Dave Scholes new novel Alien Hunter now available

Writer Dave Scholes send in an item that is real good news.  This is the gist of the note is:

• Just to let you know that I've just published a novella based on my Alien Hunter series that was published on the GVM site.
• 
  
• At present its only available on Lulu but will become available on Amazon etc and as an e-book for e-readers in the coming weeks.
• The Lulu link is here

 Thanks for the update Dave

Review: Necropolis by Michael Dempsey

Necropolis by Michael Dempsey
361 pp pb novel
Night Shade Books www.nightshadebooks.com


Now here is a novel that is either easy or hard to classify depending on what type of venue you are most likely to place the book into.

Necropolis is easily an urban fantasy but with strong science fiction frameworks holding the story up and threaded through it all is a damn good detective murder / mystery!

Many novels might bandy about the phrase something for everyone, but let me tell you Michael Dempsey with Necropolis – delivers. Hard bitten x cop pressed into solving a missing person / murder. The murder mystery may well be his own.

X New York cop Paul Donner clearly remembers his murder along with that of his wife in a neighborhood bodega, while buying cigarettes. The weird thing is – he is not dead and it's fifty years since he “died”.

It would appear that during Donner's death, a terrorist organization released a bio weapon called Shift which brings, for the most part, the dead back to life....but to grow old? Nope, to grow young and finally disappear as undifferentiated cells. He is now the under of the underclass, no rights, no real work, only the worst living conditions. In this milieu Donner is once again a detective. A detective in a world that seems to have been drawn straight out of a Raymond Chandler detective novel.

But there are plusses. His side kick is Maggie an AI girl Friday who helps him in his quest to uncover who was responsible for not only destroying his world but just about everyone else's as well.

And it would appear that New York may have just been a warm up. In Donner's new world, everyone is suspect and no one is really who they appear to be. And that is barely half of the problem.

Yep, Michael Dempsey's Necropolis is a mind twisting trip into madness and it takes you along for the ride. The novel is graphic. Michael did his research that is clear. The body blows and the breaking bones are all but felt. The madness invoked throughout the tale is palpable. Plus the future / past venue is so dense you can almost feel it.

I consider Necropolis worth a look. Even though its a thick volume, you still have trouble putting it down. It is a very fast read indeed. You know the double cross is coming, you just don't know when. You know someone is playing fast and loose with loyalties and you just can not wait to find out who and when and most certainly the WHY?!!!

More info on Necropolis by Michael Dempsey

2010 Nebula Award Winners Announced

the 2010 Nebula Awards have been announced!

The Nebula for Best Short Story this year is a tie!!! The co-winners are:

"Ponies" by Kij Johnson
"How Interesting: A Tiny Man" by Harlan Ellison

The Nebula for Best Novelette

"That Leviathan, Whom Thou Hast Made" by Eric James Stone

The Nebula for Best Novella

"The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers Beneath the Queen's Window" by Rachel Swirsky

The Nebula for Best Novel

Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis

The complete award article can be found on the SFScope site here

Scott to do "Forever War"

Variety reports that Ridley Scott is planning to make "The Forever War," into his first science fiction film since he delivered back-to-back classics with "Blade Runner" and "Alien." Scott attained the rights to the Joe Haldeman classic, after working to obtain them for 25 years, from Richard Edlund, who spent $400,000 of his own money and intended to make the book his directorial debut, but the project foundered. After a Sci Fi Channel miniseries stalled, Scott became interested again and Edlund was ready to make a deal. It took six months to secure all the rights.

The Forever War revolves around a soldier who battles an enemy in deep space for only a few months, only to return home to a planet that has moved many years into the future. Due to time dialation he has remained young but his home planet has continued to change. Now he doesn’t recognize his home and no one remembers him.

<- Variety via IO9 ->

Review: Time Machines Repaired While U Wait by K.A. Bedford

Time Machines Repaired While U Wait
K.A.Bedford
324 pp pb
Edge

I think I can safely say that this novel may hold the record for the worst title. Here is a title that screams low comedy perhaps, or at best a simplistic plot - And that dear reader would be a shame to pass this gem up. In the end the title may be marketing genius.. lol who knows! Anway:

Aloysius "Spider" Webb is a walking cliche. A down and out x-cop, released from the force for being in the end, too honest. Out of options Spider jumps at a chance to make a living wage. But the catch is, he will be fixing malfunctioning time machines. Thinking that glamour awaits, the reality of his situation is that he is trapped in a no where job, barely making ends meet working for a pig of a boss. All this would have been tolerable until a time machine blows up and leaves behind something nightmares are made of, strangers seem to be spying on him and weirdest of all he finds himself murdered in his own bed.

This list of weirdness doesn't even come close to describing the mind bending twists and turns that take place in Bedford's Time Machines Repaired While U Wait. If you are a fan of the Time Travel science fiction sub-genre you will get enough of what makes this book tick to fill four novels. At the end you will question EVERY character in the book. There are enough twists and turns, to hold the attention of even the most jaded science fiction fan. Some of the places and concepts are truly mind bending. The scope literally takes you to one of the strangest places ever. And in true potboiler cop drama, the ending is scary, disturbing and twisted in so many ways.

I didn't have much of a problem with Time Machines.... other than putting it down.

<- Edge publishing newsletter website ->

Frank Herbert's Helstrom Hive preview?

Cool! well, lets bring you up to speed - it seems, according to our friends over at SF Signal that Google will let you embed previews of certain books on your blog. Now these are supposed to be "page limited" but it would seem that the whole book is here for our enjoyment!

<- complete SF Signal story ->

Starfish by Peter Watts, Tor's newest free ebook.

Tor's current free book is Starfish by Peter Watts. and I can not give this a strong enough recommendation. I have read this novel as well as many other woks of Watts and I have always found his fiction extremely entertaining. I have read his shorter works on the podcast (Niche, Ambassador etc. ) that you might want to look up. Go get this one, you will not be disappointed!
Fyi if you didn't already know, Starfish is part of Watt's "Rifters" universe as was the story Niche that I read in episode 61 - 63 and also available in the archives.

If you have not yet signed up for the notification Tor sends out when new books are available to to Tor.com to sign up or get the newest entry in Tor's series of introductory free ebooks.

Review: Jemma 7729 Phoebe Wray

Jemma 7729

Phoebe Wray
219 pages trade
Edge 15.95

See if you recognize this theme - young protagonist, approaching a time of life when a life changing choice must be made or must comply with a society rule that will drastically change or end their life. The hero, living in a closed society, domed most of the time, does not comply and escapes. Meets a grizzled time worn parent figure that teaches them the ropes and eventually the hero grows and returns to the city to free those left behind and possibly change society. What does that sound like? Logans Run? The World Inside? Yep, been done many times before. So what makes Wray think that she can do it better? Well maybe that is the problem. I had many instances when I felt that I really could not continue reading this novel. Its starts with an unpleasant beating Wray meted out to a 7 year old female. Other sections I felt really needed to be tightened up or rewritten. It may be that Wray is uncomfortable still with the novel format, many sections were just plain difficult to read. Then again, as young adult fiction? That might well be another story. The less complex characters often are better received by that age group. The plot is often if not clumsy then overly simplistic. So in that I would recommend it to a younger audience.

Go to Edge publishing for more info and purchase

20 Science Fiction Novels that will change your life

From IO9:

Whether it's because they've altered the course of science fiction writing, or simply provide a genuinely alien perspective on ordinary life, these are novels that will rearrange how you think. Check out our list below.

Frankenstein (1818), by Mary Shelley

The Time Machine (1895), by H.G. Wells

At the Mountains of Madness (1931), by H.P. Lovecraft

I, Robot (1955), by Isaac Asimov

The Dispossessed (1974), by Ursula LeGuin

Kindred (1979), by Octavia Butler

Wizard (1979), by John Varley

Consider Phlebas (1987), by Iain M. Banks

He, She, and It (1991), by Marge Piercy

Sarah Canary (1991), by Karen Joy Fowler

A Fire Upon the Deep (1992), by Vernor Vinge

The Bohr Maker (1995), by Linda Nagata

The Sparrow (1996), by Mary Doria Russell

Cryptonomicon (2000), by Neal Stephenson

The Mount (2002), by Carol Emschwiller

Perdido Street Station (2002), by China Mieville

Pattern Recognition (2003), by William Gibson

Newton's Wake (2004), by Ken MacLeod

Glasshouse (2006), by Charles Stross


Click here for a synopsis of each book

Firefly Novel from Steven Brust!

Hey, I just read over on the IO9 blog that writer Steven Brust, best known for his fantasy/scifi Dragaeran series, has done something that should warm all the fans of Josh Weadon's Firefly hearts. Brust has written a free ebook set in the Firefly universe. And by free I mean Creative Commons free. Down load it, copy it, distribute it, as long as it's NFP, knock yourself out! IO9 contributor Newitz writes that "Brust has done a great job capturing the humor and out-West action feel of the series."

Here is the link to the novel

FREE Podiobook Grey by Jon Armstrong

Wow ready for some REALLY BIG NEWS!? Jesse Willis over at SFFAudio tells me that Philip K. Dick award nominee GREY by Jon Armstrong is available on Podiobooks.com for your listening pleasure. For free people! Sweet!

click the podiobooks link or the article title for the audio url.

Karl Schroeder's Ventus now a free CC download

Cory Doctorow had this to say, on Boing Boing:

Award-winning sf writer Karl Schroeder has just released his debut novel, Ventus under a Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial- NoDerivs license, meaning that you can download it, share it and copy it as much as you like. Cory says "It's an indication of just how far ahead he is that this seven-year-old book still feels like it's on the cutting edge, with its object-oriented sapient planet, bizarre copyright wars, and assorted grace-notes."

Definitely worth a look with a strong recommendation like that!

Wheel of Time author Robert Jordan Dies

According to Boing Boing and the Associated Press:

Robert Jordan, author of the monster bestselling fantasy series The Wheel of Time. Jordan had been suffering from a chronic illness for some years now, making it hard for him to finish new installments in the series -- he died with the books unfinished.

Jordan, whose real name was James Oliver Rigney Jr., died Sunday at the Medical University of South Carolina of complications from primary amyloidosis with cardiomyopathy. The disease attacks the body's major organs; in Jordan's case, it caused the walls of his heart to thicken.

Jordan was 58

Rollback Novel by Robert J. Sawyer REVIEW

Rollback Novel by Robert J. Sawyer 317 pp TOR

Something momentous has occurred. Sigma Draconis has sent Humanity a message.

A message in code.

Sarah Halifax is a research scientist and one of many asked to help decode the mysterious message.

Little hope is held out for the message to be decoded any time soon. But connections are made and the first communique is decoded and answered.

A multi billionaire wants in on the action that he knows will happen 28 years in the future. He wants to guarantee some of the people that were here for the first message are also there for the second. He offers Sarah RollBack, which will bring back her youth and thus guarantee that she will be available to decode the second message and many more. The kicker is that Sarah must have Don by her side in this adventure, its either that or no dice. Reluctant, the benefactor agrees but the procedure goes horribly wrong and now its a rush between death and decoding the Dracon's newest message.

I will admit that I had a hard time getting comfortable with Rollback. Why? Well, I guess the
rollback issue. I know that is wrong headed. But here we have been built up to an excited pitch with not one but two mysterious messages. For me I wanted to know about Sarah! How she felt, was there enough time....could she hold out? Would she be finally able to decode the second message. That isn't in the book, you say? Oh yes, it certainly is, however as the book is about “Rollback” we are treated heavily to Don's angst for being young, his embarrassment for being old....and his guilt for what seemed to be inevitable infidelity. I am sorry, Don could have been left out of this novel completely and it would have suffered not. Don was not a person I felt that I liked, did not for a moment agree with his choices and frankly never bought into his conflicts. Yes, I know, he was put in a very difficult position, one not of his choosing....but old, he has moral back bone and young he can't resist temptation? How droll. I suspect the writer felt the same implosion happening, but what is added? A robot! And it develops more moral fiber than Don in just a page or two? Please....!

Rollback as a story about an old man forced into a young society fails. However the robot manages to pull the two separate story halves together. Because in the end there is a joyous coming together, a tearful parting, ultimate triumph, happiness and great joy. I loved the ending of this book, but when the robot is the moral high-ground....something is wrong. I would give this book a marginal read recommendation. At 317 pages, it still is a very fast read. It starts well. The ending is a bit sophomoric, over all, it is entertaining. So I suggest you get a bigger cup of tea than usual, relax and don't fight the urges to flip ahead a bit.

On a scale of 1 to 5 Rollback is a 3.5

2007 Hugo Award Nominees!!!

Here are the nominations for this year's Hugo Awards for best science fiction!!!! I think readers and listeners will recognize some of the nominees and some of the stories as well!!! Highlighted stories are those that can be found online.

Novel
Michael F. Flynn, Eifelheim
Naomi Novik, His Majesty’s Dragon
Charles Stross, Glasshouse
Vernor Vinge, Rainbows End
Peter Watts, Blindsight

Novella
“The Walls of the Universe” by Paul Melko
“A Billion Eyes” by Robert Reed
“Inclination” by William Shunn
“Lord Weary’s Empire” by Michael Swanwick
Julian: A Christmas Story by Robert Charles Wilson

Novelette
“Yellow Card Man” by Paolo Bacigalupi
“Dawn, and Sunset, and the Colours of the Earth” by Michael F. Flynn
“The Djinn’s Wife” by Ian McDonald
“All the Things You Are” by Mike Resnick
“Pol Pot’s Beautiful Daughter” by Geoff Ryman

Short Story
“How to Talk to Girls at Parties” by Neil Gaiman
“Kin” by Bruce McAllister
“Impossible Dreams” by Timothy Pratt
“Eight Episodes” by Robert Reed
“The House Beyond Your Sky” by Benjamin Rosenbaum

Odyssey by Jack McDevitt - review

Odyssey

Jack mcDevitt

Ace hard cover 410 pages 24.95

Moonriders – black featureless globes, maneuvering in space without any sign of propulsion, have been reported from time to time. Showing up at construction sites, astronomical curiosities and the odd science outpost. Almost mythical in nature, thought to be not of intelligent origin, most believe they are the product of someones overactive imagination, harmless in any event.

To shore up waining support, the Academy, send out a research ship to “study” Moonriders. What starts as a harmless publicity stunt turns very real and very deadly as it is soon discovered that the Moonriders are indeed intelligent and far from harmless, the Moonriders prove to be aggressive to the point of destroying life. The warnings of a teenage girl, may be all that stand between humanity and the destruction of the universe.

Fans of Beam Me Up will know that I personally enjoy Jack McDevitt's writings. The show has used his short story Promises to Keep and we have reviewed Polaris in earlier shows. So how does Odyssey compare to the earlier offerings? Oh very well indeed!

Initially, Odyssey has a ship disappear much as it had in Polaris. At first this didn't bode well for me. However even though McDevitt uses this as a stage setter, he wisely steps well away from the Polaris and it's Flying Dutchman theme. No, this disappearance is merely used to set the stage and introduce us to the mysterious Moonriders. Black mysterious globes who move at will without motive power, non communicative, mysterious. Well I am not going to be a spoiler here, but needless to say, the mysterious ships are far more dangerous than anyone suspects.

Even at 400 plus pages, Odyssey is a VERY fast read. Like Polaris, McDevitt puts his foot into the plot throttle and never lets up. There are characters aplenty, but not enough to overwhelm and just enough to tell the story for enough angles to make it entertaining and interesting. Odyssey lacks the “mystery” of Polaris, however the twists and double dealings come aplenty the farther you get into the novel. Where Polaris was a closed door thriller, Odyssey is a roller coaster fun house ride mashup. Plot monsters jump out of the dark at you at ever turn. Other authors could take lessons from McDevitt on how to write intrigue and make it exciting instead of tedious.

Arthur C. Clarke award nominations

2007 Arthur C Clarke Award

The Wikipedia lists the ACC award as:
a British award given for the best science fiction novel first published in the United Kingdom during the previous year. The award was established with a grant from Arthur C. Clarke and the first prize was awarded in 1987. The book is chosen by a panel of judges from the British Science Fiction Association, the Science Fiction Foundation and the Science Museum of London. It is now administrated by the Serendip Foundation.

This year the short list nods go to:

End of the World Blues, Jon Courtenay Grimwood (Gollancz)
Nova Swing, M. John Harrison (Gollancz)
Oh Pure and Radiant Heart, Lydia Millet (Heinemann)
Hav, Jan Morris (Faber)
Gradisil, Adam Roberts (Gollancz)
Streaking, Brian Stableford (PS Publishing)

MallCity14 By Shaun A. Saunders

221 pp paperback Trafford Press $19.99 US CDN$ 23.30 Amazon

At first, when reading MallCity14 you might be lured into thinking that the theme has been done again and again. But your being lured yes, but by a master of misdirection. MallCity14 - the dehumanization of Silberberg's Urban Monads, insidious Big Brother of 1984, the literary horror of Bradbury's 451 plus rampant advertising and consumption. All of this wrapped into a clean, fast-paced first person narrative. Every bit a “brave new world” however spun up with technology and psychology that previous authors could never have imagined. And just when you think you have it all figured out...everything changes.

Is the novel misleading or misdirected? Hardly - Saunders is a master of the literary subliminal image. What will give this novel wider appeal is the protagonist. A time weary traveler? A virginal barbarian? Hardly – no, the story is told mostly from the eyes of a teenage boy. But with the masterful mix of adult subplot we are treated to story telling that will appeal to adults as well as young adults.

I have seen copies available on Amazon