Pieces on Speculative Fiction

This books is a classic, it won five awards(including Hugo and Nebula) when it was published 1973. In my opinion it is very good example of Clarkes hard science fiction before he tried to write about things he didn’t really understand, like relationships or characters. This book is about exploration and wonder. I give it four stars out of five.

The novel starts by describing decentralized solar system in 22nd century, where Mars, Mercury and several moons are inhabited. Systems designed to detect asteroids detect one moving at huge speeds towards our solar system. Closer inspection shows that it isn’t what it seems.

The premise of the book is typical to science fiction: first encounter. This is explored through a panel of scientists who debate related issues and through the protagonist space captain Norton who leads the expedition to find out more about Rama, the mystical object that has arrived to the solar system. Read the rest of this entry »

J.K. Rowling. It is simply a question of penetration. Seventh Harry Potter book sold over 11 million copies in UK and US in first 24 hours. That is just sick. I understand the appeal that those books have and all the very very clever marketing and full blown merchandising can only be admired or watched with growing horror. Rowling is probably the most important fantasy author of all-time and I there isn’t a rising star in sight who could challenge her.

Reason why Rowling is so important:

Generation of readers looking for more fantasy. This leads to more books published, ie. more good books published.

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In my opinion racial issues aren’t really discussed in fantasy and science fiction. I haven’t found many authors who are willing to tackle this task.
Tia Nevitt makes an excellent point in a recent post to her blog.

I don’t check the skin color of the author, but when I crack open the book I invariably find a novel about white characters. To be sure, most of these settings are like northern Europe, in a medieval world, where you would indeed expect there to be mostly white people. I have never read about a black elf (except the drow, which I don’t think really count).

I’ve been thinking this quite a bit and in addition to recent fantasy debudant David Anthony Durham I can’t think of any black speculative fiction Read the rest of this entry »

My favorite fantasy novels in no particular order:

• David Gemmell – Legend
• David Gemmell – Waylander

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I was inspired by Steve Pavlinas article about trying to change your life with 30 day challenges. The idea is that, if you know that you only have to do something for only 30 days then you can do it. On the other hand, if you try to say start to running five miles every morning for the rest of your life, you probably fail unless you have iron self-discipline. Most people don’t. I readily admit that I’m not a disciplined person, therefore the experiment. The goal isn’t necessarily to write about speculative fiction permanently, but rather to think about things. To write something meaningful, you generally need to think a lot. I’ve found that lately I’ve been avoiding that. Or that I’ve mulled the same thoughts over and over again. This blog offers a set way and reason to think about one specific thing.

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