what Dave thinks about movies, books and everything
Natalie Wolchover on the Life’s Little Mysteries web site tells us a bit about the future. The predictions come from an academic conference. Here’s a hint: human migration, urbanization, water wars, and mass extinctions. Also, something big will happen with energy. Either we’ll find new source(s) of energy and have enough — or we won’t. […]
{4.5/5} “Facing up to the truth ain’t always easy.” Frank is retired and his wife passed away a few months ago. His four kids were supposed to all visit on a particular weekend but they all cancelled. So he decided to take a trip across the US and visit them all — as a surprise. […]
{5/5} “To rule the heart of the Phoenix Lord — that was power. Yet what was power if one lived confined? Though the bars of the cage were of carved jade, banded with gold and hung with silk, they were still bars.” Linden and Maurynna have returned to Dragonskeep. Maurynna changed into a dragon once but […]
David Brin, author of books such as Startide Rising and Earth, has a thought-provoking article on Locus Online. It’s about why books and movies have most of their characters behaving as fools. One of his great points: “you never notice propaganda that you already agree with.” He argues that fictional worlds should be more like the real […]
{3/5} “I don’t care about your nicked knick-knacks. Your burgled baubles bore me.” Linda has taken care of Blu, a macaw, since he was a baby. A scientist came along to tell her that Blu is the last male of his kind and he wants to introduce him to the last female to try to keep […]
{4.5/5} “Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it’s not particularly dignified or […]
Gil is an eight-year-old boy who has a friend named Shandra and a nemesis named Morgan. Various strips show him at school, at home, or hanging out outside. Gil first appeared only on the web but it’s now in newspapers too. It’s written and drawn by Norm Feuti, who also does the strip Retail. I think it’s often […]
{5/5} “I’m an ordinary man, Jack. Meat and potatoes, I live in the real world. Not a big believer in magic. But this place… is different, it’s special.” A plane crashes on a possibly deserted island in the middle of the Pacific. Because the plane turned around, rescuers will be looking in the wrong place. […]
{4/5} “The incorporeality was, to many of the human race, something akin to a new and exciting religion… There were, however, some who protested most violently against it. We number ourselves among those protestants. There are many other protestants hiding out in various time periods. We maintain small, widely separated groups. It is harder to […]
I’ve decided to imagine, just for fun, that I’m giving out an award for the most significant (to me) author I’ve discovered in a given year. The award is given to an author that I really like (ie. who writes brilliant books) who I haven’t read before (except possibly a small number of short stories). Since […]