SandF #5.9 (Torture Cinema Meets Jason X) is Live!

I'll let the description for the new episode do all the talking:

You voted for it, so we have to watch it. Today is our super special Halloween edition of Torture Cinema...and we're watching Jason X, one of those awful science fiction horror flicks. Thanks, guys. We love you too. 

But to make things a little more interesting, we've decided to start including a little acting into this feature. Every Torture Cinema episode will feature a special one act play, in which we re-enact a scene from the movie in question. Granted, our acting is about as bad as the movies we have to watch, but at least we're funny, right? We hope you enjoy it!

If that sounds like something for you, then click through and download the episode!

Promo Bits: Ashes of the Black Frost by Chris Evans

It's time for a little bit of love for someone's book.  This time it's for Ashes of the Black Frost by Chris Evans, which is one of those Iron Elves books.  If you've read his books before, leave a comment and let me know what you thought of them.

Here goes:

SandF #5.8 (Interview w/ Diana Rowland) is Live!

Our latest author interview is up for your enjoyment.  This week, urban fantasy author Diana Rowland joins us to talk about some really bizarre stuff.  Such as:  morgues and their smells, substance abuse and zombies, etc.

Feel free to check out the episode here.

Dear Rick Scott: Your (Anti)Education Plan Stinks

(You'll all have to excuse me while I rant about something political on this blog.)

If you haven't heard already, Rick Scott, the governor of Florida (where I live), announced his intention to change the Floridian university system by shifting funding away from the humanities towards "job creating" STEM majors.*  Plenty of folks have poked fun at him for singling out anthropologists (for having degrees in nifty fields, but which (apparently) do little for society).**  But I'd like to talk about a different problem:  Scott's assumption that STEM majors will create jobs or assure graduates that they will be able to find them.  I'll set aside, for the moment, that his program would likely affect me personally, since I am an English major in a field that would inevitably be cut.

To start things off, STEM majors don't produce jobs.  True, putting more funding into those majors will mean hiring more teachers, which would create some jobs, but this is counteracted by all those teachers in other fields who would likely get fired as a result of the budget shifts.  Scott's plan would do little more than produce more graduates in fields that are already overwhelmed with graduates.  There aren't enough jobs in the sciences to begin with.  When graduates in any field aren't able to get jobs in or relevant to their field, it's ridiculous to assume that producing more

Classtime: Your Genre Recommendations

Originally posted on Google+, but equally relevant here:

Need recommendations from you all. I'm teaching a course called Writing About Postcolonialism and Genre Fiction and I want to couple the postco genre text with a short, representative example of the literary tradition in a particular genre. So, I'm asking you for your recommendations and opinions. I've got a lot of things in mind, but I haven't read everything and it's possible there's a perfect story that I don't know about...which you have read.

This is what I'm looking for (short fiction, novelettes, novellas, but no novels if possible):

• Golden Age or Pulp Era Space Opera (the high octane kind of stuff that best represents SF of the period) 
• Medical Thriller 
• General Thriller 
• Crime or Detective Mystery 
• Fairytale (perhaps a specific Western tradition, or specific tales) 
• Dystopia 
• Noir 

Right now, I'm considering things like Smith's Lensman Series, Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Shorts, some of Poul Anderson's shorts, and selections from Grimm's fairytales (among other things).

That's a lot of genres, I know. I just want to saturate my head with as many possibilities so I can find the perfect combo for this class. Crowd sourcing literature classes FTW!

(A quick clarification: I'm not looking for contemporary examples, as much of the texts I'm using on the postco side are from the last 40ish years. I want to show how they arise from a solid literary genre tradition, if that makes sense.)

Thanks!

I'm Not Disappeared (Updatery)

For the record, I haven't disappeared.  Nor have I quit doing all the stuff I like doing, such as reviewing books, writing, and so on.  Rather, I've been doing worrying or thinking intensely about the following:

• My upcoming paper presentation for the English Graduate Organization Annual Conference (entitled "“Escaping Apartheid: The Speculative Renaissance in South Africa”).  I've got a week.  Yikes.
  
• My paper and abstract for the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts, which is held in Orlando every year.  China Mieville will be guest of honor, though he likely won't attend any of my panels as I am not in his fields of interest.  But you never know.  The paper is on Kage Baker's The House of the Stag (a rewrite of a previous paper).
  
• The class I am teaching next semester called "Writing About Postcolonialism and Genre Fiction," in which I will be teaching students about the rise of genres like science fiction and fantasy (and their connection to the formations of empire) and how writers from the postcolony use such genres (including mystery, magical realism, etc.) to interrogate empire.  I'm going to teach some Tobias S. Buckell, Nalo Hopkinson, Amos Tutuola, Amitav Ghosh, Salman Rushdie, Lauren Beukes, Nadine Gordimer, and many others.  It should be fun.
  
• My oncology appointment on Monday.  I'm turning into a hypochondriac right now.  Every little change in my body makes me wonder whether I have some terrible new form of cancer, which is always a possibility for survivors of cancer.  It's stressing me out and all I want right now is for my cancer doctor to get some tests and tell me I'm a little overweight, have high natural cholesterol and asthma, but otherwise I'm a-OK.  Because paying for chemo, surgery, etc. etc. etc. is not something I can manage right now.  There's no way...
  
• The 70 students I am currently teaching (two classes of "Intro to College Writing" and one class of "Professional Communication").  Over the next 8 weeks, I will be busy busy busy.  But if I keep on top of things, I'll do just fine.
  
• The two papers I have to write this semester (one a short conference-length thing, and the other a full 20ish-page monster).  With all the work I'm doing, and all the personal stress, you can imagine what those papers look like on the other side of the hill:  a giant, paper-filled, ink-spewing monster!

I've got lots of other worries too, such as finishing WISB and some stories I've still got to write for the WISB project.  They're coming.  I'm drowning in work and having a hard time keeping it all together.  But I'll manage.

What's got you stressed or busy these days?

SandF Episode 5.7 (Interview w/ Lavie Tidhar) is Live!

The latest episode is here.  Jen and I talk to Lavie Tidhar about his latest book, Osama from PS Publishing, and some difficult topics like terrorism, 9/11, and Osama Bin Laden.  You definitely don't want to miss this one, folks!