Mark R. Kelly
» Founder in 1997 and site-runner for 20 years of Locus Online (Hugo Award winner in 2002). Founder in 2012 and still site-runner of sfadb.com (Science Fiction Awards Database). Retired in 2012 after 30 years as a software engineer for a certain rocket engine factory.
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- How MAGA folks don’t actually believe in traditional American values
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Category Archives: science fiction
Two More Books of Futuristic Art
FUTURE PERFECT: Vintage Futuristic Graphics, ed. Jim Heimann (Taschen, 2002, unpaginated) DRIVING THROUGH FUTURES PAST: Mid-20th Century Automotive Design, by Hampton C. Wayt (Kythe Publishing, Feb. 206, 59pp) Here are two more books that I read the same couple days … Continue reading
Posted in Art, Book Notes, Cars, science fiction
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Isaac Asimov, FUTUREDAYS
Subtitled: “A Nineteenth-Century Vision of the Year 2000” (Henry Holt, trade paperback, 1986, 96pp) This is a thin little book I’ve had for nearly 40 years, since it was published. It’s ostensibly about a set of “cigarette cards” (presumably included … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Isaac Asimov, science fiction
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Pretty to Think So
One of my running themes — here on this blog, in the reviews I’ve written of SF novels and stories in recent years, in my essay for Gary Westfahl awaiting publication, and in my book if I manage to write … Continue reading
Posted in Conservative Resistance, Politics, science fiction
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This Much is Reality… and This Much is Fantasy
Silverberg on reality vs. fantasy; It wasn’t a landslide, thus not a mandate; OnlySky: why is fascism rising? OnlySky: how knowledge endures or disappears. Here’s a passage from a key science fiction story that addresses the nature of reality, in … Continue reading
Posted in History, science fiction
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Skiffy Flix: The Day the Earth Stood Still
Of all the 1950s science fiction films, this one is arguably the most profound, the least typical, and the most liberal. It involves an alien arriving on Earth, but he is not hostile, despite the knee-jerk fears of the military … Continue reading
Posted in Movies, science fiction, Skiffy Flix
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Nones, and Genre
Why did the rise of the “nones” begin in the 1990s? Thoughts about how science fiction is, or is not, a “genre”. Here’s an article I stumbled upon today, from 2019 in The Atlantic, by a writer I’ve see a … Continue reading
Posted in Politics, Religion, science fiction
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It Can Happen Here
I’m not the first to make this observation. Trump’s rise echoes a famous 1935 novel called (ironically) It Can’t Happen Here, by Sinclair Lewis. Wikipedia: The novel describes the rise of Berzelius “Buzz” Windrip, a demagogue who is elected President … Continue reading
Posted in Conservative Resistance, Politics, science fiction, Social Progress
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Locus Awards 2024
Quick post at nearly 8 in the evening, just home from the Locus Awards. Like last year, they were held live at Preservation Park in downtown Oakland; last year’s report is here, and I’m going to borrow a photo from … Continue reading
Posted in Personal history, science fiction
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Small Town Thinking, Climate Change, and Smoking Cigars
What people in small-town Oklahoma think; Today’s headlines about the effects of climate change; A lagniappe about Republicans who need to smoke their cigars; and recalling the assumptions of 1940s science fiction by Isaac Asimov. We coastal elites are sensitive … Continue reading
Posted in conservatives, Culture, science fiction
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I’ve Caught a Cold; How Much of Science Fiction is Obsolete?
I’ve caught colds my entire life; two or three a year. I sneeze, cough, and it usually starts with a sore throat. (Whereas I very rarely have gotten flues, with a temperature and symptoms that go on for a week.) … Continue reading
Posted in Epistemology, Personal history, science fiction
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