A new book tells that Bush and Obama’s $800 billion stimulus bill actually worked.
The New New Deal: The Hidden Story of Change in the Obama Era by Michael Grunwald
Neither Party wants to talk about it leading up to the 2012 election.
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,20081124,00.html#ixzz24NakxHTs
Randy won two more Auroras, literary awards for Canadians in Science Fiction or Fantasy.
He’s the most hirsute of the winners.
That’s Robert Sawyer, holding the trophy far left. Rob won (again) for the third book in his Wake, Watch, Wonder trilogy.
I downloaded this excellent book on the recommendation of none other than Stephen King. He feels it’s the best time travel novel he’s ever read.
Author Jack Finney (1911-1995) … penned two great, influential science-fiction novels: the 1955 alien invasion story “The Body Snatchers … and this 1970 subtle romance about time travel.It’s a novel that many people hold close to their hearts, and like the movie “Somewhere in Time,” has the magic to allure you with the wonder of traveling back to a simpler time — 1880s New York in this case — and exploring in depth a world so unlike your own.
Finney, with meticulous detail and the support of numerous old photographs and drawings from the period (this is referred to as an “illustrated novel”) recreates New York in 1882, letting us and the main character, Si Morley, marvel as we walk over the old streets, see places where one day great skyscrapers will stand, gaze on a traffic jam of hansom cabs, discover the arm of the Statue of Liberty sitting in Madison Square awaiting the rest of its body, play old parlor games in a boarding house, and look at Fifth Avenue when it was a thin street of trees and apartments. …
Robert Redford had hoped to make a film of it. Has not happened, as yet.
Robert J. Sawyer is my brother’s buddy, Nebula and Hugo award winning SciFi novelist.
His latest is called Triggers:
On the eve of a secret military operation, an assassin’s bullet strikes President Seth Jerrison. He is rushed to the hospital, where surgeons struggle to save his life.
At the same hospital, researcher Dr. Ranjip Singh is experimenting with a device that can erase traumatic memories.
Then a terrorist bomb detonates. In the operating room, the president suffers cardiac arrest. He has a near-death experience-but the memories that flash through Jerrison’s mind are not his memories.
It quickly becomes clear that the electromagnetic pulse generated by the bomb amplified and scrambled Dr. Singh’s equipment, allowing a random group of people to access one another’s minds. …
A Sikh lead character.
And an all too plausible plot line — the USA deciding to take out nuclear power Pakistan.
A great read, as are all of Sawyer’s books.
If you’ve read none, I’d recommend starting with Wake.
Alastair is looking forward to this new film, an adaptation of the Jack Kerouac classic.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
related – 11 Travel Books for Bums
I’m On The Road, myself, once again.
… OK, it’s the Hilton San Jose, California. But that’s a start. 🙂
Here’s the argument – North Korea continues to brutalise its people and yet we do nothing
Shouldn’t we send in the Aircraft Carriers?
It worked so well for Vietnam and Iraq. … 😦
My opinion is that we should do everything non-violent to protest the brutality of North Korea. Gandhian resistance.
A new book brings this issue to the attention of the general public:
Escape from Camp 14: One Man’s Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West.
North Korea is isolated and hungry, bankrupt and belligerent. It is also armed with nuclear weapons. Between 150,000 and 200,000 people are being held in its political prison camps, which have existed twice as long as Stalin’s Soviet gulags and twelve times as long as the Nazi concentration camps. Very few born and raised in these camps have escaped. But Shin Donghyuk did.
In Escape from Camp 14, acclaimed journalist Blaine Harden tells the story of Shin Dong-hyuk and through the lens of Shin’s life unlocks the secrets of the world’s most repressive totalitarian state.
Shin knew nothing of civilized existence-he saw his mother as a competitor for food, guards raised him to be a snitch, and he witnessed the execution of his own family. Through Harden’s harrowing narrative of Shin’s life and remarkable escape, he offers an unequaled inside account of one of the world’s darkest nations and a riveting tale of endurance, courage, and survival.
New children’s book by Steven Colbert.
“The sad thing is, I like it” – Maurice Sendak
“The perfect gift to give a child or grandchild for their high school or college graduation.
Also Father’s Day.
Also, other times.”
– Stephen Colbert
Tom Hanks narrates the audio. It arrives in stores May 8th.
On Warren’s recommendation, I bought an audio copy of this book, Winner of the 2010 Nebula Award for Best Novel.
… Anderson Lake is a company man, AgriGen’s Calorie Man in Thailand.
Under cover as a factory manager, Anderson combs Bangkok’s street markets in search of foodstuffs thought to be extinct, hoping to reap the bounty of history’s lost calories.
There, he encounters Emiko. Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engineered being, creche-grown and programmed to satisfy the decadent whims of a Kyoto businessman, but now abandoned to the streets of Bangkok.
Regarded as soulless beings by some, devils by others, New People are slaves, soldiers, and toys of the rich in a chilling near future in which calorie companies rule the world, the oil age has passed, and the side effects of bio-engineered plagues run rampant across the globe. …
Bio-engineered plagues?
Genetically modified, sterile crops?
Here’s a real news story dated April 21st, 2011:
Vietnam says it will ask for international help to find out what is causing a skin infection that has already killed 19 people. …
BBC – Vietnam seeks foreign help to beat mystery skin disease
Bacigalupi was inspired to write this book after living through the SARS scare in Asia.
Hey. My brother was nominated for a literary prize: an Aurora.
“The Canadian Science Fiction & Fantasy Association (CSFFA)”
The Auroras – Canada’s Science Fiction & Fantasy Awards since 1980
About Us
2012 Prix Aurora Award Nominations
Best Short Fiction – English
title – “One Horrible Day” by Randy McCharles, The 2nd Circle, The 10th Circle Project
Looks like he’s also nominated in another category:
Best Fan Organizations. He’s the founder and chair of When Words Collide, the Fantasy Fiction convention hosted in Calgary.
And mentioned in yet another category:
Best Fan Publication
BCSFAzine,edited by Felicity Walker
Bourbon and Eggnog by Eileen Bell, Ryan McFadden, Billie Milholland and Randy McCharles, 10th Circle Project
related – My Mom and Dad were wed Friday the 13th, 1956. … 56yrs ago today.
The #1 book right now.
11/22/63 is a novel by Stephen King about a time traveler who attempts to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy which occurred on November 22, 1963 (the date of the novel’s title). …
Although the novel contains science fiction and alternate history elements, the majority of it is historical fiction dealing with real-life events and people between 1958 and 1963. …
King’s a terrific story teller. But I can’t particularly recommend this over other pop fiction. I find his books too long.
Actually, the only other King novel I’ve read was Under the Dome.
I found it too long.
He seems a very cool guy, though.
Rick McCharles 