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I just saw an ad for AUT - that is a university in Auckland for those who didn't know. In this ad, they made the assertion that "the Internet was invented" in 1991. Since I was using the Internet back in the '80s, I beg to differ. OK, I suspect I know what they mean and I understand the deep and fundamental ignorance of advertising people. But still, would you want to go to an institution that can't get its facts straight? Harrumph.

The fourth volume of Clive James' "unreliable memoirs" is North Face of Soho. Like the others it is told in a self deprecating style that James insists is how he really feels. The problem is with this volume there is less to be self deprecating about. It covers the time in his life when he really established himself as a critic and author. The hits in life outnumber the misses. Modesty seems a bit inappropriate. But it is full of trademark James double-jointed witticisms. It also has the cast of colourful characters who all seem to help the author in spite of his professed incompetence. I suspect that the characters this time are a little less unreliable than in previous volumes.

I'm reluctant to be negative about something which gave me such amusement, but it did feel a bit formula. A bit less fresh than the earlier volumes, perhaps for the "success" reasons above or perhaps because of a layer of melancholy that seemed to settle over parts of the book. The real pain of live overwhelming the false pain of life remembered. Did you like that last line - North Face of Soho is full of the like.

Shakespeare by Bill Bryson. It confronted me on the shelves and just dared me to buy it. Bryson is justly famous for his travel stories which morph into slices of his life, but he also has written about the English language and history. It is no great stretch to go from language and history to Shakespeare. But Bryson's language books are not quite the entertainments that his travel books are. This is because the necessity to drop a bunch of information in gets in the way of the wry observation and the wit. Having said that, Shakespeare gets off to a good start with Bryson taking a jab at himself for writing a book in an area already overflowing with offerings. He simply reports that this book is part of a series ("Eminent Lives") and that he is just filling the Shakespeare sized hole in that series. That the first sentence in the book references a distant relative of mine is no bad thing either (although he was - "bad" that is). Actually another distant relative is mentioned in the short front piece describing the series. I feel connected.

The rest of the book is a series of disclaimers dotted around the very few things actually known about Shakespeare the man. There just isn't all that much known. What there is is put forward while some of the more well known interpolations (the polite word) are dismissed. Concentrating on actual facts does not leave much to write about and so it is a short volume. Bryson's prose is, as always light and readable even if a bit wit-light compared to his usual work. A short snack of a history book really. I would also add that it makes a good companion piece and occasional counterpoint for Michael Wood's In Search of Shakespeare TV series.

It is a cold wet day outside. So, instead of going for a walk, two of my work colleagues have spent their lunch break playing Magic the Gathering. I was astonished. I really thought that this game had died away. However I’m assured that it still retains a strong following just without the high profile that it enjoyed in the ‘90s. I wonder what else is operating quietly out there below the radar. Next, somebody will tell me that the Blakes 7 fan clubs are still going strong.

I have just finished the final Harry Potter book. Not much point in saying anything about it because most of y'all out there have read it already. Of all the mysteries answered in the book, the only one conspicuous by its absence is just why all the hysteria. It has been an enjoyable journey, but I'm not enthralled in it like so many people are. Sure there is a big peer pressure and community of common interest component but that does not explain the base engagement that so many people have. Still if that was something easily understood, it would be a very strange world and life would be too easy for leaders and editors.

I seem to have done it again. Agree to set another sf quiz that is. The thing about setting a quiz is that after a certain point it does not really get any easier with practice. It gets worse because you have used up all your "A" material. Particularly this time as it pretty much has to be all new material. It will be easy enough to come up with a bunch of "name the author", "name the film" questions and a few pictorial identifications (the quiz is a powerpoint presentation), but you do need to have something a bit extras. A few questions that are a bit distinctive - things that are entertaining over and above the basic fun of answering questions.

I'm looking for ideas here.

In the meantime, if you want a question from this year's NZ natcon...

Are You Watching Closely? One was Batman, one was Wolverene but when they came together for a film, their characters’ initials run together to start the word abracadabra. What movie of prestidigitation does this describe?

I'm still on a restricted diet - just a few short stories from time to time. I just finished another collection co-edited by Gardner Dozois featuring a bunch of major players in the field. But this time it is fantasy, the co-editor is Jack Dann and the collection is Dark Alchemy. At first glance it looked like a similar sort of collection to the last one I read - a showcase for the current state of the art. Well it is that after a fashion but it is also themed - something not obvious from the cover notes. I'm not sure why you would want to obscure something like that. The theme seems to be wizards and more specifically the discovery or emergence into wizardly powers. Hardly an obscure or under-used theme but very well done in this case. Get a bunch of top authors contributing and you get a good outcome. In fact, in fantasy you often get better outcomes. Short stories allow the fantasy writer more scope than within the bounds imposed by the marketplace for the novel or trilogy. Most of the stories here seem to benefit from that freedom - only one or two plod along at the pace of a novel.

I would say this though. The big downside of a themed anthology is that the same basic story lines get repeated a lot. There just aren't that many things you can do when uncovering a wizardly power. Most of the authors here manage to transcend this by just writing well and doing the character and world building well. Still, the "here we go again" feeling does knock a bit off some of these stories. The ones where the big revelation is the heart of the story rather than the excuse to tell a tale.

I wonder if I'm up to reading a novel next. Perhaps the last one in a series about a wizard coming into his power.

Must watch TV. Just how good could this show be. I mean Fox have cancelled some great shows over the years. The really really good shows get cancelled very early. Being cancelled by Fox is a badge of honour. So how good is Anchorwoman - it got cancelled after just one show. One show! It must be the best show ever! Really! Really?

Oh and by the way, I watched it. Amazing, miracles happen. Fox actually got it right this time. Even better would have been not to air it at all, but lets not quibble with wondrous events.

What do you read when your energies are being sapped by work. Short stories seemed like the way to go. ASIM 30 didn't last very long - they never do - they are just too tasty. Looking for a larger meal that I could still take in manageable bites I turned to The New Space Opera edited by Jonathan Strahan and Gardner Dozois. This collection has received some very good reviews and I can see why as it contains a whole bunch of stories that more or less hit the "space opera" button. Since the definition of most sub-genres is fuzzy, just like the whole genre really, it means I can't really quibble with the inclusion of stories. In any case I view terms like "space opera" as being descriptive devices enabling a common vocabulary rather than any form of strict categorisation rule. Under the circumstances all I can say is that this is a bunch of essentially plot driven stories with some degree of technologically oriented setting. Beyond that it gives a good look at some of the ways that science fiction can be expressed. Add to that, that the authors chosen are all well known in the field and you can say that the collection represents a good snapshot of the current commercial state of the art in this area.

I don't want to single out individual stories. They mostly range from good to excellent. Really there were only two that I didn't like all that much. Strange that these two were the first ones in the collection. Conventional wisdom is that you put strong stories up front to grab the reader's attention. I suspect that this is a case of my tastes being different from the anthologists. That would also tally up with these stories being praised by reviewers. An interesting thing personal taste, especially given the overall matching of my tastes that the rest of the collection represents.

Sardines and instant mash. Camping meal. Why then is it so good. Must be all that salt.

Another day, another new experience. At work today I got given flowers today. More specifically, I was given a dozen red roses. Nobody has ever given me flowers before - except possibly ones made of sugar. Before you get any ideas, they were a delivery from the recruitment agency who placed me at my new job. It is common practice for them to send a card or the like, but flowers? To me? My co-workers were amused and bemused. I tried to give the bunch away, but didn't get any takers until we broke the bunch up and distributed the blooms individually. Most took one as a joke - a lot of clenching in teeth went on.

I've never really seen the appeal in bunches of flowers. OK, they look nice in a garden, but cut they are just dead things. The others around work were pretty ambivalent. I sort of expected it from the guys - expecting some sort of sex linked response thing. But the women were pretty much unimpressed too. General consensus was that a bottle of wine would have been a much better gift.

But somebody must like flowers or they wouldn't get sold. Perhaps it isn't the flowers as such but the symbolism involved. How about you? Do you like to give/receive flowers?

Old series get revived a lot these days. Sometimes it works - you know who I mean. But most of the time it does not. Back in 1980 Dino de Laurentiis made a movie of Flash Gordon. Flash has been an important part of my childhood - they showed all the old serials on TV on Sunday afternoons. I loved them. It was part of my early SF experience. The 1980 version was wonderfully faithful to those old movies and the comic strips too for that matter. I loved it.

Now there is a new Flash Gordon - the first episode has just been shown. ( lj cuts for spoilers are for wimps but... )

Sweet Jamacan beef. With banaaas! Eeeeexcellent.

Since doing much reading when I get home seems a bit beyond me at the moment, I have been watching a few movies. Although going to sleep during them is always a possibility. The other day I picked up a copy of Millennium for the price of a cup of coffee. It certainly isn't for the quality of the movie, but more a nostalgia moment for the quality of the original. John Varley was, to my mind, the greatest SF author of the late 70s and 80s. The work he did then, particularly the short stories, was just mind blowing. One of those short stories was Air Raid. It was the story which was the basis for Millennium. I loved Air Raid and I loved the book of Millennium which was more or less (mostly more) the book of the movie. Millennium the movie sucks big time. Varley wrote the screenplay. In fact he wrote it 6 times for four different directors. In the end it had been so badly mangled that all the heart was taken out of it. But it is the execution that really lets the film down. I don't know who thought Cheryl Ladd could act, but all she is really good for is keeping her hair off the floor - the hair being the better actor. The rest of the cast are pretty much of the same quality. Varley didn't write much else for about 5 years and his output has been pretty thin since.

All the above is just a way of saying that those of you who hold bad movie evenings should really give this one a shot. Then go read the book for a completely different quality of experience. Here endeth today's lesson on the perils of writers in Hollywood.

Pigeon does not taste like Chicken. It tastes like duck. Not proper wild duck. No, the boring cage bred duck. Only less nice. Disappointing.

Between work and a couple of wild food explorations (Pigeon anybody?), I seem to be filling up my days with little to spare. But I have carved out a bit of time to play with my new toy. So, further to my last post, you can now email me in my own domain (ross at threemonkeys dot co dot nz). Thanks to

beagl for pointing me in the right direction. The thing is that, while not completely painless, it really was very easy to set up. My days of being deeply geeky enough to be able to look under the technology hood are well and truly past. There was a time when you would need that type of expertise to set up a domain. Now it is a tool for the masses. It makes me a little less nostalgic for those days of knowledge.

Pate is made from liver. It tastes OK, but does not seem to deliver the right textural cues that meat should.

Whenever I start a new job I buy myself a present. Something to do with celebrating that great god - Income Stream. The items have varied but its usually a toy of some sort. Once it was a new car. What does it say about where I'm at these days that I bought a domain name?

The word for today - venison. Mmmmmmm. Red meat.

Well, I'm going to Conflux. Leave is approved, hotel booked, flights book. I suppose I had better actually register. The Conflux virtual minicon this coming weekend may help with that.

But why? It could be that Daikaiju! 3 is getting launched there. I mention this because I have just finished Daikaiju! 2 edited by Robert Hood and Robin Pen. Giant monsters - you know it has to be good. I have come to the conclusion that the real key to these big monsters isn't their size, their impossibility or their enigmatic origins. Rather it is that they stomp. All the best monster stories feature plenty of stomping. Not just walking around, I mean things getting crushed underfoot stomping. A story without a path of destruction is just second rate. So, did the earth move for you?

So why is Black Man by Richard Morgan so good? Initial examination show that it looks to be just another SF thriller. A crime story told in a recognisable future with a hard boiled lead character and lots of violence. It is large and yet tightly written, with a complex interwoven plot, fast paced and has an excellent cast of secondary characters. Those are the standard things that an SF thriller has and Morgan does them all well. He is pretty much the master of this corner of the genre. Other writers are migrating here but Morgan started off writing this stuff and this is him at the top of his form.

Yet, to me, there seems just a little bit more here as well. It isn't the added political and cultural comment. Everybody is doing it these days and while Morgan does it well, it is not special. No, I think that it is the character engagement that catches you by surprise. I really lived with the secondary characters - yes the secondary ones. It is in the nature of these types of books that the hero is a bit beyond human. They may be flawed and complex but there is something that is not in the normal realm about them. Actually, in Black Man that is literally the case. In any case, you expect to have a little difficulty identifying with them. The secondary characters in most thrillers are part of the scenery - motivation, target, red herring, villain and so forth. You don't really expect to care about them. Except this time you do. Gosh, just like a real book. Perhaps I'm reading the wrong thrillers. Anybody worried that this is some attempt to be "arty" - first note that "little bit" at the beginning of this paragraph and then go back and read the first paragraph.

One of the things I planned to do on my sabbatical from the workforce was to see more movies on the big screen. The idea being that I could go when the cinemas were not too crowded and watch the spectacle when the risk of static from other watchers was low. In the end, I didn't get to many at all - too many other things to occupy my time. But in a last fling move, I went to The Simpsons Movie today.
( Probably no spoilers but my thoughts below a cut anyway )

It isn't my normal practice to pimp YouTube video, but this little SGA fan film about one of the more obscure members of the operation is very funny.
( Cut because I know some of you are still bandwidth challenged )

I signed on the bottom line today. I start a new job on Monday. I'm happy with the workplace and I'm happy with my ability to do the work. My only worry - getting up in time. My body clock needs serious readjustment. It is like jet lag but without the helpful change in sunrise time.

I wonder what I can spend my first pay on.

I should give the "preair" thing a rest. But this time of year there are pilots about for evaluation.
( No real spoilers but you may want to be surprised anyway )
( EDIT: But wait, there is more Firefly connection )

I'm no kind of cook, but I do know that a little bit of spice can make a dish more tasty and interesting. Too much spice on the other hand can make a dish too hard to eat. So it is with exotic language in book. By exotic language, I mean words and phrases which are not part of the base language set of the book and therefore not part of the language set of the readership. SF abounds with skilful use of a bit of exotic language to make books more interesting. Frank Herbert used Arabic words to make the culture in Dune seem more exotic - he made up words too. Tolkien devised whole new languages for the races in Lord of the Rings. In her books, Ursula Le Guin invented words for which there is no corresponding concept in human society. And so on. But if you look at those works, you see that the actual occurrence of the exotic words in the books is pretty sparse. So it should be - the target audience speaks/reads modern English, so that is the language the books are written in. It isn't unreasonable to argue that the "real" language for most characters in SF work is unlikely to be 20th/21st century English - SF has too many settings and languages change too fast to assume that everybody speaks English. Therefore the author is, in effect, translating for us. The exotic words are there to give just a taste of the culture, but not overwhelm us. When done properly, as in the examples above, that is a good thing.

Which brings me to Dark Space by Marianne de Pierres. There are quite a few parallels that can be drawn between this book and Dune. Not the least of these is exotic language and culture taken from a non-English Earth culture. Where Dune features Arabic terms, Dark Space has Italian. In fact quite a lot of Italian in places. Most pages have at least one or two words and in places the density gets up to one every paragraph or more. It is too much - at least for this non-Italian speaker who does not have a sufficient language gift to be able to work out the meaning of a word from context without interrupting the reading flow. This ongoing interruption really messed up my reading process because I had to keep stopping to infer or translate. It helped make the book just too easy to put down. It seems to me similar to the situation where an author does lots of world building research for their book and then can't let go of it so leading to too much exposition. I actually went back to the books mentioned above for comparison and can see that the exotic language density in them is nowhere near as high.

As with food, tastes come into this. I like a really hot curry but I know it isn't for everybody. I just wonder if Marianne isn't restricting her potential audience too much by making the book too "language spicy". Not helping is that there is another "easy to put down" factor that counts against Dark Space. The pov characters are not all equally interesting - one is much more engaging than the others. Relatively speaking therefore the others become a chore to read. It is a pity really, because underneath that there does seem a really good bit of space opera struggling to get out.

By my count it is about 5 days since I said that I had yet to watch BSG season 2. I am now caught up to the end of season 3. It hardly qualifies as a marathon, but I am still have the feeling that I have been looking at that screen too much.

To watch 40 episodes of a show back to back you have to be pretty engaged with it. Some might even say obsessed, but I wouldn't. The thing is that the reason it took so long to get around to watching season 2 was that I thought I should re-watch season 1 first - something which I just could not do. I can pretty confidently say that I will not want to re-watch seasons 2 or 3 again either. A contradiction eh? Compelling viewing and yet not worth seeing twice.

The reason for this is that, I think, I am primarily engaged by the story. Once you have processed a story then you don't need to process it again. There are other modes of engagement apart from story but, for me, while they exist they are not so strong with BSG. I know some of you out there have different experiences but this is how it works for me. There are also quite a few things about BSG that I don't like but which engagement with the story carries me past. I wouldn't want to encounter those negatives without it. The negatives were not big issues, but lots of smallish ones. One day I might see if I can collate them all, but that might mean I have to re-watch the show. I see a problem.

Well, at least I can join in the discussions now.

It is a reflection of the sad paranoia that infests the world these days that even the tiniest concession to common sense is to be applauded. And it is a very tiny concession at that.

It was Phoenix tonight and I actually worked up the energy to attend. There was a discussion of TV show which prompted me to think that I should update my watching notes. Not that there is much going on - northern hemisphere summer means not many new shows. Burn Notice was mentioned during the meeting and from my viewing it does seem worth watching. The premise of a spy who has been kicked out so he has to make a living as a person who helps people out is an old one. But the execution looks to be excellent with some top casting and a snazzy line in voice overs. By the way, it is really quite funny. The second episode wasn't as good as the first but still looks worth a watch.

I gave Jekyll a second chance and I'm glad I did. There has been a lot of care and attention been lavished on this show to make it really interesting. Again, the casting is excellent.

I had a brief nostalgia moment today thinking about how much effort we all put in to get fifth generation VHS tapes of shows within only a couple of months of them screening in the States. Today I watched the first episode of season 2 of Eureka about 3 hours after it finished screening in the States. Y'know this has been possible for a while now but it still impresses the heck out of me.

I'll just get this off my chest. I didn't enjoy Magic for Beginners, Kelly Link's collection of stories. I feel like I'm making a confession saying that. The reason is that so many people are giving Link astonishingly high praise - in print and in personal recommendation. I feel like I'm thumbing my nose at all those people. So what is it about these stories?

They are inventive. There is all sorts of clever structural devices - nested stories, backward stories, stories which just fade out and the like - very admirable. The images in them are unsettled and chaotic in a clever and admirable fashion. The behaviour of the characters is odd and non linear too. The settings are admirably strange too. There are lots of quips in the text - not funny but clever. The same goes for the pop culture references. The prose style is quite distinct - short stabbing sentences like an angry fairy tale that keeps prodding at you. You have got to admire all the clever stuff.

Well, maybe I'm overdoing the "admirable" and "clever" but that is what I feel about this work. There is lots of unique artistic merit here but it goes too far for my taste. As a result, the adjectives missing from the description are "engaging" and "enjoyable". I'm reminded of a Paul Klee painting - important, influential and well regarded, but I wouldn't want one on my wall.