Some Kind of Fairy Tale: George MacDonald

With October's Horror duo over with, I decided that it was time to shift gears again in preparation for the really big fantasy event of the year: The Hobbit, and thus focus on some of the background on Fantasy literature, which I haven't really focused on thus far. Like Science Fiction, context for the development of Tolkien's works relies on an earlier look at what came before, and the notable author that I became interested in was George MacDonald, who really jump started the Fantasy genre by creating a number of modern fairy tales that inspired many fantasy authors that came before him. He's not a household name like Mary Shelley, Jules Verne or H.G. Wells, but he was no less influential in his works, which went on to inspire authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.

Go read Some Kind of Fairy Tale over on Kirkus Reviews.

Sources Used:

George MacDonald, Michael R. Phillips: This biography of MacDonald is an interesting one, taking on both the man and his works, in both historical and narrative style. It's a good read, with quite a bit of information about the author and some of his major influences.

An Expression of Character: The Letters of George MacDonald: This volume contains the collected letters of MacDonald, which proved to be marginally useful for this piece: some of his books are mentioned, but nothing other than mentions of his books, rather than process (at least that I could find).

Survey of Modern Fantasy Literature, Vol 3, Frank Magill: I've been talking a lot about Science Fiction recently, and as I've begun to look more closely at Fantasy literature, needed to pick up the companion to the Survey that I've been using. Also edited by Frank Magill, it covers a wide range of fantasy novels and authors. The entry for Phantastes is a great overview of MacDonald and his career, and was incredibly useful for this piece.

George MacDonald, William Raeper: This biography is another good insight into MacDonald and his life and really helped to support the other pieces that I referenced.

Republican Labels Star Wars Day as Wasteful Spending

Generally, the 501st Legion steers clear of politics. We're not supposed to appear with political candidates or generally deviate from a charitable + costume-styled mission, but there's points where we simply can't avoid it.

The New England Garrison made an appearance in Senator Tom Coburn's annual Waste Book, a publication that points out what he considers wasteful spending. The document can be found here, and on page 84, at #52, there's an entry titled 'Return of the Jedi - (MA) $365, you'll see members of the New England Garrison and Alderaan Base, from when we trooped at the Abington Public Library's Star Wars Day. Our folks had a good time, and apparently the library's patrons did as well.

The document goes on to say the following:

The Star Wars Day event, held at the Abington Public Library in Massachusetts, was paid for with $365 in federal funds, part of an $11,700 grant provided by the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services.

The Star Wars franchise has grossed over $4.5 billion over the past 35 years, so taxpayers may wonder why the government is subsidizing fan events for one of the most popular and successful movie series in the universe.

It's enough to make my blood boil.

What immediately strikes me is just how misleading this entry is, or at the very least, the second paragraph. While it's true that the films have grossed more than 4.5 billion listed, there's no direct connection between Lucasfilm Limited and the library, or us, for that matter. We're an organization that LFL works with, but we're not employees. Moreover, this works to imply that the $365 (which compared to the national budget / debt is a microscopic part) that was paid went to LFL or us to pad the bottom line. You want to know what the money was probably used for?

The librarian on staff who's position is funded through grants. At $15 an hour, that's 24 hours, less than a full work week, and far less time than what was probably required to put together the event.

I didn't work with this particular event, but I did work with another library event here in Vermont, where we worked to support the Star Wars club at the Brownell Library in Essex Junction. The grant that supplied a librarian to run the club had actually been cut, and we were there to help support that club. In all, we raised $290, which helped keep the librarian there for the rest of the year.

What bothers me the most is how absolutely clueless this entry appears, given the problems that the nation face, and it's not this enormous debt, and it's not that it's completely off mark, but that whoever placed the entry had absolutely no idea what something like this does. It's not a miniature Celebration, where fanboys can bask in the glory of Lucas's franchise: it's designed to get kids into the public library, where they can see, touch, and interact with all of the resources that are at hand for free to the general public. Libraries are the civilized world's most crucial institutions, not just for the books that they hold, but for their center in the community, for the expertise that their staffs provide, and for the multiplier effect that they can have on one's education. This sort of investment from the federal government is something that can do what is most important: assist in the education and self-betterment of our peers. Now, as the country is slowly inching along in its recovery, this is the type of institution that is evermore valuable, and evermore threatened. The Library Foundation of Hennepin County reported that in the 2002 recession, library circulation jumped 11.3%.

Looking long-term, we consistently hear arguments that the American child is falling behind relatively to their peers around the world, with the public school system often coming under fire for a poor education that public school children seem to be receiving. Those arguments aside for the moment, it's a tiny snapshot of the resources that schools and libraries are pushed to go to. Without additional funding that host communities can't provide, these important institutions simply cannot exist, and with them, any hope for sustained, meaningful economic recovery.

The Star Wars day that's come under fire here is inconsequential, but it's an important insight into how divided we are from the situation on the ground. This congressional member has likely never visited the library, or seen just how federal dollars are used, and what the direct impact on their constituents are. At the same time, the word 'Military' shows up three times. 'Army', 14 times, but most of those are in the footnotes. 'Navy'? 23 times, with a couple of good points about military readiness, but also attacking a kid's program about space and Mars. 'Marines' doesn't show up at all, all institutions that eat enormous quantities of money. I will note, I'm not against military spending, but somewhere in the $1.030–$1.415 trillion, $11,000 was lost in someone's couch cushions. I would argue, as Fermilab physicist Robert Wilson did in 1969, when questioned about the practical security value of a collider: "If only has to do with the respect with which we regard one another, the dignity of men, our love of culture... it has to do with , as we good painters, sculptors, great poets? I mean all the things we really venerate in our country and are patriotic about ... it has nothing to do directly with defending our country, except to make it worth defending. " (Rocket Men: The epic story of the first men on the moon, Craig Nelson, p.x) I don't mean to imply that there's an argument being made here that the same money should be put strictly to defense, but I don't believe that this country should be on a path of bare bones financing, at the expense of the American public.

The elimination of this single event at this single library would be inconsequential in the greater scheme of things. But when you eliminate (or suggest to eliminate one), here, and another there, soon, there's nothing left.

Again, I didn't attend this event, but at the one that I did attend, I was greeted behind my helmet by over a hundred patrons: kids, parents and fans, all excited and all of them in the library. I saw a lot of children with books. Reading is an incredibly important skill for the modern world, and everywhere I look, I see evidence that this is something that's far less valued as a whole, when it should be the most important thing that a child learns to love. Reading opens the doors to worlds previously closed to us, and allows for the creation of an innovative, creative generation that will spur this country to great heights, or down to dangerous depths from which we have little hope of escaping in the same amount of time.

It bothers me that the reality on the ground differs so much from the story that's been concocted by a disinterested party, hellbent on their mission (which certainly has its merits) to the expense of all other concerns that come up along the way. It's the programs like this, that build the country, little by little, into what makes it a great nation.

I for one am proud of what the 501st has done to support such events. This summer, we were inundated with over a hundred requests from libraries across New England for similar events, and I fervently hope that we will have twice as many next year.

EDIT, 10/23 3:20PM: NPR has a great post up on the reading habits of younger generations, and surprisingly, it's not just ebooks and internet things, it's regular, dead tree books and libraries. Read it here.

H.P. Lovecraft and the Other

With October a traditionally - horror themed month capped with Halloween, it seemed appropriate to follow up Bram Stoker and Dracula with another notable horror author: H.P. Lovecraft. Hugely influential in the horror genre, Lovecraft is an author that I got into while in college, with a course on Gothic Literature. I've found Lovecraft's stories to be delightfully macabre, and living in Vermont, I can identify with his love of the sheer age of the location, and can see just why this corner of the country is so suited for horror fiction.

Read up on H.P. Lovecraft and the Other over on Kirkus Reviews.

Sources Used:

The Best of H.P. Lovecraft: Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre, introduced by Robert Bloch: This collection of Lovecraft's stories is one that I've had since college, when I was first introduced to his works. Robert Bloch has a particularly good, if apologetic introduction to the man, laying out his life and some of the motivations behind his fiction.

Lovecraft - Tales, edited by Peter Straub: This tome from the Library of America Collection is an impressive book, not only for the stories that have been collected, but for a very comprehensive timeline in the back of the book (Philip K. Dick's own collections featured very similar reference material), which was particularly invaluable as an overview for Lovecraft's life.

Lovecraft: A Biography, by L. Sprauge de Camp: de Camp is someone that I would like to examine at some point in his own right, but for the time begin, his biography is eminently readable and extremely detailed, providing quite a bit of insight into his life and works.

Survey of Modern Fantasy Literature, vol. 4, Frank Magill: This volume provides a great overview of Lovecraft's short fiction career, rather than an individual book. In this instance, the survey focuses on Lovecraft's Cthulhu works.

Bram Stoker's Dracula

It's October, and taking off from the end of September, we've shifting gears from Science Fiction to Horror Fiction on the Kirkus Reviews blog, where I get to tackle a novel that I've wanted to research in more depth for a while now: Dracula and its formation.

While I was in college, took a course in Gothic Literature, taught by Dr. F. Brett Cox, and had my eyes pried open to the fantastic gothic and horror world, something that I'd never been really interested in before that point. Dracula, Frankenstein and many others were books that we read, and for the first time, I read through Stoker's fantastic story, not realizing how much I didn't know about the story (and how much I did).

So, to hearken in the dreary fall season, go read Revisiting Bram Stoker's Horror Masterpiece, Dracula over on Kirkus Reviews!

Sources: As I've shifted from Science Fiction to Horror, most of my usual stand-by reference books don't apply, as they focus extensively on the history of Science Fiction, over that of Horror or Fantasy. Because of that, I had to do a bit more digging around for some background information, coming across some excellent books on the background of Dracula and Bram Stoker while doing so:

The Handbook for the Gothic, edited by Marie Mulvey-Roberts: This book provides a very brief thumbnail sketch of Stoker in the greater context of the Gothic literature movement, and provided a good starting point for a bunch of things.

Bram Stoker, Carol A. Senf: This scholarly biographical piece examines Stoker as a Gothic author, and examines more than just his Dracula books: there's some good background in his other, underappreciated novels, and at some point, I'd like to return and look at these in a bit more depth.

The New Annotated Dracula, by Bram Stoker / Leslie S. Klinger, ed.: For any Dracula / vampire / horror fan, this book is an essential purchase. It's a bit large and unwieldly, but Klinger has exhaustively researched the background of Stoker and his story, inserting annotations throughout the text and providing a bit of background on vampire fiction that predates Dracula. It's a stunning book, and I'm still reading it.

In Search of Dracula: The History of Dracula and Vampires, by Raymond T. McNally & Radu Florescu: This book takes on the search for Dracula as a historical character, looking at the background to Stoker's research and everything that essentially supports the inspiration for the character. In the middle of the book is a fantastic biographical sketch that sheds a considerable amount of light on Stoker's work and life.

Brief History of the Vampire Novel

I had a gap in the schedule, and it seemed like a good time to start getting ready for October. Somewhere, I decided that I wanted to take a look at a broad swath of a genre, and because I was working on the pieces for October (Dracula), it seemed as good a time as any to see where Dracula fits into the larger picture. Turning to social media, I asked people what they thought were some of the more important vampire novels, coming up with an impressive list that had to be really pared down. There's not a lot of surprises on it, but I did find a couple of interesting points: many people believe that Dracula was *the* original Vampire novel, when in fact it's predated by a number of others that in turn influenced Dracula. Stoker's novel proves to be a tipping point, and there's quite a bit of variety after the publication of that book.

Head over to Kirkus Reviews to read A Brief History of the Vampire Novel.

This is something that's bothered me over the past couple of years: frequently, people complain about how the Twilight novels have shifted away from the traditional vampire story. The results, in a bit way, show that this isn't the case: there's not really any 'traditional' vampire novel, because each has taken on liberties of their own, driving right down to the folklore level. Camilla, Varney, Dracula, Lestat, Edward, and others all have their quirks and differences. I've yet to sit down and steel myself to read Twilight, but at some point, I'll get to it.

For this piece, I was quite a bit looser than usual with my research: The Internet Speculative Fiction Database and Wikipedia provided chunks of information on each book, but at points, I went to author's pages and book profile pages for the main details. Of the books that I consulted, The Annotated Dracula is a particularly good resource that I'll talk about when the Dracula piece is up. Another excellent source that I've since found is In Search of Dracula, by Raymond T. McNally & Radu Florescu, which has a good section on post-Dracula vampire works.

Exploring Lost Worlds: Arthur Conan Doyle

My latest post for Kirkus Reviews is now up online. Originally, I'd planned on finishing out the Science Romances with Olaf Stapledon, but when went to see if there was anyone else to look up, I found a notable author that I'd overlooked: Athur Conan Doyle. While he's most famous for his Sherlock Holmes stories, he was a prolithic author. His novel The Lost World captured my imagination as a young teenager, and I was surprised to learn that there was more to that series. Read Exploring Lost Worlds: Arthur Conan Doyle's Professor Challenger over on Kirkus Reviews.

For Sources, I had a couple of notable ones:

Billion Year Spree, by Brian Aldiss: One of my usual suspects for sources, surprisingly, Robert and Disch's history don't have any mention of Conan Doyle's character, which surprised me a little. While he doesn't seem to have had the impact of other authors, his stories DO demonstrate the impact of Jules Verne and Edgar Allan Poe.

Arthur Conan Doyle: A Life in Letters, edited by Jon Lellenberg, Daniel Stashower and Charles Foley: This is a stunning biography of Arthur Conan Doyle, one that intertwines an incredible number of letters with commentary from the authors, which provides an incredible insight into Conan Doyle's busy life, his relationships with other authors and family members, and how he set about writing his stories. Highly recommended for anyone interested in ACD's works.

Survey of Science Fiction, Frank Magill: this series has been a good standby for background reference on the books, and this one had a good critical overview of The Lost World and the Poison Belt. (I think - I'm typing this up from memory, and I'm pretty sure that I read entries about these books from here - I'll check when I'm home.)

Ernest Harmon's Battle of the Bulge

My author copies have arrived, so I know for sure that this exists: in the November 2012 issue of Armchair General, I've got an article on General Ernest Harmon, and his command of the 2nd Armored Division during the Battle of the Bulge in December, 1944.

Harmon is someone whom I've come across a number of times since college. Olympian, World War I veteran, University President, and part of the invasion of Africa during the Second World War, he stands out for his gruff demenor and ability to overcome a number of challenges when faced with difficult situations. I pick up his story when the Allies faced a major counterattack by German forces. On December 16th, he and his command, the 2nd Armored Division (aptly nicknamed Hell on Wheels) were located in Germany. When the nature of the Bulge attack became apparent, he and his division drove to Marche, a 70 mile night journey over icy roads, where they were hit by the German forces, effectively stopping the attack.

You can read up on the actions here, from my paper on the Battle of the Bulge and Norwich University, which helped start up this article. I travelled out to Belgium last year, and was able to visit a couple of the battlefields at Ciney and Celles. Here's what the terrain looks like:

Harmon was a really facinating guy to write about, simply because he was so out there, and willing to bend rules and orders when he recognized a gap between what his superiors saw and what he, on the ground, saw.

The November issue of Armchair General should be heading out to subscribers (you can subscribe here!) shortly, and will be on newsstands sometime later this fall.

Rounding Out the Science Romances

Over on Kirkus Reviews, I have a bit of a roundup post that looks back over the posts that I've written, looking at the foundational stories of the genre, and how they all fit together in the bigger picture. You can read it over here. This isn't it for my coverage of the Science Romance period: in early September, I'll be going back and looking at Arthur Conan Doyle's Professor Challenger books, but after that, we'll be looking a bit at Horror and Fantasy, before moving on towards the Golden Age of Science Fiction, which should be very exciting.

This column has been a really fun thing to work with, both in the writing and researching components. Since starting this, I've relied heavily on the Kreitzburg Library for sources, and buying some books that I've been going back to time and time again.

The usual suspects that I generally go back to are the following works, and I really encourage anyone who's got a passing interest in the overall history of the genre to do themselves a favor and check them out:

Billion / Trillion Year Spree, by Brian Aldiss: This fantastic look at the genre comes in two editions. The Billion Year Spree is all Aldiss, while the Trillion Year Spree adds in some other material. Aldiss covers the genre in exhausting detail, and at points, pulls in material that other books don't touch, providing a really great look at science fiction and its formation.

History of Science Fiction, by Adam Roberts: Robert's history is one that I've really enjoyed for years now, and he covers the genre as a speculative sort of history, going far back into antiquity for some of the really deep roots of the genre.

The Stuff Dreams are Made Of, by Thomas Disch: Disch's book is a bit more on the popular history side of things, but what he does do is provide a great, high level snapshot of Science Fiction and it's progression from author to author.

Survey of Science Fiction, edited by Frank Magill: This series has been an invaluble purchase for me: a critical survey of the genre from around the 1970s, collecting thousands of reviews of notable science fiction novels. It's been a really good tool, especially for looking over books that I haven't read, or read a long time ago.

To compliment the posting up on Kirkus, here's a list of my source posts with additional sources specific to each author:

• Hugo Gernsback: Father of Science Fiction?
• Adapting Philip K. Dick
• Looking Far into the Future: Olaf Stapledon
• Jules Verne and the Moon
• H.G. Wells and the War of the Worlds
• Ray Bradbury, 1920-2012
• Edgar Allan Poe and Jules Verne
• A Meeting in Geneva: The Birth of ‘Frankenstein’

Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo

Nicholas de Monchaux's Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo is a stunning history of the development of NASA's A7L EVA Space Suit. Used on the Apollo and Skylab missions during the heights of the Space Race, the space suit is quite possibly one of the more recognizable images of mankind’s existence in space. In this extraordinary book, he outlines what we know in abstract form: that the lunar landings were an event that was the cumulative efforts of thousands, if not millions of people across a huge number of industries. The real triumph of Apollo isn't the steps that made history on the moon: it's all of the steps in the decades before that got them there. Laid out in 21 chapters (the same number of layers that went into a space suit), and covered in a latex dust jacket, de Monchaux methodically drills into the development of a garment that would protect an astronaut in the extreme, inhospitable environment of space. In doing so, he covers far more than just the evolution of the spacesuit: he provides an in depth history of how we went to space and the impact that it had, touching on social, military and political influences.

It's impossible to oversell the book: what de Monchaux has put together an exceptional piece of history, one that's eminently readable and beautiful to behold. Laid out with numerous sources with every chapter, photographs and diagrams throughout, it’s a strikingly engaging read. Potentially dense from the outside description, we're treated to a wide-ranging examination of the background, development and execution of the iconic, all while the book covers everything from the bra industry to the New Look fashion collection by Dior to the military industrial complex and the Cold War.

While these connections seem completely unrelated and separate from Neil Armstrong's first steps on the moon, we come to find that they are incredibly and intricately intertwined. Spacesuit begins far before NASA and Apollo were conceived of in the 1760s, when mankind was first searching for ways to come up off the ground, first in balloons. What follows is a story that follows mankind's experiences in the extremes, and we find out not only why such protection is needed, but how we figured out that we needed it in the first place.

In a large way, Spacesuit is the story of technical evolution in the much larger context of humanity's greatest technological achievement. NASA was a complicated organization that has its roots in a number of diverse fields. Custom fitted for the Apollo and Skylab astronauts, the research, development and production of each space suit was the product of an incredible organizational structure that NASA oversaw from beginning to end, working closely with partner organizations, such as the International Latex Corporation, among many others. The space suits were constructed to exceedingly minute tolerances, and accompanied by reams of paperwork certifying every single component and step along the way.

Alongside the evolution of technology, Spacesuit contains a parallel narrative of the rise of NASA's organizational structure, in how planners oversaw the development of the world's most complicated machines and processes. The story of Apollo’s spacesuits is a microcosm for NASA as a whole: innovative, but bureaucratic, it shows the enormity of the challenge laid down by President John F. Kennedy at Rice University in 1962. Accomplished in hindsight, this history demonstrates just how utterly impossible the task would have likely been had it not been for the expertise in both public and private organizations. In addition to the technical and historical content, de Monchaux looks back philosophically at the end, examining the very nature of systems in nature, and how utterly deceptively complex a project such as Apollo really is.

Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo is the rare extraordinary book that provides such a wide-reaching view of the workings of the space industry that brought us to the Moon and back. Frequently, I found myself almost faced with numerous facts across all number of fields, from fashion and society to computing to military history and the Cold War. de Monchaux's words are deceptively easy to read, dense with information, yet shedding the dry, pedantic nature of an academic text. In telling the story of the space suit, we're treated to something much greater: a story of recognizing and realizing impossibility, and then overcoming it with a clear vision of what to accomplish. This book is a must-read for a wide range of people: those interested in the history of the Space Race, certainly, but also those with an eye towards project management and leadership. This book outlines the complicated nature of NASA and its task, and shows that it wasn't just a handful of astronauts who deserve all of the credit for stepping on the moon.

Meet Tiki

This summer has been a busy one for Megan and I. In June, we bought a house, and we've been working on the various things that go into that - upgrading and replacing some of the things that we have, unpacking and generally sprucing the place up a bit. It's been an adventure. One of the things that the two of us wanted was a dog, and right after we moved, we started looking around. The first couple of weeks were hard - we would find dogs that we really liked online, only to find that they'd been adopted pretty quickly out from under us, until we came across a dog at Justice for Dogs in northern Vermont: Tiki. We drove up to visit, and he warmed up to the two of us right away: a bundle of lovable energy. We filled out the paperwork, and later that week, we brought him home.

He was a bit nervous about us at first, but within a week, we found that he was completely at home, loving the yard, barking at anything that he realized was near the house. It's been a bit of a trip, because while both Megan and I have owned dogs, this is the first time that we've had one for ourselves.

Tiki's full of personality: he's a bit mischevious, and we've discovered a really fun personality with him. Stepping out of the house and leaving him on his own, outside of his cage, we'll find that he'll pick up and drop our shoes around the house, and push his rope bone at me when he wants to play. He'll stand and stare at us, and when we don't pick up on his telepathic demands, he has a funny growl to get our attention. The couch has become 'his', and no matter how much space is left on it, he'll find a way to take up as much as possible.

Already, it seems like he's been with Megan and I forever, and I can't be happier for a better friend.

Hugo Gernsback: Father of Science Fiction?

With Chicon-7 coming next month, I wanted to take a look at the man behind the main event: the Hugo Award ceremony. Over on Kirkus Reviews, I've got a brief history of Hugo Gernsback, often called 'The Father of Science Fiction'. While it's true that Gernsback coined the term science fiction, we've seen that he's not the founded of the genre as a whole. Rather, he's the founder of a modern strain of science fiction, and his influence persists to this day. Read Hugo Gernsback: To Great Heights And Down Again over on Kirkus Reviews.

An interesting letter that I came across came from Alex Eisenstein, who left me with the impression that Gernsback sat at the crossroads between quality literary style and commercial success. While the two aren't mutually exclusive, looking at the attitudes science fiction over the last half-century, it's clear which style won out. Here's the sources that I used for this piece:

- American Inventors, Entrepreneurs and Business Visionaries, by Caharles W. Carey Jr.: This book compiles a number of profiles of people, including a good thumbnail of Gernsback’s life and accomplishments.

- Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters and the Birth of the Comic Book, by Gerard Jones: This book is a great look at the rise of the comic book industry in the United States. Gernsback makes a brief appearance here in a section devoted to the pulps, which helps to provide a bit of extra insight into his life and how he influenced others.

- Hugo Gernsback and the Century of Science Fiction, by Gary Westfahl: This is an an academic book on the man and his influence: it provided some in depth information on Gernsback, but it is quite dense at points.

- History of Science Fiction, by Adam Roberts: Roberts puts together a good profile and analysis of Gernsback’s contributions to the genre, highlighting not only his life, but how he affected the genre as a whole.

- The Trillion Year Spree, by Brian Aldiss: Aldiss is less kind to Gernsback, providing an notably critical profile of the man and his contributions to the genre.

- Wells, Verne, and Science, Alex Eisenstein, from Science Fiction Studies: This letter was a turning point in how I thought about this piece: rather than just looking at the contributions of Gernsback, it made me realize that the story is more about just how much he influenced the genre that we know and love.

For the Hugo Awards, I did a bit of research online between a couple of websites:

- INFOGRAPHIC: Everything You Need to Know about the Hugo Award: SF Signal’s Infographic covering the high points of the Hugos.

- A Short History of the Hugo Awards Process: This page on the official Hugo Awards website is a good one to look into for year to year, and a general overview of the award.

Barnes and Noble, No!

Since college, I've been using Amazon.com to buy a lot of books. Typically, I hit up the used sections first, where I can generally find decent products for quite a bit cheaper, but generally, for high quality books. In general, I would hit up some of the local bookstores in Montpelier (although now, in Barre, I'm left with far fewer options), Barnes and Noble in Burlington and a bunch of places in between. Amazon, however, has been causing problems for the independent and brick and mortar bookstore scene, and I figured that it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to start doing some of my online shopping somewhere else, at least for new books. So, with a new X-Wing novel coming out, (Mercy Kill by Aaron Allston) I went to Barnes and Noble's website, pre-ordered the book, and sat back to wait. Happily, there's the option to pay with PayPal, which would help me break my habit of ordering from Amazon, which already has my credit card information, and makes the impulse buys all that much more easy. Release day rolls around, and ... no book. Checking the website, I find that it hadn't shipped yet, which is weird, because I had ordered the book last month - plenty of time to get the book out to me within the lower shipping level that I selected.

Last night, I received an e-mail from Barnes and Noble:

Dear Andrew L ,

We want to give you an update about the pre-ordered item(s) listed below. Unfortunately, we just got word that the release date for this item(s) has been changed. We expect to ship the item(s) soon and will email you when it is ready to leave our warehouse. If we cannot acquire the item(s) within 30 days, we will notify you by email.

However, if you would like to cancel this portion of your order, you may do so online at: ...

We are working to fulfill the rest of your order as quickly as possible. Because we value you as a customer, we are sending the items that are currently available in your order now at no additional cost to you. Thanks for your patience.

Please accept our sincere apologies for the delay.

-- Barnes & Noble

Well, for one, the book's release date hadn't changed: Amazon still lists it as August 7th, as does Barnes and Noble. More importantly, Random House, the book's publisher, lists it as August 7th. Weird. I really want to read this book, so I go ahead and follow the directions to cancel the order. If Barnes and Noble isn’t going to ship it to me, I might as well go back to Amazon, who I know will.

Amazon sends me an automated book ordered e-mail, and because I ordered it directly from them, rather than from a 3rd Party, I'm pretty sure it'll ship out ASAP. Barnes and Noble sends me another note:

Dear Andrew L,

We have received your request to cancel your order #.

We regret that we are unable to complete your request because your order has entered the shipping process or has already shipped. We apologize for any inconvenience.

If you wish to return this item, you may return your purchase for a refund within 14 days of delivery by following the instructions we included in your package.

For more information regarding returns please click ...

...

So, which is it? Delayed, or in the shipping process? Barnes and Noble, I followed your directions, and you're not able to go through with even that? Color me unimpressed. So, Amazon's order is cancelled, and I'm simply going to have to wait for this to arrive on my doorstep later than expected.

There's more to my indignation here than entitled fanboy demands: it goes to show just why Amazon has been doing so well with the online market, and why Barnes and Noble has not been doing well. To be fair, if I'd gone up to Burlington's B&N outlet, I'm reasonably sure that I would have been able to pick up the book off the shelf - Star Wars new releases tended to be pretty high profile in the bookselling world, at least when I worked at Borders. But, Burlington's a good 45 minutes up the road from me, and I don't typically go up there unless I'm doing several things to make the trip worthwhile. I doubt that the local bookstore, Next Chapter, has anything in stock, with such a small SF/F selection.

What bothers me the most is that Barnes and Noble has had time to perfect their customer supply chain and management. Working at a bookstore during and after college demonstrated some of the principles of how CSM policy worked, and working at a college with a real start up / business flair demonstrated how it was essential for retaining business. What Barnes and Noble is doing is not great. It's not the worst that I've seen, but it's left me deflated and disappointed that I don't have a book that I was really looking forward to reading. On one hand, it's a good lesson in patience, and another opportunity to turn to another book. On the bookseller / CMS level, it's a customer who took (well, tried) their money somewhere else that was faster, more reliable, and most importantly, happy to take their money.

What bothers me the most is the disconnect between their messaging. Following their directions, I wasn't able to cancel the order as I'd tried to do: attempting to do so providing me with a completely contrary message, which suggests that there's a disconnect somewhere in their system. As of writing this, the book is still listed as pending shipment, and for all I know, it could be waiting for me at home or two weeks away. It’s troubling, because my confidence in their ability to actually do what they’re supposed to do: take my money and put a book in my hands.

The problem that this has revealed is an issue with automated systems. In an ideal world, Barnes and Noble would use their physical stores as their greatest asset: when an online order goes out, their system routes the order to the nearest store to your location, and has them fill the order, dropping it in the mail from their store location. This saves time for the buyer, but more importantly, a real, live person puts the order together and drops it in the mail. In a world increasingly filled with automated systems, people in the loop are incredibly important, because they can do what machines can not: recognize and solve a problem that is unexpected. Any bookseller who paid attention could find that this wasn't a problem, and act accordingly.

This element is crucial to Barnes and Noble's successes as a book retailer. Borders certainly failed to act as a good customer service company: their policy of twisting their customer's arms to buy selected books was one of many reasons why Barnes and Noble is still standing. Amazon has proven that it is far superior when handling automated orders: their supply chain is nothing short of remarkable, and it's going to serve them well into the future. Barnes and Noble's key strength is a physical location, and they would do well to keep people in the loop when it comes to their day to day operations.

When it comes to comparing Amazon to the thousands of booksellers across the country, there's almost no doubt in whom I'd want to buy from: the physical retail stores, from a bookseller who knows what they're doing. The face to face interaction with an employee, even when I don't need their help, is a key part of the buying experience that Amazon.com simply cannot replicate. The recommended titles are simply based off of similar data profiles from customers, going up against a bookseller who can tell you whether or not the book that you're looking for is something worth buying - I know that I've made the case and sold books that I felt invested in. What Barnes and Noble should do is carry this same thinking over to their online world, bringing someone into the loop.

But first, they need to send me my book! In the meantime, I’m going to attempt to learn a valuable lesson in patience, and read something else in the meantime.

Adapting Philip K. Dick

This week on the Kirkus Reviews Blog, I jump ahead from some of the older stories to a very modern author: Philip K. Dick and the adaptations of his works.

This was an interesting article to write, because I wanted to tie it in with the upcoming movie release of Total Recall. Prior to writing it, I was able to find a number of the films and watch through them over the course of a weekend, to get a sense of how they were adapted. Some were a pleasant surprise: Total Recall and Screamers were two that I particularly liked. Others, like Paycheck and Next, I didn't like very much.

Dick's works have translated interestingly into film, I suspect because the premise that he's really known for - this world is not correct - is something that's easy for a film to capture and challenge its characters with in ways that audiences can easily understand.

Here's the sources that I used for this piece:

The Library of America Series (Four Novels of the 1960s, Five Novels of the 1960s & 70s, and Valis & Later Novels): This series examines notable works from American authors, seldomly looks at Science Fiction. These books are fantastic examples of the author's works, but are also excellent for their in-depth chronological look at Dick's life.

Minority Report Special Features: This is something that I watched way back, when Minority Report was the first DVD that I ever owned. It's an excellent collection of special features, not the least of which the one that talks about the adaptation of the story and how it came to be.

Prophets of Science Fiction: Philip K. Dick: This was a really neat one to watch, even as it glosses over much of Dick's life and dramatizes some of it. The most interesting thing was Ridley Scott's impressions of the man, whom he met at a screening. There's also some interesting points about how Minority Report was going to become a sequel to Total Recall.

Internet Speculative Fiction Database: This large archive was useful for tracking down the original publications of each of the stories, which allowed me to string them out in publication order.

The films: I was able to track down almost all of the films, with the exception of A Scanner Darkly and Radio Free Albemuth. Watching each (and reading most of the stories that they were based on) really helped to see what exactly was adapted.

Usual Suspects: The Stuff Dreams are Made Of, History of Science Fiction and Trillion Year Spree each have sections about Philip K. Dick and his works, which provide good background material on the life of the author and his contributions to the genre.

Looking Far into the Future: Olaf Stapledon

My latest post for the Kirkus Reviews Blog is now online! This time, we look at English author Olaf Stapledon and his legacy.

This wasn't the post I'd intended on writing. Originally, this spot had been reserved for an examination of C.S. Lewis, and his Out of a Silent Planet trilogy. As this series has progressed, I've been finding a curious evolution of the science fiction genre, something that will continue on. From Mary Shelley to Edgar Allan Poe, to Jules Verne and to H.G. Wells, there's a facinating story of connections between one another. They found influences in themselves, carrying ideas forward in time, changed somewhat by each author's own sensibilities. Following Wells, we find Olaf Stapledon, who by his own words, was influenced by Well's stories, and in turn, inspired future authors, such as Sir Arthur C. Clarke. Lewis, I found, wrote in opposition of the two, and in a large way, was out of place in my plans.

Stapledon was an interesting author, and the scale of his works and the themes behind them set him apart from just about everyone in the field at the time and since. Read Looking far, far into the future: Olaf Stapledon over on the Kirkus Reviews Blog!

Here's the sources that I used:

An Olaf Stapledon Reader, By Olaf Stapledon, Robert Crossley: This book contains an interesting series of articles on Stapledon and his writing, but of most interest is two letters that Olaf wrote to famed science fiction author H.G. Wells, where he talks about how the former influenced him.

The Olaf Stapledon Online Archive: Located here, the site for Stapledon contains a fairly good biography on the author and some of his works, which provided a good starting point for the biographical elements of this piece.

Last and First Men / Last Men of London, Olaf Stapledon: This collected version is a book that I picked up on a whim a couple of years ago, and read through Last and First Men. An interesting story, it was of particular use when coming to understand the scale and scope of Stapledon's efforts - it's a very different, but highly recommended novel.

Arthur C. Clarke: The Authorized Biography, by Neil McAleer: This biography of Clarke helped to confirm that Clarke was influenced by Stapledon's works.

Survey of Science Fiction, vol 3 & 5, Frank Magill: This book as usual, is a particularly useful resource in looking up specific meanings and critical reviews of Stapledon's works.

The History of Science Fiction, by Adam Roberts: Roberts devotes an entire glowing section to Stapledon's legacy, shedding some light on the author and his influences.

3 Norwich Stories from World War II

I have a feature up on Norwich University's Norwich Today! From Top Brass To Enlisted, Norwich Helped Build the U.S. Forces of WWII, which covers three soldiers I've come across: General Edward Brooks, when he and a small platoon held off a massive German attack, Captain George Lucey, when he was captured in Africa, and Corp. James Logan, and his efforts during the Battle of the Bulge.

On Sept. 2, 1944, he was in Marchiennes, France, accompanied by a small group of six enlisted men and four officers, when local residents notified them a German column was making its way into town. Marchiennes had recently been cleared by the 2nd Armored Division, but Brooks and his tiny force were virtually alone. Brooks took stock of what they had at their disposal: a single armored car with a machine gun, one quarter-ton truck with a light machine gun, one submachine gun and several carbines for the men.

Read it here.

ReaderCon 23

ReaderCon 23 was a marvelous time: It's the third year that I've attended, and increasingly, I'm finding myself more and more comfortable there. Over the last three years, a lot's changed: I've been working for Lightspeed and Kirkus, and I've bet and continued to see people in our relatively small pond, and increasingly, I'm finding myself looking forward to the next time when the group is together again. This year's programming was light, but interesting. My favorite panel of them all was about the Expanse series, with Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck in the room outlining all of the background on the creation of their incredible world. The pair was witty, interesting and already, I'm eagerly awaiting the next novel in the series, and can't wait to get a better glimpse of the cover.

There were some other fantastic panels as well - a talk on Post-Colonial science fiction was very enlightening, as well as a talk on why authors might choose a different name for their book's cover and an excellent talk on the works of Shirley Jackson. There were also some good talks on the future of copyright, and of course the Shirley Jackson awards.

Even cooler, I got to meet some awesome people, and got some books signed: Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, Science Fiction Grand Master Joe frickin' Haldeman, Scott Lynch, Brit Mandelo and Ken Liu. I also got to meet some interesting people for the first time: Jaym Gates, Brian White, Molly Tanzer, and Karen Burnham, which was very awesome. Too many awesome people to list in all, and I'm looking forward to going again. After it all, I came away happily exhausted.

It should be noted that there were some issues, such as what happened with Genevieve Valentine over the course of the weekend, a stark reminder that there's problematic people who attend these things. Don't be that person.

This year was also successful in that I was given more books than I bought - I still ended up buying a good handful that have already been interesting and useful. Now that the weekend is over, it's time to get to reviewing, working on new awesome projects and reading a few good books.

Throne of the Crescent Moon, Saladin Ahmed

Saladin Ahmed's debut novel, Throne of the Crescent Moon has been getting a lot of attention since its release earlier this year. It's a fantastic novel, right out of the gate, gripping and engaging, but it's also been getting quite a bit of attention for its location. Epic fantasy set in a recognizable Middle East - inspired world; it's a far cry from the pseudo-Middle-Ages-European settings that most worlds seem to inhabit.

For all of the hand-wringing lately about how little innovation there is in the fantasy world when it comes to actual world building, Ahmed's story is a nice change of pace; not because an author has bowed to public pressure and recognized that they can break out of the pack, but because he's been writing about this for a while now.

Throne of the Crescent Moon isn't all that notable within the fantasy genre because it's set somewhere besides Europe: it's notable because it's an incredibly strong, character-driven narrative. It’s the first fantasy novel that I’ve read in a while where all of the characters really work to own their destiny, and that *they*, not some long forgotten prophesy has guided their actions to make them realize who they really are. It’s a refreshing change of pace.

The line of storytelling that has been troubled me lately is the prophetic style of fantasy, and it's one reason why I tend to favor more science fiction-flavored stories in general, which tends to avoid it. Far too often, character lives have been pre-determined, with the central focus revolving around the character realizing their inherent importance or internal strengths. Far more interesting to me is when the characters move the plot forward on their own, with their own actions helping or hindering them. Thankfully, this is largely what I've found over the course of reading Throne of the Crescent Moon with its three central characters: Doctor Adoulla Makhslood, a ghul hundter of Dhamsawaat, Raseed bas Raseed, Adoulla's assistant, and Zamia Badawi, the shapeshifting protector of her band. The trio is deeply and at times, broadly flawed, but as the novel progresses, there’s an increasing recognition of this, and growth to overcome it.

A murder triggers the opening of the novel, as a powerful dark presence rises around the city of Dhamswaat, draws in the elder Doctor and his young, naïve assistant, and the young protector together amidst the backdrop of political revolution and corruption in the city. Following the trail of the gruesome murders, the unlikely band comes across a much greater conspiracy that threatens their whole world.

The plot isn't terribly original, but Ahmed's richly textured world more than makes up for it. The streets of Dhamsawatt in particular are a delight to read. Vividly written, the city and characters are captured in their entirety. Defined by their flaws, each character essentially works to overcome some of their learned nature (or, it's clear that some of them already have), presenting a nice ensemble of characters that felt very real to me.

Ahmed’s writing is the last main pillar of the novel, and Throne of the Crescent Moon is a deftly written story that pulls the reader along effortlessly. His prose is crisp, detailed and allowed me to burn through the book in just a couple of sittings, something that feels like an ever-rarer joy to do. The book is a short read, but ultimately a satisfying novel, one that has left me awaiting more installments of Ahmed's fascinating world. He’s certainly an author worth checking out and watching for the future.

Jules Verne and the Moon

My latest column for Kirkus Reviews is now online! In it, I talk about Jules Verne and his fantastic novel From the Earth to the Moon. I recently talked about Jules Verne in his influences that stemmed from Edgar Allan Poe, and I was particularly eager to return to Verne as a major influence in the genre.

As July is the month where the anniversary of the first Moon landing rests, it seemed like a good time, although Verne's novels are closer to what happened with Apollo 8, when we first reached the moon, rather than landed on it.

You can read the entire post here on the Kirkus Reviews Blog.

Here's the sources that I used for the column this time around:

Billion Year Spree, by Brian Aldiss: Once again, this book provides some good background on Verne throughout, and some of the things that helped to influence him and this particular novel, especially Poe.

The History of Science Fiction, by Adam Roberts: Roberts takes to task the idea that Verne 'predicted' how the space program would be put together, and lambasts critics who nitpick Verne's story based on some of the things that he didn't get right - such as using a giant cannon to get into space as opposed to that of a rocket. It's a good perspective to understand, that Science Fiction doesn't predict the future, but if the author is paying good attention to science, it's not likely to change all that much, as is what happens in this situation.

Survey of Science Fiction Literature, Vol 3, by Frank Magill: Magill's collection provides a great analysis of From the Earth to the Moon in its themes and influences.

To a Distant Day: The Rocket Pioneers, by Chris Gainor: This is a great history (and part of a great series on human space exploration, the Outward Odyssey series), on the development of Rocket Science. This book points to a number of rocket pioneers who read Verne's stories and looked at how they could do that in real life. Verne's an excellent example of where fiction becomes real.

Jules Verne, inventor of science fiction by Peter Costello: This biography of Verne was a particularly good one, outlining much of Verne's life and some of his influences when it came to science fiction and storytelling. He's a facinating individual, and the book provides a good overview.

From the Earth to the Moon and Round the Moon, Jules Verne: Of course, there's the source material, in this instance, a nicely bound collected edition that my wive brought with her when she moved up to Vermont. This edition has several other books, and I look forward to someday reading it to whatever children we end up having.

The Lion The Beast The Beat

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals are a band on the upswing. Enormously popular in Vermont from their first album, it's been quite something to have seen a band go from playing small gigs around town to major venues across the country. With their latest album, The Lion The Beast The Beat now out, the band is reaching new heights.

The group's self-titled 'debut' landed two years ago, which came after three prior albums (two independantly produced - Original Soul and Nothing But Water - and their first under a major record label, This Is Somewhere), and was a mixed affair. The production was great, but the album was lacking some of that energy and whimsey that really made heads turn. This latest album still has the major record label fingerprints but they've delivered a superb album that captures Grace's fantastic voice much better. It's a strong album, and bodes well for their future.

In a way, The Lion the Beast the Beat is Grace personified. All of her albums have felt deeply personal, but this one makes the jump over to the singer as a literal mechanical component: a vinyl record. Turntable is a sexually charged number that puts Grace spinning around a record player, while Never Goes Back brings in the idea that a person's life can be scratched just like a record can be.

There's a lot to love in this album with a lot of variety. Title track, The Lion the Beast the Beat perfectly mirror the energy that you'll see at one of their live shows, while Never Goes Back feels much like a throwback to the 1980s and Stars shows out her country influences nicely. There's others still, like Loneliest Soul that are just strange and very different from her usual sound, but very fun to listen to. At the center of it all is Grace Potter and her fantastic voice, which runs up and down the register effortlessly.

There's a little big of everything on The Lion The Beast The Beat, and the entire album feels like it's moved from the safe territory that their last album seemed to drift to. Potter's music has always felt like it's a bit on the edge, and it's nice to see them back to having a bit of fun.

H.G. Wells and the War of the Worlds

Over on the Kirkus Reviews blog, I've turned my attention to one of my absolute favorite science fiction novels, The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells. One of the absolute greatest works of science fiction, it's a story that I've continually learned more about ever since I first read it so many years ago. You can read H.G. Wells and the Decline of Empires over on Kirkus' website.

There's a couple of unconventional sources that I used for this book, in addition to the usual sources that I've gone to continually for this column:

Experiment in autobiography; discoveries and conclusions of a very ordinary brain (since 1866) by H.G. Wells: For specific author information, one can do no wrong by going to the original source: in this instance, H.G. Wells' words. This biography is a little frustrating at points, because he doesn't talk much about his actual writing, but it does give a unique insight into his daily life around the time that he wrote this novel.

Not Separated at Birth: Dracula and The War of the Worlds (Panel Discussion): This wasn't a reference work, but a panel that included Charlie Stross, Gregory Feeley, David G. Hartwell, Faye Ringel and Darrell Schweitzer at Boskone 38 this past spring. I took a number of notes during the talk, which was a facinating comparison between both Dracula and War of the Worlds, and examining them as colonization novels, which was part of a much larger genre at that time.

Prophets of Science Fiction, H.G. Wells: Last year, the Science Channel and Ridley Scott partnered for a series titled The Prophets of Science Fiction, which examined a handful of notable authors in the genre, including H.G. Wells. Taking their works, the program alternatively looked at biography and some of the modern technological innovations that are fairly loosely associated with the works. It's not mindblowing, but the episode on Wells provides a nice snapshot of his life, while glossing over some of the other things, such as his social politics.

The usual sources of Billion/Trillion Year Spree, by Brian Aldiss, The Dreams Our Stuff is Made Of, by Thomas M. Disch, The History of Science Fiction, by Adam Roberts and the Survey of Science Fiction all had their own praises and examinations of Wells' novel and provide a great background into that era of science fiction.

The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells: of course, the best source of them all is the original novel by Wells. It's a brilliant, stunning work that is fresh every time I go back to it. If you've never read it, you're missing out on a classic.