Nailer is a ship breaker, one of those who make their living from scavenging the ships left over from the Accelerated Age. That was a time when oil, metal, resources in general were abundant. Things are different now, and for … Continue reading
future
The future…
Sometimes a wonderful land, sometimes a dystopia. Sometimes in the past, because if the book was written in the 60s but set in the 90s then it is both set in the future and the past, or at least that’s how I sees it, and this is my blog, so that’s the way it is.
3 August 2011
Call no: 800
Genre: sff
Setting: future, USA - Denver
5 Stars
4 Comments
Flashback by Dan Simmons
It is the year 2036 and the world is in ruins. The United States of America, in particular, is one of those once-great countries that have fallen off the rails. Their army now fights for Indian & Japanses paymasters, the population that is left is increasingly turning to drugs to drown the pain. Flashback is the drug most use to numb themselves, it allows users to revisit any one of their memories, to relive a former life of happiness.
Nick Bottom is an addict. He is also an ex-policeman. Before his wife died in a car crash he was a pretty good cop. But then grief took him, and now he spends all the time he can using flashback to live his happily married days over. Never mind that he has a sixteen year old son who needs him. His addiction gor him kicked off the force. Got him abandoning his son to the care of his grandfather. But now one of the powerful Japanese billionaires who run America has taken an interest in Nick, he wants Nick to reopen an old investigation.
25 July 2011
Call no: 800
Genre: sff
Setting: future
8 Stars
3 Comments
Deadline by Mira Grant
Newsflesh book 2
It is alwasy difficult to blurb about the second book in a series. Giving the details of the start of this book will reveal the end of Feed, and that would be just plain mean, so I’m not going to do that. Instead I’ll just say you should read book one and then go pick this one up, and then wait, with me, because book three isn’t out yet :(
10 June 2011
Call no: 800
Genre: sff
Setting: future
9 Stars
7 Comments
Feed by Mira Grant
It is 2039 and Georgia & Shaun Mason are up and coming bloggers. Solid betas they are on the look out for the story that will enable them to break away and start their own site, their own identity. And they are about to get their big break, because presidential hopeful Senator Ryman is about to start campaigning for the Republican nomination. And the Masons are going to be part of his media circus.
Oh, and did I mention the zombies?
10 April 2011
Genre: sff
Setting: Dorset, future
2 Stars
3 Comments
Son of heaven by David Wingrove
9781848875258 #1 in the Chung Kuoseries A thin layer of mist wreathed the meadows all the way to reeds that traced the meandering path of the river. It is the year 2064, twenty years or so since The Collapse, which … Continue reading
Pretties by Scott Westerfeld
In the world of Uglies once you turn sixteen you also get to turn “pretty”. That is you undergo surgery that’ll get rid of all your old imperfections and instead make you beautiful according to the conventions of evolution and society. In book one Tally was the last of her friends to turn sixteen, and so was left alone when they all turned Pretty and moved to Pretty-town.
Spoiler warning for book one in effect.
13 February 2011
Call no: 800
Genre: sff
Setting: future
2 Stars
4 Comments
The Stainless Steel Rat omnibus by Harry Harrison
When I spotted this in Chapters bookshop I knew I had to buy it, if only because it is the inspiration for Carl’s blog. Plus, you know, it is one of those sci-fi adventures that you really should have at least flicked through at some stage.
Slippery Jim is our narrator, and our hero, of sorts. He is also the Stainless Steel Rat, or at least that is how he describes himself. Slipping through the technological world and committing many daring acts of thievery and innumerable cons. Safe and secure in the knowledges that his wits, charm and logic will get him out of danger. Until, that is, he is caught. The Special Corps, so special that no one is really sure they exist until, of course, they catch you, succeed in arresting him. But instead of throwing him in jail, or punishing him they offer him a job. Come and work for them. So he does, after all, he was never a bad man, just one who wanted his bit of freedom.
6 January 2011
Cast: Garrett Hedlund, Jeff Bridges, Olivia Wilde
Script: Adam Horowitz, Edward Kitsis
Genre: sff
Setting: future, virtual reality
5 Stars
4 Comments
Tron: Legacy directed by Joseph Kosinski
As a person who has never seen Tron I may be the wrong person to review this film. But then again, I’m sure I’m not alone, so here goes :) Some twenty years ago Sam Flynn’s father went to work … Continue reading
11 November 2010
Call no: 800
Genre: Juv/YA, sff
Setting: future
4 Comments
Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
Tally Youngblood is an Ugly. All her friends have gone off and become Pretties, but she is the youngest, and eagerly awaiting her 16th birthday so that she can join them. But before she reaches that magical age she meets a new friend, Shay, who tells her about a mysterious boy called David, and the notion that some people don’t want to be made Pretty. To Tally this is insane. Science and evolution prove that people like beauty. And back in the “Rusties” day, when they weren’t able to make people pretty there was so much discrimination just over the way people lived. She’ll never go off looking for the Smoke. She’ll stay in the city, and become Pretty, just like all her friends.
Of course, if she did then this book wouldn’t have much of a plot now would it?
26 October 2010
Cast: Harry Dean Stanton, Ian Holm, John Hurt, Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerritt, Veronica Cartwright
Script: Dan O'Bannon, Ronald Shusett
Genre: horror, sff
Setting: future, space
6 Comments
Alien directed by Ridley Scott
Dir. Ridley Scott
Can you believe that this film is 31 years old? Thirty one years old. That’s as old as I am. And yet it is still as effective as ever. And perfect for the RIP’s Peril on the Screen.
You probably all know the plot; a commercial space vessel’s crew is woken from cryo-sleep midway through their journey home. The ship’s computer has picked up a transmission that may be an SOS call. As they investigate they find an abandoned ship but suffer an attack on a crew member. They retreat to their own ship, carrying their injured member, and ignoring quarantine procedures, they undergo treatment from the science officer. And then things begin to go wrong…