A Far Out Fantastic Site

Credit: Pixabay I apologise for another late posting but there was a birthday in the family on Saturday and I wasn’t able to get this post done in time.  To me science fiction is not only fun entertainment but also a warning against dangerous futures and an encouragement for hopeful ones. Dystopian science fiction does a lot of the former, or at least the good ones do. Yet it’s too easy, especially with blockbuster films, to look at science fiction too much as escapist entertainment and not enough for the warnings it poses. An example of this is the controversy over the new TV series that debuts September 26, "Ring Nation”. There’s been a lot of concern that shows like this blur the demarcation line between entertainment and reality which is something that much science fiction literature, film and television have warned against. They are warnings that we mustn’t take too lightly.  The ’Ring Nation’ Controversy "Ring Nation" is a new reality TV series by Amazon and MGM th...

 It's the first Wednesday of the month and so it’s time for another Insecure Writer’s Support Group (IWSG) post! In an IWSG post, we writers bring our writing challenges and problems out into the open to share with each other and try to offer solutions. I’ll be open about it right now: I’m going to keep this post short because I’m writing it at the last minute and the extreme heat wave my area has been getting has been wearing me out and so I’ve been trying to get to bed a little earlier. I don’t have time to take an afternoon siesta (nap) on the weekdays like they do in Spain and Latin America when the weather is extremely hot. In this post I’m going to stick to answering the September optional question and commemorate a famous author who unfortunately passed away recently.  Question of the Month The optional question for September is: What genre would be the worst one for you to tackle and why? For me there are actually two genres that I would not try writing in because th...

Credit: Tor Books The fourth weekend of the month, when we normally have our Book-To-Movie review has passed us again. However, the review is still on! This month I have a guest blogger for our Book-To-Movie review. The two of us agreed to trade our book-to-movie reviews and present them to you today, this last Monday of the month. In a Book-To-Movie, we review a work of prose fiction and its movie adaptation.  And my guest blogger and reviewer is Alex Cavanaugh. Alex is the author of the Cassa series  of novels and founder of the Insecure Writers' Support Group ! Here at the Fantastic Site, he’s reviewing a best-selling novel of detective horror, "Relic", and its movie adaptation. In turn, at his site, I have the pleasure of reviewing "The Black Phone" short story by Joe Hill and its movie adaptation. So, after you're finished reading Alex’s awesome review, please leave a comment for him in the box below and then head on over to his website to check out my...

Credit: Pixabay Updated on 8/26/2022, 7:25 PM, PT I apologise for another late post, but I got a late start over the weekend.  As much as I am a vampire fan, especially of Dracula, I realised only a few days ago that this year marks the 100th anniversary of “Nosferatu”. Its actual anniversary day was back in February but the media’s celebration of it seems to continue. “Nosferatu” is the German Expression film interpretation of Bram Stoker’s “Dracula”, predating nearly 10 years before Bela Lugosi’s interpretation of the all-time famous vampire. That said, it’s one of the oldest vampire films. Even so, it’s been seen by many, especially during its time, as a rip-off of the plot to Stoker’s historically famous vampire novel.  Although the bald vampire in this film is not as popularly iconic as Bela Lugosi’s slicked back hair-do version, it’s still been an icon among goths and hardcore horror fans. So, in honour of this film, I decided to dedicate tonight’s post to it. I didn’t m...

 It's the first Wednesday of the month and so it’s time for another Insecure Writer’s Support Group (IWSG) post! In an IWSG post, we writers bring our writing challenges and problems out into the open to share with each other and try to offer solutions. This month we have the question of the month here at the Fantastic Site and I have a few details about my story in progress (SIP) which will be included in my upcoming book of short fiction.  Question of the Month The question for August 3 is: When you set out to write a story, do you try to be more original or do you try to give readers what they want? My answer to that, is that when I write a story, I don't so much try to be more original as I try to write sincerely. That means when I write I often develop the story from an idea that I had jottted down in my journal way before hand as it came to me. To me it appears to be an original idea because if it didn't I wouldn't have bothered jotting it down (at least not for ...

  Credit: Pixabay.com Our Book-To-Movie review  is usually on the fourth weekend of the month but, as I said in the last post , we had to postpone it to the fifth weekend. On top of that, an emergency came up over the weekend and so I had to postpone the review to today (Monday) which I apologise for. Yes, we are going into August with July’s Book-To-Movie but don’t worry. It will not substitute for August’s. There will be a Book-To-Movie for this month for sure because I have agreed to do one as a guest blogger which the other blogger wants it posted later than the fourth weekend of the month, so, again, it will be moved to a little after the fourth weekend. I’ll give you more details about it when we get closer to that time.  In a Book-To-Movie, we review a work of prose fiction and its movie adaptation. And this post we have another Stephen King horror book and movie! H.P. Lovecraft was one of Stephen King’s greatest influences as he’s been with many other horror autho...

Credit: Pixabay This is the weekend that we usually have our Book-To-Movie review, but I'm postponing it until next weekend. I was spending all day yesterday racking by brain dead while doing my state sales and use tax return, which in California is due at the beginning of each fiscal year. So, I was worn out totally by the evening. I couldn't keep focused or even awake to work on the current story in progress for my upcoming short fiction collection, "Bad Apps". So, I've been working on it this evening to make up for the lost time. However, I didn't want to leave you without a blog post this weekend since last weekend’s already got delayed to the middle of the week (too long of a delay for a weekly blog). So, I wanted to do at least a short post for this week, one that will tell you how you can get a free, pre-release edition of "Bad Apps"! And you can do that by being a volunteer beta reader! How You Can Volunteer as a Beta Reader for ‘Bad Apps’ ...