This is a highly abridged version of the story, which is the fictional biography of a storm over the twelve days of its existence and the effects it has on the humans unlucky enough to be in front of it. Effects range from the possibility of professional embarrassment to death.
From wikipedia:
Storm is a novel written by George Rippey Stewart and published in 1941. The book became a best-seller and helped lead to the naming of tropical cyclones worldwide,[...] .
Aside from the historical importance, it is a nice picture of how weather forecasting worked before modern technology like satellites became available.
Also posted at Dreamwidth, where there are
New World Part 2
In part one, a dissatisfied young Bernard Marx, a member of the elite, comes under fire because he does not like the world of rigid castes, promiscuous sex, drugs and stultifying conformity in which he lives. It happens that he works in Hatcheries and Conditioning where lectures about how the world came to be one of rigid castes, promiscuous sex, drugs and stultifying conformity, which is jolly convenient for Mr. Huxley. By pure chance, Marx discovers his boss has a biological son named John, families being unheard of and unacceptable in this day. It is easy enough to convince John to come back to civilization with Marx and in so doing expose his boss to disgrace.
Except, of course, that doesn't fix Marx's real problems with the society he lives in and it exposes John to a world for which he is badly adapted.
Excellent sound quality on this. The story is a bit thin (but then, it's an anti-utopia and utopias generally a bit thin) and I have to admit while I don't see the world in 632 A.F. as a wonderful place to live, in the context of what was considered acceptable practice when Huxley wrote this I cannot buy into the lip-smacking disapproval of Marx's world the way Huxley wants us to. Oh, probably should have mentioned Huxley has a speaking role in this.
Fans of Cannon and other fine shows may be interested to know William Conrad is in this.
Also posted at Dreamwidth, where there are
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s political career has had some colourful moments prior to the allegation that he is the man seen in a cellphone video appearing to smoke crack cocaine.
Also posted at Dreamwidth, where there arecomment(s); comment here or there.
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/articles/obamas-s
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/arc
As Andrew asks: if this has been going on, with (up until today) no consequences to its perpetrator, what else don't we know about?
I of course couldn't help but mention The Arena, but it'd probably be better if someone else mentioned it too. So if The Arena is your favorite, or one of your favorite, ginormous space constructs, head over there and comment!
http://mightygodking.com/?p=7933
So over on io9 they’ve posted an article about the central problem with Stephen Moffatt’s Doctor Who, and while I agree with some of their points, I think that the central problem with it — with almost any incarnation of Doctor Who, though particularly with this one — is that it makes absolutely no sense.
I’m not talking about things that are scientifically impossible or implausible, which to my mind are no more legitimate criticisms of Doctor Who are than saying the the monsters look phony and the sets are made of cardboard. What I mean is that the central premise of the show makes no sense from a logical perspective.
It’s particularly obvious in recent years because the show has returned to doing a lot of show set in Earth’s past, but always with some fantastic element (I’m informed, via The AV Club, that “Black Orchid” was the last historical Who story with no SF element other than the Doctor in it, and it was the first one since “The Aztecs” about twenty years earlier.) Often these fantastic elements would have earth-shaking or even earth-destroying consequences (an Ice Warrior triggering a nuclear war in the 1980s, for example) if the Doctor didn’t stop them. But the Doctor has been to our time, which has not shaken or blown up by any of these events, “before” (in his timeline) going to many of these times and places. So how did these events happen “before” the Doctor got involved? Why wasn’t modern-day London a smoking, radioactive ruin until the Doctor went back and stopped that Russian sub’s missiles from launching?
Now maybe this has been answered somewhere — I’ll admit to not having an encyclopedic knowledge of all Whoiana, especially of the Colin Baker-Sylvester McCoy years — but to my mind there are a couple of possible answers. The first is that these things didn’t happen because the Doctor “always” went there — essentially, when he visited our present (or future) he was experiencing the effects of things he would do in our past, his future. This makes the most logical sense but is also the most dramatically unsatisfying, because it basically means that everything he does is already set down by fate.
The only other option, considering that multiple timelines have been declared a no-no in Who canon (and are similarly undramatic, since they undercut the significance of anything you do when you travel in time) is that the times and places the Doctor goes are in some way temporally indeterminate: essentially, if they’re left alone they’ll happen the way they did in our history, but they can be changed by outside intervention. The problem with that interpretation is that it suggests that everything would be fine if the Doctor just stayed home, and that he’s risking all life on Earth to satisfy his wanderlust. Unless, that is, we suppose that each indeterminate point can only be changed once, in which case the Doctor is being brought to them so that he can seal them up before some other time traveler does.
Why are these points in time and space indeterminate? Why are so many on Earth? Why are they crawling with extraterrestrial and interdimensional visitors? Why do they so often seem to create points where history could be changed significantly? And why is it the Doctor’s job to seal — or perhaps we should say stitch them up? I don’t know. But they are pretty interesting questions…
Also posted at Dreamwidth, where there are
Also posted at Dreamwidth, where there are
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/articles/obama-f
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/articles/nation-s
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/video/angelina-j
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/articles/coworke
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/articles/clevela
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theonion/d
http://www.theonion.com/articles/call-fr
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/review-v
Recently, everyone and their grandmother are trying to place steampunk in the grander scope of things. Most of pop culture has poked at it at this point. Many in the SF/F community gives the subculture a passing nod (or are slowly edging away, since, being early adapters by nature, quite a few in sci-fi are tired of it already).
Still, questions about steampunk have set people in pursuit of the deeper meanings behind the aesthetic movement. Two years ago, Intel’s futurist Brian David Johnson wanted to answer the biggest one about steampunk’s rise: “Why now?” He was joined by a cultural historian James Carrott and they filmed a documentary, which permutated into a book by the same name: Vintage Tomorrows (or two books, actually. Steampunking Our Future: An Embedded Historian’s Notebook is the free e-book companion you can get online).
[Read more]
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/rise-of-t
People tend to pay attention to big animals when they go to the zoo or museum. They go to see the gorillas, or the tigers, or the dinosaur bones. I get it; dinosaurs are awesome. The problem is that charismatic megafauna tell only a very narrow story about evolution and biology. Again, admittedly an awesome one—dinosaurs!—but there are plenty of other neat stories that smaller critters can tell. The lives of rodents, or the humble honey bee, of fungi who infect ants and drive them to literal lunacy. Focusing on all those oddball forms of life, big or small, can lead people to overlook the unsung heroes of the ecosystem. June’s Scientific American doesn’t fall into that trap, with its article on the “Tiny Plants That Once Ruled the Seas” being a bit of a love letter to...plankton. In particular, that the rise of modern sea life, in the wake of the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event, can be traced to phytoplankton, which literally fueled the bloom of diversity in the Mesozoic (that’s dinosaur times!) and Cenozoic (that’s now). In doing so, the authors Ronald Martin and Antoinetta Quigg also tie the rise of phytoplankton into the threat of climate change.
[Read more]
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/spectru
For the past twenty years, the Spectrum Fantastic Art Annual has been the gold-standard of fantasy and science fiction art. Cathie and Arnie Fenner created Spectrum as means to celebrate genre art in an era when it was largely overlooked by the mainstream illustration industry. Since then it has grown to become the most widely distributed and anticipated annual publication of contemporary illustration on the shelves.
Today, at the second annual Spectrum Live convention, the Fenners announced that it was time hand the reins over to another publisher.
[Read more]
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/star-tr
“Dax”
Written by Peter Allan Fields and D.C. Fontana
Directed by David Carson
Season 1, Episode 7
Production episode 40511-408
Original air date: February 14, 1993
Stardate: 46910.1
Station log: Dax and Bashir are having dinner. Bashir is flirting aggressively, and Dax is studiously ignoring his advances. Dax excuses herself; Bashir offers to walk her to her quarters, which she says isn’t necessary. After she goes off, Bashir grins and rationalizes that not necessary means not forbidden, either, thus cementing his skills as a stalker.
He turns a corner to see Dax struggling with two thugs in hoods. Rather than call security, Bashir instead wades in, clubbing the thugs’ boss in the jaw and then getting his ass kicked by those same thugs. Dax does try to struggle free, and also tries to call for help, but it’s for naught. By the time Bashir comes to and it finally occurs to him to use the combadge that’s right there on his chest, Dax and the kidnappers are gone.
[Which not only compromises Bajoran security, but also... annoys us.]
Who better to interview a living legend than another living legend? “Talking with Tom” is the third installment of a Tor.com series in which Tor publisher Tom Doherty chats with one of the many authors and industry icons whose careers he influenced. Previous installments covered conversations with L.E. Modesitt Jr.and Harriet McDougal.
Please enjoy this fascinating and wide-ranging conversation between Tom Doherty and award-winning science fiction author Gregory Benford.
[The sound of time’s sure falling]
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/buy
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/?p=7
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Here are some handpicked titles from our Coming Attractions page. Want to include your book? Just read our Share Your New Book with GalleyCat Readers post for all the details.
Buyer, Beware by Diane Vallere: “Out-of-work fashion expert Samantha Kidd is strapped. But when the buyer of handbags for a hot new retailer turns up dead and Samantha is recruited for the job, the opportunity comes with a caveat: she’s expected to find some answers.” (March 2013)
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/?p=7
For your weekend reading pleasure, here are our top stories of the week.
They included how The Great Gatsby changed Haruki Murakami’s life, a steamy book cover that generated strong sales and a viral bookstore sign (embedded above).
1. This Is a Bookshop Sign Goes Viral
2. The Cover That Launched a Thousand iBookstore Sales
3. Why Haruki Murakami Translated The Great Gatsby
4. Author Gives Fake Writing Assignments to Online Cheaters
5. Hyperbole and a Half Author Returns with Illustrated Essay on Depression
6. Free Sites To Promote Your Book
7. Successful query letters for literary agents
8. Bret Easton Ellis Addresses David Foster Wallace Comments
9. Tsundoku: Illustrated Definition of a Book Lover’s Problem
10. Best Writing Music of 2013, So Far
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/wri
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/?p=7
Ever since we launched our directory of people looking for writers groups, we have found hundreds of writers looking for different kinds of writing support.
These invaluable groups can motivate you to write more, critique your work or even help you publicize your work.
To help our readers find support, we will occasionally spotlight a writers group looking for new members. If you are looking for an online writing group, you could try Australian Writers Rock! a giant writing community on Facebook.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/jen
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/?p=7
Jenny Han has inked a deal for her “semi-autobiographical” young adult novel. Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers will publish To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before in April 2014.
Publisher Justin Chanda negotiated the deal with Folio Literary Management senior vice president Emily Van Beek. Executive editor Zareen Jaffery will edit the manuscript. Here’s more from the release:
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before is the story of Lara Jean, who has never openly admitted her crushes, but instead wrote each boy a letter about how she felt, sealed it, and hid it in a box under her bed. But one day Lara Jean discovers that somehow her secret box of letters has been mailed, causing all her crushes from her past to confront her about the letters…
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/?p=7
New York Times senior staff editor John Williams will write a new column for the paper’s Book Review called “Open Book,” providing “a window onto the literary landscape.”
You can also follow Williams on Twitter.
This column will replace the weekly “Up Front” column, but the magazine will include occasional pieces about the magazine’s writers and online material.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/?p=7
Cary Goldstein has been named the executive director of publicity and senior editor at the Simon & Schuster imprint.
Previously, Goldstein had served as publisher of Grand Central Publishing’s Twelve imprint. In his new post, he will manage the operations of the publicity department and oversee the acquisitions of fiction and nonfiction projects.
A number of other publishing houses also announced new hires and promotions this week…
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
I used to love NBC’s The Office. I watched it religiously for many years. For a long time, I considered it the best sitcom on TV. After three or four seasons, I became convinced the American version had actually surpassed the British sitcom on which it was based. Dwight and Creed in particular were amazing characters, and of course, like everyone, I was caught up in the Jim and Pam romance. (Though, for a while, I was pretty sure Jim would be better off with Karen Filipelli, the Utica branch co-worker played by the outstanding Rashida Jones, who treated Jim a lot better than Pam did at the time because she actually liked him and wasn’t dithering about some completely unworthy fiancé.)
Strangely enough, I never considered Steve Carell’s Michael Scott my favorite character, but when Carell left the show, wisely sensing it was running out of steam after seven years, I quickly lost interest. I think I made it through roughly half the eighth season before opting out. Robert California, the replacement Regional Manager, was a disaster, despite being played by the superb James Spader. His character stuck out like a sore thumb. He belonged on a completely different show. Every plotline that focused on him was tedious. On top of that, I just couldn’t get into all the Andy and Erin romantic angst. They were no Jim and Pam. Not even close.
So I stayed away from the show for a year and a half, but I decided to tune in to this week’s series finale, and I’m glad I did. I laughed a lot, and even got a little teary-eyed, just like I used to during the show’s heyday. (Though Ryan abandoning his baby was pretty questionable as far as funniness goes. I mean, come on, you guys.) Still, it was a great sendoff to a once-great sitcom. So long, The Office, and thanks for all the great memories. I forgive you for Robert California.
Originally published at Nicholas Kaufmann. You can comment here or there.
Support nifty people working with interesting mythology! Give them some money! They're offering all kinds of great things at different levels.
And, I've offered to write two poems for them as stretch goals, one about Odin if they reach $10,000 and one about Loki at $14,000.
The Odin one would be posted here, and the Loki one initially sent to subscribers and then posted here in the fullness of time.
I have already written the Odin one. It's about Odin hanging on Yggdrasil, and it's quite long. If they don't raise enough for me to post it, in the true spirit of Ragnarok I will destroy it utterly and delete the file.
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Page Summary
- james_nicoll : CBS Radio Workshop: Storm (Based on a novel by George Stewart) [+1]
- james_nicoll : Brave New World Part 1 & Part 2 (Based on a novel by Aldous Huxley) [+0]
- james_nicoll : Rob Ford: 42 remarkable moments from Toronto mayor’s career [+0]
krugman_blog : Friday Night Music: Suzanne Vega, Gypsy [+0] - the_onion_daily : American Voices: Obama's Second Term Mired In Scandal [+0]
- makinglight : Crowdsourcing doesn't inoculate against corruption [+0]
- james_nicoll : And what does Taiwan think of recent events in Toronto? [+1]
- seawasp : IO9 has a question on immense space constructs... [+1]
- mighty_god_king : Putting the TARDIS before the horse [+0]
- james_nicoll : Who has worse odds of their character surviving? [+6]
- james_nicoll : Today I got an arc as a gift [+7]
- the_onion_daily : Obama Fondly Recalls Frustration Of First Term [+0]
- the_onion_daily : Nation Supposes It's Outraged By White House Scandals [+0]
- the_onion_daily : [video] ‘Angelina Jolie Is A Brave, Heroic Woman,’ Says Blogger Who Once Said She Looks Like An Alie [+0]
- the_onion_daily : Coworker Who Went To Gym This Morning A Chipper Little Fucker [+0]
- the_onion_daily : Cleveland Browns Gearing Up To Punt Ball Down Opponents’ Throats [+0]
- the_onion_daily : Call From Daycare Can't Be Good [+0]
- tordotcom : “Going Native” in Steampunk: James H. Carrott and Brian David Johnson’s Vintage Tomorrows [+0]
- tordotcom : Rise of the Planet of the Plankton [+0]
- tordotcom : Spectrum Fantastic Art Changes Publishers [+0]
- tordotcom : Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Rewatch: “Dax” [+0]
- tordotcom : Talking With Tom: A Conversation Between Tom Doherty and Gregory Benford [+0]
- mb_galleycat : Buyer, Beware & BirthCONTROL: Coming Attractions [+0]
- mb_galleycat : Our Tsundoku Problem & Viral Book-Shop Sign: Top Stories of the Week [+0]
- mb_galleycat : Writers Group Spotlight: Australian Writers Rock [+0]
- mb_galleycat : Jenny Han Lands Deal for Semi-Autobiographical YA Novel [+0]
- mb_galleycat : John Williams To Write ‘Open Book’ Column for NYT Book Review [+0]
- mb_galleycat : Cary Goldstein Joins Simon & Schuster as Executive Director of Publicity and Senior Editor [+0]
- nick_kaufmann : The End of an Era [+0]
- papersky : Sassafrass Kickstarter [+5]