Books and Music

A little off the topic of models or props, I thought I'd talk a bit about books and music. First the books, most of what I read now is sci-fi, back in the early 90's I came across the Heeche series of novels by Frederick Pohl.

It's about a man who volunteers to man one of thousands of spaceships discovered throughout the solar system. The ships were left behind by an advanced race dubbed the "Heechee". People volunteer to man these ships on their preset course, upon their return they share in whatever profits can be gleaned from where they've been. The trips are a total crap shoot at first as no one knows how to tell where the ships will go. Sometimes a short trip to Jupiter or a 100 year trip to another star, bad luck if you get that trip. There are 6 books in the series. After that I didn't read too much, didn't make the time.









I've gotten back into sci-fi recently and have come across some interesting stuff. While looking through one of my art books, I found this image a bit unbelievable.

It's a gigantic space ship, look at the size of it compared to the planets in front of it. I learned it was intended as the cover art for a book called "Marrow" by Robert Reed. It's about a spaceship the size of Jupiter, in the book however the ship does not look like the image at all, but rather a ball the size of Jupiter. 

The ships captains are immortal and indestructible and fly the ship on a cruise around the galaxy. Many alien races call the ship home, and live both in and on the ship. Turns out there is a secret within the ship, but I won't spoil it for you.

A co-worker got me into the 'Giants' series, starting with 'Inherit the Stars'

The story starts in the year 2027 when astronauts discover a 50,000 year old corpse on the moon. From there the mystery widens to one of Jupiter's moons,  Ganymede, and a chance encounter with the original inhabitants of our own solar system. There are 5 books in the series, I liked the first three, the fourth book was odd, the fifth was alright I guess.

Last summer I read Hellhole and enjoyed the fast pace and short chapters. The books ends on a cliffhanger so I need to get the next book soon, it should be out by now.





















I've recently read some of Alastair Reynolds short stories and quite enjoyed them. I like the kind of sci-fi stories that take you so far out into space and the future that anything is possible. Haven't read 'Zima Blue' yet but I did buy it.

 

When the movie "John Carter" came out I admit it looked pretty corny and did not see it the the theater. But I did get the book as a gift from my wife. It contained the movie version and the original version.
Since then I've seen the movie, and liked it. I also bought the second book and liked it too.

 

And now for the Music part, just two albums I'd like to tell you about. Both have ,to me anyway, an outer space kind of sound. I usually have them playing while I work on my models or reading. The first is ELO's Out of the Blue. It's from the late 70's and with cover art like this how can you go wrong.

One of my favorite tunes is 'Summer and Lightning'. Click on the title and have a listen.

The other is 'Underworld-dubnobasswithmyheadman'. This album is more techno and sounds pretty cool, have a listen to 'Cowgirl'.