Robert A. Heinlein – Page 44

Hi, all – Scott here. I was recently asked what p…

SFFaudio Commentary

Hi, all – Scott here. I was recently asked what podcast feeds I subscribe to. The answer sounded like a good post, so here it is – I’ll twist Jesse’s arm for his subscribed list, too.

Dragon Page – Cover to Cover
Dragon Page – Wingin’ It
Michael and Evo’s Slice of Sci Fi
Evo Terra and Michael R. Mennenga host all three of these shows, which are easily the most professional science fiction-related podcasts out there. Cover to Cover features author interviews and book news, Slice of Sci Fi focuses mainly on television and films, and Wingin’ It is 100% format free!
http://www.dragonpage.com

The Kick-Ass Mystic Ninjas
Only two podcasts in, and this is my favorite podcast. The ninjas are Summer Brooks and Joe Murphy, and they talk “old-school” SF and Fantasy. The first show was about Dan Simmons’ Hyperion, and the second featured Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land. Looks like Zelazny’s Lord of Light is next. Summer and Joe can also be heard on some of the The Dragon Page broadcasts.
http://www.kickassmysticninjas.com

Escape Pod
Stephen Eley has really put together something special here. Escape Pod is an excellent audio science fiction magazine with high quality stories that sound great. I enjoy Eley’s introductions as well, which have ranged from “Go see Serenity” sermons to discussions of copyright. He makes me chuckle often, and I’m pretty sure it’s on purpose.
http://www.escapepod.org

SciFiDig
Aaron Macom hosts this show, which is really just him talking about whatever the heck he feels like talking about. Most of the time, his topics relate to science fiction media, but his forays into other subjects are just as interesting.
http://www.scifidig.com

Treks in SciFi
Rich Dostie (Rico) talks Star Trek – mostly. I was happy to find this podcast because I am a Trek fan and this is the closest thing to a Star Trek-only podcast that I’ve found. Rico highlights an episode of Trek in each podcast, and talks about collectibles and other related stuff.
http://www.treksf.com

Craphound.com: The Literary Works of Cory Doctorow
This is Cory Doctorow, reading his own work wherever he happens to be. Great stuff.
http://www.craphound.com

ZBS
The fine folks at ZBS are podcasting Ruby 1 – I urge you to check it out if you’ve never heard it. Every day, this feed delivers the next short segment of Ruby 1. As I understand it, it was originally broadcast in these short segments on NPR.
http://www.zbs.org

And that’s it! I listen to these on my PC (if I’m sitting there) or on my Palm Zire 31, which features an excellent MP3 player. (That reminds me – I’ve been meaning to prepare a post on listening devices.) Last week, I dropped a few podcasts because I simply am out of time. I still have audiobooks to listen to, ya know? Thanks to all of the above for podcasting.

I use iPodder (Juice Receiver) to download all these shows.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

Review of Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert A. Heinlein

Citizen of the Galaxy
By Robert A. Heinlein; Read by Lloyd James
8 CDs – Approx. 9 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2004
ISBN: 0786183810
Themes: / Science Fiction / Space Travel / Sociology / Politics / Contractarianism /

SLAVE: Brought to Sargon in chains as a child — unwanted by all save a one-legged beggar — Thorby learned well the wiles of the street people and the mysterious ways of his crippled master…

OUTLAW: Hunted by the police for some unknown treasonous acts committed by his beloved owner, Thorby risked his life to deliver a dead man’s message and found himself both guest and prisoner aboard an alien spaceship…

CITIZEN: Unaware of his role in an ongoing intrigue, Thorby became one of the freest of the free in the entire galaxy as the adopted son of a noble space captain . . . until he became a captive in an interstellar prison that offered everything but the hope of escape!

Thorby’s earliest memories are of his “papa” Baslim, a professional mendicant, purchasing him at the slave market on the capital city of Sargon, a distant planet that was long ago colonized by a now space faring mankind. There Baslim teaches the rebellious Thorby the art of begging which in itself is an interesting enough trade – but Baslim also has a secret job, one that will eventually propel his adopted son all the way across the galaxy. Citizen Of The Galaxy is one of the most conceptually expansive of Heinlein’s juvenile novels, it tackles many issues including social organization, the nature of ontractarianism and most of all freedom. The society aboard the free-trader starships for example is one of the most interesting Heinlein ever invented (it would have worked as a single novel unto itself). Exploring that culture for me was the best part of the book but there were plenty of other good bits too. Of course heavy handed straw men are peppered throughout the novel to trip up our hero. This has been a big problem for Heinlein, he could never make a villain smart in any meaningful sense. Had Heinlein given us some villains along the lines of Roy Batty of Blade Runner or “The Operative” in Serenity, in other words three dimensional villains, he’d be even more luminous in reputation than he has. And that really is hard to imagine! Straw men aside, there aren’t that many interesting dilemmas for Thorby to overcome in this
one, he’s a relatively passive hero who reacts more often than he acts. As a juvenile novel it works extremely well. A great listen for teenagers and adults.

On the audio end of things Blackstone has made my wish come true! Lloyd James is becoming the definitive voice of unabridged single voiced Heinlein audiobooks. He can do both youth and adults of both sexes easily and ads accents where appropriate. Sound quality, as always these days from Blackstone, is phenomenal. The CDs had not even a hint of anything other than the voice of the text recorded on them. Well done. The original cover art on the Blackstone packaging is a triptych of Thorby from the three sections of his youth. I’ve reviewed here the “library edition” which comes in a library style clamshell binding – but also available are an MP3-CD and cassette edition as well as a retail edition on CD. Check one out in your preferred format, you’ll be glad you did.

Posted by Jesse Willis

Dragon Page Cover To Cover staffers Joe Murphy and…

SFFaudio Online Audio

Dragon Page Cover To Cover staffers Joe Murphy and Summer Brooks have spun off their own podcast! The Kick-Ass Mystic Ninjas Podcast specializes in discussions of classic science fiction novels. Two full shows have been released so far:

1. Hyperion by Dan Simmons – DIRECT DOWNLOAD MP3

2. Stranger In A Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein – DIRECT DOWNLOAD MP3

To subscribe, plug this into iTunes:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/kickassmysticninjas/

Posted by Jesse Willis

Just posted – a new Author Focus page featuring Gr…

SFFaudio News

Just posted – a new Author Focus page featuring Grandmaster Robert A. Heinlein. Click here to see it!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Review of The Rolling Stones by Robert A. Heinlein

The Rolling Stones
By Robert A. Heinlein; Performed By A Full Cast
8 CDs – 7 Hours 9 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Full Cast Audio
Published: 2005
ISBN: 1932076808
Themes: / Science Fiction / Young Adult / Space Travel / Newtonian Physics / The Moon / Mars / The Asteroid Belt /

When the Stone twins made up their minds to leave Luna City in a secondhand spaceship, they hadn’t planned on having their whole family accompany them. But the Stones are not your ordinary Lunar family – no way! – and their voyage through the solar system sure proves it.

Not long ago FULL CAST AUDIO contacted us, and gave us a heads-up – a new Robert A. Heinlein novel was coming. I was blown away by their first Heinlein adaptation so I tried to keep my expectations reasonable. “Lightning can’t strike twice”, I told myself. “Just be happy that it is being released. That’s what you asked for and that’s what you got. Don’t be disappointed if it doesn’t live up to your expectations.” I needn’t have worried. The Rolling Stones is as good as the superb full cast reading of Have Space Suit, Will Travel – maybe even a little better!

It is a Heinlein juvenile, written and first published in 1952, full of Heinleinian economics, politics, and family values, which all combine with a travelogue of interplanetary adventure. Dialogue moves the surprisingly light plot along, and the narrator provides the cultural and technological backdrop.

The Stone family is made up of father Roger, mother Edith, grandmother Hazel, the eldest child Meade, the youngest Buster, and the middle identical twins Castor and Pollux. The twins are natural born inventors and entrepreneurs, so when they go looking through the used spaceship yards on Luna they’ve got a scheme in mind. When Roger finds out about their plans he manages to turn the whole thing into a family venture. And off they go into the solar system.

If you like Heinlein you’ll love this novel but it’s a little different from most juvies in that it is more a series of smaller adventures. What I like best about the book is that it ably envisions a wonderful future of interplanetary travel in a completely scientifically accurate way. The economic model that would allow a family to buy a spaceship, fuel it and use it as their personal yacht may be unrealistic, but that won’t dampen your enthusiasm. It didn’t mine.

Most of the actors are new but Bill Molesky is back playing another father and Cynthia Bishop plays another mother figure. Peter Moller plays another small role, and FULL CAST AUDIO founder Bruce Coville makes another cameo too. Another plus – Daniel Bostick again directs. If I had my druthers, Daniel Bostick will direct all the future FULL CAST AUDIO Heinlein releases too (on the principle you don’t mess with success). The new actors are all perfect in their roles. There isn’t a false performance in the bunch.

A potential stumbling block was avoided. This is a third person perspective novel, as opposed to the first person of Have Space, Suit Will Travel, so they needed a narrator. Veteran voice over actor David Baker took the reins there and together with this full cast read another faithful adaptation of a Heinlein “juvenile” novel.

What’s really interesting though is that this is a straight reading with multiple readers, something I didn’t fully realize in Have Space Suit, Will Travel. There are no sound effects. There are just actors reading the text and a little accenting music at chapter openings. This was another excellent choice, a straight reading works well. You don’t need to paint in sound effects when the words evoke a mental image.

As is becoming the rule, the attention to detail found in the audio production extends to the fit and finish of the packaging. Jerry Russel’s original cover art is absolutely beautiful to behold. The CD case is the identical design to the Have Spacesuit, Will Travel case. A thick DVD style case, with the CDs stacked and secured by two plastic clamps. Perfect! Please FULL CAST AUDIO keep recording these Heinlein juvenile novels. I’d like to say I deserve it, but even if I don’t the novels sure do!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Commentary: Very Bad Deaths

Commentary

Scott originally reviewed Very Bad Deaths in May – click here to see it. I finished it myself and wanted to comment:

I finally got a chance to listen to this one! I had a smile tattooed on my face while I listened to Spider spin his SF web. I knew I would be interested to hear this one especially because it is set in and around Vancouver, British Columbia, where I live and it is chock full of local details. But after hearing it, and realizing that most people who don’t live in BC probably couldn’t care less about the setting what I really wanted to talk about is something a lot of listeners/readers might have missed that they should care about. Spider Robinson wrote this novel as homage to Crime Writers Of America Grandmaster Lawrence Block. Most SF readers probably don’t know who Block is but they should. Block is a prolific and talented author working in the crime genre. In VBD Robinson uses many turns of phrase that are ones Block uses almost unconsciously in his many stories. Other giveaways include the theme of a horrifically understandable serial killer and a deep and abiding love of coffee. Robinson has done this sort of thing before – his novel Callahan’s Con was an homage to Block’s contemporary – fellow Crime Writers Of America Grandmaster Donald Westlake and Callahan’s Key was inspired by the writings of Robert A. Heinlein. Another neat feature of Very Bad Deaths is that it contains the only reference in fiction to the philosophical writings of Daniel Dennett that I know of – he also manages to tie Dennett’s concepts into the book’s plot.

Spider is currently “collaborating” with Heinlein on a novel titled Variable Star, I hope Blackstone Audio acquires the audio rights to that one and that they get Spider to narrate! Oh and a sequel to Very Bad Deaths is also in the works.

posted by Jesse Willis