Maintenance

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Blogpatrol seems to have forgotten who I am, so I'm deleting the link. No more counter, no referrer information. Not that anyone ever visits this page (apart from me).

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(fre)ebooks

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Tor are currently giving away free ebooks as part of a promotion for their new website. Just sign up for their newsletter and once a week they'll email you a link to download it in html, pdf, or mobi format. They're on their third book at the moment: " The Outstretched Shadow " by Mercedes Lackey and Someone Else Whose Name Isn't As Distinctive. The previous two were " Old Man's War " by that nice Mr. Scalzi, and " Spin " by Robert Wilson. I have a decent-sized screen on my PDA-phone-thing, and reading "Spin" was quite comfortable. There were advantages over the paper version (reading in the dark; not as heavy; easier to read one-handed while swaying on the commuter meat wagon; I always have my phone with me so I've always got a book too), and disadvantages (could not read at the beach; or anywhere in bright light; not as high contrast as print on paper which did give me a slight headache after an hour or so; my book now depe...
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This graphic novel by Nick Abadzis is a semi-fictional account of the early days of the Soviet space programme. It covers the launch of Sputnik and the rushed launch of the first animal in orbit: Laika. It's a lovely story, sad and touching. If I wasn't a big, tough guy I might have had a tear in my eye at certain points. But I'm not soft, so I didn't. Ok? Anybody that tells you any different is a liar.
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Mickey Mouse Made Me Cry

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On a whim, I ordered Howard Who? from Small Beer Press (along with Kate Wilhelm's excellent Storyteller ). I'd read a couple of Howard Waldrop's stories before on the now-defunct SciFiction (the archives still work, worth a read), and was keen to read more. The man's a fucking genius. In the last week I've read about a man searching for the last dodos; Elvis wishing he could play the clarinet like Eisenhower instead of being a Senator; fishing for Leviathan after the Great Fire of London; zen sumos throwing their opponents with the power of their minds; and what happened to Mickey, Donald, and Goofy at the end of the world. All meticulously researched, and completely believable. Every single story is great. They're all examples of a writer getting an idea and running with it, elbowing aside worries about whether the story will find a market or any of the other crap that gets in the way. "Horror, We Got" is the perfect example. In it Israel builds a ...
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