scop (noun): Old English – bard, minstrel, storyteller
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Wanted: Standalone Novels
Can you find the standalone science-fiction novel? Last week’s post concluded by asking, “Do you have any recent stand-alone sf books to recommend?” Alas, it seems coming up with such recommendations is not as easy as it sounds. Consider, for example, the books pictured above–seven titles I’ve either read or reread in preparation for a…
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Great but Forgotten Films
One of the “great” science fiction films I recall seeing as a kid is World Without End, a post-apocalyptic adventure in which a band of astronauts lands on a primitive planet that turns out to be Earth in the future. That’s not a spoiler. Other films might present similar surprises as twist endings, but World…
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Science Fiction Summer
Summer days. Books. Spaceships and dinosaurs. That pretty much captures my misspent youth—so much so that even now I associate lazy July afternoons with Winston juveniles, Ace paperbacks, and EC Comics. Given that association, it’s fitting that summer is the season of the Nebula Conference (which I posted about here) and the two major science…
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Canyon of Dreams
If you dig it, they will come. In the early 1900s, the Union Rock Company excavated a tunnel through the base of a mountain in what was then called Brush Canyon. Their intent was to extract rock to pave the streets of LA. What they left behind was something more enduring. Over the years, the…
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Putting Together A Short Fiction Collection
You’ve been writing stories. Some have appeared in magazines and anthologies. A few are still making the rounds. And a few more—possibly the best of the lot—don’t seem to be a good fit for the current markets. But one thing’s for sure. You’ve got enough for a collection. So what do you do? Next week,…
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Writing & Resilience
Later this morning, I’m leaving for Milford, the town where Damon Knight, James Blish, and Virginia Kidd helped establish science fiction as a respected literary genre and where The Virginia Kidd Literary Agency still operates out of Kidd’s former residence. Blish and Kidd dubbed their residence Arrowhead, and during the 1960s it served as a…