A Far Out Fantastic Site

Credit: Pixabay.com Here is another post of Lightning News Flashes! Lightning News Flashes are bits of news in the science fiction and fantasy scene. The news for this post: author Ian McEwan’s response to fans lashing out at his so-called denial of science fiction; a new BBC series of articles about sci fi books that correctly predicted today’s events; an artifact from a classic Universal film based on a classic gothic novel; the Locus Awards. Ian McEwan Says He Was Not Putting Down Sci Fi  Last week , I said it was reported that Ian McEwan was criticised by science fiction fans for denying his newest book, Machines Like Me , being sci fi and implying that the genre was an insignificant form of fiction.   I talked about how that was a misunderstanding on the part of those fans’. Well, this week Wired reported that McEwan himself has admitted that he was misunderstood, that he was not trying to downgrade science fiction and that he was even open to h...

Last week's post was about the Poe house and museum under threat of closure due to lack of funding. I talk about it a little more in my latest Examiner.com article , but not a whole lot, mind you. However, what I do talk about a whole lot more is Poe's science fiction. What? You didn't know Poe wrote science fiction in addition to his many horror stories of the supernatural? Well then you need to read a lot more of his work! I mention a few of Poe's science fiction titles in the article, but you can find more titles by checking Amazon.com for Harold Beaver's The Science Fiction of Edgar Allen Poe and either purchase this collection of Poe's sci fi stories or look at the table of contents in the book's virtual sample pages and see what those titles are. If you go the first route, you'll have a very informing and insightful introduction and commentary by the editor to read. If you go the second route then you can read the stories in a complete wor...

They say the Recession is dying out, and that may be true in a sense, but most of us would agree that we're still seeing the impact. Many of us would agree that we're still feeling the impact! The sad thing is that what has really been getting cut or at least threatened to be cut are many art and literary programs. Many public libraries have had to reduce their hours which has been definitely the case with the one in my town of the Woodland. In addition to libraries, museums have been closing up and that includes the closing of one of Davis, California's Explorit Science Center locations. Further out from my home area of Sacramento--like way, way out--a museum is in danger of having its doors closed and that is the Edgar Allen Poe museum in Baltimore, Maryland. This includes the Father of American horror's house that he resided in when he was alive and living in Baltimore. This would be really sad to see these literary historical sights shut down for eternity and God ...