Interesting article on how to use Google for country and file specific searches, somewhat like an un-named spy agency. Adding keywords like “site” and “filetype” aren’t new, but since most people use Google, knowing these and other ways to refine searches can improve other searches.
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Thoughts on writing in letters from Raymond Chandler.
Some amusing quotes, mangled and twisted.
While not a fan of the members of the Bloomsbury writers and artists, I find literary groups fascinating.
An amazing six hours of one song as The National performs one song over and over.
Just learned about this young adult book, published in 2011and winner of the 2012 Newbury Award. Written by Eugene Yelchin, it tells the tale of a young boy in Soviet Russia
now that it is finally time to join the Young Soviet Pioneers, the day Sasha has awaited for so long, everything seems to go awry. Perhaps Sasha does not want to be a Young Soviet Pioneer after all. Is it possible that everything he knows about the Soviet Government is a lie?
Available from Amazon and other bookstores. There’s also a Kindle edition.
Recent interview with writer Harlan Ellison woven into context by the interviewer’s previous encounters with Ellison. I met Ellison many years ago (1995 at DragonCon), when he sat next to me at a bench. I moved over, and he said in what I later termed a slightly acerbic tone, “I don’t need that much room!” I think I was too awed to answer, as I’ve long been a fan of his writing.
The past three months I have focused almost exclusively on cycling. For over two years I ran on average five times a week, until a foot injury forced me to slow and then eventually stop running. I keep hoping that not running will let it heal, but so far that hasn’t happened to the point where I can run again. So, since I’ve completed a few triathlons I figured I would work on cycling.
Whereas with running I just throw on some decent running shoes and some clothes that won’t hurt me while I sweat, with cycling there’s a lot more preparation. Living in the suburbs there are few open roads, so I have to drive at least 20 minutes, often more. More equipment goes into cycling. Then, once I’m in the country, cars still zoom past (some fairly close, but most move over), though there are some great roads with very little traffic. With cycling you get to see more, since it’s easier to ride great distances than run them. I don’t feel quite as alive as when running, since my heart rate never elevates to the same level.
I usually ride solo during the week, and then on Sunday join a local group ride. When I started riding with the group I ended up somewhere in the middle. I usually got dropped by the fast group – the hammerheads, as I call them – after four miles or so. I also found I was a little faster than the next group, and so I’d end up riding solo for 90% of the “group” ride. But the way to improve is to challenge yourself and have others challenge you, and lately I find I can hang with the fast group, except when climbing hills. At this point my speed drops, and I fall further and further back. When I conquer the hills I will have reached the next level. When on the flats and downhill I’m almost a hammerhead myself, but a junior hammerhead.
I have a great deal to learn about cycling, both solo and in groups, but I’m hoping that if I’m ever able to enter another triathlon all this effort will pay off on the bike. In the meantime, I’m learning just to enjoy riding more, and trying hard not to think that I’d rather be running.
According to Time, science fiction is “stuck in a rut of hopelessness” with “cynicism and surrender at its core.” And Time isn’t looking at dystopian sf, but doomsday sf, like Oblivion and After Earth. Then there’s World War Z, which seem even bleaker than the others, and even Elysium. These are all good points, and will the pendulum swing the other direction? After all, the real world is mired in a sense of hopelessness as well, with persistent economic problems and constant acts of war and terror nearly worldwide. Surely that impacts science fiction books and movies as well?
Does being branded “science fiction” limit sales and exposure? Apparently so, from the perspective of someone who takes umbrage to a favorite new novel being called science fiction in a New York Times review. Only certain novels fall into sf:
If you’re a strict constructionist, a sci-fi story requires an extrapolation from real science. If you take a more generous point of view, sci-fi must at least provide a science-ish accounting for non-realistic elements of the story. At the bare minimum, there must be some pseudo-scientific babble and hand-waving (hello, warp drive).
One rung up from science fiction? Well, you can “call it fantasy” and that removes the sf taint. Worthy writers apparently don’t write science fiction.
