Like The Running Man, J.R.H. Lawless’ darkly comedic sci-fi novel Always Greener (paperback, Kindle) is set against the background of a TV show, albeit an Extreme Makeover: Home Edition-esque reality show and not a Survivor-meets-Gladiator-ish combative game show. But in the following email interview about this novel, Lawless not only admits that The Running Man was an influence, so was a certain spacial travel guide and a couple cyberpunk video games.
As Futurama, Catherynne M. Valente’s Space Opera, and Space Balls show, combing science fiction and humor may not be easy, but it can work really well. Which is also what you get from Gate Crashers (paperback, Kindle), a comedic sci-fi novel from writer Patrick S. Tomlinson.
Given that he’s been a filmmaker for most of his life, and all of ours, it’s easy to forget that Woody Allen was a stand-up comedian in the ’60s, and a funny one at that. But now we have a vivid reminder of his time on the stage with Woody Allen The Stand-Up Years 1964-1968 (CD, digitial), an augmented version of Standup Comic and The Nightclub Years 1964-1968 that were, in turn, collections of the out-of-print albums Woody Allen, Woody Allen II, and The Third Woody Allen Album.