Star Trek: “Make-Believe”
In 2003 Pocket Books began a series of short-story anthologies commemorating the anniversaries of the various Star Trek series: Deep Space Nine's tenth anniversary in 2003, Voyager's tenth anniversary in 2005. The fall of 2006 would see the publication of an anthology celebrating the 40th-anniversary of the debut of the original Star Trek, and who wouldn't want to be a part of that? I approached Pocket editor Marco Palmieri in May 2005 in an unusual manner. I sent him a birthday card, a story pitch, and a note: "If you're taking pitches for the 40th-anniversary anthology would you consider ...
Star Trek Generations: The Decline and Fall
An analysis of Star Trek: Generations, the seventh Star Trek film; published in Star Trek Magazine #26 (US)/#153 (UK). How did the film come to be? Did it succeed? Did it fail? This article analyzes the film in the context of the Star Trek film series — and in the context of the times in which it was made.
Star Trek: Corps of Engineers: Grand Designs
A collection of six Star Trek: Starfleet Corps of Engineers stories, including my first novella, Ring Around the Sky. That story, published as an eBook in 2004, took the crew of the da Vinci to the world of Kharzh'ulla IV, a Tellarite colony world that suffered an attack on its system of orbital elevators during the Dominion War. There, second officer Tev had to confront his own personal demons while assisting the crew in fixing the unfixable.
Doctor Who: “The Spindle of Necessity”
One evening in November 2006, I received an e-mail from Keith DeCandido — he was putting together a Doctor Who anthology for Big Finish Productions, a small UK-based media (books, audios, that sort of thing) publisher. Would I be interested in pitching? Here's the pitch document. My first reaction was, "ZOMG!" My second reaction was, "Okay, what am I going to pitch?" The concept of the anthology was encapsulated in the title — "The Quality of Leadership." The time-traveling Gallifreyan was going to meet leaders throughout time and space. I pulled out a notepad, and I jotted down some ideas. ...
Star Trek: New Frontier: “Performance Appraisal”
Kat Mueller, introduced in Peter David's Once Burned, is featured in this story about her days aboard the USS Grissom. How did she decide to go into command? When the Grissom is confronted by an insane Romulan, Mueller's quick thinking saves the ship — and prevents an interstellar incident.
Featured
On Kirill Yeskov’s The Last Ringbearer
A few months ago on a bulletin board I was drawn into a somewhat tedious argument over what, exactly, pipeweed is in The Lord of the Rings. My sparring partner argued that pipeweed was clearly tobacco, Tolkien said so, and that, cleraly, was that. The problem with the identification of pipeweed with tobacco, I said, was this: Middle-Earth is not a fantasy world. Instead, Middle-Earth is... [Read more]
On the Demise of a Band I Liked
Sunday evening I learned a band I liked had broken up. The band is Aerials Up. Unsurprisingly, they’re from Scotland. When I wrote about Aerials Up originally, I wrote that “there’s a certain similarity to Arcade Fire in the sound of Aerials Up; there’s a similar instrumentation, a similar mixture of male and female voices. But I also hear a certain Barenaked... [Read more]
On Allyn’s Second Adventure in New York
A few days ago, I went to New York City. I had it all planned out. I was going to go to The Cloisters, I was going to see their exhibition of the Lewis Chessmen, and… well, that really was all I had planned. Which caused problems when I discovered upon arriving there, due to my own lack of research beforehand, that the museum was closed on Mondays. These things happen. I said to myself,... [Read more]
On Allyn’s Adventures In New York
Yesterday, being a lovely spring day with nothing to do at the office, I took a vacation day and went to New York City. Why? Because I wanted to go to The Cloisters to see the Lewis Chessmen. However, when I planned my trip I neglected to look online to see when The Cloisters was open. Imagine my surprise when, after taking the Megabus, then suffering the indignity of the New York subway system,... [Read more]
On the Shamrock Fest 2012 Post-Mortem
I promised myself that I wasn’t going to spend much money on CDs at Shamrock Fest. After last year, when I bought five CDs (two from the Charm City Saints, two from Barleyjuice, and one from The Gobshites), what more was there to buy? Well… Shamrock Fest is a Celtic rock/punk festival held in DC each year around St. Patrick’s Day. I attended last year, and I was looking... [Read more]
Writing
On Writing A New Outline
Over the last two weeks I’ve been working on and off on a plot outline. For the past week, the work has been mainly off; it’s been a week of deadlines at the office, though there has been progress over the last two days, if only to clear my head. The germ of the idea, a piece of nonsense of the sort that I’m prone to make, had come to me a few days before I started on the outline. ... [Read more]
On Writing a Podcast Script
Today I wrote my first podcast script. I mentioned about two months ago that I was considering starting a podcast when I relaunch my website in the coming months. (By the way, there’s nothing wrong with my website that requires a relaunch, except that I have to move it to another server, so why not spiff it up and give it a new look?) Since I’m laid up this weekend with a nasty, unproductive,... [Read more]
Comic Books
On Things I’ve Been Reading
John Carter: World of Mars Marvel Comics Written by Peter David Art by Luke Ross A few weeks ago I saw John Carter, director Andrew Stanton’s adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars, the first of his eleven books set on Barsoom (better known to us as Mars), for Disney. John Carter has become legendary as one of the biggest box office failures of all time, which is unfortunate... [Read more]
On Things I’ve Been Reading
Orbit: John Lennon Bluewater Productions Written by Marc Shapiro Artwork by Luciano Kars I’ve been a Beatles fan for two-thirds of my life. I have official CDs by the Beatles as a band and as solo artists, bootleg CDs, books, posters, toys. I’ve seen Paul McCartney in concert. I’m thinking about seeing Ringo Starr in concert. I moderated a panel on the Beatles... [Read more]
