Lizards, perpetual rain and moldy KOPS: A short review of Warren Hammond’s KOP

KOP by Warren Hammond

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A hard-boiled, corrupt cop noir story infused with some science fiction. As a noir mystery/thriller, KOP is pretty good. As science fiction, it’s not so good. While the author manages to create a believable and consistent colony world, the science fiction extends no further than that. Neither the plot, nor the ultimate resolution, rely on science or any of the common science fiction tropes or themes. Simply setting your story on an alien world and giving the characters laser pistols does not make your book science fiction.

Still, I really dug the narrator’s voice, and the protagonist was a true anti-hero; refreshing in this current trend of being grim and angry supposedly makes a character an “anti-hero”. The mystery at the heart is nothing special, but the author’s talent (Hammond is a crime writer) manages to keep the twists believable and he keeps the reader from figuring it all out in the first 100 pages.

All in all I was disappointed in the lack of any real science fiction, but I enjoyed the story and the character enough that I bought the two sequels. If you are looking for a solid read and like noir detective stories, you might want to give KOP a try. The setting is well conceived if not particularly science fictiony, and the Hammond manages to add in enough detail to keep the verisimilitude going.

View all my Goodreads reviews.

The Very Hungry Cthulhupillar

The Very Hungry Cthulhupillar by Jamie Chambers — Kickstarter

There has been a spate of Cthulhu and Mythos themed children’s books on Kickstarter lately. I am a sucker of most things Lovecraftian, and the very idea of “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” (which was, and still is, one of my favourite children’s books) transformed into Cthulhu was too terrible (!) and awesome to resist.

If this kind of thing appeals to you as well (as it bloody well should), head on over to the Kickstarter page and support The Very Hungry Cthulhupillar.

It will be money well spent, especially if they make the $8000 stretch goal. If they do, supporters get a hardcover book instead of paperback!

JourneyQuest – City of the Dead

JourneyQuest – City of the Dead

I’ve been watching these guys since they released “The Gamers: Dorkness Rising”. Having cut their teeth on that seminal fantasy gaming comedy, Dead Gentleman Productions leveraged their loyal, if small, fan base to produce JourneyQuest.

This is great stuff. Funny, well acted and high production values considering the budget they must operate on. I am downloading JourneyQuest – City of the Dead, which is the second “season” of this fantasy comedy, as we speak. I will be loading up on my favourite gamer food and hitting the couch to watch it this very night.

If you haven’t heard of this hilarious take on epic fantasy before, I urge you in the strongest terms to find “The Gamers: Dorkness Rising” and watch it. When you have finished laughing, buy JourneyQuest and JourneyQuest – City of the Dead, watch them and laugh some more. They are 100% fan supported and can use all of the support they can get. Dead Gentlemen Productions is running a great deal right now: download JourneyQuest and JourneyQuest 2 in HD mp4 or MKV for only $10.00 USD. Trust me, if you are a gamer and you like “The Guild”, you will love this.

It’s Worst Than That; He’s Dead, Jim: A Review of John Scalzi’s Redshirts

Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas by John Scalzi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

An award winning book which has taken the nerd-verse by storm. A hilarious send up the of Star Trek trope that the characters wearing red shirts are the ones who die, but the bridge crew is always unscathed. This was my first Scalzi book, and while it was funny, clever and somewhat thought-provoking, I was left disappointed by the end of it. The codas felt completely tacked on, as if Scalzi’s editor told him that he needed another couple of thousand words because the book was too short. It would have been better to integrate the material in the codas into the novel itself.

But I was greatly disappointed by the direction the novel took once the characters figure out what exactly is happening to them. It would have been a much better story if they had exploited “The Narrative” to survive rather than travelling back into the past to solve their problem. The novel as written felt like Scalzi was taking the “hilarious send-up of the original Star Trek” a bit too far, relying on a solution that the actual Star Trek used twice. Once the crew journeys to 2010 Hollywood the novel begins to flag and the humour wears thin.

Scalzi is an accomplished and talented writer, to be certain, and parts of Redshirts are laugh out loud funny, but for the life of me I cannot understand why the internet makes this out to be the best novel of the year. It certainly isn’t the best novel nominated for the Hugo this year.

If you like lighthearted, comedic, but not particularly challenging or deep, Science Fiction, give Redshirts a read. You need not be a Star Trek fan to get the jokes, but it certainly does help.

View all my reviews

The Very Pulse of Science Fiction

Escape Pod, a podcast the releases audio adaptations of high quality science fiction short stories (for free! every week!) is currently featuring one of my all time favourite short stories: “The Very Pulse of the Machine” by Michael Swanwick. I don’t want to say too much about the story since anything I will say might give away the ending, but if you are a fan of science fiction you owe it to yourself to listen to this excellent audio adaptation.

Go there now and download it. Go. Now.

Why are you still here?

Worlds First Science Fiction Magazine Returns From the Dead!

From the Experimenter Publishing Company:

“The Experimenter Publishing Company is pleased to announce the reintroduction of the world’s most recognizable science fiction magazine – AMAZING STORIES!

Following the completion of a successful Beta Test begun on January 2nd, 2013, Amazing Stories is now open to the public. Fans of science fiction, fantasy, and horror are invited to join and encouraged to participate in helping to bring back a cherished icon of the field.

For the past several weeks nearly sixty fans, authors, artists, editors and bloggers have been producing articles on your favourite subjects – the literature of SF/F/H, its presentations in media such as television, film, poetry, literature, games, comics and much more.

All contents of Amazing Stories are free to the general public.

Membership is also free – and entitles members to participate in the discussion, share information and engage in many other familiar social networking activities.

Membership also represents a stake in helping Amazing Stories return to publication. The more members the site acquires, the faster Amazing Stories can become a paying market for short fiction.

Every genre fan now has a chance to help support the creation of a new market for the stories, artwork and articles they all love so much.

To visit the site and obtain your free membership, go to AMAZING STORIES, and don’t forget to invite your friends too!

This reincarnation of Amazing Stories could not have happened without the generous support of Woodall Design LLC and the members of the Amazing Stories Blog Team:

Cenobyte, Karen G. Anderson, Mike Brotherton, Ricky L. Brown, Michael A. Burstein, Catherine Coker, Johne Cook, Paul Cook, Gary Dalkin, Jane Frank, Adria K. Fraser, Jim Freund, Fran Friel, Adam Gaffen, Chris Garcia, Chris Gerwel, Tommy Hancock, Liz Henderson, Samantha Henry,
M.D. Jackson, Monique Jacob, Geoffrey James, J. Jay Jones, Daniel M. Kimmel,
Peggy Kolm, Justin Landon, Andrew Liptak, Bob Lock, Melissa Lowery,
Barry Malzberg, C. E. Martin, Farrell J. McGovern, Steve Miller, Matt Mitrovich,
Aidan Moher, Kevin Murray, Ken Neth, Astrid Nielsch, D. Nicklin-Dunbar,
James Palmer, John Purcell, James Rogers, Felicity Savage, Diane Severson,
Steve H. Silver, J. Simpson, Douglas Smith, Lesley Smith, Bill Spangler,
Duane Spurlock, Michael J. Sullivan, G. W. Thomas, Erin Underwood,
Stephan Van Velzen, Cynthia Ward, Michael Webb, Keith West, John M. Whalen,
Karlo Yeager, Leah A. Zeldes

For more information about Amazing Stories, please contact the publisher at

Experimenter@AmazingStoriesMag.com”

Hurray! This is great news. Amazing Stories was one of my favourite magazines back before TSR (and then Wizards of the Coast) turned it into a bunch of Magic: The Gathering adverts with a few stories to plump it up. I look forward to the high quality science fiction and criticism that the editor plans to publish. If you like science fiction you owe it to yourself to check out the site.

How 19-year-old activist Zack Kopplin is making life hell for Louisiana’s creationists

Fighting the good fight.

Kopplin has got all of the consequences of creationism being taught as science correct. Were I more cynical I would say let Louisiana and Tennessee continue on their course to becoming third-world states but the miseducation of children is not only a grievous error, it hurts all of the United States. And the US needs all the help it can get.