337. Ann Leckie (a.k.a. Singularitrix) — Provenance (An Interview)
http://media.blubrry.com/skiffyandfanty/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/SandFEpisode337InterviewWithAnnLeckie/Sandf–Episode337–InterviewWithAnnLeckie.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Android | iHeartRadio | Podchaser | Podcast Index | Email | TuneIn | Deezer | RSSSpace Opera, heritage, and alien ambassadors, oh my! Shaun is joined by guest host Feliza Casano of Girlsincapes.com to interview Ann Leckie about the stand-alone novel in her Radch universe, Provenance. Ann shares some of her Space Opera influences, talks about how her love of archeology led her to an exploration of the role museums play in the myth of heritage, the nature of identity, naming, language, and so very much more. Don’t miss this one everyone! We hope you enjoy the episode! Note: If you have iTunes and like this show, please give us a review on our iTunes page, or feel free to email us with your thoughts about the show! Here’s the episode (show notes are below):
#61: Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017) — A Shoot the WISB Subcast
http://media.blubrry.com/skiffyandfanty/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/ShootTheWISB61ValerianAndTheCityOfAThousandPlanets/ShootTheWisb61–ValerianAndTheCityOfAThousandPlanets.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Android | iHeartRadio | Podchaser | Podcast Index | Email | TuneIn | Deezer | RSSRampant misogyny, batipi, and failed plots, oh my! Shaun, Paul, and Alex join together to absolutely destroy the mess that is Luc Besson’s newest film, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. They REALLY hated this movie, guys. From the wish-fulfillment misogyny of Valerian himself to the wasted potential of Rihanna’s character (and virtually everything else), they found a lot of things that just went horribly wrong with this CGI extravaganza. We hope you enjoy the episode! Note: If you have iTunes and like this show, please give us a review on our iTunes page, or feel free to email us with your thoughts about the show! Here’s the episode (show notes are below):
Book Review: Substrate Phantoms by Jessica Reisman
Mysterious doings on Termagenti station, and the story of a tortured survivor of an exploration gone wrong, both external and internal, are at the heart of Substrate Phantoms, a debut space opera novel from Jessica Reisman. Substrate Phantoms features a strong character-based focus for the novel, playing firmly in the more literary side of the genre as it explores a story of what only slowly and painstakingly is revealed to be one of a first contact with the Other. The novel primarily follows a pair of characters whose stories touch and eventually converge. Jhinsei was part of a tube team, one of the groups on Termangenti Station sent as troubleshooters for various systems on the complex and sometimes badly functioning orbital habitat. In the prologue of the novel, he and his team check out a problem in the station in an area near where a mysterious derelict spacecraft has long been stashed. Things went…bad on that mission, to the point where Jhinsei, the most junior member of the team, was the only survivor. Eighteen months later, now in a safer dead end job, the consequences of that expedition and what really happened to Jhinsei start to emerge. Jhinsei has started to hear and see things, including the voices of the dead members of his team. And other things have started to happen in his presence as well. These strange events around him bring Jhinsei and what happened to the attention of some very powerful people on the station. This will put Jhinsei on the run from those he cares about, and ultimately the station itself.
326. Joyce Chng (a.k.a. The Werewolf Whisperer — Starfang: Rise of the Clan (An Interview)
http://media.blubrry.com/skiffyandfanty/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/SandFEpisode326InterviewWJoyceChng/Sandf–Episode326–InterviewWJoyceChng.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Android | iHeartRadio | Podchaser | Podcast Index | Email | TuneIn | Deezer | RSSWerewolves in space, Chinese-diaspora, and merchants, oh my! Joyce Chng joins Jen and Paul to discuss her Space Opera novella, Starfang: Rise of the Clan. We talk about the everything from how Joyce was influenced by Singapore’s maritime traditions, to children on the bridge, to werewolves, of course! And don’t believe Joyce when she tells you she can’t write romance because Starfang proves her wrong! We hope you enjoy the episode! Note: If you have iTunes and like this show, please give us a review on our iTunes page, or feel free to email us with your thoughts about the show! Here’s the episode (show notes are below):
Book Review: The Stars are Legion by Kameron Hurley
I came to Kameron Hurley’s work early, getting a copy of God’s War back at the beginning of her career, and following her work and worlds since. Sometimes I’ve had questions or issues with her work, but throughout, the “blood, bugs, and brutal women” that have been a hallmark of all of her worlds and characters have sustained my reading interest and been a welcome expenditure of my reading time. It was thus with great anticipation that I picked up The Stars Are Legion, the new Space Opera from Hurley. I started this review and continue to engage with the author on a metatextual as well as a textual level because her work responds to that sort of analysis. No writer is separate from her creation, but some writers are very intimately connected to what they write, how they write, and why they write as they do. Hurley falls into this camp. So, I went into the novel with expectations that there would be strong female characters, violence, perhaps worldbuilding that might frustrate me a tiny bit, and a harsh and high contrast verse that engages my senses. In photography terms, instead of a placid and straightforward landscape or portrait, Hurley’s work pushes pixels in both directions, sometimes discordantly, to deliberate and eye-arresting effect.
Book Review: Avengers of the Moon by Allen Steele
It takes a lot of moxie to decide you’re the one to take a character beloved from pulp magazines and anime and update it for a 21st century novel. Allen Steele has already proven that he has that moxie, having given us a novella on “The Death of Captain Future”, but that story wasn’t about Captain Future so much as about a fan of the pulps in which that hero first came to life. Twenty-odd years later, he’s at it again, but this time he’s gone all out to make Captain Future a hero for our times. Did he succeed? If by “succeed” one means creates a perfect pastiche of the hokey and wholesome tales of yore while subtly correcting for modern advances in scientific knowledge and attitudes about the Other, then he more than succeeds. Avengers of the Moon has all the feel of an early 20th century planetary romance, without any of the “mistakes” that let us smile behind our hands when reading the originals he draws on. It’s not set in the “distant future” year of 2015. There are no aliens living in caves on the moon or on the other planets in our solar system.* Weapons and gadgets and space travel are more plausible for modern readers (and cool as heck!). The nom-de-guerre of Captain Future remains but is treated as a childish embarrassment that others gently rib Curt Newton for adopting. Etc.
