Monster Model Review: Rat bat spider from 1959 film Angry Red Planet

In 2007, a geek named Rob Mattison presented a cool three-minute video review of Angry Red Spider, a resin model kit inspired by the Cold War American science fiction film Angry Red Planet (1959). Manufactured by Ultratumba Productions and sculpted by Paul Schiola, you can buy the kit off of eBay for about $50.

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!

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In 1997, a geek named Scott Van Aken wrote a cool review of Mars Liner, an injected plastic model kit originally made by Strombecker in the 1950s and re-released by Glencoe Models in the 1990s.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.

Dollhouse miniature SFF books

A company called Miniature Bookshelf of Springville, Utah offers a neat selection of more than 8,000 replica first edition hardcover titles (400 listed online), including some science fiction, fantasy and horror works. The miniature books are 1:12 scale with illegible decorative text inside. Check out these titles, each retailing for $5.99:

• The Martian Way and Other Stories (1955), by Isaac Asimov

• The Martian Chronicles (1950), by Ray Bradbury

• A Fighting Man of Mars (1931), by Edgar Rice Burroughs

• The War of the Worlds (1898), by H.G. Wells

Pictured: The War of the Worlds next to a penny!

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!

Red zeppelin

Although this cool red zeppelin with a giant letter “M” on its side looks like it would be ideal for taking an evening sightseeing cruise beneath two summer moons on a science fictional Mars, it is actually a Magisterium Sky Ferry miniature diecast toy based on the air ship in the fantasy film The Golden Compass (2007).

Preorder Dejah Thoris: Princess of Mars 12-inch figure from Triad Toys

Fans of science fiction pulp author Edgar Rice Burroughs and his fictional planet of Barsoom can preorder the forthcoming Dejah Thoris: Princess of Mars figure being manufactured by Triad Toys. Twelve inches high and priced at $99, the figure features fully pose-able and removable armor, including head guard, body armor, shoulder armor, wrist armor, leg guards and sandals; ultra-realistic, hand-painted head with Saran hair; over 25 points of articulation, magnetized feet and full metal joints!

Pictured: Dejah Thoris: Princess of Mars

Ethical problems with human-centric narratives in Lego "Mars Mission" play sets

The new, second volume of Rigor Mortis Magazine has an interesting article entitled “Ethical Problems with Human-Centric Narratives in Lego Mars Mission Play Sets,” written by Gerald Saul, head of the film & video department at the University of Regina in Canada. According to Saul, the “Mars Mission” toy building block sets produced by Lego in 2007 and 2008 are all about “invasion, colonization, slavery, and unethical scientific experimentation.”

Pictured: Lego “Mars Mission” sets.

Pardon me, would you care for a biscuit and a Mars card with your cup of Brooke Bond tea?

Thanks to an older biographical sketch of Welch science fiction author and newly minted millionaire Alastair Reynolds printed in the anthology Mars Probes (2002),
I learned about “The Race into Space," a collection of fifty collectible picture cards that were issued by the Brooke Bond Tea Co. in Britain in 1971. Distributed inside boxes of tea, the collection contains several cards related to Mars, including card #50, “The Manned Flight to Mars,” detailing a plan in which the United States would launch an expedition to Mars in 1981.

As Reynolds recalled in 2002 in Mars Probes, “As a child, I was an avid collector of the cards that appeared in boxes of Brooke Bond tea, and one of them, I recall, prophesied that we would most likely have sent someone to Mars by 1980. I remain bitterly disappointed that, even some twenty years later, we still haven’t managed to do that.”

Fortune magazine looks inside Amazon's effort to transform the book business

The website of Fortune magazine takes a special, interactive look at Amazon’s latest effort to transform the book business in a series of articles and videos listed below. A 21st-century businessman, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos sees "a genuine opportunity to make the cost structure of printing and distribution much more attractive.”

• And the Word was: Kindle. "Amazon founder Jeff Bezos used the Web to shake up book retailing. Now, his company has invented the Kindle e-reader, and is using the Internet to sell electronic books, newspapers and magazines."

• Bezos’ big-screen Kindle (video). "The Amazon.com CEO says the Kindle DX is a great value despite the near $500 price tag."

• Cover story: Amazon's next revolution. "CEO Jeff Bezos used the web to shake up book retailing. Now he's using the Internet to sell electronic books on his Kindle e-reader. A look at Amazon's latest effort to transform the book business, writ digital."

• All the news fit to e-print (video). "Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos says his company's new Kindle DX could be a lifeline for print media."

• Amazon re-Kindles the iPhone. "It took Amazon (AMZN) less than a month after the release of the second-generation Kindle electronic-book reader to put a free Kindle application on the iPhone App Store."

• The end of paper? "Someday you may be reading your newspaper on an e-paper device -- a thin piece of plastic the size of a legal pad that can be taken to the beach or on the train. That day may be a lot closer than you think."

Interested in re-kindling that old-book smell for your e-reader? Try Classic Musty Scent, a fictitious aerosol e-book enhancer made by DuroSport Electronics.

Pictured above: Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos atop a pile of books.

Mars Attacks! and Star Trek spinoffs: An interview with British film director Alex Cox

Once a promising young filmmaker who directed Repo Man (1984) and Sid & Nancy (1986), British cult film director Alex Cox has spent the past twenty years trying to rekindle his career. Cox recently visited Austin, Texas, and sat down with the city's free weekly newspaper Decider to discuss some of his projects that never came to fruition, such as the film Mars Attacks! (1996).

Alex Cox: I was the person who brought Mars Attacks! to the attention of the studio. They were bubblegum cards I had as a kid. I developed Mars Attacks! with Jon Davidson [sic], the producer of Robocop, for quite a while, but at some point my project got shut down and it was given to Tim Burton. It was a bit of a shame, but I think both the script that I wrote and the Tim Burton one suffered from not being enough like the bubblegum cards. I was very attracted to science fiction when I was a lad, but that sort of science fiction seems to have gone away now -- the hardcore Harry Harrison, Arthur C. Clarke kind of world seems to have disappeared. In the science fiction section of the bookstore now, it’s just Star Trek spinoff books and fantasy novels, flying-on-the-back-of-a-dragon stuff. That really mainstream, kind of macho science fiction of the ’50s and ’60s has just disappeared.

Pictured above is card #21 from the 1962 Topps Mars Attacks bubblegum card series. According to the blog Golden Age Comic Book Stories, the original artwork for card #1, done by Norman Saunders and Bob Powell, sold recently at auction for $70,000! Check out beautiful images of all 55 cards in the Mars Attacks series at Golden Age Comic Book Stories.

25 Martian Science Fiction reasons to purchase Amazon’s new Kindle 2 e-reader

Jeff Bezos, founder and chief executive of Amazon, introduced yesterday a new version of the company’s wireless electronic book reader, called Kindle 2. In addition to a sleeker design, the upgraded device has a crisper display, more memory, longer battery life, and a text-to-speech function that allows the device to read words to users. With a cost of $359, a selection of over 230,000 books, and shipping scheduled to start on February 24th, here are
25 Martian Science Fiction reasons why you should consider buying the new Kindle 2 e-reader:

• Gulliver of Mars (1905), by Edwin L. Arnold

• The Forge of Mars (2007), by Bruce Balfour

• The Martian Race (1999), by Gregory Benford

• The Evidence: a Novel (2006), by Austin Boyd

• Thuvia, Maid of Mars (1920), by Edgar Rice Burroughs

• Police Your Planet (1956), by Lester del Rey

• Martian Time-Slip (1964), by Philip K. Dick

• Semper Mars (1998), by Ian Douglas

• Zarlah the Martian (1909), by R. Norman Grisewood

• Marsbound (2008), by Joe Haldeman

• Mars Underground (1997), by William K. Hartmann

• Podkayne of Mars (1963), by Robert A. Heinlein

• The Martian: a Novel (1897), by George Du Maurier

• The Martian War: a Thrilling Eyewitness Account of the Recent Invasion as Reported by Mr. H.G. Wells (2005), by Gabriel Mesta

• Starstrike: Task Force Mars (2007), by Douglas Niles

• Blue Mars (1996), by Kim Stanley Robinson

• Edison's Conquest of Mars (1898), by Garrett P. Serviss

• The Secret Martians (1960), by Jack Sharkey

• In the Courts of the Crimson Kings (2008), by S.M. Stirling

• The Planet Mars and Its Inhabitants: a Psychic Revelation (1922), by Eros Urides

• Red Lightning (2006), by John Varley

• Olympus Mons (2003), by William Walling

• The War of the Worlds (1898), by H. G. Wells

• Stowaway to Mars (1936), by John Wyndham

• First Landing (2001), by Robert Zubrin

According to Amazon's Jeff Bezos, “Our vision is every book ever printed, in any language, all available in less than 60 seconds."

The Science Fictional Mars: a Preview of 2009

2008 was an awesome year for the science fictional Mars. I don't know about you, but I was pleasantly surprised by the vibrancy of the niche. The breadth and depth of the works produced, and the different mediums in which they were published, was truly stunning. From flash fiction and short stories published online to novelettes and novellas sold in e-format, from audiobooks and traditional novels peddled at local bookstores to rare works and classic reprints delivered right to the doorstep, authors, publishers and booksellers provided fans with some memorable reading material in 2008.

And 2009 looks like its going to be another phenomenal year for Martian SF. Here's a preview of just a few of the things that are coming down the canal:

• Paizo Publishing will reprint two classics fans of any generation should enjoy: The Outlaws of Mars (1934, Feb 2009), by Otis Adelbert Kline, and The Sword of Rhiannon (1953, March 2009), by Leigh Brackett.

• Caitlin Kiernan’s novella “Bradbury Weather” will be reprinted by Subterranean Press for her collection A is for Alien (Feb 2009).

• The timeless guy of Sci-Fi, Ray Bradbury, has written a new short story about Mars titled “Fly Away Home.” It will be published in his new collection We’ll Always Have Paris (Feb 2009).

• “Catherine Drewe” (2008), a short story by Paul Cornell, will be reprinted in Science Fiction: The Best of the Year, 2009 Edition (March 2009), a collection selected by SF&F critic Rich Horton.

• The third novel in Phyllis K. Twombly’s Martian Symbiont series is scheduled to be published in early 2009. I haven’t had an opportunity to read her first two books, Been Blued (2007) and Martian Blues (2008), but I’ll be reading the third one.

• John Carter of Mars action figures will go on sale in early 2009, thanks to a recent deal between Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc., and Triad Toys.

• Barry Napier is working on a project titled Birdwatching From Mars. I’m not sure if this is a graphic novel, a comic book, horror, or science fiction, but we’ll learn more about it in early 2009.

• Baen Books will reprint Jerry Pournelle’s novel Birth of Fire (1976). It will be bound with another Pournelle reprint and the two novels will be released under the title Fires of Freedom (May 2009).

• On the film front, we know that independent film maker Steve Weintz is working on The Lost Hieroglyph, a retro sci-fi adventure that will appeal to fans of Burroughs, Brackett and Bradbury. We should get a peak at a trailer in 2009.

• Camille Alexa’s short story “Weird Fruits,” which won the 2008 Marooned Award for Best Short Story, will be reprinted in her collection Push of the Sky (Spring 2009).

• Pyr Books will reprint Ian McDonald’s novel Desolation Road (1988, July 2009). Cool cover. Steampunk?

• Mary Turzillo has been working hard. We may not see her Mars novel in 2009, but her short story "Chocolate Kittens from Mars" will be published in Space and Time magazine. I believe another work,
“Steak Tartare and the Cats of Gari Babakin Station,” is scheduled to be published at some point in Analog magazine, perhaps in 2009.

• Jason Stoddard’s short story “Willpower” (2008) is scheduled to be reprinted by Wyrm Publishing in Unplugged: The Best of Online Fiction (2009), a collection selected by SF&F critic Rich Horton.

• The Empress of Mars (2008), a full-length novel by Kage Baker, will be published by Tor Books as a trade edition hardcover. The limited edition was recently published by Subterranean Press.

• Hopefully, Winterstrike (UK, 2008), the new novel by British author Liz Williams, will be released in the United States.

• I’ll be publishing several more volumes in my “10 Stories you wouldn’t know are Martian Science Fiction” series.

• And in a work of nonfiction, the Foundation Center will be posting the Robert A. and Virginia Heinlein Prize Trust's IRS Form 990-PF for calendar year 2007. Wonder if director's compensation includes free copies of Heinlein's books!

High-altitude holiday gift: Mariner 9 Mars Globe

A few days ago the blog SF Signal had a wonderful suggestion for a holiday gift: a Celestial Globe of the Earth that, when the lights go down, displays the 88 constellations of the night sky in a cool blue hue. Now, the used and rare book site AbeBooks has a listing for another, slightly more expensive, globe that the space entrepreneur, NASA administrator, or planetary adventurer in your family might enjoy as a holiday gift: the Mariner 9 Mars Globe.

Mariner 9 Mars Globe

Description: (MARS - MARINER 9) NASA. The Many Faces of Mars: 16" Visual-Relief Mariner 9 Mars Globe. Chicago, IL (globe); Pasadena, CA (booklet): National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 1973. Original globe, measures 16 inches in diameter, resting on original wooden stand; accompanying quarto booklet, pp. [13], original wrappers. $7500. First edition of the globe produced by NASA incorporating the results of the photography and data collected by the Mariner 9 spacecraft. NASA launched Mariner 9 toward Mars on May 30, 1971. The unmanned spacecraft reached the red planet on November 13 of the same year ... "Mariner 9 exceeded all primary photographic requirements by photo-mapping 100 percent of the planet's surface" (NASA). The crucial findings underpinned the later Viking program. Mariner 9 completed its final transmission on October 27, 1972; this globe and supplement were published in December, 1973. The probe remains in stable orbit around Mars until at least 2022. After analysis of the results of Mariner 9, NASA tentatively selected potential landing sites for the Viking probes which were intended to soft-land instrument packages onto Mars in 1976. NASA selected four potential landing sites for the two Viking probes ... These four sites are indicated on the globe with adhesive decals, as issued (NASA had selected the sites by July, 1973). Small typed label indicating where Viking Lander 1 touched down (most likely affixed by a previous owner). Fine condition.

Price: $7,500

Interestingly, NASA's website appears to have a picture of the same globe, displayed above, which, apparently, the space agency uses
for exhibition purposes. According to NASA, its globe is valued for insurance purposes at $165.

John Carter of Mars action figures due in 2009

The website Action Figure Insider reports that Triad Toys, Inc. of San Jose, California, and Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. of Tarzana, California, have joined forces to bring the John Carter of Mars saga to yet another generation of fans. Here’s a piece of the press release from Triad Toys:

“Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars Saga is hailed as one of the most influential works to define modern sci-fi and fantasy literature. Written almost a century ago, the epic 11 volume series chronicling John Carter’s adventures have thrilled many, many generations of readers. Triad Toys is proud to announce that it has entered into a two-year licensing agreement with Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. to produce a range of collectibles, including 12-inch action figures and statues of all the central characters from the beloved novels. The collectibles will consist of both modernized concepts developed by Triad Toys as well as the classic Burroughs vision of the Mars saga with the first series of figures releasing early 2009.”