By @edent · Book Review Panopticon Books Sci Fi · 100 words
Another one in the Panopticon series. Bouncy sci-fi which scattershoots its plots all over the place. VR, Mission to Mars, evil AI, underwater cities, eyeless technomages - this has it all. It probably has a little too much crammed in. But, hey, it's a great ride. A cliffhanger every other chapter, vaguely plausible science, and […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi · 1 comment · 200 words
This is a decent slice of sci-fi. It's the sort of story that probably could have been written any time in the last 100 years. The sole survivor of the human race is picked up by friendly aliens and spends his life as a specimen of scientific and cultural curiosity. And then... events occur! It's […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi · 1 comment · 200 words
This is a fascinating story told on an almost geological timescale. It is a tantalisingly glimpse, into a much larger world. It is a story of contradiction - there's an epic universe, but we're stuck in a parochial backwater. It is full of un-human creations - yet its politics are firmly a reflection of the […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Movie Review RomCom Sci Fi · 1 comment · 350 words · read ~169 times.
The 2016 film "Passengers", with Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt, is a gruesome study in "because of the implication". JLaw's character wakes on a spaceship to discover that only Pratt's character is alive and has prematurely roused her from her slumber. She has, in effect, been murdered and the only way she can pacify this […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi · 250 words
Is it possible to write a time-travel story which makes sense? Probably not - but this comes close! It's a bit of a slow-burn; not revealing its secrets until it is good and ready. If you've read a lot of time-hopping sci-fi you won't find anything too surprising; nothing can escape the long shadow of […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi shakespeare · 250 words
The best thing about Shakespeare is that you can endlessly redefine the stories. Romeo & Juliet works as well set in NYC to a musical score as it does set in fair Verona. The Tempest is just as good whether the action takes place on an island or an alien planet. Shakespeare can be set […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi Ukraine · 1 comment · 300 words
I don't usually back Kickstarter campaigns - but I love sci-fi & fantasy, and I don't think I've previously read any from Ukraine. So this was an instant buy - and it is a delight. As with any translation, you have to accept that the phrasing may sound a little "foreign" and you won't immediately […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi · 1 comment · 450 words
Imagine a world with inter-city rockets, where tourists still use film cameras. Where self-driving trucks sport a wide array of sensor apparatus and record all their data onto miles of magnetic tape. Where the latest Androids are life-like and can perfectly clone a dead man's speech, yet are powered by punch-cards. People make video calls […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi · 3 comments · 400 words
Everyone smokes in the future. It is such an obvious truism that sci-fi writers can predict faster-than-light travel, yet fail to see that manly men won't be smoking pipes on board their spaceships. Someone recommended that I read "Autofac" which is the sci-fi version of "The Magic Porridge Pot". But the story was surprisingly hard […]
Continue reading →By @edent · Book Review Sci Fi · 400 words
I'm a little behind on my reading - I've been busy, OK! This is a collection of tales from 2014. Which means it isn't in the shadow of a damned pandemic, lunatic president, or any of the other modern horrors which have caused shockwaves to authors' psyches. I love short stories. There's absolutely no commitment. […]
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