Local zoo has greater financial transparency than Electronic Frontier Foundation

Despite a board of directors that includes prestigious legal scholars such as Professor Pamela Samuelson, and prominent alumni like über geek and SF author Cory Doctorow, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a San Francisco-based public charity founded in 1990 that defends the digital rights of consumers, probably will not be winning any Best Practices awards for financial disclosure and transparency (D&T) in the near future. Here’s the extent of EFF’s online commitment to D&T, for all you gamers who are keeping score at home:

• 2008-2009 Annual Report

• 2007 Annual Report

• 2006 Annual Report

Contrast that with these documents, all posted on the website of the San Francisco Zoo, a decades-old, bricks-and-mortar nonprofit whose most famous resident was Monarch the grizzly bear:

• 2008-2009 Zoo Views Annual Report (coming soon!)

• 2009 Audited Financial Statement

• 2008 Annual Report Issue of Zoo Views Magazine

• 2008 Audited Financial Statement

• 2007 IRS 990 Form

• 2007 Audited Financial Statement

• 2006 IRS 990 Form

• 2006 Audited Financial Statement

• 2005 IRS 990 Form

• 2004 IRS 990 Form

• 2003 IRS 990 Form

• 2002 IRS 990 Form

If the Electronic Frontier Foundation wants consumers to type in credit card numbers so they can make generous donations and purchase cheap swag, it should at least have the courtesy to post its audited financial statements. I mean good manners don't cost nothing do they, eh Monarch?

10 astounding Mars pulp covers

I’ve compiled a gallery on Flickr of ten Mars science fiction & fantasy pulp magazine covers, all from Astounding Stories and Astounding Science Fiction, ranging from the early 1930s to the late 1950s. Please let me know which cover you like best!

SyFy channel to produce TV adaptation of Red Faction video game

Broadcasting & Cable reports that the SyFy television network will produce a two-hour, action-drama, made-for-TV adaptation of Red Faction (2001), a popular first-person shooter video game in which players fight as rebels on Mars against a large corporation in the late 21st-century. If the project is successful, it could serve as a springboard to a multi-episode television series.

Corpus Earthling, a 1960 SF horror novel by Louis Charbonneau

Corpus Earthling, a science fiction horror novel by Louis Charbonneau (1960)

Pictured: Paperback original (New York: Zenith Books, 1960) #ZB-40, 160 p., 35¢. Here's the promotional piece from the back cover of the book:

Paul Cameron heard voices. There were two of them. They were whispering to each other in the bones of his skull, wearily, interminably, making monstrous plans to conquer the Earth ...

Cameron was an educated man, an English professor at a leading university. Was he going insane? Or was he really tuned in somehow on the telepathic conversations of a recon patrol for a terrible Martian invasion? He tried warning the others, but nobody believed him.

And then one day the voices stopped for a moment. "Wait," one of them said then. "There's a listener. We've got to get the listener. When you find out who he is, kill him ...”

An appendix of recommended reading in Horror: Another 100 Best Books (2005) includes Corpus Earthling.

Charbonneau's novel was adapted into an episode for the classic 1960s television show The Outer Limits. The episode, "Corpus Earthling," aired on November 18, 1963.

According to various signed copies of Corpus Earthling for sale on AbeBooks, Louis Charbonneau attended the 2003, 2007 and 2008 Paperback Show in Los Angeles.

Looney Tunes: Texas rapist, now a fugitive, sports tattoo of Marvin the Martian

According to a recent edition of Manhunt Monday in the El Paso County, Texas area, Gilberto Orozco, a 31-year-old man who is accused of raping a pregnant woman in 2007 and assaulting and repeatedly threatening to kill his girlfriend in 2009, failed to attend a March 2010 court appearance and is considered a fugitive from justice. Orozco sports a tattoo of cartoon character Marvin the Martian on his upper right arm.

Douglas A. Van Belle’s 2009 story “Zombies from Mars” nominated for Sir Julius Vogel Award

Congratulations to New Zealand writer and university lecturer Douglas A. Van Belle, whose short story “Zombies from Mars” has been nominated for a Sir Julius Vogel Award. “Zombies from Mars” was published in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine Issue #40 (September 2009). The Sir Julius Vogel Awards are administered by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Association of New Zealand (SFFANZ). This year’s awards will be presented at Au Contraire, the New Zealand National Science Fiction Convention, to be held in Wellington in August 2010.

1950’s Californian pottery Martian motif lamp

There’s a cool 1950's space age Californian pottery lamp with Martian motif and tripod legs for sale on eBay. Only $750. Beware this portion of the seller’s return policy:

“If a buyer doubts the authenticity of an item, he/she has 30 days from the date of the sale to submit, at his own expense, an opinion in writing from a recognized expert, approved by Showplace and the purchaser, regarding authenticity. If the expert judges the item inauthentic, it may be returned in the same condition as at the time of sale and the buyer's full purchase price will be refunded.”

No lampshade? A great DIY opportunity!

Societas Sedes Sapientiae book group just read C.S. Lewis’ 1938 novel Out of the Silent Planet

Here’s a beautiful announcement for a Roman Catholic book discussion group down in Coral Gables, Florida, that just finished reading C.S. Lewis’ classic 1938 novel Out of the Silent Planet. An optional Latin Low Mass preceded the meeting!

Frederik Pohl should stop clowning around, resign from disgraced Authors Guild

The prospect that U.S. District Court Judge Denny Chin’s confirmation by the Senate for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit could further delay the long-awaited ruling on the legality of the proposed revised Google Book Settlement (GBS 2.0) presents science fiction author and SFWA Grand Master Frederik Pohl with an excellent opportunity to stop clowning around like some disgruntled supporter of left-wing lunatic Howard Dean and resign as Midwest Area Representative to the disgraced Authors Guild.

In the event that Pohl is not aware, the high-brow New York City-based Authors Guild is considered to be the Goldman Sachs of the literary world, accused of conspiring with its publishing allies to sell, without legal authorization, the copyrighted works of tens of thousands of non-Guild members to Google for $125 million.

Pohl should follow the courageous lead of fellow author and SFWA Grand Master Ursula K. Le Guin and publicly resign from the disgraced Authors Guild. Otherwise, he is simply helping billion-dollar corporations mine the literary oort of working class writers.

The Martian Agent, a 1996 screenplay written by Michael Chabon

Thanks to a recent post on the Barsoomian blog JCOMReader about three discarded screenplays (1990, 1991, 2005) from failed attempts to film an A Princess of Mars movie based upon the novels of pulp author Edgar Rice Burroughs, I stumbled across the dormant script to The Martian Agent (Revised Draft, December 18, 1996; 130 p., 5.8 MB), written by Hugo Award-winning science fiction author Michael Chabon. Here are the opening lines:

FADE IN:

STARRY SKY

Amid a million million diamonds, one dark ruby.

EXT. LOUISIANA HIGHWAY (1876) – Night

Starlight, swamp fire in the branches of the trees. CRICKETS and FROGS. The highway bends like a river. Galloping HOOVES in the distance, a maddened horse.

TITLE: BAYOU MOUFFETTE, BRITISH LOUISIANA, 1876

A pair of exhausted black horses careen past, dragging a rocking black coach. A trunk strapped to the top shakes loose, falls off. Bursts open. The horses’ thunder fades.

In the trunk, a framed chromo: a cavalryman with long yellow hair. The caption reads, in florid type, “GENERAL CUSTER” ....

If I recall, Chabon, who recently signed on as a screenwriter for the long-awaited Disney/Pixar film John Carter of Mars (2012), based the script on his short story “The Martian Agent: a Planetary Romance,” which was originally published in McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales (Issue #10, 1993).

“The Real Martian Chronicles,” a new short story of high silliness by John Sladek

The May/June 2010 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction includes “The Real Martian Chronicles,” a previously unpublished short story written by the late American science fiction author John Sladek (1937-2000) that was discovered in his papers. A piece of near future “high silliness” that chronicles the first week of a British family’s new home on a populated Mars, here are the opening lines:

Monday:

We spent the whole day unpacking our tea chests. Everyone seems to have suffered some loss: Edna found her grandmother's teapot smashed. I noticed that my musical saw was missing -- no doubt stolen by the so-called workers of Botmore's Interplanetary Removals, PLC. Peregrine, our oldest, missed his acne medicine and his collection of early Bananarama records. The twins, Mandy and Jason, accuse me of having packed only one of the table tennis paddles. By the end of the day, we were all in a bad mood, discouraged. What a way to start off in our new home ....

Apparently, John Sladek was “one of the greatest parodists ever to work in the SF field” and, “with apologies to George and Weedon Grossmith,” his “The Real Martian Chronicles” is, presumably, a parody of the pompous banality of late 20th-century British life. As if to illustrate the point, in March 2010 the esteemed literary critic Sir David Langford wrote:

Of all the insanely labour-intensive sf projects on which I've worked, I am proudest of Maps: The Uncollected John Sladek (2002; reprinted 2003). But now -- look on my works, ye mighty, and despair -- it's about to become a tiny bit obsolete. I tried to assemble all the great John Sladek's uncollected fiction (and poetry), but little did I know that there was an actual unpublished Sladek typescript hidden beneath dense verbiage in John Clute's cellar. Wearing his agent's hat, Chris Priest scanned this and cleaned it up; I proofread it; Gordon Van Gelder bought it for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. The May/June 2010 issue will thus contain "The Real Martian Chronicles" by John Sladek, which might be described as "Mr Pooter [of Diary of a Nobody fame] Colonizes Mars". This has been an unsolicited plug.

If you thought Pamela Sargent’s Nebula Award-winning novelette “Danny Goes to Mars” (1992) was a real hoot, you’ll probably enjoy “The Real Martian Chronicles.”

Compensation for top sleuth at Mystery Writers Association cracked $100,000 in 2008

While some of the largest and most powerful financial institutions down on Wall Street were pushed to their deaths in 2008, events were a bit less tragic up on Broadway, where annual compensation for the administrative manager of the Mystery Writers Association (MWA) cracked $100,000. Check out the numbers, based on MWA’s recently-filed 2008 IRS Form 990:

• W-2/1099 compensation -- $81,693

• Deferred compensation/nontaxable benefits -- $24,131

• Total compensation -- $105,824

2008 marked the fifth consecutive year that MWA’s top sleuth received an increase in compensation, up from about $58,000 in 2004.

Preview artwork for Gulliver of Mars: Beyond the War of the Worlds steampunk graphic novel

United States Naval Lieutenant Gulliver Jones may not be the most famous interplanetary hero in the history of SF&F, but he swashbuckled his way across the Red Planet seven years before John Carter of Mars. First appearing in British author Edwin L. Arnold's novel, Lieut. Gullivar Jones: His Vacation (1905), Jones returns in Gulliver of Mars: Beyond the War of the Worlds, an upcoming steampunk graphic novel written by adventurist extraordinarie Mark Ellis and illustrated by artist Preston Asevedo.

According to Ellis, Gulliver of Mars: Beyond the War of the Worlds is a steampunk sequel to Arnold's novel, but set in a The War of the Worlds universe of seminal science fiction author H.G. Wells: “The story itself is multi-layered, emotional, packed with colorful villains, smart-ass heroes, fistfights and of course...babes. In other words, pretty much all the elements that are my trademarks."

Read the details and check out the awesome preview artwork by Preston Asevedo!

Pictured: Gulliver Jones as depicted by artist Preston Asevedo.

Events of Martian Rails: Mars needs women!

Martian Rails (2009), the crayon board game manufactured by Mayfair Games about railroading on the Red Planet in which players build tracks and haul freight, has a long list of events to which players can respond in order to generate revenue for their rail companies. For example:

Mars needs women! -- Almost all the Martian babies hatched are males. Additionally, since conditions on this frontier world are harsh, the human males vastly outnumber the females. Peaceful means are being attempted to lure human females to Mars.

Martian Rails is loaded with references to Martian SF!

Frank Frazetta family feud resolved; theft charges and civil lawsuit against son dropped

Great news out of Pennsylvania! The Pocono Record reports that the bizarre family feud over the work and legacy of renowned fantasy & science fiction artist Frank Frazetta has been resolved. In a written statement, Frazetta said, “all the litigation surrounding his family and his art has been resolved. All of Frank's children will now be working together as a team to promote his remarkable collection of images that has inspired people for decades.” The dispute pitted Frazetta and three of his adult children against the fourth, involved the December 2009 arrest of Frazetta's oldest son, Frank Jr., for theft, and resulted in the March 2010 filing of a civil lawsuit against Frank Jr. for intellectual property violations.

“There was No Paradise,” a 1940 golden novelette by Manly Wade Wellman

Thanks to Doc Mars of the amazing French-language website Mars & la Science Fiction, you can download and read American Sci-Fi author Manly Wade Wellman’s complete interplanetary novelette “There was No Paradise” (pdf) as it was originally published in the August 1940 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories magazine. A tale about a man from Mars who had the Midas touch but couldn’t buy the things he wanted, here are the opening lines of “There was No Paradise”:

THE windowless gray room was overcrowded. Fifty men and more sat in rows of chairs. Rakish, watchful men, with pencils and pads of papers. They were reporters.

“Here he comes,” whispered one.

And here he certainly came, between two uniformed guards, the warden ahead and a muttering priest behind. He was the tallest and handsomest man any of them had ever seen, even though he wore shapeless prison shoddy and his high skull was shaven. Though intent and alert, he had no appearance of worry. His color was good, and his step firm . . . .

C'est magnifique, Doc Mars!

Rhone, a new dark heroic fantasy novel written by John A. Karr

Rhone, a new dark heroic fantasy novel set on Mars and written by eclectic American writer John A. Karr, has just been published as a trade paperback by United Kingdom-based Wild Wolf Publishing. Inspired by legendary writers Robert E. Howard, Michael Moorcock, Karl Edward Wagner and Edgar Rice Burroughs, here is the promotional piece for Rhone:

Mars has a hero that will defy both god and man ...

Rhone is an ex-soldier of mixed blood, more man than demon but with reserves of hellish power. He has led a peaceful life as a fisherman since his soldiering days and is raising a daughter, Enna. Returning home one day he finds Enna murdered -- or so he believes.

And so begins Rhone's manipulation by Ducain, a demigod hell-bent on ruling the heavens. After avenging his daughter's death, Rhone grieves and isolates himself in the mountains. Ducain tells him his daughter's soul is locked in purgatory but can be retrieved ... and if Rhone also frees the titan who once defied the king of gods, Enna will live again.

Fans in the United States, Canada, the UK and Europe have a chance to win a free copy of Rhone. Check the rules. The deadline is April 30, 2010.

Pictured: Rhone, cover by artist Peter C. Fussey.

Kim Stanley Robinson's 2007 Google Tech Talks lecture on climate change

There’s an insightful hour-long video posted on YouTube of acclaimed Martian science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson giving a 2007 Google Tech Talks lecture on climate change. He discusses strategies for decarbonizing our civilization, “focusing on social questions, cleaner energy and transport, mission architectures, possibilities of geo-engineering, and the important role that Google can have in all these as world leader in information technologies.”

I’m curious to see whether Robinson calculates and discloses his carbon burn for traveling to and attending Aussiecon 4, the 68th World Science Fiction Convention, to be held in Melbourne in September 2010. He’s a Guest of Honour!

Self-publisher Lulu postpones $50 million IPO

Main Street readers interested in a share of the risks and rewards of the self-publishing explosion will have to wait a while longer. The Wall Street Journal and other sources reported last week that Lulu Ltd, a privately-held self-publishing company based in Raleigh, North Carolina, that maintains the popular Lulu.com website, has postponed its $50 million initial public offering (IPO). Financial losses, poor share pricing and a listing on the Toronto Stock Exchange were among the main reasons for the postponement. Lulu is the brainchild of Bob Young, co-founder of Red Hat Inc, the well-known open-source software company.

Home of artist Frank Frazetta burglarized

The Pocono Record of Pennsylvania reports that the Marshalls Creek home of renowned fantasy & science fiction artist Frank Frazetta was burglarized sometime over the past few weeks. Among the missing items: a gun collection. Placed on Frazetta's desk: a photo of his late wife, Ellie, who died in July 2009.

In related news, The Ghost of Ellie, a spirited if sometimes speculative Frazetta fan website which removed all of its content several weeks ago, has vanished from the Internet. The website, which was believed to have been based in the Netherlands, staunchly supported Frazetta’s oldest son, Frank Jr., in the bizarre and nasty family feud over the legacy and work of the aging artist.

Cover art for Pyr reprint of Ian McDonald’s novel Desolation Road wins BSFA award

Congratulations to French artist Stephan Martiniere, British author Ian McDonald, and American editor Lou Anders of Pyr! Martiniere’s exquisite cover art for the 2009 Pyr reprint of McDonald’s acclaimed debut novel Desolation Road (1988) recently won a British Science Fiction Association (BSFA) award in the category of Best Artwork. When you've finished admiring Martiniere’s work, check out a Flickr gallery of about 10 other Desolation Road covers!

The Biographical Dictionary of Authors Guild Insiders: Michael Gross

The legal shit storm at Goldman Sachs reminds me that it is time to post the last entry in The Biographical Dictionary of Authors Guild Insiders. The Authors Guild “insiders” are those senior staff members who worked in smoke-filled backrooms with the Guild's publishing allies to craft a spurious legal agreement titled Google Book Search Settlement in a brazen attempt to sell the copyrighted works of tens of thousands of non-Guild writers to Google for $125 million. Here's the final entry:

Michael Gross -- a 1999 graduate of New York Law School and staff attorney for the Guild since 1999, who has assisted hundreds of authors in contractual and copyright matters and speaks regularly to writers groups on book contract issues, provided additional legal support for the negotiating team. [The Public Index]

Other entries include biographical sketches of Guild executive director Paul Aiken, general counsel Jan Constantine, director of legal services Anita Fore, consultant Simon Marcus, marketing director Sandy Long, and librarian Terry King.

A federal judge is currently reviewing the legality of the revised Google Book Search Settlement (GBS 2.0).

UPDATE: Just checked the website of the Authors Guild. I cannot believe that legendary SF author Frederik Pohl is still listed as an advisor to the Guild's Council. What a clown.

RPG adventure: Canal Priests of Mars

If you are a fan of role-playing games or just want to read a clever 64-page RPG adventure, check out Canal Priests of Mars (1990, 2000), an original Game Designers' Workshop publication designed by Marcus L. Rowland and reprinted by Heliograph Inc. of Somerville, Mass. An epic four-chapter adventure that uses the RPG rules of the legendary Space: 1889 adventure, Canal Priests of Mars opens with a holy mission in London, embarks aboard the luxurious Princess Alexandra ether liner, and concludes with a terrific crash on the Red Planet. Here’s a promotional piece:

When a high priest of the Canal Priests dies, a complex astrological formula based on the time of his death indicates when and where his successor will be born. The lesser priests must locate the successor and educate him in his duties. When assassins from a rival cult kill the high priest, it should be a simple matter to locate the new candidate. But the portents make no sense -- the positions of the stars and planets at the time of the old priest's death indicate the new high priest will be born in the skies.

In Canal Priests of Mars, one of the PCs has an unexpected heritage: the high priesthood of the Canal Priests of Mars. Being a high priest is not all chocolates and soft cushions. Every job has restrictions, and the high priest is not without obligations. Still, the lucky character can look forward to the fawning adulation of thousands of converts -- once the news gets out, the cult can begin recruiting members again. Of course, this is exactly what some people don't want...

I downloaded Canal Priests of Mars from DriveThruRPG (free 64-page pdf with registration; free 8-page pdf preview w/o registration) and was not disappointed. After a little difficulty understanding the first few pages, which detail the cult of the Canal Priests of Mars, it was smooth sailing! Although I only read about a third of the adventure, the book is full of sharp illustrations, portraits of the main characters, deck plans of the Princess Alexandra, maps, and more. I felt like I was reading one of those old Infocom game manuals. You know, Zork II, Deadline, Planetfall, etc. Great stuff!

PublishAmerica guy invented hexadecimal abacus, qualified to work at Goldman Sachs

Lawrence A. Clopper III is not only co-founder and co-owner of PublishAmerica, a controversial vanity press based in Frederick, Maryland, he is also co-inventor of the hexadecimal abacus. According to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Clopper and a colleague were granted patent number US4812124 in March 1989 for inventing the hexadecimal abacus. Here’s the abstract from the USPTO:

Hexadecimal Abacus

This abacus is an accurate instrument that is capable of performing complex arithmetic functions in the hexadecimal number system. Primarily, it consists of a frame having a multiple number of rods extending through a cross bar member, and eight beads are provided below the cross bar and three beads are provided above the cross bar. The value of the beads above the bar is eight and the value of the beads below the bar is one.

Presumably, inventing this revolutionary financial instrument means Clopper is well-qualified to work at Goldman Sachs.

Pyr reprints Ian McDonald's 2001 magic-realist novel Ares Express

The Pyr reprint of award-winning British author Ian McDonald’s 2001 novel Ares Express has landed on bookstore and library shelves. The follow-up to Desolation Road (1988, 2009), McDonald’s acclaimed debut novel, Ares Express is set on a terraformed Mars and stars fusion-powered locomotives.

A Mars of the imagination, like no other, in a colourful, witty SF novel; Taking place in the kaleidoscopic future of Ian McDonald's Desolation Road, Ares Express is set on a terraformed Mars where fusion-powered locomotives run along the network of rails that is the planet's circulatory system and artificial intelligences reconfigure reality billions of times each second. One young woman, Sweetness Octave Glorious-Honeybun Asiim 12th, becomes the person upon whom the future -- or futures -- of Mars depends. Big, picaresque, funny; taking the Mars of Ray Bradbury and the more recent, terraformed Marses of authors such as Kim Stanley Robinson and Greg Bear, Ares Express is a wild and woolly magic-realist SF novel, featuring lots of bizarre philosophies, strange, mind-stretching ideas and trains as big as city blocks.

SF&F critic Rich Horton reviewed Ares Express for the SF Site in 2002, concluding, "This may not be the most serious or the most significant SF novel of the past year, but it just might be the most fun. I loved it wholeheartedly."

More recently, Publishers Weekly gave the Ares Express reprint a positive review, concluding “McDonald’s fantastic Mars is vividly detailed and owes much to Bradbury’s Martian stories. Despite a bit of hand waving around technology that is glibly indistinguishable from magic, this sequel is entirely worthy of its rightly lauded predecessor."

Pat's Fantasy Hotlist has three copies of Ares Express that it is giving away. The announcement was posted on April 14, 2010, but I'm not sure when the deadline is.

Pictured: Ares Express (2010), with artwork by Stephan Martinière.

Mars art: Tom Sutton original 1976 painting based on Ray Bradbury short story “Usher II”

Here’s a beautiful piece of artwork for sale on eBay: a Tom Sutton original painting based on the Ray Bradbury short story “Usher II,” which is part of The Martian Chronicles. 10 1/2" x 13" image on heavy 13" x 17" board. Apparently, Sutton's painting was originally published as the back cover of the fanzine Rocket’s Blast Comic Collector #131 (October 1976). Price: $5,000.

Dire Planet Compendium: Arshen

Pulp science fiction author Joel Jenkins has posted the fifth entry in his Dire Planet Compendium: Arshen. The compendium, illustrated by Noel Tauzon, is derived from Jenkins’ Dire Planet series, a collection of three sword & planet books inspired by Robert E. Howard and Edgar Rice Burroughs that chronicles swashbuckling hero Garvey Dire and his adventures on the Red Planet.

London Book Fair presses ahead despite volcanic ash, flight delays

The London Book Fair Team is working hard to minimise the disruption to the fair caused by the volcanic ash temporarily closing airports in the UK and Europe. Our customer service team are calling international exhibitors to offer assistance with manning stands and arranging alternative travel plans where possible. Our view is that the show must – and will – go on and we will provide all the help we can to ensure it runs as smoothly as possible.

We know that many international exhibitors and visitors have already arrived and those travelling from Europe are finding alternative transport. Our substantial UK attendees remain unaffected. Our website is being updated regularly with practical information and helplines. I want to thank everyone for their calls of support and determination to get to the fair and to reiterate that we will be in continual communication over the coming days.

Sincerely, Alistair Burtenshaw

Lots of cool info on the website of the London Book Fair 2010, which runs from April 19th through April 21st. Check out the floor plan (pdf)!

“$1,000 a Plate,” a 1954 short story by Jack McKenty about Marsy Gras

Thanks to Doc Mars of the amazing French-language website Mars & la Science Fiction, you can download and read American science fiction author Jack McKenty’s short story “$1,000 a Plate” (pdf) as it was originally published in the October 1954 issue of Galaxy magazine. A light-hearted tale about a scientist and a casino owner who join forces to dampen the Red Planet’s Marsy Gras celebration, here are the opening lines of “$1,000 a Plate”:

       SUNSET on Mars is a pale, washed out, watery sort of procedure that is hardly worth looking at. The shadows of the cactus lengthen, the sun goes down without the slightest hint of color or display and everything is dark. About once a year there is one cloud that turns pink briefly. But even the travel books devote more space describing the new sign adorning the Canal Casino than they do on the sunset...

Merci beaucoup, Doc Mars!

Read ERB's The Gods of Mars as published in 1917 Biloxi newspaper

Read the Prologue, Foreword, Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ The Gods of Mars (1913), as published in the January 17, 1917, issue of The Daily Herald, Gulfport and Biloxi, Mississippi. (1 page, pdf)

The Martian Inca, a 1977 novel by Ian Watson

The Martian Inca, a science fiction novel by Ian Watson (1977, UK)

Pictured: 1978 American paperback (New York: Ace Books, 1978), 299 p., $1.95. Cover art by Steve Hickman. Here's the promotional piece from the back cover of the book:

The Mars probe has crashed. A triumph of Soviet technology, the first two-way interplanetary probe performed brilliantly until the final stage of its return. Then something went wrong: rather than following its programmed course to a soft landing in its country of origin, the probe crashed in the Peruvian Andes. Now a weird infection beyond the understanding of medical science has wiped out an entire village -- except for one man, who, alone and undiscovered by the medics, survives. He has awakened to find himself become his own ancestor, and a god. Suddenly the flames of an Indian revolution are spreading in South America; he is the Martian Inca.

According to the library catalogue of the University of Liverpool, the institution's copy of the 1978 Ace paperback edition was bequeathed by author John Brunner, whom Watson admired and once referred to as "the Rachel Carson of science fiction."

A harsh review of The Martian Inca by Stanislaw Lem was published in Science Fiction Studies in 1980.

Race in Roy Rockwood's 1910 juvenile adventure novel Through Space to Mars

Fans, writers, editors and scholars who are studying the topic of race in early science fiction will find interest in Through Space to Mars, or the Longest Journey on Record (1910), a boy's adventure book written by Roy Rockwood. The fourth novel in Rockwood’s Great Marvel juvenile series starring delinquents Mark Sampson and Jack Darrow, Professor Amos Henderson, handyman Andy Sudds, and an African-American named Washington White, Through Space to Mars is replete with disturbing dialogue. For example:

"Well, here we are," announced Jack, about three hours later, as the train pulled into a small station. "And there's Washington on the platform waiting for us."

Jack hurried out of the car, followed by Mark.

"Hello, Wash!" cried the fat lad. "How are you? Catch this valise!" and he threw it to the colored man before the train had come to a stop. Washington deftly caught the grip, though he had to make a quick movement to accomplish it.

"I 'clar t' gracious!" he exclaimed. "Dat suttinly am a most inconsequential mannah in which to project a transmigatory object in contiguousness to mah predistination."

"Whoa, there!" cried Jack. "Better take two bites at that, Wash!"

"Dat's all right, Massa Jack," answered the colored man. "I'se glad to see yo', an' I suttinly hopes dat de transubstantiationableness ob my—"

"Wow!" cried Jack. "Say that over again, and say it slow."

"Don't yo' foregather mah excitability?" asked the colored man rather anxiously.

"Yes, I guess so. What's the answer? How's the professor? How's Andy? What's the matter? Why did he send for us?"

You can read Through Space to Mars online or download it through Project Gutenberg or ManyBooks.net.

Review of Michael Moorcock’s 1965 ERB-inspired novel Barbarians of Mars

Dr. Hermes, a fan who enjoys “classic pulp, comics, movies, paperbacks and babes of yore,” has a scathing review of Barbarians of Mars (1965), the third novel in a trilogy written by British science fiction and fantasy author Michael Moorcock as a homage to the Barsoom series by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Dr. Hermes concludes that “with all the one sentence paragraphs, heavy-handed explanations and minimal vocabulary, it [Barbarians of Mars] reads very much like an attempt to write a Barsoom story for grade school children.”

Random House rearranges deck chairs

Publishers Weekly reports that the Random House publishing group is merging several former paperback publishers and science fiction imprints into one division, to be titled the Ballantine Bantam Dell unit. According to PW, the reorganization will result in the elimination of... one position. I wonder how long before Random House CEO Markus Dohle and his wife Karin sell their recently purchased $3.1 million McMansion in Westchester County, New York, and move back to Europe.

[via Ian Randal Strock of SFScope]

Interview with Jeff Loew, creator of new comic book The Regulators

Comic Book Bin has an excellent interview with Jeff Loew, creator of The Regulators (2010), a new politically-charged future thriller one-shot comic book set on Mars that was just published by Visionary Comics. Paired with a three-page preview, here is a snippet from the interview:

Comic Book Bin: I just had the privilege of reading this one-shot debut. It really feels like a classic 2000 A.D. jaunt into the far-flung future. Was the book The Regulators influenced by the sci-fi stories in that British magazine, and what other stories have influenced this title?

Jeff Loew: 2000 A.D. and Judge Dredd blew my mind when they were reprinted in the U.S. in the early 80s. Those stories have definitely influenced my writing. My proudest publication credit is probably a short story I had printed in the small press section of the Judge Dredd Megazine a few years back. I’d say that The Regulators is also influenced by the same 1950s and 1960s classic science fiction that influenced 2000 A.D., folks like Robert A. Heinlein. The structure of the story, with Pax Manfreddy, the lead character, hunting for another lost regulator on Mars, is pretty archetypal for a hard-boiled noir mystery. I even re-watched John Ford’s classic western, The Searchers, when thinking about the best way to tell the story -- the Martian landscape stands in for the American West.”

The cover art is a bit lame, but some of the interior artwork looks pretty cool.

Commodities of Martian Rails: Fish

Martian Rails (2009), the crayon board game manufactured 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:

Fish -- Crossbred Martian and Earth water creatures that live in the canals. They are food sources for humans. The native Martian fish were rare and not particularly nutritious but they could survive the harsh climate.

Martian Rails is loaded with references to Martian SF!

Letter from Diane Duane, best-selling author of new YA novel A Wizard of Mars

Dear Amazon Reader,

"What the heck ... let's go to Mars!" That's what one of those little voices in the back of my head said some years back, when I was contemplating where I'd be taking the Young Wizards series after Wizards at War.

When you're a writer, you learn to live with these little voices. As a former psychiatric nurse, I know that they're just one more way that the creative urge expresses itself to help you get the work done -- a friendly voice being something you're more likely to listen to than some vague, disembodied Spirit of Creativity. I treat these suggestions as if they came from one of the "shoulder angels" or "shoulder devils" you see in cartoons. When they pop up and whisper something, you can pay attention or you can brush them off, but the final choice is always yours.

This time I listened. Mars has turned up in the YW books in the past, but only as a bit player -- Nita's sister Dairine stops off there briefly on her wizardly Ordeal, not wanting to pass by without visiting Olympus Mons, the biggest volcano in the solar system (and a must-see for alien tourists in our arm of the galaxy). Surely, I thought, the planet next door merited a little more attention from me than just that single mention. For not merely as an astronomy geek from childhood, but as someone who's spent a lot of time in and around science fiction, I've had Mars on my radar for a long time.

Many of the great names in the science fiction and fantasy fields -- Wells and Heinlein and Bradbury and even C. S. Lewis -- have been interested enough in Mars to "visit" there, each bringing along the best scientific knowledge of the moment, and his or her own particular vision of what the Red Planet meant to them and what it might eventually mean to humanity. Other writers -- Edgar Rice Burroughs, particularly -- have gone there packing less science and more romance. But regardless, Mars has usually seemed to elicit good things from those who visit there in literary mode: visions of beauty and of terror, the unexpected and the seriously strange.

And for me, the fascination with Mars itself became an issue, a question to be answered. Why does Mars command so much attention from both the scientific community and the general public? What is it with Mars, anyway? Specifically, why has it so often been where invaders come from? ("Invaders from Jupiter?" Nita says at one point. "Invaders from Venus? It just doesn’t sound right. But invaders from Mars...") Is this just the effect of much piled-up popular culture, or do Earth and Mars have something else going on? If so, what? And what if that long-buried issue should suddenly come up to be resolved?

That last one is the question I found myself dealing with as I wrote this book ... and it was a whole lot of fun. In the process I got to nod "hello" to a lot of my illustrious forbears in the field who've left their literary footprints on the planet (or their name: a surprising number of craters on Mars have been named after science fiction writers). I also got to do some goofy things, which is a writer's prerogative as long as she's careful about it and doesn't disturb the main flow of story business: watch for a cameo by a well-known Martian of 1950s vintage). Most important, I got to push my characters into situations that challenged them in some very different ways from the usual ones, their personal dramas playing themselves out on an alien landscape that's a little less alien because they can see Earth from there.

And -- as a happy side issue -- I had help from NASA in scouting my locations for the main story events. The Mars Global Surveyor satellite completely mapped the surface of the Red Planet before its sad demise, and NASA's made that data available to anyone who wants it. So with the right software to process the data for you and create the imagery, you can seem to stand on the surface of Mars yourself, and take a look around.

So, all in all, Kit and Nita and I had a serious party in our stay on Mars. In A Wizard of Mars, the party's still going on. And we can't wait for you to join us there!

All the best,

Diane Duane

Rob Zombie should remake 1968 Yvonne Craig film Mars Needs Women

With his curriculum vitae full of horrible movie remakes, perhaps musician, troll and horror film fan Rob Zombie should remake the 1968 Hollywood flop Mars Needs Women, which starred a dapper Tommy Kirk as a desperate Martian and a sexy Yvonne Craig as Dr. Marjorie Bolen, an expert on extra-terrestrial reproduction. Considering that SF&F writer James D. MacDonald is looking for a new cat to wax, perhaps he and Stacia Kane, Barbara Bauer, Debra Doyle can play the lead roles. After listening to Doyle's “Sex and Outer Space” lecture, the audience can attend MacDonald's “Be a Sex-Writing Strumpet” workshop!

POD dispute between PublishAmerica and Lightning Source will go to jury trial in 2011

According to a legal document issued late last month by the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, the “Print on Demand Agreement” contract dispute between PublishAmerica (PA), a vanity press based in Frederick, Maryland, and one of its vendors, Lightning Source Inc. (LSI), a print-on-demand printer located in La Vergne, Tennessee, will be decided by a jury trial in September 2011. PA’s complaint (pdf) against LSI, filed on February 1, 2010, includes seven counts and asks for nearly $1 million in compensatory damages, punitive damages, costs, interest and attorney’s fees. LSI answered with a counterclaim (pdf), filed on February 25th.

Dire Planet Compendium: The Rotteliver

Pulp science fiction author Joel Jenkins has posted the fourth entry in his Dire Planet Compendium: The Rotteliver. The compendium, illustrated by Noel Tauzon, is derived from Jenkins’ Dire Planet series, a collection of three sword & planet books inspired by Robert E. Howard and Edgar Rice Burroughs that chronicles swashbuckling hero Garvey Dire and his adventures on the Red Planet.

“The Martian and the Magician,” a 1952 tender romance by Evelyn E. Smith

Thanks to Doc Mars of the amazing French website Mars & la Science Fiction, you can download and read American science fiction author Evelyn E. Smith’s short story “The Martian and the Magician” (pdf), “a hilarious rib on space travel, old-fashioned magic, BEMS or what-have-you,” as it was originally published in the November 1952 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Here are the opening lines:

       EVER since childhood I had grown accustomed to being followed by Things wherever I went. I was never lonely. There was always a reptilian zok from Mars, who changed progressively into a more and more fearsome variety of monster as I grew familiar with the initial horror. I was never harmed, since the zokk had to throw so much energy into projecting themselves from Mars (or Zokk, as the natives called it) that they had none left with which to execute any malevolent projects...

Merci beaucoup, Doc Mars! What are we going to read next?

Artist John Schoenherr (1935-2010)

SFScope reports that award-winning science fiction illustrator and cover artist John Schoenherr died April 8, 2010. Born in New York City in 1935, Schoenherr did the cover art for several Maritan SF novels, including: The Bird of Time (1961), by Wallace West; Mars is My Destination (1962), by Frank Belknap Long; The Martian Sphinx (1965) and Born Under Mars (1967), by John Brunner; and The Sword of Rhiannon (1967), by Leigh Brackett. I’ve put together a small gallery over on Flickr.

The Biographical Dictionary of Authors Guild Insiders: Terry King

News that the American Society of Media Photographers and other groups representing visual artists have filed a class-action lawsuit against Google over its highly contentious digital library reminds me that it is time to post another entry in The Biographical Dictionary of Authors Guild Insiders. The Authors Guild “insiders” are those senior staff members who worked in smoke-filled backrooms with the Guild's publishing allies to craft a spurious legal agreement titled Google Book Search Settlement in a brazen attempt to sell the copyrighted works of tens of thousands of non-Guild writers to Google for $125 million. Here's today's entry:

Terry King -- a former librarian at State University of New York, New Paltz, who was awarded a Master of Library Science Degree from Columbia University in 1988, contributed his expertise both as to library systems and - in his capacity as Operations Manager of the Authors Registry - to the operations of royalty payment systems. [The Public Index]

Other entries include biographical sketches of Guild executive director Paul Aiken, general counsel Jan Constantine, director of legal services Anita Fore, consultant Simon Marcus and marketing director Sandy Long.

A federal judge is currently reviewing the legality of the revised Google Book Search Settlement (GBS 2.0).

Creepy 1924 animated Soviet propaganda film vanquishes all the capitalists on Mars

I just watched Interplanetary Revolution (1924), a creepy 8-minute animated Soviet propaganda film replete with evil capitalists and dancing swastikas. A tale starring Comrade Cominternov, the Red Army Warrior, who vanquishes all of the capitalists on Mars, Interplanetary Revolution is "an event very likely to happen in 1929."


Check it out!

FBI makes note of Frazetta family feud

The Pocono Record of Pennsylvania reports that the bizarre family feud over the artwork and legacy of renowned fantasy & science fiction artist Frank Frazetta has been brought to the attention of the FBI after three of Frazetta’s adult children received demanding and threatening phone calls, text messages and e-mails from an anonymous man who claimed he was hired by Frazetta’s fourth and oldest child, Frank Jr., as a business consultant, adviser and strategist.

In related news, The Ghost of Ellie, a spirited if sometimes speculative Frazetta fan website believed to be based in the Netherlands and which has been highly critical of Frank Frazetta Jr.’s three siblings, removed all of its content earlier in the week. It is unclear if the move was related to events in the States.

Devil’s Planet, a 1942 scientifiction novel by Manly Wade Wellman

Thanks to the folks at the Internet Archive, you can read or download Devil’s Planet, a complete book-length scientifiction novel penned by American writer Manly Wade Wellman (1903-1986) that was published in the Vol. 7, No. 1, January 1942 issue of Startling Stories magazine. Set on the Red Planet, the plot revolves around an intrepid Earthman and Pulambar, a Martian city of pleasure. Here are the opening lines:

       YOUNG Dillon Stover woke easily and good-humoredly, as usual. He knew he was in bed, of course -- but was he? He felt as though he were floating on a fleecy cloud, or something.

He stretched his muscular long legs and arms, yawned and shook his tawny-curled head. He felt light as a feather, even in the first waking moment. He was alert enough to remember now. This was Mars, where he weighed only forty percent of what he weighed at home in the Missouri Ozarks. He'd come here to carry on the scientific labors of his late grandfather, which labors he'd inherited along with old Dr. Stover's snug fortune. For the first time in his life Dillon Stover had fine clothes, independence, money in his belt-pouch -- and responsibility.

That responsibility had brought him to Pulambar, Martian City of Pleasure, for study and decision...

Devil's Planet was republished as a stand-alone novel in 1951.

Pictured: Mars art by Rudolph Belarski depicting a scene from Devil's Planet.

[via Tinkoo Valia of Variety SF]

EFF should celebrate its 20th anniversary by posting 15+ years of paperwork

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a tax-exempt, San Francisco-based nonprofit founded in 1990 that defends the digital rights of consumers and the general public and which spends a significant amount of OPM filing lawsuits against the United States government and large corporations over their lack of disclosure and transparency, recently celebrated its 20th anniversary by hosting a hell of a geeky birthday fundraiser.

Sadly, the EFF, which “continues to confront cutting-edge issues” and "makes documents available to the public by putting them on our website," has only three years of its annual reports, zero years of its audited financial statements, and zero years of its IRS Form 990s posted on its website. In other words, the EFF has a lot of work to do in improving its own disclosure and transparency.

Just curious: Did the $66,000 and $88,000 the EFF paid in consulting fees to science fiction author and former EFF employee Cory Doctorow in 2004 and 2005, respectively, cover meals & entertainment?

Review of Mars Liner plastic model kit

In 1997, a geek named Scott Van Aken wrote a cool review of Mars Liner, an injected plastic model kit originally made by Strombecker in the 1950s and re-released by Glencoe Models in the 1990s. Apparently, the real Mars Liner was part of Disneyland's Tomorrowland exhibit for many years. You can buy the kit off of eBay for about $13.

Confederate History Month proclamation neglects to mention John Carter of Mars

While civil rights leaders are justifiably outraged that Gov. Robert F. McDonnell’s proclamation declaring April 2010 to be Confederate History Month in the state of Virginia fails to mention slavery, Martian science fiction fans are irked that the proclamation mentions famed General Robert E. Lee but does not mention legendary Captain Jack Carter of Virginia, a courageous Confederate cavalry officer who served the South in the War Between the States and who is better known as John Carter of Mars.

New poem: “Martian Opal” by Ruth Berman

Award-winning short science fiction writer and speculative poet Ruth Berman recently had a neat new poem entitled “Martian Opal” published in the April/May 2010 double issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction magazine. Comprised of just two short stanzas, here is the first line: “When humans are born on Mars”