A baker's dozen of Waldrop's best short stories about movie and TV. Dream Factories and Radio Pictures collects twelve of Howard Waldrop's movie (“dream factories”) and television ("radio pictures") stories from his first four collections, as well as a new article and a new story. The stories — about personalities, history, projections, alternatives, guesses, and the effects they had and keep on having as they and we evolve — are accompanied by Waldrop’s original (in every sense of the word) introductions full of "Strange But True facts uncovered while researching them.” The collection includes: "Fin de Cyclé,” "Save a Place in the Lifeboat for Me,” “French Scenes,” "Heirs of the Perisphere,” "Hoover’s Men,” "Major Spacer in the 21st Century,” and more.
The stories in this collection imaginatively take readers far across the universe, into the very core of their beings, to the realm of the Gods, and to the moment just after now. Included are the works of masters of the form and the bright new talents of tomorrow. This book is a valuable resource in addition to serving as the single best place in the universe to find stories that stir the imagination and the heart.
This anthology presents a wide range of analysis, criticism, and opinion about one of the most influential fantasy authors of the twentieth century, with contributions by such well-known writers and critics as: Poul Anderson, Fritz Leiber, George H. Scithers, L. Sprague de Camp, S. T. Joshi, Howard Waldrop, Steve Tompkins, Darrell Schweitzer, Leo Grin, Robert Weinberg, Mark Hall, Charles Hoffman, Don D'Ammassa, Robert M. Price, Gary Romeo, and Scott Connors. A "must buy" for every fan of Robert E. Howard.
The Washington Post Book World called Howard Waldrop the "resident Weird Mind of his generation, he writes like a honky-tonk angel." Explore this second retrospective volume of Waldrop's work which collects seven of his best novellas and adds new author afterwords to each and you'll agree that no one else can be quite as weird, quite as excellent.
Widely regarded as the essential book for every science-fiction fan, The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 17 continues to uphold its standard of excellence with more than two dozen stories from the previous year. This year's volume includes not just a host of established masters but also many bright, young talents of science fiction. It embraces every aspect of the genre - soft, hard, cyberpunk, cyber noir, anthropological, military and adventure. Plus the usual thorough summations of the year and a recommended reading list.
“If this is your first taste of Howard, I envy you.”—From the Introduction by George R.R. Martin Acclaimed cult author Waldrop's stories are sophisticated, magical recombinations of the stuff our pop-culture dreams are made of. Open this book and encounter jazz singers, robotic cartoon ducks, nosferatu, angry gorillas, and, of course, the dodo. The first paperback (and twentieth anniversary) edition of a landmark debut collection. Waldrop’s capacious, encyclopedic knowledge of superheroes, baseball players, world wars, long-dead film stars, Mexican wrestlers, pulp serials, and fairy tales is put to good use in these sophisticated re-combinations of oddball television shows, radio plays, scientific expeditions, extinct species, knock-knock jokes, and questions like these: * What if the dodo wasn't extinct after all? * What if sumo wrestlers could defeat their opponents with the power of the mind? * What if Izaak Walton and John Bunyan went fishing for Leviathan in the Slough of Despond? Never published in paperback, long out of print, and extremely collectible, Howard Who? was Waldrop's seminal debut collection. If you haven't read Waldrop before, you're in for a treat. "The best Waldrops tend to mix the humorous and wistful.... Italo Calvino once said that he was "known as an author who changes greatly from one book to the next. And in these very changes you recognize him as himself." Much the same could be said of Howard Waldrop. You never know what he'll come up with next, but somehow it's always a Waldrop story. Read the work of this wonderful writer, a man who has devoted his life to his art -- and to fishing." —Michael Dirda, Washington Post "A charming collection." —Los Angeles Times "Back in print after so many years, Howard Who? remains a terrific collection of short stories. There is nobody else alive writing stories as magnificently strange, deliriously inventive, and utterly wonderful as Howard Waldrop." —Metrobeat Table of Contents Introduction by George R. R. Martin. The Ugly Chickens Der Untergang des Abendlandesmenschen Ike at the Mike Dr. Hudson's Secret Gorilla . . . the World, as we Know't Green Brother Mary Margaret Road-Grader "Save A Place in the Lifeboat for Me Horror, We Got Man-Mountain Gentian God's Hooks Heirs of the Perisphere Praise for Howard Waldrop: "Clever, humorous, idiosyncratic, oddball, personal, wild, and crazy." —Library Journal "Wise and funny." —Publishers Weekly "An authentic master of gonzo sf and fantasy." —Booklist "Erudite and gonzo." —Science Fiction Weekly "Waldrop subtly mutates the past, extrapolating the changes into some of the most insightful, and frequently amusing, stories being written today, in or out of the science fiction genre." —The Houston Post/Sun "The man's a national treasure!" —Locus "The resident Weird Mind of his generation, he writes like a honkytonk angel." —Washington Post Book World About the Author: Howard Waldrop, born in Mississippi and now living in Austin, Texas, is an American iconoclast. His highly original books include Them Bones and A Dozen Tough Jobs, and the collections All About Strange Monsters of the Recent Past, Night of the Cooters, and Going Home Again. He won the Nebula and World Fantasy Awards for his novelette "The Ugly Chickens."
The twenty-first century has so far proven to be exciting and wondrous and filled with challenges we had never dreamed. New possibilities previously unimagined appear almost daily . . . and science fiction stories continue to explore those possibilities with delightful results: Collected in this anthology are such compelling stories as: "On K2 with Kanakaredes" by Dan Simmons. A relentlessly paced and absorbing tale set in the near future about three mountain climbers who must scale the face of K2 with some very odd company. "The Human Front" by Ken MacLeod. In this compassionate coming-of-age tale the details of life are just a bit off from things as we know them-and nothing is as it appears to be. "Glacial" by Alastair Reynolds. A fascinating discovery on a distant planet leads to mass death and a wrenching mystery as spellbinding as anything in recent short fiction. The twenty-six stories in this collection imaginatively takes us far across the universe, into the very core of our beings, to the realm of the gods, and the moment just after now. Included here are the works of masters of the form and of bright new talents, including: Eleanor Arnason Chris Beckett Michael Blumlein Michael Cassutt Brenda W. Clough Paul Di Filippo Andy Duncan Carolyn Ives Gilman Jim Grimsley Simon Ings James Patrick Kelly Leigh Kennedy Nancy Kress Ian R. MacLeod Ken MacLeod Paul J. McAuley Maureen F. McHugh Robert Reed Alastair Reynolds Geoff Ryman William Sanders Dan Simmons Allen M. Steele Charles Stross Michael Swanwick Howard Waldrop Supplementing the stories are the editor's insightful summation of the year's events and a lengthy list of honorable mentions, making this book a valuable resource in addition to serving as the single best place in the universe to find stories that stir the imagination and the heart.
Their future depends on oursã Here, some of the most advanced carbon-based minds in science fiction offer their own unique perspectives on the complex and conflicted future relationships between mankind and his most brilliant creations--some funny, some sad, some bizarre, some terrifying, and all beyond anything ever imagined. _Itsy Bitsy SpiderÓ by James Patrick Kelly _Robots Don't CryÓ by Mike Resnick _London, Paris, Banana . . . _ by Howard Waldrop _La MacchinaÓ by Chris Beckett _WarmthÓ by Geoff Ryman _Ancient EnginesÓ by Michael Swanwick _Jimmy Guang's House of GladmechÓ by Alexander C. Irvine _DropletÓ by Benjamin Rosenbaum _Counting Cats in ZanzibarÓ by Gene Wolfe _The Birds of Isla MujeresÓ by Steven Popkes _Heirs of the PerisphereÓ by Howard Waldrop _The Robot's Twilight CompanionÓ by Tony Daniel At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).
Fifteen all-new stories by science fiction’s top talents, collected by bestselling author George R. R. Martin and multiple-award winning editor Gardner Dozois Burroughs’s A Princess of Mars. Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles. Heinlein’s Red Planet. These and so many more inspired generations of readers with a sense that science fiction’s greatest wonders did not necessarily lie far in the future or light-years across the galaxy but were to be found right now on a nearby world tantalizingly similar to our own—a red planet that burned like an ember in our night sky . . . and in our imaginations. This new anthology of fifteen all-original science fiction stories, edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois, celebrates the Golden Age of Science Fiction, an era filled with tales of interplanetary colonization and derring-do. Before the advent of powerful telescopes and space probes, our solar system could be imagined as teeming with strange life-forms and ancient civilizations—by no means always friendly to the dominant species of Earth. And of all the planets orbiting that G-class star we call the Sun, none was so steeped in an aura of romantic decadence, thrilling mystery, and gung-ho adventure as Mars. Join such seminal contributors as Michael Moorcock, Mike Resnick, Joe R. Lansdale, S. M. Stirling, Mary Rosenblum, Ian McDonald, Liz Williams, James S. A. Corey, and others in this brilliant retro anthology that turns its back on the cold, all-but-airless Mars of the Mariner probes and instead embraces an older, more welcoming, more exotic Mars: a planet of ancient canals cutting through red deserts studded with the ruined cities of dying races. FEATURING ALL-NEW STORIES BY James S. A. Corey • Phyllis Eisenstein • Matthew Hughes • Joe R. Lansdale • David D. Levine • Ian McDonald • Michael Moorcock • Mike Resnick • Chris Roberson • Mary Rosenblum • Melinda Snodgrass • Allen M. Steele • S. M. Stirling • Howard Waldrop • Liz Williams And an Introduction by George R. R. Martin! Praise for Old Mars “Strong, fun and evocative.”—Tordotcom “A fantastic anthology . . . Pulp magic lives in these pages.”—Bookhound
SPECTATOR BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2015 Britain's empire has gone. Our manufacturing base is a shadow of its former self; the Royal Navy has been reduced to a skeleton. In military, diplomatic and economic terms, we no longer matter as we once did. And yet there is still one area in which we can legitimately claim superpower status: our popular culture. It is extraordinary to think that one British writer, J. K. Rowling, has sold more than 400 million books; that Doctor Who is watched in almost every developed country in the world; that James Bond has been the central character in the longest-running film series in history; that The Lord of the Rings is the second best-selling novel ever written (behind only A Tale of Two Cities); that the Beatles are still the best-selling musical group of all time; and that only Shakespeare and the Bible have sold more books than Agatha Christie. To put it simply, no country on earth, relative to its size, has contributed more to the modern imagination. This is a book about the success and the meaning of Britain's modern popular culture, from Bond and the Beatles to heavy metal and Coronation Street, from the Angry Young Men to Harry Potter, from Damien Hirst toThe X Factor.
