H.G. Wells – Page 23

BBC 7: H.G. Wells, Brian Aldiss, Hergé’s Tintin and a promise of Arthur C. Clarke tales to come)

SFFaudio Online Audio

By the sheer volume of H.G. Wells stories airing this coming week on BBC Radio 7 you’d might think it was H.G. Wells who had just died, and not Arthur C. Clarke! But no, BBC7 is planning on playing some Clarke for they announced the following: “As a tribute to Arthur C. Clarke we will be repeating these programmes [four readings commisioned and broadcast in 2007] in the near future.” Good on them! Until then…

In typical Wellsian fashion (time travel used to be fantasy until Wells got his mitts on it) this 1901 tale transforms a Fantasy concept (the existence of past lives) into a SF theme, casting a future life (as of a dream), that is both vivid and recognizable – written before both of the World Wars it depicts a world in which tanks, airplanes and something that sound like a nuclear weapon exists…

A Dream Of Armageddon
By H.G. Wells; Read by Robert Bathurst
2 Parts – Approx. 2 Hours [ABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC7 / The 7th Dimension
Broadcast: Monday and Tuesday at 6.30pm and midnight
A tale of an advanced civilisation descending into mindless war was an uncannily close prediction of the horrors of WW2 when it was written in 1901.

This one, sounding more like Lovecraft than it has any right to, should be a treat for sailor and land lubber alike…

The Sea Raiders
By H.G. Wells; Read by Robert Bathurst
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [ABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC7 / The 7th Dimension
Broadcast: Wednesday at 6.30pm and 12.30am
Another classic tale of high adventure by sci-fi master H. G. Wells. Strange monsters from the deep start terrorising the horrified residents of Devon’s coastline.

Yep, you’ll find Wells was responsible for most of the well worn tropes of SF – this next one is described as the inspiration for the Star Trek (original series) episode “Wink of an Eye”…

The New Accelerator
By H.G. Wells; Read by Robert Bathurst
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [ABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC7 / The 7th Dimension
Broadcast: Thursday at 6.30pm and 12.30am
A friend of H.G. Wells is on the verge of making a scientific breakthrough which promises to revolutionise human life – so the two friends decide to road-test the new drug – with exciting but dangerous consequences.

And a Brian Aldiss tale, first broadcast back in May 2007…

Song Of The Silencer
By Brian Aldiss; Read by Nigel Anthony
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [ABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC7 / The 7th Dimension
Broadcast: Friday at 6.30pm and 12.30am
To establish universal peace, scientists have constructed a massive computer designed to mimic human thought and act as a guide to world decision making. But will flicking the switch signal the end of the human race?

First broadcast on BBC Radio 5 in 1993, here’s a treat of an audio drama…

The Adventures of Tintin
Based on the Hergé comic book series; Performed by a full cast
6 Broadcasts – 3 Hours [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC7
Broadcast: Monday to Monday at 9am, 8pm and 1am
Famous boy reporter Tintin has been covering the return of the Sanders-Hardiman expedition from Peru. When all the participants fall mysteriously ill, Tintin is compelled to investigate.

All of the above will be available on the “listen again” page the day after they air.

Posted by Jesse Willis

The First Men in the Moon

SFFaudio Online Audio

One of the great early space adventure stories, Wells’ novel is, like the rest of his SF, a timeless classic that still evokes a sense of wonder. Now thanks to LibriVox, there is now a free, unabridged audiobook available. Having very recently read an e-book of the story, I was hesitant about listening but was quickly drawn in again and had finished the first chapter before I knew it. This is a well read version of a wonderful classic.

The First Men in the Moon
By H. G. Wells; Read by Mark F. Smith.
26 MP3 Files – 8 Hour 03 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: November 6th 2007

Britain won the Moon Race! Decades before Neal Armstrong took his “giant leap for mankind” two intrepid adventurers from Lympne, England, journeyed there using not a rocket, but an antigravity coating.Mr. Bedford, who narrates the tale, tells of how he fell in with eccentric inventor Mr. Cavor, grew to believe in his researches, helped him build a sphere for traveling in space, and then partnered with him in an expedition to the Moon.

What they found was fantastic! There was not only air and water, but the Moon was honeycombed with caverns and tunnels in which lived an advanced civilization of insect-like beings. While Bedford is frightened by them and bolts home, Cavor stays and is treated with great respect.

So why didn’t Armstrong and later astronauts find the evidence of all this? Well, according to broadcasts by Cavor over the newly-discovered radio technology, he told the Selenites too much about mankind, and apparently, they removed the welcome mat! (Summary by Mark)

Complete Audiobook [zip], individual MP3s here.

Podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/the-first-men-in-the-moon-by-hg-wells.xml

Posted by Dave Tackett.

Beam Me Up podcast archives 2 dozen Science Fiction stories

Online Audio

Holy cow! Paul Cole of the Beam Me Up radio show/podcast has written into say:

“I am archiving stories off the podcast (I have limited space on podomatic so eventually I have to pare the oldest ‘cast off the roll) they are just the stories from the podcast (a lot of the material in the podcast is news and ages out quick)”

It think that’s awesome, he’s absolutely right, the news material doesn’t age well and the unabridged short stories and novelletes will all be listenable for decades (and centuries) to come. You can find the archive of stories HERE, or below:

68 Vette
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 11 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

All The Things You Are
By Mike Resnick; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 69 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Ambassador
By Peter Watts; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 24 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

The Crystal Egg
By H.G. Wells; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 51 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Curtain Call
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 15 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Digital Love
By Mary Turzillo; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 8 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Echo
By Elizabeth Hand; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 22 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
*This one is a Nebula Award winning story

Final Solution
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 5 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Henry James This One’s For You
By Jack McDevitt; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 20 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Hubble
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 14 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Kin
By Bruce McAlister; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 32 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Last Light
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 9 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Message In A Time Capsule
By Charles M. Stross; Read by Ron Huber
1 |MP3| – Approx. 7 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Of Mice And…
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 5 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Old MacDonald
By Mike Resnick; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 31 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Pip And The Fairies
By Theodora Goss; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 22 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Print Crime
By Cory Doctorow; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – 7 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Promises To Keep
By Jack McDevitt; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 44 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

The Applicant
By Karren Gossow; Read by Paul Cole
1 MP3| – Approx. 5 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

The House Beyond Your Sky
By Ben Rosenbaum; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 32 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

The Lollipop Man
By Shaun A. Saunders; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 5 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

The Walls Of The Universe
By Paul Melko; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3|- 2 Hours 26 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

Tyger
By Jack McDevitt; Read by Paul Cole
1 |MP3| – Approx. 17 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]

If you want to keep up with the show subscribe to the podcast via this feed:

http://beameup.podomatic.com/rss2.xml

posted by Jesse Willis

New Releases April/May

SFFaudio New Releases

Lots of new release out right now. First up is a FREE one. A podiobook that took nearly a year to finish. Tracy Hickman’s near future dystopia The Immortals is now COMPLETE! Point your web-browser towards Podiobooks.com, sign-up and subscribe.

Podiobook - Immortals by Tracy Hickman The Immortals
By Tracy Hickman; Read by Tracy and Laura Hickman
40 MP3 Files – [UNABRIDGED?]
Publisher: Podiobooks.com
Started: April 2007
It’s 2020, and an attempted cure for AIDS has mutated into a deadlier disease, V-CIDS. The U.S., under martial law, has set up “quarantine centers” in the Southwest. Searching for his gay son, Jon, media mogul Michael Barris smuggles himself into one of centers only to discover that it and the other centers are actually extermination camps. With a strange assortment of allies, including the leader of the camp’s gay barracks, an army officer and a local cowboy, Barris precipitates an inmates’ rebellion that promises the unraveling of the death-camp system and the overthrow of the government that established it.

Let’s not forget the venerable and always reliable TellTaleWeekly, selling short stories for great prices!

The Star
By H.G. Wells; Read by Alex Wilson
1 MP3 , Ogg Vorbis or AAC File – Apprx. 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: TellTaleWeekly.org
Published: April 2007
Just $1.00 payable via PayPal. One hundred and one years before the films Armegeddon and Deep Impact entered U.S. theaters, the father of modern Science Fiction scared the crap out of Victorian London with this, the first of such death-from-above SF tales.

Hurray for Tantor Media! They’ve got lots of waycool stuff in the works including lots of Asimov…

No Humans Involved
By Kelley Armstrong; Read by Laural Merlington
10 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – Approx. 12 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Media
Published: May 2007
ISBN: 1400104416 (CDs), 1400154413 (MP3-CD)
Jaime knows a thing or two about showbiz, as a woman whose special talent is raising the dead, her threshold for weirdness is pretty high: she’s used to not only seeing dead people but hearing them speak to her in very emphatic terms. But for the first time in her life—as invisible hands brush her skin, unintelligible fragments of words are whispered into her ears, and beings move just at the corner of her eye—she knows what humans mean when they talk about being haunted.

The Caves of Steel
By Isaac Asimov; Read by William Dufris
6 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 7 Hours 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Media
Published: May 2007
ISBN:1400104211 (CDs), 1400154219 (MP3-CD)
A millennium into the future, two advancements have altered the course of human history: the colonization of the galaxy and the creation of the positronic brain. Isaac Asimov’s Robot novels chronicle the unlikely partnership between a New York City detective and a humanoid robot who must learn to work together. Like most people left behind on an over-populated Earth, New York City police detective Elijah Baley had little love for either the arrogant Spacers or their robotic companions. But when a prominent Spacer is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Baley is ordered to the Outer Worlds to help track down the killer. The relationship between Baley and his Spacer superiors, who mistrusted all Earthmen, was strained from the start. Then he learned that they had assigned him a partner: R. Daneel Olivaw. Worst of all was that the “R” stood for robot—and his positronic partner was made in the image and likeness of the murder victim!

Simon & Schuster Audio even has a new title!

City Of Bones
By Cassandra Clare; Read by Ari Graynor
12 CDs – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Published: March 2007
ISBN: 0743566572
When 15-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder — much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It’s hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing — not even a smear of blood — to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

And of course, nobody is publishing more Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror audio than the wonderous Blackstone audio…

Where’s My Jetpack?
By Daniel H. Wilson; Read by Stefan Rudnicki
3 Cassettes, 1 MP3-CD or 4 CDs – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: April 2007
ISBN: 9780786148707 (Cassettes), 9780786171606(MP3-CD), 9780786160822 (CDs)
It’s the twenty-first century and let’s be honest—things are a little disappointing. Despite every World’s Fair prediction and the advertisements in comic books, we are not living the future we were promised. By now, life was supposed to be a fully automated, atomic-powered, germ-free Utopia, a place where a grown man could wear a velvet spandex unitard and not be laughed at. Where are the ray guns, the flying cars, and the hoverboards that we expected? What happened to our moon colonies and servant robots?

Variable Star
By Robert A. Heinlein and Spider Robinson; Read by Spider Robinson
8 Cassettes, 1-MP3-CD or 10 CDs – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: May 2007
ISBN: 9780786149384(Cassettes), 9780786170159 (MP3-CD), 9780786158843 (Cds)
At his death in 1988, Robert A. Heinlein left a legacy of novels and short stories that almost single-handedly defined modern science fiction. But one of Heinlein’s masterpieces was never finished. In 1955, he began work on Variable Star, a powerful and passionate tale of two young lovers driven apart by pride, power, and the vastness of interstellar time and space. Then he set it aside to focus on other novellas. The detailed outline and notes he created for this project lay forgotten for decades, only to be rediscovered almost a half century later. Now the Heinlein estate has authorized award-winning author Spider Robinson to expand that outline into a full-length novel. The result is vintage Heinlein, faithful in style and spirit to the Grand Master’s original vision.

Komarr
By Lois McMaster Bujold; Read by Grover Gardner
8 Cassettes, 1 MP3-CD or 9 CDs – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: May 2007
ISBN: 9781433202575 (Cassettes), 9781433202599 (MP3-CD), (CDs)
Komarr could be a garden with a thousand more years’ work, or an uninhabitable wasteland if the terraforming fails. Now, the solar mirror vital to the terraforming of the conquered planet has been shattered by a ship hurtling off course. The Emperor of Barrayar sends his newest imperial auditor, Lord Miles Vorkosigan, to find out why.

posted by Jesse Willis

Review of The World Set Free by H.G. Wells

H.G. Wells Month

The World Set Free
By H.G. Wells; Read by Shelly Frasier
1 MP3-CD or 6 CDs – Approx. 6.5 Hrs [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Media
Published: 2002
ISBN: 1400150108 (MP3-CD); 1400100100(CDs)
/ Science Fiction / Atomic Power / Atomic Bombs / War / Utopia / Politics / Futurism / Prophecy / World State /

“Never before in the history of warfare had there been a continuing explosive; indeed, up to the middle of the twentieth century the only explosives known were combustibles whose explosiveness was due entirely to their instantaneousness; and these atomic bombs which science burst upon the world that night were strange even to the men who used them.”

The Father of Science Fiction first works are still among our classics. With excellent treatments of alien invasion (The War of the Worlds), space travel (First Men in the Moon), proto-genetic manipulation (The Island of Dr. Moreau), and of course time travel (The Time Machine). In his first decade of a writer he had written these classics as well as The Invisible Man, and The Food of the Gods, as many classic short stories.

Wells continued his writing career for another 40 years. Always remaining a popular author. So what happened to all these books he wrote? What happened to this iconoclast of SF? Why were his later works seldom reprinted and so hard to find? In his day, books like Tono-Bungay and Ann Veronica were huge critical and commercial successes. Thanks to Project Gutenberg and other public domain sites, his more obscure works are now obtainable. Much of his later work does not qualify as SF. But there are a number of his novels that deal with prophecies and future utopias and do qualify as SF.

The World Set Free was one of those future visions. Written and published upon the cusp of World War I, the novel proves that Wells had a gift for prophecy, although many of the details played out in a different way. In the novel the World War would not occur till 1956.

The main impetus of the novel is the advent of atomic power, both as a bomb and as a power source. The atomic bomb has many similarities to the actual bombs, including decaying radiation. Wells’ portrait of a World War would lead to numerous atomic bombs destroying civilization.

Wells had hoped from the ashes of a World War that nationalism would dissolve and a new world state would evolve. He portrays the World War in a horrific way. For one who saw the war as a way to a new world order, he does not handle the horrors of war with kid gloves.

Wells uses a narrative device that this book is written from a far utopian future. And from this far future perspective, it tells of the dark days of the war and then of the end of countries and the beginning of the world state. The tone is scholarly and leaves the listener/reader distanced from the characters.

I believe Wells started to see himself as an educator to the masses. That through his writing, both fiction and non-fiction, he could change the world. Sounds like a maniacal delusion, but he was an extremely popular writer. He was the equivalent to a rock star in terms of cultural popularity, but with the intellectual clout of an author. Unfortunately this didactic charge, he placed on himself, put storytelling subordinate to the message. Despite these flaws, the novel is filled with many thought provoking ideas.

Shelly Frasier narrates the novel. After an introduction, in which she speaks with an American accent, she switches to an English accent for the text of the novel. After getting use to this change, I found her accent and characterization quite good and she turns in a solid performance.

posted byThe Time Traveler of the Time Traveler Show podcast.

H. G. Wells Month – Gresham College

H.G. Wells Month

Gresham College in central London, U.K., enrolls no students and grants no degrees – it provides lectures free to the public. Students who attend in person get outstanding lectures by prestigious professors. Students who can’t attend in person can watch or listen via Gresham College website! Former professors have included Sir Christopher Wren, the legendary Robert Hooke and more recently Ian Stewart (a mathematician and Science Fiction author). Among the many fascinating lectures archived on the website since 2002 is one by Professor Martin Campbell-Kelly on the subject of the origins of the World Wide Web. Prominent within the lecture is Campbell-Kelly’s thoughts on the role of H.G. Wells’ book The World Brain (1938). The lecture is available in the RealPlayer format and is entitled “From World Brain To World Wide Web.”

posted by Jesse Willis