Tag Archives: alien invasion
Magazine: Perihelion SF, Sep 2016
I pull over onto the shoulder of the desert highway. The county Sheriff is waiting for me. He rolls down his window and points into the desert as I walk over. “Tracks go that way.” “You’ve got good eyes, spotting them from the road.” “Family in a minivan called it in.” “They saw it cross […]
Side Quest: from The Cold Step Beyond to Digital Rites
The next 10 stories in my side quest: The Cold Step Beyond by Ian MacLeod. A warrior-monk-girl-thing is sent on her latest monster-killing quest. The thing she’s sent to kill turns out to be herself in the past. Also, she’s the imaginary friend of a dead girl who took over the dead girl’s body. Possibly the […]
Side Quest: from The Copenhagen Interpretation to a Response from EST17
The next 10 stories in my Side Quest: The Copenhagen Interpretation by Paul Cornell. A steampunk espionage story, where the great powers have learned to fold space-time. The Invasion of Venus by Stephen Baxter. Two alien species fight a war in our solar system, but ignore Earth. This could have been a nice flash fiction, but instead […]
Mini-Review: The Thorne Legacy
The Thorne Legacy I’m still being crushed (under a mountain of paperwork) at my job, so I don’t have time tonight to write up another magazine review and continue my last Four Apes story. Instead, I thought I’d put down a few words about a story by fellow blogger JD Brink. While thinking about […]
Award Thoughts – Indie Reading
I’ve already posted my award thoughts concerning short stories, and the better novels I read last year. At the start of 2017, I made an effort to read some self-published books (and a couple of traditionally-published I hadn’t gotten to) to see if they might be worth nominating for best SFF book of the year. (I […]
Setting: Galactic Empire, part 4
In part 1, I described the enormous scale of a galactic empire. In part 2, I discussed the impact of FTL technology on the empire’s economy. In part 3, I wrote about the purpose of the empire, and ways it could be managed. Now, I ask: how does our empire maintain military and political control? […]
The Other Magazine Quest
If you’ve been following this blog lately, you know about my original magazine quest. I’m reading at least one issue from 24 (up from the original 12) different science-fiction magazines, and picking which one(s) I’ll subscribe to. I’ve only posted 14 magazine reviews so far, but I promise I’ll write up the others over the […]
Review: Armada
Armada Two nuclear missiles (2 out of 4 rating) I read Armada as part of my search for a 2015-published novel worthy of a Planetary Awards nomination. I place it third out of the five traditionally-published novels I read. If Armada had been indie-published, I also would have placed it squarely in the middle of […]
Flash Fiction: 365 Tomorrows
You might enjoy 365 Tomorrows if you like your science fiction in small, regular doses. Every day, it posts a new story that doesn’t take long to read (600 words or less). I don’t visit the site as often as I’d like to; I’m not the “visit every day” type, I’m more the “guy who […]
Movie: Edge of Tomorrow
Four Royal Crowns (4 out of 4 rating) A spoiler-free blog post for people who haven’t seen the movie This is the first movie review here at PDC. As you may know, PDC is currently headquartered in a non-western country, and either because the country isn’t considered important in Hollywood, or due to the […]
Planetary Defense Command 