The old blog, active from 2006 through 2012.
Revisiting Middle Earth: “The Hobbit”
J.R.R. Tolkien’s Silmarillion contains a beautiful depiction of the world’s creation through music by Eru Ilúvatar and his choir of Ainur. It has passionate love stories, an Oedipal tale of woe, and theological conundrums aplenty. The Hobbit, by contrast, contains: A character who invents the game of golf by knocking the head of the goblin Golfimbul into a rabbit-hole Dopey trolls named William, Bert, and Tom, who speak in Cockney Goblins who sing doggerel verse... Continue reading→
Revisiting Middle Earth: “The Silmarillion”
After finishing up MultiReal (for the time being, at any rate), I felt that I needed to immerse myself in something familiar. Something classic. And so I decided to re-read J.R.R. Tolkien’s books on Middle Earth chronologically from start to finish, from The Silmarillion to Return of the King with a pitstop at the newly published Children of Húrin. This will probably be my fourth round trip through the whole cycle, the first being sometime... Continue reading→
“Infoquake” Reader Reactions
Amazon recently took down a 5-star reader review of "Infoquake," and I'm a little disappointed. Also, I received an email from a woman who claims "Infoquake" is a "guy magnet." Continue reading→
Penguicon 5.0 Wrapup
Here's Penguicon 5.0 in a nutshell, from my perspective: one part serious business, two parts goofy SFnal fun. Continue reading→
The Virginia Tech Killings
Some quick thoughts on the Virginia Tech massacre: I read Cho Seung-Hui’s play Richard McBeef. Yes, it sucks, but it’s not as sucky as I had been led to believe. It’s also quite disturbing, but honestly, the play in itself isn’t the stinking, fetid hatebomb of a warning sign that the media thinks it is. I wrote some disturbing shit myself in college — there was one story I wrote in the form of an... Continue reading→
The Works of Kurt Vonnegut
Since I'm thinking about the late, great Kurt Vonnegut, I decided to do a short summary of his works here, along with my take on them and my star ranking of each. Keep in mind that it's been many years since I've read some of these books, so my remembrances of a few might be a bit off. Continue reading→
So It Goes: Kurt Vonnegut, RIP
The news of Kurt Vonnegut's death today hits me particularly hard. For me, Vonnegut was THE novelist. He was perhaps the first "adult" novelist I read seriously, the first novelist I fell in love with, and undoubtedly the novelist who got me through high school. I'm sure there are millions of people out there who can say the same thing. Continue reading→
Rapid Fire SF Reading in DC Wednesday Night
Tomorrow (Wednesday) night, April 11, I’ll have the privilege of reading with a bunch of other science fiction folks in the Washington, DC area. It’ll be held at the Tenley Interim Branch of the DC Public Library at 4200 Wisconsin Avenue at 7:30 p.m as part of their National Poetry Month programming. (Note that the reading is at 4200 Wisconsin, and not 4450 Wisconsin, which is what the Washington Post printed over the weekend. Darn... Continue reading→
The Science of Infoquake
Norman Spinrad recently wrote a review in Asimov’s of my novel Infoquake wherein he discussed the scientific accuracy of the book. Mr. Spinrad had this to say: [W]hether or not such a novel could be considered “hard science fiction”… might be moot if Edelman himself were just blowing rubber science smoke and mirrors. Instead, he is actually trying to make bio/logics and MultiReal seem scientifically credible in the manner of a hard science fiction writer... Continue reading→
Goodbye, Vickie Lynn
The whole Anna Nicole Smith saga is so monumentally depressing that it's hard to know where to begin. Why anyone would want to hold Marilyn Monroe's sad, sad life up as an inspiration, I don't know, unless her goal was to make Marilyn look less pathetic in comparison. Continue reading→