Book, newspaper and magazine stock watch

Here’s an update to the list of 14 book, newspaper, magazine and publishing stocks I’m watching, ranked by year-to-date performance:

1. Borders Group (+ 250%)

Red Planet Noir, a new retro Sci-Fi detective novel by D.B. Grady

Red Planet Noir (2009), a new science fiction detective work and debut novel by freelance writer D.B. Grady, was just published as a paperback original by Brown Street Press of Lexington, Kentucky. A hard-boiled detective tale written in the pulp tradition of the 1930s, Red Planet Noir is “a Raymond Chandler mystery in a Robert Heinlein world.” Here's a description of the novel, taken directly from Grady’s blog:

Michael Sheppard was the best private eye in New Orleans, and then his wife left him. After finding solace in the bottle, he finds his career in the toilet. Nights at the casino pay the bills, until they don’t, and leg breakers start knocking at the door, and knocking out his teeth.

When a socialite on Mars offers him work, it’s a chance for a new start. Her name is Sofia Reed and her father is dead. The coroner says suicide, but Sofia suspects foul play. A leader of the Martian police state, her father had powerful enemies, and nobody on Mars will touch the case for fear of retribution. Michael Sheppard is her only hope.

Chased by cops and gangsters, his investigation takes him from stately mansions to smoke-filled speakeasies, from deserted ice colonies to mining towns on the asteroid belt.

All he wanted was a paycheck to clear some gambling debt. Now Michael is the key figure in a murder conspiracy that’s left a vacuum in the halls of power, with the labor union, mob and military vying for control of Mars.

You can read Chapter 1 (PDF) of Red Planet Noir for free!

D.B. Grady is a graduate of Louisiana State University and lives in Baton Rouge with his wife and family. He is a former paratrooper with U.S. Army Special Operations Command and is a veteran of Afghanistan. His writings have been published in The Atlantic and Boys’ Life.

Commodities of Martian Rails: Alien Artifacts

Martian Rails, the new board game made by Mayfair Games about railroading on the Red Planet in which players build tracks and haul freight, has a long list of cool commodities that players can transport to generate revenue for their rail companies. For example:

Alien Artifacts -- Over the millennia, Mars has been visited by and temporarily housed beings from beyond our Solar System. The Face is a huge artificial construct marking their presence. Excavations occasionally discover objects from these ancient visitors.

Martian Rails is loaded with references to Martian SF!

Podcast of "Martian Chronicles," a new YA Mars story by Cory Doctorow (Part 2)

Thanks to Canadian blogger, copyright activist and SF author Cory Doctorow, you can listen to him read Part 2 (MP3, 14 min.) of his podcast of “Martian Chronicles,” a new Young Adult short story that he is writing for Australian editor Jonathan Strahan's forthcoming YA Mars anthology, Life on Mars (2010). According to Doctorow, “It's a story about the colonization of Mars by free-market absolutists and the video-games they play.”

Artist imagines Boris Karloff in abandoned 1930s film A Trip to Mars

Professional illustrator and graphic designer Rob Kelly has created a creepy but beautiful poster for the abandoned 1930s film A Trip to Mars, which was slated to star legendary horror actor Boris Karloff as a Martian leading a mass revolution on the Red Planet. For some info on the film and an explanation of the poster, read the recent entry on Kelly’s blog. The poster is the latest installment in Kelly’s impressive Universal Monsters series and is part of the Boris Karloff Blogathon (November 23rd to 29th).

Rob Kelly's clients have included Forbes, The Grammy Awards, Harper Collins, National Basketball Association, Pitney Bowes, Popular Science, Time Out New York, Vibe and The Alamo Drafthouse in Austin, Texas.

Pictured: Boris Karloff in A Trip to Mars. Artwork by Rob Kelly.

Pembroke Sinclair’s 2009 novel Coming From Nowhere now available in paperback

Writer Pembroke Sinclair, whose debut novel Coming From Nowhere (2009) was published last spring as an e-novel, announced that his work is now available in paperback through eTreasures Publishing and Amazon. Set on the Red Planet, here’s the storyline:

JD does not have a past at least not one that she can remember and that makes living life on Mars challenging. With nowhere to go, she is sent to the local military academy where she is trained to become a member of the elite secret police. While there, she becomes a pawn in Roger’s struggle for military dominance and Chris’s rebellion to overthrow the military regime. She supposedly holds a secret that will change the face of the soldier, but, unfortunately, she doesn’t know what that secret is. Her only desire is to find the truth of her existence, and finds herself thrust into a realm where the truth of her past and present is more horrific than she ever imagined.

Coming From Nowhere received positive reviews from The Absent Willow Review and fan Fran Lewis.

Black Friday door-buster: Martian Fluxx, a family card game

Released in September 2009 by a company called Looney Labs, Martian Fluxx is an old-school card game that the entire family can play and enjoy. Designed for 2-to-6 players ages 8-to-adult, here’s the official product description of Martian Fluxx:

Are you ready to conquer the earth? Martian Fluxx is a classic monster story in ever-changing card game form. It's an Invasion from the Planet Mars! The players are the Martians determined to destroy the Pathetic Humans who are keeping them from winning. It's got Flying Saucers, Giant Tripod War Machines, Tentacles, Ray Guns, a Mothership, and of course, a Space Modulator. Be careful -- you don't want your Humans escaping from the Abduction Chamber!

Martian Fluxx retails for less than $20.

German map depicts the Mars of Leigh Brackett

The German website Fantasy-Atlas.org has about a hundred cool maps based on various books, including one depicting the Mars of science fiction & fantasy author Leigh Brackett’s classic novel Das Erbe der Marsgötter (The Sword of Rhiannon, 1953). I can’t read German, but I recognize several of the sites on the map: Jekkara, Valkis, Barrakesch, Sark and Khondor. Presumably, “Rhiannons Grab,” in the right hand corner of the map, marks the location of the Tomb of Rhiannon!

Pictured: Das Erbe der Marsgötter (1978)

Reviews of Gilbert and Edgar on Mars, the new novella by Eric Brown

Here are two short but positive reviews of Gilbert and Edgar on Mars (Nov 2009), the new novella written by British science fiction author Eric Brown and published by PS Publishing. The first review is by The Baryon Review, which concludes “This is a very enjoyable tale and would make a great present for your friends who enjoy the pulpish tales of yesteryear.” The second review is by Leona Wisoker of Green Man Review, who concludes, in part, “the mixture of reality and surreality in this short novella, combined with Eric Brown's skill with details, written in an excellent reproduction of the way science fiction used to sound, produces a story engaging, amusing, and just the right length.”

PS Publishing has posted the first 17 pages (PDF) of Gilbert and Edgar on Mars.

“Monsters of Mars” a 1931 novelette written by Edmond Hamilton

Thanks to the industrious folks at Project Gutenberg and ManyBooks.net, you can read online or download “Monsters of Mars,” an old novelette written by Edmond Hamilton. Originally published in the April 1931 issue of Astounding Stories magazine and based on the science of the age of radio, the plot involves three Earthmen who visit the Red Planet and unexpectedly find hostile Martians who are eager to conquer Earth. Here are the opening lines of the story:

Allan Randall stared at the man before him. "And that's why you sent for me, Milton?" he finally asked.

The other's face was unsmiling. "That's why I sent for you, Allan," he said quietly. "To go to Mars with us to-night!"

There was a moment's silence, in which Randall's eyes moved as though uncomprehendingly from the face of Milton to those of the two men beside him. The four sat together at the end of a roughly furnished and electric-lit living-room, and in that momentary silence there came in to them from the outside night the distant pounding of the Atlantic upon the beach. It was Randall who first spoke again.

"To Mars!" he repeated. "Have you gone crazy, Milton--or is this some joke you've put up with Lanier and Nelson here?" …

Pictured: April 1931 issue of Astounding Stories, depicting a scene in “Monsters of Mars.”

Bob Eggleton one of 50 Best Living SF/F Artists

Congratulations to award-winning science fiction and fantasy artist Bob Eggleton, who was recently named as one of the 50 Best Living SF/F Artists by the British digital art magazine ImagineFX. While Eggleton's artwork has spanned many themes over the years, he has produced quite a few works of Mars art, including the covers of these books:

• Labyrinth of Night (1992), by Allen Steele

• Man O’War (1996), by William Shatner

• Rainbow Mars (1999), by Larry Niven

• Martians and Madness (2002), by Fredric Brown

• The Martian War (2005), by Gabriel Mesta

Eggleton maintains his own website and blogs at Bob’s ART du Jour, where you can browse (and buy) some of his Mars art.

Pictured: The Other in the Mirror (Subterranean Press 2009), an omnibus by Philip José Farmer that contains a reprint of his novel Jesus on Mars (1979). Cover art by Bob Eggleton.

[via John DeNardo of SF Signal]

Trailer for Asylum’s film Princess of Mars, starring Traci Lords

The Asylum, a motion picture studio located in Burbank, California, has released a trailer for its forthcoming low-budget, direct-to-DVD film Princess of Mars. An adaptation of the classic early 20th-century novel written by author Edgar Rice Burroughs, the film features actress and former porn star Traci Lords, as Martian princess Dejah Thoris, and Antonio Sabàto, Jr., as Confederate Civil War veteran John Carter. The film, classified as science fiction, is scheduled to be released in late December 2009.

[via JCOM Reader]

First Landing, a 2001 novel by Robert Zubrin

First Landing: a Novel, by Robert Zubrin (2001)

At left: Paperback (New York: Ace Books, 2002), 262 p., $6.99. Cover art by Bob Warner. Here's the piece from the back cover:

Five are chosen for the landmark mission to Mars -- to become the first humans to walk upon the Red Planet. But when their findings set off a wave of controversy and political upheaval back home, public opinion turns against the Mars mission -- and an ineffective government leaves the team stranded. As their situation becomes more desperate, all trust is lost in NASA Mission Control. With differences dividing the crew into warring cliques, life-threatening accidents begin to look like sabotage. Yet somehow the crew must try to pull together. Because if they don’t save themselves, no one will...

Originally published in 2001, First Landing was reviewed by Publishers Weekly, Elisabeth Carey of the New England Science Fiction Association, and Wil Owen of Rambles, a cultural arts magazine, amongst others. Booklist concluded that "Space advocates, especially, will warm to it, but Greg Bear's, Geoffrey Landis', and, above all, Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars novels make more satisfying reading."

An astronautical engineer, founder of the Mars Society, and activist for the colonization of the Red Planet, Dr. Zubrin has received a considerable amount of attention over the years.

Lars of Mars makes list of 1000 greatest comics

Jeff Kapalka, a reviewer of comics and video games for the New York website Syracuse.com, is taking complete responsibility for the inclusion of Lars of Mars No. 10 in the new book 1000 Comic Books You Must Read (Krause 2009), by comic writer and columnist Tony Isabella. Attributed to writer Jerry Siegel and artist Murphy Anderson, Lars of Mars No. 10 was published by Ziff-Davis in May 1951 and is really the first issue in this short-lived series. Thanks to the French website GotoMars, you can read beautiful jpegs detailing the exploits of that incredible crusader from another world, Lars of Mars!

Pictured: Lars of Mars No. 10 (May 1951).

Tim Burton exhibit at MoMA displays severed heads from 1996 film Mars Attacks!

A new exhibit called Tim Burton just opened at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. A major retrospective of the Hollywood director’s graphic and cinematographic works, it includes likenesses of the severed heads of Pierce Brosnan and Sarah Jessica Parker from Burton's 1996 film Mars Attacks!. The exhibit runs through April 2010 and, if you can believe this, is sponsored by Syfy.

If you’re a writer and plan on traveling to New York City to view the Tim Burton exhibit, consider booking a room at the historic Algonquin Hotel. It’s "Writer’s Block" rate offers a 25% discount. All you have to do is show them a published work or your work in progress!

Pictured: Promotional poster for Tim Burton's film Mars Attacks!

NaNoWriMo writers breach 50,000-word barrier

Tresa Cho and Joi Weaver, two twenty-something SF fans and women writers, have breached the 50,000-word mark in writing their respective Mars novels for National Novel Writing Month 2009.

Cho’s novel, which is entitled Of All Things Forgotten and revolves around humans on Mars, has passed the 65,000-word mark! You can read an excerpt on her NaNoWriMo webpage. Also, her blog, Science Fiction and the Women who Love it, is worth checking out.

Joi’s untitled novel, which is set in the year 2052 and stars a woman named Dejah Sorenson who recovers NASA’s long-lost Phoenix Lander, is approaching the astounding 150,000-word mark! Joi is posting the entire novel in pieces on her blog, Dreamer of Mars.

Traditionalist and Libertarian themes in Science Fiction and Fantasy

Over the past several months, Mark Wegierski of Enter Stage Right, an online journal of modern conservatism, has been writing a series of articles entitled “Traditionalist and Libertarian Themes in Science Fiction and Fantasy.” Although I haven’t read through the 13-part-to-date series, I hope Wegierski mentions some Martian SF&F titles.

Here are the links to the Wegierski's series:

The Mars Experiment, a new debut novel by Paul C. Vinci

Congratulations to writer Paul C. Vinci, whose new debut science fiction novel, The Mars Experiment (2009), was launched recently. Inspired by astronomy and a love of science fiction, The Mars Experiment is a futuristic tale about the mysterious Red Planet, set in the year 2034. Here’s a description from the publisher, Eloquent Books/Strategic Book Group:

Man is about to embark on a mission: to land on Mars and find out what mysteries it holds and what those discoveries will mean to mankind.

A group of scientists and military personnel have been thoroughly trained to embark on the momentous mission.

As the day approaches for takeoff, these dedicated individuals will check and recheck systems, trying to ensure a successful mission. There is no room for failure as the mission will undoubtedly be one that could very well change life in the solar system.

What will they find on this terrestrial planet of volcanoes, valleys, deserts and polar ice caps? What will they uncover on this planet so similar in seasonal cycles to Planet Earth, but so different in appearance? What this brave team discovers may just surpass their expectations and dreams and hold infinite possibilities toward exploration of the vast, infinite universe.

Paul C. Vinci earned a BA in English Literature/Creative Writing. He lives in Connecticut and is working on his next novel.

Neil Gaiman liked BBC’s Doctor Who television special “The Waters of Mars”

Award-winning British SF&F author Neil Gaiman revealed in a recent entry in his online journal that he liked the BBC’s Doctor Who television special “The Waters of Mars,” which aired in the UK last Sunday evening, November 15th:

“Maddy and I watched the antepenultimate Doctor Who special, The Waters of Mars, which we both liked a lot more than the Bus-in-the-desert episode. Good, scary classic, monstery Doctor Who which felt predictable (in a good way -- almost inevitable) until suddenly it wasn't, and it got interesting in different ways. I liked the plot and performances, and feel comfortably certain that David Tennant's Doctor is going to have a better exit from the stage than any of the other nine.”

"The Water of Mars," which is set on the Red Planet in the year 2059 and stars British Actor David Tennant as the Doctor and acclaimed Scottish actress Lindsay Duncan as his companion, will be aired in New Zealand on Sunday, November 29th; in Australia on Sunday, December 6th; and in the United States on BBC America on Saturday night, December 19th.

New flash fiction: “Eagle 2” by Al Vazquez

The free SF story site 365 tomorrows has a new piece of flash fiction titled “Eagle 2” (2009), by Al Vazquez. It’s about the first human landing on Mars. Here's the opening line: “The retro-rockets jolted the ship as it began its decent into the thin, cold atmosphere.”

Podcast of "Martian Chronicles," a new YA Mars story by Cory Doctorow (Part 1)

Thanks to the generosity of Canadian blogger, copyright activist and SF author Cory Doctorow, you can listen to a podcast (MP3, 7:30 min.) of a piece of "Martian Chronicles," a new Young Adult short story that he is writing for Australian editor Jonathan Strahan's forthcoming YA Mars anthology, Life on Mars (2010). According to Doctorow, “It's a story about the colonization of Mars by free-market absolutists and the video-games they play.”



[via Blue Tyson]

SFU: Queerness and Edgar Pangborn’s 1954 novel A Mirror for Observers

Class is in session over at DePauw University’s Science Fiction Studies, #109, Volume 36, Part 3, November 2009, where Brian Attebery of Idaho State University argues that the works of science fiction & fantasy author Edgar Pangborn seem “to be grounded in a queer perspective.” According to Attebery, the best example is Pangborn’s SF/F novel, A Mirror for Observers (1954), which details the relationship between a Martian named Elmis and a gifted Earth boy named Angelo.

Pictured: A Mirror for Observers, 1958 Dell paperback.

The books that inspired Dungeons & Dragons

James Maliszewski of Escapist Magazine just wrote a neat article entitled “The Books That Founded D&D,” which explores the books that inspired Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax to create the world's first tabletop, role-playing game, Dungeons & Dragons, back in the early 1970s. Among the books: Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Martian adventures in which John Carter “is groping through black pits” on Barsoom.

Sci-Fri: NASA and Microsoft launch Martian website, use crowdsourcing to map Red Planet

Earlier in the week, NASA and Microsoft launched a new website called “Be a Martian! Part education and part fun, it is an attempt by the space agency to enlist the public in the study and mapping of the Red Planet. “There's so much data coming back from Mars. Having a wider crowd look at the data, classify it and help understand its meaning is very important,” said Michelle Viotti, a representative from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Wonder of the Worlds, 2005 novel by Sesh Heri starring secret agent Harry Houdini

Wonder of the Worlds (2005), a novel written by Sesh Heri, is a scientific adventure in which secret agent Harry Houdini journeys to the Red Planet with scientist Nikola Tesla and author Mark Twain to retrieve a crystal stolen by Martian agents from the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Here’s the product description from Amazon:

An adventure for all times! Mark Twain teams up with Nikola Tesla in this historical fantasy pitting them against secret agents from Mars. These Martians have been sent by their tyrannical emperor to steal Tesla's latest and greatest invention: a crystal engine! Along with reporters Lilly West and George Ade, and the young Harry Houdini, Twain and Tesla journey to Mars aboard a fantastic flying machine to take on the conquest-driven Martians! This is an adventure in the tradition of H G Wells and Jules Verne!

Apparently, Sesh Heri has developed his own scientific theory of geomorphology.

Shirley Temple took a trip to Mars?

The website Mexican Memorabilia has a slew of Mexican and Latin American magazine covers and other collectibles from the 1930's and 1940's depicting the famous Hollywood child actress Shirley Temple. One of the items: a sci-fi pulp titled Un Viaje a Marte (1937), by J. H. Rosny.

Martian Rails cities: Ares University

Martian Rails, the new board game made by Mayfair Games about railroading on the Red Planet in which players build tracks and haul freight, has a long list of interesting cities that players can utilize to generate revenue for their rail companies. For example:

Ares University - A small university settlement at the intersection of the Equator and the Prime Meridian. There is no “center” on a planet’s surface. However, the intersection of the two principal great circles seems fitting, for this is the center of learning on Mars. “Ares” is the Greek name for the planet Mars.

Martian Rails is loaded with references to Martian SF!

Review of 1893 feminist and utopian Mars novel Unveiling a Parallel: A Romance

I just found a neat old book review of Unveiling a Parallel: A Romance (1893), a feminist science fiction and utopian Mars novel. Initially attributed to “Two Women of the West,” the novel was actually written by Alice Ilgenfritz Jones and Ella Merchant of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Here’s the entire review from the The Review of Reviews, Vol. VIII, No. 1, July 1893:

Montage of deaths from 1990 film Total Recall

A creative fan over on YouTube has painstakingly compiled a four-minute video montage entitled “All the Deaths in Total Recall (including Johnny Cab).” In short, it shows all the deaths (human, animal, robot) from the Mars film Total Recall (1990), starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sharon Stone, Rachel Ticotin, Michael Ironside and Ronny Cox.



The film Total Recall is based on the classic Philip K. Dick story "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" (1966).

Wanted: Photo of author Leigh Brackett and her 1964 Corvette

Thanks to a recent blog post by File 770, Mike Glyer's fanzine about the news of sf fandom, I learned that Martian science fiction author Leigh Brackett owned a 1964 Corvette. If anyone has a photo of Brackett and her Corvette, please consider sharing with the rest of us. Thanks!

Millions in UK tune in to Doctor Who tv special “The Waters of Mars”

BBC’s highly anticipated Doctor Who television special “The Waters of Mars” landed on the small screen Sunday evening in the United Kingdom. More than 9 million viewers tuned in to watch the Doctor, British actor David Tennant, and his companion, Scottish actress Lindsay Duncan, confront Zombies at Bowie Base One on Mars in the year 2059. Trumpeted by many as the “scariest” Doctor Who episode ever, “The Waters of Mars” is receiving mixed reviews. For example:

Freas Martian enjoys Doctorow launch at Merril Collection in Toronto

Dressed in a Gunner Cade shirt, blogger, copyright activist and SF author Cory Doctorow launched his latest novel, Makers (Tor 2009), this past weekend from the Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation and Fantasy at the Toronto Public Library. As shown in this photograph posted on Doctorow’s blog, the well-known Martian painted by SF&F artist Kelly Freas seemed to enjoy the show.

Oddly, the Freas Martian is not usually associated with the writings of author Judith Merril, the “little mother of science fiction,” for whom the Merril Collection is named. Rather, it is usually associated with Frederic Brown’s humorous novella, "Martians, Go Home!" (1954), which was later expanded into the novel Martians, Go Home (1955).

NaNoWriMo writers on course with Mars novels

Although it is only November 15th, Joi Weaver and Tresa Cho, two twenty-something women writers and science fiction fans, are on course in penning their respective Mars SF novels for National Novel Writing Month 2009.

Joi’s untitled novel, which is set in the year 2052 and stars a woman named Dejah Sorenson who recovers NASA’s long-lost Phoenix Lander, has surpassed the 95,000-word mark! You can read the bulk of her novel to date, and gain some insight into three of her characters (Dejah Sorenson, Nathan Chandrayaan, Maxwell Hamm) on her blog, Dreamer of Mars.

Cho’s novel, which is entitled Of All Things Forgotten and revolves around humans on Mars, has passed the 50,000-word mark! Read an excerpt on her NaNoWriMo page, then check out her blog, Science Fiction and the Women who Love it.

Pictured: Artistic rendition of Dejah Sorenson.

“Red Dust,” a new SF Western by Amanda Lord

A few months ago, Crossed Genres, the online magazine of Science Fiction & Fantasy with a twist, published a short story entitled “Red Dust” (2009), by Amanda Lord. Essentially a SF Western set on Mars, “Red Dust” revolves around an artificial intelligence unit named Lewis. Here are the opening lines:

Call me Lewis. I have lived here on Mars for nearly fifty years. I was the most advanced AI in existence when they shipped me to Mars. Now? Fifty years of red dust in my gears. Fifty years of pieces wearing down, wearing out. I have sent missive upon missive back to Earth, but, I won’t send this one. When the colonists come in two years’ time, they may read this. They’ll come with new bots, newer AI to replace me. I won’t be here to greet them. ...

Amanda Lord earned a B.A. in English and a M.S. in library science. She maintains a LiveJournal and lives in a dilapidated Victorian house in New York State with her husband Joel. “Red Dust,” her first publication in a SF magazine, will be reprinted in Crossed Genres’ first short story anthology, scheduled to be published in February 2010

Authors Guild et al. files revised $125m Google book settlement; ignores Chabon, Doctorow & Newitz’s privacy concerns

Late last evening, the Authors Guild and its allies (Association of American Publishers, Google) filed a revised edition of the proposed $125 million Google Books Settlement, which is being dubbed Settlement 2.0. While the Authors Guild trumpeted the revised agreement and posted details of the “big changes,” the Open Book Alliance, a consortium of opposition groups that includes Amazon, Microsoft and Yahoo, blasted it as "a sleight of hand."

In related news, Cindy Cohn, legal director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), noted that Settlement 2.0 does not add any reader privacy protections, something science fiction writers Michael Chabon, Cory Doctorow and Annalee Newitz were strongly in favor of.

The New York Times provides a solid overview of the latest developments. For more details, check in at The Laboratorium, the blog of New York Law School Prof. James Grimmelmann.

Fascisti su Marte, a 2006 Italian political satire

Essentially the work of popular Italian satirist Corrado Guzzanti, Fascisti su Marte (Fascists on Mars) imagines a 1939 expedition to Mars in which a group of followers of Benito Mussolini attempt to turn the Red Planet to Fascist black. Originally developed in 2002 as a skit for Italian television, Fascisti su Marte was expanded to more than 100 minutes and screened at the 2006 Rome Film Festival.



Here’s the first six minutes of Fascisti su Marte.

Gutenberg geeks print copy of Percival Lowell’s 1906 scientific study Mars and Its Canals

There’s a riveting seven-minute video over on YouTube that shows some of the geeks at the Harvard Book Store in Cambridge, Massachusetts, printing a copy of Percival Lowell’s infamous scientific study, Mars and Its Canals (1906), compliments of the bookstore’s new print-on-demand Espresso Book Machine.

Speaking of geeks at the Harvard Book Store, blogger, copyright activist and science fiction author Cory Doctorow will be signing copies of his new novel, Makers (Tor 2009), on Monday evening, November 16th. I took a quick look at the downloadable freebie. He should have titled it Battery Ventures.

Joel Jenkins working on fourth novel in his Dire Planet pulp SF series

Pulp science fiction author Joel Jenkins recently revealed on his blog that he is entrenched in writing Lost Tribes of the Dire Planet, the fourth novel in his Dire Planet series. Inspired by legendary authors Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard, this sword & planet collection chronicles hero Garvey Dire and his swashbuckling adventures on the planet Mars.

Pictured: Dire Planet (2005), the first novel in the series.

New reprint of ERB's A Princess of Mars ideal for litigious students

Maryland-based publisher Arc Manor's new reprint of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ classic novel, A Princess of Mars (1917), is ideal for litigious students like Justin D. Gawronski, the Michigan high schooler who became so emotionally unbound after Amazon’s Kindle e-reader deleted his summer reading notes to George Orwell's novel 1984 he initiated a class-action lawsuit against the Internet giant.

Part of the attractively-priced Phoenix Science Fiction Classics series, A Princess of Mars includes critical essays by acclaimed author and Arizona State University professor Paul Cook and by Alexei Panshin & Cory Panshin, co-authors of the Hugo Award-winning nonfiction book on the history of science fiction, The World Beyond the Hill: Science Fiction and the Quest for Transcendence (1989); a chronology of the life of Edgar Rice Burroughs; a bibliography of science fiction works; and, most importantly, special margins providing students with a liberal amount of space for taking notes (view sample).

Sci-Fri: Mars Solar Garden blossoms

Earlier this week, Mars, the global snack food and candy company, flipped the switch on the Mars Solar Garden at its U.S. corporate headquarters and manufacturing complex in Hackettstown, New Jersey. The 18-acre field of solar panels is capable of generating 2.2 megawatts per hour of clean energy. That's about 20% of the plant's power needs, or enough power for roughly 1,800 homes. Former New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman, who once headed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, attended the ceremony, saying the Mars Solar Garden proves corporate profits and environmental stewardship are not mutually exclusive.

“Child-Empress of Mars,” a new interfiction short story by Theodora Goss

“Child-Empress of Mars,” a new short story written by Theodora Goss, was just published in the acclaimed Interfictions 2 (Nov 2009), an anthology of interstitial writing edited by Delia Sherman & Christopher Barzak and published by Small Beer Press of western Massachusetts.

I haven’t had an opportunity to read "Child-Empress of Mars" but according to a review by T. S. Miller for Strange Horizons, it is “a pseudo-pastiche of Edgar Rice Burroughs […] a rewriting of the early genre of ‘interplanetary romance’ by someone more likely raised on post-Tolkien high fantasy, the spectacular result of which somehow ends up being nearer in many ways to Roger Zelazny's thoughtful SF yarn "A Rose for Ecclesiastes."”

Interestingly, three pieces of artwork based on Goss’s short story will be auctioned off as part of a fundraiser for the Interstitial Arts Foundation:

• “The Child Empress of Mars,” mixed media art doll, by C. Jane Washburn. Bidding opens November 12th.

• “Dream of the Child Empress of Mars,” mixed media diorama box, by Connie Toebe. Bidding opens November 15th.

• “The Child Empress of Mars,” decorative piece, by Laramie Sasseville. Bidding opens November 26th.

[via Charles Tan of SF Signal]

New audio adaptation of The Martian Chronicles coming down the canal

Phil Nichols, a Ray Bradbury media aficionado and collector stationed in the UK, announced recently that The Martian Chronicles will be given its first complete full-cast audio production. Based on a fresh script written by Jerry Robbins with input from Mr. Bradbury, the full-length dramatization will be produced by The Colonial Radio Theatre of Boston.

"I plan on adapting the entire book, so I'm not sure on the running time yet. I hope to have the script finished mid-December for Ray to read through. At that time I should have a rough idea as to the length. I don't plan on an abridgment of content by any means. If we're going to do Martian Chronicles, we're going to DO Martian Chronicles," Robbins said.

Stay tuned for more info. Meanwhile, check out Tor.com’s sixth in a series of seven interviews with Ray Bradbury on the “visual nature of his fiction, the art of collaboration and the process of writing.”

The Martian Race, a 1999 novel written by Gregory Benford

The Martian Race, by Gregory Benford (1999)

Pictured: Paperback (New York: Aspect / Warner Books, 2001), 444 p., $6.99. Cover illustration by Don Dixon. Here's the piece from the back cover:

As NASA bogs down in politics, tycoon John Axelrod mounts a privately funded expedition to the Red Planet. Axelrod's not high-minded -- he expects the televised flight to net him billions. But for astronaut-scientist Julie, Viktor, Marc, and Raoul, the mission's not about money. It’s about discovery ... and surviving for two years on a frigid, alien world that can kill them in countless ways.

For a time will come when -- in order to live -- the explorers must embrace everything that makes them human ... and everything that will make them Martian.

In the afterword to The Martian Race, Benford wrote, “This novel attempts a portrayal of how humanity might explore Mars in the near future, at low cost and with foreseeable technology. Undoubtedly, reality shall prove the details wrong. Still, I hope to sound a note of realism in the sub-genre of exploration novels, to depict just how demanding true planetary adventuring will be.”

An excerpt from The Martian Race is available at SFFWorld.

Benford discussed his novel in a 2000 interview with Locus.

Quite a few individuals have reviewed The Martian Race, including Donna McMahon of SF Site, Steven H. Silver of SF Site, Amy Harlib of SciFiDimensions, Chris Aylott of Space.com and T. M. Wagner of SF Reviews.net. In addition, Amazon has reviews from Publishers Weekly, Booklist, Kirkus Reviews and Library Journal, as well as from nearly 50 fans.

German cover art: Hilding Borgholm’s 1961 novel Schatz in der Marswüste

Here's some cover art that reminds me of the East German Stasi: Schatz in der Marswüste (Treasure in the Martian Desert, 1961), a novel by Hilding Borgholm. The novel is #277 in the Utopia series of SF&F books published by Pabel-Verlag in West Germany in the 1950s and 1960s.

Sale: Archive of 34 letters and notes written by Edgar Rice Burroughs to his daughter

L. W. Currey, Inc., a rare, fine and collectible book dealer in New York State that specializes in science fiction and fantasy literature, has an interesting listing on AbeBooks: An archive of 34 letters and notes written by pulp author Edgar Rice Burroughs to his daughter, Joan Burroughs Pierce, covering a twelve-year period from 1927 to 1939. Plus 16 black-and-white photographs of Hawaii taken by ERB, with his typewritten captions on the backsides. Price: $18,500.

Pictured: A financial statement from 1909. Apparently, a “Girl” cost only $5.

Kim Stanley Robinson: “The world has become a science fiction novel”

Today’s Guardian newspaper in the UK has a nice article entitled “Kim Stanley Robinson: Science Fiction's Realist.” The bulk of the article is a discussion about Robinson’s new novel, Galileo's Dream (HarperVoyager 2009), but it also mentions his recent criticism of the judges of the Man Booker Prize for neglecting SF, and his observation that “The world has become a science fiction novel.”

BBC releases clip for Doctor Who television special “The Waters of Mars”

The BBC recently released a three-minute video clip for its forthcoming Doctor Who television special, “The Waters of Mars,” which is set on the Red Planet in the year 2059 and features zombies. British Actor David Tennant stars as the Doctor and acclaimed Scottish actress Lindsay Duncan plays the role of Adelaide Brooke, his companion and head of Bowie Base One on Mars.



"The Water of Mars" will be aired on BBC One in the United Kingdom on Sunday night, November 15th, and on BBC America in the United States on Saturday night, December 19th. The DVD and Blu-Ray are scheduled to be released in early 2010.

[via John DeNardo of SF Signal]

Martian Rails commodities: Airweed

Martian Rails, the new board game made by Mayfair Games about railroading on the Red Planet in which players build tracks and haul freight, has a long list of cool commodities that players can transport to generate revenue for their rail companies. For example:

Airweed – A native plant of Mars that converts oxygen from the soil and thin atmosphere. The plant then stores the oxygen in pods. The plant was discovered near the Equator but is being introduced to areas away from the Equator.

Do you like board games? Martian Rails is loaded with references to Martian science fiction!

After the Mars Exodus, a new LGBT novel written by Jackson Scheerer

Here’s an interesting work you can preview or purchase through the self-publishing website Lulu.com: After the Mars Exodus (2009), a new Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender novel written by Jackson Scheerer. Focusing on the themes of religious tolerance and social justice, here's a description of After the Mars Exodus:

It has been over fifty years since a renegade Christian sect colonized Mars to make its own version of a perfect world. Michael Simonson was being raised into this world when he realized something that complicated things: He was attracted to men. Afraid that he would be executed for disobeying Martian law, he used the money his parents gave him for college to buy a one way ticket to Earth.

Captain Marley Rock is having his own crisis. Although he was raised to be socially aware, he had for the past twenty years been working for a travel corporation he believed to be unjust and evil. For his last mission on the PIV Copper, his fate will cross with Michael's and send them on an adventure neither they nor the crew would ever forget.

Jackson Scheerer is a bisexual and transgender author and activist who lives in Wisconsin.

All the colors of Mars: A list of 17 works

Many months ago, while perusing science writer Oliver Morton’s brilliant nonfiction work of scientific journalism, Mapping Mars: Science, Imagination, and the Birth of a World (2002), I came across a footnote which mentioned some SF books about Mars that have the names of colors in the titles. Building on Morton's footnote, I've compiled “All the Colors of Mars: A List of 17 Works”: