Phursday Photos: The RAF turns 90

The Royal Air Force turned 90 this week, so to celebrate that fact here's a few favourite photos of their hardware. It doesn't cover the whole 90 years. I'm holding some back for the centenary post...

Armstrong Whitworth Meteor

Gloster Javelin

Couldn't not have a Vulcan, could we?

I once had a Lightning hung from my ceiling too...

Achtung! Spitfire!

Achtung! Er, the other one...

No action shots of these guys to hand. Sorry.

Blog Tours to the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness

This week the bloggers of the Christian Science Fiction & Fantasy Blog Tour have been On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, courtesy of Andrew Peterson.

Now, this month's featured novel is the first book in the Wingfeather Saga - a fantasy series. And of course, I don't get fantasy, which would usually make this a pretty short stop on the tour. And in keeping with tradition, I haven't read On the Edge of the Dark Sea.... I have, however, read a few interesting comments on the tour so far.

For instance, Timothy Hicks and Christopher Hopper both commented on some Python-esque aspects of the book. CherryBlossomMJ, who has at least started the book, hears that the author has been connected with those Veggie Tales reprobates - and who doesn't love a bit of Veggie?

There are a few notable exceptions to my non-getting of fantasy, and given the aforementioned reasons to expect silliness, I am wondering whether On the Edge of the Dark... might in fact be one such exception. I may (gasp!) be forced to acquire a copy, just to check.

Based on the reviews, blurbs etc on this tour and elsewhere, I am given to think that, were I to write a review of On the Edge..., it would include somewhere within it words like 'Pratchett' and 'Discworld'. So, if anyone would like to compare On... to, say, The Light Fantastic, please let me know.

Some folks who may be interested in doing that include...
Sally Apokedak Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Jackie Castle Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour Gene Curtis D. G. D. Davidson Janey DeMeo Jeff Draper April Erwin Beth Goddard Marcus Goodyear Todd Green Jill Hart Katie Hart Michael Heald Timothy Hicks Christopher Hopper Jason Joyner Kait Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Shannon McNear Rebecca LuElla Miller Pamela Morrisson John W. Otte Deena Peterson Rachelle Steve Rice Cheryl Russel Ashley Rutherford Chawna Schroeder James Somers Donna Swanson Steve Trower Speculative Faith Robert Treskillard Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise

Sci-Fi Song of the Week

You can thank Mr Hopper for this. It is, of course:

Monty Python's Galaxy Song, from The Meaning of Life. Downloadable MP3 here!

Phursdsay Photos: Lindisfarne

Apparently today is St Cuthbert's Day, which seems like a good excuse to brighten up the blog with some pictures of his erstwile home, the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.

Lindisfarne Priory

Lindisfarne has one of the iconic castles of the Northumbrian coast, which is a recurring feature around our house for various reasons.

Sir Arthur C Clarke, 1917-2008

Sir Arthur C Clarke, one of science fiction's most visionary authors, has died at the age of 90.

Best known, of course, for the movie 2001: A Space Oddysey, he was an author who often included religious (or at least mystical) elements or themes in his stories (The Star, and The Nine Billion Names of God come to mind), and as such will probably crop up here again.

That he hasn't cropped up here more often is a poor reflection on the influence he has had on the science fiction genre, and no doubt will continue to have for some time yet.

In honour of St Patrick....

...I will dedicate this post to directing you to something that has been on my list of 'things to get round to looking at'.

It's Irish Christian science-fiction, of course! Brought to you by Rick Sutcliffe, all the way from, er, Canada. Naturally.

Even though these stories are readily available as handy e-books, I have yet to get round to trying one, so I can't offer a proper review. (But you don't come here for the reviews, do you?)

I can however, tell you that I find the whole idea of the Interregnum intriguing - but then, I'm a sucker for alternate histories, which is precisely what the Interregnum series is. In fact, it tells the story of several alternate earths, connected by the Timestream. One of the main 'Earths' is Hibernia, otherwise known as Greater Ireland, and has a detailed alternate history plotted out here, which starts with the non-crucifixion of Christ, and ends with the Three Worlds' War in 1939 (via space flight in 1735) , where the story begins.

If anyone out there has read any of the series, I'd be interested to know what you thought. For the rest of you, well, maybe I'll have a review ready by next St Patrick's Day...

Churched Batman

Since superheores have crept into the last few posts for one reason or another, today I will hand over to ASBO Jesus for his take on the subject....

Tuesday Tunes Goes Old Skool

Last year we inherited a second-hand sound system - quite a flashy looking one, but it was the 5-CD changer that turned my head, and made me decide to pension off our existing stereo. The stereo in question was about 12 years old, and the CD player has never been the same since it got some dust in it when we moved house, but it did date back to the days of 'records', which, for the iPod generation, are like bigger, more cumbersome versions of CDs. I know, how did we ever manage?

In light of all this I decided that I would transfer my vinyl onto cassette (I know, I know!) for posterity. Only I hadn't got far through the process when the tape deck exploded.

So (and this is the point of the story) I bought myself a new toy recently - an Ion USB Turntable. And a suitably impressive piece of kit it is too. I bought it with the intention of digitising my vinyl collection, but having hooked it up to the stereo and tried it out on a couple of tracks, I think it's likely to get a lot more use than that. There is something satisfying about the act of putting the needle on the record. Even the snap, crackle and pop of some of the lower quality vinyl I own adds to the experience rather than becoming annoying. And, of course, there is the adventure of rediscovering some of those wierd 12 inch singles I bought in the early 90s.

There is no doubt that the new turntable is far superior to the one I just threw out - after all, that was part of an all-in-one unit released at the time vinyl was being replaced and the CD was on the rise. At least one LP I had thought scratched beyond listenability has turned out, in fact, to skip only one or two spots.

It is, of course, probable that the novelty will wear off and getting up to turn the record over every 20 minutes will get a bit tedious, at which time I will get transfer them all to MP3 and go back to using the 5 disk changer from across the room. Until then, I shall continue to wallow in my nostalgia.

Sci-Fi Song of the Week

I've done enough self-indulgent wibbling today, so all that remains is to introduce this weeks Sci-Fi Song, which, in keeping with the superhero theme of recent posts, is (Wish I Could Fly Like) Superman, by The Kinks.

Miscellaneous Podcastery

First, following on from Friday's review, if Robin Parrish's Dominion books, or Heroes, are the sort of thing you like, you may well have discovered Mur Lafferty's Playing for Keeps. It's a podcast novel along similar lines, the story of a bunch of, well, rubbish superheroes, I guess, who find themselves stuck in the middle of a titanic battle between superheroes and supervillains. The last podcast went out a couple of weeks ago, so I guess I owe Mur an apology for not plugging it earlier. My Third Wave power would be 'shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted'. There's PDFs too, for purists who prefer the written word. :)

Second, I believe Mir speaks quite highly of Carole McDonnel. So, for Mir's benefit if nothing else, she has a story on Escape Pod this week. EP is always worth checking out, so if you haven't got round to it yet, there's your reason - I could be wrong, but I think this was the first time I've heard Steve Eley use the word 'Christian' in his intro. It's a bit different from their usual fare - I like a good alternate history, but I didn't really get that much of a feel for the world in this story. And although the story centred on racial politics, it did hint at Christians getting a raw deal elsewhere in the reimagined USA, which would have had more relevance to me.

Finally, a couple of quickies to check out: Starship Sofa are podcasting the nominees for the BSFA Best Short Story Award 2007 this week, so that should be good; and I've been getting into the Daily Audio Bible just lately, for anyone interested in listening to the Bible over the course of a year.

Friday Review - Fearless by Robin Parrish

Regular visitors may recall that Fearless has already been featured on the CSFF Blog Tour, but I hadn't read it back then, so my contribution was a review of book one of the Dominion Trilogy, Relentless, which you can read here.

Fearless continues the story in a world in chaos, with apparently natural disasters happening in LA, Jerusalem, London... you name it. Personally I thought these bits got a bit Left Behind at times, but on the whole the story wasn't in that league (which is agood thing, btw!). Superhero 'Guardian', aka Grant Borrows, and his fellow Loci head to London, via the aforementioned disaster in Jerusalem, where Grant discovers more about his destiny. None of them seem the least bit bothered about why they had to switch bodies, which still bothers me a bit. And while we're talking minor niggles, exactly where is 'downtown London'? And (spoiler alert) how come the psychic barrier extends to the Underground, but allows the Loci to walk across the river bed? The Underground, to best of my knowledge, goes under the river. The author might as well have wrtten 'the Loci made their way through the barrier by locating a big enough plot-hole'.

OK, enough criticising. I enjoyed Relentless when I read it last year, and for the most part, I enjoyed Fearless just as much. The pace is just as fast as in the first volume, thanks in part to the short chapters, and in part due to the fact that this book is even more chock full of action than the previous volume. Cliffhangers lurk around every corner, right up to the final climactic scene.

There's plenty of suspense, a suitably varied cast of superheroes, some of whose back stories are touched on to add a little depth to the proceedings.

As I mentioned when reviewing Relentless, I like my Christian fiction to have a bit more Christianity in it, and so far it has only had passing mentions in this series. I will, however be looking out for Merciless to see how (if?) the Secretum, Loci and associated mythology relate to the Christian faith.

If by some fluke you haven't read any of the Dominion Trilogy books (and especially if you don't live in the UK), go read Relentless now. Fearless might work on its own, but I would recommend starting at the beginning.

Who is This God Person Anyway? (Fit the Sixth - The Total Perspective Vortex)

So we make a long-awaited return to the increasingly occasional series plucking at the spiritual threads of Douglas Adams' writings.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy has this to say about the Total Perspective Vortex:

The Total Perspective Vortex derives its picture of the whole Universe on the principle of extrapolated matter analyses.
To explain--since every piece of matter in the Universe is in some way affected by every other piece of matter in the Universe, it is in theory possible to extrapolate the whole of creation--every sun, every planet, their orbits, their composition, and their economic and social history from, say, one small piece of fairy cake.
The man who invented the Total Perspective Vortex did so basically in order to annoy his wife.
Trin Tragula--for that was his name--was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher or, as his wife would have it, an idiot.
And she would nag him incessantly about the utterly inordinate amount of time he spent staring out into space, or mulling over the mechanics of safety pins, or doing spectrographic analyses of pieces of fairy cake.
"Have some sense of proportion!" she would say, sometimes as often as thirty-eight times in a single day.
And so he built the Total Perspective Vortex--just to show her.
And into one end, he plugged the whole of reality as extrapolated from a piece of fairy cake, and into the other, he plugged his wife: so that when he turned it on she saw in one instant the whole infinity of creation and herself in relation to it.
To Trin Tragula's horror, the shock completely annihilated her brain, but to his satisfaction he realized that he had proved conclusively that if life is going to exist in a Universe of this size, then one thing it cannot afford to have is a sense of proportion.

I was sort of going somewhere with this, like to parallel the Vortex with the way getting too close to God would annihilate the brains of Old Testament Jews, but really I just wanted to let the universe speak for itself.

On Slacking

I have been a bit slack when it comes to writing lately, both in letting my thoughts loose here and in getting on with Project Seven.

That will be, at least in part, real life getting in the way. Oh, and the fact that there is a gaping hole at the beginning of the story - there is no reason for the events I wish to portray to actually happen - which bugs me every time I try to get on with the story.

I try to tell myself that a sucky first draft is allowable, and probably what I'll end up with whatever happens. But the lack of a concrete opening is leaving a lot of leaway for the whole thing to descend back into the realms of fantasy, which I've tried to keep it out of on the basis that a non-spec-fic version of the story might actually get published. I suppose I should be realistic, tell myself that's completely unlikely and make it as fantastic as it wants to be.

Or maybe I should write something else; I have a huge array of characters, settings, story ideas and themes which are, currently, largely unrelated. Maybe I should pick a random one from each list and see where the story goes - just as a change of creative scenery, if nothing else.

Above all, I think I need to constantly remind myself of the importance of writing, to me, as a way of spending time with God. When I wrote Countless as the Stars, I spent ages reading the Bible as research, and learnt a lot about God as a result. The whole process became an act of worship in many ways (and I hope that came through in the end result). This one is different; the story is much more personal, and I am having to learn a lot about myself as research. For various reasons, my protagonist and I find ourselves in similar positions. Writing about his journey is my way of reflecting on my own.

So I guess I have some writing to do. In the meantime, I will try not to let this become a blog about writing...

This week, I 'ave been mostly watching...

Primeval, the second series of which ended on Saturday. I was a bit disappointed with the resolution of last season's cliffhanger, but it did introduce the idea that someone able to travel through time can make small changes to the here and now. The full implications of that weren't revealed until this season's finale, so obviously next year I'll just skip to the end.

Actually, to be fair it had improved over the first series. Her out of S-Club managed to keep her clothes on most of the time (although for some reason she sold her Mini. Or maybe it was a parallel universe her, without any taste.) and there was even a story arc, which added a bit of depth to the running around after CGI, which got a bit tiresome last year.

So, it's no Doctor Who, but if the pace picks up season three might be worth watching.

Ashes to Ashes, the Life on Mars spin-off set in the early 80s. Now I liked Gene Hunt, and I liked the 80s, so I had high hopes for this. It has had it's moments - like Zippy and George from out of Rainbow making a cameo appearance - but there's something missing. Apart from there being a bird on the team in place of Sam Tyler, that is. And I don't know whether Gene's gone a bit soft, but he hasn't made me laugh as much as he did in LoM. But mainly, knowing what happened to Sam, the mystery has left the show, and for me that's spoilt it somewhat. The writers have dealt with that issue quite nicely though, so it's still good telly, if no Life on Mars.

Love the Quattro though!

Torchwood. The Doctor Who spin-off set in Cardiff. And may I say, good call to go back on the original plan not to do any cross-overs. The arrival of Martha Jones has mixed things up nicely, and the episodes she has been in have been about the best so far (although, I suspect they could overdo the story arc if it drags on too long).

It's no Doctor Who, but it is (dare I say it?) the Torchwood we were all hoping for. More please!

It's a Vulcan, Jim, but not as we know it...

Every so often you see something that makes you think 'I must go and write a Cold War alternate history, just so I can put one of these in it...'

I'm a big fan of the iconic delta wing of the actual Vulcan bomber, but the initial concept is so weirdly futuristic - and faintly reminiscent of the B-2 stealth bomber - that it deserves to see some action. Who knows, with the many false starts and constantly fluctuating back story of Project Seven, maybe that will have an early 80s Jericho twist to it before it's finished...

Tuesday Tunes: Pimp My Chips

We interrupt this weeks blog tour for something completely different...

I guess this may have a slightly limited appeal among my usual readership (and those innocent passers-by on the blog tour), but I recently stumbled across what can only be described as, um, 11 pop songs performed on the sound chip from a ZX Spectrum. Obviously I have no excuse for mentioning it here other than that as a Spec-chum of yore I think it's brilliant. Check out Pimp My Chips here.

Sci-Fi Song of the Week

Among the songs covered on Pimp My Chips is a little tune by Radiohead going by the name of Paranoid Android. And it turns out the coder (Matt Westcott) has made the Spectrum version available as a downloadable mp3. Yay him!

CSFF Blog Tour: Nemesis

Lawks, have I really not posted anything since the last blog tour?

Well, that's ok, because the subject of the current tour, Chris Walley, is 'away in the Midlands at the moment and somewhat technologically isolated'. Well now I live in the Midlands and must therefore be permanently technologically isolated, so you should consider yourselves lucky that anything ever gets posted here.

Anyway, this tour thing. It's all about The Shadow and Night, a repackaging of the first two volumes in the Lamb Among the Stars series, which has been around on these shores since 2002. Finally, the tour recognises British talent...

I reviewed the first (half) volume way back in September '06. So rather than repeat myself, here's the link, and that's me done for the tour. I'll see you next month!

Until then, entertain yourelves by visiting Chris Walley's website, his blog, and then buying the book.

Then visit these bloggers who have probably already done those things:

Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Grace Bridges Jackie Castle Carol Bruce Collett Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour Gene Curtis D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Janey DeMeo Jeff Draper April Erwin Marcus Goodyear Rebecca Grabill Jill Hart Katie Hart Michael Heald Timothy Hicks Christopher Hopper Heather R. Hunt Jason Joyner Kait Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Shannon McNear Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here Pamela Morrisson Eve Nielsen John W. Otte John Ottinger Deena Peterson Rachelle Steve Rice Ashley Rutherford Chawna Schroeder James Somers Rachelle Sperling Donna Swanson Speculative Faith Robert Treskillard Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise

CSFF Blog Tour - Auralia's Colors

There are a few things you need to do if you've just ambled onto the tour at this stage. First, you need to visit Christopher Hopper's blog, which got missed off the tour list and CH is probably too nice to complain. Which is a shame, cos he got a creative little competition thing going, which you've probably missed now, but do be sure to stop by there anyway.


You should also stop by a few of the other blogs on the tour (although, ironically, some of those on the list haven't posted...). Don't miss John Ottinger's offerings, which include both review and interview.

Then you should probably look at the book's website, the author's blog, and then check out Auralia's Colors at amazon.

Auralia's Colourful Tuesday Tunes

At this point in the month I am contractually obliged to write something which could be construed by some as ‘mildly amusing’ and which has a tenuous link to Jeffrey Overstreet’s Auralia’s Colors.

And, as it's Tuesday, I will be doing so through the medium of song. A rainbow medley of songs, going something like this:

Nena - 99 Red Balloons. Because you can't beat a bit of cheesily inoffensive 80s pop.

REM - Orange Crush. This was REM on the cusp of the greatness that followed Out of Time.

Yello - The Race. Swiss electronica. Who knew?

Kermit the Frog - It's Not Easy Being Green. Muppet.

New Order - Blue Monday. Over 7 minutes long, biggest selling 12 inch single of all time, remixed and reissued every year since 1983. Or so it seems.

Moloko - Indigo. You see that Róisín Murphy? No? Well, she was in Moloko anyway.

Prince - Purple Rain. Yeah, well you come up with a good tune for 'violet' then.

Sci-Fi Song of the Week

I was a bit hard pushed for a colourful sci-fi song, but I think this should do the trick.

Oh yes, nearly forgot - there's a blog tour or something going on. Go here:

Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Grace Bridges Jackie Castle Carol Bruce Collett Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Jeff Draper April Erwin Marcus Goodyear Andrea Graham Jill Hart Katie Hart Timothy Hicks Heather R. Hunt Becca Johnson Jason Joyner Kait Karen Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Shannon McNear Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here Pamela Morrisson Eve Nielsen John W. Otte John Ottinger Deena Peterson Rachelle Steve Rice Cheryl Russel Ashley Rutherford Hanna Sandvig Chawna Schroeder James Somers Rachelle Sperling Donna Swanson Speculative Faith Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise

Rubbish stories, saviour siblings and unlikely superheroes

I have spent my writing time over the last couple of days working on a short story which hasn't worked. The short story is still a genre which baffles me. I can do short-shorts, blast an idea out in 500 words, but most of the contests I’m considering ask for about three times that, which is way beyond what I can get to at the moment.

There again, I had the same problem when I started attempting novels – the first few chapters would be ok, an interesting story sprinkled with witty one-liners, but then I’d find I had used all my ideas, lose the plot, so to speak, and end up waffling until finally realising it was all crap and giving up.

A couple of those abandoned in a desk drawer somewhere and I finally managed to put something of novel length together that I thought was far enough from rubbish to release on the world.

Practice, as they say, makes slightly better.

It's kind of a shame I haven't got to grips with it yet, because there's plenty of real life material for sf stories at the moment: two UK universities have been given research licences to start work creating human-animal hybrid embryos; along similar lines, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill currently going though Parliament will also allow the creation of "saviour siblings", essentially genetically engineered kids created to provide healthy tissue for a sick sibling.

Both of these things have been opposed by some Christian groups, but I'm more interested in the fact that, well, if a saviour sibling isn't a cool short sf character, I don't know what is. If I was a better writer, maybe I could do a nice, thought-provoking piece about that. I may yet give it a try anyway.

I'm probably more likely to write about the hybrid embryo that accidentally developed into... HeiferMan! Part man, part cow, Britain's latest super hero has the amazing ability to stand in fields for a long time, know when it's going to rain, and be slightly inconvenient to ramblers.

Well, practice, as they say...

Have you seen a blowfish driving a sports car?

And so begins Season 2 of Torchwood. Hopefully this opening line is a precursor to a Torchwood that doesn't take itself too seriously, and concentrates on entertaining, like big bro Doctor Who.

That said, I am raising no expectations at this stage as to whether it has addressed the shortfalls of series one. I will almost certainly stay tuned, if only because it's on in Heroes' old slot, which, coming after Jericho finishes elsewhere, makes for a good evening's telly.

Anyway, the opening episode: a smidge predictable at times, but, yes, entertaining. I may have chuckled a couple of times. Jack is a bit less angsty having resolved his issues with the Doctor, and a bit more like the Captain Jack we first met. I liked Captain John, but I can't help wondering how long I can watch him before wanting to actually watch Spike. (I don't think there was any intention to hide his Spikey origins; unless the 'sewer chic' comment and his enquiry as to the whereabouts of the blonde were meaningless coincidences.)

Unfortunately, Captain John's soundbite from next week's trailer suggests that one of my gripes with the first series hasn't gone away:

"It's all sex, sex, sex with you people isn't it?"

Then again, maybe they'll just have a laugh about that too.

Dang, I said I wasn't going to do that...

The Pale Thin God

It's not really science fiction, but I like this story, by Mike Resnick, the world's most decorated short sf author.

I mention it today because the crew at The Sci Phi Show deserve a shout out for putting together an audio presentation of it. Personally I'm not sure the voice effects add anything to it, but there are versions available with and without the effects available for download here.

I definitely recommend checking it out. It'a a worthwhile way to spend 7 minutes 59 seconds anyway.

The obligatory New Years post...

...in which I pointlessly resolve to post on my blog more often...

No, of course, that would be silly. But there are one or two things I do intend to do this year:

Write more often. I'm not going to say every day, because that's asking for trouble. I will try to write a couple hundred words every day - mainly to flesh out the story of Project Seven - but sometimes there are just more important things to do. Like:

Read the Bible. I've been slacking on this too. I'm actually trying out a few Bible podcasts, so I can listen when stuck in traffic, but I need to find a reader whose voice and/or accent doesn't start to irritate me. (I know that's not a very good way to look at it, but there you go.)

I guess that will do as far as this blog is concerned. You don't really want to hear about the personal lifestyle changes I would like to make, do you?

Oh yes, it's Tuesday isn't it? Time for one of these then:

Sci-fi Song of the Week

I tried to find one that was New Year-related, but the closest I could think of was Year 3000 by Busted. Not my usual genre, but it is kinda fun.

Tuesday Tunes: Radio 1 Established 1967

I love a good cover version. Especially the fantastically bizarre cover versions that take a well known song off in a completely unexpected direction. It doesn't really matter whether they work or not most of the time, I just think they're great fun.

And so, when Radio 1 celebrated it's 40th anniversary a few months ago by inviting 40 of today's greatest artists to cover 40 years of hits, I was hoping for a CD compilation without even hearing most of the tracks.

Lucky then, that I got a copy for Christmas.

The compilation is a little heavy on trendy indie bands, including some with whom I have only a passing acquaintance; but there's also Robbie, Kylie, and the largely pointless Girls Aloud fighting pop's corner.

It starts off with the first track played on the station - The Move's Flowers in the Rain, performed by Kaiser Chiefs - and delivers a song from each year up to 2006.

For me the highlights are the more insane versions: Careless Whisper by Gossip; Madonna's Crazy for You given a Groove Armada makeover; Hard-Fi doing Britney's Toxic; The Streets' rendition of Elton's Your Song is so bad it's good; and the ultimate crazy cover must be Armand van Helden and Mika teaming up to destroy Can't Stand Losing You (originally by The Police).

Even the less out there covers are mainly good; Kylie doing Love is the Drug; Klaxons covering No Diggity and Foo Fighters rocking out Band On The Run make songs I wasn't previously bothered about, well, more enjoyable.

In fact, I think there are, at most, two dodgy tracks out of the 40. One is a song I don't know the original of and am pretty apathetic towards the cover; the other is by Girls Aloud. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind Girls Aloud doing their own stuff; it's largely inoffensive pop music which I am happy to allow a place in my life. But they sapped the life out of The Pretenders' I'll Stand By You a few years ago, and pretty much do the same to Teenage Dirtbag here. These sort of things give cover versions a bad reputation - thankfully, the rest of the compilation more than makes amends.

That reminds me: The Pretenders' Don't Get Me Wrong is given the Lily Allen treatment - not a huge change like some, but the Lily Allen treatment is just too great not to mention. There are some other classic tunes given worthy renditions - Teenage Kicks; Bowie's Sound and Vision; and Stereophonics doing You Sexy Thing to name a few...

I am fairly sure there must be something for everyone in this compilation. Look:

Sci-Fi Song of the Week today is the only sci-fi related track on Established 1967. Covered by The Pigeon Detectives, it was originally by Huey Lewis and The News, and is the album's featured track for 1985. The year when it was, of course, the theme for one of the biggest time travel movies of all, er, time...

Friday Review - 2007

So, before wrapping up for Christmas, just time for one final Friday review.

2007 was a year which started out promisingly, started out with sci-fi related commentary, and then wandered off into sub-plots about music and old cars. Personally I think that made it a bit more interesting (and colourful) than 2006, but I think I'd like to see a bit more sf in the sequel (working title: 2008).

There was an interesting sub-plot involving Her Babyship in the middle, which was largely in the background (and comments) but which obviously distracted the protagonist while it was going on. It was an emotional rollercoater, but reached a satisfying (if unrealistic and cheesy) conclusion when Her Babyship took her first faltering unaided steps on her second birthday.

Back to the sci-fi: Robin Parrish and Austin Boyd found their way onto the reading list via the CSFF blog tour, where they joined classics by C S Lewis and Mary Doria Russel.

On the telly front we had the Doctor's best season so far, the slow and ultimately disappointing Primeval, and the last couple of seasons of Angel on DVD. Finally. Oh, and of course Life on Mars, with all its attendant Yoda-shaped goodness.

Writing seemed to suffer from the Babyship crisis. Early promise of Hitchhikers inspired blog posts and some original fiction went unfulfilled, but things did pick up again towards the end: I started a (non-sf) novel, finished a short story (but was never happy with it) and started a couple more. I even got an article published (admittedly a butchered version of one I wrote a decade earlier).

At least that all leaves some loose ends to be tied up in 2008. Until then, have a merry Christmas and a peaceful New Year.

Phursday Photos: Christmas for Minis

These pictures are from the Christian Mini Owners Club stand at the London to Brighton Mini Run in 2001. Find out more at whatwouldjesusdrive.org.uk.

That reminds me, I really should get that Christmas tree up...

CSFF Blog Tour: Wayfarer's Journal

I think I've mentioned here before that I'm rediscovering the short story as one of science fiction's strong points - just throw an idea out there, give the reader something to think about, and end the story before over-cooking it.

I've been in my car a lot lately, and listening to a lot of fiction (mainly sf) podcasts while driving, and as a result I've had a lot of recent exposure to some great stories. I'd love to say that those on Wayfarer's Journal easily match up to the best, but from what I've sampled I can't honestly do that.

That's not to say there aren't some good stories on the site - there are, and I'm getting to that point - or that I could do better, because I probably can't (although I may well try). But I've been listening to Hugo nominees, stories published in Asimov's, and other well practiced and respected authors. Wayfarer's Journal is a new market, and can't be expected to match that. Hopefully as it gains readers and contributors (helped along by this tour) the ideas, story telling, and editing will all improve.

As an aside, there has been some interesting feedback on some of the stories during this tour(reviews by Steve Rice, John W Otte and Mir have highlighted some areas for improvement, for example) and I would like to see some form of reader feedback on the site, so the writers and editors can try to give the people what we want.

Now, the good stories. I don't think anyone on the tour has commented on Me That I Am by Dale Hansen yet, possibly because it's not a current story. I haven't read all the stories available yet, but this has been my favourite so far. It is the tale of one man's journey into faith, a journey facilitated by a uniquely sci-fi device which 'the bright minds of our time are calling an “Event Threshold” and whispering it’s name like they’re afraid it’ll hear them and show up'.

Oh yes, it's got humour too - those bits which may have wandered into As you know, Bob territory are packaged in lines like 'the mathematics of the whichness of where could drive a man to drink tea.'

I don't even care that some of the sentences didn't trip off the tongue that easily. Or that I had to keep mentally changing where into were for the thing to make sense. Me That I Am took a nice sf idea, wrapped it around a spiritual journey, and sprinkled it with lines that just tickled my sense of humour. That is enough for me to want Wayfarer's to go on to bigger and better things.

Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Grace Bridges Amy Browning Jackie Castle Carol Bruce Collett Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Jeff Draper April Erwin Marcus Goodyear Andrea Graham Jill Hart Katie Hart Michael Heald Jason Joyner Kait Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here John W. Otte John Ottinger Rachelle Steve Rice Cheryl Russel Ashley Rutherford Hanna Sandvig James Somers Speculative Faith Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise

Tuesday Tunes: Space Christmas

I would have liked to have posted a Christmas story somewhere by now, but life has gotten on top of me again (pesky life) so I haven't done. Maybe next year?

Instead, I bring you the final instalment of my festive Tuesday Tunes offerings. Christmas has, for a long time, been a time for me to discover new music. It's got even better lately, with the facility to amble along to a download store, type in 'Christmas' or 'Santa' and see what novelties come up.

This isn't one I discovered that way, though I guarantee it will be new to many of you. It has become almost as traditional as White Christmas or Santa Claus is Black in our house since I first heard it played by the late, great John Peel, probably 15 or so Christmases ago.

SciFi Santa Song of the Week

Space Christmas by Shonen Knife.

Yes, there I go again - pop-punk guitar music with girly vocals and an accent (this time Japanese). I downloaded it a year or two ago, though I can't find it available now. Check out the samples at amazon instead:

CSFF Blog Tour: Wayfarer's Journal

A lot of the time the subject matter of this tour passes me by, because I don't do fantasy, and there seems to be a lot of that around. So I am particularly glad to say that the tour has pointed me in the direction of Wayfarer’s Journal recently.

Wayfarer's Journal is an e-zine for 'science fiction with a difference' - by which, obviously, they mean that with a spiritual dimension. And the author's guidelines are quite specific about wanting science fiction only. So if you're on this tour only for the fantasy, well, you probably know better than to read what I have to say most of the time.

There have only been a couple of issues so far, and the plan is to remain semi-annual (it says February and June, but the most recent issue is called the Fall Issue... ) with little features in between, and an ongoing blog.

Apparently there have been some technical difficulties lately, and when I last popped in there was at least one story missing, but hey, what website doesn't have occasional glitches?

I'd like to have more time to comment on some of the stories, but there's work to be done. And I haven't even got the Christmas tree up yet. (Christmas? What's that?) Hopefully I'll get round to it later in the next couple of days. And then maybe I'll post on the tour again too.

Meanwhile, your tour continues here:

Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Grace Bridges Amy Browning Jackie Castle Carol Bruce Collett Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Jeff Draper April Erwin Marcus Goodyear Andrea Graham Jill Hart Katie Hart Michael Heald Jason Joyner Kait Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here John W. Otte John Ottinger Rachelle Steve Rice Cheryl Russel Ashley Rutherford Hanna Sandvig James Somers Speculative Faith Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise

Tuesday Tunes: Relient K

So, I was rooting around my favourite download sites for tunes for my latest Christmas compilation, and I came across this. I look forward to terrorising the in-laws with their manic interpretation of 12 Days of Christmas ('Whats a partridge?/And what's a pear tree?/ I don't know so please don't ask me/ but I bet those are terrible gifts to get') and We Wish You a Merry Christmas, followed by the shouty pop-punk 'I'm Gettin Nuttin' for Christmas' and then alarming them with Handel's Messiah in the style of a soccer terrace chant with rock guitars, Good King Wenceslas in the style of bad carol singers, and the post-Christmas melancholy of Boxing Day.

And then - and only then, because it's more fun that way - I will reveal that this terrible band with their loud guitars and stupid lyrics are, in fact, good Christian boys. I can hear the scoffing noises of disbelief now... until I skip to the sublime I Celebrate the Day. That'll shut them up.

Seriously, if you only download one Christmas song this year, make it I Celebrate the Day.

Sci-fi Santa Song of the Week

If that wasn't enough Christmassy rock fun, see if you can track down a copy of I Want an Alien for Christmas by The Fountains of Wayne.

Eight Random Facts

Posts are a bit thin on the ground here at the moment, mainly because the pesky day job keeps dragging me across the country for one reason or another. Tsk.

Still, those nice bloggers at The Sci-Fi Catholic tagged me for this, so I figured that since it saves me actually thinking too much I'd take a stab. So here are 8 (count 'em) random facts about moi:

1. My fourth car was a Mini. Yeah, my first one was too, but that sounded a bit predictable and not at all random. My second and third cars (and fifth and sixth) were Minis too.

2. I don't currently own a Mini though. Technically Yoda belongs to Mrs UKSteve.

3. I've gone off the idea of progress. It's over-rated.

4. I have an annoying tendency to quote The Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy whenever the opportunity arises. Also Red Dwarf and The Italian Job if they are more suitable.

5. I have read His Dark Materials. Yes, the whole trilogy.

6. And if I go to hell, it probably won't be for that.

7. One of my first published writings was a witty little thing called '101 Things to do with a Kettle'. The sequel, '101 Things to do with a ZX81', was far better in my opinion, but due to the more limited target audience I have yet to make a fortune from it. I made a couple of half-hearted attempts to put it online, but never quite found the right format.

8. I don't think this blog has eight regular readers, especially not eight that haven't already been tagged by DGD and his blogging pets.

So, if you happen to be passing through and haven't done the 8 Random Facts meme yet, consider yourself tagged.

Actually, that was quite fun.

Tuesday Tunes at Christmas

It's an interesting phenomenon (possibly) that a lot of things that I would try to avoid most of the time become strangely palatable around Christmas. Like mince pies - I don't really like them, normally, but can't help myself come December. And a more common example, of course: sprouts.

And as far as tunes are concerned, there are, I think, three Cliff Richard numbers on high rotation during the festive season. That would be a frankly alarming propsect under normal circumstances, but Christmas without Cliff just doesn't seem right any more.

A slightly more bizarre variation on this theme features as this week's Sci-fi Santa Song of the Week: A Spaceman Came Travelling, by retired bin man Chris de Burgh. Completely mental nonsense about a spaceman who travelled for light years of time to bring a message for mankind to hear. Utter drivel really, but hey, it's Christmas, peace and goodwill to all men. Even Cliff and the de Burgh fella.

CSFF Blog Tour: Stephen Lawhead

As regular visitors will have gathered by now, this month's CSFF Blog Tour is about Stephen Lawhead's latest book, Scarlet. You will probably also have gathered that this blogger is more interested in science fiction than fantasy or legend. So as a compromise, I'm going to review Lawhead's science fiction epic, Empyrion.

The story begins about 300 years into Earth's future, but quickly flings it's heroes even further into the future and a very long way from Earth, thanks to a convenient wormhole. Your main protagonist is the unlikely hero Orion Treet, who, despite his cool name, is a rather boring historian. He and three others are sent to check up on the first extra-solar colony, set up by the Cynetics Corporation five years earlier. Unbeknown to them, so long has passed on the Empyrion colony that a whole civilisation has risen and subsequently fallen into a violent, oppressive and generally unpleasant state, sealed off from the wider world in a crystal dome.

The peoples origin has faded into legend, Cynetics a kind of legend, a rarely spoken name. Religion - of the worst kind - has risen again, with the people worshipping an entity called Trabant. Apparently communist block automobiles have also faded into legend.

They later discover that as well as this dystopia, a second civilisation has risen on the planet: the apparent paradise of Fierra, and so, naturally, begins a battle between good and evil, as our heroes either get acquainted with the God of the Fieri, or lose their minds thanks to the paranoid leaders of Dome.

The worlds are all well imagined, and spiritual themes run throughout the book, from the two contrasting religious societies, to the spiritual journeys of Treet and Yarden, to the talking fish, communication with which seems a lot like prayer. (On which note, intelligent marine mammals bringing a message of impending doom.... rings a bell somehow.)

The second half - originally the second book, Siege of Dome, gets off to a slow start, especially following the action towards the end of book one. It is partly concerned with Yarden's spiritual awakening, and partly with what became of Crocker, another of the Earthlings, but honestly I got a bit bored and just wanted to see how Treet was getting on. Once things got going again it was ok, but the whole 900 page volume is just too long.

And there's a couple of things that didn't work for me because, well, they didn't appear to serve any useful purpose. Like Crocker - as far as I can tell he should have just gone away and stayed there. And what was the deal with the coccoons? OK, this is a spoiler, but like I said, has no impact on the plot. Our hereos, on their way to Fierra, pass through a sort of mist or cloud, and get a bit wet. Later they get sick, bust out in boils and such, and eventually become coccooned by their own secretions. (Eeww!) And later they break out of them again, feeling younger, fitter and prettier than before. This much I get; it's a wierd alien disease they've contracted, and it works on that level fine. It also works as a sort of paralell to baptism and rebirth. Clever. And making them fitter probably enables them to survive the journey. Fair enough. But what I don't get is this: nobody mentions it again once they've moved on. If it were me, the first thing I'd be asking when I met a Fieri is 'What is the deal with that cloud and the coccons?' But no, they just carry on as if it was perfectly normal to spend days or weeks encased in pus in the middle of a desert on an unknown planet. Eh?

Anyway, that aside, I mostly like Empyrion, although the second book did drag at times. It's good sci-fi with a bit of a fantasy feel, and lots of spiritual (Christian in all but name) threads. My recommendation would be to skip all the bits about Crocker and his cat, and shave a few pages off your total reading.

And if anyone knows how to pronounce 'Tvrdy', please let me know.

CSFF Blog Tour vs Tuesday Tunes

Or: 'The Post That Wrote Itself', because rather than leave me to come up with the Top Ten Scarlet songs (obscure album tracks by Bananarama and U2 are all that come to mind), a couple of chaps called Jeff Johnson and Brian Dunning have put together a soundtrack CD for Scarlet, and a bunch of other Lawhead novels for that matter.

As you may know, I think soundtracks for novels are a pretty nifty idea. When they release the soundtracks for Empyrion and Dream Thief, I'll be sure to check them out.

Which rather scruffily leads us to the Sci-fi Song of the Week:

well, since I've already mentioned it once, here's another track from the classic Bananas LP True Confessions: Venus.

CSFF Blog Tour: Scarlet

This month the CSFF Blog Tour rolls round to Stephen Lawhead’s place, for a peek at his latest novel, Scarlet. Which is banned in my part of the world, because we all know Robin Hood was from the East Midlands and not Wales, and therefore I haven’t read the book.

Fortunately Mr Lawhead has also written a couple of science fiction novels in his time – the Empyrion duology, and Dream Thief, both of which I first read about a decade ago when Christian science fiction was a rare thing - not like now, when the shelves are awash with the stuff. Or at least, should be. Oh, and he co-authored City of Dreams with his son Ross, which looks an intriguing re-telling of the life of Jesus (set that in Wales – or Nottingham – and I’m in the queue!).

Anyway, Scarlet. Even at this early stage in the tour it looks like opinion may be divided over whether another Robin Hood story was a good idea. More reviews will be appearing over the next couple of days, so I guess we'll find out whether the actual books are any good: keep an eye on these bloggers:
Trish Anderson Brandon Barr Wayne Thomas Batson Jim Black Justin Boyer Grace Bridges Amy Browning Jackie Castle Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Jeff Draper April Erwin Beth Goddard Marcus Goodyear Andrea Graham Jill Hart Katie Hart Sherrie Hibbs Timothy Hicks Christopher Hopper Becca Johnson Jason Joyner Kait Karen Dawn King Tina Kulesa Mike Lynch Margaret Karen McSpadden Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here Eve Nielsen John W. Otte John Ottinger Lyn Perry Deena Peterson Rachelle Cheryl Russel Ashley Rutherford Hanna Sandvig Chawna Schroeder James Somers Rachelle Sperling Speculative Faith Robert Treskillard Jason Waguespac Daniel I. Weaver Laura Williams Timothy Wise

For anyone still reading, and bothered how my writing expedition went this month, the wheels sort of fell off last week when Her Babyship got sick. Not badly, just enough to distract my attention from writing. I did get that short story finished, but it was very hurried to get it on time and within the word limits, so I don't expect any prizes. Which of course means I can revisit it in a couple of months - I'll probably trim it to its original size and post it somewhere (probably here) as a flash piece (depending on how short I think it should be and what you define as flash, of course...)

And another problem arose with the timeline of Project Seven, which looks increasingly like being set sometime after the London Olympics.

Time Crash

I know there are people reading this that wouldn't have seen Children in Need last week but might like to know about the Doctor Who bonus scene.

I could waste your time by going on about how it sums up everything good about Doctor Who in one eight minute scene, but I think it would be better just to let you watch it for yourselves if you haven't already done so.

As far as I can tell the beeb uploaded it with embedding disabled, so I'm going to do the decent thing and just give you the link.

Oh, and say that if you like it, give some cash to Pudsey or one of his colonial pals. ;)

Phursday Photos: Brrrrr!

It's our first frosty morning of the winter, and, having the day off work, I thought I'd wander around the garden with a camera for a few minutes. It's not a very big garden though, so all I came back with was this:

But that inspired me to post these, taken on the road up to the Basilica di Superga, which overlooks Turin, way back in February 2005.

Writing, Competitions, and Absent Titles

So yesterday wasn't a particularly productive day, wordcount-wise, although I did manage to scribble a couple of sentences when inspiration struck about the next chapter of the novel. I'll keep that turning over in my mind for a few days now as I need to get that short story finished and mailed off in the next week or so to meet the contest deadline.

Which seems a good point at which to throw in some linky goodness, if only for my own later perusal:

Creative Writing Contests - does exactly what it says on the tin: a whole bunch of poetry, fiction and non-fiction contests and calls for submissions in a handy blog-shaped format. They all seem to be from the US, which is not a whole bunch of use to me, but I subscribed to the feed so I don't miss anything too yummy.

Jacqui Bennett Writers Bureau has a whole list of UK writing competitions, as well as all kinds of other useful stuff.

What I definitely will be doing next year is entering a few more of the Writers' News and Writing Magazine competitions. I've done a couple in the past, without any success, but you know what they say about practice...

And of course, once I've had lots of practice and can do a good short sf story...

But first I need to finish the one I'm working on. Which still doesn't have a title.

Writing update #2

Well, it looks like even without the help of NaNoWriMo, this blog is becoming a somewhat thinly populated blog about writing. Maybe I'll actually write something about writing next time, rather than just copping out like I am.

Still, the writing is coming along: the novel wordcount is at around 1770; if I can keep that pace up I'll easily have enough words to make a novel in 12 months time. Whether they fit together in any coherent way is an entirely different matter of course...

I have, however, hit a slight stumbling block. A passage that actually works quite well in itself simply does not work, chronologically speaking. I tried a little bit of research with a view to rewriting it later; alternatively, I could just set the novel ten years or so into the future, which may render some bits I have yet to write more difficult, but at least I could kid myself I was writing sci-fi after all...

Writing so far this month

So here's my first progress report for those interested (but mainly to keep me honest in my daily writing intentions).

So far I've managed to find somewhere between 20 & 40 minutes every day to do a bit of fiction. I've got a short story project up to about 960 words, which I need to get up to at least 1500 to qualify for the contest I am writing it for. I think another rewrite, a bit more showing not telling, should get me somewhere near the mark without padding.

Didn't get any long stints over the weekend, but spent some time pulling a few ideas together and scribbling notes for Project Seven. I've decided it would be nice to get a first draft of P7 finished in the next 12 months, and maybe participate in NaNo next time round.

Unlikely, but nice.

Total wordage for the month runs to about 2000 so far on the two projects. Which isn't a bad start really.

Spooky coincidence

Last night I was being industrious, and getting some long overdue web updates started elsewhere in my virtual empire.

I was uploading these photos, and decided I should try and find a suitable link to serve as a reminder of what the X-Files movie was all about and what it had to do with Minis.

But I couldn't track down the official movie web page because of all the chatter about the sequel. Well, let's hope that drags some more custom round my little corner of the webbiverse, eh?

I haven't seen the X-Files in a long time. I kind of lost interest in that last season, the one without Mulder, and I think it went on a bit too long. Surely Mulder finding his sister, and Scully becoming the believer, keeping the X-files going with a sceptical partner, surely that was the end?

I dare say I'll go see it, or if Her Babyship doesn't allow, watch it on DVD. Who knows, maybe it will even have the desired effect and send me scurrying out to amazon to get the TV series on DVD...

Phursday Photos: Tintern Abbey

If there's not a ruined castle nearby, an Abbey that Henry VIII got his hands on will do. This one is in the Welsh borderlands.Don't you love that archy goodness?