threemonkeys | Recent Entries

So, lets try the old method of doing a trip/con report by just throwing a bunch of thoughts out there and see what sticks to the wall...

Thursday, got up at stupid o'clock to catch plane. Flew Air NZ for the first time in a while - they have changed their seats to considerable advantage. The old ones were torture. The new ones are, well to be honest also torture, but they won't break you so quickly.

Went to comics exhibition at the Jewish Museum of Australia. Excellent - highly recommended. First hint as to how good the hotel location was - the tram stop I needed to catch was right beside the hotel. Did I mention that trams intimidate me - not the catching or riding them - its the getting completely lost in a strange town. Not that this has ever happened.

Got back to hotel to find that my dinner plans have been canceled because my cousin is not well. So grabbed quick meal and crashed early due to significant fatigue.

Friday, walked down to the new Melbourne convention centre where the worldcon will be. Very impressive building. I walked back too via a bunch of book and electronics shops. I was going to catch a tram but every time I got to a stop I spied something just up ahead to walk to. Got back exhausted.

Con started really well - a Richard Harland book launch means a Richard Harland reading. Not to be missed. Good thing it was early because I crashed pretty much straight afterward.

Saturday - had lunch with cousin who was feeling better and keen to learn some family history. Ordering "large beef special" at Vietnamese place put me in mind of the Kliban book "Never eat anything larger than your head".

Rest of saturday seemed a bit flat. There was some stuff on at the con of interest, but there seemed to be a lack of a focal point for just kicking back and chatting to folk. Its an important point for a con because no matter how well organised a con is (and this one was very well organised) for me this is the most important part of the con. I suspect it was why Conscription worked so well this year despite being chaotic.

Bought books. Got really worried about luggage weight. Bought more books. Looked at people parading in costumes. Went to bed early.

Sunday had more interesting stuff on at the con and worked better from a chatting to people point of view probably enhanced by going out for lunch with interesting people. Demanded vendors sell me more books. Failed to find dead dog party - had another convivial meal with the same interesting people I had lunch with. Packed my stuff - wondered just how much weight I could put in my carry-on bag. Went to bed early.

Monday, got up at stupid o'clock to get to airport. Annoyed because I found out I could have actually bought another couple of books. Got home without fuss. Slept.

Things better not come in threes

Managed to accidently rip a contact lens in half. That is a new experience. Function with one lens is not new but it is disconcerting.

Managed to spill a glass of water all over my work laptop. At this stage it is drying out I don't know if it can be saved.

Next?

This article describes how more people are just using forks to eat and that use of the traditional knife and fork combination is declining. No surprises there - at home if I didn't occasionally have to spread stuff on a cracker I'd never use a knife at all.

But this line caught my eye: "...while 28 per cent did not possess fish knives and saw no reason for buying them". Does that mean that a whopping 72 per cent of people do have fish knives and presumably know what to do with them? I haven't seen a fish knife for a very long time. I really thought they were already extinct.

I just got addressed as Paul today. It doesn't happen all that often, but when people get my first name wrong, it is pretty much always to call me Paul. I have nothing against the name, and getting called the wrong name doesn't worry me much, but it is just odd that it is usually the same name. I have a couple of theories.

One idea is that it is just one of those combinations that go together automatically - how else to explain all those David Thompsons or John Smiths. On the other hand, I have never actually met anybody with the name combination in question and I cant see any particular family history of it - lots of Richards, Peters and Grenvilles but no Pauls. Although our mother informed us that my sister would have been called Paul if she had turned up as a boy.

The other theory is that folk are remembering an old radio/tv series. In today's case, the person in question would have been born long after the series was well and truly over.

There is now Time Team America. That can't be a good thing right? I mean look at Top Gear - Australia - regardless of how well done it might be, because it was trying the be the same as the original, it was always going to suffer by comparison.

But the American version of Time Team is a different beast. It has the same basic theme - a well equipped team doing a 3 day dig. But the detail of the implementation is quite a bit different. It has its own character and style. Plus, because it is a PBS show, it isn't as rabidly over the top as you might fear. So quite a pleasant surprise really.

On the other hand, there is no Baldrick - or the rest of the well known characters from the Brit show. It took the original edition years to build up the character of the show. I wonder if the American edition can build up the same character - perhaps I'll come back in a few years to check it out.

Scene 1 - a workplace conversation discussing the relative merits of the 2001 and 2010 movies. This leads to comparisons between these and the corresponding Arthur C Clarke novels. The conversation ends with the statement "but Clarke basically wrote idea porn". There was a nodding of heads and a return to work.

Scene 2 - me looking at Zima Blue, a short story collection by Alastair Reynolds and wondering if there is anything worth writing about it, or should it go straight on the shelves. It was really rather entertaining and it reminded me of something but I couldn't really articulate it.

The turning point in this little play was remembering the work conversation. The chain of association goes something like this. Clarke wrote idea driven stories about using ideas derived from science. Most of his work was short fiction. Most of the best idea driven work is short - single ideas are not, by themselves, enough to sustain a novel. The collection in front of me is short stories. Most of them are strongly science idea driven. "Ah ha".

Now I know the comparisons between Reynolds and the rest of the new space opera crowd to the golden age writers has been around for ages. But it always struck me as a pretty superficial comparison and when looking at the novels I think that is right. But comparing the short stories, it looks much deeper - they have the same heart.

Not that Reynolds actually writes like Clarke. He is a modern writer with modern sensibilities dealing with ideas modern science. He very much has his own style. Still, I grew up reading idea based short SF - it is good to know that there is still a bit of it around.

Sunday night brings with it the realisation that I have to get up for work the next day. Preparation generally means spending the hour leading up to bed watching Time Team. Perhaps a touch of irony then that tonight's episode has some dodgy editing. One of the segments between ad breaks is actually from a different episode - a time discontinuity. One minute there is a Roman site, the next they are excavating a medieval great hall in a different county. Next ad break, they are back with the Romans. Thing is, the medieval one looked a lot more interesting. Obviously it is just sloppy editing, but I am reminded of books where there is a teaser chapter of the next volume in the series at the end of the book. Would they be more effective if the teaser chapter was dropped in the middle?

Oooh - The Stranglers have just turned up at the Roman dig. I was listening to Rattus Norvegicus yesterday - for the first time in years. Coincidence? Well yes.

So I like (amongst other things) science fiction, fantasy and crime books. There aren't all that many writers who try to combine all three. Rather to my surprise, it turns out that Liz Williams has had a go with her Inspector Chen novels. The first of which is Snake Agent. Set in a hi-tech near future where the gateways to Heaven and Hell are well known and open. Inspector Chen is a police officer assigned to cases of supernatural and mystical nature which means from time to time he has to take a literal trip to Hell. He has a demon counterpart, a dumb sidekick, a beautiful demon wife - and to be science fictional, he uses a nanotech computer system running on an organic neural network.

Its all there - it really is. It works pretty much too, although there is perhaps a bit too much coincidence and divine intervention in the story for a great story. But Williams' best strength is the way she evokes a strange non-human landscape. Setting half a book in Hell is a perfect match for her skills. So Hell is evil, hot, bureaucratic, spiteful, secretive and has opera. A perfect evocation.

The Smoking Room stole my weekend. Apart from a bit of essential domestic work and a trip to stuff myself silly at Yum Char, I basically spend the rest of my waking time watching both seasons.

If you don't know it, it is a British comedy where the (in)action is entirely set in one rather shabby room which is the smoking room of a firm of some sort. No special effects, no fights, no explosions, no twisting the "cringe" knife, no laugh track, no "loud is funnier", no celebrity cameos. Everything comes from the conversational interaction between the characters. It is very simple comedy and much the better for that.

From time to time I head off over to the Continuum site. Partly to see what news/updates there might be. But the main reason is to follow the accommodation link to the hotel and then to the pricing to see if the room rates have dropped yet. I have been working under the assumption that they will drop because travel and tourism are not in a great state at the moment.

Imagine my consternation then to see that the booking page on the web site appears to have been re-engineered (or switched to another provider) and that the room rates have gone up by about 25%. Cough splutter ack.

Then I noticed that the prices being quoted were in NZD. Changing the currency to AUD restored my equilibrium. The new booking site must look at my IP address or some such and from there determine what my native currency is. Smart yes? Except that when I look at prices in another country*, I expect by default I expect to see the native currency. Of course, the ability to change to my own currency is a very welcome feature, but not one I want by default.

Or perhaps it is a really sensible way to operate and my reaction is just me being contrary and resistant to change.

(*Despite the way it may appear at times, Australia is still counts as a foreign land for me)

Sunday afternoon sigh. I'm reminded of what Douglas Adams once wrote:

In the end, it was the Sunday afternoons he couldn't cope with, and that terrible listlessness that starts to set in about 2:55, when you know you've taken all the baths that you can usefully take that day, that however hard you stare at any given paragraph in the newspaper you will never actually read it, or use the revolutionary new pruning technique it describes, and that as you stare at the clock the hands will move relentlessly on to four o'clock, and you will enter the long dark teatime of the soul.

On this particular Sunday afternoon, television is offering a contrast. An early episode of Top Gear against an early Time Team. A contrast because these are two long running British shows ostensibly dealing with factual subjects also have a lot of similarities. Over time these series have acquired bigger budgets and become much slicker and ambitious as a result. Interesting because one show has become much more watchable and informative since those early days - effectively using that extra budget to make the spectacle more interesting. The other has become overblown and self indulgent losing the important aspects of what made it great in the first place.

But which one is which? I suspect that opinions will differ.

At this time of year, light levels are pretty low around the time I travel to work. Not actually dark, but a pretty dim twilight. Yet every day there are always a few cars on the road without their lights turned on. Too many to just be the odd forgetful person - it has to be a deliberate choice by the drivers. These cars are very difficult to see in some places on the road. It is quite dangerous.

Up until now I have assumed that the drivers were, like the light conditions, just a bit dim. They don't get that turning your lights on is about being seen, not enhancing how much of the road they can see.

But perhaps there is another explanation. On TV there has been a Comedy Channel promo bit where somebody is going around asking people on the street what superpower they would most like to have. Invisibility get a few mentions. I have seen this in other polls - being invisible is a popular choice for a super power.

So these drivers aren't necessarily just stupid. They want to be superheroes.

Dead superheroes.

There are errands to be run.

I can see snow on the Orongorongos and it has just started to hail again.

Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow.

I haven't been writing about what I have been reading lately. But I have a little pile of books which need to be put on shelves, so time for a few quick comments.

Death's Head by David Gunn was touted as superior military SF and for nearly half the book, it looked that way. More comarable to Richard Morgan that David Weber really. But then the hero got a talking gun. I don't care if it has an AI or is fueled by magic; talking guns, cats, horses, spaceships, swords or whatever do not work. These sassy, funny usually sulky creations destroy plots and character interaction. It certainly ruined the second half of this book.

Bloodmind by Liz Williams is a sequel to Darkland. Darkland was a breakthrough book for Williams. It delivered on the promise that earlier books had shown but not really delivered. But sequels rarely deliver what the first book manages. Such is the case here. And yet it still manages to validate that the author has "arrived". Put another way, it shows that the first book wasn't a fluke. I'm glad about that.

Sixty Days & Counting by Kim Stanley Robinson adds weight to the notion that he is the world's best boring author. No that does not mean most boring. Just that amongst the worlds large collection of boring authors, he writes the best books. Still boring though.

Johnny Phillips Werewolf Detective is by Robbie Matthews who was fan GoH at Conscription. How you get to be fan guest when you have a newly published book is a question for another time. One word - fun. It is the ASIM ethos and it is therefore no surprise to see it here. Being not actually written for humour but just for free spirited entertainment make this a tasty little snack of a book.

Dark Visions is a bunch of novellas by Stephen King, George R R Martin and Dan Simmons. It sounds like a dream team collection except that it was put together in the late '80s. george was in a quiet phase of his career (book-wise that is - he was in hollywood) and Simmons hadn't really made his name. King was at the top of his powers though. Interesting and quite precient move to bring them together. The sceptic in me does wonder though - I'm pretty sure these three all knew each other back then. Was it a way for King to unload a few of his hard to package novellas while givings his pals a leg up. Who cares - just look at the result.

Canterbury 2100 edited by Dirk Flinthart is more than just a shared worled anthology. It is designed to mimic the original Canterbyury Tales storytelling mode as well as allow a coherent story to story flow inside a bigger framework. What a challenge for an editor herding a bunch of headstrong authors into that structure when they all want to talk with their own voices. And yet those voices can't be shut off because that is what they bring in the first place. It is no wonder that the editorial duct tape shows through more and more as the collection progresses. But it does hold together and what it more you can see just what it is about the notion of such a collection really excites and why an editor is prepared to take on the challenge.

Conscription

The Good:
There was a really excellent convivial buzz around this con. As good as any I have been to. Plenty of interesting folk to talk to (including the guests) and plenty of suitable places to do so. Since the personal contact aspects are the most important to me, this alone makes the con worth attending.

The book launch for Russell's Beyond the Wall of Time.

The spillover from the writers workshops into the con worked well for the feeling of the con. It was good to have so many local writers attending.

The SJVs. People I nominated won stuff. Congratulations to everybody.

The Au Contraire team did some great promotional work. I am looking forward to what they have to offer next year.

I did a bit of worldcon sales work and got a lot of good response. It helped a lot that Donna provided some cool giveaways.

The Bad:
Ill. That cold didn't go away and while I was able to suppress it somewhat, it did affect my enjoyment. Early nights shouldn't really be a necessity but that was what I was forced to do.

Y'know there is a tradition of organisational chaos at cons, but there wasn't really a need to embrace it quite so completely this time. That extended to the programming - some good items but it was pretty thin overall.

No con bids for 2011. Do you want to run the NZ Natcon in 2011 (please)? Bids close on Nov 30 so you have plenty of time to get organised.

The Strange:
The SFFANZ AGM - but that probably goes without saying.

My travel arrangements back all worked perfectly. You may think I should include that on the "good" but experience suggests otherwise. Even QANTAS managed to get the flight to run on time and that is really strange.

I only bought 3 books. Whats up with that.

My shiny new laptop machine arrived this morning

The Good:
Pretty.
It works. Everything works - first time. Even the wireless internet connection.
Fast.

The Bad:
Not actually bad but it does feel a little on the flimsy side.

The Strange:
There was a test DVD left in the optical drive. A very battered one with "test DVD" hand written on it. I'm betting some QA worker is pissed off right now.

Girliejones clearly understands. The close proximity of an SF con and having a cold/flu are closely correlated. Yes, I do have a cold.

Installing a new modem/router using the convenient wizard.
There is a problem and it fails to connect to the internet.
So, click on the "troubleshooting" button.
Button opens browser and attempts to connect to web page.
Connection fails because router isn't working.

Didn't think that one through did they.

Seems I'm out of touch with trends again. Just yesterday I decided that my turntable could be put away in storage. I'm sure I haven't played any music on vinyl for at least a year. Anything I want to listen to is available to me in other, more convenient, formats.

So along comes this article going on about turntables being back in fashion. More particularly they are making a comeback in the domestic scene rather than just being the DJ equipment that has been the case for years.

It could just be a puff piece driven by an importer trying to create business or it could be me missing yet another trend. Not that either matters much to me but I am curious. Are turntables really making a comeback?

It was blast from the past time yesterday.

First up was Reggie Perrin - a remake of the classic The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin. First you have to ask the question - why did such a great show have to be remade in the first place? Opinions will differ on that one, but once you accept that it has happened, you can see that the remake is well done with a lot of respect and even love for the original. It isn't an exact copy but retains so much of what was important about the old one while reworking it where necessary for the world of today. There is also rework so that it matches Martin Clunes in the lead role.

Except that they ruined it with a laugh track. Not an ordinary one but an extra loud and intrusive one. It really bugged me. Even if, as a producer, network or whatever you decide that a laugh track is necessary (as it isn't here), at least do it properly. There is plenty of subtle variation possible with the technology. None of that was on display here. Some idiot CJ type manager somewhere has to be to blame.

Then there was the new Star Trek movie. Crass product placement, plot holes, atrocious physics (even by Trek standards) would make you doubt how good it could be. But that same quality of respect and love for the original comes into play here too. This time it is those things and a good healthy dose of fun that makes it easy to get past the annoyances and just enjoy the film. Then there was the characterisations and the spectacle. OK, so not perhaps a great movie but a very enjoyable one and a good way to spend a cold wet Sunday evening.

Personal confession time. I really dislike labels. I don't mean the categories that get applied to people or things in order to stigmatise them. I mean ordinary sticky labels that get put on stuff. Really, I'm talking about price stickers on retail items here. But it isn't just them. All those extra "special offer" or "gift inside" type advertising stickers also bug me. And don't even get me started on the censorship category stickers on DVDs - I have a special hatred of them.

I don't know why I dislike them so much. I thing perhaps they offend my aesthetic sensibilities because they sully the original design of the object in question. A manufacturer takes the trouble to design something and then some retailer comes along and slaps a sticky label on it which changes the appearance of that object. But then I also object to these labels on very ugly objects.

Which brings me to the real problem. Obviously the solution is that whenever I buy an object, I peel off the label as soon as I can. But some labels just don't come off, or when they do they leave behind a nasty glue residue that is even harder to remove. Yes I know that there is an anti theft/fraud element to this, but some labels get around that by pre-made cuts. In any case, barcodes and computerised systems make the threat from swapping labels so much less. For that matter they tend to eliminate the need altogether - it is the case in most supermarkets. None of which explains that the "special", "sale" and the like labels are usually the hardest of all to remove.

What brought this rant on. Well, not for the first time, no matter how careful I have been, the removal of a sale sticker has actually resulted in damage to the item I have bought. It just bugs me.

Following on from yesterday's post. The hard disk on my computer made a bunch of strange noises on startup. Last time that happened, it was a precursor to failure. Well, after doing backups in a panic, the noise stopped. Huh?!

Well I did load a bunch of security updates the night before and the noise wasn't so much the screech of heads gouging platter as prolonged excessive seeking. And it wasn't so much panic as hurried caution. And a little reflection that backups should be done *before* applying operating system updates.

But it did remind me that last year I was looking at getting a portable device - a laptop or something similar. That plan got subverted into a media player purchase instead. But now I'm seriously looking to re-visit it. As well as being a travel device, the laptop also becomes a backup for basic computer functions.

All of which is a long winded way of asking for any of your thoughts out there as to the right sort of machine to get. Given the basic condition that it is cheapish and has wireless connectivity and an optical drive. Any bad experiences? Any really good ones?

Why yes, I am using you as an information resource. You got a problem with that then?

Main Entry: fear
Function: noun
Etymology:
Middle English fer, from Old English fǣr sudden danger; akin to Old High German fāra ambush and perhaps to Latin periculum attempt, peril, Greek peiran to attempt
Date: 12th century

1 a: an unpleasant often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger b (1): an instance of this emotion (2): a state marked by this emotion
2: anxious concern : solicitude
3: reason for alarm : danger
4: the feeling you get when your hard disk makes strange loud noises at startup

Time for an unscheduled backup I think. Now!

Current Mood: anxious

Because all the cool kids seem to be doing it, I now have a Dreamwidth account. Boringly it is the same name as my lj one.

I am quite compulsive in this regard. I have account stubs all over the place. I wonder if I will use this one.

The mention of Gene Wolfe in my last post wasn't an idle one. I have just read The Knight. The plot structure of Wolfe's work is fascinating. There is only one thread but it could never be called linear. The story loops and swirls all over the place. Just when you start getting used to one direction, off the story goes in another direction, or to another place or time or whatever. I suppose it is possible for a weaver to make cloth with a single strand. You would have to keep making sharp turns with the thread though to keep crossing it over itself. Wolfe's writing is a bit like that.

I have to confess to being a bit disappointed by the Book of the Short Sun series. To carry the above analogy further, the big loops became knots that were too hard to unravel. The Knight gets it just right though. I enjoyed it a great deal. My only concern is that there is a sequel and Wolfe is one of those writers who always seem to do their best work in the first volume. Time will tell.

Musing again on the subject of giving up on things. OK, so we know that how far you go along with something depends on circumstances. Just how sucky it is to start with dictates how far you persist. Things like reputation, importance etc may play a part too. Given that, the 10 minutes I gave Caprica was probably not enough and I may have to return to it.

But what has been interesting me is the other end of the giving up spectrum. As what point when you have been persisting with something should you just suck it up and see it through to the end. Is there such a point?

I got over 80% of the way through Nick Harkaway's The Gone-Away World. If I can read 400 or so pages of a book, surely I can read the last 100. Yet I had no desire to do so. I had no interest in what was happening or the fate of the characters. I even read the epilogue to see if there were hints of big things or revelations in the last part of the book. It is clear there is a big revelation at the end. Even that wasn't enough to make me go back and find out. Yet I got through that first 80%. Should I have kept trying?

Some explanation can be offered by the structure of the book. The first chapter opens ad a high action hard SF tale. Then it goes into a 300 page flashback tracking the life of the main character up to that point. Yes 300 pages. Effectively a whole book of a typical litfic coming of age story embedded in the SF novel. I actually rather like this type of story and wasn't put off by its intrusion into the SF novel I had started reading. In fact, it was a pretty well done example of its kind. But then the book eventually reconnected with the story started in the first chapter. At that point it also fell apart. You can get by telling a life story without much plot - the traversal of a life provides the structure. But you do really need one to tell an adventure story. Well usually anyway - Gene Wolfe seems to be able to get away with it, but Nick Harkaway couldn't pull it off.

Have any of you read this book? I wouldn't mind a CliffsNotes summary of the ending to confirm my suspicions even if it isn't worth reading through those last 100 pages.

I'm getting a feeling of temporal dislocation.

I've just been watching an episode of Callan - an episode first broadcast in 1970. Callan itself is a time travel experience and a very down and dirty vision of toughness. But to counter that, who do I see but a very young Graham Crowden playing an eccentric doctor in a manner that very much foreshadows Jock McCannon in A very Peculiar Practice.

Then there is a short story series called Continuum edited by Roger Elwood (yes that guy) in the '70s. The reason I bought it was because I recognised the cover art of the second volume. It was by Ian Miller of Dragon's Dream fame. Not that it was credited anywhere in the book. I recognised it because a poster of that same art lived on my wall for many years. Actually, the art was derived from a rather mundane story in the collection by Poul Anderson. The mundane nature of the story had the rather unfortunate effect of tainting my appreciation of the artwork just a little. Did you every buy a book because of the cover art?

Then there is the matter of another one of those Asimov, Waugh and Greenberg collections - this one dedicated to the Short Novels of the 1960s. You would think the main area of interest in such a collection is the stylistic and subject changes that were happening in such a radical fashion in the genre - the "new wave". But what really stands out about this collection is the emphasis on war. The Vietnam war was the lead item in the news every day at that time. Its effect permeates every work in the book.

By way of perspective, I went to visit my 93 year old great aunt during the weekend. Her stories went a lot further back. True tales of being a solo parent as WW2 approaches gives you a different appreciation of toughness.

I have music in my car again. It was just plain weird being without it - driving just isn't right without a backing track. Interesting that, because I don't seek music so much elsewhere - no mp3 player headphones on my head all the time. In fact no headphones ever - they cut me off from the world and I don't like that. Beside, they are uncomfortable and the wires get in the way. Yes I know you can get wireless ones but it doesn't get past the cutting off factor.

When I'm alone in the house I may have music playing or some other background noise. But not all the time. However, in the car I need it. One of my colleagues is having car sound problems too. Her comment was that without it, it seems lonely in the car. Perhaps that's it, but I'm not so sure. Still it was nice to come home with Sarah McLachlan today.

Woah - not Andy Hallett. Dead of heart failure at 33.

And it isn't 1-April yet so I guess its true.

Ah synchronicity, you provider of blog fodder. Why yesterday my car stereo died and in the post arrived an MTA voucher which could be used towards a new one. It came from the domain name service I use because I filled out a survey form and they drew my response from the metaphorical hat for a thank you reward. I didn't think such things actually happened.

Today I opened at random a freshly arrived copy of Banana Wings from the redoubtable

fishlifters and the first thing I saw was an article about real science in your SF and how your appreciation of the science can affect your enjoyment of the work. Significant because I'd been wondering what approach to take to Golden Age SF - a collection of 1940s novellas edited by Asimov, Waugh and Greenberg. There is so much that can be written about the SF of that period and this collection was supposed to be representative. Or at least as representative as it could be given that they couldn't get the rights to any Heinlein stories. Naturally the intro to this collection went on about John W Campbell jr and his influence on stories. In particular and relating back to the Banana Wings connection is that the stories were supposed to emphasise science - real hard science in particular. Well the stories are about science but most of it isn't real. In isn't even outdated science that the years have disproved. Most of it is technobabble - scientific sounding but meaningless words meant to justify the story. A story that was about the solving a technical problem using that non-science. I found most of it dated and really rather tiring to read actually.

But then near the end, was a story by A Bertram Chandler called Giant Killer. It used a good grasp of evolutionary theory as an underlying but not explicit driver for a story and what is more the characters were not just cyphers there to spout the technobabble. It is a wonderful story which would not be out of place in any modern SF collection. It gave me quite a lift.

Actually, something else gave me a lift. The wonderful illustrations in that Banana Wings from Harry Turner. I'd never noted his work before but it is superb. Sadly my discovery of his art was coincident with the realisation that it was a memorial because he died earlier this year. The art remains to enjoy however.