WHY I’M NOT HAPPY WITH THE AV RESULT EVEN THOUGH I VOTED “NO”
So I voted no on the AV referendum (for reasons set out here), therefore you’d probably imagine I’m delighted with the result. I’m not. I’m angry.
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WHY I’M VOTING “NO” TO AV EVEN THOUGH I SUPPORT ELECTORAL REFORM
Actually, that title should probably read, “Why I’m voting “No” to AV because I support electoral reform”… Electoral reform is something I’ve been interested in for many years. I’ve been a bit of a nerd about electoral systems (amongst many other things) since university when I spent two years as the student union’s returning officer […]
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GENESIS
There is no point mincing my words. As a work of fiction, Bernard Beckett’s Genesis is a bit of a disaster. While there are interesting philosophical points raised, Beckett has made the fundamental mistake of forgetting that the first task of a novelist is to engage and entertain. If instruction is the author’s goal – […]
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JOURNEY INTO SPACE
Before starting this review I want to congratulate artist Chris Moore and the (uncredited) designer at Penguin responsible for the cover of this book. It was a brave design choice to park the title and author’s name on the little spaceship in the bottom left hand corner of the cover, but the masses of negative […]
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OTHER EARTHS: IN PRAISE OF A DOG EARED PAPERBACK
Does anyone need another reworking of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness? It’s not like there’s ever going to be a re-imagining of the story that’s more balls-to-the-wall than Apocalypse Now, so what more needs to be said.
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BLINDSIGHT…
Or “In a Chinese Room, not far from the loo” I have been a little unwell. Nothing serious, a stomach bug that my four-year-old daughter shrugged off without so much as a backward glance to check whether there was any puke in her curly locks (there was, we found it later) but which put dad […]
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THEATRICAL SF
There’s piece on today’s Guardian theatre blog by Andrew Haydon that starts interestingly, wondering why science ficiton – which can make an impact in cinema, television and, of course, literature – isn’t embraced more by the theatre. He goes on to list a number of previous theatre sf productions – including Mark Ravenhill’s The Cut – and […]
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THE EXECUTION CHANNEL
When I first picked up Ken MacLeod’s The Star Fraction in 1995 I hadn’t been reading much science fiction for a while but I had just picked up Red Mars, which had gone a long way to reigniting my interest and I was looking for more. I don’t know what attracted me to MacLeod’s book […]
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IRON MAN: CAPITALIST ICON?
Jonathan McCalmont’s always provocative SF Diplomat blog has published an interesting piece on Iron Man. His reading of early Iron Man as a straightforward, modernist, anti-communist hero is perfectly defensible, but I’ve felt there was always something more to Iron Man/Tony Stark’s character that, typical of the work of Stan Lee, has meant that there […]
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IN RESPONSE TO CRITICISM OF A REVIEW
Well, if nothing else it’s nice to see that I’ve made it to the top of someone’s list about something. Scott Edelman is upset by my review of Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet at The Fix. Thanks to Niall at Torque Control for bringing this to my attention… I think.