Just happened to turn on Blade the TV series, and there was a character who looked just like Hillary Clinton, in intensive care, which seemed oddly apt. Anyway, that’s enough reading American political commentary from random pulp gleanings; instead, I’m going to turn to reading the future from random SFnal conversations, which I suspect willContinue reading “Luke comes in colours”
Category Archives: Science Fiction
‘Ghosts’ lives!
Well, much excitement here at Allumination Central as my short story, ‘Ghosts’ has hit the streets in the latest issue of ‘Midnight Street’ – and it’s the cover story! Which I didn’t know about at all until my copy popped through the postbox, so a lovely surprise. Anyway… the story’s about the problems of exploringContinue reading “‘Ghosts’ lives!”
Cities, alienation, spaceship design and fish
Space is so often seen as an open field that exists to support some form of vast, optimistic transcendence. But in fact, reality suggests that it will force an almost infinite claustrophobia on us. Surrounded by its empty hostility, we’ll travel it in tiny metal tubes, at best spending only years locked together withContinue reading “Cities, alienation, spaceship design and fish”
Science, the future and my Luddite superpowers
Well, it’s been a frustrating time for me technologically over the last week or so; I seem to have developed some kind of weird anti-modernity super power. On return from America, I discovered that my boiler had stopped working; a plumber came and ‘repaired’ it last Friday, but it’s still not going. Last Thursday, myContinue reading “Science, the future and my Luddite superpowers”
(Hello, Hello) It’s Good To Be Back
Well, hello all! I have returned from a truly fantastic two weeks in the States. We packed so much in, it feels like much longer – so where to begin when talking about it? Well, there were the wonders of Olympic National Park, the joys of Seattle, the sheer bounciness of meeting H’s various friendsContinue reading “(Hello, Hello) It’s Good To Be Back”
Life with the Vaders
Well, a busy day at Allumination Central, so for your delectation – and following on from yesterday’s Star Wars referencing post – here’s the first of the magnificent online saga that is ‘Chad Vader – Day Shift Manager’. It’s about Darth Vader’s somewhat less adequate little brother, and his daily battles as he manages aContinue reading “Life with the Vaders”
Aliens and the family unit
Well, according to Grim Reviews and Papers Falling from an Attic Window (hi guys!) I’ve become involved in the online Derleth / Lovecraft debate. To be honest, I didn’t know there was one, but it touches on some very serious issues – the integrity of an artist’s worldview, the limits of universe sharing, and soContinue reading “Aliens and the family unit”
Crossing Lovecraft
Today as it turns out is looking very hectic, and I’m out and about tonight, so instead of a long typed-in-the-evening post about Hal Duncan (I’m going to a talk on Norse Gods, etc), here’s a short rant about H. P. Lovecraft. Not so much about Lovecraft, in fact; more about August Derleth’s misappropriation ofContinue reading “Crossing Lovecraft”
(Un)Real city
Just been reading over yesterday’s post about Zola, and I realised that there’s an unstated assumption about the actual process of writing underlying it. I don’t think that any writer pulls something from nothing. Rather, I think that the act of writing is an act of interpretation. Details of the world are pulled into fictionContinue reading “(Un)Real city”
Space is Deep
A.R. Yngve’s comment below set me thinking about the deepness of space, and a writer who’s dealt with its profoundly dislocating emptiness more successfully than most – A. E. Van Vogt. Van Vogt’s ‘Voyage of the Space Beagle’ (or ‘Space Bagel’, as it’s known round these parts) couldn’t really exist without that awareness. Its protagonist,Continue reading “Space is Deep”