Leslie Nielsen has died. All the obits are talking about the comic turns he did in AIRPLANE and afterwards, but to me he will always be Commander J.J. Adams, captain of the United Planets cruiser C-57-D on its ill-fated mission to Altair IV in MGM’s classic science fiction film FORBIDDEN PLANET.
Adams was a clear precursor to James T. Kirk. Without FORBIDDEN PLANET, I doubt there would ever have been a STAR TREK.
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The Sunday night preview ran just before the latest episode of BOARDWALK EMPIRE. If you missed it, it can now be viewed on HBO’s GAME OF THRONES site:
http://www.makinggameofthrones.com/
And here’s the same trailer, in its YouTube version:
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And the G-Men won too. What a day…
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For those for you who were not watching HBO tonight (Saturday) here’s the teaser you missed:
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More coming soon. Like real soon. Like tomorrow (Sunday), just before the 8pm (eastern time) movie. So tune in ten minutes early to catch a new promo.
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If you skipped Days of Ice and Fire in the Twin Cities weekend before last — or if you were one of the folks who tried to get there and got caught up in that horrendous Saturday snowstorm — the good folks at Fantasy Flight Games have posted a report and some video highlights of the event. You can find them here:
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=1783
The video clip is also available on YouTube and iTunes.
The event was a great success, as was my Monday night signing at B&N. FFG knows how to throw a party, and I think all the attendees had a good time. I’m told that FFG is going to do it again next year, so mark down November 11-13, 2011 on your calendar for the second annual Days of Ice and Fire.
(No, I don’t know whether I’ll be able to return myself, but FFG will have a special guest there, be it me or someone else. Maybe more than one guest).
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It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’s… yes, actually, it IS a plane. Jetboy’s plane. And a whole bunch of blimps.
WILD CARDS is back. I’m talking volume one, originally published in 1987, the book that introduced a universe of high-flying aces and twisted jokers, and kicked off a series that is still going strong today, twenty-three years later. Tor has just released a reissue of the book in trade paperback format. It went on sale today, and you’ll find it in your favorite local bookstore… most likely, right next to SONGS OF LOVE AND DEATH.
Now, maybe you’re one of the hundreds of thousands of readers who already has a copy of WILD CARDS sitting on your shelf, so you figure you don’t need to snap this one up. Well, you’d be wrong. We didn’t just re-release the original book, we improved it with extra added content — three brand new stories, by Michael Cassutt, David D. Levine, and Carrie Vaughn, covering some of the “lost years” in the Wild Cards timeline. Secret histories and tales untold till now.
The new stories are “Captain Cathode and the Secret Ace” by Michael Cassutt, “Powers” by David D. Levine, and “Ghost Girl Takes Manhattan” by Carrie Vaughn, stellar additions to the original lineup of work from Howard Waldrop, Roger Zelazny, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Walter Jon Williams, Lewis Shiner, Victor Milan, Edward Bryant, Leanne C. Harper, Stephen Leigh, John Jos. Miller, and yours truly. Jetboy, Dr. Tachyon, Fortunato, Yeoman, the Sleeper, Golden Boy, Mark Meadows, Sewerjack and Bagabond, Puppetman, and the Great and Powerful Turtle… they’re all back, and this time they’ve brought friends.
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November’s a big month for me. Look around, and you’ll find my stuff everywhere.
First out was the hardcover of SONGS OF LOVE AND DEATH, the latest crossgenre anthology I’ve edited with Gardner Dozois, featuring seventeen original never-before-published tales of star-crossed lovers, with a lineup that includes fantasy, paranormal romance, and SF, written by some of today’s hottest writers.
The table of contents:
-Jim Butcher, “Love Hurts”
-Jo Beverly, “The Marrying Maid”
-Carrie Vaughn, “Rooftops”
-M.L.N. Hanover, “Hurt Me”
-Cecelia Holland, “Demon Lover”
-Melinda M. Snodgrass, “The Wayfarer’s Advice”
-Robin Hobb, “Blue Boots”
-Neil Gaiman, “The Thing About Cassandra”
-Marjorie M. Liu, “After the Blood”
-Jacqueline Carey, “You and You Alone”
-Lisa Tuttle, “His Wolf”
-Linnea Sinclair, “CourtingTrouble”
-Mary Jo Putney, “The Demon Dancer”
-Tanith Lee, “Under/Above the Water”
-Peter S. Beagle, “Kashkia”
-Yasmine Galenorn, “Man in the Mirror”
-Diana Gabaldon, “A Leaf on the Wind of All Hallows”
If you’re a fan of Harry Dresden, the Kushiel series, the Outlander books, or any of the other featured writers, this is one you’ll want to pick up.
SONGS OF LOVE AND DEATH was released from Pocket Books on November 16, and should be available from your favorite bookstore right now.
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Hiya, kids. Heh, heh, heh.
Olivier as Big Daddy? Well, no, but sort of. Dunk found him annoying. Harry had dealings with him, Jason with a namesake. He’s done Dickens, Shakespeare, Thackeray, Chaucer, and Pratchett, and might have run into our dog as well.
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All of you waiting eagerly for every tidbit of news about the HBO series of GAME OF THRONES, be sure not to miss this week’s issue of ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY, which features a “first look” at the show, with ten exclusive photographs from the set.
The issue is now on sale across the nation at newsstands and bookstores. But grab a copy soon, it may not be there long.
Be warned, the text does contain spoilers for those who have not read the book.
The EW website also features some of same pix at
http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20385926_20442931,00.html
so check that out as well. However, the print edition of the magazine includes some extra pictures that the website does not.
Hope you all enjoy your “set visits” as much as I enjoyed mine.
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Almost caught up on my football. Last night we watched the Giants / Seahawks game.
Holy crap. What a beating. Not exactly the most suspenseful contest we’ve seen this season, but there is a certain rough pleasure in watching your guys just whale the tar out of another team. And it certainly beats being on the losing end of such of a pounding, as the G-Men were several times last year down the stretch.
Honestly, it looked to me as if the Seahawks just stopped playing about halfway through the second quarter. If so, that’s worrisome for you Seattle fans. I remember when Pete Carroll coached the Jets. Only one season. The team just quit on him after the infamous Marino fake spike game. Maybe Carroll really is better suited to the college game.
I have to believe that Seattle is not nearly as bad as they looked. I’d like to believe that the Giants are as good as they looked… but I don’t, not really.
It was a terrific game for Eli and his receivers, though. That long TD pass to Nicks was a thing of beauty, as was the thread-the-needle pass to the double-coevered Kevin Boss. And the RBs kicked some ass too — Ahmad Bradshaw, Brandon Jacobs, even Danny Ware. Though by the time that Ware came in, the ‘Hawks were playing two-handed touch. The Giants D also looked great, though given how quickly the score got lop-sided, we probably should have had more sacks. Poor Whitehurst was passing on almost every play.
Kudos to Tom Coughlin too. To my mind, he coached the blowout exactly right. He took out Eli and the starting RBs right at the beginning of the fourth quarter, and instead of trying to run up the score he just ran the ball straight into the line with Ware for play after play after play to chew up the clock and end the massacre. Even at the end, with the Giants inside the Seahawk ten, he had Rosenfels kneel down four times rather than push in another TD. That, to my mind, is sportsmanship… and stands in sharp contrast to the crap that Evil Little Bill was pulling when he had his 18-1 team and set all those scoring records. Let the other guy leave with a little dignity.
Still have Giants/ Cowboys II and Jets/ Browns to watch. Then we’ll be caught up. But of course there are two new games tomorrow.
Meanwhile, in Westeros, I am wrestling with krakens.
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FWIW, the feature that preceded us in Belfast’s Paint Hall — the medieval comedy YOUR HIGHNESS — now has trailers out on YouTube.
Here’s the longer, raunchier one, for them what like such stuff.
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If you look closely at some of the backgrounds, you’ll catch some glimpses of a throne room… the very one that eventually became the throne room of the Red Keep in our own show, albeit after a major redress. It’s a massive set, entirely filling one of the Paint Hall’s four pods.
Not sure how many of you are interested in such crunchy behind the scenes stuff, but there ’tis for those who are.
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