Here’s a convention panel from Readercon 2011 entitled “Capturing the Hidden History of Science Fiction.” It was recorded back in July 2011 and the panelists include Fred Lerner, Barry N. Malzberg, Jamie Todd Rubin, Darrell Schweitzer and Eileen Gunn. Apparently one of the panelists objected to it’s existence on YouTube, but it’s up and online again.
[via SFSignal]
Posted by Jesse Willis
THE CHALLENGE:
This is our 6th Annual SFFaudio Challenge. Every November 11th, for the last six years, we’ve offered the following challenge to SFFaudio readers:
“We’ll give you an audiobook if you make one for everyone else.”
That deal still holds. We’ll get you an audiobook if you make make an audiobook out of one of the public domain etexts we suggest. All you’ll need to do is claim a title (by email), record the audiobook, using your own human voice (sorry no robots), and follow the rules (see the first comment of this post for the rules). Some titles will not be public domain in all countries, but this is a global challenge. We’ve also added, for the very first time, a French language title!
Still feeling a little unclear on how it all works? Then have a look at our past SFFaudio CHALLENGES:
|OUR FIRST CHALLENGE|
|OUR SECOND CHALLENGE|
|OUR THIRD CHALLENGE|
|OUR FOURTH CHALLENGE|
|OUR FIFTH CHALLENGE|
PRIZES:
This year we’re doing something a bit different with prizes, something better. Instead of offering those unwieldy physical copies we’ve got DRM-FREE MP3 downloads for you! This not only saves us on postage it also allows for a much greater selection of audiobooks! For each audiobook you complete, you can choose one of more than 1,300 titles available! All prizes this year come courtesy of Tantor Media.
CHALLENGE TITLES:
The Friendly Demon (aka The Devil Frolics With A Butler) by Daniel Defoe |HORRORMASTERS|PDF| (short story)
Seventh Victim by Robert Sheckley |PDF| (short story)*
CLAIMED BY CAINE DORR NOVEMBER 12, 2011
Untouched By Human Hands (aka One Man’s Poison) by Robert Sheckley |PDF| (short story)*
Writing Class by Robert Sheckley |RTF| (short story)*
CLAIMED AND COMPLETED BY WILLIAM COON (of Elquoent Voice) ON NOVEMBER 13, 2011
The Purple Cloud by M.P. Shiel |GUTENBERG| (novel)
City At World’s End by Edmond Hamilton |ARCHIVE.ORG| (novel)
The Common Man by Mack Reynolds |GUTENBERG| (short story)
The Ship Of Ishtar by A. Merritt |GUTENBERG AUSTRALIA| (novel)
Supernatural Horror In Literature by H.P. Lovecraft |WIKISOURCE|GUTENBERG AUSTRALIA| (essay)
Almuric by Robert E. Howard |WIKILIVRES|GUTENBERG AUSTRALIA| (novel)
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell |GUTENBERG AUSTRALIA| (novel)
Animal Farm by George Orwell |GUTENBERG AUSTRALIA| (novel)
Empire by Clifford D. Simak |GUTENBERG| (novel)**
CLAIMED BY BILL KIRBY ON JANUARY 3, 2012
The Great Potlatch Riots by Allen Kim Lang |GUTENEBERG| (short story)
The Dominion In 1983 by Ralph Centennius |GUTENBERG| (30 pages)
Ten From Infinity by Paul W. Fairman |GUTENBERG| (novel)
CLAIMED BY KAREN SAVAGE ON NOVEMBER 11, 2011
No Great Magic by Fritz Leiber |GUTENBERG| (short story)
CLAIMED BY DANIEL GURZYNSKI ON NOVEMBER 21, 2011
The Syndic by C.M. Kornbluth |RTF| (novel)*
CLAIMED BY MARK NELSON ON NOVEMBER 13, 2011
Our first French audiobook:
La Vie Électrique by Albert Robida |GUTENBERG| (novel)
So, who wants to sign up?
[*With special thanks to Rick Jackson of Wonder Publishing for selection advice **This etext was part of SFFaudio Challenge #2, but wasn’t completed]
Posted by Jesse Willis
I was curious about which of our podcasts was popular. Since it’s relatively easy, and I’m always interested in other podcaster’s podcasts statistics, I thought I’d reveal ours. Maybe this post will prompt some others to post theirs too.
Here is a list of SFFaudio’s single most popular podcast per month (by download) from January 2011 to October 2011.
Jan. (1216 Downloads) – #089 – Jesse talks to Professor James Campanella |MP3|
Feb. (3088 Downloads) – #094 READALONG: Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift |MP3|
Mar. (2700 Downloads) – #097 READALONG: The Garden Of Forking Paths by Jorge Luis Borges and Fair Game by Philip K. Dick |MP3|
Apr. (1267 Downloads) – #102 Scott Jesse and Tamahome talk about new releases |MP3|
May (1258 Downloads) – #109 AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: The Hanging Stranger by Philip K. Dick |MP3|
Jun. (1390 Downloads) – #112 AUDIOBOOK: The Marching Morons by C.M. Kornbluth |MP3|
Jul. (2190 Downloads) – #116 READALONG: The Space Merchants by Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth |MP3|
Aug. (3740 Downloads) – #105 – AUDIOBOOK: The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell |MP3|
Sep. (7417 Downloads) – #105 – AUDIOBOOK: The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell |MP3|
Oct. (7480 Downloads) – #105 – AUDIOBOOK: The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell |MP3|
As you can see, for the last three months our single most popular download has been the exact same show. It is a complete and unabridged reading of Richard Connell’s The Most Dangerous Game. This show, which came out on April 25, 2011, has been downloaded about 22,000 times so far. That makes it one of our most popular (if not the most popular shows’s we’ve ever done). It is however a bit of an anomaly. This is due to the fact that The Most Dangerous Game is commonly assigned in schools. Almost all of the rest of the credit should go to the most excellent narrator, William Coon, who recorded it – go check out his site he has many other excellent audiobooks too.
If we exclude that episode from the last three months we get the following results:
Aug. (1939 Downloads) – #120 Scott, Jesse and Tamahome talk to Infinivox editor Allan Kaster |MP3|
Sep. (2006 Downloads) – #126 AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: The Statement Of Randolph Carter by H.P. Lovecraft |MP3|
Oct. (1892 Downloads) – #128 Scott, Jesse, Tamahome and Luke Burrage talk about new releases and recent arrivals |MP3|
Looking at just the most popular downloads I’m pleased to see that nearly all of our kinds of shows are represented. READALONG, AUDIOBOOK, and even regular discussion podcasts are all popular. Our listeners all have great and eclectic tastes it would seem.
For a complete listing of all our past shows go HERE.
And for other podcasters (and anyone else who cares) here is the raw data on our top ten downloads for each month (January 2011 to October 2011):
Posted by Jesse Willis
Our friend, and narrator, William Coon has a wonderful new collection of C.M. Kornbluth short stories available through OverDrive, NetLibrary and Audible.
The Little Black Bag and Other Stories
By C.M. Kornbluth; Read by William Coon
WMA, MP3 or Audible Download – Approx. 4 Hours 2 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Eloquent Voice
Published July 15, 2011
ISBN: 9780983089865 (retail), 9780983089865 (library)
Although C.M. Kornbluth died an untimely death at age 34, in his short career he managed to write dozens of short stories and a number of novels, often collaborating with other writers. The five stories in this collection are all his own, and show a writer at the height of his powers. In “The Little Black Bag” (1950) a disgraced physician finds salvation in a high tech doctor’s bag that has inadvertently been transported from the future. “The Altar at Midnight” (1952) explores an unintended consequence of space flight, where astronauts become physically deformed by their work in space, thus making them outcasts back on Earth. “MS Found in a Chinese Fortune Cookie” (1957) presents a humorous tale of a writer who finds enlightenment but ends up in an insane asylum. “The Adventurer” (1953) is a tale of political intrigue, in a future where our Republic has become a dynasty for one ruling family. In “The Marching Morons” (1951), a follow-up to “The Little Black Bag,” a 20th Century man awakes in a distant future, where intelligence has been mostly bred out of humanity.
Here’s an interesting sounding mini-collection from a small publisher never before mentioned on SFFaudio…
A Dollar for Your Soul and The Vision Vine
By Earl Vickers; Read by Derrick Barrett
1 CD or Download – Approx. 60 Minutes [UNABRIDGED?]
Publisher: 3Daudioscapes.com
Published: 2010
Featured in this collection are two short stories, “A Dollar for Your Soul” and “The Vision Vine” “A Dollar For Your Soul” – Based on a true story about a high-school soul-selling pyramid scheme, this story is a timeless look at Ponzi schemes and the madness of crowds. It was originally published in Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Fantasy Magazine, and a Russian translation appeared in Yesly (“If”) magazine (voted Europe’s best science fiction magazine). “The Vision Vine” is a short story about a tribal culture in conflict with modern civilization. A young boy journeys to a strange virtual world and attempts to bring the two worlds together. This story originally appeared in Whole Earth Review and has also been published in Russian and Japanese
This sounds like an excellent audiobook…
The Age Of Wonder: How The Romantic Generation Discovered The Beauty And Terror Of Science
By Richard Holmes; Read by Gildart Jackson
17 CDs – Approx. 20.4 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: July 1, 2011
ISBN: 9781455114320
The Age of Wonder is a colorful and utterly absorbing history of the men and women whose discoveries and inventions at the end of the eighteenth century gave birth to the Romantic Age of science. When young Joseph Banks stepped onto a Tahitian beach in 1769, he hoped to discover Paradise. Inspired by the scientific ferment sweeping through Britain, the botanist had sailed with Captain Cook in search of new worlds. Other voyages of discovery—astronomical, chemical, poetical, philosophical—swiftly follow in Richard Holmes’ thrilling evocation of the second scientific revolution. Through the lives of William Herschel and his sister, Caroline, who forever changed the public conception of the solar system; of Humphry Davy, whose near-suicidal gas experiments revolutionized chemistry; and of the great Romantic writers, from Mary Shelley to Coleridge and Keats, who were inspired by the scientific breakthroughs of their day, Holmes brings to life the era in which we first realized both the awe-inspiring and the frightening possibilities of science—an era whose consequences are with us still.
I’ve wanted to get my hands on this book for about 20 years, I’ve heard things about it…
Hardwired
By Walter Jon Williams; Read by Stefan Rudnicki
10 CDs – Approx. 11.7 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: July 1, 2011
ISBN: 9781433253065
In Walter Jon Williams’ classic cyberpunk novel, the remnants of a war-ravaged America endure in scattered, heavily armed colonies, while the wealthy Orbital Corporations now control the world. Cowboy, an ex-fighter pilot who has become “hardwired” via skull sockets directly to his lethal electronic hardware, is now a panzerboy, a hi-tech smuggler riding armored hovertanks through the balkanized countryside. He teams up with Sarah, an equally cyborized gun-for-hire, to make a last stab at independence from the rapacious Orbitals. Together, they gather an unlikely gang of misfits for a ride that will take them to the edge of the atmosphere.
For the first time on audio… but I’ve read this, I have the paperback. I know I have read it. But for the life of me I cannot remember it at all. Which is doubly odd given the premise of the story: The main character is missing his memories!!!
The Unpleasant Profession Of Jonathan Hoag
By Robert A. Heinlein; Read by Tom Weiner
4 CDs – Approx. 4.3 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: July 1, 2011
ISBN: 9781433265815
Jonathan Hoag has a curious problem. Every evening, he finds a mysterious reddish substance under his fingernails, with no memory of how it got there. Jonathan hires the husband-and-wife detective team of Ted and Cynthia Randall to follow him during the day and find out. But Ted and Cynthia find themselves instantly out of their depth. Jonathan leaves no fingerprints. His few memories about his profession turn out to be false. Even stranger, Ted and Cynthia’s own memories of what happens during their investigation do not match. There is a thirteenth floor to Jonathan’s building that does not exist, there are mysterious and threatening beings living inside mirrors, and all of reality is not what they thought it was. Part supernatural thriller, part noir detective story, Heinlein’s trip down the rabbit hole leads where you never expected.
Posted by Jesse Willis
The SFFaudio Podcast #117 – Scott, Jesse and Tamahome talk about audiobooks, the recent arrivals and the new releases.
Talked about on today’s show:
We have some genuine Science Fiction!, The Year’s Top Ten Tales Of Science Fiction Vol. 3 edited by Alan Kaster, Damien Broderick, Robert Reed, Steve Rasnic Tem, Ian R. Macleod, Luke Burrage, The Mars Phoenix has Science Fiction (2008), John W. Cambell, The Things by Peter Watts, 8 Miles should be title 12.1 Kilometers, the metric system can’t be sold politically in the U.S.A., florescent lightbulbs are unamerican, Corner Gas, Larry Niven, Harvest Of Stars by Poul Anderson, totalitarianism, Jerry Pournelle, The Boat Of A Million Years by Poul Anderson, immortality, utopia, Blackstone Audio, the French meter stick (is actually made of platinum and iridium not silver), Charles Stross, Free Apocalypse Al, Where are all the Ted Chiang audiobooks?, Steal Across The Sky by , The Astounding, The Amazing, And The Unknown by Paul Malmont, Robert A. Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, L. Ron Hubbard, The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril, Lester Dent, Doc Savage, H.P. Lovecraft, remixing pulp era authors with pulp era stories, Edgar Allan Poe, the boring cover of The Astounding, The Amazing, And The Unknown, Shadow On The Sun by Richard Matheson (a western that’s also supernatural horror), I Am Legend, Gatherer Of Clouds by Sean Russell, Vancouver Island, Dragon’s Time by Anne McCaffrey and Todd McCaffrey, Brian Herbert, Citadel Of The Lost by Tracy Hickman, is Harriest Klausner a robot?, Phil Gigante, SFSignal.com’s podcast interview with Tracy Hickman, Patrick Hester, Titus Awakes by Maeve Gilmore, Mervyn Peake, Simon Vance’s YouTube videos, Gormenghast (TV series), The Hitch-hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, grotesque, fantasy with no magic and no intelligent species other than humans, “a fantasy of manners”, “a comedy of manners”, metaphors are not spoilers, The Iron Druid Chronicles: Hammered by Kevin Hearne, viking vampires, “someone give that dog a bacon latte”, Very Bad Men by Harry Dolan, Stories Of Your Life And Other Stories by Ted Chiang, Tower Of Babylon, Story Of Your Life, Hell Is The Absence Of God, The Prophecy, Christopher Walken, Viggo Mortensen, Elias Koteas, Combat Hospital (kind of a dramatic remake of MASH), Keanu Reeves, Blair Butler, comics, Northlanders Vol. 5: Metal And Other Stories, non-vampiric vikings, Brian Wood, Blade Vs. The Avengers, Marvel Zombies, Iron Man has a blonde twin brother, The Walking Dead, Robert Kirkman, George R.R. Martin, Dust by Joan Frances Turner |READ OUR REVIEW|, Rule 34 by Charles Stross, A Colder War, Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross |READ OUR REVIEW|, Friday by Robert A. Heinlein, interstellar sex, I Will Fear No Evil by Robert A. Heinlein, the meaning of “Rule 34”, “Space Porn – that’s one sexy nebula”, Luke Burrage’s review of Halting State, Choose Your Own Adventure, “turn to page 61 for the acidic death bath”, Infocom, Lesiure Suit Larry, Heaven’s Shadow by David S. Goyer, William Coon, Resume With Monsters by William Browning Spencer, “just added” vs. “new releases” on Audible.com, Steven Gould audiobooks, Vortex by Robert Charles Wilson, iambik audio, Open Your Eyes by Paul Jessup, Flashback by Dan Simmons, a brand new UNABRIDGED release of Neuromancer by William Gibson, Penguin Audio, American Gods by Neil Gaiman (multi-narrator), George Guidall’s reading of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods |READ OUR REVIEW|, American Gods as a TV series, Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman |READ OUR REVIEW|, Odd And The Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman |READ OUR REVIEW| (even though it is too expensive), Deathworld by Harry Harrison is available on LibriVox narrated by Gregg Margarite, The City And The City by China Meiville, Embassytown, Hexed by Alan Steele, A Dance With Dragons by George R.R. Martin, NPR’s On Point podcast interview with George R.R. Martin, Sandkings, Nighflyers, A Song For Lya, Dreamsongs, Roy Dotrice, drones (unmanned aerial vehicles), Forever Peace by Joe Haldeman will be the subject for an upcoming podcast readalong, Upon The Dull Earth by Philip K. Dick will be the next SFFaudio readalong, what contest should we hold to give away The Selected Stories Of Philip K. Dick Volume 1 (and 2)?, rural fantasy, A Good Story Is Hard To Find podcast #009 The Mystery Of Grace by Charles de Lint, The Space Merchants by Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth.
Posted by Jesse Willis
As mentioned on SFFaudio Podcast #116 there is no commercially available audiobook edition of The Space Merchants. What I failed to mention, however, is that there is a two-part radio dramatization from 1957:
CBS Radio Workshop – The Space Merchants
Based on the novel by Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth; Performed by a full cast
2 MP3 Files – Approx. 1 Hour [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: CBS
Broadcast: February 17th and 24th, 1957
Provider: archive.org
Mitch Courtenay, portrayed by Staats Cotsworth, is a rising star copywriter for the Fowler Schocken Advertising Agency. He’s just been given the company’s biggest campaign – he must promote the colonization of Venus. You’d think would be no problem at all given that Earth is an over-populated planet with polluted air and played-out resources. But there’s a wrinkle – somebody is working against Mitch, and an underground rebellion threatens the very foundations of Earth’s economy!
First serialized in the March through May 1952 issues of Galaxy Science Fiction under the title Gravy Planet, The Space Merchants by Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth was one of the most popular science fiction novels of the 20th century. Here’s the first ever depiction from it, by Ed Emshwiller, for the cover story from the March 1952 issue of Galaxy:
Darrell Sweet’s cover for the 1976 Ballantine Books paperback edition took inspiration from the original magazine appearance:
Whereas Steve Stone’s cover art for the Orion / Gollancz – SF MASTERWORKS (Volume 54) edition seems more inspired by Blade Runner:
[Thanks Bill]
Posted by Jesse Willis