Monthly Archives: July 2008

Todd McAulty announced at the Black Gate newsgroup on SFFNet that a free PDF of Black Gate 12 will be available on the website for a limited time. They’re not abandoning print publication, but they are looking toward some kind … Continue reading →

Weird news about pollution and gender imbalance in an Arctic community. Fortunately, that’s a long way away and it could never happen here. [The first report seen at Salon.com’s Broadsheet.]

Thirty nine years ago much of my large and obstreperous birth family was huddled around our little black-and-white TV trying to make sense of the grainy images we saw there. Ostensibly they represented the outside of the LEM and we … Continue reading →

I was going to post a long political screed here, but then it occurred to me that there might be one or two other people on the internet who have that beat covered. And now: this.

My brilliant agent Mike Kabongo (a.k.a. onyxhawke) ran some Strunk up the flagpole this afternoon, but I couldn’t salute it. Strunk: “Write with nouns and verbs, not with adjectives and adverbs. The adjective hasn’t been built that can pull a … Continue reading →

I appear before you fresh from having searched the word “fantasy” in a blog-search program. And I have learned two things, one general and one specific. A.) (general) Never do this. B.) (specific) Do not write about BDSM unless you … Continue reading →

1. Happy Bastille Day. 2. WALL*E is (in my son’s words) “as good as Wanted was bad.” I liked the sparing touch with exposition, the soaring visuals, the courageous decency of most of the characters (and the plausible self-interest of … Continue reading →

I might have mentioned yesterday, but didn’t, that we’re doing a group-read of Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age in the SFReader Forums starting early next week.

This talk by Neal Stephenson has been all over the place recently; I think I saw it last at the Pyr blog. I finally watched it and was glad I did, even though I find the video player sort of … Continue reading →

1. What in the name of Apicius and Lucullus is a “summer crushed tomato” and why is Bertolli so sure it’ll sound appetizing? It sounds more like a nightmare about castration anxiety. Which leads to my next item… 2. Wanted … Continue reading →