Used Cars: Ray Bradbury is speaking out on the future of transportation. Bradbury, like Alfred Hitchcock, hates cars and doesn't drive them himself. Hitchcock reportedly found cars terrifying.

If you think about it, they're right. Is there really any sense in transporting ourselves around in metal canisters filled with explosive liquid that hurl along highways at breakneck speeds, at any moment, only as safe as the reflexes of the drivers around you allow? Isn't there a better way to do it?

Bradbury suggests we won't see one until the problems with our current system get so out of control that we're forced to. That makes sense, and is usually the case with capitalism.

But there is another way. There was no dire emergency that led to the popularity of post-it notes, no disastrous shortage of note paper that could stick to stuff that forced the hand of the market. Somebody came up with something nifty and people bought it.

Bradbury's position is that we'll keep cars until the situation gets so bad the other options seem good. Honestly, if somebody came up with a better solution today, that would probably solve the problem right there.

Happy Birthday Ray Bradbury

Just a couple short weeks after 08-08-08, science fiction writer Ray Bradbury is turning 88. SF signal is celebrating by posting an old commercial featuring Bradbury.

Oh, to have lived in a world where TV would feature commercials with science fiction writers.

I can see it now. James Patrick Kelley for PetCo! Robin Hobb for Carnival Cruises! William Gibson for Ray-Bans!

Happy birthday, Ray.

Here are the other posts where I've mentioned him (including the story about the time I met him).

Moore VS. Bradbury: Ray Bradbury is one of my favorite authors. His fiction rings so true to me and his metaphor is so powerful, it sometimes leaves me emotionally drained.

Michael Moore is one of my favorite filmmakers. His films (which also contain a lot of fiction) are very well done, and despite the fact that he and I agree about little, he really does create effective and entertaining polemic.

Now, Bradbury is upset about Moore's having copped his title for his new documentary.

Moore, I'm sure, could care less.

I'm It: Sandefur (as he is wont to be called) also "Tagged" me on his way out. So here goes:

1. Total Number of Books I've Owned: Not sure. Probably a 4 digit number. Definitely a 4 digit number if you count my wife's books.

2. Last Book I Bought: If you want to be literal, the last book I bought was Shadow Of The Hegemon by Orson Scott Card. I found it at the dollar store and couldn't resist buying it even though I had a copy, since I knew I could find it a good home eventually.

The last time I bought books for myself, I got three: The Game Of Work by Charles A Coonradt, Entrepreneurs: The Men and Women Behind Famous Brand Names and How They Made It by Joseph and Suzy Fucini, and The Art Of Playing Real Life Monopoly by Duncan Lindsey, to replace the one I've been "borrowing" from my Dad since my second daughter was born. I got them off the discount rack for a buck apiece.

3. Last Book I Read: Dang it! You caught me on one I'm not excited about. I read Middle Of Nowhere by Ridley Pearson while I was waiting in line for the midnight showing of Revenge Of The Sith. Don't get me wrong--I really enjoyed reading it. It was a page turner and all that. But after I finished, I didn't feel like it had done anything for me.

On the other hand, Ship of Magic by Robin Hobb, which I've been reading at the hotel, is fantastic. I'll blog more about that one in my coming "Author of the month" post.

4. Five Books That Mean A lot to Me: (Insert usual disclaimer about how this isn't in order, isn't complete, blah blah blah)

1. Prentice Alvin by Orson Scott Card (Of course, there's also Ender's Game, but that's what everybody expected me to say).

2. Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury. No other has the mastery of metaphor that Bradbury has. It is impossible to exaggerate this man's talent, and this is him at his sentimental best.

3. Mr. Mysterious & Company by Sid Fleischman. Fleishchman and Roald Dahl were the two who taught me there were interesting worlds to read about outside of comic books.

4. And as long as we get sentimental--the book that taught me how much fun reading could be: The Monster At The End Of This Book by Jon Stone. Needs no explanation.

5. The Scriptures. I know I don't usually get religious on this blog, but no set of books has as much influence on who I am as these.

5. Tag five people and have them do this on their blog: If I were to do this part, I would only discover five people I think read my blog who really don't.

Tell you what--if you do it, email me and I'll link to you.

Word Count: Like I've been talking about in my other blog, I've been trying to write 1,000 words a day.

Lots of writers advice this, but the best book I've ever read on writing is still Ray Bradbury's Zen In The Art Of Writing.

I've probably told this story a million times, but I'm going to tell it again.

I met Bradbury about 5 years ago, shortly after Marci and I were married. He was signing at a delightful bookstore in San Dimas. He was being his usual self, providing plenty of opinion and personality to everybody in line. It was interesting, because we usually couldn't hear the people who were talking to him, but we could always hear his responses.

"Crap!" he shouted at one point. "That's all the internet is, really, is crap."

If the most eloquent writer I know chose that terminology, I think there's something in it. My wife put that on a sign and hung it over my computer for a while after that.

So we got up to him, and I pulled out my little paperback copy of Zen In The Art Of Writing.

"I love this book," I told him. "This is what I take for depression."

"That's wonderful!" he said. And then, "So do you write every day?"

I hemmed and hawwed.

"Well, I'm sure you're busy," he said. "Work, school, other things." His enthusiasm faded as he made my excuses so I wouldn't have to.

I wanted to tell him, no! Don't make excuses for me! Chastise me publicly, right here in the front of the line at Mrs. Nelson's Bookshop!

But he didn't. He went on to say clever things to the person behind me, and I went away knowing he thought I was just another dreamer pretending to be a writer.

For two days now, I've put 1,000 words on paper each day. Tomorrow, can I make it three? And the day after that? And after that?

I can't convey how much I want the answer to be yes. I have something to prove. To myself, to my wife and my family, but also to the most eloquent writer I know, the one who put my excuses in my mouth for me, and in so doing, chewed me out royally.

And The Nominees Are . . .: As usual, you can find most of this year's Hugo nominees online.

A few years back, they also added a "retro" Hugo category. Done partly to inspire interest in classic SF, and partly to provide a chance for all the people who think all the good stuff was written 50 years ago, the competition is tough and the novels are fantastic. It's partly depressing to look at the list--this year's retro nominees for best novel include The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov,
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, and Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke. Are we really producing anything that good today?

I think we are. But nostalgia is a tough spice to outflavor, and these stories still have something to them missing today.

As much as we hype nostalgia, though, most fiction quickly stales with age. The fact that these still feel so fresh and revelant--how many of this year's nominees will withstand that test?

(I'm honestly asking--I haven't read them yet. I'll post reviews as I do, though.)

Bradbury will win of course. Clarke will get to take comfort in his "The Nine Billion Names of God" winning in the short story category, though. Check that one out, if you haven't--it really is short.

Poem: As somebody who I already linked to once today and who doesn't need any more links, thank you, pointed out, April is National Poetry Month. And since I already have the book in my hot little hands, I thought I'd post one of my favorite Bradbury poems, and encourage you to rush out and buy the book right now, right this minute, never mind that it's after two in the morning.

DOING IS BEING

by Ray Bradbury

Doing is being.
To have done's not enough;
To stuff yourself with doing--that's the game.
To name yourself each hour by what's done,
To tabulate your time at sunset's gun
And find yourself in acts
You could not know before the facts
You wooed from secret self, which much needs wooing,
So brings it out,
Kills doubt by simply jumping, rushing, running
Forth to be
The new-discovered me.
To not do is to die,
Or lie about and lie about the things
You just might do some day.
Away with that!
Tomorrow empty stays
If no man plays it into being
With his motioned way of seeing.
Let your body lead your mind--
Blood the guide dog to the blind;
So then practice and rehearse
To find heart-soul's universe,
Knowing that by moving/seeing
Proves for all time: Doing's being!

In Reruns: Came across this list of the most widely anthologized Sci-Fi short stories.


1 Bradbury, Ray - The Sound of Thunder

2 Asimov, Isaac - Nightfall
Wells, H. G. - The Star

3 Ellison, Harlan - "Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman
Aldiss, Brian W. - But Who Can Replace a Man?

4 Clarke, Arthur C. - The Nine Billion Names of God
Clarke, Arthur C. - The Sentinel of Eternity
Simak, Clifford D. - Desertion

5 Bradbury, Ray - There Will Come Soft Rains
Godwin, Tom - The Cold Equations

6 Clarke, Arthur C. - The Star

7 Ballard, J. G. - Billenium
Keyes, Daniel - Flowers for Algernon
Leinster, Murray - First Contact

8 Wells, H. G. - The Man Who Could Work Miracles


9 Bixby, Jerome - It's a Good Life
del Rey, Lester - Helen O'Loy
Ellison, Harlan - I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream

10 Blish, James - Common Time
Brown, Fredric - "Arena"
Clarke, Arthur C. - History Lesson
Merril, Judith - That Only a Mother
van Vogt, A. E. - The Monster

I do get to feel that warm, fuzzy feeling that I've read nearly every story on the list, and all but a couple of them are on a bookshelf not three feet from me as I sit typing this.

It's also interesting that despite the belief that "Nightfall" is the most widely anthologized short story, "The Sound of Thunder" beat it, and an old HG Wells story ties it. One with the same title as the better known Arthur C Clarke story that's in the number 6 position.

But I think if textbooks were included in this list, "The Sound of Thunder" would beat everything, hands down.

Arthur C Clarke Dies at Age 90

If you were to ask somebody for the A, B, C's of science fiction, chances are the three names you'd most likely get would be Asimov, Bradbury, and Clarke.

Asimov passed away in 1992, and now another of the big three has passed, as we have lost Arthur C Clarke.

The world would probably best know him as the author of the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, a film that probably perplexed most of them as much as it perplexed me the first time I saw it as a junior in high school--reading the book a dozen or so years later, it made infinitely more sense.

Among science fiction readers, he's probably best known for his short stories--particularly, "The Star," and "The Nine Billion Names of God." My mother teaches American Literature to college students who aren't native English speakers. When I ask people for suggestions for good science fiction stories to use in class, those two inevitably get mentioned, which would be great if Clarke hadn't been British (Perhaps she'll have to wait for her semesters at Cambridge).

More details and links at Locus Online.

Sunday Book Review:

When I feel overwhelmed, when I've absolutely given up hope that I'll ever be able to string two words together, when I forget why I wanted to write in the first place, this is the book I reach for.

It's not a how-to book. It's more of a why-to book, and there's times when that's a more important question.

The essays are culled from various places, but they all possess that usual Bradbury metaphor and energy. I daresay your receptiveness to this book may be the same as your usual reaction to him--if his lyrical prose fiction leaves you cold, this may not be the book for you.

But if, like me, you've ever found yourself gasping at how his metaphor can reach in and grab you by the heart, tugging as you realize it is clear, it is right, it is how the world is, you will find that same feeling here.

He will coax you down the path, lead you back to that place inside of you that must write every day, just to sustain itself, and, ultimately, to sustain you.

Congratulations: To Ray Bradbury, for receiving the National Endowment for the Arts Award, and Madeleine L'Engle, for receiving the National Endowment for the Humanities Award.

Speaking of Late: So I also missed out on this trend. The one where you grab the closest book, open up to page 23 and post the fifth sentence in your Blog. This is hard. I think I am equidistant my entire bookshelf, but I shall see.

Ah. Two books sit nearer me on top of each other. The first:

"So you can imagine how astonished I was when I prowled through a free carnival exhibit and saw all those fetuses of humans and cats and dogs, displayed in labeled jars."

The second:

"Because you couldn't always tell from the surface, thought Marin."

The first is from Zen in the Art of Writing, by Ray Bradbury, and the second is from the anthology Spectrum 5, edited by Kingsley Amis and Robert Conquest, from a story called "Student Body" by FL Wallace.

Regarding Henri: This is from the Sleeping Beauty DVD special features, from an excellent short entitled "Four Artists Paint One Tree."

"The best advice I have ever given to students who have studied under me has been just this: Educate yourself. Do not let me educate you."

I'm reading from Robert Henri in response to a question often asked in letters from Art students. However they put it, it always boils down to this:

Students become confused by honest admiration for one school of painting, mixed with recognition of the success and popularity of another style, along with advice to follow a still different approach. Frequently a student will ask which one he should imitate.

Robert Henri would advise, don't imitate anyone. He says, "One of the great difficulties of an art student is to decide between his own natural impressions and what he thinks should be his impressions." And on another page, "Go forward with what you have to say, expressing things as you see them."

Time after time, in his Art spirit, Henri says, "Be yourself." --Walt Disney

I admit to being terribly guilty of this. Rather than write stories or essays from the heart, I sometimes feel I'm attempting to create something that fits what I think a short story or essay is supposed to be.

Too often, I attempt to impress rather than make an impression.

The result is stilted and awkward. It's too derivative to touch anyone else, and it's too withdrawn from who I really am to be cathartic for me.

In fact, since my goal was solely too impress, I inevitably end up feeling like a failure, whereas when I write something that pleases me, I get to enjoy it for myself, opinions of others notwithstanding.

But usually those turn out to be the peices others enjoy. My first bit of published fiction was cranked out in an hour, the result of an idea I was passionate about, of my having something to say.

(For further reading, check out Ray Bradbury's Essay "Zen in the Art of Writing," in the book by the same name.)

Election Time: To honor the fact that we're supposed to vote on some stuff soon, I'm going to cast a bunch of votes. Here goes.

Best Candy Bar: Butterfinger
Best Candy in General: Jelly Bellys
Best Online Tetrisesque Puzzle Game: Bejewelled
Best TV Show of All Time: The Dick Van Dyke Show
Best Movie of All Time: Back to the Future
Best Kids Movie: Matilda
Website That Jumped The Shark The Worst: Coming Attractions
Celebrity Who I'm Glad Isn't Popular Because I Like Having Her To Myself: Keri Russell
Best Book That's Not By Orson Scott Card: Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
Best Film That Showed People Internet Films Could Be High Quality: Troops