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The SFFaudio Podcast #602 – READALONG: An Exchange Of Souls by Barry Pain

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #602 – Jesse, Paul Weimer, Maissa Bessada, Evan Lampe, and Trish E. Matson

Talked about on today’s show:
a huge post script, some Latin, darkness, the poetry of Catullus, the afterlife, is this all about gender, Ex Oblivione by H.P. Lovecraft, a Platonic explanation, uses drugs, a Dreamlands story, set in the Dreamlands, The Cats Of Ulthar, The Quest Of Iranon, The Doom That Came To Sarnath, that horrible Heinlein novel, I Will Fear No Evil, yelling at Heinlein the whole time, kissing, a synonym for kissing, old married couples, a synonym for soul, spirit, aspire, expire, inspire, exhaling, the breath being the soul, very basic, Christian theologians, a Vorkosiverse reference, Barrayar, how deep is this book?, The Undying Thing, Paul in another form, frustrating, where to go with its gears, supernatural events out of nowhere, contact from beyond the grave, philosophy and medical science, not totally out of nowhere, she was physically changing, the metamorphosis, mind-body relationship, how does the mind control the problem, the change in mind affects the body, the mind IS separate from the body, cheated, the railway accident, can Alice be Alice again, Alice Daniel, bored, interesting, Strange Case Dr Jekyll And Mr Hyde, he wants to part (by walking over kids), very banal Victorian stuff, wills, blackmail, dressing like a man, a mystery, men didn’t understand women at all, up on a pedestal, wanting to wear men’s clothes, freedom of movement, the woman becoming the man, a sort of queer story about transformation, the exciting undercurrent, a subtextual reading, deep into the subtext, reading it subversively, was there a murder?, a chivalrous man, their class relationship, emotional relationship (or lack there of), underground family secret, basically The Hound Of The Baskervilles but literally supernatural, some sort of sin tainting the genetics, divine retribution, by murder and theft, I am due elsewhere, he was killed twice, who smashed up all the equipment, we don’t see it on screen, Jesse’s reading, class revenge and gender swap, with our stupid narrator, so timorous, so conventional, a tool of the person who wants something, the two protagonists, we see so little from her point of view, The Thing On The Doorstep makes these things much more explicit, very subtle, The Moon-Slave, fairy tale France, The Glass Of Supreme Moments, Guy de Maupassant, a less passionate Philip K. Dick, an envious student, an Ayesha kind of figure, ascending through the fireplace, the way to read it, a glimpse of reality, dying of smoke inhalation, Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven, very interested in women, a princess who does not want to marry, a garden labyrinth, either Pan or the Devil, a story about menstruation, very subtle and very sensitive, the Victorians didn’t have twitter so they could focus pretty well, a contemporary review, The Sketch, cars, tires, women flying airplanes, high tech fun toys, Lord Dunsany, an unattributed review from June 4th, 1911, poets nowadays are tired, Science is assertively awake, the origins of Life, the purposes of Death, Poetry, the determination of the ego, in what does your self consist?, preserved in an asylum, the man’s self still persists, after luncheon, souls or selves, wropped in unscientific mystery, the kind of craft one would expect as a craftsman like the author, the character names, Alice In Wonderland, her Miss Lade, what has been mislaid?, laden, her soul weight is doubled at one point, Daniel = god is my judge, doing a good job, son of the earth, the will the estate, bundling the mom off to New York, background, Daniel’s interest in food, a point or a thesis, what humankind’s souls are, a Frankenstein story, scorned by his peers, a happy soldier, an Igor who’s also his wife, it feels “boring”, the book doesn’t have any the stuff we care about until half-way in, distracted by the blackmail, the Salvation Army, the other transformation, he’s trynna save his soul, is he wrong?, his blackmailer’s accusations, he was a bad dude, he musta lead thousands astray, a projection of his own guilt, our viewpoint character, the empty protagonist, he’s quite witty, as men get older they’re more likely to become neat, the phone calls, off to the countryside, a country home, killed on the way, train “accident”, this is too early for that person to have died, all part of a scheme, the premise, how exchanges of souls work, anesthetized too, the smoke as an anesthetic, a hypnogogic state, a story about immortality and avoiding death, transferring your consciousness into another person, a whole new life, Altered Carbon, a story about class, methuselahs never lack for bodies, an evil plan, revenge, the female spirit inside the physical brain of an old man, the haircolour change, Tuvix, Star Trek: Voyager, actor contracts, an answer to that question, the Federation seems really nice all the time, fucked up things in Federation culture, only normal from an American point of view, Star Trek: Picard, two hours of analysis and sensitivity reading, crossing the streams, The Boy Who Really Got It by Jesse, The End?, Daniel Dennett, a Twitter beef with Sam Harris, wrong about everything, a theory about what consciousness is, consciousness transference, Rollback by Robert J. Sawyer, the center of narrative gravity, a teapot, a uranium block glued to a teapot, anything with mass has a center of gravity, Rene Descartes, Phineas Gage, looking for a particular part of the brain, best mic, drop in history, souls aren’t real, a Douglas Adams reference, dreams where dead people come, a very cool dream, jellyfish style thing, you’re not dead, I got eaten by this monster thing, would you be back alive again the way you were, shot in the head, personality change, our spirit is physiological, its a software thing, Cyteen by C.J. Cherryh, the software is the hardware, silly theories about what sleep is for, all the studies looking for souls, a phone call in the middle of the night, spiritualism, Doyle wanted to believe, massive character flaw, giving money to grifters, a cultural judgement, this thread of mind-transference, quasi-spirtuality to scientific, they thought they were high tech doing spirtualism, Ghostbusters, psychokinetic energy, Dan Akroyd believes in that stuff, ghost hunting, hunting bigfoot is for exercise, playing a culturally important role, the essential work of ghost hunting, not reading enough books, religious people, rejecting the vast reality of the human experience, a character flaw Jesse is proud of, Evan’s missing out on, William James, Contact, Arthur C. Clarke, conflating vs. mentioning, materialist, Robert Sheckley, Gregg Margarite, Mindswap, picaresque, bildungsroman, travel to mars, vacation to Mars through consciousness transference, swapping genders and species, The Strange (RPG), he roamed the stars in a borrowed body searching for his own, pretty funny, a prurient 12 year old, the sexual aspect of switching bodies, like Dollhouse, back to the book, Compton the narrator, with eye-rolling frequency, too French, floppy tie, disgusted by music-hall female impersonators, tidying away this mystery, beloved research, historical letters from the Peninsular War, this great mystery of life, a rather revolting annoyance, humours essays, social satire, people who try not to be like other people are very tiresome (hipsters), another comic book biography of H.P. Lovecraft, translated from French, some factual errors, a really interesting letter Lovecraft wrote in the Omaha Bee, what does this mean?, his father sold some property there?, what does Compton do when not doing blackmail?, a bunch of letters from Wellington, a really publicly important thing, the equivalent of Churchill, the word, Evan!, after you die you can still have your will done in a WILL, it’s amazing, a part of somebody’s consciousnesses, what you’re doing is evil Will, Cecil Rhodes, an evil alliance that kinda worked out, Henry Ford’s estate, being an executor is a burden, harm through social structures, the fairer sex, why she wants to be a man, Barry Pain is very good at not making it super-obvious, the ratings are very high, it doesn’t overstay its welcome, he’s going to his death in a calm and nice way, there’s a poignancy, his personal world is going to end, The Last Policeman by Ben H. Winters, which is the best Ringworld book?, they get progressively worse, diminishing returns, Larry Niven, self-criticism, take lessons, sometimes people write about stuff, the best general history of The Reformation, getting all corrupt, a very Douglas Adamsy thing, More Of God’s Greatest Mistakes, a trilogy in 5 parts, exchange of dogs, a subsequent chapter, hinted very strongly, the face being disfigured was deliberate, transferred into another body, Jesse wants to read it subversively, Trish didn’t see it at all, in cases of supermen stories, breaking it down, Captain America: The First Avenger, the hydra guys, bald guy actor, the recipe can’t be repeated, one and done, Stanley Tucci, Big Night (1996), once the equipment is destroyed, who wants to do this again?, is Jesse crazy?, accursed of murder, she burned her hair in the oven, covering up, smells bad, a lotta lies, Compton is incompetent, a window on events almost too passively, a distraction, British murder mysteries, inheritance of property, the whole book is a distraction to Compton, coming to terms with death, literally doing what Frankenstein wants to do: defeat death, abandoning progeny, both ghosts, all delusions, another lie, incurious, covering up, if this was a true story, he’s a briber, he doesn’t do anything immoral, he’s trying to be dispassionate, I found I had a lot more friends than I though I did, hilarious, if you buy a beach house you suddenly find you have a lot of relatives, upperclass twits, who are their patients?, paying off, class stuff, drinking to much, gambling debts, class concerns going up and down, rich people’s problems, the exploitation of a nice person, a more sinister story than it looks and feels, proposing a term, back and forth, social customs, the science fictional aspects, the main aspects, a tragedy of manners, not a comedy of manners, what gives the story its juice, weird customs and judgements, what they say about each other when their not around, I’ll tell him what you said, you see that in science fiction too, space opera, who’s on the cover, who’s being looked at, that’s a really striking cover, that lady is our subject (object), A Princess Of Mars, her husband is the subject of the sentence and she’s the object, who’s that behind her, his tie is not that floppy, looking at her askance, sort of faded, astral projection, he’s got some doubt in his mind, the mom, what is she in there for?, what’s the point of that?, the governess, light and fluffy, pairings we want to see, European princesses, my son should marry her, he’s an up and comer, servants are sources of amusement, golf cartoons, Trump golfing when 100,000 people were dead, Jimmy Carter was near the bottom, a business man’s thing, money money money, ground Alice, her accent changed, London accent to upper-crust accent, so malleable, why he’s choosing her, he really likes the apartment, access to materials, disgraced, moving people away, they’re betrothed, she thinks it is for Alice’s health, supposed to be read subversively, he doesn’t kick his audience in the balls and run off he tweaks their nose, people need Paul, he’s the nexus the axis the axel.

Posted by Jesse Willis Become a Patron!

The SFFaudio Podcast #535 – READALONG: The Pirates Of Ersatz by Murray Leinster

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #535 – Jesse, Paul Weimer, Maissa Bessada, Julie Davis, and Terence Blake talk about The Pirates Of Ersatz by Murray Leinster

Talked about on today’s show:
The Pirates Of Zan, translation, there’s no planet named Ersatz, inferior substitute, pirate planet, a terrible pirate, a great pirate, a successful pirate, replacement pirates, Darth pirates, actors, so fun, The people of Walden are pirating themselves, Zan pirates, regular boring farming, he wanted adventure, cover with a slide rule in his teeth, he wanted to be an engineer, climbing into the boat, a stun pistol, Jesse read it 10 years ago, forgettable fun, comic novels, The Incomplete Enchanter by Fletcher Pratt and L. Sprague de Camp, Space Viking by H. Beam Piper, between the two poles, Joseph Andrews by Henry Fielding, a road trip, a means of pointing out flaws in society, “audiobooks are books, Paul”, back when Jesse was angry about stuff on the internet, the same Kurt Vonnegut story: 2BOR02B, where the PDF Page came from, The Aliens by Murray Leinster read by Julie Davis, Forgotten Classics, you’re welcome for the audiobook, the Astounding book, a nominee for the Hugo, Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein, Sirens Of Titan, definitely written for John W. Campbell, the competent man, a comedic novel, The Stainless Steel Rat by Harry Harrison, Deathworld by Harry Harrison, there are better con-men novels, with less infodumping, his tricks, not cheating as much as we might guess, Jesse is not an electrical engineer, everything is wirelessly charged, this is all very plausible (in theory), everyone is getting cooked with microwaves, magnetic coils, how romantic, a Tesla thing, a wireless radio without a battery, the radio waves themselves are the power, Julie wants no more details, the central problem and its resolution, a “death ray”, being set-up, an unintended consequence, he wrapped it up nicely, virtually in suspense, the political/sociological heft, a little too pat, the ambassador and the grandfather are the Heinlein characters, the mental wisdom for Hodan, oh yeah, gotta bunch of wisdom to instill in this kid, Walden Pond, here’s what comes from too much peace, stasis, civilization, the most civilized planet, frontier mentality, tranquilizing society, taking Oxycontin in their main hobby, the Captain Kirk of their society, an agent of chaos, he facilitates, some more of the embassies, the kind of Earth empire (not even a confederation), a larger universe, central authority, feudal chaos, different polities, a space patrol, The High Crusade by Poul Anderson, green-skinned aliens, the Krishna novels, fauna and flora, legalistic arguments down to a fine art, culturally sophisticated, the lord of this and the king of that, the bride of our hero, “this is the woman for you, dude”, the angriest woman in the universe, Chekov’s gun, Netta, the glamour of being associated with a pirate, cowing the barbarians, she wants to make a nice girl out of me, speaking of gender, the Gendered Text Project, suddenly everything’s different, when Bree Hodan…, she was a delightful girl, the weirdest one, it changes the feel, a basic romance, non-binary, Bryn, hir room, zee went to bed, hir ambitions, zee’d be well to do, such prospects made for good sleeping, grandPARENT, what does this do to the original story, kind of like a Conan story, the fools all around them, a softer Conan story, a very weird concept (with that in mind), the male version of the book, Thor is female (or was), a female Wolverine, a novel of a capable man, a capable woman (a Mary Sue), unlikeable, fun and helpful, what happens to your perception, Derek was almost like a female character to begin with, backing into the piracy, originally funnier, who wants to go off an be a civil engineer?, messing around, a new company comes out, ebooks, the Adult version of Harry Potter, Harriet Potter, does that inform your writing, copyright laws, we need a new clause, Indian films, Ghajini (2008) is the Hindi version of Memento (2000), non-creative, zero-respect, the point of writing a book, nyah nyah nop eugh, Julian Assange being taken out of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, shelter, citizenship, citizenship revoked, “crime”, the science fiction romp frothiness vs. realpolitik, could that fictional embassy possibly exist?, how striking, shimmying down a rope, heat guns, a very Cory Doctorow thing, flashmobs, an ad on Craigslist: white wig and blue shirt, 10,000 Julian Assanges, embassy intrigue, not that kind of science fiction (really serious about politics), an adventure story, razed in a day, England and embassies, not so much pirates, Pirates Of Darth, the Danegeld, some viking will take them up on it, semi-civilized, William the Bastard, invading a neighbouring island (England), the really fun part, the homeless people are his fleet, sense of empathy, he’d been cheated, so angry, with the insurance, the bonuses, it’s his character, a soft-hearted pirate, why’d you come to a poor place, the poor will give you everything, the underclass, high fleet admiral, against the elites, the Walden society is fucked up, Robert E. Howard’s theories about civilization and barbarism, built-up capital, addiction and getting servants in to pick your crops, a built-in establishment likes they way things work out for them, not everyone is equally powerful, cops vs. judges, a critique of 1959 USA, a lot of lines like this, a lot of frothiness, the background buildup in the philosophy of the world, in cahoots, in support of that system, from the fourth paragraph, good writing, quite pretty, the highest in the Nurmi cluster, a supply of tranquilizers, the tigers aren’t after us at this very moment, blackbears aren’t super-dangerous, a bear up stuck in a tree, wealthy humans getting excited about a bear, so few bear skeletons found in trees, would they notice with one hand clapping?, straight thinking is a delusion, real things aint simple, aint clear, make it as complicated as you can, isn’t that the way, we’ll just do this to do that, that bit of wisdom, how politicians get out of hot water, death ray vs. he literally fell out of a tree, tying everything back in, luring them into understanding how it works, using them as a means to his end, in dealing with other peoples problems you can solve your problems, a helluva lot better neighbour, its not your business, US public healthcare would force Canada to go left, Jagmeet Singh, the US government can’t administer Medicare very well, corruption, we have to up our game, Jesse is not wrong, Canada defines itself in opposition to the USA, Nice, France, from the outsiders outsiders point of view, how clear that question was, 42, Twitter as a medium of links and pictures, Gilles Deleuze, the grandfather’s idea, piracy is good for the economy, things only work because they break down, piracy is a good think, a timid introverted poor student from Australia who went to France, a powerful thinker, what old guys thought might make sense, that history of failure is fascinating, see where someone else made this mistake a long time ago, 1987, an English teacher in a technical high-school, terminal, a couple of hours of philosophy a week, six or seven hours a week, general culture, written in the 1950s, this depiction of piracy, stasis vs. disorder, a product of its time?, relative stability, would people go for it?, a precarious situation, does this novel work today, Frederik Pohl, P. Schuyler Miller, adventure yarning, of piece of lightweight for entertainment purposes only, sneaks up on you, something funny about the names, Hodan like Odin, Bran, brain vs. brawn, Darth is dearth, things with the names, order and chaos, no longer applicable, capitalism is based on producing as much disorder as possible, Crim is the ultimate capitalist, Walden is sublimation, full of crackpots, for spite, a subtle sort of hidden intellectual side to the story, spot on, John Clute, “a competent but unremarkable space opera”, a series of planetary romances, The Odyssey, picaresque, Penelope isn’t delightful so he goes back with Circe, coming to mind, stasis vs. richness, Jesus: feel sorry for the rich man, a cyclical need, Jesse wants to read more of these, other Leinsters, The Forgotten Planet, A Logic Named Joe, Journey To Barkut, William F. Jenkins, one of the earliest science fiction writers of the pulp era, making a living, Police Your Planet by Lester del Rey, Badge Of Infamy, The Green Odyssey by Philip Jose Farmer, humans are pretty funny, a smelly barbarian queen, he delicately disassembled, a very nice sweeping line, one could spend a lifetime, absolutely true, industriously reading pirated books, so important, torrent site, not available in his region, deathbed conversion, sin-eater, something real about the piracy thing, the title is already a parody (of The Pirates Of Penzance by Gilbert and Sullivan), making fun of the romantic idea of piracy, the pirate nation known as the United States, Fred Himebaugh’s pirate novel (with Blackbeard as president), USA maintains a shit list, yo ho ho and a bagful of books, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, Laughing Shall I Die: Lives and Deaths of the Great Vikings by Tom Shippey, viking is a verb, you get a song out of it, heroic lifestyle, the Wild West, threats vs. warnings, we need an audiobook of this book, the last John W. Campbell story, angels, Alec Nevala-Lee, philosophy as a sort of science fiction, people are complex numbers existing on an imaginary axis, a last joke, Campbell’s definition of science fiction, non-philosophy, he’s gone beyond everyone, September 1971, On The Nature Of Angels, a pun, the really sad part, adhering the copyright law is hurting people, playing a little bit fast and loose, makes sense, a “sample”, pirates are nice folks, generally helpful, helping the insurance industry, Walden to the nth level, sad story for them, romance adventure and derring-do, The Runaway Skyscraper by Murray Leinster, stf = scientificition, Jules Verne, Edgar Allan Poe, H.G. Wells, 40 years later, 1919 – 1959, LibriVox, on the lam, The Creatures Of The Abyss, good basic pulp-type story, Sidewise In Time, passenger pigeons are back, pulpy goodness, alternate histories, Star Trek, First Contact, here’s an idea, poor Tom Godwin couldn’t write his way out of a wet paper bag, thick accent that infests every sentence, getting more Leinster up.

Ace Books, 66525, The Pirates Of Zan

The Pirates Of Zan, 1974

Kelly Freas' The Pirates Of Ersatz

Piratefleet Over Darth

ACE Books D-403, The Pirates Of Zan

The Pirates Of Zan, 1989

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #506 – READALONG: Brain Wave by Poul Anderson

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #506 – Jesse, Scott, and Paul Weimer talk about Brain Wave by Poul Anderson

Talked about on today’s show:
1953/1954, people and animals getting smarter on the Earth, Space Science Fiction, the 2nd half was never published, the first half is public domain, Greg Bear and Poul Anderson’s daughter, bad logic, a strange curiosity, 1953, oh crap my subscription’s lapsed!, The Escape, putting Poul Anderson on notice!, Scott’s prediction, idea science fiction, fantastic, very good, the reviews, what people love about it, too short?, 164 pages, Archie Brock, Jesse is not here to poop on the book, the imagery, the opening, Ray Bradbury, an elephant, a chimpanzee with a shotgun, these covers are weird, not a novel about an animal uprising, that’s not what you see mostly, didn’t come to fruition, throwaway stuff, a revolution in Africa, a one off, gorillas organizing, Protector by Larry Niven, A Fire Upon The Deep by Vernor Vinge, the laws of thought in different in different parts of the galaxy, Earth is in the slow zone, stories that nest within this premise, a dampening field was turned off, echoes in other stories about intelligence or stupidity, Anderson didn’t say enough, it wasn’t philosophical enough, the dog, reflection on motivation, reading news reports, the Chinese army has defected, characters coming up with explanations for other characters to shoot down, a shotgun approach, the Goodreads reviews, a good idea for a bunch of different writers to tackle, Mike Resnick can take a bone and chew on it real good, Rachel In Love by Pat Murphy, Flowers For Algernon, a lack of focus, a whole novel about that farm, what does it mean to be smart, people going crazy, its better to be stupid (so as to not be unhappy), a philosophical meditation or exploration, among the scientists, cut the book up, the space stuff is supposed to make us think, is there something that we don’t see?, that’s amazing, no backup systems, no safeguards, an arrogance there, hubris!, racing brains, manic, what about the insects?, the pigs, it almost turned into Animal Farm for a minute, how George Orwell’s novel can be explained, bees, ants, social insects, the higher animals, working at real speed, shrew to humans, reptiles, fish, what about all the aquatic mammals, dolphins and whales, So Long And Thanks For All The Fish, he isn’t really interested in the animals except on the farm, 5 times boost, critical mass, let’s explore what intelligence is, is this about school?, more facts, more history, math, train you up, a useful and functional member of society, quitting your job and moving to the country, Clifford D. Simak’s City stories, it’s not a metaphor, what Anderson thinks education is about, they never make the whole planet dumb, a sidebar, save humanity by making it dumb, so 2018, The Food Of The Gods by H.G. Wells, an apple the size of a basketball (or bigger), a scientific adventure romance, a fabulation, a fertilizer that boosts production, the ultimate result, a homeostasis, profits are always temporary, no eternal profits (or prophets either), very sparky for ideas, no answers, a real thorny issue, The Marching Morons by C.M. Kornbluth, Scott is surprised, if you multiply everyone’s intelligence by 5 the system we live in will fall apart, rote jobs, the elevator job, the farm job, Sheila wasn’t very bookish (was looking into the abyss), Jesse doesn’t know what intelligence is, very pleasant house frau, deep conversations, dissatisfied, I don’t want to know, red pill blue pill, is that intelligence, so small, people don’t enjoy things except for food, bad coffee, super geniuses on top of super geniuses, IQ, what IQ tests are, we’ve got morons and we’ve got imbeciles, problematic language, disability to the mean, mental disabilities, mental classes, does existential angst only kick-in at a certain intelligence class?, sphere of influence, put things back the way it was, there wasn’t a universal thesis, intelligence is a bag, this explains voting, you guys aren’t doing it right, “if everybody got a 5x boost Hillary would be president”, why not the American army, ho one gets classified as an officer (vs. a grunt), why is Sgt. Rock a sergeant, the iconic Nick Fury (and his Howling Commandos), the top of the competence chain, he isn’t saying specific, no single thesis, what is intelligence, bad at math good at smelling bullshit, sometimes stupid sometimes smart, gradients or thresholds, here’s a massive effect, why do so many move to the country?, circumstances and limitations, intellectual limitations vs. vs. power limitations, the rabbit has not hand, power and manipulation, no matter how smart dolphins are they don’t impact us?, what’s a dolphin going to do with a ship?, what’s in the black box (underneath)?, Jesse will shut up for a while, no evolutionary pressure to increase intelligence after a certain level, no supersingularity civilizations, humans can now explore the galaxy, what is that going to do?, human-alien relations, story possibilities, now what?, leaving it hopeful at the end, categories of human, the level we used to be, good luck and godspeed, neanderthals and homo sapiens, recolonize the earth, what the pigs have to say about being slaughtered, veganism, pigs are ok to eat because they’re yummy, negotiations, mutually yummy, we’re mutually yummy, chicken eggs, how much is language importance to intelligence?, dogs and pigs and the elephant, a new logical language, natural shorthand, efficiency of communication, pretty hungry, now the sheep knows what’s happening, cows don’t want to go in the slaughterhouse, in the queue, I’ve heard Bessie, what does this mean?, an animal with human level intelligence and no thumbs and no fire, new sets of questions, selection pressure, no hands and no speech, Lawrence M. Schoen’s Barsk, uplift, Startide Rising by David Brin, a driving thesis, it doesn’t really work that way, reading the gossip column, poetry is making her depressed, we need to develop a new philosophy, usually the problems, what is the new relationship on the farm going to be?, what should happen?, should we stop eating meat?, if pigs were intelligent(er), lots of experience with cows, feral pigs in Texas, vegetarianism, dairy, slaughtering animals for meat, another thing Anderson doesn’t think about, what about Africa?, Mountain Lions are lions, they can’t eat vegetables, carnivores, what are the predator prey dynamics, birds of prey, intelligence is associated with hunting, instincts to huddle up and get in the center, runaway or get to the center, hide and kill, wolves, stalk, kill, a major disruptor of ecology, what will the wolves do, Traveller (RPG), the entire Earth’s ecology will be disrupted, what we don’t see, the amount of time spent under tutelage, both kids in college, an empty nest, 18 years in the nest, most animals, insects and snakes never meet their parents, hunting skills, a full fledged member of the group, the cultural tools, linguistic tools, not just for poetry, much more to be said on this topic, a place to spark ideas from, not the end word on it, from Locus magazine, what five books would I like to be remembered for? Tau Zero, Mid Summer Tempest, The Boat Of A Million Year, Three Hearts And Three Lions, The Enemy Stars, Brain Wave, what science fiction does best, maybe one more chance, thank you Paul, he didn’t put the High Crusade on the list, Call Me Joe, funny and fun.

Space Science Fiction, September 1953

BLACKSTONE AUDIO - Brain Wave by Poul Anderson

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #471 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: Out Of The Earth by Arthur Machen

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #471 – Out Of The Earth by Arthur Machen; read by Mr Jim Moon. This is an unabridged reading of the short story (21 minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants in the discussion include Jesse, Paul Weimer, and Mr Jim Moon.

Talked about on today’s show:
the proper pronunciation of Machen, Arthur Llewellyn Jones, Up Under The Roof by Manly Wade Wellman, apprentice journalist, The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen, The Lost Club, Reading, Short And Deep, identicals, a Hellfire Club, a big scary black book, never heard from again, a very weird story, truly as the first weird fiction author, Edgar Allan Poe, cosmicism, Mr Weird, H.P. Lovecraft, “it is this”, M.R. James, bedrock authors, Machen lived this stuff, a real-life magical society, the Esoteric Order of the Golden Dawn, W.B. Yates, a genuine mystic, landscape, in the modern world people see things on the surface and don’t apprehend the meaning, meta narrative, the interior story, so deeply framed, so nested, the hoopla surrounding The Bowmen, it’s not the story, the story is not the story, the story is the effect of the story, embarrassed by the story, a disappointment, surprisingly funny, a bit of whimsy, the early weeks of WWI, a ray of hope, taken as a genuine report from the front line, the Angel of the Mons, fighting the tide, how rumours take hold without any evidence, “snow on your boots”, reading it a straight up, a weird meta-fiction, pre-Borges, this sounds familiar, so popular, side projects, tales, stories, a meme, fascinating, how many Machens?, not a good story, T.P.’s Weekly, November 22nd, 1915, the retreat from Mons (August 1914), September 1914, six months later, weird podcasts, Tin Foil Hat Podcast, part of being an adult is being interested in the truth, conspiracy, half of capitalism, Clinton and Pizzagate, really fucked up things going on in government, punishment for plebs, a Clinton, New York child sex scandal, in the memory, it couldn’t be killed, all the letters Machen got, death threats, bottom up stories and top down stories, Russia! Russia! Russia!, collaborating or colluding, a conspiracy theorist, the person who testified who can’t be found, the Russian rumor, reports of Russian troops seen in Britain, a plague of spies, Cossacks at train stations heading south, a huge flap, a third myth, the Rape of Belgium, a rumour among German troops, resisting the invasion, buckets full of eyes, necklaces of German soldiers’ eyeballs, breasts cut off, every conceivable atrocity, a British censor on war time reports, the liars did very well, James Hayward’s Myths And Legends Of The First World War, German corpse factories, “the vile Hun”, fake news, the horrible little children, the Edwardian equivalent of the internet, into the papers in a round about fashion, how the nature of rumor and myth begins, transmitted in times of uncertainty and trouble, official news sources, Fox News, MSNBC, CNN, they’re all correct, CIA infiltration of news agency [and MI5 screening of BBC], a lack of news, filling the gap with whatever they can find, the whole Russia story, 13 Russian trolls, Facebook ads, “the big gotcha moment”, the Internet Research Agency, in the business of trolling (for money), fake accounts, we have these rubes, for commercial purposes, Trump somehow helped the Russians hack the DNC servers?, borders mean nothing to the ultra-rich, puppets, Bernie-bro,

“army recruiters reported problems in explaining the origins of [WWI] in legalistic terms” hence an evolution in tactics, or different tactics for different classes, or the intellectual vs. the visceral

posters from 1914 and 1918

Seventy years ago your great-grandfathers and their great-grandfathers signed a document that made certain guarantees about Belgium’s neutrality.

vs.

Remember when the Germans raped their way through Belgium

this was Pearl Harbor!, why this story is so relevant, the thing that is the story, a powerful point about war, Morgan the childlike man, Castle Coch, the Red Keep, read about Belgium, and think they could haven been more than five or six years old, they were to ear what slime is to the touch, blasphemies struck like blows, a swarm of noise-some creatures, children with old men’s faces, one paragraph, Morgan to dream of Avalon, to purge himself of the fuming corruption of the streets, is this a true story?, places that are deprived and poor, the underwolves, super-predators, the Central Park five, seven fold increase in prison population, harvesting slaves, whatever new drug it is, top down or bottom up, moral panics, juvenile delinquents, hoodies, chavs, thuggish people, picked up by politicians, class war, welfare is for crack and knives, mainstream news, rock and roll, Beatles records, video nasties, horror comics, Dungeons & Dragons, video game violence, Trayvon Martin, manipulate the facts, the funny children, is Machen starting another story?, this is how I make this stuff up, the myth of the JD (juvenile delinquent), teddy boys, rockers, mods, a Bank Holiday British tradition, Quadrophenia, arguments about-for-and-against education, bad seeds, evil children, The Midwich Cuckoos, teenage hoodlums, Graham Greene’s The Destructors, free rides, sticking it to the man, sense of power, community centers, midnight basketball, psychology, the irresistible impulse to knock over a house of cards, the impulse for destruction, they just came in from Siberia, a train ride from Scotland, the British, Americans, and Canadians invade Siberia to try to reverse the Russian Revolution, The Sandbaggers, the rumour becomes the reality, wanting to believe the legend, not caring about evidence, fossilized in this story, what Robert E. Howard calls the little people, elves and trolls and gremlins, from fantasy to fake news, fake fairies, a strange new power, The Novel Of The Black Seal, The Novel Of The White Powder, Panther paperback, terrible cruel dwarf elves, the horror of war, he took a long time to get there, what’s this mention of Belgium, the worst swearword known in the galaxy, a weird momentum, the story has to keep replicating, the introduction to The Bowmen And Other Stories, the answer of course is in the question, struggles in truth in news, false, the seedbed for new conspiracy theories, official unknown sources, trying to fill dead air, Mr Jim Moon’s Folklore On Friday articles, Krampus, absolute bullshit, Mr Jim Moon’s shows on Halloween, the received wisdom is always wrong, a new dark age, perceiving reality, where this story is set, who’s saying it, there are so many narrators, real places, Glastonbury Tor, Morgan le Fay, the myth of Avalon seems to be a bottom up story, Geoffrey Of Monmouth, Mallory, John Boorman’s Excalibur, a gel filter, the land of the fairy, Morgan le Fay is she has sex with her half brother, Mordred is killed by Arthur, Arthur is wounded and goes to the island of Avalon where he is healed by his sister and the mother of his child, how you get out of the horror of the Belgian horror, internecine war, the Kaiser and the Czar hugging each other.

propaganda evolution in WWI

The Angels Of The Mons

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #463 – READALONG: Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #463 – Jesse, Paul Weimer, Marissa van Uden, Bryan Alexander, Luke Burrage, and Maissa Bessada discuss Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan

Talked about on today’s show:
2002, a pretty good book, cyberpunk continuing, classic film noir detective stuff, sleeving, an old book, the Netflix TV adaptation, 10 years of the Science Fiction Book Review Podcast, too heavy, too violent, sex scenes, long and graphic, too much tumescence?, a major part of the book, having partial control of your body, Ortega connection, his dick understands, your biology and your mind, Luke is his penis and his brain, the disconnect, what a lot of this book is, hard to listen to a narrator narrate, not Morgan’s forte, the action, the love of the guns, the sheen of the blades, a really interesting idea book, the second and the third book, the narrator’s pronunciation of Kovach (in book 2 and 3), Todd McClaren’s narration, a causal vs a casual link, Bancroft has Mr Burns (from The Simpsons) voice, thinking about the sex and the violence, a book about the first year of the war on terror?, Battlestar Galactica, part of his identity, a ghost in the book, The Maltese Falcon, Bay City, a setup for the traditional private eye novel, hardboiled novels, the femme fatale, the noir detective, a murder mystery, a locked room murder mystery, a false ending, we are with the detective, proper timing, missing the whole lightness of being, it feels like a first novel, merging a hardboiled detective novel with a real science fiction idea, alien technology, the perennial spoilers are uninteresting conversation, consciousness uploading and downloading, a whole economy that works inside of the technological system, real death, “organic damage”, Prof. Eric S. Rabkin’s “transformed language”, capitalism can go a step further, repossessing you body, mortgaging your body, what the riches of the ultra-capitalist winners look like, Market Forces, Morgan understands global capitalism in a way few science fiction writers rarely do, Neuromancer by William Gibson, when Case disparaging the meat-sack, so much smoking, sleeve-sickness, cross-sleeving, a fourth book?, skip to the third book, Broken Angels, military SF, Woken Furies, Quellist struggles, the ideal series, like Doctor Who or James Bond, what would normally trigger a lot of people, a big backlash?, racism-proof, accidentally funny, whitewashing, not enough of the Asian identity, two different faces in the mirror, Ghost In The Shell (2017), Maissa was witness to the Falcon Heavy launch and recovery, making note of Miriam Bancroft, Jesse tells a story that turns out to be importantly incorrect, loving James M. Cain at age 14 or 15?, a terrible crash of destiny, stories about femme fatales, which Takeshi Kovacs, childhood memories set the program, telling Jesse’s sad stories, feeling betrayed, face punch exchanges, you’re not supposed to hit women, legitimate hitting, resonating for a reason, personality formation, not enough or the right kind of trauma, all kinds of experiences, resleeving and doing the podcast again, weird connections, identical twin problems, growing up and not being a single human unit, Luke and Nathan go to see the head teacher, tedious and annoying and boring, that’s not the fun game, everybody got Luke and his brother mixed up, what it’s like to be your own identical twin, one particular trauma to magnify, how long will it take to be two different people, rock-paper-scissors, virtual, taking the randomness out of it, taking out all the whims, how can they even be throwing differently, quantum improbabilities, slight differences, it isn’t chance, trying to lose, fun sex party, second guessing to win and lose, how attached they were to that life, proud to have been able to have killed himself, a will, the institution of you continuing on after your death, codicils, the A.I. hotel, Jimi Hendrix, Purple Haze, the reason for the change, the Hendrix estate, Hendrix was a big fan of SF, the language of H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, the sidekick, a second trope, the possessive girlfriend nature of the hotel, a lot more personality, meeting the Hendrix, social graces and hotel service, subsumed inside his job, everybody in the police station has a mohawk, why does Ortega cut her own hair?, an undeveloped plot thread?, she’s Catholic, is it possible she doesn’t have a cortical stack implant?, everybody would have the scar, savoring that idea, when you can live forever and nothing can kill you, less meaning to existence, savouring the moments, never do a show twice, we’re never going to do one again, poignancy, the upcoming Dune show, the holiday lasted forever, permanent memoirs, people re-act, the physicality of the sonic booms, startling emotions, why am I crying?, death is more meaningful, seeing in the background, the first bit of violence, death isn’t final, “we saved the stack”, sixteen real deaths, more meaningful, not just movie violence, Ryker didn’t like mohawks, the default in computer gaming is multiple games, iron man mode, flushing your cache, stuck with the consequences, get to the next screen, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds vs. Battlefield 4, completely different vibes, paranoia sneaks up on you, constant electrical shocks, one life to live mode, all the more meaningful, an accomplishment, the highest highs and the lowest lows, as a game mechanic, thirty minutes in, becoming very meaningful, seeming to rely on neurochem as superhero juice, neurochemicals, if you can control your neurochemicals you can control a lot of your world, dials you can up or down, pouring my coffee is doing the neurochem, anticipating the hit, fight sequences, about the meths, meth now means something else, more relevant, economic inequality, more in the consciousness, about the 1%, eat the rich, Black Man aka Thirteen, the Jesus-land idea, a very different resonance, a just reward for hard work, race and gender, the U.S. Democratic party, still fighting the 2016 election, a dystopia in the worst way, everything we have now except it will never end!, Baby Boomers, Nancy Pelosi sacrificed herself by standing for eight hours, Morgan really knows what’s going on, his wife is Spanish, teaching English in non-English countries, a world book, the quintessential American noir detective novel, not Agatha Christie, the femme fatale wife, the ultra rich guy paying the bills, private justice, the cop who is the enemy and the friend, a tangled romantic past, all backstory, his body has a history, he has a history outside his body, well layered, the Patchwork Man story, Frankenstein, Golems, Neuromancer, just delete me, man, Galatea 2.0 by Richard Powers, Charles Stross, Douglas Adams, Raymond Chandler, his politics, economics, deep corruption, strikingly feminist, strikingly anti-religion, these resonate, the triad boss, it feels like fifteen short stories before it, the pacing, what would you cut, the book is about the sex, cut down the fights, the Thunderdome, Head-In-The-Clouds, kung-fu for 15 minutes, and now a gunfight, fade to black, toggling the text in or out, dial it up, you can’t easily skim read an audiobook, super-aware of the narrator, Jonathan Davis on performing sex scenes, the post torture rampage, time working differently in virtual, the rampage feels lifted straight out of Robert E. Howard’s The Vale Of Lost Women, rampage mode, stack killing (RDs), a very dark Dashiell Hammett, Red Harvest, the weapon that he is, an important scene, the unicorn backpack is turning into a meme, to film that scene, designed to be a film, it isn’t a Blade Runner rip-off, a different kind of dystopia, we’re going on a run, the visual connections, a cartoon, why can’t all cityscapes, Blade Runner: 2049 as a silent film or a wordless film, plenty of direct links, “freeze and enhance”, Rick Deckard, bounty hunter and mercenary, film noir tropes, the visuals do not come out of the book, let’s play out the same thought experiments, everything is at night in the rain, Dark City (1998), off to the rest of the galaxy, stagnation, why is it so conservative?, the leftovers, Earth?, that shithole, this is not the home planet, quaint and ancient, a lampshading way of saying we’re not going to invent that much more, how hard it is to write near future SF, why isn’t it called San Fransisco, PoCo, IOCO, PoMo, slang terms, more transformed language, Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler, Harlan’s World = Harlan Ellison’s world, UBC Museum of Anthropology, mossy and rocky with beautiful forest, mom and dad and sister, not just a rampage book, smoking, what is it like to come back to the homeworld and think of it as a dump?, The Impossible Planet, Wall-E, Milk Of Paradise by James Triptree, Jr., environmental, on the nose, the underbelly, Head-In-The-Clouds vs. Licktown, seeing what it is, Miriam Bancroft, Chinatown (1974), the proposition, ‘it’s all about the money, man’, the puppetry by the rich of the inconsequential, where are they getting all the human bodies?, disposiblity, working to grow your clown, a mismatch between the scarcity of bodies and the plurality of bodies, increasing the number of crimes, The Jigsaw Man by Larry Niven, exploitation, synth-bodies, The Crack In Space, an orbiting whorehouse, Westworld, loving one and not caring about another, feeling a connection, an anti-hero, rooting for the mission (not the man), Jimmy’s story, Poe, a fairly good job at adapting, Dollhouse, body hopping, virtual reality, an almost sexual urge, the show’s appeals, the grandma, exiting Bryan’s brain, bonding with the main character, Luke thinks about his penis a lot, fun to read, such a sad life, a twisted sense of humour, skewering global capitalism, Car Wars, hedge-fund managers play Mad Max, what’s wrong with us, we’re being manipulated, extending life, what about everybody else?, leave the planet, if we don’t treat it as a metaphor, people act as if, this long view of the world, Bancroft has been alive longer than the history of my planet, would you live in this world?, taking a chance, in a sim?, South America, India, dystopia is already here it’s just not evenly distributed, hanging out with Ortega, super-corrupt, Ryker would go around beating people up, torture program, we did that, there are no good cops, seeing the world from the civilian POV, seeing cyberpunk having an extended life, sub-genres, steampunk, alternate history, Ridley Scott, more of that, not that many good ones, Neuromancer remains the great one, a subterranean vibe, a masterpiece you don’t enjoy watching, such a cultural impact, what comes through, Jack Womack, computer gaming, manga, power and influence, to persist, looking back over the years in science fiction, we’re too close, Gollanz Masterwork series, wait twenty years, 40 years for Moby-Dick, we’re accelerated, what is the good movie?, the Best Picture Oscar winners are a photo-negative of quality, hype machine, more than a twitter, good speech takes a long time, short speech is advertising, Mad Max: Fury Road, come back in a new sleeve in twenty years, all the evil corportations are named S.A., the European version of LLC, Tessier-Ashpool S.A., the orbital battle scenes, the client, Miriam Bancroft gets a punch in the face from me, the fist remembers, Annihilation, a long time since Berlin, hiking the hills, Honeybear lives, organic dog damage, does the dog have a person in it, a tiger sleeve, sleeved in a snake, What It Is Like To Be A Bat, qualia, an attempted-masturbation scene.

Altered Carbon - The Patchwork Man

Altered Carbon street scene

Carbone Modifie

TANTOR - Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #460 – READALONG: Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #460 -Jesse, Paul Weimer, and Maissa Bessada talk about Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Talked about on today’s game:
the television series, Lenny Henry, Chef, tribes of homeless people in London, the novel, a little sandwich, what book would you take to a desert island?, The Sandman, not the way that things usually run, in the back of Paul’s mind, a full and visceral fall into London Below, the audio drama, Paul buys too many ebooks and audiobooks, Paul’s poor little TV, a new life in the world below, the sewer folk, the comic book adaptation, sadly and tragically, Glen Fabry, Preacher, DC Vertigo, Door has a keyhole over her eye, a completely different vision, insane, shot on videotape, early Doctor Who, Paterson Joseph, Mr Croup and Mr Vandermar, working hard to say bad things about Neverwhere, a children’s book for adults (true about everything Neil Gaiman writes), a metaphor for homelessness, Mr Stockton, Richard’s career as a security analyst, a metaphor for going inside yourself, looking for a critique, real damn good, a sketch, suggesting rather than telling, when Gaiman goes spare he goes better, Charles Dickens, here comes the pressure, the new illustrated edition, William Morrow Harper Collins, Chris Riddell, illustrations throughout, long noses, an eye, a branch twining through the pages, taking you down into it, the Angel Islington, Door is a child, Anesthesia, parallel characters, packed with illustrations, old-wordiness, “entwined”, Jesse’s book fell through the cracks, allusions to semi-mythical literary stuff, referencing earlier materials, The Graveyard Book, The Lord Of The Rings, Alice In Wonderland, Coraline, WONDERFUL, Neil Gaiman tattoos, we completely agree Neil Gaiman is awesome, Gaiman speaks to people, The New Mother by Lucy Clifford, why is it called Neverwhere?, physical place that has never existed in time, that fairy tale fantasy title, Stardust, reflective, gods and angels, pixie-like elfin girls, killers with knives, The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling, a murder of a family, a knife in the darkness, the backstory of this book, getting the same stuff in a different package, writing about marriage, a hand in the darkness, consider how London Below works, an unperson, utterly cut-off, social interaction, hitting Paul in the feels, nobody gives a damn if I live or die, tapping into fundamental fears, deep and true mythic social stuff, the beginning and the end, so much really works, very H.P. Lovecraft, Celephaïs by H.P. Lovecraft, disconnection with reality, the doubt, the ordeal, the trial, a subversion reading that’s IN the text, on the train platform, suicide, potent stuff, if they wanted to film it again today, too sensitive, romanticizing homelessness, if you’ve ever gone camping, romantic in the theoretical or in retrospect but there’s no romance in reality, too empathetic, an issue, defenses built up, its very very hard, people are strong even when they’re strong in the wrong ways, a problem you can’t easily fix, homelessness, many kinds of failures, Jessica’s reaction to Door’s body lying there, getting taken, a horrible thing to say “the all have homes, really”, generosity of strangers, it depends on how sympathetic you are, the book version, Jessica is not a monster, misplaced priorities, interested in the wrong things, exemplars of humanity, Aurora, Ontario, bags bags bags, she’s starving, “no thank you, I’m fine”, housing costs, pets, smoking, not enough money, schizophrenia, forbearance, neat hoarding, Jesse doesn’t have any doilies, if you don’t have a plant there’s something wrong with you, if you are not able to conform yourself, if it was not for a social safety-net more would be homeless, falling through the cracks of the bureaucracy, not a romantic story of homelessness, Lir (the musician), you always need another favour in you pocket, I don’t think he’s 100% reputable, rats and fur, a good craftsman, well polished, his turns of phrase are virtually perfect, a long list of things that are in (or not) a room, how Croup and Vandermar are alike, who they are without how they came to be, a very small world, Hunter, a little bit “dodgy” in the same way rats are a little bit covered in fur, How The Marquis Got His Coat Back, the Marquis de Carabas is from Puss In Boots, the sewer as a river, a non-existent person, the last door is opened by the Marquis, its clear to Paul, mutual friends, the Marquis came back from the dead, Richard left and returned, we’re going to lie-in, seeing it all laid out, Dante’s Inferno, the Marquis is like Virgil, Dracula, Frankenstein, Transformers, a tiny bit from the audio drama, the 15th century, they’re time travelling psychopaths, The Facts In The Case Of M. Valdemar by Edgar Allan Poe, Valdemar wants “Dead things. Extra teeth.”, we’ve never killed a marquis before, Men?, if you prick us do we not bleed?, no, the timelines, his watch and his debit card stop working, bubbles in time and space, three thousand years ago, the remnants of a Roman legion still camped, more fantastical elements, more 12th century England, no allowance for Jesse, Jesse was in competition with homeless people, Dungeons & Dragons modules, a quasi-homeless industry, if you want to help the homeless increase the bottle deposit, 2018 vs 1980 money, people don’t like to be condescended to, Jesse’s penurious poorness, a trunk full of bottles is a treasure, they wear weird clothes, pushing shopping carts around, its not only about homelessness, choosing your own way to live, Richard’s apartment is taken away, he has a duty to his fiance but a greater duty to a stranger, there re just some things that are wrong, the difference between rude and cruel, we’re dangerous as humans, you have to be sensitive, invisible people, standing at an intersection asking for money, you have to look away, horror, too sensitive a soul, the people who don’t see it, when Jessica sees and can almost remember Richard’s name, is Mr Stockton an angel in the world above?, angel investor, the restoration of an angel, a kind of underdeveloped parallelism, a media guy, Rupert Murdoch, he’s a monster, “I’m in banking”, oh my god…how can you live like that?, being Neil Gaiman, being Maissa, being a creator of a whole universe of characters is fun, choosing a life of mystery and adventure, a life of horror, a recipe for making money, Jessica is more down that path, no pet names, choosing you life, pre-history, the trolls he has on his desk, that’s lampshaded, TV Tropes, Spaceballs, replacing an actor, Iron Man, “I’m here, get over it”, you look different, no answer, that’s how you write the story, the fortuneteller, destiny, the trolls, his new office, the nice cup of tea, Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, talk about the mice, vastly intelligent pan-dimensional beings, the rats, ratty, Neil Gaiman’s book about Douglas Adams, “yes, this!”, zany but controlled, Gaiman has much more discipline than Douglas Adams, procrastinating, Dirk Gently, Last Chance To See, Starship Titanic, the very Englishness, the parallels that happen, the incompetent of the group, Arthur Dent, madcap adventure, Richard levels up, surviving the ordeal, he had empathy for himself, like Door’s sister, the bracelet, the level of humanity, Jesse am unashamed about reading this urban fantasy, the number of times “duck” comes up, “duck under”, like water off an oiled duck, poor towel substitutes, a small yellow rubber duck, inside the silver box, another velvet, a duck’s egg, why are there so many ducks in here?, a weird little affectation, somewhere in between the size of a duck and a planet, plotting’s not my thing, let’s see where this goes, Gaiman can do it line after line, incredibly talented at the job of knowing how to tell the story, being Neil Gaiman, Paul Cornell’s Shadow Police novels, a cameo.

Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere Issue 1 Page 10

Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere (Preferred Text)

Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere BBC Radio Drama

Posted by Jesse Willis