Christopher Hinz's Blog, page 5
March 12, 2017
Listen up!
BINARY STORM is an audiobook! Check out the spoken-word version by downloading the novel from Audible.co.uk, an Amazon subsidiary. A standalone science-fiction thriller, BINARY STORM is narrated by Todd Boyce and serves as a prequel to the more distant future of the Paratwa Saga (Liege-Killer, Ash Ock and The Paratwa).
February 12, 2017
Falling in love with SF - Part 2
In the 1960s, SF was rather sparse until closer to the end of the decade when the classic 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes appeared. And then, within a decade of those films came the supernova known as Star Wars (Episode IV: A New Hope), which had such a transformative impact on the film industry that it ensures cinematic SF’s popularity to this day.
In the realm of books in the late sixties I discovered two of all my all-time favorites, Frank Herbert’s Dune and Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. Although I’m still awaiting the perfect cinematic adaptation of the former, Tolkien’s opus was well-served by Peter Jackson’s brilliant trilogy. In the seventies I took a detour away from science fiction after discovering horror novels, mainly William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist and the early books of Stephen King. But like being caught in the energy of an irresistible tractor beam, I was always pulled back to the home base, SF.
Like many fans of the genre, there were some preadolescent and teen efforts at writing, although never with the necessary discipline to master the craft. Yet even in my early twenties, during a period when I drifted away from SF, the urge to create was always present. It hovered there in the distance like the cosmic microwave background, that leftover radiation from the big bang.
It was Hollywood that reignited my interest, basically during that two-year span from Lucas’ Star Wars to Ridley Scott’s Alien. I decided it was time to put up or shut up when it came to making the writing dream come true. Finally I got serious enough to compose my first real novel, Anachronisms. It was a flawed work and in its earliest incarnation didn’t sell, but it taught me a lot about the art and craft of storytelling.
Subsequently, I returned to a novel I’d abandoned a few years earlier because it had seemed derivative and uninteresting. But tucked away within that aborted project’s flawed chapters was a relatively minor story element about a murderous creature known as a para-twin, whose consciousness existed simultaneously in two distinct bodies. Para-twin was transmuted into Paratwa and “Liege-Killer” was born, which became my first published novel and gave birth to the universe of the binaries.
And late last year came the publication of Binary Storm, fourth book in the Paratwa Saga (although a prequel to the other three). Today, the very idea of science fiction - writing it, reading it, watching it, relishing it - is an enduring part of my psyche, a transformative facehugger permanently attached.
Life would be unimaginable without it.
In the realm of books in the late sixties I discovered two of all my all-time favorites, Frank Herbert’s Dune and Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. Although I’m still awaiting the perfect cinematic adaptation of the former, Tolkien’s opus was well-served by Peter Jackson’s brilliant trilogy. In the seventies I took a detour away from science fiction after discovering horror novels, mainly William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist and the early books of Stephen King. But like being caught in the energy of an irresistible tractor beam, I was always pulled back to the home base, SF.
Like many fans of the genre, there were some preadolescent and teen efforts at writing, although never with the necessary discipline to master the craft. Yet even in my early twenties, during a period when I drifted away from SF, the urge to create was always present. It hovered there in the distance like the cosmic microwave background, that leftover radiation from the big bang.
It was Hollywood that reignited my interest, basically during that two-year span from Lucas’ Star Wars to Ridley Scott’s Alien. I decided it was time to put up or shut up when it came to making the writing dream come true. Finally I got serious enough to compose my first real novel, Anachronisms. It was a flawed work and in its earliest incarnation didn’t sell, but it taught me a lot about the art and craft of storytelling.
Subsequently, I returned to a novel I’d abandoned a few years earlier because it had seemed derivative and uninteresting. But tucked away within that aborted project’s flawed chapters was a relatively minor story element about a murderous creature known as a para-twin, whose consciousness existed simultaneously in two distinct bodies. Para-twin was transmuted into Paratwa and “Liege-Killer” was born, which became my first published novel and gave birth to the universe of the binaries.
And late last year came the publication of Binary Storm, fourth book in the Paratwa Saga (although a prequel to the other three). Today, the very idea of science fiction - writing it, reading it, watching it, relishing it - is an enduring part of my psyche, a transformative facehugger permanently attached.
Life would be unimaginable without it.
January 30, 2017
Falling in love with SF - Part 1
Science fiction has been a big part of my life since childhood. I was captured early on by the magical gift of reading. But it wasn’t until around the age of eight or nine when, as a Christmas gift, I received Stand by for Mars, that SF began its mind-expanding parade.
Stand by… was the first book in the “Tom Corbett, Space Cadet” series of juveniles based on a primordial American television show (I was too young to have seen the show; it aired in the early 1950s), Tom Corbett and his faithful sidekicks, cadets Roger Manning and Astro, endured thrilling adventures as they explored our solar system and nearby stars. For a youngster with a vivid imagination (not yet cognizant of the disparaging notoriety the term “space cadet” was achieving) the books hit home with synapse-bubbling intensity.
Somewhere in that time frame I also had a relatively short but intense fling with comic books, mainly of the superhero variety. I tended to gravitate to DC’s universe - Marvel was still in the early stages of its Stan Lee/Jack Kirby metamorphosis - and I found Superman, Green Lantern and The Flash enjoyable. But it was really the team comics that took hold, in particular, Justice League of America and Fantastic Four (my sole Marvel fave). Like all too many fans, I had most of the first ten or fifteen issues of both titles but through eventual disinterest, allowed my mom to throw them in the trash, thereby potentially disposing of the cost of a college education or two.
But my #1 fave of that era was a more obscure title: Challengers of the Unknown. A fearsome foursome - Prof, Ace, Red and Rocky - had no superpowers but cheated death on a regular basis by utilizing interlocking skill sets, thus saving the world from alien monsters, malignant humans and other dire threats.
Yet as pleasurable as those early comics were, it was the Tom Corbett novels that really stoked the fire and started a lifelong passion for the genre. Over the years, as my horizons expanded, I waded through rivers of SF novels, enjoying regular jaunts to the Northwest Library, a few blocks from our house in Reading, Pennsylvania, to borrow every SF title I could find.
My Uncle Eddie was a fan and lent me novels from his collection, most memorably, E.E. “Doc” Smith’s famed Lensmen series, originally published in the pulp magazines but later collected into a six-book set. The Lensmen was space opera at its grandest, with millions of alien races aligning with either the “good” Arisians - who developed the lens that gave its users great mental and telepathic abilities - or the power-hungry Eddorians. I’ve often wondered whether George Lucas read Smith’s books at a pivotal age. There are definite parallels to his Star Wars universe.
As my reading prowess grew, I discovered many authors who I later realized constituted the field’s acknowledged masters. Clarke, Heinlein, Bradbury, Asimov and others were rapidly consumed, as was an early favorite, the effervescently strange A. E. Van Vogt. (His “Voyage of the Space Beagle” is an early prototype not only for Star Trek but for the first Alien movie.)
And speaking of movies, my early absorption of written SF was paralleled by an equally potent attraction to genre cinema. The 1950s produced a surfeit of filmed SF, most of which I saw years later on TV. Although their quality tended to be rather low in terms of character-driven storytelling and special effects, the better ones remain impactful to this day, especially The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Thing from Another World and Forbidden Planet.
(Part 2 to follow)
Stand by… was the first book in the “Tom Corbett, Space Cadet” series of juveniles based on a primordial American television show (I was too young to have seen the show; it aired in the early 1950s), Tom Corbett and his faithful sidekicks, cadets Roger Manning and Astro, endured thrilling adventures as they explored our solar system and nearby stars. For a youngster with a vivid imagination (not yet cognizant of the disparaging notoriety the term “space cadet” was achieving) the books hit home with synapse-bubbling intensity.
Somewhere in that time frame I also had a relatively short but intense fling with comic books, mainly of the superhero variety. I tended to gravitate to DC’s universe - Marvel was still in the early stages of its Stan Lee/Jack Kirby metamorphosis - and I found Superman, Green Lantern and The Flash enjoyable. But it was really the team comics that took hold, in particular, Justice League of America and Fantastic Four (my sole Marvel fave). Like all too many fans, I had most of the first ten or fifteen issues of both titles but through eventual disinterest, allowed my mom to throw them in the trash, thereby potentially disposing of the cost of a college education or two.
But my #1 fave of that era was a more obscure title: Challengers of the Unknown. A fearsome foursome - Prof, Ace, Red and Rocky - had no superpowers but cheated death on a regular basis by utilizing interlocking skill sets, thus saving the world from alien monsters, malignant humans and other dire threats.
Yet as pleasurable as those early comics were, it was the Tom Corbett novels that really stoked the fire and started a lifelong passion for the genre. Over the years, as my horizons expanded, I waded through rivers of SF novels, enjoying regular jaunts to the Northwest Library, a few blocks from our house in Reading, Pennsylvania, to borrow every SF title I could find.
My Uncle Eddie was a fan and lent me novels from his collection, most memorably, E.E. “Doc” Smith’s famed Lensmen series, originally published in the pulp magazines but later collected into a six-book set. The Lensmen was space opera at its grandest, with millions of alien races aligning with either the “good” Arisians - who developed the lens that gave its users great mental and telepathic abilities - or the power-hungry Eddorians. I’ve often wondered whether George Lucas read Smith’s books at a pivotal age. There are definite parallels to his Star Wars universe.
As my reading prowess grew, I discovered many authors who I later realized constituted the field’s acknowledged masters. Clarke, Heinlein, Bradbury, Asimov and others were rapidly consumed, as was an early favorite, the effervescently strange A. E. Van Vogt. (His “Voyage of the Space Beagle” is an early prototype not only for Star Trek but for the first Alien movie.)
And speaking of movies, my early absorption of written SF was paralleled by an equally potent attraction to genre cinema. The 1950s produced a surfeit of filmed SF, most of which I saw years later on TV. Although their quality tended to be rather low in terms of character-driven storytelling and special effects, the better ones remain impactful to this day, especially The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Thing from Another World and Forbidden Planet.
(Part 2 to follow)
December 2, 2016
Ebook Special Deal
On Sunday, Dec. 4, LIEGE-KILLER will be available for one day only at the low introductory price of $1.99 from all U.S. retailers. Check here or here for details.
November 8, 2016
November 1, 2016
The "STORM" is here!
BINARY STORM, the brand-new prequel to Liege-Killer and the Paratwa Saga, is now in stock. Trade paperback and ebook versions are available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and most other quality retailers. Published by Angry Robot Books.
September 16, 2016
BINARY STORM: cover art and sample chapter
The STORM is almost here! The cover for BINARY STORM, the new Paratwa Saga novel, is online. Larry Rostant of "Game of Thrones" fame did a terrific job with the noirish and appropriately menacing art. And check out the first chapter on B&N's science fiction/fantasy blog.
September 1, 2016
BINARY STORM update
The cover for BINARY STORM, the Paratwa Saga prequel, is almost finished. It looks apropos to the story, noirish and menacing. The art was done by Larry Rostant, a 2016 nominee for the prestigious Hugo Award for best professional artist. Rostant did the covers for George R.R. Martin’s "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels, better known by their HBO series title, "Game of Thrones".
The cover should be online soon. US, UK and ebook editions of the novel are slated for early November.
The cover should be online soon. US, UK and ebook editions of the novel are slated for early November.
August 1, 2016
Specter of the Krell
For someone who came of age prior to the Internet, I continue to be amazed by the online realm. The invention of the net is a spectacular and far-reaching achievement, quite possibly among humankind’s greatest. Yet for all its capabilities and future promise of connecting every soul in the world, it also serves to empower and amplify our darker emotions.
Forbidden Planet is one of my all-time favorite science-fiction films. Its sixty-year-old special effects don’t compare to the incredible CGI available to contemporary filmmakers and some of its elements are puerile by today’s standards. Yet the movie remains impressive. I first saw it on rerelease years after its 1956 debut and found its story and themes, loosely based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest, more sophisticated than most SF cinema of the era. Gene Roddenberry noted that Forbidden Planet was one of the inspirations for his creation of Star Trek.
The story revolves around a starship crew sent to determine the fate of a colony on the planet Altair IV, which has been out of touch for 20 years. Led by Commander Adams (Leslie Nielsen in his pre-comedic days), the crew finds a survivor, Dr. Morbius, and his engaging daughter, who was born there. Morbius tells Adams that the rest of the colonists, other than his wife who died of natural causes, were destroyed by an invisible “planetary force.”
A series of lethal attacks on the ship and crew by the mysterious force lead to a confrontation between Adams and Morbius, who has discovered the subterranean technology of the Krell, a long-lost civilization. The Krell’s greatest scientific achievement was a mind-over-matter machine that could materialize anything the populace could imagine, but which ended up destroying their entire species over the space of a single night.
Adams has fallen in love with Morbius’ daughter and intends to take her back to Earth. Adams forces Morbius to admit that jealousy over the prospect of losing his daughter, coupled with experimenting too closely with Krell technology, has given his subconscious mind terrible powers. Morbius is the planetary force. He not only unknowingly murdered the colonists because they wanted to leave Altair IV but is responsible for the attacks on Adams and the crew.
That’s the basic plot synopsis. What follows is the point of this recap. Here’s a taste of Adams’ dialogue as he accuses the disbelieving Morbius of being the agent of destruction.
Creation by mere thought… But like you, the Krell forgot one deadly danger. Their own subconscious hate and lust for destruction… And so the mindless beasts of the subconscious had access to a machine that could never be shut down. The secret devil of every soul on the planet all set free at once to loot and maim.
I tend toward a glass-half-full view of the world; it’s an exaggeration to say that the subconscious harbors only the darkest of emotions. Yet Adams’ words have always resonated. I can’t help but see parallels with contemporary civilization.
Today, massive clumps of cynicism-driven anger and fear morph into screeching diatribes, right-wing and left-wing alike, that increasingly clog the flow of rational online discourse. Could the Internet, despite its wondrous capabilities, be the Krell machine that can never be shut down, enabling the secret devil of every soul on the planet to ultimately bring about our collective downfall?
Forbidden Planet is one of my all-time favorite science-fiction films. Its sixty-year-old special effects don’t compare to the incredible CGI available to contemporary filmmakers and some of its elements are puerile by today’s standards. Yet the movie remains impressive. I first saw it on rerelease years after its 1956 debut and found its story and themes, loosely based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest, more sophisticated than most SF cinema of the era. Gene Roddenberry noted that Forbidden Planet was one of the inspirations for his creation of Star Trek.
The story revolves around a starship crew sent to determine the fate of a colony on the planet Altair IV, which has been out of touch for 20 years. Led by Commander Adams (Leslie Nielsen in his pre-comedic days), the crew finds a survivor, Dr. Morbius, and his engaging daughter, who was born there. Morbius tells Adams that the rest of the colonists, other than his wife who died of natural causes, were destroyed by an invisible “planetary force.”
A series of lethal attacks on the ship and crew by the mysterious force lead to a confrontation between Adams and Morbius, who has discovered the subterranean technology of the Krell, a long-lost civilization. The Krell’s greatest scientific achievement was a mind-over-matter machine that could materialize anything the populace could imagine, but which ended up destroying their entire species over the space of a single night.
Adams has fallen in love with Morbius’ daughter and intends to take her back to Earth. Adams forces Morbius to admit that jealousy over the prospect of losing his daughter, coupled with experimenting too closely with Krell technology, has given his subconscious mind terrible powers. Morbius is the planetary force. He not only unknowingly murdered the colonists because they wanted to leave Altair IV but is responsible for the attacks on Adams and the crew.
That’s the basic plot synopsis. What follows is the point of this recap. Here’s a taste of Adams’ dialogue as he accuses the disbelieving Morbius of being the agent of destruction.
Creation by mere thought… But like you, the Krell forgot one deadly danger. Their own subconscious hate and lust for destruction… And so the mindless beasts of the subconscious had access to a machine that could never be shut down. The secret devil of every soul on the planet all set free at once to loot and maim.
I tend toward a glass-half-full view of the world; it’s an exaggeration to say that the subconscious harbors only the darkest of emotions. Yet Adams’ words have always resonated. I can’t help but see parallels with contemporary civilization.
Today, massive clumps of cynicism-driven anger and fear morph into screeching diatribes, right-wing and left-wing alike, that increasingly clog the flow of rational online discourse. Could the Internet, despite its wondrous capabilities, be the Krell machine that can never be shut down, enabling the secret devil of every soul on the planet to ultimately bring about our collective downfall?
