science fiction

Connie Willis and the Nebula

Various people on my friends list have greeted with dismay the news that Connie Willis has won this year’s best novel Nebula for All Clear (step forward and ). I have enjoyed a few works by Willis in the past, but they’ve almost all been her shorts. For me, Fire Watch and Blued Moon are the stand-out shorts. Her novels have mostly left me underwhelmed, partly because poor research and lazy plotting seem to be her bywords. For example, the farcical bits of To say nothing of the dog work well enough, but I lived in Coventry for long enough… Read More »Connie Willis and the Nebula

First Men in the Moon

The Gatiss version. Our intrepid heros, Bedford and Prof. Cavor, are about to land on the moon. Suddenly, a klaxon sounds…

You have been outbid…

Bother. I spotted an emergency power off panel from an IBM 1602 on eBay over the weekend, and was out-sniped within the last ten seconds (I’d set my snipe for 29 seconds, figuring that there wasn’t likely to be a great deal of interest in a 3kg block of metal). On the plus side, the postage would have cost me the best part of USD50. For those of you that might be wondering why I’d want an obsolete IBM boat anchor, might I refer you to one of ‘s stories, particularly the last four paragraphs.

This Vicious Cabaret

I’ve been looking forward to the release of V for Vendetta with some trepidation since I first heard that an adaptation was seriously in the offing (see my previous posts). and I went to see it last night; I’m hoping that she will also post her views on the film, because unlike myself she hasn’t read the comic and has a different (and more positive) take on the film. Without spoilers, what are my feelings on the success of the film? Is it a bad film? No. Is it a good adaptation? Sadly, also no. It isn’t a disaster, but… Read More »This Vicious Cabaret

A for Andromeda

Given that the 1961 original was lost in one of the great BBC tape purges of the 1970s (to make way for Match of the Day, no doubt), it’s unsurprising that I’ve never seen A for Andromeda. Rather more embarrassingly, I’ve not read any of Fred Hoyle’s novels. and I watched the live remake of The Quatermass Experiment that BBC Four showed last year; I enjoyed it, but I didn’t think that the plot had dated especially well, and the pacing required of a live production with outside broadcasts felt artificial. I’ve just seen BBC Four’s remake of A for… Read More »A for Andromeda

Worldcon

Well, that’s that. I’ve finally taken the plunge and paid my money for Interaction, so I guess that I’m going to be at the Worldcon this summer, making this both my first Worldcon and also my first large SF con (having repeatedly failed to get to any Eastercons). Those of you who are going to be at Intersection – which hotels will you be staying in?

And now, the 1998 Show!

A little over a year ago, I commented that I hadn’t heard that the Wachowski brothers were working on an adaptation of V for Vendetta. Yesterday, Warner Bros put out a press release stating that they’re going ahead with the project. There’s a poster image for people to drool over: For what it’s worth, they appear to have cast Natalie Portman as Evey, which might work.