http://www.sfsite.com/ The new issue of the SF Site is now online. Copyright 1996-2007 SF Site en-us http://www.sfsite.com/images/sfspot1.gif http://www.sfsite.com/ http://www.sfsite.com/03b/un244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT We start in contemporary London, where teenage schoolgirl Zanna and her best friend Deeba seem to be the focus of a series of strange events. Eventually these lead them through a crack between the worlds into a parallel city, UnLondon, where they discover that Zanna is the Shwazzy, the Chosen One, destined to lead them to victory against the evil Smog. UnLondon is a magnificent creation, as vivid, as full of spectacular invention, as New Crobuzon. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/jm244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Bob Howard, like James Bond, works for the British Secret Service -- but that's where the resemblance ends. Howard is a computer networks manager for the Laundry, the arm of the British Secret Service that deals with events that, for want of a better word, we might label "occult." "Lovecraftian" might also do, even "transdimensional" at a pinch, but not "glamorous" -- never glamorous. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/over244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT If you followed this column last month, you may have come to suspect that it's really just an excuse for Neil to clear some books off his reading shelf -- and in the process to share with you each month his opinions on a book that is generally deemed a classic, alongside one that has been more or less neglected. Supposedly, his thesis is that we can all read more if we are studious in our endeavours to avoid less important tasks like flossing, grocery shopping, a really thorough cleaning of the bathroom, or sleeping more than absolutely necessary to stave off hallucinations. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/fm244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT The intelligent, literate stories in this collection -- eight previously published, three brand-new -- showcase the author's range and versatility, moving easily from science fiction to fantasy, from fabulism to realism, from humor to tragedy -- sometimes in the space of a single story. The book's standout is "Gestella," a novella about a female werewolf who has been tamed by her human lover. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/best07b.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT As many of you know, since mid-December, SF Site has been soliciting your votes for your favourite books of the past year. We had a good rate of participation this year, and some very interesting choices. Thanks to everyone who participated. One suprise is how little overlap there is with the Best Read of the Year: 2006 list. It's almost like we weren't even reading the same books. But the good thing about that is it means there are even more great recommendations to be found by looking through both lists. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/bh244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Inquisitor Glotka has to deal with a city besieged by the forces which made him what he is. It leads to the consequences of his success in the role given him by his superior. Meanwhile he keeps finding threads of the conspiracy hinted at in the previous book. His struggle is set against the war in Angland between the Union forces and the invading Northmen. as we follow West, an officer of the union. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/wb244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Ever since he travelled to the remote, haunting Faeroe Islands as a young man, Allen Warrener has longed to return. He's obsessed in equal measure by the beautiful young woman he fell in love with, the failure of his own ambitious dreams, and a legendary sea monster. It isn't until he's a middle-aged, divorced professor of History that he gets his chance to go back. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/geeks244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT In the second part of the article on the making of Weird Business, the 400+ page comic book anthology he co-edited with Joe R. Lansdale, RIck tells us of his days at Blackbird Comics and how he honed his skills as an editor. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/sc244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Arkady seems to be a lamb sent to slaughter. Nothing in his sheltered, heavily socialized upbringing in a deep space creche with hundreds of identical A-series Rostov Syndicate clones has prepared him for being dumped on a dying Earth as a pawn in a cynical and violent espionage game. He's never been outside Syndicate space before, never mind on the ground in war-ravaged Israel among un-engineered humans. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/sl244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT The Select Fire Remix is a slightly altered version of his short fiction collection Secret Life, published in 2004. It features about twenty pieces of short fiction (the exact number is not that easily determined, given the nature of some of the texts), ranging from realism to post-apocalyptic SF. Some stories from the original edition have been excluded and a few new pieces have been added, all that (and more) explained in the thirty pages of author's notes. http://www.sfsite.com/books/new244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Here at the SF Site, we've seen quite a number of exciting new books come our way lately, including the latest from Jack Whyte, James Barclay, Minster Faust, Charlaine Harris, Robert Holdstock, Keri Arthur, Eliot Fintushel, China Mieville, and many others. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/rick244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Rick has been watching the second and third seasons of Smallville on DVD along with the network TV episode "Promise." He has some thoughts on them along with what is going on in Battlestar Galactica. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/fw244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT One of the stereotypical images found in fantasy art is of the woman wearing a chain-mail bikini. Often found on the four-color covers of pulp magazines, these damsels, frequently in distress, would be shown chained and awaiting rescue at the arms of some iron-thewed Conan clone. While they may be the foremost artists when it comes to depicting women in chain-mail bikinis since Frank Frazetta, their damsels are in anything but distress. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/jw244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT The number of academic texts dealing with Joss Whedon's TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer is truly extraordinary. Like most of these books, this monograph combines the perspective of the fan and that of the scholar. Their argument is that Joss Whedon's oeuvre can (and should) be read as narrative explication of a communitarian ethics based on existentialist philosophy. http://www.sfsite.com/03b/gt244.htm Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT The Seven Kingdoms have a tumultuous political history, but have been at peace since Robert Baratheon slew the Mad King Aerys Targaryen some ten years earlier and took his throne. He accomplished this thanks to the other noble families of the realm, but most notably the Lannisters, to whom his Queen belongs, and the Starks, led by his best friend Eddard. When the Hand of the King, John Arryn, dies under suspicious circumstances, King Robert summons Eddard from his northern stronghold of Winterfell to become the new Hand and help him rule the realm. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/best07b.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT As many of you know, since mid-December, SF Site has been soliciting your votes for your favourite books of the past year. We had a good rate of participation this year, and some very interesting choices. Thanks to everyone who participated. One suprise is how little overlap there is with the Best Read of the Year: 2006 list. It's almost like we weren't even reading the same books. But the good thing about that is it means there are even more great recommendations to be found by looking through both lists. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/mp243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Rudy Rucker is a unique and idiosyncratic science fiction writer, who over the years has slowly carved out a niche for himself in the canonical landscape. Closely associated with Bruce Sterling's seminal cyberpunks, he has also defined his own sub-school of writing, "transrealism." The product of this colourful and care-free career is a brand of science fiction with its own distinctive sound and texture, dressed in surf-bum threads and sun-tanned by laid-back surrealism. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/ci243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Lorpas is an alien who was raised by alien tourists marooned on Earth. His whole life has been one of wandering, and of keeping the secret of his true nature. He is befriended by an old woman, but she dies, and he is unfairly suspected of foul play. He escapes, and continues a search for the rumored "Secret City" that some of his fellow aliens may have built somewhere in the Sierra Nevadas. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/jeff243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT In this month's column from Smaragdine, Jeff is forced to participate in the annual rites of Backwards Month and provides an interview with Nick Mamatas who talks about his new novel, Under My Roof. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/cd243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT This is the fourth novel in the Vatta's War series. Ky Vatta has decided that what the systems need is a space force to fight these pirates. Since no one else is starting one, she will. While looking for support for her nascent fleet, her cousin Stella is recovering from the shock of a nasty revelation by burying herself in business. And along comes the mysterious, rather charismatic covert ops guy, Rafe, who is somehow connected to them and has gone off on his own. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/hc243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Lovecraftian mythos as the object and the target of harboiled investigations, or, if you want, Howard P. Lovecraft teaming with Raymond Chandler. Indeed an intriguing, original idea which has produced twenty-one new stories by a group of writers sharing an established enthusiasm for the universe and the disreputable inhuman entities created by the master from Providence. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/rick243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Battlestar Galactica seems to have lost some of its momentum this season. It has certainly lost some of its viewers -- less than two million people tune in each week. The good news is that Heroes just keeps getting better and better. Heroes currently has more than 14 million viewers every week. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/my243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Back by popular demand, it's the second installment in the fabulously speculative, occasionally baffling anthology series, brought to you by the same people who produce the SF/Fantasy poetry magazine, Mythic Delirium. Once again, a crack team of creative talents has been assembled to put together a collection of short fiction and poetry. One can't say it's entirely unlike anything else you'll find on the shelves, but his half-fiction/half-poetry format is somewhat unusual: too much fiction for the poetry lovers, and too much poetry for the fiction lovers, or so it might seem. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/di243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Gina Bliss is the top female action film star in the world (think Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft), a black belt with a killer body, a face with a regular role in a million male fantasies, and an attitude the size of Hollywood itself. Just off a demanding film schedule, Gina's ready for a vacation, and what better way to kick back than by accepting a role on the latest Survivor clone, 'Surviving Demon Island'? Little does she know (cue spooky music) the demons on the island are real. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/steven242.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Science fiction fans have always had a respect and understanding for the history of the genre. Unfortunately, science fiction has achieved such an age that each year sees our ranks diminished. The science-fictional year 2006 could have been much worse for the science fiction community in sheer numbers. While there were a few tragic surprises, the mortality rate for 2006 was no higher than would normally be expected. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/geeks243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Rick is back after taking some time off. He is beginning a multi-part article on the making of Weird Business, the 400+ page comic book anthology he co-edited with Joe R. Lansdale and his adventures in the publishing industry. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/best07.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT This is our 10th annual Top 10 Best Books list. As usual, we have a few surprises in store. The biggest surprise for Neil was our number one best read of 2006 -- but we'll get to that in due time. As many of our long-time readers already know, we can never quite manage to narrow down our Top 10 list to a mere 10 books. Every year the editors, reviewers, interviewers and other contributors to the SF Site are solicited for their top picks, and the results are compiled and amalgamated into this annual list. Because of the way we decided to weigh and calculate the results 10 years ago, we almost inevitably end up with a few ties on the list. http://www.sfsite.com/columns/david243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Among the things so remarkable about Lost's precipitous third season demise is the degree to which, in its effort to both answer question and complicate the drama, it has distanced itself from the formula that made it successful in the first place. Lost's early appeal was based not on the mysterious isolation of its characters. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/nd243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Joe Pitt's a Vampyre. He's been infected by a Vyrus that slows aging, imparts phenomenal strength and sensory abilities, and survives by feeding off its host's blood -- which forces its host to go out and drink more blood so the Vyrus can survive. And now there's a growing drug problem in the Vampyre community, some really bad stuff that makes users go crazy -- not easy to manage for those infected with the Vyrus, which is solicitous of its hosts and cleans drugs and alcohol out of their systems almost as fast as they go in. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/ad243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Harry Creek had the misfortune of being an infantryman in Earth's biggest military defeat of the 21st century. His best friend's brother died in his arms during the retreat. Now Harry's kind of drifting, but he's about to get a short, sharp shock.... Robin Baker runs a small pet shop on the outskirts of Washington, D.C. She's leading a dull-normal suburban life, but she's about to meet Harry, on a truly memorable first date.... http://www.sfsite.com/03a/gr243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Ghost Rider has two things going for it, good visual effects and Nicholas Cage. Sadly, director Mark Steven Johnson does not think he needs a writer, even though he lacks basic writerly skills himself. He does come up with some clever bits. But he has no idea how to establish a character, twist a plot, or build suspense. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/yo243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Pundits are getting younger. Time was when it was a writer in the pomp of his career who would deign to dispense tidbits of advice to the young scribblers coming up; or at least a decent midlist author at some hiatus in mid-career who would plug a gap between books with a little 'how to' volume. But John Scalzi is barely past his Campbell Award, and to judge from everything he tells us in this book there is no looming hiatus in his career. http://www.sfsite.com/03a/ll243.htm Thu, 1 Mar 2007 11:00:00 GMT Locke Lamora is a thief so audacious, able and discreet that even the underworld crime boss of Camorr has no inkling that Locke has amassed a fortune by swindling the local nobility. Along with his close associates, the Gentleman Bastards, Locke is in the midst of his biggest con game ever, posing as a Vadran wine merchant to entice the Don and Dona Salvara to invest twenty-five thousand crowns in an entirely bogus business deal. http://www.sfsite.com/rssfeeds01.htm Sat, 1 Jan 2005 11:00:00 GMT After constructing our first RSS feed, it soon became apparent that the size of files could grow quickly. We decided to separate them into smaller ones, breaking them up by month. On this page you will find RSS feed files for all of our content beginning with January 2005.