where is everybody? Smithsonian Magazine asks “Where Is Everybody in Our Universe?”

…There is no doubt that the simplest answer to the questions “Why the Great Silence? Why don’t we hear any SETI signals?” is that we don’t hear signals because no one is sending them. There are a number of other explanations that have been put forward, and we can look at them briefly before taking William of Ockham seriously. Basically, the explanations can be divided into three categories:

1. They really are out there, but they’re not interested in us.

2. They really are out there, but they’re protecting us.

3. They really are out there, and we’re going to get it unless we mend our ways.

An example of the first category would be a race of extraterrestrials living in a Dyson sphere, happy as clams with their star’s energy and supremely uninterested in anyone else. Another possibility would be extraterrestrials on a rogue planet who can’t imagine a planet near a star being inhabitable. An example of the second item in the list is seen in the Star Trek series, where spacefarers obey the Prime Directive, which forbids them from interfering with the development of other life forms. The last category is portrayed in the classic 1950s film The Day the Earth Stood Still, in which an extraterrestrial visitor warns that Earth will be destroyed unless we control our use of atomic weapons:

Klaatu barrada nikto!” …

The authors’ conclusion makes for grim reading: there is no one out there and that’s because evolution produces warlike, aggressive species that use their newly developed scientific expertise to wipe themselves out, a fate that awaits us too.

(2) SIMULTANEOUS TIMES. Space Cowboy Books has posted episode 74 of the Simultaneous Times podcast with Eric Fomley & Tonya R. Moore. Stories featured in this episode:

“Control” by Eric Fomley; with music by Phog Masheeen
“Halfway House” by Tonya R. Moore; with music by Patrick Urn
Theme music by Dain Luscombe

(3) SHORT OF PERFECTION. [Item by Steven French.] When you’re looking for a disappointing utopia … “The Illustrated Map of America’s Worst Utopias” at Atlas Obscura.

THERE ARE MANY WHO WANT to believe that a utopia—a perfect society, an ideal world—can exist. Even in America.

Yet, as quickly as leaders eagerly build utopias, they often crumble in a glorious heaping mess. Some fall to sex scandals, others toil in hunger, while many are struck with bad luck. From nudist colonies to bioterrorist cults, we map and explore six of the most disappointing and unfortunate utopias in the United States.

(4) CORA BUHLERT VISITS 1969. Here are links to Cora Buhlert’s recent contributions to Galactic Journey, the blog that keeps track of the latest in science fiction – 55 years ago.

She reviewed The Face in the Frost by John Bellairs and Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. Cora says, “I lobbied for the Slaughterhouse Five review, considering I actually knew people who survived the bombing of Dresden”: “[March 14, 1969 ] (March 1969 Galactoscope)”.

Cora also wrote an article about the non-Conan Robert E. Howard works that came back into print in the late 1960s in the wake of the huge success of the Conan reprints: “[March 28, 1969] Life Beyond Conan: The Other Heroes of Robert E. Howard”.

(5) GEORGE LUCAS, REAL ESTATE TYCOON. “Chicago’s Most Expensive Condo Being Constructed By Director George Lucas” at Chicago YIMBY.

“Star Wars” creator George Lucas, have expanded his real estate portfolio with the purchase of a $11.2 million 66th-floor penthouse in Streeterville’s 800 N Michagan Avenue building from Citadel founder Ken Griffin. They plan to merge this penthouse with their existing 65th-floor condo, bought in 2015 for $18.75 million, to create a 16,000-square-foot duplex penthouse. The total cost for this project is estimated at $33.5 million, setting a new record for Chicago’s most expensive condo. Architect Scott Fortman of Gibbons, Fortman & Associates is overseeing the design, which includes adding two new interior staircases and upgrading electrical and mechanical systems as reported by the Chicago Tribune.

(6) JUBILEE CHO (1998-2024). SFWA today posted “In Memoriam – Jubilee Cho”, honoring the author of the upcoming middle grade fantasy novel Wishing Well, Wishing Well who died on March 6 at the age of 25.

Cho grew up near Disneyland, enamored with stories of fantastical princesses. Yearning to see herself included in such tales, she wrote her own to help give new generations of children something she’d needed to create for herself. Cho planned a long writing career and wanted to use her platform to foster awareness about disability and mental health, and to share the beauty of trans joy with the world.

Author Kwame Mbalia who had reached out as a mentor says, “In the briefest of moments that I was able to interact with Jubilee, her desire to not only write, but to write for young readers about drawing upon their own identity and sharing that with others, was an inspiration. She is an inspiration, and her light is gone too soon, though its glow will live on in the hearts of those who knew her.”

Author E.D.E. Bell said, “Jubilee was a princess who wanted everyone to know that they too can be included in stories, in joy, in femininity, in Pride, in gathering, in any magic they desired. I hope children will find their own spirit in her lovely, hopeful story, and let it lift them to soar.”

(7) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

Born April 26, 1945 – M. John Harrison, 79.

Paul Weimer wrote this Birthday.

M John Harrison taught me about the joy of inconsistent and contradictory worldbuilding.

For most writers of fantasy, for most works of fantasy, I am always looking for the consistency and the power of the worldbuilding. Inconsistent, and worse, lazy and weak worldbuilding, can catapult me right out of a story or a novel, permanently. This has happened for me as a reader just this month with a brand-new novel.

M John Harrison is the exception to that for me. My reading of his work is almost exclusively Viriconium. But it is precisely in Viriconium, Harrison’s carved out territory in the Dying Earth subgenre, that I learned that worldbuilding is not the be all and end all of fantasy writing. The contradictions, the inconsistencies, the lack of cohesion is part of the point of the dying world of Viriconium. Not being able to rely on previous stories and novels in the sequence to understand what is happening in a particular work is something that Harrison relies on, and it is something that I learned to accept, and even expect in the Viriconium stories.

Really, Viriconium’s world building is beside the point, and that is why Harrison writes it in a way that you can’t rely on it. Instead, to use modern parlance, Viriconium is much more all about the “vibes”, and what vibes! Vance and Wolfe may have perfected Dying Earth as a subgenre, but Harrison gives it a feel that few authors have managed to hit ever since. There are few authors I’ve read that have managed to embody the vibe of the subgenre they are writing in as well as M John Harrison has. And with such language and writing. On a sentence by sentence level, Harrison is one of the most talented writers I’ve ever read, of any genre.

A singular talent.

(8) COMICS SECTION.

Free Range has a guest who’s forgotten it’s a talk show.
Close To Home has an ethical use of a time machine.
Off the Mark shows that patience is not unlimited.
Bizarro launches an alternate astronaut/
Macanudo might be a Zelazny reference. Or if not, then certainly Bradbury.
Rhymes with Orange discovers something about homemade phones.

(9) WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE MY NEIGHBOR? Eh, maybe not: “How Scientists Are Preparing for Apophis’s Unnervingly Close Brush With Earth” at Gizmodo.

In about five years’ time, a potentially hazardous asteroid will swing by Earth at an eerily close distance of less than 20,000 miles (32,000 kilometers). During this rare encounter, Apophis will be ten times closer to Earth than the Moon and scientists want to take full advantage of its visit….

…Private space companies like Blue Origin and startup Exploration Labs, or ExLabs, have come up with proposals for missions to rendezvous with Apophis before its anticipated flyby, SpaceNews reported. During a recent workshop at a European Space Agency center in The Netherlands, the companies pitched their mission concepts in an effort to learn more about the asteroid and other space rocks that could pose a potential risk to Earth….

…NASA’s OSIRIS-APEX spacecraft, formerly known as OSIRIS-REx, is already on its way to study Apophis and observe changes the asteroid may endure from its close encounter with Earth. After dropping off samples from the Bennu asteroid in the Utah desert, the spacecraft was repurposed for a new errand, having to carry out close passes to the Sun, as well as three Earth gravity assists, to reach Apophis in five years….

(10) NASA BRINGS HOME THE HARDWARE. “NASA Wins 6 Webby Awards, 8 Webby People’s Voice Awards”.

NASA was recognized [April 25] by the 28th Annual Webby Awards with six Webby Awards and eight Webby People’s Voice Awards, the latter of which are awarded by the voting public. The Webbys honors excellence in nine major media types: websites and mobile sites, video, advertising, media and public relations, apps and software, social media, podcasts, games, the metaverse, and virtual and artificial intelligence (AI).

Full List of NASA’s 28th Annual Webby Award Wins

NASA.gov
Webby Winner, People’s Voice Winner
Websites and Mobile Sites-General Desktop & Mobile Sites | Government & Associations
This is the fifth Webby Award and the 12th People’s Voice Award for the agency’s website

NASA’s Curious Universe: Suiting Up for Space
Webby Winner, People’s Voice Winner
Best Podcasts-Individual Episodes | Science & Education

NASA’s Immersive Earth
Webby Winner, People’s Voice Winner
Artificial Intelligence (AI), Metaverse & Virtual-General Virtual Experiences | Science & Education

NASA: Message in a Bottle
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Webby Winner, People’s Voice Winner
Advertising, Media & PR-PR Campaigns | Best Community Engagement

OSIRIS-REx Asteroid Sample Return (Official 4K NASA Live Stream)
People’s Voice Winner
Video-General Video | Events & Live Streams

NASA’s First Asteroid Sample Return Mission
Webby Winner, People’s Voice Winner
Social-Social Campaigns | Education & Science

NASA+ Streaming Service
Webby Winner
Websites and Mobile Sites-General Desktop & Mobile Sites | Television, Film & Streaming

Annular Solar Eclipse
People’s Voice Winner
Social-Social Campaigns | Events & Live Streams

Hubble’s Inside the Image
NASA, Origin Films
People’s Voice Winner
Video-Video Series & Channels | Science & Education

(11) CLIPPING SERVICE. Here’s a Heinlein photo from the San Pedro CA News Pilot, dated August 14, 1948.

(12) VIDEO OF THE DAY. Ryan George shares footage of “The Focus Group That Gave Us The Internet”.

[Thanks to Kathy Sullivan, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, Paul Weimer, Bill, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, and Teddy Harvia for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Andrew (not Werdna).]

Pixel Scroll 4/25/24 Why Scroll Around Half Dead When We Can File You For Only 22 Pixels?

Posted on April 25, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) THE EDITOR’S LIFE. Penmen Review has a two-part transcript of a panel about “The Role of the Editor in Publishing” with editors Ellen Datlow and Joe Monti, and copyeditor Deanna Hoak.

Ellen Datlow: Well, I mean, short fiction is very different in getting into. It’s always been difficult, and I think it still is, but there are so many people starting new magazines. It’s hard to make a living out of writing short fiction and editing. There aren’t that many magazines that pay their editors or publishers, like F&SF, the four Dell Magazines: Ellery Queen, Alfred Hitchcock, Analog, and Asimov’s. Most of the others are started by people who are scrambling to make a living out of it, like Neil Clarke and the Thomases. It’s very hard. And the way to get into anything is to read slush, whether it’s novels or short stories, if you can get a job or an internship. You often don’t get paid to do that, but it’s experience, and you make connections and contact anyone you ever heard of.

One thing I learned very early is that if someone—a book editor or a major editor or publisher or anybody else—says “There’s no job, but I can talk if you’d like to come in,” always say yes. If anyone professional offers to have a drink with you, coffee with you, just talk with you in their office, say yes, because they may know some other job available, and they’ll give you insight into the whole publishing industry. It goes back to the connections and networking aspect of the whole thing. You have to put yourself out there.

Part II is here: “Professional Editors Discuss Self-Publishing, Networking and More”

W4W: We’re going to try to pull some questions out of the chat. How fast do you need to be able to edit?  …

Deanna Hoak: I’m paid by the hour, but you’re expected to do more and more within that hour. When I first started out in copy editing, the standard was that you were expected to edit about 2,500 words per hour, say ten manuscript pages an hour. But now companies are expecting more and more. I know there is one publisher that wants 17 pages an hour done.

As a copy editor, I read every manuscript at least twice, and I read sections of it more than that, because if I don’t read it at least twice, I will miss some of the plot holes. Plus, you’re fact checking. You’re going back and forth. You’re doing a lot of stuff. Seventeen pages an hour – it just doesn’t work for me. I end up not taking very many projects for the companies that want me to do that.

Joe Monti: I keep it all in my head as I go along. It’s terrible. So I’m a slow reader, but it’s because I read and ingest it and keep it all going in my head at the same time. I may make little comments on the side throughout the manuscript. But yeah, I keep it all in my head, and then keep going. And then there’s a flow that happens. It’s very much a bell curve. Maybe 15, 20 pages the first hour. And then by like hour two or three, I’m going to 40, 60 pages an hour.

But it depends on the book. And sometimes I have little to no editing. I have done almost no editing on Ken Liu‘s quartet of fantasy novels. And if you’re not familiar, the last two were 367,000 words, so it was split in two. That one we cut the ends off and beginnings. But other than that, I didn’t edit almost anything in it. Yet it took me two months because I was reading it and making sure it all fit. And everything fit perfectly. But Ken’s a rare genius, and he’s worked meticulously on his craft. One of the reasons why we work well together is that I know he knows that I trust him, and I get him. This is a lot of the creative part of it–I get your voice.

(2) ONE BILLION SERVED. In “Yes, People Do Buy Books”, Lincoln Michel rebuts the claims in Elle Griffin’s “No one buys boks” (recently linked in the Scroll).

… How many books are sold in the United States? The only tracker we have is BookScan, which logs point of sale—i.e., customer purchases at stores, websites, etc.—for most of the market. BookScan counted 767 million print sales in 2023. BookScan claims to cover 85% of print sales, although many in publishing think it’s much less. It does not capture all store sales, any library sales, most festival and reading sales, etc. (Almost every author will tell you their royalty reports show significantly more sales than BookScan captures. Sometimes by orders of magnitude.)

Still, I’ll be very conservative and assume 85% is correct. This means around 900 million print books sold to customers each year. Add in ebooks and the quickly growing audiobook market, and the total number of books sold over 1 billion. Again, this is the conservative estimate….

(3) DEDUCING THE SATISFACTIONS OF SHERLOCK. “Nicholas Meyer on the Great Escape of Art (and the Art of Detective Fiction)” at CrimeReads.

…I write Sherlock Holmes stories for the same reason I read them, to divert my attention from the terrifying issues that plague the rest of my waking hours—Ukraine, Gaza, drought, famine, wildfires, limits on voting rights, Fox News and anti-vaxxers.

But for a few hours, when I read or write Sherlock Holmes stories, I am transported to what appears to be a simpler world, where a creature of superhuman intelligence, nobility, compassion and yes, frailty, can make sense of it all. Was the Victorian world in fact simpler than this one? We’ve no way of knowing, but like an audience willing itself to believe that the magic trick is really magic, we are conniving accomplices to our own beguilement….

(4) JIM HENSON DOCUMENTARY. Animation Magazine is there when “Disney+ Debuts ‘Jim Henson Idea Man’ Official Trailer”.

… Directed by Academy Award winner Ron Howard, Jim Henson Idea Man chronicles the story of extraordinary artist and visionary Jim Henson. In his 36-year career, Henson created some of the world’s most cherished characters, including classic Muppets like Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy and all of Sesame Street’s iconic residents, including Big Bird, Grover, Cookie Monster and Bert and Ernie. Henson also directed beloved fantasy films like The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth….

(5) HUGO 24. Camestros Felapton is reviewing the 2024 Hugo finalists. The latest entry is “Hugo 24: The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera”.

…Fetter, the central character of The Saint of Bright Doors is more keenly aware of the dislocation of both time and geography than most. He has some of the qualities of a Peter Pan, unattached from his shadow and with a loose relationship with gravity. Raised in a remote rural village by his mother to be an assassin, he has turned his back on that destiny and instead lives in the modern world of email, crowd-funding, run-down apartments and light-rail transit.

Fetter lives in the present or rather he doesn’t live there at all. Science fiction and fantasy have their fair share of unreliable narrators but Fetter lives in a world of unreliable world-building….

(6) TEDDY HARVIA CARTOON.

(7) FATHOM LORD OF THE RINGS EVENT. Via Robin Anne Reid we learn that Fathom Events will reprise The Lord of the Rings Trilogy on June 8, 9 and 10 in certain U.S. theaters. Tickets available at the link.

Warner Bros. and Fathom Events are teaming up to release Jackson’s magnum opus in extended versions, including those Jackson remastered for the 4K Ultra HD rerelease that came out in 2020. This will be the first chance for fans to see the purest iteration of Jackson’s vision on the big screen, however.

(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born April 25, 1969 — Gina Torres, 55. Where shall I start with Gina Torres? What was her best role? I submit it was a non-genre role as Jessica Pearson in the legal drama Suits and Pearson, the sort of sequel series where she was a disbarred attorney. It was a truly meaningful role that she got to grow into over the time the two series ran.

Genre-wise her most interesting character was Zoë Alleyne Washburne in the Firefly series which I really would have loved to see developed into more a rounded character had the series lasted. I liked her background of having served in the Unification War under Reynolds for two-and-a-half years and being one of the few to survive the Battle of Serenity Valley.

Before that she was down in New Zealand, where she appeared in Xena: Warrior Princess as Cleopatra in “The King of Assassins” , and in Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, she had a recurring role as Nebula.

She was in the M.A.N.T.I.S. series as Dr. Amy. I liked that series.

She was the Big Bad in a season of Angel as Jasmine. It’s hard to explain what she did here without Major Spoilers being given away and there might be at least one least one reader here who hasn’t seen Angel yet. I actually think it’s a better series than Buffy was.

Right after the Firefly series, she has a role in the Matrix films, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions as Cas.

After that came the Cleopatra series where she was Helen “Hel” Carter (and which last longer than I thought at twenty-six episodes) , a great piece of pulpy SF. She was obviously having a lot of fun there.

One of my favorite roles for her strictly using her voice came in the animated Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths where she was the Crime Syndicate Siberia Woman. Stellar role done with just her voice. She also voiced Vixen / McCabe on Justice League Unlimited. She was the girlfriend of John Stewart, the Green Lantern there.

She voiced Ketsu Onyo on two of the animated Star Wars series, Star Wars Rebels and Star Wars Forces of Destiny. She’s a Mandalorian bounty hunter who helps the Rebel Alliance.

She’s on Westworld in a storyline that that is so convoluted that I’m not sure that I could explain it. Suffice it to say that she was there. Or not.

Lest I forget I should note that she had a recurring role on Alias as Anna Espinosa, an assassin who was the utterly ruthless and ceaselessly persistent nemesis of Sydney Bristow, the character that Jennifer Garner played.

(9) COMICS SECTION.

Speed Bump crosses a book club with a road house.
Phoebe and Her Unicorn discusses the rules of time travel.
Rhymes with Orange has a predictable result.
Bizarro knows the winning move in this game.

(10) OCTOTHORPE. In episode 108 of the Octothorpe podcast, “Ramp is Not Ramp”, John Coxon, Alison Scott and Liz Batty look back at Eastercon.

We bask in the post-Levitation haze, going into some detail on accessibility, venue, programme, virtual, social and other aspects of the most recent Eastercon. We also mix in a variety of witty and insightful commentary, probably.

A drawing of a blackboard with text that reads: “Octothorpe 108 guide to Glasgow street food.” A picture of a deep fried pizza with glasses is next to text reading ’The “Coxon” pizza crunch’, a picture of three pakora with glasses next to ‘The “Scott” haggis pakora’, and a picture of a deep fried Mars bar next to ‘The “Batty” deep fried Mars bar”. Stars also adorn the backboard, and bottles of red and brown sauce are in the bottom-left-hand corner.

(11) ABANDON HOPE. Inverse reasons that if Heritage Auctions is selling all the stuff needed to make more episodes of HBO’s Westworld, there’s no hope that will happen: “2 Years After It Was Canceled, HBO’s Most Divisive Sci-Fi Show Might Officially Be Dead”.

Westworld ran for four seasons on HBO, but was canceled shortly after its last season wrapped and was later booted from the streaming platform. Season 4 ended on a more or less satisfactory note, but both Nolan and Joy have expressed interest in finishing the story they started.

According to the creators, Westworld still needs one more season to wrap up the battle of wills between humans and hosts. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, however, Nolan suggested the story could continue in a different medium, like a graphic novel or even a movie. Either way, television production seems to be moving on for good, as Westworld’s costumes, props, and set pieces are about to be scattered to the winds.

Heritage Auctions is hosting a massive Westworld auction. The event features more than 230 pieces from the series…

(12) THE HILLS ARE ALIVE WITH THE SOUND OF MAGIC. Variety reports “Harry Potter Books Full-Cast Audiobooks to Be Exclusively on Audible”.

… Amazon’s Audible and Pottermore Publishing, the global digital publisher of Rowling’s Wizarding World, will co-produce a brand-new audiobook series for the original seven Harry Potter stories. The new audiobooks are scheduled to premiere in late 2025, with each of the seven English-language titles to be released sequentially for a global audience, exclusively on Audible.

The companies said the full-cast audio productions — with more than 100 actors — will “bring these iconic stories to life as never heard before.”…

(13) UNEXPECTED STUFF. “Oreo Has a First-Of-Its-Kind Cookie Hitting Shelves Soon” and Allrecipes is ready to blab what it is.

… Oreo and Sour Patch Kids have teamed up to create the first-ever sour Oreo cookie. No, the Sour Patch Kids aren’t playing a trick on you—this collab is very real.

The limited-edition Sour Patch Kids Oreos look like your classic Golden Oreo, but look again; Those mischievous gummy candies are actually in the cookie and creme. The Oreo cookie itself is Sour Patch Kids-flavored and dotted with colorful mix-ins. The sandwich creme is the classic Oreo creme filled with sour sugar pieces. Looks like this Oreo will also be sour, sweet, then gone….

(14) CHARGE IT! “Detroit debuts ‘road of the future’ with wireless electric vehicle charging” – WBUR explains.

Drivers will buy 17 million electric vehicles this year, according to the International Energy Agency. That means one in five cars sold worldwide will be EVs.

That’s a lot of cars, and they need a lot of places to charge. Detroit is testing a new way to charge EVs that doesn’t require plugging cars in — just drive on the right strip of road and watch the battery fill up.

Here & Now’s Peter O’Dowd spoke with Bloomberg NEF analyst Ryan Fisher and Justine Johnson, chief mobility officer with the state of Michigan’s Office of Future Mobility and Electrification about the future of charging systems and EV sales….

“A vehicle will be connected to a smart road. Essentially the road has a wireless inductive charging coil inside of it and the vehicle is communicating with the actual coils underneath the road to receive their charge. So while a vehicle is driving, as long as it has the receiver underneath the vehicle, you charge and you drive at the same time maintaining your charge but also adding some charge range to that as well.”…

(15) TAU BELOW ZERO. Reported in today’s Nature: “Detectors deep in South Pole ice pin down elusive tau neutrino”. “Antarctic observatory gathers the first clear evidence of mysterious subatomic particles from space.”

An observatory at the South Pole has made the first solid detection of a type of elementary particle called the tau neutrino that came from outer space.

Neutrinos of all three known ‘flavours’ are notoriously elusive, but among them, the tau neutrino is the most elusive yet: it was first directly detected in the laboratory only in 2000.

At the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, detectors embedded throughout a cubic kilometre of the Antarctic ice sheet pick up flashes of light that signal the possible presence of a neutrino. When a tau neutrino hits the ice, it produces a particle called a tau lepton, which travels only a short way before decaying. The resulting signal is similar to that produced by an electron neutrino, whereas muon neutrinos produce muons, which leave long traces in the ice.

The IceCube Collaboration looked at IceCube data from 2011 to 2020, and used machine learning to distinguish between the signals of tau, electron and muon neutrinos. The collaborators found seven interactions that had a high probability of being produced by high-energy tau neutrinos.

Primary research here

[Thanks to Teddy Harvia, Kathy Sullivan, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, and Steven French for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Patrick Morris Miller.]

Pixel Scroll 4/24/24 The City With Two Dates Twice

Posted on April 24, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) NAOMI KRITZER Q&A. Hear from Naomi Kritzer in this 2024 Minnesota Book Awards roundup: “Meet the Finalists: GENRE FICTION”.

Minnesota Book Award finalist Andrew DeYoung (2023) moderated a discussion between all four 2024 finalists in contention for the Minnesota Book Award for Genre Fiction: C.M. Alongi, author of Citadel (Blackstone Publishing); Tashia Hart, author of Native Love Jams  (self-published); Naomi Kritzer, author of Liberty’s Daughter (Fairwood Press); Emma Törzs, author of Ink Blood Sister Scribe (William Morrow/HarperCollins Publishers).  The Minnesota Book Awards are sponsored by Education Minnesota; Macalester College is the 2024 category sponsor for the Genre Fiction category.

(2) MURDERBOT’S VOICE. AudioFile Magazine has been “Talking with Author Martha Wells” about the audio versions of her series.

…This relatability is part of what has made The Murderbot Diaries so beloved. Golden Voice Kevin R. Free, who has narrated all of the unabridged audiobooks in the series, says that fans regularly reach out to him to tell him that they’ve listened over and over again. “When people say, ‘It’s comforting to me when I listen to this,’ I just feel so happy that I’m bringing people comfort.” Free stresses that he’s also a fan of the books, and he’s quick to give full credit to Wells….

(3) APPLY FOR SLF OLDER WRITERS GRANT. The Speculative Literature Foundation will accept applications for the 2024 Older Writers Grant from May1 through May 31. The complete guidelines are here.

Since 2004, the $1,000 Older Writers Grant has been awarded annually to writers who are at least fifty years of age at the time of application to assist such writers who are just starting to work at a professional level. These funds may be used as each writer determines will best assist their work. This grant, as with all SLF grants, is intended to help writers working with speculative literature.

Grant applications are open to all: you do not need to be a member of SLF to apply for or receive a grant. Launched in January 2004 to promote literary quality in speculative fiction, the Speculative Literature Foundation addresses historical inequities in access to literary opportunities for marginalized writers. Our staff and board are committed to representing racial, gender, and class diversity at all levels of our organization. This commitment is at the heart of what the Speculative Literature Foundation stands for: equal access to create and advance science fiction, fantasy, and horror literature. We strive to enable writers at any stage of their career and of any age, any ethnicity, any gender expression, from any location and of any economic or social status, who want to learn about, or create within, the speculative arts. The SLF is a 501(c)3 non-profit.

(4) NEW VOLUME IN THE TAFF LIBRARY. Sue Mason’s Into the Wide Purple Yonder: A Fan Artist in America, a report of her westbound TAFF trip to the USA and the 2000 Chicago Worldcon (Chicon 2000), was published in 2023 by Alison Scott, illustrated with many photographs and artwork by Sue herself. David Langford says it now has been “Added to the TAFF site with the kind permission of Sue and Alison on 24 April 2024.” Cover artwork by Sue Mason.

(5) DOES THIS WARNING SOUND FAMILIAR? Annalee Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders devote their latest Our Opinions Are Correct podcast to “Fascism and Book Bans (with Maggie Tokuda-Hall)”.

Science fiction has been warning us about fascism for decades — so why haven’t we listened? How did Nazis become just another monster in our stories, like werewolves or cyborgs? Plus we talk about the new wave of book censorship with Maggie Tokuda-Hall, co-founder of the new organization Authors Against Book Bans.

(6) POWER PACKED. CBR.com lists the “13 Most Powerful Artifacts In The Marvel Universe (That Most Fans Forgot Exist)”. We’ll begin by reminding you about —

#13 — Casket Of Ancient Winters

First Appearance: Thor (Vol. 1) #346, by writer/penciler Walt Simonson, inker Terry Austin, colorist Christie Scheele, and letterer John Workman Jr.

Created by the frost giants, this ancient weapon has limitless power stored within it. The Casket of Ancient Winters can unleash a devastating icy wind that can consume entire worlds. It often gets forgotten because it has been stored in Odin‘s treasure room safely for years.

The Casket of Ancient Winters briefly appeared in the MCU. Loki used it to help the frost giants take over Asgard. His plan was unsuccessful, and the artifact remained locked in Odin’s vault, but it is an endlessly powerful tool that has been seemingly forgotten by Marvel fans.

(7) SUFFOLK UNIVERSITY JOURNAL APPRECIATION OF DEB GEISLER. “In memory of Deborah Geisler: a life of impact” – read the complete article in The Suffolk Journal.

…Geisler was known for her snark and humor, from her cherished pocket constitution to her in-class commentary. In her beloved 1980s Mazda GLC, Geisler was a vibrant presence on campus, one that worked to push her students just as much as she worked to foster their passion for journalism.

Edwards, who had a class with Geisler in the spring of 2020 at the start of the coronavirus in 2020, said her spirit was pivotal to maintaining community and morale throughout Zoom classes.

“Through the transition to virtual learning, Deb made it so all about the students. She put her students before herself, she again always found time to make us laugh. She was very, very flexible. She really was just great,” said Edwards.

Geisler was heavily involved in the Suffolk and Boston communities. At Suffolk, she was the adviser to The Suffolk Voice. Her passion for all things science fiction led her to chair Noreascon 4, the 2004 World Science Fiction Convention, along with her involvement in conventions through the years….

(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born April 24, 1930 — Richard Donner. (Died 2021.) Tonight we have Richard Donner who has entered the Twilight Zone, errr, the Birthday spotlight. As a genre producer, he’s responsible for some of our most recognizable productions.

His first such works was on The Twilight Zone (hence my joke above in case you didn’t get it) as he produced six episodes there including “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet”. He’d go on to work in The Sixties on The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Get Smart!, and The Wild Wild West. He closed out this period by producing Danger Island (which I’ve never heard of) where, and I quote IMDB, “Archaeologists are being pursued by pirates around an island in the South Pacific. On this island, various adventures await them.” It’s at least genre adjacent, isn’t it?

Richard Donner in 1979. Photo by Alan Light.

So forty-eight years ago and then two years later, he directs not one but two now considered classic films in two very different genres. First out was The Omen with an impressive cast far too long to list here that got mixed reviews but had an audience that loved and which birthed (that’s deliberate) a franchise and garnered two Oscar’s nominations.

Next out was, oh guess, go ahead guess, Superman. Yes, it would win a much-deserved Hugo at Seacon ’79. DC being DC the film had a very, very difficult time coming to be and that was true of who directed the film with several sources noting that Donner may have been much as the fourth or fifth choice to do so. Or more.

So what did he do post-Superman? Well something happened during the production of Superman II and he was replaced as director by Richard Lester during principal photography was Lester receiving sole directorial credit. That being most likely tensions, and that was the polite word, which he had with all of the producers concerning the escalating production budget and production schedule. Mind you both films were being shot simultaneously.

If you’re so inclined, Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut was released oddly enough when the film came out so I’m assume he had the legal right to do so which I find damn odd.

He did go on to direct The Goonies. Now I really don’t think it’s genre, but I will say that the treasure map and the premise of treasure make it a strong candidate for genre adjacent, wouldn’t you say? Truly a great film!

He went on to direct one of my favorite Bill Murray films, Scrooged. The Suck Fairy says she still likes that film and will agree to watch it every Christmas as long as there’s lots of hot chocolate to drink

His last work was a genre one, Timeline, about a group of archaeologists who travel back to fourteenth century France, based on a Michael Crichton thriller.

(9) COMICS SECTION.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal delivers a sad analysis of childrens’ books.
Candorville will miss a cancelled show.
Close to Home finds work for a retire superhero.
Eeek! has the sequel.
The Argyle Sweater shares a vision of how space exploration will be paid for.
Wallace the Brave is always prepared for things nobody else anticipates.
Macanudo fulfills the prophecy.

(10) SUN-RELATED SFF ON LEARNEDLEAGUE. [Item by David Goldfarb.] There was a One-Day Special quiz about the Sun recently. Most of it isn’t relevant to our interests, but there were two questions involving SFF:

4. In the Marvel Universe, Brazilian mutant Roberto da Costa draws powers from the Sun that include super strength, flight, and the ability to generate blasts of energy. What superhero name does da Costa use as a member of both the X-Men and the New Mutants?

Only 17% of players knew this was “Sunspot”.

7. The 1953 science fiction story “The Golden Apples of the Sun” follows a spaceship tasked with approaching the Sun and trying to literally capture a sample of its material within a giant metal cup operated by a robot hand. The title of the story was taken from a line in the 1899 poem “The Song of Wandering Aengus.” Name either the author of the sci-fi story (who is American) or the writer of the namesake poem (who is Irish).

45% of players got this one. The poet was William Butler Yeats; I won’t insult Filers by giving the name of the SF author.

If anyone is curious about the whole quiz they can find it by following this link.

(11) WINNING WITH BREATHABLE AIR. NPR explains how “New Catan board game introduces climate change to gameplay”.

In the original version of the popular board game Settlers of Catan, players start on an undeveloped island and are encouraged to “fulfill your manifest destiny.” To win you have to collect resources and develop, claiming land by building settlements, cities, and roads.

A new version of the board game, Catan: New Energies, introduces a 21st-century twist — pollution. Expand responsibly or lose. In the new version, modern Catan needs energy. To get that energy players have to build power plants, and those plants can run on renewable energy or fossil fuels. Power plants operated on fossil fuels allow you to build faster but also create more pollution. Too much pollution causes catastrophes….

(12) SANCTIONS IGNORED. “New Isekai Anime Series Believed to Have Been Outsourced to North Korea” – CBR.com tells what raised people’s suspicions.

…This week, 38North published an article revealing that a North Korean animation studio was believed to have worked on the upcoming anime Dahlia in Bloom. This is despite sanctions currently being observed forbidding businesses from working with state-owned North Korean companies. An analysis of leaked files shows that the North Korean studio was likely April 26 Animation Studio, also known as SEK Studio. 38North adds that the studio is North Korea’s leading animation studio, producing many series for domestic TV.

Analysis of the files has also revealed that instructions in Chinese were provided to the North Korean studio, with 38North adding that a Chinese company likely acted as an intermediary between the North Korean studio, Dahlia in Bloom‘s animation studio and others. Other animated series the studio is believed to have worked on are HBO’s Iyanu, Child of Wonder and Invincible Season 3. Files have also been identified that may suggest a relationship with the Japanese animation studio Ekachi Epilka (Demon Lord, Retry!).

Despite its many risks, outsourcing in the Japanese anime industry is often done due to significantly lower labor costs.…

(13) VIDEO OF THE DAY. Phil Foglio recommended a video – “The Process: Inking Old-School”.

Shane White is an artist, and a mighty good one. I've hired him to ink stuff before (see illo), and now he's posted an entire video about inking. It is very educational. The next time I see him, I will ask for his autograph. (https://t.co/weIx1hhKBl) pic.twitter.com/Lhx7iQC6Gx
— Phil Foglio (@FoglioPhil) April 23, 2024

[Thanks to Steven French, Teddy Harvia, Kathy Sullivan, Michael J. Walsh, David Goldfarb, Daniel Dern, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, and SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day OGH.]

Pixel Scroll 4/23/24 Forget About Our Pixels And Your Files

Posted on April 23, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) SOCIETY OF ILLUSTRATORS HOF CLASS OF 2024. Muddy Colors announces the Greg Manchess and Yuko Shimizu are among the “2024 Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame” inductees. See examples of all the artists’ work at the link.

The Society of Illustrators has announced the 2024 inductees into their prestigious Hall of Fame. In recognition for their “distinguished achievement in the art of illustration” the artists are chosen based on their body of work and the significant impact it has made on the field of illustration as a whole. This year’s honorees are:

Virginia Frances Sterrett [1900 – 1931]
Robert Grossman [1940 – 2018]
Gustave Doré [1832 – 1883]
Yuko Shimizu [b. 1946]
Gregory Manchess [b. 1955]
Steve Brodner [b. 1954].

(2) LE GUIN PRIZE NOMINATION DEADLINE 4/30. There’s just one week left in the nomination period for the 2024 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction. This $25,000 cash prize is awarded to a writer whose book reflects concepts and ideas central to Ursula’s work.

The recipient of this year’s prize will be chosen by authors Margaret Atwood, Omar El Akkad, Megan Giddings, Ken Liu, and Carmen Maria Machado.

Through April 30th, everyone is welcome to nominate books. Learn more about the prize, eligibility requirements, and the 2024 selection panel here.

(3) MIÉVILLE REJECTS GERMAN FELLOWSHIP. China Miéville has rescinded his acceptance of a residency fellowship for literature for 2024 in Germany which he had been awarded by the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (German Academic Exchange Service) – DAAD. The full text is here: “Letter to the DAAD” at Salvage.

China Miéville refuses to take up DAAD residency in Germany in protest of the institution’s willingness to be part of a “shameful program of repression and anti-Palestinian racism” pic.twitter.com/1Y8xOBvdgr
— James Jackson (@derJamesJackson) April 23, 2024

(4) A LITTLE TOO ON THE NOSE? [Item by Scott Edelman.] This year’s Met Gala theme will be “The Garden of Time,” a 1962 short story by J.G. Ballard. “Met Gala 2024: A Guide to the Theme, Hosts and How to Watch”. (Read the New York Times gift article courtesy of Scott Edelman.)

OK, what is the dress code?

It’s as potentially confusing as the exhibit. Guests have been instructed to dress for “The Garden of Time,” so named after a 1962 short story by J.G. Ballard about an aristocratic couple living in a walled estate with a magical garden while an encroaching mob threatens to end their peaceful existence. To keep the crowd at bay, the husband tries to turn back time by breaking off flower after flower, until there are no more blooms left. The mob arrives and ransacks the estate, and the two aristocrats turn to stone.

Just what comes to mind when you think “fashion,” right?

(5) BUTLER IS THEME OF LITFEST OPENING. LitFest in the Dena will hold its main program on May 4-5 at the Mt. View Mausoleum, 2300 N. Marengo Ave, in Altadena, CA. The opening event will be on May 3 – “Introduction and Keynote Presentation: In Conversation with Nikki High”, founder of Octavia’s Bookshelf.

Founder of Octavia’s Bookshelf, Nikki High will tell us about her discovery of books as an early reader and how authors of color helped her discover herself and what could become of her life. Featured in conversation with her friend Natalie Daily, librarian and literacy advocate at the Octavia E. Butler Magnet in Pasadena, Nikki talks about her bookstore as a community gathering place for book lovers who will find a treasure trove of BIPOC literature.

(6) O. HENRY 2024. Literary Hub takes care of “Announcing the Winners of the 2024 O. Henry Prize for Short Fiction”. Is there any sff on this list? I leave it up to you to identify it.

Emma Binder — “Roy“, Gulf Coast
Michele Mari — “The Soccer Balls of Mr. Kurz,” translated from the Italian by Brian Robert Moore, The New Yorker
Brad Felver — “Orphans,” Subtropics
Morris Collins — “The Home Visit,” Subtropics
Jai Chakrabarti — “The Import,” Ploughshares
Amber Caron — “Didi,” Electric Literature
Francisco González — “Serranos,” McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern
Caroline Kim — “Hiding Spot,” New England Review
Katherine D. Stutzman — “Junior,” Harvard Review
Juliana Leite — “My Good Friend,” translated from the Portuguese by Zoë Perry, The Paris Review
Kate DiCamillo — “The Castle of Rose Tellin,” Harper’s Magazine
Colin Barrett — “Rain,” Granta
Robin Romm — “Marital Problems,” The Sewanee Review
Allegra Goodman — “The Last Grownup,” The New Yorker
Dave Eggers — “The Honor of Your Presence,” One Story
E. K. Ota — “The Paper Artist,” Ploughshares
Tom Crewe — “The Room-Service Waiter,” Granta
Madeline ffitch — “Seeing Through Maps,” Harper’s Magazine
Jess Walter — “The Dark,” Ploughshares
Allegra Hyde — “Mobilization,” Story

(7) ANTI-LGBT HARASSMENT SAFETY ADVICE. “Drag Story Hour’s Jonathan Hamilt on Bomb Threats, Safety Tips” at Shelf Awareness.

Around the country, growing numbers of independent booksellers are finding themselves the targets of anti-LGBT harassment, with bomb threats proving to be an increasingly common tactic.

In recent weeks, Loyalty Bookstores in Washington, D.C., and Silver Spring, Md., Buffalo Street Books in Ithaca, N.Y., and Mosaics in Provo, Utah, have all been targets of bomb threats related to drag storytime programming. Sadly, they are not alone, and the numbers only continue to rise.

Per the nonprofit Drag Story Hour, there were nine documented incidents of bomb threats targeting official DSH events in 2023. In 2024, there have already been at least 12 such incidents, with the number growing almost every weekend.

DSH executive director Jonathan Hamilt noted that bomb threats represent only a small fraction of the harassment directed at LGBT communities and LGBT-inclusive gatherings. In 2023, there were more than 60 documented cases of harassment targeting DSH or adjacent programming; the figure more than doubles when including anti-drag incidents in general.

Hamilt called it “deeply disturbing” that adults are choosing to incite violence and intimidate children, parents, and storytellers at family-oriented events while claiming to want to protect children.

Despite what the public perception may be, Hamilt continued, Drag Story Hour is “not scrambling.” The organization is nearly 10 years old and its efforts are “very organized.” Anti-LGBT harassment is nothing new, though sometimes it takes different forms, and the organization is “working on getting through this.”

(8) ELLISON BACK IN PRINT. Inverse interviews J. Michael Straczynski for a piece titled “The Unexpected Resurrection of Harlan Ellison “. The interviewer’s portion is largely a rehearsal of decades-old Ellison controversies. (But by no means all of them.)

…As the title suggests, Greatest Hits is a kind of historical document. These are stories that don’t necessarily reflect where science fiction and fantasy are going but where the genre has been, as seen through the dark lenses of Harlan Ellison. Some of the stories (like “Shatterday”) hold up beautifully. Some, as Cassandra Khaw points out in her introduction, have problematic elements.

But unlike recent reissues of books by Roald Dahl or Ian Fleming, these stories remain uncensored. The fight against censorship was one of Ellison’s lifelong passions, and so, other than a few content warning labels in the book, the sex, sci-fi, and rock ’n’ roll of this writer’s vision remains intact and raucous. Like the punk rock of genre fiction, Ellison’s stories are as jarring and blistering as ever.

“No, no, you don’t touch Harlan’s stuff, man,” Straczynski says. “Even if he’s dead, he’ll come after you.”

(9) SPEAKING OUT. The New Mexico Press Women presented George R.R. Martin with its “Courageous Communicator Award” last month, which Martin found thought-provoking as he explains in “Women of the Press” at Not A Blog.

“On the Occasion of its 75th Anniversary Bestows its COURAGEOUS COMMUNICATOR AWARD on March 15-16, 2024 to George R.R. Martin for building new worlds and creating strong, yet nuanced, women characters in his books and television shows.”

…Our world needs courageous communicators more than ever in these dark divided days, when so many people would rather silence those they disagree with than engage them in debate and discussion.    I deplore that… but had I really done enough, myself, to be recognized for courageous speech?

I am not sure I have, truth be told. Yes, I’ve spoken up from time to time, on issues both large and small… but not always. It is always easier to remain silent, to stay on the sidelines and let the storms wash over you.   The more I pondered, the more convinced I became that I need to do more.   That we all need to do more.

I started by delivering a 45 minute keynote address, on the subject of free speech and censorship.   Which, I am happy to say, was very well received (I was not entirely sure it would be)….

(10) 2024 ROMCON AWARDS. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] Best Translation goes to an old Ian Watson title from 1973…

The Best Novella winner Silviu Genescu is noted for back in the 1990s winning the Romanian equivalent of “D is for End” (that’s the English translation but the play on words works in English as it does in the original Romanian). I remember staying with Silviu’s family back in the late 1990s when doing an Anglo-Romanian SF & Science Cultural Exchange, and their son came back from school to say that they had been learning about his father’s oeuvre that day in class….

(11) THE LONG WAY HOME. “’Furiosa’ has an action scene that took 78 days to film” – NME tells why.

The upcoming Mad Max prequel film Furiosa includes a 15-minute action scene that took 78 days to film, it has been revealed.

Speaking to Total Film Magazine, the film’s star Anya Taylor-Joy and George Miller’s production partner Doug Mitchell spoke about the scene, which Taylor-Joy says is “very important for understanding” the character of Furiosa better.

Mitchell revealed that the film includes a “has one 15-minute sequence which took us 78 days to shoot” and required close to 200 stunt workers on set daily. While little else has been revealed about the scene, it has been described as a “turning point” for Furiosa…

(12) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born April 23, 1973 — Naomi Kritzer, 51. Naomi Kritzer’s CatNet at this point consists of “Cat Pictures Please” which won a Hugo at MidAmeriCon II, Chaos on CatNet and Catfishing on CatNet. As one who likes this series enough that I had her personally autograph the Cat Pictures Please and Other Stories collection, I wanted to know the origin of CatNet, so I asked. Well, I also gifted her with a birthday chocolate treat, sea salt dark chocolate truffles. Here’s her answers:

Naomi Kritzer in 2020 after winning the Lodestar Award.

Naomi Kritzer: The original short story was basically the collision of two things:

1. The line, “the Internet loves cat pictures,” which made me imagine a central internet-based intelligence that wanted pictures of cats.

2. Getting myself a smartphone for the first time (I was a late adopter), and discovering some of its quirks, and coming up with anthropomorphic explanations for things like bad directions.

I mean, the Internet clearly does love cat pictures — although “the Internet” is “the billions of people who use the Internet,” not a secret sentient AI, though!

Cat Eldridge: I went on to ask her how CatNet came to be…

Naomi Kritzer: Do you mean in the story, how it got created? I was very vague about it in the short story but sort of heavily implied it was the result of something someone did at Google. In the novel CatNet was an experimental project from a company that was again, heavily implied to be Google.

Way, way cool in my opinion.

While putting this Birthday together, I noticed that she had two other series from when she was starting out as a writer, so I asked her to talk about them. Both are available on Kindle.

Cat Eldridge: Let’s talk about your first series, Eliana’s Song.

Naomi Kritzer: Eliana’s Song is my first novel, split into two pieces. I rewrote it really heavily multiple times, and each time I tried to make it shorter and it got longer. When Bantam bought it, they suggested that I split it into two books and expand each, which is what I did.

The book actually started out as a short story I wrote while in college. It garnered a number of rejections that said something like, “this isn’t bad, but it kind of reads like chapters 1 and 36 of a novel.” I eventually decided to write the novel, and struggled for a while before realizing I could not literally use the short story as Chapter 1, I had to start over writing from scratch.

Cat Eldridge: And your second series, Dead Rivers.

Naomi Kritzer: Sometime around 2010 I picked up the Scott Westerfield Uglies series and really loved it. Uglies in particular followed a plotline that I really loved, in which someone is sent to infiltrate the enemy side, only to realize once she’s there that these are her people, far more than her bosses are. But she came among them under false pretenses, and she’d have to come clean! And she almost comes clean, doesn’t, of course is discovered and cast out, and and then has to spend the next book (maybe the next two) demonstrating her worthiness to be allowed to come back. I read this series and thought, “dang, I love this plot — I loved this plot as a kid, and reading it now is like re-visiting an amusement park ride you loved when you were 10 and finding out that even when you know where all the turns and drops are, it’s still super fun.” Like two days after that I suddenly remembered that I had literally written that plotline. It’s the plotline of the Dead Rivers trilogy. I really really love this plot, it turns out! So much that I’ve written it!

I’m not sure how well it’s aged. We were not doing trigger warnings on books yet when it came out, and the fact that the book has an explicit and fairly vivid rape scene took a lot of readers by surprise. It’s also a story that’s very much about whether someone can start out a bad guy and work their way to redemption.

Cat Eldridge: Now unto your short stories. I obviously believe everyone should read “Cat Pictures Please” and Little Free Library”, both of which I enjoyed immensely. So what of your short story writing do you think is essential for readers to start with?

Naomi Kritzer: That is a good question but one I find very hard to answer about my own work! It’s a “can’t see the forest because of all the trees” problem, I think.

“So Much Cooking” would probably be at the top, though (with the explanatory note that I always attach these days — I wrote this in 2015.) And then probably “Scrap Dragon” and “The Thing About Ghost Stories.”

To date, she has two short story collections, Gift of the Winter King and Other Stories which is only available as an epub, and of course Cat Pictures Please and Other Stories which is also available in trade paper edition.

(13) COMICS SECTION.

The Far Side knows how TV is written.
The Far Side shares an entry from its “Ground Control to Major Zooky” collection.
Phoebe and Her Unicorn crosses genres.
Reality Check introduces the superhero nobody wants.

(14) A MONOPOLY OF WHAT? Ellie Griffin concludes “No one buys books” at The Elysian.

In 2022, Penguin Random House wanted to buy Simon & Schuster. The two publishing houses made up 37 percent and 11 percent of the market share, according to the filing, and combined they would have condensed the Big Five publishing houses into the Big Four. But the government intervened and brought an antitrust case against Penguin to determine whether that would create a monopoly.

The judge ultimately ruled that the merger would create a monopoly and blocked the $2.2 billion purchase. But during the trial, the head of every major publishing house and literary agency got up on the stand to speak about the publishing industry and give numbers, giving us an eye-opening account of the industry from the inside. All of the transcripts from the trial were compiled into a book called The Trial. It took me a year to read, but I’ve finally summarized my findings and pulled out all the compelling highlights.

I think I can sum up what I’ve learned like this: The Big Five publishing houses spend most of their money on book advances for big celebrities like Brittany Spears and franchise authors like James Patterson and this is the bulk of their business. They also sell a lot of Bibles, repeat best sellers like Lord of the Rings, and children’s books like The Very Hungry Caterpillar. These two market categories (celebrity books and repeat bestsellers from the backlist) make up the entirety of the publishing industry and even fund their vanity project: publishing all the rest of the books we think about when we think about book publishing (which make no money at all and typically sell less than 1,000 copies).

But let’s dig into everything they said in detail….

(15) I WALK TO THE TREES. [Item by Steven French.] If anyone fancies a walk through some weird woods … “12 Forests That Offer Chills and Thrills” at Atlas Obscura.

…While Translyvania, Romania, brings to mind images of Dracula and his imposing castle, the Hoia Baciu Forest might be more reliably scary. Known as the “Bermuda Triangle of Romania,” the forest has been home to UFO sightings, glowing eyes, strange disappearances, in addition to trees that look like they were plucked from the Upside Down. In the busy residential section of Ichikawa, Japan, is a small, seemingly out-of-place wooded area. It’s been said that those who choose to enter the Yawata no Yabushirazu are whisked away, never to be seen again. Entrance is strictly forbidden. From a woodland in the shadows of England’s “most haunted village” to a tree in a Michigan forest said to be possessed by spirits, here are our favorite spine-tingling forests…

(16) KITTY LITERATURE. “A survey of feeding practices and use of food puzzles in owners of domestic cats – Mikel Delgado, Melissa J Bain, CA Tony Buffington, 2020” at Sage Journals. (Downloadable as a PDF.)

…Environmental enrichment (although without a single, agreed-upon, definition) generally refers to the addition of activities, objects or companionship to optimize physical and psychological states and improve an animal’s welfare.^1–3 Appropriate enrichment encourages species-typical behaviors,¹ and may improve welfare by providing an individual a greater perception of control and choice in their environment,⁴ and reducing their perception of threat.⁵ Because all non-domesticated animals must forage for food, whether by hunting, scavenging or searching, interventions that encourage foraging behavior are commonly implemented for zoo and laboratory animals.

Previous studies of companion animals have demonstrated positive effects of foraging toys on behavior. Shelter dogs that were provided with a Kong toy stuffed with frozen food in addition to reinforcement-based training were calmer, quieter and showed less jumping behavior when meeting potential adopters.⁶ Shelter parrots that engaged in feather-picking spent more time foraging and showed improved feather condition when provided with a food puzzle.⁷ Case studies suggest positive effects of food puzzles on the behavior of cats such as weight loss and resolution of inter-cat aggression and other behavioral concerns,⁸ even though a recent study found that food puzzles may not increase overall activity levels in house cats.⁹ Despite potential benefits, a recent survey found that less than 5% of Portuguese cat owners attending a veterinary practice provided food puzzles for their cats or hid food around the home to stimulate foraging behavior.^10…

TEDDY HARVIA CARTOON.

[Thanks to SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, Teddy Harvia, Hampus Eckerman, Arnie Fenner, Kathy Sullivan, Scott Edelman, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, and Cat Eldridge for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Dan’l.]

Pixel Scroll 4/22/24 Pixel Walked Through A Wall Where She Encountered More Pixels

Posted on April 22, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) CLARKE AWARD SUBMISSION LIST. The complete list of eligible books received by Arthur C. Clarke Award judges has been posted in “Carbon-Based Bipeds: Apr 22^nd”. This year the judges received 117 eligible titles from 50 UK publishing imprints and independent authors.

(2) PEN AMERICA MAKES LITERARY AWARDS DECISIONS. “PEN America Cancels 2024 Literary Awards Ceremony” reports Publishers Weekly.

PEN America has canceled its 2024 Literary Awards ceremony, which was previously scheduled to be held at the Town Hall in New York City on April 29, although some awards will still be conferred. The move follows months of steadily mounting criticism of the organization over its response to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, which culminated last week in 28 authors withdrawing books from consideration for the awards, including nine of the 10 authors nominated for the organization’s top prize, the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award.

“We greatly respect that writers have followed their consciences, whether they chose to remain as nominees in their respective categories or not,” PEN America literary programming chief officer Clarisse Rosaz Shariyf said in a statement. “We regret that this unprecedented situation has taken away the spotlight from the extraordinary work selected by esteemed, insightful and hard-working judges across all categories. As an organization dedicated to freedom of expression and writers, our commitment to recognizing and honoring outstanding authors and the literary community is steadfast.”

The $75,000 prize accompanying the PEN/Stein award will be donated, this year, to the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund at the direction of the Literary Estate of Jean Stein….

The five finalists and winning titles for each of the more than 20 awards conferred by PEN America had already been selected by judges during deliberations held before the mass withdrawals, the organization said in a statement. As a result, the organization continued, the two winners who remained under consideration for their awards will receive their cash prizes. Those include Countries of Origin by Javier Fuentes (Pantheon), which was chosen to win the $10,000 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel, and The Blue House: Collected Works of Tomas Tranströmer by the late Tomas Tranströmer, translated from the Swedish by Patty Crane (Copper Canyon Press), which was chosen to win the $3,000 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation.

No winners will be announced if the winning title was withdrawn from consideration for the award,…

(3) CLARION WORKSHOP 2024. The Clarion Workshop at UCSD has announced the Clarion class of 2024:

The Clarion Workshop at UCSD also plans to bring back the Write-A-Thon this year.

Last summer we saw enormous success in our Indiegogo fundraising campaign, but we also missed joining in writerly solidarity with the larger Clarion community. That’s why we’re returning to our roots–but we’re also hoping to shake things up a little (more news on this soon!)

As always, this year’s Thon will run concurrently with the workshop (June 23 to Aug 3) to help Clarion raise scholarship money to support future students. The Write-a-Thon also helps participants commit to writing goals for the summer.

We’ll include more details for how to participate and contribute in our next newsletter. In the meantime, it’s time to start thinking about your writing goals for the summer. We can’t wait to hear more about them!

(4) THE X-MAN AND THE WHY-MAN. Deadline shares “’Deadpool and Wolverine’ Trailer”. Deadpool & Wolverine is set to arrive in theaters on July 26. Ryan Reynolds is Deadpool, and Hugh Jackman reprises his role of Wolverine in the Marvel film.

(5) READERS TAKE DENVER, AUTHORS GIVE IT BACK. [Item by Anne Marble.] On Threads, there are a lot of upset posts about Readers Take Denver — an event for authors and readers. If you see “RTD” trending, that’s why. This weekend, it was one of the top trending items on Threads. On Twitter, the Readers Take Denver posts were mostly positive — until later on Sunday. (On Twitter, if you search for RTD, you get mainly posts about Russell T Davies of Dr. Who, so I had a hard time finding information at first.) Here are some newer Twitter posts taking on the event:

The tea is on #threads pic.twitter.com/0QsM4qoWh6
— Isobel Starling (@isobel_starling) April 21, 2024

How do you 'oversell' #author spots at a con…unless you're pulling a con! #readerstakedenver pic.twitter.com/WAiJxMA6Md
— Isobel Starling (@isobel_starling) April 21, 2024

Everything I hear about Readers Take Denver gets worse and worse… and apparently now there's MULTIPLE reports for people being sexually assaulted/harassed in the masquerade by military personnel from another conference at the hotel who snuck into RTD.
— Torrance ? here but not here (@torrancesene) April 21, 2024

On Threads, there are so many posts that “RTD” got its own tag on Threads: tag on Threads (registration required).

Here is a good starting place on Threads (registration not required): @charlottedaeauthor: “After scouring Threads for information regarding Readers Take Denver, here’s what I’m gathering”.

How influencers were treated: @authorncaceres “Influencers received different treatment. 1st they were told not to film anywhere. Then they were…”.

There were also accessibility issues: @rinkrat702 “Readers take Denver. Accessibility: me when I signed up. ‘I’d love to be on the ADA team’”.

It’s mostly a romance event, but it included romantasy authors — including big names such as Rebecca Yarros (“Fourth Wing”). There was also a day for thriller authors, including Jason Pinter and Mark Greaney. It sounds as if the organizers got way in over their heads. They had something like 3,000 attendees. And a huge list of authors (“Attending Authors / Narrators – Readers Take Denver”). Many think they aimed too high and ended up with a logistical nightmare.

There are allegations that the registration line took 3 hours — Also, signing lines took a very long time as well — too many authors in a small space without enough time allotted for the event. Authors are alleging that items were stolen from them (such as boxes of books). I’ve read about at least one case where an author’s books were accidentally given away as “swag.”

Also, the organizers apparently ran out of lanyards (!) and swag bags. And they didn’t have enough bottled water for the authors. Many readers enjoyed the event and had no issues, but other readers felt that they were ripped off.

It sounds like they needed better security, too. Later on Sunday, sexual assault allegations emerged. Several men attending another event entered RTD (despite having no badges) and groped women at RTD.

(6) SOFANAUTS LAUNCHES. Tony Smith hosts a new podcast — Sofanauts. He says the podcast mixes science fiction and technology. Two episodes are already available.

…Each week I’ll be joined by futurist, educator, speaker and writer Bryan Alexander (Thursdays) to talk about science fiction and technology. We’ll be discussing our favourite books, movies, and TV shows, as well as the latest technological developments that are shaping the future from the the very books, films and TV shows we’ve watched and read over the years….

(7) RAY GARTON (1962-2024). [Item by Anne Marble.] Horror author Ray Garton passed away on April 21. The announcement came from Dawn Garton on his Facebook page:

On April 9, 2024, he had posted on Facebook that he was in the hospital with stage 4 lung cancer.

Garton was named a World Horror Convention Grand Master in 2006.

Among others, Stephen King posted about his death:

I’m hearing that Ray Garton, horror novelist and friend, died yesterday. This is sad news, and a loss to those who enjoyed his amusing, often surreal, posts on Twitter.
— Stephen King (@StephenKing) April 22, 2024

A GoFundMe was started earlier in April by a family friend. “Ray Garton~Beloved Master of Horror”.

(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born April 22, 1937 — Jack Nicholson, 87. My all-time must watch again performance by Jack Nicholson is that of him playing Daryl Van Horne in The Witches of Eastwick. I’ve refused to watch any of the later versions of The Witches of Eastwick simply because I can’t picture anyone else being that character.

Bill Murray had been cast in the role had dropped out before even preliminary filming began. Jack Nicholson expressed interest in playing the role of Daryl to the producers through his then-girlfriend Anjelica Huston who was then being seriously considered for a role there. (Apparently the role Susan Sarandon got according to several sites.) So thus we got The Devil in the form of him. Brilliant role.

Jack Nicholson, center, Murray Close, right.

Now his first role in the genre was in The Little Shop of Horrors, the true one of course, not the latter one, as Wilbur Force, The Dentist. Because Corman did not believe that The Little Shop of Horrors had any chance of making money at all after its first run, he did not bother to copyright it, resulting in the film entering public domain immediately, so I can show you this scene with him in that role.

His next film, another Roger Corman affair, The Raven, was better known forc who he was performing with than for him being in it, those performers being Vincent Price, Peter Lorre and Boris Karloff. He played Lorre’s son, Rexford Bedlo. Poe’s “The Raven” poem was very, very faintly the basis of this film. Think a drop of blood in a gallon of water.

He’s Andre Duvalier in The Terror. Here he’s a French officer who is seduced by a woman who is also a shapeshifting devil.

Now we come to what critics consider his best performance of all time, that of Jack Torrance in The Shining based off King’s novel which was produced and directed by Kubrick who co-wrote it with Diane Johnson. Look I can’t judge his role there as I do not do horror of that sort, so it’s up to the collective wisdom here to tell me how he was there. Go ahead, tell me.

Now I did see Batman. Several times. And yes, I like it a lot. And yes, I thought he made a most excellent Joker. And one of the best Jack Napiers as well, a role that is even harder to get right. (The animated B:TAS series did so by showing him smartly dressed and grinning evilly but not speaking after committing a cold blooded murder. They’d refer to him several times over the series and in The Mark of The Phantasm film which I highly recommend.) So it was a very good role for him.

In Wolf, he was Will Randall. A middle-aged chief editor who hits a wolf with his car who is actually a werewolf who bites him. A Very Bad Idea Indeed. He chews a lot of scenery here. A lot. And he can, as we saw in Batman, chew scenery really, really well. Actually he did so in The Witches of Eastwick brilliantly as well.

Finally there’s Tim Burton’s LoneStarCon 2 Hugo-nominated Mars Attacks! where he plays two roles, President James Dale and Art Land. I’ll be damn if I remember the latter role now nearly thirty years on after seeing it. One moment… Oh I see, he was the Galaxy Casino owner. No, that still didn’t help. The President James Dale character was fascinating if only as for being a much less in your face role than some of his other genre roles such as those of The Shining, Batman, and Wolf.

(9) COMICS SECTION.

Free Range delivers a strict ruling.
Nancy demonstrates scene changes.
Non Sequitur suckers us into visiting a tourist attraction.
Off the Mark hosts a nice meetup for Earth Day.
Reality Check suggests an encounter will end badly for a fairy tale figure.
Speed Bump is very meta about this search for a missing someone.
The Argyle Sweater features a fashion maven’s ancestor.
Rhymes with Orange has prevention worries.

(10) TEDDY HARVIA CARTOON. Another of Teddy’s Belphegor cartoons. “I must have sold my soul to the Devil to come up with such funny stuff.”

(11) X MARKS A LOT OF SPOTS. Check out the first half of Scott Koblish’s connecting cover that run across four upcoming X-Men titles: X-Men #35 (Legacy #700), X-Men #1, Uncanny X-Men #1, and Exceptional X-Men #1. (Click for larger image – though still might not see a lot of detail.)

It’s a great time to be an X-Men fan! In addition to their animated resurgence in Marvel Studios’ X-Men ’97, the X-Men’s comic book line is closing out its’ revolutionary Krakoan age of storytelling AND gearing up for the exciting all-new From the Ashes era this summer! To celebrate this iconic franchise’s recent milestone, acclaimed artist Scott Koblish has crafted an insanely epic connecting cover that will grace some of the most highly-anticipated upcoming X-Men comic releases….

Showcasing the entirety of the X-Men’s 60-year publication history, including core X-Men series as well as spinoffs and limited series, this breathtaking group shot spotlights A-List X-Men, obscure mutants, super villains, allies, super hero guest stars, and much more. Test your knowledge of the mutant mythos by finding your favorites and identifying as many characters as you can! For more information, visit Marvel.com.

(12) ASTEROIDS QUIZ. Brick Barrientos’ “Asteroids One-Day Special” went live on April 15. He says “Rich Horton was among my playtesters.” Here is the link to the quiz: https://www.learnedleague.com/oneday.php?5701.

The first question has audio which can only be heard by Learned League members – but you can eavesdrop on the copy hosted at Brick’s Google Drive:

1. What astronomer and composer of this piece first suggested the term “asteroid”, just after the discovery of Pallas, the next body discovered after Ceres? Although at that time, the term was intended to apply also to the moons; objects with a star-like point appearance.

(13) NOW, VOYAGER. [Item by PJ Evans.] In far-out news, Voyager 1 seems to be communicating again: “NASA’s Voyager 1 Resumes Sending Engineering Updates to Earth”.

…For the first time since November, NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft is returning usable data about the health and status of its onboard engineering systems. The next step is to enable the spacecraft to begin returning science data again. The probe and its twin, Voyager 2, are the only spacecraft to ever fly in interstellar space (the space between stars)….

…The team discovered that a single chip responsible for storing a portion of the FDS memory — including some of the FDS computer’s software code — isn’t working. The loss of that code rendered the science and engineering data unusable. Unable to repair the chip, the team decided to place the affected code elsewhere in the FDS memory. But no single location is large enough to hold the section of code in its entirety.

So they devised a plan to divide the affected code into sections and store those sections in different places in the FDS. To make this plan work, they also needed to adjust those code sections to ensure, for example, that they all still function as a whole….

(14) VIDEO OF THE DAY. It’s a tight one. “Most awkward moments in superhero filming”.

Great power comes with… a painful costumes. Today, it’s about the unavoidable pain of being a superhero.

[Thanks to Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, JJ, Anne Marble, Kathy Sullivan, Brick Barrientos, Teddy Harvia, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, and Chris Barkley for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Cat Eldridge.]

Pixel Scroll 4/21/24 Alright, You Heard A Selkie Bark!

Posted on April 21, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) FREYDIS MOON IDENTITY CHALLENGED. [Item by Anne Marble.] There are allegations that author Freydis Moon is really an alias for Taylor Barton, Taylor Brooke, and Jupiter Wyse — who were problematic. Freydis Moon is a nonbinary autistic author of horror and fantasy plus paranormal romance. The author was also claiming to be Latine. (The author won an award for Best Latine Representation from Indie Ink.) But the allegations say that this author is actually white — and that they were caught being racist against BIPOC in the past. There is a lengthy and detailed thread by Elle Porter on X.com that begins here: “In this thread you’ll find a walkthrough of evidence that shows a direct link between Freydís Moon and Taylor Barton/Taylor Brooke/Jupiter Wyse.”

There is so much information that there is a Google Docs file.

This document contains evidence that links Jupiter Wyse, one of the many pen names of Taylor Barton, to Freydís Moon, despite Freydís’s frequent claims they do not know Taylor Barton or any of their aliases.

Evidence compiled in this document was a dual effort between a long-time peer of Freydís Moon and someone who was close to Taylor Barton/Taylor Brooke/Jupiter Wyse during their active periods. The latter has chosen to remain anonymous at the time of this document’s creation, so names and emails have been censored to protect that person’s identity.

All screenshots include a link to the image hosted on a public google drive….

For more about earlier accusations against Taylor Barton, there is an article from 2021: “Fake Names & Brownface: Why Queer Fantasy Author ‘Taylor Barton’ Has Been Accused of Catfishing” [at Fanficable].

Freydis Moon was on Twitter, Instagram, etc. But the Twitter account seems to be gone, and their @freydismoon Instagram account is now private.

The author published a number of books under the Freydis Moon name: Freydís Moon (Author of Heart, Haunt, Havoc) at Goodreads.

The author also helped edit Spectrum: An Autistic Horror Anthology. The publisher has responded to this and removed Freydis Moon’s presence from the anthology:

Or any future Third Estate Projects going forward. We hope in time the community can heal and restorative dialogues can be had. Solidarity always, Third Estate Board.
— Third Estate Books (@Thirdestatebook) April 21, 2024

(2) BRAND WISDOM. Here’s Charlie Jane Anders’ advise about “How To Build Your Online ‘Brand’ Without Burning Out” at Happy Dancing.

…I suspect that our ideas of what is possible on social media got heavily skewed by a few outliers who were good at both creative pursuits and also being an influencer. For most of us, I feel like there’s a law of diminishing returns: the more followers you have, the smaller the percentage of those followers will actually support your work instead of just enjoying the free entertainment of your online antics.

So here are some possibly helpful tips for having a personal brand, without burning out…

The first of seven tips is:

1) Keep surprising people

The essence of a brand is predictability and consistency — but we love people who surprise us. Don’t let the brand thing force you to get stuck in a rut. You should contain fucking multitudes!

Another tip is:

5) Don’t try to go “viral”

Instead of trying to do whatever the algorithm wants you to do, focus on doing stuff that actually makes your community happy — even if you go less “viral,” people might appreciate you more and be more likely to support you in the future. Oftentimes, “going viral” means amusing people who will never give a shit about you.

(3) THE BOTS ARE ALRIGHT. “How Stories About Human-Robot Relationships Push Our Buttons” in The New Yorker; Annie Bot and Loneliness & Company reviewed.

… As modern dating has evolved into an online-first activity, artificial intelligence has found its match in a generation of users for whom tech-assisted romance is the default mode. The Kinsey Institute revealed in this year’s “Singles in America” survey that fourteen per cent of Gen Z-ers admit to using A.I. to optimize their dating lives. Volar is just the latest company to leverage the new technology in the love space. For help crafting seductive dating-app profiles, love-seekers don’t need Cyrano de Bergerac—they can simply download Cyrano, one of countless “rizz generator” apps (“rizz” being Gen Z slang for charisma). When love dies, there are such apps as Texts from My Ex, which lets A.I. scan messages from a former flame for signs of incompatibility. A woman fresh from a breakup with a jerk named Cesar let A.I. perform an autopsy on their correspondence; she posted her results to Reddit, writing, “I let AI examine our text messages = validation at last.”

Others, tired of kissing frogs like Cesar to find a prince, have started asking A.I. to make them a knight in the shining armor of a titanium-encased smartphone….

(4) THE PAST OF CAPTAIN FUTURE (AND OTHER FUTURES). Alter Ego # 187 has recently gone on sale with Glen Cadigan’s biography of Edmond Hamilton, and it even includes a free preview online which can be read here. Cadigan adds:

As often happens with these things, there was material that didn’t make it into the finished product, and I ran a lot of it in my most recent Substack newsletter. “Is This Thing On? XVIII”. I also included bonus material in previous newsletters, such as quotes from Ray Bradbury about his friend and mentor, as well as a poem by then-seventeen year old Mortimer Weisinger, Hamilton’s future agent and editor, which originally ran in the November, 1932 issue of Astounding Science Fiction, extolling his virtues. All of these can be found (and linked to) at glencadigan.substack.com.

(5) TOP MEN. Listverse picks “The Ten Greatest Engineers in Science Fiction History” – a list obviously put together by someone who never read a book. Only two women, though they are ranked first and second. (And #9 — “Buckaroo Bonsai”?!)

In first place is —

1 Bulma

Wife of the irritable Saiyan Prince, Vegeta Bulma is quietly the most interesting character in the entire Dragon Ball series. She built a Dragonball detector from scratch. She also invented a portable shrinking machine, a time machine, and a generator that allowed Vegeta the hyper-training necessary to become a Super-Saiyan.

She’s constantly creating cool gadgets and hacking any technology she comes across. She created a universal translator to decipher alien languages and can use it to speak to animals. The list of her accomplishments goes for light years, making her the greatest engineer in all of science fiction

(6) LEANE VERHULST (1969-2024). Conrunner Leane Verhulst died April 20 at the age of 54. Aware that she was in the late stages of cancer, a group of friends gathered at the Chicago-area convention Capricon in February in hopes of encouraging her, as Chris Barkley wrote in “So Glad You (Didn’t) Ask #81”.

The family obituary is here and begins —

Leane Verhulst, 54 of Spring Valley, died Saturday, April 20, 2024 at Rock River Hospice and Home in Sterling.

Leane was born on June 25, 1969 in Sterling, the daughter of John and Phyllis (Gluesing) Verhulst. She graduated from Newman Central Catholic High School in 1987. She then continued her education at North Central College where earned a double Bachelor’s Degree in Mathematics and Computer Science. Leane worked as a computer programmer for the US Dept. of Veterans Affairs (1991-1994), Northwestern Medical Center (1995-2003), Advocate Health Care (2003-2006), and most currently, as an independent custom programmer for Verhulst Consulting working through Blackhawk Consulting in Chicago. She enjoyed going to Science Fiction Conventions, playing board games, traveling, and reading. She was a part of the Science Fiction Outreach Program and would donate books to those in need….

(7) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Born April 21, 1954 — James Morrison, 70. So which cancelled series are on your list that you wish had definitely been finished? On mine is Space Above & Beyond with James Morrison as Lt. Col. Tyrus Cassius “T. C.” McQueen (USMC, In Vitro), whose Birthday is today. As played by Morrison, Lt. Col. McQueen was a completely believable military officer, not a caricature of one as seen in far too many SF shows. He, like every character, was a believable real being.

Likewise the series itself was stellar, both the ship and the universe it traveled being quite believable. The Chigs made an interesting enemy being linked to Earth life — something not noted until the last two episodes of the cancelled series. They had small black eyes set deeply in the head, pale pink skin, an almost missing nose, a protruding upper jaw, something that might be gills. As the Chigs got as close in Jupiter, the question is how far out did the War start? Was this a compact war fought with a few star systems? There’s no way to know as, like all SF series that deal with interstellar flight, it deals with such distances badly. Just my opinion of course.

Ok, so what else is Morrison do? His other long term character was on 24. Is it genre? I think so, or at genre adjacent. Buchanan during the Day 4 story was the Director of CTU Los Angeles. Before taking command of CTU LA, he was a Regional Division Director at CTU. He was initially sent to CTU Los Angeles by Division Command to oversee the exchange of Jack Bauer for Behrooz Araz in that story. He role would develop over a number of stories. He’d be in thirty-five episodes, one of the longest running characters.

Not surprisingly he had a Twilight Zone appearance, though given his age it was on the new series. He was in “The Blue Scorpion” episode where a strange here now, gone then gun effects an anthropology professor who’s going mad. He is the voice of JEFF. I won’t say more just in case someone here hasn’t seen it.

He plays a major a role in the X-File episode, “Theef”: Dr. Irving Thalbro is staying the night with his daughter and her family including Dr. Robert Wieder (Morrison) when in the middle of the night, Irving finds a pile of dirt shaped like a man in his bed. Irving is eventually discovered by Robert hanging from the ceiling with the word “theef” painted in Irving’s blood on the wall.’”

(8) COMICS SECTION.

Frank and Ernest pick a time travel destination.
Reality Check makes a lyrical trek.
Carpe Diem delivers a disturbing message.
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal — this is not the Voight-Kampff test!
Bizarro visits the late stages of a supermarriage.
Periwinkle Chukwu the Cat:

???? pic.twitter.com/uEizEEGA3C
— Periwinkle Chukwu the Cat (@PeriwinkleChuk1) April 20, 2024

Tom Gauld – wow, this is like The Hunger!

My cartoon for this weekend’s @GuardianBooks / @GdnSaturday pic.twitter.com/PMAjm3S5GO
— Tom Gauld (@tomgauld) April 20, 2024

(9) DOIN’ WHAT COMES NATURALLY. [Item by Mike Kennedy.] About 2.2 billion years ago, an archaea absorbed a bacteria and eventually “tamed” it as an organelle called a mitochondria. Adding this new capability allowed the evolution of all eukaryotes (cells with membrane-bound sub parts) and eventually multicellular life.

About 1 million years ago, a more advanced cell absorbed a cyanobacteria which eventually became an organelle called a chloroplast. Thus began the evolution of plant life.

Now there’s evidence that about 100,000 years ago, a single-cell algae absorbed a bacteria capable of directly fixing nitrogen from the air. And some of those scientists believe we may be witnessing the creation of an organelle they dub a nitroplast. “For the first time in one billion years, two lifeforms truly merged into one organism” at Popular Science.

… In the paper published in Cell, a team of scientists show that this process is occurring yet again. They looked at a species of algae called Braarudosphaera bigelowii. The algae engulfed a cyanobacterium gives it a bit of a plant superpower. It can “fix” nitrogen straight from the air and combine it with other elements to form more useful compounds. This is something that plants normally can’t do….

[Thanks to Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Kathy Sullivan, Anne Marble, Hampus Eckerman, Lise Andreasen, JeffWarner, Glen Cadigan, Steven French, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel (reference explained here) Dern.]

Pixel Scroll 4/20/24 Was Cheops A Very Large Cat? Only The Builders Know

Posted on April 20, 2024 by Mike Glyer

(1) UKRANIAN WOMEN IN SF. Michael Burianyk’s English-language roundtable interview with Ukrainian Science Fiction and Fantasy writers Daria Piskozub, Svitlana Taratorina, Iryna Hrabovska, Natalia Matolinets and Nataliya Dovhopol has just been published in the British Science Fiction Association blog, Vector: “Ukrainian Women in SF: A Roundtable Conversation”. The wide-ranging discussion, on Ukrainian Science Fiction and Fantasy, literature and culture, language and translation, women’s writing, is insightful and often touching and even harrowing at times.

…There is a strong trend of more Ukrainian SFF being published. Why did you think this was happening?

Nataliya It’s mainly about escapism. After spending the night in a bomb shelter and doom scrolling all day, one needs something less traumatic. Yet, SFF can also help to cope with feelings, to project one’s own experiences on those in the stories. Then the ban on book imports from Russia and a growing interest in Ukrainian culture has created more of a demand for domestic literature….

(2) HORROR UNIVERSITY OPEN FOR ENROLLMENT. StokerCon has announced the 2024 Horror University Online workshop schedule. From May 30 to June 1, they will present nine live, in-person workshops at StokerCon 2024 in San Diego, CA. See items at the link.

HORROR UNIVERSITY is designed for horror writers interested in refining their writing, learning new skills and techniques, exploring new writing formats, or better understanding the genre. These workshops are taught by some of the most experienced voices in horror. Full descriptions and registration information for our STOKERCON 2024 Workshop Schedule is available in the Horror University School on Teachable: https://horror-university.teachable.com/courses/category/stokercon-2024.

REGISTRATION IS OPEN NOW!

Registration for each workshop is $65 for non-HWA-members. HWA members receive a 15% discount on individual courses or a 20% discount on registration for five or more courses. Log into the Members Only area of www.horror.org and check the discounts page for codes. General registration for StokerCon does not include Horror University programming; additional registration is required so that the Con is able to compensate each instructor for their workshop and support the cost of the program.

(3) FIVE FOR YOUR MT TBR. Lisa Tuttle’s roundup of “The best recent science fiction, fantasy and horror” for the Guardian reviews Calypso by Oliver K. Langmead; Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell; The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo; The Underhistory by Kaaron Warren; and The Universe Delivers the Enemy You Need by Adam Marek.

(4) GAY FURRY HACKERS. Them reports“Gay Furry Hacker Group SiegedSec Breached Far-Right Media Outlet Real America’s Voice”.

The gay furry hacker group SiegedSec has done it once again, this time claiming responsibility for leaking the data from a far-right media outlet.

In a Monday post to its Telegram channel, the group announced that it had hacked the app for Real America’s Voice, a right-wing media outlet founded in 2020 that regularly features far-right activists like Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk. The outlet also frequently platforms conspiracy theories and transphobic rhetoric.

As part of SiegedSec’s ongoing hacktivism campaign OpTransRights, the group said they released the personal information of over 1,200 users on the app, including their full names, phone numbers, and email addresses. The group also said they “went poof on their files,” wiping user data from the app’s API and its cloud storage.

“[T]hroughout our attacks on transphobic entities, we have received concerns that our attacks will be used to label the LGBTQ+ community as ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals,’” the group wrote in a Telegram message. “[T]he thing is, these types of people will blame the LGBTQ+ community regardless of what we do. they will look for a reason to hate, they won’t listen to reason, they want to spread lies to shun people different than them.”…

(5) COPYRIGHT’S WOBBLY LEGAL LINE. “Author granted copyright over book with AI-generated text—with a twist” reports Ars Technica.

…The novel draws from Shupe’s eventful life, including her advocacy for more inclusive gender recognition. Its registration provides a glimpse of how the [Copyright Office] is grappling with artificial intelligence, especially as more people incorporate AI tools into creative work. It is among the first creative works to receive a copyright for the arrangement [emphasis added] of AI-generated text.

“We’re seeing the Copyright Office struggling with where to draw the line,” intellectual property lawyer Erica Van Loon, a partner at Nixon Peabody, says. Shupe’s case highlights some of the nuances of that struggle—because the approval of her registration comes with a significant caveat.

The USCO’s notice granting Shupe copyright registration of her book does not recognize her as author of the whole text [emphasis added] as is conventional for written works. Instead she is considered the author of the “selection, coordination, and arrangement of text generated by artificial intelligence.” This means no one can copy the book without permission, but the actual sentences and paragraphs themselves are not copyrighted and could theoretically be rearranged and republished as a different book. [emphasis added]

(6) GLASGOW 2024 NEWS. The Glasgow 2024 Worldcon “In Memoriam” list is being constantly updated by Steven H Silver. They ask of you know of someone you believe should be included, please let us know.

(7) DUNE MUSICAL AT WORLDCON. Glasgow 2024 also invites members to “Prepare for a unique twist on Frank Herbert’s masterpiece with Dune! The Musical. Solo artist Dan Collins will take you on a whimsical one-hour journey across Arrakis with humour and song.” There will be a performance at the Worldcon.

A memoir in song by the Earl of Caladan, trusted adviser to the Padisha Emperor and beloved troubadour-warrior, the bard Gurney Halleck.

Following the success of his work on “A Child’s History of Muad’Dib” Gurney will perform hits from his back catalogue and introduce never-before-heard songs from his time among the Fremen.

Sing along with little Paul Atreides on his journey to Sietch Tabr; can he tame the worm, save the world and get the girl?

Forget everything you know about Arrakis and get ready for Dune! The Musical…

(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

Born April 20, 1939 — Peter S. Beagle, 85. [By Paul Weimer.] It’s Rankin and Bass’ fault that I got into the work of Peter S. Beagle. As a voracious young reader, I saw The Last Unicorn in the library and somehow, even given my small “c” catholic tastes in SFF, saw that it was somehow not going to be for me. So I didn’t pick it up. I passed it by.

Fast forward to the mid-1980’s. NYC’s Channel 11, an independent TV station, aka “New York’s movie station”, introduced me to a gigantic swelter of movies.

One of them, by accident, was the 1982 animated version of The Last Unicorn. I remember not remembering at the time or realizing at the time that it was based on the Beagle novel, but after I was transported and transformed by the adaptation, I went and sought out the original novel. As fine and charming as the movie is, the novel truly gave me a sense of the power and lyric nature of Beagle’s work.

I was hooked.

I came across my favorite Beagle, The Innkeeper’s Song, in the mid 90’s. I was in a strong fantasy vein at the time and was interested in a variety of narrative forms. The Innkeeper’s Song, with its multiple first-person narration, was a revelation in escaping the usual multiple third-person points of view that were the norm at the time. Even today, Innkeeper’s Song feels fresh and unique in its approach to narrative, point of view, and literary interest. Even before Gene Wolfe, I think Beagle’s fantasy was my first real immersion into what one might call literary fantasy.

But even more than literary talent or line by line skill, what Beagle’s work does to me, from the Last Unicorn to today, is make me feel. I think his shorter fiction is where the distillation of his skill, craft, mood and the ability to evoke emotion is at its best in the short form. “Two Hearts”, a sequel to The Last Unicorn, is a particular favorite, because Griffins. His TNG written episode “Sarek” is one of the most moving pieces of Star Trek to this day. And yes, to this day, The Last Unicorn, the movie, brings tears to my eyes.

(9) COMICS SECTION.

Free Range supports the cause.
Red and Rover have a sentimental moment while watching cartoons.
The Flying McCoys reveals an unexpected haberdashery crisis.
Carpe Diem predicts a technology improvement.
Rhymes with Orange has a medical problem and a song reference.

(10) CLOSING WORDS. GiantFreakinRobot discusses “The Last Essay Ray Bradbury Wrote Before He Died”.

…At points, he describes how his librarian would get upset with him because he’d check out so many books when she didn’t think he’d read them all. But he did, he read every word he could get his hands on. As Bradbury explains, books “are the building blocks, the DNA, if you will, of you.”

Reading fed Ray Bradbury’s appetite for knowledge and his curiosity, which led to his understanding of writing and imagination. He expressed his love for books throughout his work, including, famously, in his 1953 novel Fahrenheit 451, which describes a future world where books and reading is against the law.

Having his last essay be about the art of reading in general is more than a little fitting for Ray Bradbury. It acts as something of a career summation, an explanation for why literature and the act of reading are just so very important for us as humans. There really is no better sendoff for the writer, an inspiration for all us.

(11) BLUEY. Chris Barkley assures me sff fans will want to know this news: “’Bluey’ Drops Surprise New Episode on Disney” at The Hollywood Reporter. I’m guessing Chris knows this show exists because he has kids in his life. When my daughter was young I knew about Blue’s Clues and Mister Rogers Neighborhood in detail. Now kids’ TV is an undiscovered country for me.

… The new episode comes a week after “The Sign,” a special, 28-minute installment of the beloved kids’ show debuted (most Bluey episodes run under 10 minutes). The special drew waves of critical praise for its emotional storyline centering on the Heeler family possibly selling their home and moving to another city where dad Bandit would take a new job, as well as a wedding between the Heelers’ Uncle Rad and Frisky.

Coupled with the preceding episode, “Ghostbasket,” the special spawned widespread speculation that Bluey was ending. While the long-term future of the show, originally commissioned by Australia’s ABC and the BBC in the U.K. hasn’t been decided — “the BBC has asked for me never to talk about the kids’ voices or the future of Bluey,” creator Joe Brumm told The Hollywood Reporter in 2023 — “Surprise” ensures that “The Sign” isn’t the last episode of the series.

Bluey has been a breakout hit for Disney+ in the United States. It’s the most streamed show in the country this year in terms of total viewing time, according to Nielsen’s streaming ratings, after ranking second in 2023 and sixth in 2022….

(12) LESSONS FROM THE UKRAINE. The New York Times asks “Do Tanks Have a Place in 21st-Century Warfare?”

… Despite their power, tanks are not impenetrable, and they are most vulnerable where their heavy plated armor is the thinnest: on the top, the rear engine block and the space between the hull and the turret. For years they were mainly targeted with land mines, improvised explosive devices, rocket-propelled grenades and anti-tank guided missiles, like “shoot and scoot” shoulder-fired systems. These were widely used early in the Ukraine war because they could strike tanks from above and hit them up to 90 percent of the time.

The drones that are now being used against tanks in Ukraine are even more accurate. Known as first-person view drones, or FPVs, they are equipped with a camera that streams real-time images back to their controller, who can direct them to hit tanks in their most vulnerable spots. In several cases, the FPVs have been sent in to “finish off” tanks that had already been damaged by mines or anti-tank missiles so that they could not be retrieved from the battlefield and repaired, Colonel Reisner said.

Depending on their size and technological sophistication, the drones can cost as little as $500 — a paltry investment for taking out a $10 million Abrams tank. And some of them can carry munitions to boost the impact of their blast, said Colonel Reisner. These could be rocket-propelled grenades, he said, or self-forging warheads known as explosively formed penetrators, or EFPs, that were widely used in roadside bombs during the war in Iraq. Colonel Reisner has collected videos of tanks in Ukraine being chased down by the drones or drones flying into their open turrets.

“Welcome to the 21st century — it’s unbelievable, actually,” said Colonel Reisner, a historian and former armor reconnaissance officer who oversees Austrian forces’ training at the Theresian Military Academy….

(13) MILITARY AI. “’Machines set loose to slaughter’: the dangerous rise of military AI” – a 2020 article from the Guardian.

The video is stark. Two menacing men stand next to a white van in a field, holding remote controls. They open the van’s back doors, and the whining sound of quadcopter drones crescendos. They flip a switch, and the drones swarm out like bats from a cave. In a few seconds, we cut to a college classroom. The killer robots flood in through windows and vents. The students scream in terror, trapped inside, as the drones attack with deadly force. The lesson that the film, Slaughterbots, is trying to impart is clear: tiny killer robots are either here or a small technological advance away. Terrorists could easily deploy them. And existing defences are weak or nonexistent.

Some military experts argued that Slaughterbots – which was made by the Future of Life Institute, an organisation researching existential threats to humanity – sensationalised a serious problem, stoking fear where calm reflection was required. But when it comes to the future of war, the line between science fiction and industrial fact is often blurry. The US air force has predicted a future in which “Swat teams will send mechanical insects equipped with video cameras to creep inside a building during a hostage standoff”. One “microsystems collaborative” has already released Octoroach, an “extremely small robot with a camera and radio transmitter that can cover up to 100 metres on the ground”. It is only one of many “biomimetic”, or nature-imitating, weapons that are on the horizon…

(14) NO SIRENS ON TITAN. “Dragonfly: NASA Just Confirmed The Most Exciting Space Mission Of Your Lifetime” enthuses Forbes.

NASA has confirmed that its exciting Dragonfly mission, which will fly a drone-like craft around Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, will cost $3.35 billion and launch in July 2028.

Titan is the only other world in the solar system other than Earth that has weather and liquid on its surface. It has an atmosphere, rain, lakes, oceans, shorelines, valleys, mountain ridges, mesas and dunes—and possibly the building blocks of life itself. It’s been described as both a utopia and as deranged because of its weird chemistry.

Set to reach Titan in 2034, the Dragonfly mission will last for two years once its lander arrives on the surface…

(15) VIDEO OF THE DAY. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] Nearly 200,000 views and not even out for two days…. Matt O’Dowd over at PBS Space Time wonders “Why Is The World Rushing Back To The Moon?”

The Moon has been one of the most important theoretical stepping stones to our understanding of the universe. We’ve long understood that it could also be our literal stepping stone: humanity’s first destination beyond our atmosphere.

[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, Michael Burianyk, Francis Hamit, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, Mike Kennedy, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Cat Eldridge.]

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