Alan Baxter's Blog, page 112

Great little review

I just got this through Twitter:

@Alan Baxter: Just finished Realm Shift. Found it to be a phenomenal piece of dark fiction. Loved its view of religions/reality.

Brilliant praise in 140 characters or less. She called it "phenomenal" which makes me all fuzzy inside.

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It's Easter – time for Christian hypocrisy

It would be funnier if it wasn't so fucking tragic, but you can always get a laugh when the Christian bigwigs come out with their Easter messages. My favourite so far this year is this one from Anthony Fisher, the new Archbishop of Parramatta (NSW, Australia):

"Last century we tried godlessness on a grand scale and the effects were devastating," he said.

"Nazism, Stalinism, Pol-Pottery, mass murder and broken relationships: all promoted by state-imposed atheism or culture-insinuated...

Crazy little short film

I picked this up over on S F Signal and liked it. See what you think.

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Offensively, brilliantly true

This is highly offensive and also highly correct. It is also highly pertinent in this internet age of laziness. If rude words offend, don't read it.

Edit: I didn't make this. I neglected to mention that I stole it from here.

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First Novel Sales: The Data from Writer Beware

Writer Beware is a publishing industry watchdog group sponsored by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America with additional support from the Mystery Writers of America. They've recently posted some data on their blog about the advances recieved for first novel sales and many other related facts and figures.

In the piece they ask some very pertinent questions:

What's the average advance for a first novel? How long does it take the typical first novel to sell? Do most first novelists...

"Battlefield Earth" officially the suckiest movie ever

This month, Battlefield Earth, an absolute bomb of a movie based on the novel by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, won the Golden Raspberry Award, or Razzie, for "Worst Movie of the Decade." J.D. Shapiro, the film's (first) screenwriter, who also wrote the screenplay for Robin Hood: Men in Tights, has subsequently written an open letter via The New York Post to apologise. His article opens:

Let me start by apologizing to anyone who went to see "Battlefield Earth."

Clearly anything as...

Ah, the juvenile fun of it all

My mate James pointed this out to me and I did laugh. There's been some news lately about the Vienna Boys' Choir. To quote the Times Online:

The most famous choir in the world has been caught up in the wave of paedophile scandals sweeping Germany and Austria, with eight former choristers denouncing their teachers in the past few days.

This stuff is just hideous and not at all funny. But this particular article is hilarious when you read the byline.

Vienna Boys' Choir caught up in sex abuse...

District 9 – review

I'm behind the times on this one, but I missed District 9 when it went round the cinema circuit. However, having picked up the DVD recently, I finally got to see it and find out what all the prawn fuss was over. There'll be spoilers later, but I'll give you fair warning.

District 9 is a very imaginative and original sci-fi movie. A massive spaceship breaks down over Johannesburg in 1985 and nothing happens. After three months of wondering, the humans finally fly up there in choppers and cut...

By the power of the Plastic Fork Dragon

This has very little to do with this blog, other than there are dragons in many of my stories. And the spec fic stories of others. Fuck it, that's all the excuse I need. Frankly, I just want this totally awesome dragon on my website.

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Print version of A 'Verse Full Of Scum

I'm planning to make a print version of my novella Ghost Of The Black: A 'Verse Full Of Scum available through Blade Red Press. The novella is free online here at The Word and it's currently free as an ebook over at Smashwords.

I'm going to add a price to that ebook at Smashwords, probably just US$1 or something like that, and the print version will be POD via Amazon for under US$10. This is as much for my own benefit as anyone else's – I want to have a hard copy of the story on my shelf...