Reading, Short And Deep #451
Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss Moon Dog by Arthur C. Clarke
Here’s a link to the story |PDF|.
The Unveiling was first published in Galaxy, April 1962.
Posted by Scott D. Danielson Become a Patron!
Reading, Short And Deep #451
Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss Moon Dog by Arthur C. Clarke
Here’s a link to the story |PDF|.
The Unveiling was first published in Galaxy, April 1962.
Posted by Scott D. Danielson Become a Patron!
The SFFaudio Podcast #786 – The Radium Pool by Ed Earl Repp, read by Thomas Copeland (for LibriVox). This is a complete and unabridged reading of the story (2 hours 43 minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants in the discussion include Jesse, Maissa Bessada, Will Emmons, and Terence Blake
Talked about on today’s show:
in Earth language, sorry everybody, Sophie Wenzell Ellis, another radium filled story, avoid radium, taking a long time to get started, WHAT!, so many explicitly catery characters, outer narrator, professor who explains things, meet a guy who who is looking for another professor, another professor, infodumper, chapter 9 tells us despite the counter evidence, that makes sense, me too I agree this story makes a lot of sense, if H. Rider Haggard were boring, Inception, oh yeah, that was a thing, awkward framing, August and September 1929, The Moon Pool by A. Merritt, an early popular science fiction story, sequels, sorry, cool cover with a lady in yellow, old science fiction, some shitty science fiction out there, completely unfuckin scientific, despite the gestures, Jovians from Jove, lovesick guy with a gun, getting the better, cheated by using telepathy, tentacles, a scientific fact, other than it’s a planet, a gesture at the distance, whatever, this story is so fuckin bad, Mars has already been done, there are good stories set on jupiter, Call Me Joe by Poul Anderson, The Radium Poul, Lester Del Rey, good ideas, not being so long-winded about it, Maissa speaks for Will, the same as Avatar, grow a Jovian, as in the original Avatar, a telepathic link, guy just lives in the new body, a centaur with a big axe, Poul Anderson likes vikings, downloading yourself into an avatar in reality, what Justin Trudeau is trying to do, become a leader of the people, the first 2 Avatar movies, waiting til we are ready for it, why they’re all the same, he’s good at what he does, Titanic (1997) is his worst movie, a long and a prequel for Avatar 3, do your own serialization, might as well just talk about Avatar, Jake Sully is fundamentally untransformed by becoming an indigenous leader, a football coach from Cincinnati, for the Navii that’s exotic, why he’s not so boring to them, what’s really happening in Avatar: the American audience inserts themselves into Jake Sully and downloads themselves into the movie during the running time of the movie, six years old and think its cool, he’s not a character you aspire to be, he is you, no qualities, the most frequent expression, the bad guy in the first one, too bad they brought him back, there’s a reason we don’t do a movie podcast, most movies aren’t very deep, playing with the water theme, The Abyss, a cool Cold Equations scene, you need to drown in order for us to live, with a solution, the aliens thing at the end, crazy guy with a nuke is enough, better than Terminator 2, radioactivity coming into its own, radium was touted by doctors and scientists, rejuvenation, it kills cancer, it killed all those women, Marie Curie, watches are time and immortal, some sort of high before you die, unobtanium, when radium is in abundance it has other qualities, scaling, a big pool full, also power your spaceships, homeopathic doses of radium, the opposite, it can eat off your fingers, burn the end of the barrel of your gun, garbage story, something very bad, we’ve all done bad, a humiliation ritual to cleanse, something special about it, from the period it is, a taste of 1929 is very refreshing, the way we think, Jules Verne, hollow earth fantasy, four levels of characters to explain one muscular action, too space-opera in fashion, E.E. Doc Smith, Triplanetary, 1934, the swing of the pendulum, Creatures Of The Light by Sophie Wenzel Ellis, Antarctica, Death Valley, you can’t stand being their too long, lack of research, infodumps, guys feelings, partners for a long time, alien shows up, I turned your girlfriend into my throne lady, a Sleeping Beauty moment, I can throw words at pages, diverges, the peridocity?, Astounding, Science Wonder Stories, more science, throw everything into this pot, king of the university, robot sentry and a wagon and a gun, editor at the journalist desk, we’re not reading the newspaper report, chapter 9, somehow I found it incredibly plausible, pad his expense account, this is not the newspaper report, another step out, censored at the end, plausible we can go to Jupiter, first they’re going to have to find some more radium that wasn’t drained away, a lot of Doctor Who, a serial, Enlightenment, the fifth Doctor, Peter Davison, companion pets, materializes on a ship at sea, Edwardian era sailing vessel, all the officers have telepathy, Turlough and Teegan and the Doctor are thinking, they’re racing in space, solar sail race, crewed by humans, the grog doesn’t work, the aliens who look like humans, so bored, there’s stuff here, cheating, treating the humans like pets, learned a word: ephemerals, word in back pocket, being bored and nothing to do, you can’t waste your time because you have to live forever, three score years and ten, in June Terence will be 70, somebody becoming immortal, mine shit, lord it over, big long speech at him, quite taken with that girl, best possible tautological name: Alley Lane, Jimmy Olsen, just plain ordinary folks with superhuman friends, Spider-Man, earnest reporter who’s on the beat, the twist is he’s reporting on himself, here’s a market for stories about pools, suckered in, pretty girl, not as green as expected, 40 years in the desert, hoping to meet her, got a bad rep, something super-redeeming, this doesn’t have that much, not as tedious as it should be given how it doesn’t pay off, it’s naive, not meta-level at all, several layers of explanatory sauce, a magic formula, I have to put the ingredient of scientific realism in, that way nobody can say, radium parfait, Mimic by Donald A. Wollheim, film’s not great, the problem with the film is just jump scares and has to fill two hours,
“the original MIMIC, the 1942 story by Donald A. Wollheim, is abt as close to perfect a science fiction story as you can find
1. HEAVY EARLY INFODUMP✔️
2. PAYOFF WITH A TWIST BASED ON INFODUMP✔️
3. 4PGS LONG✔️MIMIC is highly suggestive. leaves u in awe. leaves u with ideas.
the movie takes 1 hour and 45 minutes – the story takes less than 9 minutes to read with your eyes, 13 minutes 34 seconds to read with your mouth
the movie takes 1 hour and 45 minutes – the story takes less than 9 minutes to read with your eyes, 13 minutes 34 seconds to read with your mouth”
stars some lady, Mira Sorvino, Charles S. Dutton, young Josh Brolin, Thanos, Cable, a fun actor, Jeremy Northam, Charles S. Dutton is a cop, buy food from local street vendor, now in the present, killed in his apartment, a metal box, the window is open, not actually a human, literally an insect that looks like a human, his trenchcoat is a carapace, some other animal mimicking another animal, swarm of its babies, chimney suddenly transforms into a predator, there are creatures out there that mimic humans, the awesome infodump, paid off, takes it one step farther, what if…, backstory about cockroaches spreading a COVID-like disease, Guillermo Del Toro, tweeting about Microcosmic God being in the public domain, neoterics, capitalism trying to happen, steal his ingeniousness, Theodore Sturgeon’s great classic, classic mad scientist buys and island and does Edison work all day, make a race of creatures do the work for me, tiny people, meth and probably radium or whatever, an evil god, materials and compounds and alloys, he steals their patents, that guy’s got too much power, same techniques, a nested idea of the story of Edison as a mad scientist creator, it’s also us, we need to build cave walls and sunscreen and french fries in order to survive, Blood Music by Greg Bear, usually he’s a horrible writer, a collection, Wind From A Burning Woman, who’s talking, what’s going on?, children born with mutated organs, wasteage, incredibly intelligent, takes most of the novel, slow with lots of information dumps, Vitals, you’re not good, had he died tragically it would have been must better for him, dead to Jesse, Darwin’s Radio, so slow, even the novel is good, the grey goo problem, make a machine that can make stuff automatically on an atomic level, the paperclip problem, the Grogu problem, cute animals from twitter, should I be sending this?, some sort of deermouse with peglegs eating lettuce, quite relevant, somehow enhanced, here’s a baby muskox eating some lettuce, incredibly racist, two racisms in a row, grappling with the king of the Jovians, a white beast, mental leap to Octavia Butler’s Dawn, tentacles, creepy crawly little tendrils, seem ugly to the explorers, arrogant and condescending, making shit up and throwing it on the page, having characters tell each other its very plausible, the radium powered plausibility machine, drink the pool, how dare you do this to a white man, something about a ‘spic, completely unnerves, Sands, you look like a ghost, you don’t look like a white man yourself, by jingle, second childhood, not the opening character, outback hicks who are racist, I’m second in charge of everything, I could destroy you with a wiggle of my tentacle, then I give a big long speech about how I like your girlfriend, and I keep her on this throne for reasons, and I’m going to take her back to my planet, for reasons, with her dad!, and you notice your gun doesn’t doing anything to me, well that won’t stop you from shooting me later six times in the head and that will stop me, I’m telepathic but I thought you were dead, I hit my wordcount, accepting a lot of shit, as an artifact it is a valuable lesson, understand the progress and changes, there’s some shitty stories too, the S effect, Nerves by Lester Del Rey, revealing atomic secrets, this story doesn’t reveal anything about anything, if this story came out today, would not be popular, the attack vector, it’s dangerous for children because they’re going to eat radium, manipulate the watch, a darkroom to show you that it worked, radium in its pure state, tritium glows green?, is there a dye?, radioactive isotope of hydrogen, luminous because of the alpha particles, phosphorous, most volatile, little bit of green maybe, copper, if you had it in a pool, you experienced the radium pool, no research done, fake fainted a lot, Freud started treating hysterical patients, hysteria was more common, one explanation, so oppressed, rebellious of deviant feelings through their bodies, listened to women, more narcissism, no real feelings, a social change, the evolution of the symptoms, how tight their corset was, special radium ribbed corset, keep your shape, as much as she wanted, marriage ceremony right now, have you forgot I’m a pastor?, the opposite of Chekhov’s gun, Munchausen’s threads, ends suddenly when Alexander the great comes in and chops it off, why should she faint?, telepathically knocked out, they don’t eat anymore, whatever, if you’re immortal, they ate all the radium on Jupiter, the story is stupid, in V they want our water, Michael Ironside, a Dutch historical story about occupation by Nazis, we call the the Visitors, V for Victory, V for Vendetta, the aliens that look just like us, they have to wear sunglasses, sex with the lizard man, lizard baby, the resistance against them, the Nazi party, Nazi occupation of Europe with aliens that were lizardmen, Alien Nation, the show was amazing, oppressed migrants, a movie with James Cann, hardboiled cop buddy movie with an alien partner, the human is racist against the aliens, mild mannered, strange culture, alien lady with no head, they solve murders involving the alien, manufactured by other aliens, the masters are not their, a shipwreck with 100,000 aliens, Fox show in the early 1990s, contemporary with Star Trek The Next Generation, is it weird to have a guy sleep with your wife, dating one of them, 1 full season and then 6 movies, a film first, parallel with, archive.org or youtube, it helps to be able to see things, the 80s is a weird time, women in the work place sort of stuff, Murphy Brown, ten seasons, presidential debate, there’s nothing going here, a different time, weird period of time, of this terrible story, not everything in the past is good, the Olemas sequel, why would I hurt them like this?, The Ones Who Stay And Fight by N.K. Jemisin, condescending and fascistic, goes off into an alley, quote mine it, an alternative universe, send information between alternate universes, observing our universe, our TV shows, a very American world, one of Jesse’s big objections, horrific videos of people being bombed to death, you condescending lady, the Heinlein solution, if you’ve been infected by observing our earth, I know what mis-mal-disinformation, you’re not equipped, its my burden, Ursula K. Le Guin, maybe she’s wonderful, mummy knows best condescension, mommy knows the right people to drop the bombs on, it just takes a few good surgical strikes on what people know, everybody Eloi, one Morlock, the worst treated proletarian, magically, more politically correct, our horrible racist evil world’s ideas, the CIA and the FBI, the secret judges and jury, killing people with the wrong ideas, apologize and sit still, it won the Hugo?, wow powerful story, am I offering good solutions for humanity, patting myself on the back, given what’s happening in Palestine right now, double down, the holy shit people are protesting, 500,000 people in London walking together can’t stop it, the price of being on the wrong team, let’s make a long list, always an excuse to drop bombs and kill people, object to the trolley problem I have to make a choice where the trolley goes, some people are not going to accept it, the response, a response to a false Omelas, a straw-man of Omelas, very much a Bartleby, The Scrivener, grit in the system, taking the metaphor literally, I’m better than Le Guin, sanctioning Biden sending arms and ammunition, I’m going to give you a condescending lecture, a movie that’s an antidote to all of this, Dream-Speaker (1977) TV movie, Cam Hubert, Angry 11 year old orphan Ian Tracey burns down his school, meets an Indian shaman and his mute companion, the authorities find out, blonde white boy, reform school, he’s hung himself, cut back to the Indian and his mute companion, please place me in a tree as was traditionally was done, school is a horror, institutions, it just is a horror, asking kids why they set things on fire, what am I supposed to do with this, residential schools, doing pretty well with their broken family out in the forest, an instinct in people to try to solve problems, cogs to be solved in problems, no alcohol should be imbibed, you think you’re fighting for something good, is there a possibility that you’re wrong, arrogance, interesting, more artistic trolley problem story, another objection, 3829, 1200 and something for Omelas, a lot to prove?, flourishing details, random paragraph, wear wings too, some are invisible, forbid the emulation of beasts, all honored, all sounds very nice, the triggering word is honoured, honouring her feelings, don’t honour feelings, not something to be venerated, kids don’t have the experience you have, couch it in another way, not the right way to frame it, stupid feelings, that was a silly thing to feel, you can wear as many wings as you want, we can still be friends, you need to be destroyed, targeted at race, 2018 and still talking about race all the time, racism exists, ingrained in a racist society, the nadir is the lowest, pinnacle, the worst kinda racism period, look at this huge problem and what caused it?, the kenosis, self emptying, on an ordinary level, maybe one day I will, grope around in the dark, starting with the idea that I don’t know, a big part of the solution, anti-kenosis, infodumping, solution dumping, moral dumping, best done through parable, that’s not a parable, oh my little sweetie, it’s okay that mommy runs drone programs, you’ve got something wrong with your car, sledgehammer, gets rid of the problem by getting rid of the people saying the problem, just delete youtube and twitter channels, mute it, give a warning, violence by having a video, goodreads, Omelas is pornography?, this is about abortion!, offended her kid was told to read, in her school English class, what ever happened, spirit and refreshment, she may not like it, millions of murdered babies, billions of dollars the abortion industry…, pornographic literature, demonic desensitization of our young people, the punishment of a child, about capitalism, if she was standing in line at the grocery store, Peel District School Board, emptied everything pre-2008, unfathomable, somebody talking about the red scare, number of professors fired for being communists, anti-woke (not censoring), a kind of hysteria that’s going on now, writers telling other writers you don’t need to read anything past 10 years ago, because other better writers, and token John Scalzi, you don’t need to read a Lovecraft story, lies you’re telling yourself, trust me the homework’s not worth doing, school library is a place to hide in the school, even in prison they have books, prison book programs, escape the horrors they’re locked in, a bulldozing non-thinking tactic, super-retarded, those people shouldn’t have those jobs, in favour of humans doing ok, because they’re ignorant fucks, mommy or daddy knows best, mommy vs. daddy, daddy’s meaner than mommy in the stereotype, oh sweetie, condescending like I got a boo-boo, old fashioned radium pool drinking black pilled anarchist with tendril face, giving lectures to professors, trolling me, a very bad story, it had a nice cover, produced, not much meat on these bones of the story, what did I do to my friends, not very deep, Thomas Copeland’s narration, university professor in English, his recordings of Paradise Lost, his productions, long stuff, Orlando, Furioso, Jerusalem Delivered, a classical education, unjustly forgotten science fiction, worthwhile, rock bottom, we’ve fasted and we’ve prayed, skeletons hanging on the wall, Lowdown Road by Scott Von Doviak, The Terminal Man by Michael Crichton, watch his movies, an ancestor to cyberpunk, science fiction-ish, watch The Andromeda Strain, good science fiction, race-against-the-clock, he knows his shit, Gilgamesh the King by Robert Silverberg, The Sword Of Welleran by Lord Dunsany, on the other side of the state, find the length, his novels are a little longer, he’s fun, fun and short, Hobbits!, Marimna, a dream story, the kings of all the countries, a cute story with beautiful description that he subverts somehow, Lord Dunsany’s in a restaurant, crazy man runs into the restaurant, The Hashish Eater, a doesn’t think about race at all Lovecraft, whimsy, entertainment for toffs, cozy, even when dishing out, quite cozy, In A Dim Room, a ghost story, a tiger in India, all the subsequent fracas is on Jorkens, very palate cleansing sort of reading, half-sold, Through The Gates Of The Silver Key by H.P. Lovecraft and E. Hoffman Price, The Weirwoods by Thomas Burnett Swann, reactive and doesn’t pull his punches, a sparky conversation, Arkansas, Kentucky, another Kentucky, mountains and hillpeople, reputation for being backwards, very foreward thinking, Sirius by Olaf Stapledon, smart dog book, they all want to get kisses instead of doing podcasts, The Cave Girl, no bad books, just less good books, a good way to start the year, The World That Couldn’t Be by Clifford D. Simak AND The Worlds Of If by Stanley G. Weinbaum, a double good show, the titles, inspired a magazine, kinda like an ACE DOUBLE, chocolate and peanut butter, that will be the homework for the podcast, draw a straight line from, modalized titles, Return From The Stars by Stanislaw Lem, Dark Carnivals: Modern Horror And The Origins Of American Empire by W. Scott Poole, strongly suggested, nuke Nice, take hostages, political experts, political views, The Devil’s Elixirs by E.T.A. Hoffmann, Matthew Gregory Lewis’ The Monk, minor capuchin, said by scholars, sort of a pioneer of a lot of interesting stuff, Poe ripped him off, 200 year old novel, Confessions Of An English Opium Eater by Thomas De Quincey, Drug Of Choice, At Time Of Changes, with beautiful art, mentioned in a Lovecraft story, interleaved the art, of things that are hot, 41,000 views over 11 years, 5 hours, comments on this video, transformed my life!, all addicts?, this is really interesting, learned more about drugs by not taking them, read it 50 years ago, well written, hallucinatory style, not modernist prose, from the era of the Romantics, 1821, here’s what I found, no image remains, the pains of opium, a BBC In Our Time, still a good show, podcast, did we miss anything?, parodied in Elder Scrolls, Morrowind, Scottish opium eater’s POV, Mount Analogue by René Daumal, the surrealists really loved it, symbolically authentic non-euclidean adventures in mountain climbing, treated in a science fiction way, famously finished on a comma, an audio comma, producing a short film festival, have lunch, commune, participation, fear to recommend, that would be homework, trick-or-treaters, not a light to turn on to summon them, never big in france, society is going to hell, can’t wear masks and demand candy?, protestors, invite them in, makes Jesse cynical, she’s popular, take it at face value, a good reply to Le Guin, way worse ideas, a big answer rather than posing a question, very American and not very universal, take it to Australia, right to be distressed, James Wallace Harris’ review, fairly bland takes, very clear writer, not a radical, doesn’t have strong opinions, angry ripostes, that’s sad, Lester Del Rey is a bad writer and great writer, Greg Bear is a great writer and a terrible writer, banger after banger, filling my brain with interesting stuff, is this the same character as the one on the previous page?, so good at sparky ideas, full of anger, go on to write Halo novels, so horrible despite the good ideas, despite the fact that Blood Music is great, he didn’t ruin it, Asimov ruined his stuff with Silverberg, married Poul Anderson’s daughter, fairly litigious about estate shit, nude pics of her cosplaying of Dejah Thoris or Red Sonja, Karen Anderson, 85 now!, temporary and long term, just recent stuff, Hardfought, great!, an old telephone operator switchboard, 10 hours on youtube, from Recorded Books, fake audiobooks, that’s not a human, Bears Discover Fire by Terry Bisson, the idea yes, cozy American, marshmallows around the fire, they don’t need fire, look manually, read with your mouth, creates an image, read with fingers, counting on your fingers, precise title, Frederik Pohl, Luke Burrage has mentioned it, an essay, Consumership by Margret St. Clair, Meem, kind of light, a lot of good worldbuilding for no reason, Three Worlds Of Futurity, A History Of Science Fiction Without Holes, The Man Who Sold Rope To The Gnoles, the title, take an ordinary expression and interpret it literally, one of the big secrets of science fiction, he knows diddly squat about science, there’s a Bevatron, even if he’s not New Wave, that forces you to be in a scientific background, go one step further, the whole and your life that way, that’s Philip K. Dick, a pure case of science fiction, being able to solve things, somebody tried, wanna use this for the cover of your book?, seven minute stories, need to be inspired by something, this is a really good story, Jesse, sent it to Eric, an excellent little story, pioneer uplift stories, build a robot and marry her in your basement stories, why everything is working, weird, and arrogant, The Basket by Jesse, this is a very good story, why shouldn’t you do a show on it?, lead the dance, maybe it is a great idea, not having other authors on to talk about their own work, what’s there to discuss, brings stuff out, not Dickian enough, The Exegesis, but what if, where’s that goddamn novel?, put on a different hats, story about hats and baskets, this picture is a story, how writing techniques work, The Man In The High Castle with the I, Ching, what’s the penalty if they don’t, get their grammar fixed, students play the game, boys love competition, they think it’s treat, Isaac Asimov’s Super Quiz, Bruce Jenner will be in there, pick a card, get to keep the card, aka the smartest person in the room, defeated their brother or this other kid in the room, that’s how kid brains are actually, busywork, makework, indoctrinated into school horror, sometimes it’s super-hilarious, who got up?, Bobina, young kids who need, could do anything, the program was more and more edulcorated, putting sugar in, the final exam, we’ve removed 1 result from this page, the only result has been censored by a copyright claim, medieval latin, India Love, the pornstar’s onlyfans, Instagram, allegedly infringing boobzone, a sex move, very rapidly, exam copies, straight-away, count as correct even when it wasn’t, very hard to get bad marks in English on the exam, special methods, minimum knowledge, some very short stories, half page stories, three minute videos, a minute and half, I’m against school, I’ve failed my life, I’m a school teacher!, that’s why we don’t like it, egodeath, killing your conformist self, the whole literal, Edward D. Hoch, the most delicious sin, the ancient sin, what is this sin?, mummifying himself, the story is profound because I don’t know what it means, suicide, this Karl Jung quotes, the one is the shadow of the other, seems interesting, psychological types, the four functions, the rival psychologists, Alfred Adler, Friedrich Nietzsche, like that Luther show, beyond Jung, Elmer Gantry audio, I could grow to love me, she’s a lot like the characters in The Fountainhead, a dominatrix, real love has all sorts of elements, I like reading his stuff, sharing his works, deeply flawed novels, dreading his phonecalls, shitty love, purified form of love, I don’t want to have power over you, hence the job of parent, more to make you think, a schema, will to power is not power over others except in its lower forms, to will it over and over again, because it has the name attached and picture, too guru, an all or nothing sort of thing, very ultimatumy, not even true for Jung, his alchemical phase, tortures and crucifixions, weird hermaphroditic result at the end, it has the shadow in there, a sentence, is that true?, this sounds interesting, makes sparks start flying, Omelas makes sparks go, you’re a monster, am I supposed to think you’re a monster?, a feel good libertalia, she’s tough love, I kill you if you think the wrong thing, maybe they read it and say you are so evil in this story, Beggars In Spain, yes, I’m a slan, the Hillary Clinton mentality, the most qualified person in history, whip me harder, mom, hence Trump, he has the right enemies, the joker card, a card working under cover for another card, he only works for him, all about him, the existence of billionaires, not a deep man, not my first choice, capitalism creates egomaniacs, one is an honest egomaniac, why this Jung stuff is so interesting today, all shadow projection, this Cirsova guy (Alex P.), we go back and forth, his critiques are pretty good, Paul has a problem with him, integrated into the microcosm, he’s on a team, reacting what’s going on in Israel and Palestine right now, same story as Ukraine but more heated, The Jimmy Shore Show covered Ryan Long’s skit, it would be really convenient to be a coma right now, at the end they’re dead, the reason the left hates Nazis so much, because they killed 27 million communists, pretty sure she’s not, see something they don’t like inside themselves, just trying to hate that person, poor vocabulary, Justin Trudeau, literally calling people to Nazis and then giving a standing ovation to a guy who worked for Adolph Hitler, there’s Nazis in Russia, what Putin is saying: we’ve got to root out the Nazis, they are definitely on the Nazi team given the Nazi imagery, totenkopf is one thing, dumped the imagery but kept the guys, kept the unity and the symbols and dumped the Jew hatred, nothing political on twitter at all, good for jokes, for links, get to meet people that way, either hyper-religious and autistic or mentally ill, I never see that, might be a listener to the podcast too, Roof Bears, weird people to get new insight into the world from, most of the time no feedback, one of them will bring good reaction, for maybe 10 years Jesse’s been poking Wayne June, what ancient wisdom was ruthlessly torn from the sacred archives?, are they fit?, what twitter is good for, poked Jonathan, a great sense of humour, ok robot, he’s very very dry, too dry, piss off?, hard to do tone, his communication system is too different, The Wall (1982), big long music video, Roger Waters words, politics, he gets stuff wrong, a great attitude, love Dawn Of The Dead (1978), it needs to be seen by political people, responds by becoming a fascist, The Quiet Earth (1985), Jesse is not a music guy, must be missing something, Wagner’s good, philosophy, science fiction, nothing, Tangerine Dream, music over the end credits, a beat in a scene where you get a montage, that’s something you like, we don’t need no education, political speeches, active politically, 1979, 1982 in the cinema, wife to be, Blade Runner (1982), The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), El Topo (1970), acid western, Jodorowsky’s Dune (2013), this new Dune movie, dumbing it down, what they did to Jessica, can’t stop weeping openly, we’re not allowed to have narration or voice overs, one-dimensional, like a Cliff’s Notes, multidimensional, the TV adaption, why Lynch’s Dune is reviled, a book medium, people decoding each other, even Heinlein, The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress has some action and some visuals, the martian one, Stranger In A Strange Land, of his adult novels, Dune is better than Stranger In A Strange Land, you need the ideas, you need the doubt, you need the multidimensional, different grids, good science fiction in writing, you need a demanding film, how much Blade Runner is able to extract from the novel, Mercerism, the owl, that’s enough, the dove, he’s a video guy doing a video medium, a little bit of this book, no fake police station, I want more life, fucker, the elevator scene, the eye scene, Gaff, a real idea movie, little stick man, a robot and robot love story, why the sequel is a failure, here’s the bad guy for the next movie, pretty good for being what it is, Ridley Scott has dumbed himself down, we didn’t need Harrison Ford, children and garbage, the political woman, we all whole through that, very N.K. Jemisiny, film editing, The Matrix (1999), took everything out about Zion out as irrelevant, take away the battery scene, The Thirteenth Floor (1999), eXistenZ (1999), David Cronenberg, he can’t help his fetish, bodies, opening them up and getting weird, Barry Convex, tripping over his own fetishes, kinda gross, long live the new flesh, even The Fly (1986), Crash (1996), vagina surgeon twins, Dead Ringers (1988), lingering over body trauma, reaching into his belly and inserting videotape, Lovecraftian, Videodrome (1983), with some judicious editing, The Electric Ant, he likes boobs, mainstream fetish, fit them in regularly, they don’t rot or explode or melt, very William Burroughs, with RoboCop guy, Peter Weller, Naked Lunch (1991), like a Cohen brothers movie with Cronenberg added, non-intellectual class, this is basically a film about cockroaches, Brazil (1985) a similar movie with political resonance, comedic riposte to Nineteen Eighty Four, the state we’re in right now, kids don’t get to mine back movies, old movies, almost impossible to find anything old on streaming services, the Orson Wells movie with the sled, people who enjoy making movies, Citizen Kane (1941), William Randolph Hearst, stuck with the dross, unwatchable, Oppenheimer (2023), Barbie (2023) by other means, a big ad for that, very meta, socially critical, unless Red Letter Media covers it, seeing this as a science fiction film, Tenet (2020), paradoxes, does the universe re-arrange itself, you’ve seen it played through hundreds of times, nonetheless, really clear, Goddard movies, traffic going by, Robert Goddard made movies?, Breakthroughs In Science by Isaac Asimov, lots of stuff in common between his fiction and popularizing history and science, the Roman Empire and the Roman Republic, see Foundation in a new light, figuring out the worth of things like that, don’t read anything since 2008, throw dice for the Hugo finalists, unfortunate, not in the microcosm, when some of the Hugos made sense, read science fiction all alone, starved for good books, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Franz Kafka, fan clubs, media people, like dressing up, they found their people, a little like university, you’re going to have a lot more interaction with people who like books, just enough true, Greg Bear was there, Harlan Ellison, Connie Willis, Robert Silverberg, Larry Niven falling asleep, the panels were like very weak shit podcasts, so many names mentioned, going through the list of all the names mentioned, here’s a long list of reasons why SFFaudio Podcast hasn’t won a Hugo, that’s exactly what it is, read a trilogy, three years too late, very time based cheerleading, we can still talk about an old book and be happy about it, a cheerleading squad for people in our niche, mostly not good, mostly very fluff, that show is so fucking long, goes hours and hours, Luke Burrage did an exercise, focuses on new books, some fantasy stuff, Alzabo Soup podcast, the Gene Wolfe Literary Podcast, The Fifth Head Of Cerberus, made it real enough to plunge into the stories, Marooned On Mars podcast, novel by novel, Kim Stanley Robinson, the other podcasts who follow new writers, some of them are good, somebody else’s job to read it for Jesse, that 1812 book, kicked around for 200 years, probably something to it, Hayy Ibn Yaqdhan by Ibn Tufail, two ibns, more intelligent than us, how dare it!, a good phrase, a Sufi scholar, re-written in the first person, Robinson Ibn Tufoe, in A Time Of Changes, without language you can’t get access to reality, it was good, reading all Silverberg is a life, Scott Miller’s Lost Sci-Fi Podcast, The Thing Behind Hell’s Door by Robert Silverberg, inside out world, a really good source, his enthusiasm, famous authors and some obscure thing, some obscure science fiction author we’ve, Watchbird by Robert Sheckely, going Sheckley crazy, shitty Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett humour, Sheckley was there first and better, a more diverse range, a lot like Philip K. Dick a little more sane maybe, R.A. Lafferty and John Sladek, Harry Harrison, The Stainless Steel Rat, just having fun, Bill The Galactic Hero, the narrator who did the whole series for Brilliance, what’s going on on facebook, heterosexual man got nude pictures from a teen girl, he was a good narrator, maybe he broke a law, Phil Gigante, Commentary, Rusty Rockets, Russell Brand, they took his monetization away, they should promote cancelling people, so very public, keeping him on there is pure profit that week, almost 5 hours.
Posted by Jesse Willis
The SFFaudio Podcast #763 – The City Of The Singing Flame by Clark Ashton Smith, read by Tommy Patrick Ryan. This is a complete and unabridged reading of the book (1 hours, 30 minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants in the discussion include Jesse, Paul Weimer, Trish E. Matson, Connor Kaye, and Tommy Patrick Ryan
Talked about on today’s today’s show:
two these, Beyond The Singing Flame, it’s an onion, should Jesse have asked Tommy to record that too?, no novels, pretty famous guy for a guy with basically no novels, he’s 14 years old, bursting with ideas, reads like a D&D campaign set in the Arabian Nights, a flame like in She, the copyright status, Hippocampus Press, The Black Diamonds, he’s really hard too, his writing is very simple in this one, his vocabulary, give himself some feedback, supernal, an archaic word for supernatural, Eric S. Rabkin, a 3 sentence prose pastel, splenetic, iridescent, arabesque, nympholepsy, mien, rutilant, ill-tempered, the least difficult CAS story, sentence by sentence story, that might make a novel, becoming from high heaven, ethereal, rife with words, he’s masterful with the language, construction is good too, the shape of the plot is really excellent, a very interesting story, The Emperor Of Dreams documentary, accessible, why lots of writers like it, sidereal, lead astray, considering his vocabulary, lepidoperous, did you think of Logan’s Run?, swirling around, transcend and get reborn (or die), moth to a flame, exactly, multi dimensional higher dimensional transcendence, really into the body, really into material, obsessed with death and beauty, Lovecraft likes stars, immortality, architecture and burying the past, sexuality, reproduction through death, the beauty of those things, the siren call of the city, where’s it all going, he’s obsessed with thinking about it and telling about it, his structure is really good, sentence by sentence, he didn’t really do anything with it, the structure makes more appreciable, missing the last chapter, asking for the sequel, the narrator gets inserted into the story, no wrap up frame, disconcerting, he didn’t have an ending, kill the main characters, kind of Clark Ashton Smith but not really, this document is now found in a cylinder falling from the sky, I found this cylinder when taking a hike, Angarth more Smith, he’s the illustrator and the artist, his friend who’s also a weird fiction, never met in real life, the real life connections, EldritchDark, the best etext versions, Arkham House along with the sequel, published during his lifetime, July 1931, Wonder Stories, We had been friends for a decade or more, the journal, July 1st, 1938, July 31st, 1930, I’ve been gone for two years, set in the future, originally, Philip Hastane, there’s always a war in Europe, the reprint in Startling Stories, The Scientifiction Hall Of Fame, Harry Warner, Jr., of all the living writers of fantasy, A. Merritt, an alien planet, read around, the word that kept coming up, Carcosa, a bunch of layering on Carcosa, True Detective‘s first season, anything Yellow King related, Robert W. Chambers, Gene Wolfe’s vocab, The Wizard Knight, even deeper, circle back, cycle of stories, alien city on another world, not as sinister, more sirens, more sexy than horrific and compelling, this city is relatively safe place, Giles Angarth, he still brings his gun though, inner and outer narrator, sandwiches, coffee, and a gun, The Demoiselle DY’s, The Elf Trap, Ambrose Beirce, a friend of George Sterling, a continental famous kid, often on the front page, wunderkind child poet from California, newspapers were hungry, syndicated, The Vancouver Sun, every city paper had that story, a little bit like, A Wine Of Wizardry, Jack London, never met Ambrose Bierce, titans of American and international literature, An Inhabitant Of Carcosa, An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge, a death story, I don’t recognize this landscape, I have the illness, recognizing the landscape, it’s California, the animals, no birds, no insect, a lynx, transforming the landscape into a another world, literally a hike, the Lake Of Hali, Tathagoua, the Book of Eibon, Tsathoggua, are their lynx in Colorado, they go on the hike that inspires this story, central to that, a ski resort, a deep mountain tarn that’s never been sounded, seeing the landscape from the documentary, otherworldly, rock formations, been out on a hike, what if this was an alien world, walking makes your brain start going, Sedona, like an alien formation, episodes of Star Trek, where am I, substances Smith abused, the strongest drug, coffee, dream like drug trips, The Hashish Eater, Lord Dunsany, Confessions Of An English Opium Eater, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, an excuse to let imagination run wild, psychedelic ideas, your brain is manufacturing drugs for itself, H.P. Lovecraft is the opposite, Bobby Derie took cocaine for a prescription, HPL: coke head, it’s not for you, warned Clark Ashton Smith not to take it, wine, Atlantean wine, the wine state, schizophrenia, first and second guy bring the third guy, the structure, a brief summary of the book, British enough, does a really good Irish, third or fourth time, we keep going back, changed somehow, brings the cotton balls, suicide, gonna be great, after that event, the siren song has wooed him completely, he’s an artist not a wordsmith, what’s on the other side, a total utopia, only humans come back, the flame dimension, everything is in ruins, a temperance story, a big popular thin in the city, gin, Marvel movies, whatever drug, we gotta lock this down, depopulate us, kill yourself with a friend, a horrible destructive lure, what’s beyond this flame, death is beyond this flame, a transformation, an ascension, Downward To The Earth by Robert Silverberg, rebirth, everybody dies, choose to rebirth yourself, if your hand isn’t flashing red, on your birthday, you’re young and strong, swiping left, or right, nu you, is this a fantasy or is it a science fiction?, weird fiction, psychedelic fiction, very spiritual, technological or magical, a teleporter, an ancient doorway, more Coruscant, the thermos of coffee and set a little bit in the future, wormholes in place, a science fiction writer as a character, in a science fiction magazine, moer super-science than regular science, transdimensional, Algol, sangfroid, struck with awe, a spiritual transformation, we’re all one now, this feeling of singularity, moth people, purified or made unified, very-Lovecraft, Ex Oblivione, love being non-existent, H. Rider Haggard, these science fiction writers and illustrators are better people, earthly pleasures, Ebbonly, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, matching haircuts, stepping through the pillars and falling, falls a different way, using the scientific methods, pilgrimage, the earplugs, numbing agent, can you numb your ears?, super-meta, words couldn’t possibly describe it, here’s how sweet I am, here’s some really excellent prose about it, all the names, things to work into a story, Angarth, a small town in Scotland, is that his real name?, Clark Smith seems like a pretty boring name, working the vocab mine, Hastur, the tamarack, mid-California, the Sierras, Kim Stanley Robinson, Zenna Henderson’s The People, on the shore of some foreign planet, alienation, vertiginous, determine our personalities, shut-in, his dad traveled the whole world, back to the library, reads The Arabian Nights, this landscape, Crater Ridge, stones of monolithic size and shape, an unknown vegetation, luminescent amber, Anakim, spire on giant spire, stepped through the looking glass into a fantasy world, this alien city with a yellow mist, best be done animated, much more illustrated than live action, Anakim are giant humanoids, basically giants, gargantuan, that’s a normal world, Darth Vader, where they steal all their names from, he just read the Bible, the people of the city, giant stone people, they do not have ears, a Las Vegas, popsicles and silver suits and haircuts, many roads to this city, alien creatures, their corridors, other Earths, other planets, a plane of portals, The Black Company by Glen Cook, Las Vegas for suicide/transcendence, the sinning has got to be stopped, why it’s so interesting and demands a sequel, humans center themselves in their stories, we’re a sideline, spectators and not really important, the gun never gets used, siege weaponry, a tower with legs, like our good friend Sauron, suicide cult, why are they so certain there’s something bad through the flame, obviously you’re going to die, immolated, smoke, instantly consumed, near the end, mesmeric lure, succumbed to the desire, immolate himself, a giant lepidoptery being, so good, smart moths, compassionate moths, fellow travelers, rather sweet, deadly enslavement, he ran forward in a series of leaps both solemn and frenzied, sacerdotal, headlong into the flame, more dazzling greenness, benumbed brain centers, annul the perilous mesmerism, fled from the shrine, envying my companion’s fate, fiery dissolution, more people going in from coming out, this is very attractive, enjoying wine, not for me, ice cream, fomo, a hilarious short story [And All The Earth A Grave] by C.C. MaCapp, a computer slips a cog, two coffin garage, this face tattoo is very fashionable, emigration, people living the country, a moral upset, even maybe mention, telepathy, the incoming army, the foundation of the flame, Reno trying to steal Las Vegas’ business, the last pilgrims, the rulers of the outer lands, obeyed the lure of the singing fountain and vanished into the higher sphere, the story leans that way, you don’t know, one moth to the other moth, I used to be a caterpillar, many legends in the outer lands, guessed by only a few, the inner dimension is hated, a lethal and pernicious chimera, an opium paradise, a mecca for this?, suicide boothing, the build up the city, built up around it?, larger or more impressive than other buildings, like a beautiful waterfall for Paul, it’s too dangerous, we can’t have too many people being happy here, into a higher state of consciousness, a VR fountain, live in your basement a VR all day, hippies, spiritual higher stare of consciousness, the great resignation, there’s more to life, the religion vs. a cog in the machine, our viewpoint characters, lashed to the mast of the ship like Odysseus was, timeless concept, war on a peaceful nation, can they destroy it?, like a laser beam, a geyser, a geological force, the scoriac stuff, gotta read the sequel, when you read Conan, those were the days, jump onto a new ideal, Conan never revisits the same place, Poseidonis stories, 2 or other stories like that, that Averoigne series, why is this happening, the letters pages, is this really possible, we should ask, more by the same author, the nature of this world and the purpose of the flame, if Tommy wants to record it, professional grade, keep using that, The Black Abbot Of Puthuum, on my phone in a farm in Ecuador, a checklist, an excuse to read a story, read it at a level, getting to share that, accents, Irish to Scottish to British, theatre, Saturday Night Live, Alec Guinness and Obi Wan Kenobi with Yorkshire, all the British characters from Star Wars, a City Of The Singing Flame tattoo, explaining Clark Ashton Smith, Lovecraft is in the Marvel Universe, Clark Ashton Smith movies, a TV adaptation, he’s difficult, he’s high level, incredible vocab, the imagery the colours, chalcedony, they love their art, they’re art men, rectilinear architecture, the nod to Lovecraft, cyclopedia, a Lovecraft vocab database, why Jesse does the podcast, an appointment, J. Manfred Weichsel, William Jeffrey Rankin, it is up to individuals, denying the attraction of the flame, just another drug problem like heroin, gin, or marvel movies, your AI friends, my AI girlfriend likes the same AI movies I like, you learn stuff, what people think they want, just read Clark Ashton Smith, customized stuff, opt out, everybody’s an AI, too new of a book, the best science fiction books, AI generated, 23 books on the list, 1 book from 2016, some listicle website, integrated and got rid of duplicates, Arthur C. Clarke, Blake Crouch’s 2016 book, The Martian, best?, you’d do pretty well, full circle, The Sunken Land Rises Again by M. John Harrison, Viriconium, weird fiction, pretty damn weird, an assistant to a mad scientist, super dense and very prosey, light on plot, he’s on the long list, Light novels, an unsettling atmosphere, feels very very modern, Nova Swing, 19 hour collection of stories, Neil Gaiman, Jack Vance’s Green Magic, get magic, bitter and tragic, recursive worlds, not quite getting what you want, poignant and good, dying earth wizards, the Zothique series stories, William Hope Hodgson’s The Night Land, sad story, Subterranean Press, premium paper, Logan’s Run, Shakespeare’s Planet, Invitation To The Game, The Charwoman’s Shadow, Scratch One, Progeny by Philip K. Dick, getting back to Philip K. Dick, 53-57 stories, always exciting, these incredible authors, Le Guin once, Arthur C. Clarke, Elmore Leonard, nobody knows they’re public domain yet, all the weight of the world is on your shoulders, it’s exciting, or gals, its nice to be appreciated, there for somebody, its not just for the moment, its for the ages, share it with somebody 30 years from now, put it on a bookshelf, big box computer games, selling it for $86, an arc of nostalgia, 286sx, Future Shop, couldn’t afford a 28.8, $0.99, nostalgic for their youth, an old broken 286, feel the floppy going in, become valueless and then come back, the Harlan Ellison version, an L.A. based radio show, not for the ages, an enthusiastic and emotive, very very elderly, the narrator of the film, Harlan Ellison claimed to have read it 200 times, that’s how he learned to read aloud, narrated some Ben Bova, Run For The Stars, passionate, going to Hollywood and getting cynical, born into a world weary wisdom about reality, he went his own way, a passion project, a Hippocampus Press DVD, shill for publishers, passionate people, sharing the materials, solid contents, effort into their covers, the complete poems of Lovecraft, a really handy reference, S.T. Joshi finds some scrap of poem, The Hashish Eater poem, delectable, makes reading delicious, so rich, the lightest and most accessible, 101 Clark Ashton Smith, high level, for bibliophiles, all this prose, a lot of sugar, a slice of cake, small desserts, you have to like that, niche, if you don’t like honey you’re not going to like it, the richest Tommy has ever read, Ambrose Bierce, challenging the reader, why are you trying to make your prose…, making jokes, carving magnificent sculptures out of mountainsides, he really does have something, why Lovecraft was his biggest fan, Robert E. Howard was a great poet, translations of Charles Baudelaire, Poe and Dunsany, Baudelaire and Poe, taproot, undeniable, the first Sherlock Holmes short story, A Scandal In Bohemia, The Purloined Letter, Conan Doyle is the accessible and dumb version of Poe, this hidden photograph, I will have her show me, we love Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson and London and Irene Adler, we don’t love Dupin, the contents of the letter are sick evil and twisted, the photograph is of the king of Bohemia, I’m doing a tribute to Poe and nobody knows, Harry Potter vs. Tolkien, J.K. Rowling, super entertaining, no Harry Potter tattoos, Harry Potter is breezy, Tolkien is fun but not breezy, an afternoon’s entertainment, Clark Ashton Smith: guaranteed enjoyment, intellectually interesting, attentive, tickles a different part of the brain, high art, good art, most art is good, one of his best plots, well that happened, Lovecraft’s plots are much better, not much of a plotter, 700 pages to explore this concept is cool but nothing happened, Pacific Edge, guy tries to get girlfriend at baseball game, not playing the same game, just a weird guy, how popular he was, talked this one to death, Pirates Of Venus, A Meeting With Medusa, Sailing To Byzantium, Farnham’s Freehold, northern Minnesota, almost Canada, just about out May, The Thing On The Roof, No Man’s Land, pick in August, 2 years is fine but 5 years is too long, lost tribe of cave people, troggies, chuddies, surprise chuds, Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers, lick and nip, Paul Sings The Classics, a singing voice for silent musicals, Nerds Of A Feather get together, Gather Yourselves Together by Philip K. Dick, from 1994, posting photos, Jesse misses Connor on twitter, usually eastern, an awful awful dream, discombobulated, very fun, that sentence sounds like he put a space in it, disjointed, a snip in the file, mouth noises, get closer to your mic, get a better mic, not all for the audience, caring a lot about art, Cat Killer by Donald E. Westlake, brutal an interesting sounding, Clive Barker, Jonathan is not a murder as far as I know, collecting human heads, Tales To Make You Vomit, not all horrific, that weird, you guys should be DMing each other, some sort of money arrangement, throwing around numbers, probably not even 4 hours, an hour and a half recording, relatively cold, ACX pays per finished hour, the going rate, $200 or $300 per finished hour, wordcounter.net, sell them not on audible.com, revenue sharing, Planet Of The Wage Slaves, diverse ideas and lots of nudity, amazing covers, their text over my art, Warrior Soul looks great, the lady’s hair in front of the title of the book, art direction vs. being an artist, coming up with interesting ideas, Five Maidens On A Pentagram, gothic horror sex-farce, Hasatan, sex-crazed demon, just sounds fun and pulpy, our reality, cycling through Smith/Howard/Dick, millions of great things, how to get this stuff out there, enough bundled together, anthologies based on themes, teaching the occasional yoga class.
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The SFFaudio Podcast #747 – Space Viking by H. Beam Piper – read by Mark Nelson for LibriVox. This is a complete and unabridged reading of the novel (6 hours 17 minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants include Jesse, Paul Weimer, Cora Buhlert, and Jim Kitchen
Talked about on today’s show:
serialized in Analog, November 1962 and February 1963, paperback in 1963, Ace Books, Little Fuzzy, the Scalzi treatment, gently disagree, Michael Whalen covers, homerun painting, a children’s book of Fuzzies, The Cosmic Computer, Lord Kalvan Of Otherwhen, cross dimensional novel, Roger Zelazny, rat hole, popular, used bookstores almost don’t exist, expensive used bookstores, why are those books harder to find?, how much was published, more printings of Space Viking, redoing it, a great inspiration for the Ewoks of Star Wars, Ewok-ish, translated into German, normal Ace printruns, fell into public domain, Jerry Pournelle, The Other Human Race, Uller Uprising, Junkyard Planet, Graveyard Of Dreams, Graveyard Planet is by Clifford D. Simak, a tier down, grabs your lapels, Dr. McCoy, still alive and on twitter with a pipe and gun emoji, it doesn’t work as an idea, obvious three things, two of them, three rules of H. Beam Piper, 1. throwback to historical incident or occasion, Sepoy Mutiny, fated to repeat our mistakes, hey that Hitler guy had some pretty good ideas, the big lie works for me, anti-cancer vaccine, 2. chainsmoking is still a thing, break out the cigarettes, hardboiled science fiction, drinking, gun oil and cleaning rod, firearms, everybody has cap guns in the future, after the crackup, the final war on Earth, only the southern hemispheres are around, race goes out the window, character’s looks don’t match the character’s names, Four Day Planet, Japanese name but looks like a viking, western colonization, whiteman-centric science fiction, go forward from there, the bleeding edge, he’s with Heinlein, a bigger name, Scalzi commented on his blog about it, his estate is in shambles, how amazing his writing is, his reputation has gone up since his death, all the people we don’t remember from the early 20th century, why everyone hates H.P. Lovecraft, standard beliefs, still read today, worse than Lovecraft, not that apparent in the fiction, Henry S. Whitehead, weirdos like us, 60 years since it came out, rotted in great fiction, Three Musketeers, Four Musketeers, character, romance, begins with a gutpunch, qualms with the society is a part of, the darkest motive of all: revenge, find and end him, a little worldbuilding, playing by the same rules, playing fair by those rules, an axe to grind, pschoanalyzing, a self-educated man, doing their hobbies on 500 journeys, history, he has his characters doing that, when not polishing his gun he’s smoking and reading history, a self-made man, somebody who champions the self-made man, a hardscrabble version of Heinlein, pocket money, by his bootstrapping himself, he was a working man, a nightwatchman, his interests, the way he focuses his characters on engaging in intellectual ideas, some massive blindspots but mostly right, a moral horror book, post-apocalyptic and protect my family, 17 books in this series, intellectual heft he’s working through, we’re utter monsters, I know what I’m doing is utterly monstrous, I’ll have a scene where I explain with a little girl and a dog, Beowulf raid, rape and other things, swordworld core values, Gallic law, innocent people, a quote, the Duke of Wellington, Siege of Cádiz, the 30 Years War, ya ya I know, rifles and pistols, they keep on fighting, what would you do in their place, terro-humans are all stupid like that, a massacre, a man made hell, a compulsion to share their guilt, it doesn’t stop him from writing the book, realistic, WWII, WWI, Ukraine war, The Bridge (1959), betrayed by the German Green party, all of the kids die, grew up to be famous actors (and a singer), whenever they swear, swearing by Satan, writing for magazines, “foul unprintability”, Katherine Tarrant, the system states cede, the collapse, the decline, interstellar ability, sick of what’s coming, raid the bones of the Federation, the atrophy that brought down the Federation, the Empire that comes after, Retrun Of The Jedi, Hoth is one of the planets, Dagon, Nergal, named after famous swords, Durandal, Excalibur, cookies, Gram, The Song of the Nibelungs, the Traveler RPG universe, Game Designer’s Workshop, good thing it is public domain, right?, the worst cover art ever, how did a game with such a crappy cover get any traction, Paranoia had great art, Battletech, Mechwarrior, a pox on you, 1976, Logan’s Run, the juggernaut that is Star Wars, Marc Miller, the great blurb on the cover, where D&D was just a box, the storyhook, Space Opera, Fantasy Games Unlimited, Battledroids, FASA, peoplw ere so excited about the blurb on the cover, a literary game, a board games, tabletops games, playing the game smiling, mmm interesting, explore the entire galaxy, ruled mostly by the French, WWIII, the superpower of the stars, Heinlein smoked, Heinlein could quit, Starship Troopers, horror and guns, a massively different book, different foundations, ideological, hobbyistic, a thing to look at, the names, an explanation, Morglay, Omfray, Nikkolay, Andray, this comes up a lot, pig-latin, in Shakespeare, dog become goday, God become Ogday, Google becomes Ooglegay, a game kids play, you have to learn, Ol’Nick, From, Morgue, Rand, a being from the same culture, Rathmore (wrath), playing fun games, giving the game away, a fun game, smart guy, self-made, he wants to be an architect and couldn’t afford to, a couple of different kinds of arches, what a cathedral you’ve built here sir, he only has marble, he can’t build with girders, a powerful intellect without enough time, he’s got to know he’s brilliant, we can all make it, all noble and good and smart, a very American view of history, very Heinleinian, adventurers who wanted adventure, Germans in the 1850s/60s, the 1848 revolution, gold in California, the apprentice who would never be the master, women who couldn’t find husbands, risky, he’s saying the crazy vicious people leave to go viking, slightly supported by a glance at reality, Scandinavia, barbarism and civilization, what would Robert E. Howard would have liked H. Beam Piper and arguing at the bar all night, very nice socialist emotionally cold, hygge, being cozy at home, exported their vicious people, anger makes him go off, dissatisfaction, describing the reality, starvation, new government policies, cleaning the lands, the enclosures, thieving bread, shipped off, exporting his best genes, not fully decided, viciousness and tenderness, from a ground pounder’s point of view, an infantryman, all the best officers start off as regular soliders, a grounding in what reality is, only people who’ve seen war, imagining a future, settled and collapse, barbarian is back baby, neo-barbarians are not the same as the space vikings, Heinlein started off as a socialist, went to seed later, where he’s at is not the mid Heinlein phases, a very sparky engine, rich or even overrich with ideas, Junkyard Planet, A Planet For Texans was a co-production, courtroom stuff, served on a jury?, people who think for themselves, do you have any set ideas?, let me make a list, strong opinions or closeminded, persuadable by argument, spark up, he wants to be a lawyer, he’s making arguments, ideas against monarchy, from the top down, he leans into it, sits down and smokes, what Conan does, similar guys, he was in a working class society, resident working class vs. transient working class, he had to have a trade, dreams are fleeting, solved their problems the same way in the end, amazing but unsupported is crushing, not all business with Howard or Piper, they both think that they’re geniuses, breathing room for characters, the little girl with her dog, arranging all the family dynasties, he likes the romance, having so much fun in this book, the murder of the new bride, the massacre at the wedding, Game Of Thrones’ Red Wedding, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Ian Fleming, different classes, an older trope, people will be doing Heinlein like deep studies on Piper’s books, war with Russia, we are lead by sad idiot clowns, incompetent on purpose, ex-Nazis, semi-competent, what would happen if H. Beam Piper had become a politician?, feeling based ideas, he would want to be a king, not a lot of room for diplomats, Keith Laumer, his standing has much receded over the years, every year that goes by, most writers decline towards the end of their life, later period Asimov, the smart ones stop writing, rising and developing and getting better, if Philip K. Dick was writing today…, you shoulda stopped around 80s man, a better short story writer than a novelist, he works pretty well at the novelette and novel length, ascended, people who want to record his stuff, ebooks with decent covers, people love making the art for his books, Wildside Press, the spinner rack, a whole month of pocket money, the ending, the hallucinations, shot to death, Elaine was with him, be good to her, then she was gone, such a romantic, the chivalry stuff, Howard likes girls and thinking about girls and describing them, Piper is a romantic, his writing style, his grammar is a little bit off sometimes, who says goodbye, Elaine?, its the author, suffering loss, a short brief awful bought with cancer, two ways you go, on off switch or lingering fade, goodbye dad, who is writing this book?, third person, her head against his cheek, one way of reading it, now it finally be said, I can let it all go, I got my revenge and there’s no heaven, it’s not by Trask, it’s by Piper, he’s so crazy, who else would do that?, sometimes it can hurt, a presence throughout the book, appears to him multiple times, in order for the plot to happen, fridging, he breaks the rule of the narration, reframing the whole book, that’s something on the page, lain in ruins, forays to loot the corpse, wealth of detail, how it has all fallen apart, if you wanna understand piper, set during the Federation, seams and threads, natural disintegration, key peices of the Piper library, a lot of himself into it, Jerry Pournelle: Piper was a craftsman, Uller Uprising, set in a common universe, let three authors loose, Twayne Triplet [The Petrified Planet], how these chartered companies work, an analog to the East India Company, sequential order, Space Viking‘s sense of romance, Piper in his prime, he’s put himself into the protagonist’s shoes, agree and disagree, Jesse’s thesis, Fletcher Pratt, Judith Merrill, humour stories, public domain but we didn’t know, it helps your career, hidden behind a paywall of an estate that renewed, Condé Nast, good and bad, still Junkyard, very different, a different girl, Adept’s Gambit, Night’s Black Agents, trans people and gay people in the mid-1930s, Gideon Marcus, Galactic Journey, comparable to Foundation [by Isaac Asimov], good at short stories and bad at novels, Asimov’s characters, big honking series novels, late period novels, horrendously bad, James Lovelock, Arthur C. Clarke, genetically engineered weapon, great ideas, three stages, the setup, the last third, the left turn to Albuquerque, courtroom drama, he’s right most of the time, reinforced from Terra, a hunt through pornographic romantic fiction, sketching on notes, meanwhile his mind is percolating along, interesting to read and not typical novels, the most straight up book he’s got, sell Jesse on Four Day Planet, the closest to juvenile fiction, let’s book it, sea-monsters and unions, one of Piper’s greatest jokes in it, a dad joke, fun, twitter is weird right now, Games Workshop, the worlds largest toy soldier company, Microsoft, stat at home dad, Illinois, tired of moving, all that wonderful stuff, a mover’s worst nightmare, Rivian, surrounded by where the car industry is leaning, why some materials are so important, Amazon delivery vehicle has a panic button, a very science fictional thing, something you’d find in a Heinlein novel, third parties to deliver packages, majority minority employing, the drivers love them, gigantic windshield, mid 50s, make friends with young people, a really good plan, pained but smiling, if you didn’t like her…, German post, electric vehicles, more and more, a facility in Vancouver, Calgary, The Sentry Box, sleep in a teepee, Coquitlam, outside Minneapolis, The Source, Tower Games, great game stores, 1300 game stores, the ones that survive, Staten Island, The Complete Strategist, comic book stores were hit hard by COVID, [Hourglass Comics] leaned into gaming, Diamond Distribution, 18-24 months, Comic World, Huntington, West Virginia, burns everything to ash, Pokemon trades, the black and white bust of the late 80s, a bookstore, they’ve got the space, literally 1 block away from light rail, Evan Lampe doesn’t understand toys, Cora’s got all the He-Mans, Funkopops, scarred by Diddl Mice, Beanie Babies killed an industry, Edmonton, Eternita playset, you deserve it, Rotterdam, they didn’t want to take the hint, you were always watching something, every single Ninja Turtle ever made, you have to keep doing, you can’t overcoming the inertia, Battle Cat, a slippery slope, now they need a Skeletor, Target and Walmart exclusives, I shall make you a queen amongst all the others, new Masters Of The Universe figures, want list, Lego minifigs, little H.P. Lovecraft stories scenes, Playmobil, some amazing stuff, Nativity Scene, general appeal, people are Christians, an A-Team Playmobil, there are no children who have ever seen The A-Team, this is a product that is marketed to adults, adult toys, not the kind you get at the sex shop, Star Trek, nobody sits down with their kid and says let’s watch some A-Team, German only jokes, George Peppard, Perry Rhodan, a series, audio dramas, not huge in North America, its not New Wave, Dan Dare, the morass of Doc Savage, small magazines, dime novels, lucky to have a newsstand, John Sinclair, the biggest science fiction series in the world, almost no impact in North America, an institution, issue 2254, a very robust industry in central Europe, a fan in Italy, Urania, similar in style, great art, pretending to be American, so wonderful, found some long lost friends, we’ve all lost some books you’ve read, Worlds Without Number, Jack Vance’s Tschai, remix everything, Jack Vance integral edition, nobody has the money to buy it, hear about Urania, all the Italian Giallo movies, Italian crime magazines, other European countries, romance and westerns, for the old men, back issues of various pulp magazines, Cora’s main comic store, elderly ladies coming in, romance novels, a lesbian elderly couple, lesbian bookstores are very common, that same collector trait that men more often have, lesbian couples, comics and games don’t pay the rent, the sextoy shopped, they’re in it for the books but the sex-toys sell, 90% of the profits, there’s a joke to be made hand over fist, Playmobil Perry Rhodan, he’s still in very good condition, one of the first ones, Jesse’s theory: Hummels are to the 1950s as Playmobil is to the 2020s, collectible doll,
Rocket Ship Galileo, some cookies, caught COVID in the hospital for the second time, wearing masks, negative tests, she never caught COVID at home, we’re being lied to.
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Jesse, Will Emmons, Trish E. Matson, and Cora Buhlert talk about The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett
Talked about on today’s show:
1955, Edmond Hamilton’s wife, her other family, her parents, when they were courting, brought her back a little to late, a California person, a home outside of California, set in space, The Long Goodbye, The Big Sleep, detective California books, Californian detectives, westerns, super-religious, post-apocalyptic, the craft of it, the heat of the farm, the dust of the road, the mob scenes are scary, well executed, very believable, small town, city, island, religious craziness, nutzoid about religion, very well written, easy to follow, nice characterization, a slick writer of people, The Queer Ones, the Rediscovery anthology, small town atmosphere, gossipy, rural small town, a very American book, dying of cancer and radiation sickness, the fallout would have gotten them, a limited nuclear war, mutations, iodine, cesium, if you omit certain lines, Robert A. Heinlein, the viewpoint characters are not sophisticates in this stuff, a fear, a taboo, grandma remembers the mutations, dead babies, cancers, we could squint that away, the Radium Girls case, Isaac Asimov, skeptical of nuclear energy, life will go on, John Wyndham’s The Chrysalids, Amish or Mennonites, big cities have been destroyed, a line about France, the Soviets are the likeliest suspects, could have been South Africa (probably wasn’t), some years mentioned early, a barn built in 1952, 1854, 100 years in the future?, are people living extra-long?, didn’t understand the length of time, how long a century is, rural people, life organized by seasons, Esau flushed a little, on the gable end, four numbers, 1952, before even Gran was born, the meeting house (a church), down behind the lilac bushes, 1842, a child’s POV, the unreliable narrator, they have these dreams of what this technology was, radio, memories of having things nice, now they’re all Mennonites and they don’t like it, mechanical engineers with electricity, church oppression is physical, the warehouse burning, burning the whole town down, upsetting, a weird rural mindset, comes from the parents, enforced through children, restrictive, 11km from Bremen city center, traveled as a kid, visiting Disney World, don’t talk about Disney World (that’s bragging!), the 1968 anti-Vietnam war America is Evil generation, they all have leprosy in India, does not fit our worldview, this American experience, Doukhobours, Guatemala, Russia, biggest city in North Carolina, Presbyterian church, southern Baptists, fundamentalists, was Will a city boy?, the Creation museum, a monument to ignorance, evolution is a lie, dinosaurs on Noah’s ark, Leviathan and Behemoth were dinosaurs, plants aren’t actually alive, American Protestantism, fear of science, an alternative authority, the insidious part, they’re challenging the authority that I have as a mean bastard to discipline people, for adults its not the same, they lock you in there, indoctrinated, go about your business, forming your understanding of reality, Len and Esau, sinning by getting the radio, the wrong type of religious meeting, stealing books, no education, everything out of the bible except for math (sums), someone might build an atomic bomb again, deliberately kept stupid, an Amish exception, kept down by the schooling, Catholic areas, Lutherans are nice mellow progressive people, occasional throwback, rural Bavaria in the 1950s, weird American churches, religious nutcases, the Catholic thing, the opposite book to this A Canticle For Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr., monks preserving knowledge, Davy by Edgar Pangborn, mutants too, more about power than science or anti-science, making your own carts, they control the books, who stole the books?, more about power than denial of science, what bartertown?, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985), two men enter one man leaves, George Miller, some wonderful tropes, methane, escaping from a cult, tragedy, lifestory, living in tragic times, a coming of age book, ridiculous task, wise adults, we don’t have an army, helping kids out, wrongthink, muddle through, always tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, build a city, refuge is destroyed, bottom up government oppression, five warehouses make a city, 200 houses and 1000 people, a local judge, the judge seems reasonable, Hofstadter, the mob itself, Dulinsky, just trying to do capitalism, believable, too believable, nothing good happens to anybody, they abandon their families, finding love, never returning to Piper’s Run, fanaticism, they do it to themselves, the return of the prodigal son, a horrible biblical story, pillar of salt, a sinner, dabbling with forbidden knowledge, quaint and harmless and peaceful, pacifist, new ishmaelists, The Walking Dead, the group who live with the zombies, take the discipline, hypocritical, demanded as tribute, how they freeze to death, race and genocide stuff, people who’ve been made homeless, live on the charity of us hardworking farmers, the dirty thirties, leeches vs. our duty, oppressed by the past, oppression from the law, use the fruits of knowledge, a stick, maybe Len and Esau could end up with those people, awfully close, too faint praise, the hopes that we have are destroyed, nothing good happened, quick fixes and Edens to escape to, their own kind of cult, don’t give yourself false hopes, you’re going to have to work for stuff, disappointing things in politics, reversions and regressions, the long cycle of things, working continually towards progress, a life of working towards better things, the Foundation from [Isaac Asimov’s Foundation] Foundation, working on this one specific problem, a bunker of some kind, conventional fossil power, a force field that stops fusion and fission, magical thinking, nuclear bombs bad vs. nuclear energy good, the Windscale fire, anti-nuclear power, opposed hated disliked, coal power, a fairly overcast country, solar power, co-generation, nuclear power is against god, getting to the library, they have a radio, getting power from the radio waves themselves, finding the mysterious box, an allegory for growing up in the radio age, screenwriter, a radio kid, mysterious transmissions, a form of education, the magic of radio, The Adventures of Fatty Finn, soap box racing, drawn from her own life experience, public domain clearances, noticing a pattern, her copyright renewed works got by a bank, the executors of their estate, the bank got Leigh Brackett’s retro-Hugos?, the first solo-work nominated for a Hugo by a woman, Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein, a very good book, The End Of Eternity by Isaac Asimov, a Kuttner/Moore story, women only exist to be wives, cover city, enlightened change, no women scientists, get married stat, Gran is amazing, deferring to the kid’s dad, hopes and dreams, the tragedy of this book, better ask your pa, that red dress, music and clean toilets, ice cream, chocolate rabbits at Easter, water that ran out of shiny faucets, two faded sparks, “flat-hat”, a red dress and a TV, a good world, it ended because it was evil, the world that was, hold her tongue and bow her head, great writing, post-war American dream, electric power, the great game changer, telephones, it wasn’t that great a time for women either, kicked out and sent back to the home, suburban towns, women scientists in the 1950s, in crisis times, the COVID pandemic, childcaring, why they didn’t have any kids, 2015, Kinsman, Ohio, Star Wars fans, where the force awoke for the series first sequel, her summers, The Big Sleep (1945) Rio Bravo (1959), The Long Goodbye(1973), Batman, more than 20 summers, Hamilton’s sisters, 1946, a century and a quarter, deer and woodchucks, I work in a small white wooden room, old boys book, a mug from “Duke”, John Wayne, the Vindicator, The Long Tomorrow is about the Kinsman house, the Canfield fair, age 13, Howard Hawks, No Good For A Corpse, William Faulkner, lovers of that genre, Ray Bradbury, Lorelei Of The Red Mists, buy a convertible and drive it all summer, Ed and Leigh, 1963 Corvette Stingray, Superman bought that corvette!, they were tied to their typewriters, “it’s good to be home”, writing under deadline, strikingly ordinary, Hatari (1962), round the world cruise, dig up the turnips, Yoda gift bags, what a charmed childhood, the cancer hit her, that first script is on the internet, so very Planet Stories, the small towns in this book, through a child’s eyes, delightful for them, a luxury sports car, the edge of fertility, they’re having fun, writing action adventure superheroes, Will has read some of Edmond Hamilton’s Superman comics, Under The Red Sun, zany post apocalyptic journey, robots of the people that he knew, he’s got a beard, Metropolis is destroyed, in a box somewhere, Krypton, my hair and nails have grown, under Earth’s yellow sun…, shaving with eyelasers and a mirror, inconsistent continuity, Edmond Hamilton, The Star Kings, Jack Vance, Captain Future stories, an anime series, Star Trek reruns, Space: 1999, Moonbase Alpha, The Daughter Of Thor, a polar expedition with a semi-frozen queen with a pet tiger, half vikings, Fantastic Adventures, Weird Tales, E.E. Doc Smith, unreadable, Crashing Suns, Interstellar Patrol, Brackett was a better writer, one of the best writers of the Golden Age, Clifford D. Simak, C.L. Moore, July 18th is Edmond Hamilton Leigh Brackett Day, Robert E. Howard Days, Cross Plains, Texas, Youngstown, if this her most depressing one, mostly shorter length, her mysteries, The Long Goodbye (1973) is so good, a noir ending, Elliot Gould, a jazz movie, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Robert Altman, the role of his life, so 70s, so weird, Humphrey Bogart, cat action, be up for it, a delight, a long and lazy movie, what kind of movie is this?, rotating crime shows, working class cop, no dialogue for five minutes, shocking German swear words, set the deal with United Artists, not exactly my idea of Philip Marlowe, a technical problem of this enormous, involution and convoluted, side tangents, its all getting to the thing, both California of the period, MASH, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969), Robert Altman, still working, very elderly now, Bosch, renting movies based on actors, The Silent Partner (1978), Margot Kidder, so many great movies, fall into a wonderful world, A Bridge Too Far (1977), WWII movies, Operation Market Garden, take too many bridges, Die Brücke (1959), very depressing, war is evil, war: don’t do it, we still need them, a high point in the late 50s to the mid 60s, The Lincoln Lawyer, Michael Connelly wrote both series, Leigh Brackett’s great, read everything by her, get your hands a copy of The Long Tomorrow, Hatari (1962), Rio Bravo (1959) and Rio Lobo (1970), Faulkner, write a screenplay, Bogart made everything better, Elliot Gould playing Eric John Stark.
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The SFFaudio Podcast #695 – Jesse, Paul Weimer, Maissa Bessada, Evan Lampe, Will Emmons, and Trent Reynolds talk about The Busy Body by Donald E. Westlake
Talked about on today’s show:
1966, paperback or hardcover?, it’s better if it is a paperback, not by Westlake, Burglars Can’t Be Choosers by Lawrence Block, while burgling, on the run, five pages before the end, what the mystery was and how all things came to be, a subgenre between Westlake and Block, little excerpts, a real book, Block introduced Jesse to Westlake, from reading a series, self-flagellation, a movie the very next year, a Frazetta cover, a pretty bad movie, an episode of The Monkees, sets in relief author choices, the jacket that goes missing, heroin, literal cash, a million dollars, a typical Hollywood move, a cargo ship filled with cash, massive stakes inflation, our hero is a murderer, grave-digging was one thing, a functionary of the institution, an apparatchik of the organization, he’s redeemed, he gets out, he goes to California, he abandons his month, tell us more about your mafia connections, heat of the moment self-defense vs. deliberate planned murder, Gravito, all fun mafia stuff, over his shoulder for the entire book, comedic, tightrope walk, a Westlakeian attitude, how he can get himself out of this lifestyle he’s in, Westlake’s view of the world is very funny, human absurdity, a caper, the big send off, definitely fun, as a person living in the world, reconcile, a lot of books like this, most of the [Richard] Stark books, Paul felt bad for him, framed for something he didn’t do, go get the world, we should have trouble, 20 years after The Sopranos, a very old book, kids have turned to glue, white slavery, prostitution, running girls, subverting the religion, the roads are bad, a Protestant a Catholic funeral, if it was a less naturally gifted writer, less absurd it would be more disturbing, heightened reality, the laws of physics still work in this place, he rolls out of a moving car, a missed opportunity, Westlake adaptations to film, The Stepfather (1987), The Grifters (1990), Jim Thompson, the novel medium, one little sequence, when he wakes up in the bed with the widow, dream sequence, a frame-shift, kneeling, this guy is really old, a young vigorous guy, the fish-eye, so talented, looking in a mirror, those details mark out Westlake, great language, this guy’s a killer, future comic novels, mildly funny, more sympathetic, robbing an orphanage, a conscious move, dead serious, the desperate circumstances, keystone cops, intrusive music in bad movies in the 1960s, CW shows, music over conversation, ruinous, a detective story, phone calls, inherent in the absurdity of the situation, in real life, a phone tag conversation, it’s one of those days, like candy, Westlake’s thoughts on society are all over the page, a few years ago, all the potholes are marked, New York City, all of these things feed into reflections, how city management could be done, corruption at the airport, hashmarks up and down his uniform, the yellow brick novel, Dancing Aztecs, what it all means, the title is kind of misleading, Weekend At Bernie’s, Weekend At Bernie’s II, every decision is bad, they make the jack brown in the movie, low rez, brown for shitty, a red herring, the title, we never see the body, somebody moved it at some point, Al Engel, Aloysius, Mr. Kan, a lot of widows (fake and real), The Busie Body, a 1709 play, Susanna Centlivre, the venice carnival, gigolo, all these people wanting to get with each other, everybody is in everybody’s bedroom, kinda similar, a French farce, I’m busy, nosing into other people’s business, an older meaning, nosy Parker, 17th century meaning, sexually active, she’s a busy body, a kissing book, Gentleman Prefer Blondes [subtitled: The Intimate Diary of a Professional Lady by Anita Loos], a new release on LibriVox, Marilyn Monroe, a musical, a flapper prostitute’s POV, super funny, a blank book, a funny cutesy attitude, super-naive, inference work, she’s a busybody, a lot of gentleman callers, one sex scene, this woman who keeps showing up, the list of suspects, who framed him?, he didn’t play fair, you don’t feel cheated though, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), I recognize you, dinner, very small payoffs, low stakes, the threat of California, Dolly, Brody who’s a body we never see, a light confection, a nephew novel, Somebody Owes Me Money, The Organization, yeaah, pushing towards, a replacement for government, it used to be there was always big hits all the time, now that things are organized, a warlord, turned into a bureaucracy, things settle down, the origins of government, before the progressive era in the United States, the mafia providing social welfare, why Sicily is important, when the cops won’t give satisfaction, the competition, the government has a monopoly on violence, coercion, threats, asking, and paying, a second government, Engle, he’s not a murderer he’s just a soldier, Secret Service, doing his duty, they are crime books, twisted, Callahan, bribed, lots of cops are on the take, Serpico and all these other stories, paying attention to tiny details, reading the paper and seeing how things actually work, we don’t need to know his service history, a very subtle take, the insurance angle didn’t come up until the end, the fake widow, this was just honest insurance fraud, Double Indemnity, Black Widow (1987), Debra Winger and Theresa Russell, the eraser, marrying her way to riches, the great personality, neo noir, she disappears from the bathroom, he’s a great card player, the book’s greatest weakness, the funeral parlor employee, suspicious as hell, in a more mature Westlake book, the reader expects a cutesy flirty relationship, the resume sticker, the romantic love interest was behind it all, too obvious, they’re going to hook up later, the restaurant that used to be a barn, wagonwheels on the wall, workmanlike, great scenes, the explanations, Dortmunder books, long for the content, like a ping pong ball bouncing around New York, he wasn’t really steering his ship, a lair, a manipulator, thin, The Producers, a blueprint for Dortumnder, driven by circumstances, Westlake calls the tune and the characters dance the jig, recurring motifs, government is incompetent and/or corrupt, Cops And Robbers, two cops decide to supplement their income, playing both sides, moral judgement, he’s a criminal!, profiting off of death and misery, making a mockery of religion and subverting good order, good gags out of the prostitution angle, the heroine character, she gets away with it, leaving the life of prostitution when she got married, run away, one of the best tricks in the novel, a lifestyle that’s somewhat voluntary, sexual rewarding, she writes a nice note, he’s a thinker, he isn’t just punching a clock here, Humans, a fireman at Chernobyl, what does it all mean, the early days of the web, please enter, “I believe my subject is bewilderment, but I could be wrong?”, isn’t it weird we live this way that we do?, this mob world is normal, aren’t you surprised?, a bizarre situation, there’s something wrong with the world, get back in the good books, be chairman himself!, get back to normal, a pretty happy ending, an exhausted guy gets out of the thing that exhausts him, the organization put him through the ringer, pursing the widow instead of Dolly, she’s got the money, get away to Hawaii, escape the system, parallel motivations, his face was disfigured, his head was burned off, does Engel have an angle, just a name, the Brody/body, what’s his angle?, sometimes Rose is a man, this Rose person, comedic, laughing out loud, almost productive in death as he was in life, 5 books since 2008, a manuscript for a Henry Winkler production, Call Me A Cab, Redbook, eBay, $1550, $79, Redbook is the woman’s magazine, Bluebook was a men’s magazine, Yellowbook, Australian Woman’s Weekly, in Westlake’s writing career, a break from Parker, Campus Lovers, Campus Lovers, The Man With The Getaway Face, you can imagine this book ending today (as a series), change the ending and give me one a year, like a shark, emotionless vs. driven by revenge, standalones, Castle In The Air, John Scalzi comes to mind, feature not bug, what does that do for the author?, flex some other muscles, designed not to be a series, the characters are exhausted, gone off with the widow, they’ve got the money, it’s the principal, smart, 6’1, his hair colour, he’s heterosexual, he has a mom, Grofield, full time actor, part time heister, this was a character that could work, a person to see the world through, he’s not like Parker, he’s not a turncoat, a lens through which they see the world, answering the phone: California, Westlakeian humour, subtle fun, maybe’s he’s going to be a milkman, Richard Pryor, charisma, Soylent Green (1973), it’s whats for dinner, standard in American crime fiction, all the institutions are corrupt from top to bottom, chess, locked room mysteries, the social aspects, Dashiell Hammett, everyone is dirty, notable, talking to booksellers, filed under mystery, Agatha Christie style, Mysterious press, these are crime books, classifying, where to put Two Much, to get it in the bookstore section, put a dragon on the cover it’s fantasy, put a gun on the cover: mystery, a spaceship = science fiction, a heaving bosom -> romance, always slotted in as a mystery writer, much more about crime, slices of life of people in the crime industry, quotidian, a bank job, always in the background, the reality, this is business, why are you so weird, thinking weird thoughts that come across as not weird, what his philosophy is or are, the robustness of the descriptions of things, what we call in fantasy “worldbuiklding”, the geography of New York, fabulous, mixing drinks, how much scotch does this guy drink?, it was the sixties and he was on the run, God Save The Mark, Oliver Wyman rage quit twitter, an excuse, The Spy In The Elevator, it would be crime not to do it, on the heels of it, 3 or 4 a year in early years, They Also Serve, Tomorrow’s Crimes, the Starship Hopeful series, Call Him Nemesis, a pulp hero kind of deal, this is a holdup, it was in IF.
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