Blog Archives
sThe Atomic Age Narrative: Half-Baked Posthumous Psychoanalysis
Sunday , 12, March 2017 Uncategorized 11 CommentsL. Sprague de Camp (1907-2000) was another writer who went from writing fiction to book reviews, non-fiction articles and books, and biographies. If you look at his bibliography, non-fiction essays appear to outnumber the number of fictional stories he wrote. De Camp was part of the Campbellian revolution in the pages of Astounding Stories/Science Fiction […]
In the early days of the role playing hobby, particularly in the rapid expansion days when the craze was really starting to hit in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, there was a lot of jumping on the bandwagon. Games were rushed out not fully tested or other types of games had role playing elements […]
There’s been a lot of lively debate the last few weeks about the relative merits of things like pulp vs no pulp, and why the devil would you ever want to drink orange juice without pulp? Or worse, strain wonderful apple cider of all its suspended pulpy particles and turn it into apple juice…. Or, […]
In early science fiction criticism, James Blish (1921-1975) is generally ranked right behind Damon Knight as one of the pioneers. Blish was part of the left wing leaning “Futurians,” a group of New York based science fiction fans in the late 1930s, though Blish was apolitical or possibly right wing. He broke into science fiction […]
Short Reviews – The Moon that Vanished, by Leigh Brackett
Friday , 3, March 2017 Uncategorized 31 CommentsThe Moon that Vanished by Leigh Brackett appeared in the October 1948 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories. It can be read online here. “They say that Venus once had a moon. It rode in the clouds like a disc of fire and the god who dwelt within it was supreme over all the other gods. […]
Tom Kratman, Vox, Amazon Best-Selling Scfi author Richard Fox, and myself, have been collaborating on the Secession of California. I mean the timeline for such a fictional event… should it ever happen, and how we would WarFight it. We went through and pulled all your comments on the possible timeline, events and craziness, that could […]
Henshin! (A brief history of Japanese SF – Part 3 of 3)
Thursday , 2, March 2017 Uncategorized 13 CommentsLast time, in Denki Jidai, we followed the transformation of Japanese genre fiction through what might be seen as a kind of “industrial revolution” – from the Meiji era on, Japan was absorbing and adapting Western technologies and ideas at a breakneck pace, and by the 1920s and 1930s hunger to catch up with the […]
Damon Knight (1922-2002) was a major editor/anthologist and somewhat mid-ranking writer of science fiction from the 1950s to the 1980s. He edited the hybrid science fiction-fantasy digest magazine Worlds Beyond. He is also often viewed as the first real professional critic within science fiction. From 1950 to 1960, Damon Knight seemed to be everywhere reviewing […]
Review – The Adventure of the Incognita Countess
Friday , 24, February 2017 Uncategorized Leave a commentI received a free physical review copy of The Adventure of the Incognita Countess by Cynthia Ward from Aqueduct Press. In the aftermath of the Anglo-Martian war, Lucy Harker, the half-vampire daughter of Mina Harker and Dracula, is an agent for the British government who has been sent on-board the Titanic to make sure that […]
Isaac Asimov was not a fan of action fiction. He had this to say about sword and sorcery fiction in an editorial for Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine: “I imagine that almost any male would at least occasionally wish he had biceps as hard as chrome steel and could wield a fifty pound sword as […]
We are reaching the end of our 2017 subscription drive, and while we have long since been “funded”, we are trying to expand our reader base. That is why a digital subscription to Cirsova will only cost you $1. There are a lot of reasons why you should check us out. Castalia House blog contributor Misha […]
Superversive: The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Romances
Tuesday , 14, February 2017 Uncategorized 28 CommentsI’m not ashamed to admit that I’m a sucker for a good romantic arc in a story. I mean, come on. I’m a Macross fan, and Macross is about three things: fighter planes in space, pop music idols, and love triangles. Don’t get me wrong; I’m here for the explosions, more often than not. But […]