Richard C.

  • Take Me to Cuba

    By Richard C. Even with tourism to Cuba increasing and relations warming, my bank account says I’ll still be getting my taste of Cuban food, fiction, and history the vicarious way. My favorite lately is the instant documentary – Spanish or English anytime, right!? After that it’s fiction. Crime fiction. In Havana Blue, it’s a troubled past catching up to… Continue reading

  • The Science Fiction Checklist Challenge: Hard SF

    By Richard C. Start your Hard Science Fiction Checklist Challenge with a just-published and aptly-titled short story collection, Carbide Tipped Pens. Number 1 is called The Blue Afternoon that Lasted Forever, and there’s more intensity in its 13 pages than you’ve ever had before. Yes indeed, you’ll find it a work of Hard SF that’s… Continue reading

  • The Science Fiction Checklist Challenge: Military SF part III

    By Richard C. It’s Military SF part III! And for those of you following along at home, I know what you’re thinking — how did it take two whole posts to get to Joe W. Haldeman and Orson Scott Card? Just who does this Richard C. guy think he is, anyway? Well, here we go!    … Continue reading

  • The Science Fiction Checklist Challenge: Military SF Part II

    By Richard C. It’s Military SF part II, and important questions remain. Like what about the role of women here, both as authors and characters? If you made it to Seattle’s February Potlatch convention – a small, literary speculative fiction event – you might have seen a session called Women Ruin War – The Gendering of Military… Continue reading

  • The Science Fiction Checklist Challenge: Military SF Part I

    By Richard C. This week let’s mobilize your imagination for the military themes in Science Fiction. In fact, I have so much to say about it that we’re starting early with the first of three installments. Diverse opinions on the issue of war notwithstanding, Military SF can launch a reading experience altogether exhilarating, touching, educational,… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday: Writers Write

    By Richard C. “Serious writers write, inspired or not. Over time they discover that routine is a better friend than inspiration.” —Ralph Keyes NaNoWriMo may have come to a close, but that’s all the more reason for writers to retain momentum. Did you submit to the library’s self-publishing contest or hear about Write out of this World?… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday: Crossovers From Video Games And More

    Richard C. Crossovers between books, comics, video games, movies, board games, and more – it’s an increasingly common theme in our beloved genre. When I used to glimpse HALO books I’d always think “no thanks” rather quickly, but perhaps too quickly! Something IS worth trying when it carries the influence of giants like Larry Niven and the Ring… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday: Time Is On Your Side, Yes It Is

    ~Richard C. My favorite part of the recent movie Interstellar (semi spoiler alert) was the character development when time started passing differently in the plot. Nothing terribly new about this in SF, but capturing the stark emotional realities of time in human space travel – this I found utterly moving (well, nearly exhausting after a 169… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday – Know Your SF

    By Richard C. Set aside those simple lists online for the best SF and Fantasy. Useful, yes. Context, no. Much in these genres stem from common themes and traditions, which is great. But many defy and transcend those patterns, which is often even better. So what’s to help us zoom out on our usual reading threads and find… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday – Technophiles Unite!

    By Richard C. Influx (2014) We might very well laugh at how “flying cars” symbolized technological progress 100 years ago, or, we might think about our own symbols (fusion power, singularity, etc.) and then wonder hey what’s the damn holdup here! Physicist John Grady finds one disturbing reason for the holdup when his major discovery in gravity reflection… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday – Oh How The Mighty Are Fallen!

    By Richard C. Oh how the mighty are fallen… What greater theme in Fantasy than the dramatic succession and intrigue of rulers and rogues in turbulent kingdoms? Kingdoms covered by darkness wrong and terrifying, terrains dangerous and foreign to poor little earthling readers like ourselves? Well, you came to the right place: 1) The Falcon Throne… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday – Careful What You Think!

    By Richard C. I would be in big, big trouble around telepaths! But it is fun to think about, and telepathy has been a compelling sci/fi theme for decades. These six telepathy tales cover the empowering and sometimes maddening experience of mind readers: 1) The Demolished Man (1953) In one of the earliest takes on telepathy in sci/fi, ruthless… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday – Leading Women

    By Richard C. Sometimes it’s good to zoom out on your reading tendencies and see what you’re missing.  The leading women in these sci/fi choices may cause you to wonder if some diversity would refresh your favorite themes, or perhaps even spark some new ideas: 1) Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delaney. A poet, linguist, and ship’s captain sci/fi heroine?!… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday: Winter Is… Here?

    By Richard C.  Even with summer waning, winter is coming has become a popular phrase, what with the ice-cold specter of death and desolation hovering over the latest installments of A SoIaF. Eagerly awaiting the release of Winds of Winter, know that the coldest season has long snowed up the pages of sci/fi, pages buried deeply in ice ages and harsh glacial landscapes, where the stark realities… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Friday – Aliens Behind the Scenes

    By Richard C. So often the aliens of our sci/fi stories appear with a bang – their big, sinister ships suddenly hovering over our largest cities. Take the cover of movies like District 9 and Earth vs. The Flying Saucers, or the plots of books like Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke, where the invasion may be as abrupt as it gets. But what… Continue reading

  • Science Fiction Fridays: Something in the Sky. Something BIG!

    By Richard C. Remember that huge cylinder hovering over Earth, desperately sucking up the ocean in search of long lost whales in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home? Well the “gigantic and probably dangerous object in the sky” theme makes great science fiction. No “take me to your leader” message here, folks, instead an unfathomable confrontation with… Continue reading

  • Immigration from the Tops of Trains

    By Richard C. Enrique’s Journey By Sonia Nazario I remember so vividly the beginning of Moby Dick when Ishmael says “…whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul… then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can.” The full quote is truly golden. Like Ishmael, whenever I… Continue reading

  • Spy vs. Spy vs. Spy

     By Richard C. Fiction may offer thrilling tales of espionage, international and covert operations galore, but gems of nonfiction on the lives of spies and spy agencies will also keep you riveted. What I want to know is, are books about spy agencies as fascinating as they are terrifying? Here are my latest three reads in search of an answer: MOSSAD By Michael Bar-Zohar… Continue reading