The SFFaudio Podcast #766 – READALONG: Invitation To The Game by Monica Hughes

The SFFaudio PodcastJesse, Paul Weimer, and Trish E. Matson talk about Invitation To The Game by Monica Hughes

Talked about on today’s show:
1990 or soon after, culled it, the audiobook, the only audiobook of Hughes’ stuff, a book for the blind, 35 books for young people, Earthdark, Crisis On Conshelf Ten, The Keeper Of The Isis Light, pummel Paul, one of those states Paul’s in, not absolutely perfect?, didn’t quite gel for Paul, slightly undercooked, the main character narrator or the author?, the society, not well thought out by the government, left with that impression, not allowed to do that, the best and the brightest, except for one, rigging the tests, terrible employment conditions, fodder for being invited to the game, environmental catastrophe, robots saved humanity, robots are taking our jobs!, rigging, the psychiatrist and the farmer, definitely governmental action, badly thought out elements, just stupid to send off people without tools at all, no fire implements, a lot of people out to be dying, boots and overalls, a crazy method of colonization, chip their own flints, they were given the knowledge and their massively awesome bodies and they were given each other, physical fitness, all these skills, knowledge and skills, the do survive, is it realistic?, grad school, basic premise, basic plot, basic sketch of a story, no more detail than absolutely necessary and good SF, and that’s it, perfectly competent SF, exactly what she’s trying to do, it’s by Heinlein, Tunnel In The Sky, Alexi Panshin’s Rite Of Passage, super complementary to that, are we actually on earth, identical reasoning?, this sky doesn’t seem familiar, there’s no Moon, it rained most of the time, Planet Of The Apes (1968), kvetching, it took you this long, they had a Heinleinian style conversation, not in a VR simulation, emotional scenes, we’re doing all this extra work, it doesn’t matter because they’re not coming out of it, we’re running out of time, the last words of the book are the first words of the book, we’re her descendants!, she did a great job, Andre Norton gets a lot of attention, Monica Hughes is way better, much better sketched, I wanna like her stuff, a big reputation, years of publication, first book was in her 50s, she was a WREN, Bletchley Park, seems like a pretty smart lady, emigrated to Alberta, Zimbabwe, publishing like mad, Canada’s finest writer of science fiction for children, Robert J. Sawyer is crying, Canada’s only full time science fiction writer, retired by the time she started writing, hit after hit, that’s really cool, hopeful someone is gonna make audiobooks out of these, very basic SF, good introduction material, children living on their own and having to make do, Robinson Crusoe, more than just that, Tom Sawyer, The Black Stallion, Island Of The Blue Dolphins, all the stuff set on Earth, interesting sociological stuff, lack of sympathy employed people had for the unemployed, resonant and modern, she doesn’t tell us how to think about that, the people who go the jobs were the worst students, a minor role in an automated luxury society, descending scores, when you’re doing your assignments for your marks, what is my goal?, this is how you would approach this problem, hit a certain number, getting good marks in school is not a sign you’re going to be a better doctor or manager, an engineer or an architect, getting a great job, scrounge, learn to make their own food, their home into a castle, they teach eachother how to do karate and run marathons, keep eachother safe, who is to say?, my evil plan, who or what the government is, we assume it is, the top layer of government, we don’t know anything about it, a ground level view, a very interesting modern dystopia, the poor and unemployed, seems to be that way, separated from parents and families and each other, 15 minute cities, vaccine passports, a rebellion against the suburban sprawl, Star Trek Deep Space Nine’s Bell Riots episode, Past Tense, Jesse will hear not bad words about it, 2017 podcast discussing this book, Teen Creeps podcast, jobs in Burbank, read old book they would have read in their teens, talking about work, too much of a sketch, unrealistic dialogue, not knowing the motivations, why did they hate it?, gets you to the thoughts where you’re wondering about things, feature not bug, which is worse: you go to a massage parlour and are offered a happy ending, going on craigslist and cheating on your wife, watercooler talk to distract yourself because you hate your work, these despised people, isn’t able to work, scrounging everyday, saving their money, learning to cook bad food, avoiding the thought police, I’ve read this 50 times, seems excessive, you need more books in your life, it is a good book, a comfort read, competence porn, within the context of…, Harry Potter of competence porn of thing people can’t be competent at, you’re special harry versus rejects, a bit sulky about it, you guys ruined it for me, family farm, desperation, sympathy for Benta, the rejects of the rejects, vast conspiracy somehow to get us into the game, twice rejected, rebellion against the robots, the double left behind, that setting is awesome, set 300 years in the future, that’s a great thing, open and thinking about it, could be Colorado, could be Edmonton, farmland somewhere nearby, bus, universality, some of the appeal of the book, Jesse went to that school, purposefully not enough markers, available for anyone to identify with the characters, awe and interest, oh Heinlein I hate you moments, conclusions about, isolated as a community, all the kids will bond together as a family, hanky panky, sex?, how old are they? are they high school graduates?, a little older a little younger, crime boss was 22, he could be a lot older than he looked, at least 10 years old, late teens, nobody starts up any relationship, an unrequited crush, then she gets Philip, immediately pregnant, that pent-up, a little old fashioned, unrealistic to the nature of kids, as a children’s writer, not wanting to deal with romance, a teen soap opera, maybe it’s a Christian book, marriage ceremonies, that’s in Heinlein though, if this book was written today, farm friend, pair bond, what happens when you get on another planet, exact numbers, two teams of 10, so toxic, nothing remaining of itself, society has gone so wrong, send young people off, that seems high, people all over the planet, survivor bias, some of them died when they got sick, pregnancy, a medic, childbirth equipment, actual improvements in civilized countries, reducing childbirth and childhood mortality, had the book been sketched slightly more…, it’s not that they had questions, it’s that they didn’t like that there were questions, this is the opposite, barely enough material to cover the topic it is handling, not even 5 hours, the Heinlein is longer, this whole other level, accidentally didn’t get picked up, Heinlein pulls the rug out, now we’re coming back in force!, triple rugs pulling out, vaguely: pollution bad, don’t cook beside the cesspit, the first step of not polluting everything, you got the ashes, animal fat for nutrition, not even animal husbandrying, a great ending, being good at computer gaming, survival genre, Minecraft, NZ based comedy troupe, Viva La Dirt League, game sketches, poof you appear on a beach, EPIC NPC MAN, scanty armour, tankies and healers, 3 sticks and a stone and now you have a hand-axe, crafting games, Valheim, Survival Logic, The Long Dark, how long you can survive, the VR game, Dream Park is more like Westworld, you dress up, injured in the simulator, the transition between the artificial and the other planet is slippy, no Philip K. Dick style moment, Jesse was still thinking, a book that works with this, Tad Williams’ Otherland, 24/7 in the tanks, City Of Golden Shadows, a million onehundred thousand words, it doesn’t overstay its welcome, the same setup as Avatar, were their consciousnesses inside of drone robots, Trish’s assumption, makes sense, hey what’s that shit on your hair?, I with the feather pen, and there was this shitty gel on my head, that’s the situation we’re all in, we can pull out at any time, put a bookmark in it, those other peoples were wrong, so good, just enough, a nice simple meal precisely cook, no exotic tang, a great introduction to science fiction, the BEST BOOK EVER, other Monica Hughes books exist, go argue with Heinlein for a while, other books exist, Paul’s notes, eXistenZ (1999),

“Cronenberg: Here, put this in your mouth.

Me: I’m not sure I want to do that.

Cronenberg: It’ll make me feel good though.”

I feel violated, you’re going to like being violated, you do make some interesting idea movies, a Larry Niven story, What Can You Say About Chocolate Covered Manhole Covers?, a creative mind, so good at karate, karate is important, specifically karate, bluefurs, anything you do to this book to add anything makes it longer, more romance, a predator, no matter what you do it would make it longer, the B.A. biology degree in Paul, book 2 in the series explains there was a killer robot, a bulldozer with Earth’s Thought Police on it, wearing the skulls of the native peoples around, Stephen Baxter’s Proxima, because convicts, Swiss Family Robinson, Lord Of The Flies, all of those answers make the book longer, the scenario, No Escape (1994) Ray Liotta, Lance Henrickson, Kevin Dillon and Ernie Hudson, set in 2022, half-Mad Max half-I will not have my will dominated, The Penal Colony by Richard Hurley, an action movie with no girls, Gale Anne Hurd, it’s a B movie, a prison movie, threw in a couple of girls, The Prisoner as Mad Max with a Waterworld vibe, a lost classic, Ray Liotta in a science fiction movie, any other links?, “comps”, a good book for YA, quibbles, some interesting things to think about, I’m on my deathbed what book should I read Trish?”, “I’m a slow reader!”, a long review exegesis of Time Enough For Love, doubled the length, Paul had to restrain himself, it was a trauma, a sweat lodge you had to sweaty, such a sweaty essay, raised a daughter to adulthood, pioneering trip by themselves, major problems with this whole scenario, voluntary colonists, obsessed with incest, boink and marry, those are your two choice on your deathbed: Time Enough For Love or Invitation To The Game, lets play some pinochle, 5 hour class, taken this off, got yourself some rest, grandma you’ve been sitting in this chair all day, Jesse! stop podcasting!, when not resting, need a good rest.

Invitation To The Game by Monica Hughes

Invitation To The Game by Monica Hughes

Invitation To The Game by Monica Hughes

Posted by Jesse WillisBecome a Patron!

The SFFaudio Podcast #761 – READALONG: Downward To The Earth by Robert Silverberg

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #761 – Jesse, Paul Weimer, Terence Blake, and Jonathan Manfred Weichsel talk about Downward To The Earth by Robert Silverberg

Talked about on today’s show:
downward dog, the sad story, a biblical quote, Nightwings, lots of short stories, 200 short stories?, sensing a pattern, The Book Of Skulls, Up The Line, Thorns, Dying Inside, similar tones, 1970, 1972, serialy in Galaxy, awesomely similar, Sundance, maybe having a mental breakdown, Tom Tworibbons, first nations native, setup the colonization, exterminating a possibly sentient pest, Colonel Kurtz, favourite writers, Lovecraft has Poe and Dunsany, Silverberg’s is Joseph Conrad, The Secret Sharer, Conrad is not really sciencefictional, rather elderly, a whole basement full, the comic book, its very French, one of the guys looks like Silverberg, aware of the adaptation, why did they make me that guy, Philippe Thirault and Laura Zuccheri, same bear same hair same face, messed around with the plot, so internal, such a novel novel, as opposed to Harry Potter, in his head, try to make a Dying Inside movie, cloud forests, getting into his racist head, voice over narration, look at the original Dune movie, that’s the book, the Villeneuve, why Jessica has to cry all the time, a superwoman who must cry in every scene, being upset all the time, more evil or less ready for their rebirth?, a different part of Gunderman, dialogs struggling with his internal self, the tour guy dude, Kurtz, externalize all of the that, cut them down and synthesize them into the basic idea, decide what each character represented, Avatar 2, a 3 hour movie, my unconscious is smarter than I am, a one hour on a similar theme, The Crunch, a tv movie by Nigel Kneale, most of the good stuff out of the UK is just Nigel Kneale, former island nation colony, takes place in realtime, natural resources, we’re all friends now aren’t we?, now pay us back what you stole from us, kinda like science fiction, resentment, African or North American or South American or island colonies, The Mouse That Roared (1959), drops you into it, similar to what we have in this book, the colonization of a planet, back for more, they thing that they wanted to get: unobtainium, a piss take, Cameron was a science fiction reader, moving off Earth, financing the whole trip, capitalists from Earth, makes you immortal, killing all these sentient whales, the relationships between the na’vi and the whales, the two alien species we have in this book, to see that pattern, interconnected, they literally link together, commune with each other, let’s do colonialism, let’s pull back from colonialism, Stephen Lang, he’s a Colonel Kurtz, twisted and evil, seeing the ending coming, foreshadowed from the beginning, quiet about things they shouldn’t be quiet about, meat-eater vs. omnivore, peaceful aliens, peaceful vs. pacifist, our main elephant we’re riding, him, permission from the human to kill the human, taking it as an order, whales are not allowed to fight, one of the whale characters, bad whale, excluded from the group, being violent to another sentient being, we warhawks here on earth, yeah getem!, power armour, a meditation on African colonialism, the Humanoids comic book company, I went to Kenya in 1968, I’d always liked Conrad, his mode at this time, he’s really into this stuff, Philip K. Dick drug-trippy, transcendence, interior life, immortality, relationships gone bad, Majipoor, a big series, strange dream and psychedelic stuff, wandering, getting into adventures, less interior, more Vancian, a new wave book?, painfully new wave, I like this book, what new wave proves, complaining about navel gazing, navel gazing is good, meditative, Sundance blew Jesse out of the water, alien baby factor, disturbing, they left that out, why?, amped up the sexuality and the nakedness, a French move, what scenes parallel what scenes, that snake pumping station, the three witches?, maybe, what they’re doing is horrible but we don’t know why, giving hallucinogens to horses, that’s the horror, cultural appropriation, species appropriation, terrible behavior, a native secret ceremony, how do these taboos develop, no photography, connected to the people, the taboo is there in part because we don’t have the physical transformation, a healing ceremony, an activity done by people who know what they’re doing it, solve some community problems, not scientifically proven, backlashes with the insects, everybody’s friends, some of the alien lifeforms are not you friends, eaten by some moss, you can commune with everything with your pony-tail, your horse, your sky-horse, your whale friend, cougar behind that tree, the bear will not meditate with you, the coyote will take your kid, the quasi-cultural appropriation, the tounge thing from Maori, the tree people bear their teeth and hiss, we’re all going on a spiritual journey, we can’t talk about it, respect our cultural practices, more Silverberg than Conrad, an initiation into the shadow side of things, Marlowe, sitting on a boat waiting for the tide to change, experiences in the Congo, a framed device, I went up the river, heard about this Kurtz guy, doing genocide, the slaughter of the elephants vs. the cutting off of hands, this book can’t exist without Conrad’s book, after colonialism, Kurtz is going back for forgiveness, it’s its own story, tourism as some element of every Silverberg, he’s writing what he knows, immortality but not in a way anyone would want, regrows limbs and heals damage, the rebirth ceremony, makes your sins go away or turns you into a puddle, on a symbolic level, the original X-Men movie, Magneto can turn people into mutants, forcibly mutantized, interior nature and interior sin, reflecting the inner life, none of the robots get to have a rebirth ceremony, patient AI, wall decoration, not a threat, the physical animals, fucking around the meaning in the comic, more Avatar earth mother, the planet is alive, the mother of souls tree, waking up the life of the planet, do the revolution, the plateau where transformation happens, a poor substitute for rebirth, go downward like beasts, gaining psychic powers, starchild in 2001, he becomes space Jesus, Paradise Lost by John Milton, the better the angel the more he can fall, Ecclesiastes, maybe animals and humans are or aren’t the same, if we’re special and they’re not, creatures without souls, munching the weeds, they are beasts, their leaden spirits go downward, sapient spirits go upward to the mists, the boom boom boom, he thought it was drums, they don’t have hands, a very pretty comic, huge hardcover, Paul should’ve loved that, not recognizing what a map, communicate with my dog, the frisbee section, the knowledge game, what a map means, not recognizing a picture, visual representation of an object, so many questions, what he’s doing in this books, spent some time, starts off the main character as a racist, that was me in the past, the other elephant guys are telling him, a new wave thing, engagement with the ideas, the sweat lodge, they need to, a cultural practice, we got to get your head on straight, a dance ceremony as medicine, dance therapy, bandages and drugs, a real solid engagement with non-western medicine, Badge Of Infamy is a medicine book, the baccy weed is gonna solve all our problems, the drug has actual effects, as used as a medicine, get Tolkien smoking pipes, changes your brain state, we’re not using it properly, the wafer on my tongue, transubstantiation, a dream state, I’m going to break into the rectory and get me some crackers and wine, special penance ceremony, kill things, pretty brutal, go down to earth temporarily, a healing ceremony to prep for transcendence, I am the emissary, I am the light of the world, love one another, he’s space Jesus, milking snakes, a funny phallic scenes, what stays in Vegas, masturbation contests, help all the other humans go through rebirth, galactic faith, an ecstatic state, this is that thing, impose the elephant people’s stuff on the humans, already in a state of grace, The Word For World Is Forest by UKL, Vietnam War, a pugnacious book, in the afterword of the colonization, a quiver full of kids, his blue children, an adopted white (human) kid, the sky people are back, Apocalypse Now (1979), the other way to go, after, goddamn those horrible fat cow people, maybe I’m not right, the same debates, relinquishment, 20 years in Afghanistan, they’ll just not let girls get educated, Eye Of The Monster by Andre Norton, playing a conservative author, a more nuanced view, a more liberal view, in science fiction in general, healing vs. drug abuse, fried up on drugs, A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick, psilocybin, body horror, a liberation for our disabled main protagonist, a joy, a different attitude towards the concept, very palatable, wanna live in Avatar, a fantasy, living in a VR meta, his brain transfer, thinking you can be immortal, downloading your memories, that’s not how it works, Think Like A Dinosaur by James Patrick Kelly, way more engaged with a reality, puddle Kurtz, a thing on the wall feeding you black liquid, much more Alien (1979), only if they have to pee, people are alienated from their own bodies right now, they’re not comfortable in their own skin, the mind-body connection, ceremony connecting, body and mind and spirit, separate vs. connected, Silverberg vs. Cameron, where the horror is, the inside manifesting itself physically, a very solid book, grandmaster award, what is his standout work?, Heinlein, Philip K. Dick, short stories, little things that he’s done, a huge long career, is there any such thing for Silverberg, Born With The Dead, pretends his dead, why they don’t care anymore, sounds great, due to Audible and their evilness, brilliant, he can be amazing, Up The Line, Thorns, a picaresque comic novel, time tourism, a slacker flunky, a time courier, a tour guide for time travelers, have sex with their ancestors and drink a lot, causing a serious paradox, motifs, helix parlours, future drugs, weird connections, light/fun read, also light, Project Pendulum, a lot of fun, futuristic humans, bamboozle them, the quintessential Silverberg: Nightwings, graphic novel, the mouth, Roman Holiday (1953), some audiobook narrator, The Asteroid Stealers, Vampires From Outer Space, Thorns, really good, really dark, really depressing, a psychic vampire, reality tv shows, what authors do too, the short story guy, pretentious, new wave = pretentious, Avatar is just dumb, went on the journey, compared to Andre Norton…, the lack of a map is a feature not a bug, the dreamlike nature of this book, he gets lost, the elephant guys, a theory about the alien’s name, Borgazor, the most beautiful words in the English language: cellar door, that Anglo Saxon, Celtic, less Germanic, a logic to the language to the nameing of the things, an Elf tribe in Tolkien, old guy traveling a landscape of his youthful adventures, This Immortal, Call Me Conrad, [Damnation Alley], now they’re all old, rekindle alliances or hostilities, you see this in so many authors, back to the scene of old battles, the plot of a lot of new wave fiction, just because Jonathan’s old and has had battles, a new new wave writer, attracted to things and not do them themselves, I love Star Wars…, that’s sad, probably never gonna write a westerns, I can like westerns and not make westerns, we can enjoy a whole lot, late 1960s early 1970s, playing on the old pulp stories, less naive and more cynical, relitigate, redefine, Humanoids questions, how did you get into comics, Planet Comics during WWII, how did you get into paperbacks, then I found science fiction fandom, that was a long time ago, since 1969 to now, he thought he was getting old then, I’m an old man now I’m fifty, its taking this time, he exists and he loves the internet, gives the occasional speech he gets yelled at about, Heavy Metal, come out of retirement, famous fantasy novel, Lord Valentine’s Castle, I have more to say, keeping up with all the new books, 90s collabs, regular editorial, had to apologize for offending somebody, the big three magazines, out of retirement so many times, 2015/2016, Lawrence Block has retired several times, here’s an old book I wrote, a habit that’s built in, people like it still, I got this need to write it, it makes me feel something, wasn’t Marion Zimmer Bradley a grandmaster?, so many movies, Isaac Asimov, fixture on late night television, what do you think about speculative fiction, a rational and sand and excellent writer, I never heard of that, hundreds of works, his reputation, series are generally popular, what’s crazy about Silverberg, manic depressive thing, a ton of novels, fallow seasons, he turned down a nomination, compete with one another, Tower Of Glass, he was writing that many books, pretty darned good, Hawksbill Station, very prolific, A Time Of Changes, a J.G. Ballard vibe?, the guy who died of crystal infection, in reflection, the stuck couple, the brooding pit, a Drowned World sort of horror, feels less new wave?, Terence loved all of it, not a very visual person, descriptive passages are less interesting, the audiobook voice, Bronson Pinchot, bad experiences, a pleasure to read, Sailing To Byzantium, Grover Gardner, like and dislike, forced to tone down the performance, they only have gestures, by looking at their eyebrows, sardonic or whatever, a performance that can overwhelm a book, reading Tim Powers, the other kind of narrator, a straight narrator, getting the pauses perfectly, better audiobook taste, from the sitcom, The Bronson Pinchot Project, a weird hobby, 1985, Sixth Column by Robert A. Heinlein, prepare your racists selves, language changed for the book publication (vs. the serialization), City Of Singing Flame by Clark Ashton Smith, Logan’s Run by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson, two dudes, Shakespeare’s Planet by Clifford D. Simak, Invitation To The Game, The Charwoman’s Shadow by Lord Dunsany, A Midsummer’s Tempest by Poul Anderson, the Canadian less shitty Andre Norton, Michael Crichton, Stephen King, Peter Straub, Progeny by Philip K. Dick, A Meeting With Medusa, just a blah book, his pre-post war stuff, 6 hours, do you have a Heinlein problem, sir?, as one should, you’re angry with the man, Farnham’s Freehold, most people are afraid, a special ranting booth, oh my god, this is getting creaky, The Number Of The Beast, the original illustrated version, next Heinlein, everybody wants to be on Starship Troopers, let’s do all the racist ones, winnow the podcast, a completely different interpretation, A Voyage To Sfanomoë, how he got his vocab, he read the dictionary, completely self-taught, one week in the United States, Boy Genius!, George Sterling, no you cannot do that!, his mentor guy, okay father figure, Lovecraft became his Sterling, revering, the opposite of August Derleth, Robert E. Howard, a tie, his terrificness, his ideas are weaker, beauty, Charles Baudelaire is a freak, Les Fleurs Du Mal, Terence put his hand in the mouth and is still two handed, put something in there, we need to talk about your audio quality, plug in some headphones, earbuds are not comfortable for two hours, more active noise cancellation, iPhone is pretty darned good.

Humanoids - Downward To The Earth

Humanoids - Downward To The Earth

Posted by Jesse WillisBecome a Patron!

The SFFaudio Podcast #754 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: Four-Day Planet by H. Beam Piper

The SFFaudio Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #754 – Four-Day Planet by H. Beam Piper – read by Mark Nelson. This is a complete and unabridged reading of the novel (6 hours, 14 minutes minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants include Jesse, Paul Weimer, and Cora Buhlert.

Talked about on today’s show:
Henry Beam Piper, 1961, paired with another Piper, probably serialized?, no, doesn’t need a serial feel, Putnam and Sons, standard Piper spaceship: ball, the hunting of the seamonster, Lone Star Planet, chased by giant steer, more action hunting in this, makes you want to read it, influences, a Jack London novel, Moby Dick, kind of a juvenile, a YA protagonist, not 18 yet, felt younger, felt older, “Tin Tin And The Space Whalers”, Tin Tin at the typewriter, drill down into this book, Tin Tin on Instagram, streamer tech, video and audio recording everything, flashing it to his dad, their planet doesn’t have satellites, only 20,000 people on the planet, stubborn SOBs, occasional miscreant, divide satellites by the number of people on earth, Jesse’s not a math guy, GPS, navigating from the stars and inertial systems, cute surprising moves, on the docks, pulls out a gun, sea-snail, gets poisoned, showcases Piper’s hobby horses, excuses for guns, excuses to smoke, loves his guns, low opinion of police, respect, government forces lumped in with the racketeers, as a group they get no respect, libertarianism is in the mix, propaganda for libertarianism, undercutting that, multiple volunteer fire departments in the same city?, one alarm system, seven small villages, look at the geography of this planet, near antarctica, very rural, ports, no farming, vat meat, vegan meat, under-egged that, limited to the ocean journey, the lifeboat, a Battlestar Galactica episode, Dogget will survive until the air turned to liquid, taught us interesting things, Fritz Leiber’s A Pail Of Air, To Build A Fire by Jack London, The Sea Wolf, Eden among the sealions, not a romantic vacation, thick bark trees, using machine guns to cut down trees, more guns in this scene?, everybody brought their own personal weapons, the meta, a former slaver hiding his identity, a dead woman’s fingers, driving down the price of a natural resource in order to enrich himself, the hazards of monopolism, they wanna lynch, government’s on the case, that’s be nice, not very likely, Israel hunting Nazis, a Federation government, agents, at the general level or admiral level, James Bond, ordinary murderer, bank robber or conartists, enslave a planet, he’s a war criminal, more along the Hitler lines, characters from the Jack Vance Demon Prince novels, a personal mission not a government mission, the Manuel Noriega story, maybe I should run this country, they went after him, they knew he was corrupt, ask Saddam Hussein, why am I the one defending libertarianism to H. Beam Piper?, lynch law is bad, correct moral message, you must go to court, reading books, schools in Florida, supporting public education, the value of a good education, old fashioned, out in 7 months, useless information from chat GPT, good curation of knowledge, critical race theory in math books, banning hijabs, a women only safe space room, wasn’t even allowed to do her internship, a math class, a technique to divide the poors, telling H. Beam Piper his business, going against his own instincts, Kim by Rudyard Kipling, grows up wild, ends up working for the British empire, his Irish father and his good instincts, turn him into a spy, British empire good, Heinlein takes that and says I can do one better, Citizen Of The Galaxy, he has legs at home, gathering information for the Empire, goes a little cynical with them, a revolution is about to start, we’re storming the Bastille today, whoof the rug is pulled out from under him, cooler heads have already been on the case, he’s not as good as Heinlein for this, YA elements, where’s the romance?, the girl who’s going to work for him, doing romance in the 40s and the 50s, not in the cards for our hero Mr. H. Beam Piper, the sister, she’s a girl!, that’s a rough place, these rough people, the dad is busy smoking, doing the job of three people, way below, he’s not doing it as good, we need way more about the ecology of a planet with four days in the year, they can’t eat any of the food, and the food can’t eat them, Larry Niven, catsnake?, for this planet Niven [would be] better, Space Viking, breezier and easier, very simple, space battles, why is this science fiction?, the strongest science fiction idea in here, its the instagram recorder, youtuber streamer, and the hunting of the wax, shielding, a commodity, intense sunlight, analogizes with Moby Dick, whaling was huge, tallow wax and whale oil, how they breed, not to hunt them to extinction, traditional societies, north German Bremen dish made with whale meat, the meat was not the moneymaker, it was the sperm, petroleum, he doesn’t do enough with that, a reporter, friend doesn’t quite do enough, disappears like Ishmael, not a classic for the ages, Little Fuzzy, interesting, not a terrible books, but not special, Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen, the definitive Piper book, Omnilingual, a richer piece, passes the Jesse test, the 20 chapter titles, a cute little nod, obscure author from Scotland: Arthur Conan Doyle, the Javelin, the Pequod, gunpron, monster killing, treason, masks off, a simple story, 180 hour away from sunset, H. Beam Piper with Larry Niven, had he not killed himself, they could’ve been friendly, Robert E. Howard, tapering off, Clark Ashton Smith, ailing parents, kept changing, c’mon you can do this, doesn’t have the fire in the belly anymore, coming into his oats, Jerry Pournelle, sometimes it don’t work, sometimes it do, Oath Of Fealty, Dream Park ain’t a good book, a little silly, pretty good book, the whole Bish thing, a kind of western, quickdraw, Firefly and Serenity (2005), special agent, an H. Beam Piper tv show, our heroes and their dialogue, the empire they were fighting against were flat, the Alliance, insurance company, the Dortmunder, a Donald Westlake character, the reavers, better in prediction than in execution, it had potential, fashionable to criticize, Cora always had her issues, the best episode of Firefly: Objects In Space, a bottle episode, the casting was good, The Witcher tv series, Elric, they both have swords and white hair, hiatus, forgetting to cancel shows, the pilot for the Logan’s Run TV show, the movie in fast forward, the new Logan, an elder council is running things!, they have to make it a series, there’s old people?, old and weird looking, there’s no renewal, Logan and this other chick, they find a car in D.C., an android robot that will help them every episode, a Paul thing, the Planet Of The Apes TV series, about 6 Star Trek episodes, you can’t tell anybody what you saw there, an old circus poster of an ape behind bars, Sky has never been so good again, music videos and cartoons, Dutch people, best TV channel ever, D.C. Fontana was story editor, Harlan Ellison wrote an episode, David Gerrold, George Clayton Johnson, William F. Nolan, Logan’s Run, all on for Odds On, not abridged, a Jesse book, Breakthroughs In Science by Isaac Asimov, in a rabbit, Sixth Column, Tommy Patrick Ryan, Shakespeare’s Planet by Clifford D. Simak, Charwoman’s Shadow a novel by Lord Dunsany, in Spain, dowry, substitute shadow doesn’t grow and shrink, praises by Theodore Sturgeon, I love the book, humour and beauty, E.F. Bleiler found it excellent, tradition of George MacDonald, first science fiction novel, Keeper Of The Isis Light by Monica Hughes, Crisis on Conshelf Ten, political crisis or something, set on the Moon, her stuff is really short, thin volumes, mostly girly and boarding school stuff, kiddie gossip for teens, a series, Invitation To The Game, a horrible situation, it’s odd, fewer women science fiction writers, she put out a lot of YA, solid science fiction book, not having the greatest prose ever, on the pirate website, a real shame, Invitation The Game by Monica Hughes, Lisse and her friends are unemployable after graduation, embrace The Game, narrated by June Carter, abebooks, Scholastic Books, way before Harry Potter, the YA cover look, an affordable edition, the shipping, import them, twice the value of the book for shipping, Ballantine Adult Fantasy, the Internet Archive, a hard science fiction dystopian novel, children go to government schools, social welfare systems, agitating for political reform, many are involved in organized crime, just write science fiction like you mean it, and not too long, 192 pages, from 1990, died in 2003, she was British, Canadian by emigration, 11 novels?, Earthdark, the Arthur C. Clarke moonbus book, Devil On My Back, used headset, hairgel, the price was right, bargain hunter, Jesse’s gonna hug Cora, Angélique books by Anne Golo, proto-bodice rippery, smoky shag rug, nicotine stained wooden rosary, one bloody Mary two bloody Marys, might as well convert, half-equipped, stinky old books, best wishes to the father-in-law, taking parents to hospitals, four hospitals in six weeks, nursing home, and blah, Paul met Cora’s mom, already in pain, not very communicative, karaoke evenings, what went wrong, heart surgery, hip surgery, not a lot going on with her anymore, Worldcon, collapsed at the airport, farm animals, recognizing farm animal, have you ever touched a bird, have you ever touched a cow, where was Paul born?, have your touched a cow, have you touched a bird, a lot of people haven’t, three days old, Jesse’s mom’s photography is awful, very significant hand disability, well done Jesse, you get 9 points, the one who blocked Jesse, cows or goats, not a farm kid, obviously a cow, cow, bull, and calf, a little bull, the relevant pieces, an active farm across the road, the cows next door, one of the cows would run away, Uncle Heine and Aunt Marianna, three sets of grandparents, kids need to do that, in New York city, a farm visit, city kids, look at all the animals, sit on a horse, had to have his balls banded, that makes him a steer so he can be eaten, ox and oxen, most of the meat, you need one bull just like you need one rooster, prairie oysters, rocky mountain oysters, I’d like a weird meat cut please, boy penises are dog chewies, rawhide chewies are penises, product descriptions, pure meat, oxen are commonly castrated, don’t steer us wrong, working animals, riding an ox, horses or camels or bicycles, a monkey riding a dog, riding an elephant, bull-riding doesn’t last very long, pull carts, ploughs, Paul has to game, Over The Edge, work for an embassy, misadventures, get into troubles and have adventures, bye, breakfast is what Jesse is hearing, Odd’s On by Michael Crichton, reuse of Easy Go notes.

HARDCOVER - Four Day Planet by H. Beam Piper

Four Day Planet by H. Beam Piper

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The SFFaudio Podcast #170 – READALONG: The Fountains Of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #170 – Jesse, Tamahome, and Jenny discuss the Brilliance Audio audiobook of The Fountains Of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke.

Talked about on today’s show:
Skyhooks and space elevators, Sri Lanka, “my first space elevator book”, Robert A. Heinlein, Friday, “it feels like a novel”, “the fictional accounting of a real construction project”, history, Colombo, afterwords, sources and acknowledgements, “what a rip-off”, Sigiriya’s Lion Paws Gate, King Kashyapa I, “past, present, and future”, engineering fiction vs. science fiction, Taprobane, Paradise Regained by John Milton, Jo Walton’s review of The Fountains Of Paradise, religion, “Heinlein in a dress”, an idea book, to think interesting Science Fictional thoughts, hard SF, Clarke’s Laws, space probe, a game changer, Gregg Margarite, Shri Jawaharlal Nehru, The Nine Billion Names Of God, Sigmund Freud, growing out of religion?, Thomas Aquinas, symbolic logic, Bertrand Russell, satellites and their uses, unseen benefits to giant engineering projects and science, Sydney Opera House, the Eiffel Tower, Burj Khalifa, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, “this is what we’re meant to do”, the space age, the 1970s, Jenny gets depressed, Terpkristin‘s visit to French Guiana (PICS!), will we have a Chinese moonbase by 2022?, innovation vs. exploration, Jerry O’Neil, good reasons to go to space, we ought to do things that we can do, Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey, the daily life challenges of a space born population, The Island Worlds by Eric Kotani and John Maddox Roberts, the probe is a person, The Geek’s Guide To The Galaxy #64: John Scalzi, (Star Trek holds us back), “the God Particle”, “you’re going to die soon”, can we empathize with a character that isn’t a human being?, a complimentary cosmonaut, 2001: A Space Odyssey, one day in Jerusalem, the transhuman future in the end of The Fountains Of Paradise, Starglider/Starholme, a well developed solar society, the Wikipedia entry for The Fountains Of Paradise, The Last Theorem, The City And The Stars, a non-off putting post-human story, Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, Ted Chiang, Charles Stross, sequels and science, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Alastair Reynolds, Kim Stanley Robinson, in SF ideas build can on one another whereas others books are more parasitizing upon those ideas, why does it have to be a new book?, ‘these were the stepping stones to today’, a balance of both a good story and good ideas, William Gibson, Embassytown by China Miéville, The City And The City, “garbage, garbage, garbage”, 2312, Playboy’s serialization of The Fountains Of Paradise, Buckminster Fuller, why did Sir Arthur C. Clarke live in Sri Lanka?, Milton is literature, Dante’s Inferno, Lucifer’s fall from heaven, Brilliance Audio, A Fall Of Moondust by Arthur C. Clarke, BBC Radio dramatization of A Fall Of Moondust, Crisis On Conshelf Ten by Monica Hughes, “best book ever”, The Abyss, Tom Swift, Aquaman vs. The Sub-Mariner, Blue Remembered Earth by Alastair Reynolds, The Prefect, Ray Of Light by Brad Torgeson, “Alien sun mirror block deepwater living daughter Glimmer Club surface discovery.”, the Mars tangent, Phobos and Deimos, John Scalzi, “I liked that he didn’t explain it.”, “we don’t build em that way”, “I want it to be hard”, Phobos interference would be a feature not a bug, “wiggle the thread”, atmospheric density and windspeed, carbon nano-tubes vs. buckminsterfullerene, Roald Dahl, Charlie And The Great Glass Elevator, horror, The BFG, Jack McDevitt, a waking dream, in the shadow of Vesuvius, the Prime Directive, Doctor Who, Fantasy vs. Science Fiction, Inferno (Doctor Who episode), Sliders, Doorways by George R.R. Martin, Tom Baker.

BRILLIANCE AUDIO - The Fountains Of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke

Caedmon - Arthur C. Clarke reads Fountains Of Paradise

Del Rey paperback - The Fountains Of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke

Playboy, January 1979 - The Fountains Of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke - illustration by Ignacio Gomez

Playboy, February 1979 - The Fountains Of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke - illustration by Ignacio Gomez

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #008

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #008 – here there be podcasts – we’ve adorned ourselves in too much gold, now we can’t move! So join us on our 8th show, where we’re always etymologically correct.

Scott: Oh ya right. I just forgot something man. Uh, before we dock, I think we ought to discuss the bonus situation.

Jesse: Right.

Scott: We think… we think we deserve full shares.

Jesse: Right.

Scott: Pass the cornbread.

Topics discussed include:
42Blips.com, METAtropolis, Jay Lake, John Scalzi, Elizabeth Bear, Tobias Buckell, Karl Schroeder, Mr. Spaceship, Philip K. Dick, Stefan Rudnicki, Wonder Audio, Anne McCaffrey, The Ship Who Sang, Michael Hogan, Battlestar Galactica, 18th Century Spain, Cascadia (Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, and sometimes Idaho), Detroit, “Turking”, The Turk (the chess playing automaton), alternative economy, Kandyse McClure, infodump, shared world, Brandon Sanderson, hard fantasy, Elantris, Larry Niven, The Magic Goes Away, manna, unicorns, dragons, Dungeons & Dragons, Mistborn, Robert Jordan, The Wheel Of Time, Writing Excuses Podcast, Howard Tayler, SchlockMercenary.com, Dan Wells, The Dark Knight, Aural Noir, The New Adventures Of Mike Hammer, Stacy Keach, Mike Hammer, Full Cast Audio, Red Planet, Robert A. Heinlein, Bruce Coville, Mars, Heinlein’s Future History sequence, the Red Planet TV miniseries, Princess Academy, Shannon Hale, Blackstone Audio, The Collected Stories Of Philip K. Dick Volume 1, and Volume 2, Inferno by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, David Farland, Runelords, Collected Public Domain Works Of H.P. Lovecraft, LibriVox.org, October, Ray Bradbury, “Autumn ennui”, AUTHOR PAGES, LEIGH BRACKETT, FREDERIC BROWN, JAMES PATRICK KELLY, BBC7, RadioArchive.cc, Beam Me Up Podcast, MACK REYNOLDS, Robert Sheckley, Religulous, Constantine’s Sword, The Ultimate Encyclopedia Of Science Fiction: The Definitive illustrated Guide edited by David Pringle, space opera, planetary romance, Julie D., Forgotten Classics podcast, The Wonder Stick, time travel, alien intrusions, metal powers, Slan, The Demolished Man, comedic SF, aliens, artificial intelligence, “cosmic collisions”, Deep Impact, cyborgs, dinosaurs, the dying Earth, Gene Wolfe, elixir of life, immortality, Roger Zelazny, Robert Silverberg, genetic engineering, nuclear war, overpopulation, parallel worlds, robots, androids, Joanna Russ, Ben Bova, space travel, suspended animation, teleportation, transcendence = the Singularity ?, Childhood’s End, Arthur C. Clarke, religion, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Monica Hughes, Crisis On Conshelf Ten, Hard SF, cyberpunk, psychology, New Wave, lost races, military SF, science fantasy, shared worlds, steampunk.

Posted by Jesse Willis