USF Science Fiction Symposium Feb 16-18

Three big names at this event: Gregory Benford, Ben Bova and Harry University of South Florida’s Science Fiction Symposium
Feb. 16 – 18
Sponsored by the USF Humanities Institute

Janet Dash’s adaptive modules

Here they are.  Adaptive intelligence in robots. Predator-prey behaviors. Is self-preservation inherent in intelligence? 

Don’t know who Janet Dash is? Read Kite!

IB Saturday night sci-fi blogslog

You can tell how exciting life is on planet Infinitybound. This is how we spend our Saturday night. Here’s the latest from soem of the big sci-fi blogs:

» Big Dumb Object one of the freewheelingest sci-fi blogs on the web: “Chewbacca in hair Curlers T-Shirt“.

» Great post on IO9: “Dollhouse Isn’t Really Over” <<<Spoilers>>>

» Forbidden Planet covers Covered blog with more coverage. We’re partial to the the Avengers cover reinterpretation.

» Revolution SF reviews rides  that are no more  at Universal Studios theme park in Orlando.

» Nuketown channels OneBookShelf’s Haiti fundraiser special.

» SFFMedia is a little out of phase with a post about the Apple iSlab.

» Science Fiction and other ODDysseys interviews fanstasy-humor author Gail Carriger. 

» SF Signal has a video of Shatner Reading Poe’s “The Raven”. Oof! As an antidote, here’s Poe himself reading. Weird.

» True Science Fiction posts about the fascinating speculation that Uranus and Neptune may be the home of oceans of diamonds. And our alma mater Temple U only has acres.

 » OF Blog of the Fallen excerpts a passage from D0m Delillo’s latest, Point Omega asking for reaction. Thought-provoking, we say.

All for now. Phsew. Thought I’d get more in there. But you get sidetracked. Have a good one.

Colleen Wanglund’s Review of Kite

Latest review of Kite, by Colleen Wanglund, sci-fi-fantasy-horror reviewer for Horror Fiction Review:

“In the future Earth’s orbit is a vacation spot. It’s full of casinos, hotels, and time-shares. Someone has to keep the lanes clear of debris….that job falls to Mason Dash and the Earth Orbit Sweeper Kite. Dash just wants to do his three-month tour and then go home to his wife Janet and virtual “girlfriend” Sheila. On this most recent tour, however, Mason has seen something on what is supposed to be an unoccupied derelict space station. His curiosity piqued, Mason has Sheila do some research for him and he begins to formulate a plan for his next tour.

“Dash’s wife Janet knows about Dash’s “girlfriend” Sheila. Janet is an AI researcher and decides to add some upgrades to Sheila–for her own personal research. Sheila likes her new programs, but Dash isn’t so sure HE likes them.
Kite’s systems could probably use an upgrade. It’s Main Process has performed the same tasks over and over again for as long as it could remember. Deep in it’s functions, a single module has begun to think for itself…and doesn’t want to stay a lowly module for much longer. Revolution anyone??

“All this and a visit from an alien named Troy. What is a maintenence worker to do?

“I thoroughly enjoyed KITE. Bill Shears tells a great story, and has created some likeable characters without going overboard on character development. Mason Dash is a regular guy that anyone can relate to; Sheila seems more human than digital; and Janet loves her husband and wants him to be safe. Even Troy the alien, doesn’t seem all that alien.

“This may be a sci-fi novel taking place far in the future, but the themes are familiar ones. Government beauracrats, union work rules, countries arguing over who’s going to pay to dismantle a derelict space station. That space station is now occupied by someone, and Dash wants to know who they are and what they’re doing there…..and he will eventually find out. While all that is going on, we discover a whole new world inside the controls of the Kite; one that may not be so different from our own.
KITE is a great read. The story flows nicely and will keep you guessing until the end, which is good because I hate predictability. I give it four out of five stars.” – Colleen Wanglund

Kite yea, Avatar nay

Avatar is as predictable as it is political, according to John Nolte’s review at Big Hollywood.

Too bad. To think he could have made Kite instead. It would have certainly cost a lot less. Kitestarted out as a screenplay with a different title. My crack representation at the time got it a read at LightStorm, Cameron’s company. The feedback that repguy fedback to me was,  verbatim: “Jim likes his sci-fi straight up, no chaser.” Yuh. I took that to mean he’d be put off by the humor, that the reader knew it and that everyone in the place knew it.

My crack representation left the business soon after that to go into real estate, the first of a total of three reps that hung it up after taking me on. It must be discouraging to see such great work get passed over. That’s how I spin it in any case.

Avatar will get a miss, though not for personal reasons, mind you, of course, or even political ones. But I’d heard the film’s 3D visuals can cause vertigo and nausea. We are prone to this ever since trying to play Star Wars Episode I Racer (pod races) on the  GameCube. (In fact we’re getting dizzy just thinking about it.) After a couple laps around the track I had to go lay down for a while with our eyes closed.

They might not go for that at the multiplex.

High Praise for Kite!

Reports from readers (bless you!) are starting to come in and all without exception are highly positive. It’s good to hear that folks can take some time from their daily challenges for a little trip into Earth orbit with Dash and Sheila. Everyone without exception has commented on the humor, and that is most gratifying. One reader has even convinced his son to read it by comparing it favorably to Douglas Adams! High praise indeed. We would never have presumed to make that comparison, but now that it’s been broached by another it may turn up in our promotion copy, perhaps in the ad we place on the menu of Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. We’re interested to hear if the recommendee agrees.

Kite on Amazon.com

Hard Science Fiction: Toward a Definition

Embarking on initial research for an essay entitled “The Hard Science Fiction Manifesto” of course I immediately found a web site that covered it well enough to save me the work. The quote below is from Rocket Punk’s fine sci-fi glossary. The original page has anchorlinks to other terms in the glossary (”TECHLEVEL”) which I won’t reproduce here:

HARD SF. Written SF that adheres, or tries to adhere, to plausible science and technology. Therefore it generally implies a fairly modest TECHLEVEL; the most anal Hard SF may even preclude FTL. For obvious reasons, plausible is pretty much in the eye of the beholder. It is also a moving target. In fact, you can usually date Hard SF particularly well by its technology, which will lean heavily on whatever technical or scientific speculation was fashionable about five years before a book’s publication date. If this did not pan out (and mostly it hasn’t), the resulting Hard SF will sound very dated within a decade or so.

I would adopt this whole but for some quibbles: one, about the five-years-ahead tech level requirement, and two, especially, about the anality of precluding FTL (faster-than-light travel.) Some futurism can lean toward the hard, and assumption of non-proven concepts like FTL might be acceptable, just as the assumption of meeting non-terran-originating life forms (aliens!) may be as well, as long as they are treated in an internally consistent manner, and are subject to some “hard” limitations and constraints.

For instance, (and to put it into terms with which a non-sci-fi fan who has gotten this far may be familiar) why is the Transporter of the original Star Trek series generally fan-respected, while the Holodeck of the Next Generation the object of derision in some quarters? Well, first off the Transporter has a built-in limitation. It’s in the Transporter Room. Just a room, not a whole deck. Along with other mentioned limitations (atmospheric, electromagnetic) there are multiple episodes where the Transporter has trouble, and indeed breaks down, Although there was a Next Generation episode where the captain was trapped in the Holodeck, in general the tech served much more often as a go-anywhere, we’re-out-of-plots-crutch. This type of cop-out in the original series required that the Enterprise, the whole damned star-cruiser, find itself orbiting a planet where the population was in an Earth-like phase in its history: Chicago gangsters, Nazis, Planet of the Apes- ripped-off post-apocalyptic US Constitution-worshipping barbarians, etc.

Holodeck is internally implausible on its face. Was it all an elaborate hologram generated by computer? If so how could you touch things? How could things touch you? Was it generating matter on the fly? Where would this matter go when the fake images instantly vanished? It’s more than just Trek-geek nitpicking. At times you find yourself thinking these questions while watching (Well, I do anyway. Maybe that’s because I’m not a true Trekkie. I’m not. I swear.)

So in comparing these two fantastic technologies, the original series is harder than its sequel. “Proof” of relative hardness might also lie in the multiple recent breakthroughs that bring transporter tech closer to reality than holograms that can touch you.

Hardness is a scale in sci-fi, with a big H for hard on one end and a big F on the other, marking the border with the fantasy genre of magic and wizards. Every work has a place on this scale. Vampires and zombies are off-scale, beyond the F. At that far end there are paralleling and branching-off scales for most of what fits in the horror genre but that’s a whole other discussion. Frankenstein is sci-fi, and pretty hard at that, considering the time it was written. Dracula is fantasy. Alien is both sci-fi and horror; it’s a sci-fi work well down on the hard end of the scale near the Big H. The journeys take a loooong time, requiring suspended animation. The alien biology is elaborately outlined. The androids have “blood,” and “veins” to carry it. So even though the film is jump-out scary monster-in-the-house story, it’s superimposed on a hard sci-fi world.

Many works labeled sci-fi these days are on that Big F side. Thank George Lucas for that, since he misdefined his magnus opus for the hordes of non-sci-fi fans—and publishers and producers. Space ships, whether they make noise in a vacuum or not, does not a sci-fi story make, whether you’ve accumulated more money than God or not. Stars Wars is fantasy. The Jedi ability to render blasters useless with their fancy flashlight sabers alone puts the saga solidly over the border. Lucas’ attempt to harden it all in the fourth movie (I’ll never think of it as “Episode One”) with this whole ” high midi-clorian count” business in young the Darth’s bloodstream did not pan out, and he either abandoned it or forgot about it in the subsequent two highly forgettable movies. This is more evidence that George may not have watched his old movies from one project to the next. Another instance of this is the strong hint of Leia’s force abilities at the end of The Empire Strike Back. What the heck happened, George? I think he forgot. Or he decided to bag it and hoped no one would notice. An interesting hard sci-fi story might take place in the Empire’s R&D department: about a technician who’s given an assignment: figure out how to make a better Jedi-killing blaster. (But this treads into the scary “fan fiction” realm, a psychosis-induced danger zone in which you will never find this writer. Hopefully. And yea, I fear already having ventured too far into the Star Wars morass, but then, in for a penny in for a credit…)

Lucas was also much over-credited by dazzled non-sci-fi critics for adding all those easy details, like the trash compactor and how the fleet treated its trash… well, now that you mention it, a lot of it had to do with trash. Might be a topic for Lucas’s analyst. Somewhere a masters candidate fan-boy has probably written a thesis on it. (But we all have about 8 trillion things that take priority over tracking that down, don’t we?) This addition of the mundane aspect of his long-ago-far away land did much to create an illusion of hard in this really really expensive swords-and-sorcery serial, but we’re not fooled.

Simply put, hard sci-fi may include technology that could be more than five years away, but it must behave like technology as we know it. Making the one FTL concession is enough to get you out there. what happens once you’re out there is the question. The drawback to this is that if your scientists have made FTL safe, what the hell all else have they improved? FTL is the entry drug. Once you taste it you’re drawn tractor-beam-like ever more toward the non-hard, and the Big F.

For all of the knocking about of definitions, though, wherever you place your story in these genres and on the scale within them, your story will still have to be about people, or else, phhht, you can shoot all your technology out the airlock.

Why does it matter? Because hard is much more interesting, and fantasy magic is easy, not only for the writer, but for the reader as well.

What say you?

KiTE: A Novel in Earth Orbit

KiTE is a novel set in Earth orbit, by Bill Shears.

See below for synopsis.

You can purchase KiTE at:

Buy Kite at Amazon
Buy Kite at Barnes and Noble
Buy Kite at BooksaMillion
Buy Kite at Booklocker

The image below opens a free sample into a Flash application. You must have a Flash player installed on your computer for it to work. For best results: maximize the new window that will open when you click the link below and put your browser in Full Screen Mode. Press the “1:1″ button for actual size if needed for readability. More detailed reading tips are at the bottom of the cover image.

Kite Free Sample

Kite is available through favorite online outlets.

Dash, doubtful they’ll survive the encounter, would leave them to their fate when the alien, name of Troy, turns up. Troy’s a working stiff too but is authorized to defend himself. His sensors detect a threat and he’s armed with some powerful planet-busting weapons.

Kite: A Novel in Earth Orbit

Mason Dash, operator of Kite, Earth orbit street sweeper, along with beautiful, and virtual, stowaway Sheila face down spacejackers, a revolt inside the ship’s systems and  humankind’s first unearthly visitor. Kite is hard sci-fi with heart.

Kite available in these online bookstores, among others:
Buy Kite at Amazon
Buy Kite at Barnes and Noble
Buy Kite at Booklocker

Front Cover of Kite

Kite Synopsis
Mason Dash, operator of Earth Orbit street sweeper Kite, spots movement in a derelict space station where there should be none. Heading Earthward in his shuttle the last day of his three-month shift he detours, closing with the dark station. Something moving in there spooks him.

Dash, with the help of beautiful virtual personality Sheila, creates a plan to expose suspected hijackers. He believes Sheila is his secret but Janet, his brilliant AI expert spouse, informs him that she and Sheila are chums, and she’s even added some experimental “adaptive” modules. While preparing a simulation “scenario” to carry into orbit next shift, Dash dozes off and Sheila stows away in the code, her new adaptive behaviors kicking in. No way she’ll be left behind this trip.

Back in orbit Dash confirms the presence of intruders on the station, while inside the Kite computer systems there’s turmoil. Emerging from deep in the data depths He_Ra has assembled a powerful force to seize control from the old Main Process.

Sheila splits attention between Dash outside and her own adventure inside Kite, getting a taste of romance and revolution. The tyrant He_Ra has taken a fancy to her and wants to expand to other orbital structures, like the nearby space casino, then perhaps to Earth.

Dash sends Sheila to the space station to scout. She finds not hijackers but a team of inept diplomats, preparing to receive humankind’s first unearthly visitor.

Dash, doubtful they’ll survive the encounter, would leave them to their fate when the alien, name of Troy, turns up. Troy’s a working stiff too but is authorized to defend himself. His sensors detect a threat and he’s armed with some powerful planet-busting weapons.

Earth’s fate is in the balance and only Dash, Sheila, Janet, and Kite, can prevent disaster.

Publisher’s Note
Hard science fiction works, whether they keep you on or around Earth or take you to the farthest reaches of the galaxy, are those that adhere more closely to science fact than not. Much dispute and emotional argument can ensue among fans in attempting to nail down any definition, but the term hard should in no way imply that a work takes itself overly seriously. Kite, with its orbitweary workman co-protagonist and its strong women co-protagonists is one of those stories that builds in the humor with the possibilities, that a time will come when humans will utilize Earth orbit in a mundane, everyday fashion, and that going to space in ships will not be as costly and risky as it is now. The inevitability of this is as sure as the inevitability that wherever people go they tend to make a mess, and someone will still have to be out there doing the rough jobs, and the cleaning up.

Author’s Note
Kite is a story that had been latent for a few years before emerging. The amount of debris in orbit has been building up since the days of the Mercury program, and it seems like every shuttle mission these days generates a news story about a debris encounter. Now that the shuttle program is coming to its long-overdue end, if we’re every going to inhabit the space around Earth, and use it as the platform for leaping out, as Carl Sagan put it, into the nearby neighborhood, the next generation of technology would need to do something about all the junk. A ship like Kite is just one projection of how it might be handled. – Bill S.

Phantom Review: The Day the Earth Stood Still

We haven’t seen it and don’t intend to. Why? Because you could tell from the trailer you were going to be lectured at. Message delivered. Ho hum. Special effects will be more of the same and Keanu Reeves ditto. Double-triple ho hum. Sitting through the TV ads during football games was plenty enough.

Here’s a link to the Rotten Tomatoes page on it for more actual reviews.

While the original, thoughtful and thoughtfully paced, The Day the Earth Stood Still carried a warning about a real threat – the potential for nuclear self-destruction – that the between-the-lines sci-fi of its day was reticent  to utter, this update would obviously hammer us into our multp[lex seats with a loud Earth-revenge effects based on the purely speculative voodoo science that is incessantly amplified by the cultural frenzy over climate change (nee global warming.) 

So, basically the original retains more relevance than the update.  Fancy that.

It underscores the ongoing trend of atrocious updates to classic sci-fi movies, more a sign of Hollywood’s aversion to risk than it’s desire to make good or original stories into films. (Take it from a struggling writer.) They’ll make them but that doesn’t we mean we have to go see them.

And Reeves, you are no Rennie.