Rocket Science 1966 – 1967

SFFaudio News

The Fix - Short Fiction ReviewRecently posted over at The Fix: Short Fiction Review is my latest Rocket Science column, covering Hugo-winning short fiction from 1966 and 1967.

From 1966: “”Repent, Harlequin!” Said the Ticktockman” by Harlan Ellison. Ellison reads this himself in the Voice from the Edge: I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream audio collection. |SFFaudio Review|

From 1967: Novelette: “The Last Castle” by Jack Vance. I don’t know of an audio version of this one. The only Jack Vance audiobook I know of is from Wonder Audio – “The Devil on Salvation Bluff”. I’d certainly welcome a Vance audio collection – he’s great.

Also from 1967: Short Story: “Neutron Star” by Larry Niven. The only audio version of this one that I’m aware of is from an old Books on Tape version of Niven’s Beowulf Schaeffer collection called Crashlander. Long out of print, and I can’t think of any other versions.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

The SFFaudio Podcast #026

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #026 – Jesse and Scott argue about how long books should be, talk about audiobooks, audio panels, Audible’s new audio format (higher quality). We also ask the questions:

“If Stephen King was your dad and reading you a bedtime story, would you ever get to sleep?” and “Why does Epic Fantasy have to be so long?”

Talked about on today’s show:
Science Fiction Symposium @ BYU, Writing Excuses podcast, Brandon Sanderson, I Am Not A Serial Killer by Dan Wells, Howard Tayler, The Immortals by Tracy Hickman, The Science Fiction Hall Of Fame Vol. 1, Elantris |READ OUR REVIEW|, L.E. Modesitt, Jr., David Farland, Eric James Stone, James Dashner, Orson Scott Card, Audible’s new Enhanced Audio Format, Blackstone Audio‘s forthcomings: new Harlan Ellison (and old), Stir Of Echoes by Richard Matheson, Passage by Connie Willis, Bellwether by Connie Willis, CBC Radio Between The Covers, Wake by Robert J. Sawyer, Battlestar Galactica, the Story Speiler podcast, And All The Earth A Grave by C.C. MacApp, The Space Merchants by Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth, 20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill |2 FREE STORIES|, Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill, On Writing by Stephen King, Telling Lies For Fun And Profit by Lawrence Block, Inferno by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle |READ OUR REVIEW|, Escape From Hell, Wikipedia is full of spoilers, Exit Door Leads In by Philip K. Dick [is full of swearing], The Most Brilliant Sci-Fi Mind on Any Planet: Philip K. Dick |PDF|, Starship Rebel by Mike Resnick |READ OUR REVIEW|, and a 5 sound review of Babylon 5, A Song Of Ice And Fire by George R.R. Martin, Wild Cards would make good audio, HBO’s True Blood, is it all ‘too much conversation, not enough sword?’

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #015

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #015 – On today’s podcast we take you on a merry chase ending with… “governments can do things right.”

Talked about on today’s show:
SFFvideo.com!, The January Dancer, Michael Flynn, Blackstone Audio, Eifelheim, big dumb object (also a website), Earthfall, Orson Scott Card and his interview, the Homecoming Series, the book of Mormon, The Book Of Lies, Brad Meltzer, Ender In Exile, Tor.com podcast, in what order should you read a sprawlling series? answer = publication order, First Meetings, Orson Scott Card’s InterGalactic Medicine Show, Scott’s story Adrift and my reviewlette of it, MrAudiobook.com/ReQuest Audiobooks, Eye For Eye, Run For The Stars, Harlan Ellison, Tony Smith’s StarShipSofa podcast (roundtable discussion #6), Anathem, Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, Quicksilver, William Dufris, Red Mars, Kim Stanley Robinson, Richard Ferrone, Blue Mars, Green Mars, Cryptonomicon a 1000-page novel, Scott Brick, A History Of English In 28 Minutes, The Hour Of The Dragon podcast, Robert E. Howard, Conan, Already Dead, Charlie Huston, Elantris, Recorded Books’s Sci-Fi Audio imprint, Audible’s RSS feeds, Love In The Time Of Fridges, Tim Scott, Forty Signs Of Rain, The Coming, Joe Haldeman, Elizabeth Bear, Moth Storm: The Horror From Beyond, Philip Reeve, DRM isn’t inherently evil, my solution to the problem = government (libraries), the future of digital distribution, video game models: Battlefield Heroes, Battlefield 2, Sudden Attack, Steam, what if Audible.com went out of business tomorrow?, Starship: Mercenary, Mike Resnick, iTunes, digital estates, abandonware, Steve Feldberg (director of content at Audible.com sez: Mike Resnick’s Starship book 4 is coming to Audible in mid-December! Huzzah!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Review of On the Road with Ellison, Volume 3

SFFaudio Review

On the Road with Harlan Ellison, Volume 3On The Road With Ellison, Volume Three
Live Performance by Harlan Ellison
1 CD – 1 hour – [LIVE PERFORMANCE]
Publisher: Deep Shag Records
Published: 2007
ISBN: None
Themes: / Live Performance / Publishing / Writing / Film / Middle East / ERA / Education / Chandeliers / The Abyss /

I think there’s a part of every writer, once he or she comes in contact with Harlan Ellison through his writing or in person, that wishes one could squeeze the man’s passion into an aerosol can for use at the right times. I also think there are a lot of people who wouldn’t mind that the squeezing would leave Ellison a wrinkled raisin, for they’ve heard enough from him.

I have not heard enough from him, and as a writer, I marvel at his honesty and his willingness to open doors and pour himself through them in both his fiction and in his live appearances. His fiction is available everywhere, and some of his live appearances have been captured in a series of CDs that are available from Deep Shag Records.

In this, On the Road with Ellison, Volume 3, Ellison speaks in front of live audiences about being on the set while filming a scene that means a particular lot to him, about buying copies of Alone Against Tomorrow back from the publisher, and about the professor and the chandelier. Track after track of wonderful stories, this time true, told by a master storyteller. I was moved, I laughed, and I was annoyed at different times throughout. In short, I loved it, and bet you will too.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

The SFFaudio Podcast #006

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #006 is here. Six is the loneliest number (after 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5) dontchanknow. In this our 6th, and sixth loneliest, show we’re asking lonely questions like: ‘If you had to choose a universe without either Ray Bradbury or Neil Gaiman, which would you pick?’ And ‘Which is the worst audiobook recording ever made?’ Pod-in to find out the answers to these and many more exciting questions that nobody asked us.

Topics discussed include:

StarShipSofa’s Aural Delights
, Paul Campbell, Michael Marshall Smith, The Seventeenth Kind, Estalvin’s Legacy, Rebels Of The Red Planet, Charles L. Fontenay, The 2nd SFFaudio Challenge, Parallel Worlds, The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman, The Jungle Book, American Gods, The Fix Online, Audiobook Fix, author read audiobooks, Harlan Ellison, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Stephen King, Robert J. Sawyer, James Patrick Kelly, Good Omens, Terry Pratchett, Neverwhere, Gary Bakewell, if you had to pick…, Stardust, Douglas Adams, Roger Zelazny, The Long Dark Tea Time Of The Soul, radio drama, BBC Radio 4, BBC iplayer, Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer, The Supernaturalist, The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy [the Ivory Coast edition], The Spanish Prisoner, Strange Horizons, Shaun Farrell, From iTunes to the Bookshelves: The First Wave of Podcast Novelists, Podiobooks.com, Nathan Lowell, Quarter Share, Evo Terra, Pavlovian experience, Ed McBain, Donald E. Westlake, NPR, Driveway Moments,

Posted by Jesse Willis

New Arrival from Deep Shag Records

SFFaudio Recent Arrivals

Just in from Deep Shag Records!

On the Road with Harlan Ellison, Volume 3On The Road With Ellison Volume Three is the latest report in from Harlan Ellison and a life lived on the road. Here we find the author contemplating mortality – his own and that of the world; always with a keen eye, a sharp tongue, and one foot planted firmly in the ass of the terminally stupid. And why did he drop that chandelier on those people? This is Ellison live on stage and anything goes.

And yes, Deep Shag Records has On the Road Volumes 1 and 2 as well, with samples from all three recordings – find it all here.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson