For ease of use and to prompt me to up date a whole lot more, we’re moving home!
Come find us at http://scifiwarrington.tumblr.com
September will see us meeting, as normal, the first Tuesday of the month – 7th September 2010 – at 7pm in the Ring O’Bells.
The book to read is Children of Men by P. D. James (in honour of her 90th birthday). This book was made into a well received film and is the well known crime writer’s first and only venture into Sci-Fi.
As always, we’re looking for what else you’ve been reading and suggestions for next month.
June will see us meeting, as normal, the first Tuesday of the month – 1st June 2010 – at 7pm in the Ring O’Bells.
The book to read is Was by Geoff Ryman (Amazon UK, The Book Depository). This book from 1992 made it to the Fantasy Masterworks series and centers around the lives of three characters connected through The Wizard of Oz stories.
As always, we’re looking for what else you’ve been reading and suggestions for next month.
(Apologies, reviews from previous meetings will be up soon)
(Double apologies for only just realising I’d only drafted this…)
February saw the first post-Borders meeting due to the January snow problems. Five of us made it – no snowdrifts this month!
We discussed David Weber’s Bolo! – a collection of stories set around the exploits of the Artificially Intelligent mega-tanks. Robert summarised his notes for us:
Weber is a prolific writer, deeply into military – especially naval – history [Thanks Wikipedia]
This is the first set of stories I’ve read about an AI controlling a weapons system that doesn’t say bad things like “Dave, I’m afraid I can’t allow you to do that”.
Mixed opinions overall: Right-wing techno-fantasy?, some tedious/annoying bits, some engaging stories.
I’d sum up the discussion as “Totally bonkers technology – but quite entertaining.”
Alex offered:
I went into this without a very open mind. The cover alone just screams “our tanks, your horses… who do you think is going to win”. I managed to read one of the collection and, while it was funnier than anticipated (the cynical expectations of the beuracratic system) it still descended into a “my gun’s bigger than your gun” storyline.
The main Bolo character in the story – Nike – was also immensely irritating – I don’t care that it took you 0.23454829 seconds to do something – that’s just bragging and crass. Actually, now I think about it, that seems a remarkably long time but that’s a sign of the age of the book.
There were elements of humour and enjoyment, but overall it wouldn’t survive a theoretical purge.
Finally, NerdStock on BBC Four was mentioned – iPlayer appears to have it available still (2 days).
The March 2010 meeting for SciFi Warrington will be on Tuesday 2nd March 2010 at 7pm. We will be meeting in our new home The Ring O’Bells next to St. Elphin’s Church/Sainsbury’s.
See you there!
SciFi Warrington 