Deep Space Rumble PRIMER

PRIMER Genre: Time Travel, wierd, quirky, movies that make you think. It is in the same vein as RUN LOLA RUN, PI, MEMENTO, THE THIRTEENTH FLOOR, and BEING JOHN MALCOVITCH. A film to stretch your mind, or maybe to squeeze it into a new shape. You will watch with rapt attention, and then curse your memory for not catching the thing that would explain it all. I watched it twice in a row, just to see the things I thought I had missed. I shouldn't give the story away, but it involves people experiencing the causality paradox effects of time travel first hand. If you consider yourself an aficcionado of time travel, this movie needs to be on your must see list. Ppld.org has it in their DVD collection.

(Deus Vult)

RECON Books to Read

I was doing some browsing and came across a book called ARMOR. It was published in 1984. I don't know why I haven't heard of it before. Fans of this book have all the right things to say about it. In particular, more than one of them say "It is the one book I recommend to my friends." And "this book basically rocks." One called it his "favorite science fiction novel ever." I have never heard of the author John Seakley. Amazon displayed it as a match when I was looking for Larry Niven.

Speaking of which - Niven has a new collaboration (with Brenda Cooper) called BUILDING HARLEQUIN'S MOON. It sounds like typical Niven inginuty: A mulitgeneration starship breaks down and the crew has to terraform all the moons of a planet in order to be able to repair their ship, using their descendants as slave labor.

Niven's other recent publication is a collection of his Draco's Tavern stories. These are very short stories. I have read several of them. This is the book to get if you want to read them all at once.

Anyone up for some recon work?

(Deus Vult)

RED LIGHTNING progress report

Both Rick and I have finished the book. Rick finished two weeks early - a new personal record for him. This is good, since we carved two weeks off of the schedule for Denton's book. The Denton book reads like a text book and will force anyone's reading speed to a near standstill while the reader's mind tries to assimilate the information on a topic far removed from most people's normal thoughts. RED LIGHTNING is typical of the new Varley. He is currently writing easilly acessable novels that feel like short stories. By this I mean that, like a short story, his newer novels pull you in quickly, and are based on just a few simple ideas. While I enjoy this type of a story, I keep hoping Varley will one day cut loose all the stops and deliver another groundbreaking story, like The Persistence or Vision or better yet, a complex novel like STEEL BEACH.

(Deus Vult)

Meeting Dates

Saturday, May 20th - John Varley's RED LIGHTNING
Saturday, July 1st - Michael Denton's EVOLUTION: A THEORY IN CRISIS