Big Changes Coming to the Blog

This is the same post I ran yesterday at Adventures Fantastic.  The readership of the two blogs overlaps quite a bit but isn't identical.  I'm reposting the announcement here in case anyone missed it.  If you saw it yesterday, it's the same thing, verbatim.

Traffic the last few days has been up quite a bit, so when traffic today was down, I wasn't too worried.  I've noticed that trend before, a drop in hits on the day following higher than usual traffic, even thought the traffic drop today is greater than usual.

Then I noticed something in my inbox.  It was from Google.  It had come in overnight, and at first glance I thought it was spam that had slipped through the filter.  Instead it was accusing this blog of being spam.  The second line read, in part, "As a result of your site having pure spam, Google has applied a manual spam action..."

Excuse me!?!

Happy Birthday, James Gunn

James Edwin Gunn was born this day in 1923.  He's still with us, and I  hope he will be for many years to come.  His best known works include The Listeners (1972), Starbridge (with Jack Williamson, 1955), The Immortals (1964), and Kampus (1977).  He edited the six volume historical anthology, The Road to Science Fiction (1977, 1979, 1982, 1998). This is one of the best overviews of the field.  Nearly every story in it is a classic.  Gunn was a Professor of English at the University of Kansas and is currently Professor Emeritus and director of The Center for the Study of Science Fiction.  This is the organization that gives out the John W. Campbell Memorial Award (which is not the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer) and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award at the Campbell Conference.  He was awarded a Grand Master Nebula by the Science Fiction Writers of America in 2007.

I only met him once, in 1989 if memory serves.  There was some sort of gathering at the UNT in which a number of science fiction authors were present.  I think it was a meeting of the Science Fiction Research Association.  Among the other attendees were Fred Pohl, Jack Williamson, L. Sprague and Catherine de Camp, James Frenkel, and Brad Denton.  I remember Gunn as being a quiet and pleasant man.

Happy birthday, Dr. Gunn, and many happy returns!

Essential Space Opera

I've been in the mood for space opera lately.  And I have some in mind that I'm planning on reading.  Just for grins, and because in spite of my best efforts I can't read everything, I thought I would see what some of you think are the essential works of space opera.  So, what do you think are the essential works of space opera that every well-read fan should be familiar with?

More Androids with a Dash of Grandmother

iD
Madelaine Ashby
Angry Robot Books
UK Print
Date: 4th July 2013
ISBN: 9780857663108
Format: Medium (B-Format) Paperback
R.R.P.: £8.99
US/CAN Print
Date: 25th June 2013
ISBN: 9780857663115
Format: Large (Trade) Paperback
R.R.P.: US$14.99 CAN$16.99
Ebook
Date: 25th June 2013
ISBN: 9780857663122
Format: Epub & Mobi
R.R.P.: £5.49 / US$6.99

I reviewed the initial novel in this series, vN, last year and was quite impressed by it.  It held my interest when I wasn't able to read it for days at a time.  As a result, I was looking forward to the sequel.

Unfortunately (for me, at least), the sequel didn't live up to its predecessor.  Part of that is because the viewpoint character in this one is Javier rather than Amy.  Javier doesn't interest me as much as Amy and her grandmother Portia do. Portia isn't dead, BTW.

RIP, Jack Vance (1916-2013)

The science fiction and fantasy world is saddened to learn that Grandmaster Jack Vance passed away on May 26 in Oakland, California.  Vance was 96.

Locus Online has an obituary that summarizes Vance's life, plus there's the Wikipedia entry linked to in the above paragraph.  I'll not repeat what they've written.  Rather, I want to make this a more personal reflection.

Out on the Galaxy's Edge

Galaxy's Edge
Mike Resnick, editor
Published bimonthly
paper edition $5.99 Amazon  Barnes and Noble
ebook $2.99 direct from publisher Amazon Barnes and Noble
online free

I posted an announcement that this magazine was coming over on my companion blog, but since most of the contents are science fiction, I figured this would be the more appropriate place to review it. 

The format is one that we've seen before.  Stories are posted online for free over the period of an issue.  Subscriptions or individual issues are available for purchase.  Just off the top of my head, other practitioners of some variation this model include (but may not be limited to) Nightmare, Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and Apex.

That's pretty good company.  So how does Galaxy's Edge stack up?

Coming Home to the Moon

Apollo's Outcasts
Allen Steele
Pyr Books
Hardcover, $16.95, 330 p.
ebook  $9.99 Kindle Nook

Jamey Barlowe was born on the Moon, in the lunar colony Apollo, but has lived almost all of his life on Earth.  For his sixteenth birthday, he's going back.

He doesn't know this, and it's not the sort of birthday surprise you want to have.  Jamey's father works for the International Space Consortium.  Dad has just become a wanted man along with a number of his coworkers.  They signed a petition protesting a position taken by the Vice-President.  The President has just died, allegedly by assassination, and the new Commander in Chief is rounding up her political enemies. 

Jamey and one of his sisters, along with the children of several ISC employees, are hurriedly evacuated.  Jamey's other sister gets bumped from the ride to make room for a girl named Hannah. 

Jamey doesn't realize just how much his life is about to change, nor how much he's about to be forced to grow up.  None of the kids do.