Daily QuickPoll
Best "for kids" property that would be awesome with a "dark and edgy" reboot! (asked by beetnemesis)
Feel free to help me out and suggest ideas for future quickpolls
ReadAndFindOut - Grand Opening!
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, robots and elves alike; welcome to the best site around for Sci-Fi & Fantasy discussion.
We've only just opened our doors, so come on in and make yourself at home. The first thing you'll probably want to do is register, after which you'll be able to create new posts on the messageboards, create journal entries, and send notes to other members. Why not let us know about an upcoming release that you're excited about, or share a review of the last book you read?
Be sure to check out the welcome post too, it'll help get you started here!
Sci-Fi & Fantasy News
There's a lot going on in the Sci-Fi & Fantasy world. Here's some of the latest news:
- So, let's talk about Doctor Zhivago. 2010-03-15 12:51:09
- April Book Club: Solaris by Stanislaw Lem (Details inside) 2010-03-11 15:08:19
- New Releases for March 2010 - a few bigger names this month. 2010-03-01 18:36:32
Community News
Here's all the latest community and site related news:
- Small site updates 2010-01-07 22:45:09
- Donate links 2009-12-13 15:29:02
- Behold: Quote of the Moment! 2009-10-18 19:18:04
Wheel of Time News
Desperate for Wheel of Time news? Here's the latest, hot off the press:
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The WOTawards.... place your nominations now!
2010-01-04 10:38:27
Other News
Want news on TV, Movies, Computer Games and Role Playing Games? Just head this way!
- Movie club March part 1: Blade Runner 2010-03-11 09:11:13
His Master's Voice by Stanisław Lem
I picked this up way back because I was told its conclusion might be relevant to my master's thesis. Only as an example at the tail end of a point, but that is what I do: I procrastinate by reading books that are only vaguely possibly a bit relevant if I am really lucky. I need to stop that.
At any rate. I had read Stanisław Lem before, but only Cyberiad (somehow I managed to completely bypass his more famous Solaris. My expectations were therefore that I would find something quirky, mad, entirely different and genuinely interesting. And so I wasn't surprised; but I wasn't disappointed, either.
His Master's Voice is not like any science fiction I have ever read. Including Cyberiad -- in fact the two are nothing alike. It is a much more coherent story, it is more complicated, it requires more attention. But at the same time it is wonderfully intriguing, perhaps especially to someone with some grasp of the theory of language and communication.
Lem takes a taken-for-granted premise of so much science fiction, that communication with an alien race is possible, and questions it in a theory-heavy context of most major sciences ...
Ringworld by Larry Niven
I find it pretty difficult to write about the good SF that came out in the sixties and seventies, because a part of me always wants to go, “It was very ____, for its time,” which is not really a very helpful thing to say. But Larry Niven’s Ringworld took up a bat, smashed all my “for its time” cliches and laughed at my shock and pleasure.
Louis Wu is 200 years old, and he’s just ditched his own party to teleport through time zones to make the day last a little longer. He exhibits your usual signs ...
Gruesome and delightful: Little Hands Clapping by Dan Rhodes
Little Hands Clapping is a story of love returned and love rejected, of loneliness and despair and moths drawn to the flame. It's a story about a doctor, a model, a baker and a caretaker. It's a story about Pavarotti and accents. But most of all it's a story about something very hinky going on in a museum.
The museum is dedicated to the hopeless and despairing, to failures, and to death ...