Jan 07
The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie Orbit Books, 2019 Ann Leckie’s fantasy novel The Raven Tower came out last year and received immediate buzz because of its unique structure and voice. Told in second person (that is, an unseen narrator addresses the main character as “you” and tells this You everything the You thinks and …
Dec 31
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson Random House, 1972 (originally published in Rolling Stone magazine in 1971) [Challenge # 28 : A book everyone else seems to have read but you have not.] I’ve heard a lot about Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson, so that made …
Dec 30
“Maybe I’m a-mazed at the way you love me all the time…” (Supremely creepy poster art by Polish artist Wieslaw Walkuski)
Dec 18
The fun of creating randomly generated magic spells derives from trying to figure out what they do from two or three words. Sometimes it’s self-evident: Robe of the Gymnast. Other times, I need to think a little: Aelart’s Fairy Feet. This was inspired by a scene in the Angelina Jolie fantasy movie Maleficent, where one …
Nov 20
Some magical items are very useful to the recipient. Some are cursed, or useless. But more often than not they have a minor kind of magic, helpful in a certain situation. Here are some of those items. Minor and Mundane Magical Items The Wizard Kift’s Small Dirt-kicking Satyr: A diminuitive statue of a satyr …
Nov 18
Isn’t this guy a shady character! He’s got a buckskin and pointed ears like the mythical satyr but no hooves. Peter Paul Rubens, 1638. On display at The Prado, Madrid.
Nov 13
Steampunk as a genre got its start with The Difference Engine and The Diamond Age, both set in a alternate world Victorian England. So, it bears to follow that Steampunk characters have English language names that were popular during that time. There are no hippy names like Rainbow or Phoenix in Steampunkland, and neither are …
Oct 16
Elfquest, created by Wendy and Richard Pini, exploded onto the publishing scene in the early 1980s. A graphic novel series about, basically, hippy Native American elves who ride wolves, it took the comic world and SF fandom by storm, kick-starting the indie comic movement while also growing out of the earlier adult comic movement of …
Sep 30
Calligraphy follows shapes and spirals. A shell (caracola) and a pear. A lively looking butterfly with personality. What does it mean?
Sep 16
What happens to the people who Medusa turned to stone? Do they remain conscious over millennia, as continents sink and ocean levels rise?
