Sandman Slim sequels

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Richard Kadry, author of Sandman Slim (my review) and it’s sequel Kill the Dead (on my list to read soon), has signed on to write a few more sequels:

Richard Kadrey’s Sandman Slim series will continue with a second trilogy after the third book, Aloha From Hell, comes out. And Kadrey’s new deal with the newly global Harper Voyager will get his books into the U.K. as well.

Red Dwarf coming back

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Long time BBC comedy science fiction series Red Dwarf (which ended in 1999) is scheduled to come back to BBC sometime next year:

in 2009, Freeview channel Dave commissioned three new episodes of the programme to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the show.
And the episode gained record viewings for the channel when they aired over the Easter Break, attracting more viewers than BBC2 and Channel 4 combined.
Now it seems that the unprecedented success of the comeback show Red Dwarf: Back to Earth has led to a new series being commissioned bringing much loved characters including Lister, the Cat and Rimmer back to our screens.

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

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Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s novel The Shadow of the Wind was a huge bestseller in his native Spain after it was published in 2001. When it was translated to English a few years later, it became a huge bestseller in the England. What the beginning of the story reminded me of was the story Calliope from Neil Gaiman’s Sandman collection Dream Country. In the story Morpheus punished a man by giving him endless ideas and one of them was a man who got a library card to the library at Alexandria. While that’s not exactly what happens here, it is very close. The book is a gothic mystery book that revolves around books and a mysterious writer whose books have been mysteriously removed from the world…except when our protagonist finds one. And what happens next?

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DC Comics dropping CCA…finally

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Jim Lee posted on the DC Comics blog that DC Comics will finally be dropping the Comics Code Authority Seal:

As of January 2011, DC Comics titles will no longer carry the Comics Code Authority Seal of Approval. In 2011, DC Comics will employ a rating system consistent with that of the rest of the industry, as well as with our digital releases, which already utilize a rating system. As for our Vertigo comic books, they will not utilize the rating system, because they will continue to be labeled as “For Mature Readers”.

Click through to see the new ratings

2010 Philip K Dick Award Nominees

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The nominees for 2010’s Philip K Dick Award were announced today:

YARN by Jon Armstrong (Night Shade Books)
CHILL by Elizabeth Bear (Ballantine Books/Spectra)
THE REAPERS ARE THE ANGELS by Alden Bell (Henry Holt & Co.)
SONG OF SCARABAEUS by Sara Creasy (Eos)
THE STRANGE AFFAIR OF SPRING HEELED JACK by Mark Hodder (Pyr)
HARMONY by Project Itoh, translated by Alexander O. Smith (Haikasoru)
STATE OF DECAY by James Knapp (Roc)

I haven’t read any of these books (although I do have Harmony on hold at the library), but I always enjoys best of or award lists as they give me additional books to check out.

Spider-Man: With Great Power by David Lapham and Tony Harris

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When I reviewed Stray Bullets a couple weeks ago (review), I mentioned that Lapham had stopped working on Stray Bullets to do mainstream work (due to higher pay). Spider-Man: With Great Power is one of the books Lapham worked on. It is an out of continuity look into the beginning of Spider-Man’s career. It mentions briefly the the spider bite and stops before Uncle Ben dies which basically leaves his glorious wrestling career as the subject of this 5 issue series. That’s right, we have five issues dealing with Spider-Man’s wrestling career. So, how did Lapham and Harris do?

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James Ellroy’s LA: City of Demons

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The ID network (which apparently stands for Investigative Discovery) has a new series coming out: James Ellroy’s LA: City of Demons. It starts tomorrow (1/19) night and is scheduled to run through at least the end of February. The first episode deals with The Black Dahlia (the murder, not his great book or the bad movie) and Ellroy’s mother’s murder (as well as a couple recent murders) and Ellroy is off from there with Lana Turner, Confidential Magazine, LA Police, LA Gangs and a whole lot of other things you only read about in Ellroy’s LA Quartet (and you did read them didn’t you?).

It should be a fun ride.

The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang

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The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang is full of interesting ideas. It’s a long term look at non human virtual creatures (kind of a cross between Sims and tamagotchis) and what happens to them when the initial excitement has worn off. Chiang has thrown out dozens of ideas in this book, but he doesn’t do a great job pulling them together into a story. So, what is the story about?

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