Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

Author: Sandy Ferber


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Now Wait for Last Year: A virtual compendium of Dick’s pet themes

Now Wait for Last Year by Philip K. Dick

A virtual compendium of many of Philip K. Dick‘s pet themes, tropes and obsessions, Now Wait for Last Year, the author’s 17th published sci-fi novel, originally appeared as a Doubleday hardcover in 1966. (As revealed in Lawrence Sutin’s biography on Dick, the novel was actually written as early as 1963 and rewritten two years later.) Phil was on some kind of a roll at this point in his career, having recently come out with the masterpieces The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch and Dr.


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Film: Zotz!

Zotz! directed by William Castle

Today, the name “Tom Poston” might not resonate with anyone who happens to be younger than those in the baby boom generation. Boomers and their parents will surely remember Poston, however, from his numerous appearances on 1960s game shows such as To Tell the Truth and What’s My Line?, not to mention any number of sitcoms, including The Bob Newhart Show and Newhart. His film appearances, however, were scarce and infrequent, making his comedic turn in producer/director William Castle’s 1962 offering,


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The Black Star Passes: For a very limited crew

The Black Star Passes by John W. Campbell, Jr.

Back in the late 1970s and early ‘80s, some of my favorite reading material, sci-fi-wise, was the wonderful series of 21 “Best of” anthologies put out by Ballantine. In an early indication of my future tastes, my favorites among those 21 collections were those by C.L. Moore, Henry Kuttner, Leigh Brackett, Edmond Hamilton and Philip K. Dick, although to be truthful, I thoroughly enjoyed them all… with one exception.


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Film: The War of the Gargantuas

The War of the Gargantuas: Battle of the Gargantuas Versions

Up until recently, I was probably the only baby-boomer fan of Japanese monster movies (“kaiju-eiga,” I believe they’re called) who had never seen the 1966 Ishiro Honda cult favorite The War of the Gargantuas. Though the film had been lauded by numerous friends and coworkers, and though I have read many good things about it over the years, it has taken me all these many decades to catch up with it. And now that I HAVE finally seen it,


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The New Adam: Of mice and mentation

The New Adam by Stanley G. Weinbaum

Stanley G. Weinbaum was one of the great “what if…” authors in sci-fi history. Perhaps no other writer before or since has been so influential, and shown so much early promise, only to have that budding career cut tragically short. The Kentucky-born author caused a sensation when his very first tale, “A Martian Odyssey,” appeared in the July 1934 issue of Wonder Stories, and its ostrichlike central alien, the unforgettable Tweel, was a true original of its kind. In a flurry of activity,


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Film: The Leech Woman

The Leech Woman: A fun Sci-Fi/Horror outing with a surprising feminist subtext

Coleen Gray, who passed away this week at the age of 92, was an actress best known for her work in the film noir genre, but did dabble on occasion in the sci-fi and horror fields. Here is a review of one of her more sci-fi/horror-oriented projects, the cult item known as The Leech Woman (1960).

On a recent TCM special presentation entitled Cruel Beauty, four great actresses of the film noir genre — Marie Windsor,


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Margaret: A full-blooded swashbuckler

(Fair) Margaret by H. Rider Haggard

Every schoolchild knows that in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. But what about the year before that? Did anything of note happen in 1491? Well, as any reader of H. Rider Haggard‘s 31st novel, Margaret, will discover, the answer is: plenty! Margaret, which Haggard wrote from 1905 – ‘06, was initially published in London in September 1907 under the title Fair Margaret,


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The Invisible Woman: A true delight

The Invisible Woman directed by A. Edward Sutherland

In the original Invisible Man feature of 1933, a biochemist named Jack Griffin had gone homicidally mad after injecting himself with his newly devised invisibility serum, leading to his death at the hands of the British police. Featuring Claude Rains in his first screen role, it was a very serious film, with a bare minimum of humor. In 1940, Universal came out with its belated sequel, perhaps inevitably entitled The Invisible Man Returns. This film featured Vincent Price in his first horror role and was a marvelous follow-up,


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The Starmen of Llyrdis: A small but perfect gem from “The Queen of Space Opera”

The Starmen of Llyrdis by Leigh Brackett

For fans of sci-fi’s Golden Age, it has been a sort of literary guessing game to riddle out which stories were written by Henry Kuttner and which by his wife, C.L. Moore. And this has proved to be no easy task, as the two, as legend goes, were so in rapport that one could pick up in mid-paragraph where the other had left off. But for several reasons, no such difficulty could ever be presented by Golden Age stalwart Edmond “The World Wrecker” Hamilton and his wife,


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Creature With The Atom Brain

Creature With The Atom Brain: It should certainly stimulate YOUR amygdalae

Perhaps no other actor of the late 1940s throughout the ‘50s squared off against as many sci-fi monstrosities on screen as Poughkeepsie, NY-born Richard Denning. In 1948’s Unknown Island, Denning battled a T. rex and other prehistoric nightmares; in Creature From the Black Lagoon (1954), he grappled with the most famous amphibian in cinema history; in Target Earth (also from ’54), his problem was invading aliens and a humongous, lumbering robot; in The Day the World Ended (1955),


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Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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