Jared Shurin's Blog, page 14

'Ghost with a Knife' (1977)

"Ghost with a Knife" from CBS Radio Mystery Theatre, originally aired on Dec. 16, 1977. Listen along here.

Thoughts Before Listening

I am going to listen to something called Ghost with a Knife because ghosts are scary and knives are scary so this should be scary as heck, right? I DON���T KNOW! I GUESS!! Now here are some questions regarding this radio drama, raised by Illustrious Acquaintance and an assortment of friends who would be very offended to hear me refer to them as friends (WE COUL...

Jane Gaskell, First Lady of the Weird

Her books feature gorgeous settings, icy protagonists; batshit worlds and beautiful words. Strange plots and great prose... welcome to the Weird!

Disclaimer

There are no Gaskell ebooks, because life is cruel. Fortunately, super-cheap Amazon Marketplace copies aren���t hard to find, and you can build out your Gaskell collection for a few bucks. Two problems though. First, the naming/editions can be annoying, especially in the Atlan series, so use ISFDB to make sure you���re getting the right...

SPFBO2017: The Finalists Reviewed (All of 'em!)

We're participating in the Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off. You can learn more about what this means (and how the finalists are doing) here. And follow the various stages of our process here.

I think I'm going to follow up in a week or two with a wibbly 'WHAT I LEARNED' post, and talk about my SPFBO experience(s) a bit more as a whole [UPDATE: Nyah.]. It has been a lot of fun, very enlightening - I've read a lots that covered the whole spectrum of quality - and learned a fair amount about wha...

'I wish I could've been in Alien': An interview with Mark Hamill (1980)

[He hates the word 'genre', loves Alien and makes poop jokes. This 1980 interview between Empire Strikes Back-era Mark Hamill and Starburst reaffirms why we love the guy so much. -- PK]

I asked him if being a fan of the genre meant that working on the Star Wars films was a real pleasure for him.

Yeah, it really is. I've done a lot of work on different television shows that I wouldn't allow to be beamed into my house but they were just jobs I did as an actor. But luckily for me I love to work...

Mary Stewart, Storyteller; Possible Wizard

To my mind there are really only two kinds of novels, badly written and well written. Beyond that, you cannot categorize��� ���Storyteller��� is an old and honorable title and I���d like to lay claim to it.

Mary Stewart (1916 - 2014) is a British novelist, known for her significant contributions to multiple genres. She was of the most prominent - and critically-acclaimed - creators of the romantic thriller. Stewart then went on to write the Merlin trilogy, a best-selling blend of history a...

Star Wars: The Last Jedi

I promised myself I���d keep this review spoiler-free. Though frankly, at this point I���m not even sure why; if the opening weekend box-office take is anything to go by, pretty much everyone in the Western world has seen this film. Hell, I bet even those aliens buzzing fighter pilots over the Pacific have seen it.

And even if you haven���t, unless you���re living under a rock on Jakku, you���ve been so bombarded with hackneyed merchandising that you might as well have. In which case, just g...

5 Possibly Controversial Star Wars Opinions

1. The Ewoks are fine.

The Nerdcore is really into the idea that The Empire Strikes Back is the best Star Wars original trilogy films, and Return of the Jedi is the worst, and that's primarily because of the Ewoks, which are the official worst thing in the entire original trilogy. Seriously, everyone fucking hates the ewoks. And I get it!

My dudes, there are many worse things in the original trilogy than the Ewoks. These things include but are not limited to: the Sarlaac pit, which doesn't ma...

Ban Fiction: 'The Empire Cashes Back' by Mazin Saleem

���I shan���t thank you for coming to see me. Your report stated, bragged even, that you���d chosen to use the proper channels rather than - what exactly? I didn���t know any improper channels still existed. No don���t look worried, I���d been meaning anyway to have this chat.

���You���ve questioned our spending over - forget the last quarter - the last four decades. Implied, a question of priorities. You���ve stated, with I detect some polite horror, that the first station cost 10 trillion,...

4 Kids Walk Into a Bank: Childhood is short, brutal and hilarious

The age where your creativity and the ability to realise said creativity meets must be somewhere in your 30s.

I know this because the rolling wave of nostalgia in TV and film has now firmly hit the 80s and doesn���t look like it���s going to be moving on for a while.

Both Netflix���s nostalgia-fuelled Stranger Things and the latest adaptation of Stephen King���s It with it���s ���updated��� 1980s setting are proving to be big hits. The world of comics, never a stranger to nostalgia, is fron...

M.A.R. Barker, Emperor of the Petal Throne

There are worlds and there are worlds, and, even amongst the latter, T��kumel stands out.

Gary Gygax, a man who knew a bit about fantasy worlds, called T��kumel ���the most beautifully done fantasy world ever created���. He even went on to say that its creator, M.A.R. Barker is, with the exception of Tolkien, ���completely without peer���. D&D���s co-creator, Dave Arneson, also cites T��kumel as his favourite world. (Probably the last thing those two ever agreed on.)

Barker was a professor,...