Escape from Elba

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  

News:

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4

Author Topic: Fiction  (Read 16872 times)

FlyingVProd

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4430
    • View Profile
Re: Fiction
« Reply #15 on: December 03, 2019, 05:24:31 PM »

If you want to produce love stories, then Fern Michaels is a great writer of love stories, her books would all make great films.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fern_Michaels

And for instance, her book "Captive Innocence" would make a great movie.

I would like to produce some love stories, and I want to hire the most beautiful women to be in my movies.

Salute,

Tony V.


« Last Edit: December 03, 2019, 05:27:28 PM by FlyingVProd »
Logged

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

barton

  • Guest
Re: Fiction
« Reply #17 on: May 11, 2020, 03:27:06 PM »

Logged

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
Re: Fiction
« Reply #18 on: May 21, 2020, 04:54:04 AM »

Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

barton

  • Guest
Re: Fiction
« Reply #19 on: May 21, 2020, 03:58:19 PM »

Our copy seemed to be buried in an unknown book box,  so I reserved it at the library,  and am still waiting in the queue.   Will report back.
Logged

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
Re: Fiction
« Reply #20 on: May 22, 2020, 10:37:35 PM »

Our copy seemed to be buried in an unknown book box,  so I reserved it at the library,  and am still waiting in the queue.   Will report back.

Cool.

Thanks!
Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

barton

  • Guest
Re: Fiction
« Reply #21 on: September 04, 2020, 12:59:46 PM »

Starting The Plague now.  This really got back-burnered more than I meant to.

Meantime, anyone read "Memory" by Donald Westlake?  Loneliness, alienation, depression...it is Westlake coming as close to Dostoevsky as he ever gets (and he's usually quite far from Dostoevsky).  It was published posthumously, in 2010, and appears to be something he wrote early on, perhaps in the early sixties -- going by setting details and speech patterns.  (either that, or the story is deliberately retro for some purpose that will be revealed in the last act)  I'm about 3/4 through it, and hoping that the first-person character, an amnesiac actor who struggles to recover his memories, will find some light at the end of his long dark night of the soul.  There is the usual fine writing and masterful storytelling that one expects from Westlake, and moments of humor and clever philosophic observation that make the going easier. 

Anyway, finishing this tonight.  Then starting "The Plague."  And then perhaps Suzy Cheerful's manual on how to play with puppies.  Balance the yin with a bit of yang. 

Logged

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
The Shadow!
« Reply #22 on: November 18, 2020, 12:21:40 AM »

Radio plays from 1937-1938.
Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
R.I.P. Ben Bova
« Reply #23 on: November 30, 2020, 09:59:08 PM »

Ben Bova, by his son.

Benjamin William Bova died on the morning of November 29th, 2020. He was an American writer. He was 88 years old.

Dr. Bova was the author of more than 200 works of science fact and fiction, including short stories, essays, newspaper articles, non-fiction works and novels. He was the six-time winner of the prestigious Hugo Award, the editor of Analog Magazine, and the editorial director of Omni Magazine. He was president of the National Space Society and the Science Fiction Writers of America.

It is a common wish to visit the future and report back to the present; to time travel. Ben Bova was that time traveler; his books and short stories: the journals from the future. In his various writings, Dr. Ben Bova predicted -- years before they happened: the race to the Moon during the 1960s, satellites using the Sun to power the Earth’s technologies, the discovery of organic compounds in interstellar space, virtual reality and the internet, human cloning, the struggle to relieve the world of nuclear weapons, humans living on Mars, stem cell therapy, the discovery of ice and water on the Moon, electronic book publishing, robot police, and sex in space.

While he experimented with some fantasy works (his Orion series is a good example) most of his novels were science fiction: no stories of a rocket’s roar in empty space (where sound cannot travel). He believed that a reader should feel, immersed in one of his books and short stories, that you were walking on the rusty, rock strewn surface of Mars, enduring the planet’s light pull on your cheeks, and tasting the stale air in your suit helmet. Newton’s Laws were not suggestions.

Widely read, Dr. Bova would delight in reciting entire poems of, say, Rudyard Kipling, or the songs of Cole Porter on occasion. He would acknowledge the most esoteric pun or obscure reference with a groan or a wry grin. He could – as he often did during writing breaks – with pen and sans eraser, complete entire New York Times crossword puzzles in the time it takes to finish a lunch cup of yoghurt. Words were his tools; his memory and imagination, his toolbox. And his two pointing fingers – he never used his entire set of fingers to write, the hammers that pounded first the typewriter keys and then, when it was invented, the home computer to conceive and mold a good story.
And stories he wrote. Translations of his multiple works appear in bookstores and libraries world-wide. He once said of his craft that “it is so easy to find a reason for not writing. Writing is hard, grueling work; it’s much easier to do something else. Especially if you have a “real” job that demands eight hours a day or more, it is difficult to make the time for writing. Yet that is precisely what you must do. Make the time. “Writers,” he said, “don’t “find” the time to write. They make time for their writing. Family, friends, job, all the other pleasures and obligations of your life must take second place to writing,” he counseled. “If you are going to be a successful writer, you must write.”
Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the depths of The Great Depression, his family was so poor, a can of beans would suffice as supper, and so destitute he suffered from rickets, a vitamin D deficiency, now readily available in supermarket milk. Asthma kept him from playing stick ball and out of South Philadelphia’s violent street gangs which, along with his curious mind, led him to read books and write stories. Lots of books. Lots of stories.

To support his family, he worked as a newspaper reporter for several years before joining Project Vanguard, the first American artificial satellite program. He later wrote scripts for teaching films with the Physical Sciences Study Committee in association with Nobel Laureates from many universities. Later still he became the manager of marketing for Avco Everett Research Laboratory, in Massachusetts, and worked with leading scientists in fields such as high-power lasers, artificial hearts, and plasma dynamics.

But it was as the editor of Analog Magazine (earlier Astounding Science Fiction -- the running joke at that time was that nothing was amazing, only astounding), then editorial director of Omni Magazine in New York City where he had the most influence on the craft of writing. It was at these magazines that Dr. Bova discovered, guided, and promoted some of the most talented writers known today.
For his exceptional editorial work, he received the Science Fiction Achievement Award (the “Hugo”) for Best Professional Editor six times. In 2001 Dr. Bova was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He received the 1996 Isaac Asimov Memorial Award; was the 1974 recipient of the E.E. Smith Memorial Award for Imaginative Fiction; the 1983 Balrog Award winner for Professional Achievement; the 1985 Inkpot Award recipient for his outstanding achievements in science fiction. In 2000, he was Guest of Honor at the 58th World Science Fiction Convention, Chicon2000.
Dr. Bova taught science fiction at Harvard University and at the Hayden Planetarium in New York City, where he also directed film courses. He received his doctorate in education in 1996 from California Coast University, a master of arts degree in communications from the State University of New York at Albany (1987) and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Temple University (1954).

He lectured on topics dealing with the prospects for human immortality, the interaction of science and politics, space exploration and development, the craft of writing, and the search for extraterrestrial life. He worked with film makers and television producers such as Woody Allen, George Lucas, and Gene Roddenberry.
Dr. Bova was a regular commentator on WGCU-FM, the southwest Florida NPR station. He was the science analyst on CBS Morning News, and appeared frequently on Good Morning America and the Today show.

Dr. Bova served on panels of the Office of Technology Assessment. He was a member of the Board of Governors of the National Space Society, a charter member of the Planetary Society, and a Fellow of the British Interplanetary Society. Temple University honored him as a Distin­guished Alumnus in 1981, and in 1982 made him an Alumni Fellow.
He was the resident Emeritus of the National Space Society and a past president of Science Fiction Writers of America, Dr. Bova received the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Arthur C. Clarke Foundation in 2005, “for fueling mankind’s imagination regarding the wonders of outer space.” His 2006 novel TITAN received the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best novel of the year. In 2008 he won the Robert A. Heinlein Award “for his outstanding body of work in the field of literature.” In 2012 he received a Space Pioneer Award from the National Space Society.

Using romance, adventure, and scientific accuracy, Dr. Bova showed how the human race will expand through the solar system in his Grand Tour novels LEVIATHANS OF JUPITER, MARS, and TITAN. His nonfiction books, such as FAINT ECHOES, DISTANT STARS and IMMORTALITY were honored by the American Librarians Association.

If one is fortunate, one is able to count at the end of one’s life the few good deeds done for a friend, for a son or daughter, perhaps for a student. In this, Ben Bova was blessed. His humor and warm counsel are the gifts he leaves to a multitude of friends. His love, his caring, his generous soul, and a cornucopia of memories, are the gifts he leaves to his family. His literary works are the gifts he leaves the world, requited now by the gratitude of those who read and enjoy his stories, and in the future, by those yet to be born.
Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

barton

  • Guest
Re: Fiction
« Reply #24 on: December 02, 2020, 12:40:03 PM »

Thanks, good obit.  I used to read both Omni and Analog, while he was on board.  I've read some of his short stories and a couple novels (maybe it's time to go back and recall which ones, have another look).  I remember they used to call all the sci-fi writers with "B" last names, The Killer B's, and recall you could find a solid trove of good sci-fi there in a public library fiction stacks - Bova, Baxter, Bear, Benford, Bradbury, Butler, et al. 
Logged

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
Re: Fiction
« Reply #25 on: December 02, 2020, 06:28:18 PM »

Thanks, good obit.  I used to read both Omni and Analog, while he was on board.  I've read some of his short stories and a couple novels (maybe it's time to go back and recall which ones, have another look).  I remember they used to call all the sci-fi writers with "B" last names, The Killer B's, and recall you could find a solid trove of good sci-fi there in a public library fiction stacks - Bova, Baxter, Bear, Benford, Bradbury, Butler, et al.

I'd always heard the Killer B's were Bear, Benford, and Brin, but regardless, it is certainly a packed letter!
Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

barton

  • Guest
Re: Fiction
« Reply #26 on: January 12, 2021, 09:30:17 PM »

A sentient and immortal light bulb named Byron has suggested to me that Gravity's Rainbow is just not quite the right Pynchon novel for me.   But I tried,  this past week.   Much paranoia.   Many erections.   Many V2 strikes where the erections had occurred.  A statistician named Mexico who favors the role of randomness. Erotic plastics.   Attack conditioned octopi.  9, 452 other things,  people,  dreams,  banana hothouses,  puritans, Namibian rocket engineers,   pinball machines, black boxes,  Masons,  Walpurgisnacht visions,  baby boners, pet lemmings, molecules, power grids,  kamikaze pilots,  and... Byron says I should stop and splash cold water on my face.   I freeze now,  with a rocket poised over my head,  transcending the organic world.   

         
Logged

barton

  • Guest
Re: Fiction
« Reply #27 on: January 12, 2021, 09:34:01 PM »

Thanks, good obit.  I used to read both Omni and Analog, while he was on board.  I've read some of his short stories and a couple novels (maybe it's time to go back and recall which ones, have another look).  I remember they used to call all the sci-fi writers with "B" last names, The Killer B's, and recall you could find a solid trove of good sci-fi there in a public library fiction stacks - Bova, Baxter, Bear, Benford, Bradbury, Butler, et al.

I'd always heard the Killer B's were Bear, Benford, and Brin, but regardless, it is certainly a packed letter!

I forgot to mention Brin which is odd because he was my favorite, when I was in heavy sci-fi mode.     
Logged

josh

  • Global Moderator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 18995
    • View Profile
Re: Fiction
« Reply #28 on: January 12, 2021, 10:06:14 PM »

Thanks, good obit.  I used to read both Omni and Analog, while he was on board.  I've read some of his short stories and a couple novels (maybe it's time to go back and recall which ones, have another look).  I remember they used to call all the sci-fi writers with "B" last names, The Killer B's, and recall you could find a solid trove of good sci-fi there in a public library fiction stacks - Bova, Baxter, Bear, Benford, Bradbury, Butler, et al.

I'd always heard the Killer B's were Bear, Benford, and Brin, but regardless, it is certainly a packed letter!

I forgot to mention Brin which is odd because he was my favorite, when I was in heavy sci-fi mode.   

Odd indeed! His Uplift sequence is one of my favorite series of all time.

The Killer B's origin is detailed in here:
http://web.mit.edu/m-i-t/science_fiction/transcripts/bear_benford.htm
Logged
The day Richard Nixon failed to answer that subpoena is the day he was subject to impeachment because he took the power from Congress over the impeachment process away from Congress, and he became the judge and jury." ~Lindsey Graham

Hairy Lime

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6950
  • I'm not eating one iota of shit.
    • View Profile
Re: Fiction
« Reply #29 on: January 12, 2021, 10:25:12 PM »

A sentient and immortal light bulb named Byron has suggested to me that Gravity's Rainbow is just not quite the right Pynchon novel for me.   But I tried,  this past week.   Much paranoia.   Many erections.   Many V2 strikes where the erections had occurred.  A statistician named Mexico who favors the role of randomness. Erotic plastics.   Attack conditioned octopi.  9, 452 other things,  people,  dreams,  banana hothouses,  puritans, Namibian rocket engineers,   pinball machines, black boxes,  Masons,  Walpurgisnacht visions,  baby boners, pet lemmings, molecules, power grids,  kamikaze pilots,  and... Byron says I should stop and splash cold water on my face.   I freeze now,  with a rocket poised over my head,  transcending the organic world.   

       
Did you make it to (and past) the Katje/Pudding poop as a dick scene? That is usually a bright line. Get through that and it is downhill.
Logged
The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle; the chalice with the palace has the brew that is true!
Pages: 1 [2] 3 4