While human cloning hasn’t been perfected, yet, it’s still a controversial topic that’s inspired moral, ethical, and spiritual debates. But all of these discussions have been about whether human cloning should or should not be allowed, not what happens when it does. It’s those latter kinds of questions that inspired aspects of Mur Laffery’s new sci-fi murder mystery novel Six Wakes (paperback, digital, audiobook), as you’ll see in the following interview.
While the most recent Star Trek movies kind of, sort of, but not really rebooted the saga, the Trek novels have continued the timeline of the original series, the other shows, and the previous movies. Which is how we get to Dayton Ward’s Star Trek The Next Generation Headlong Flight (paperback, digital), a new adventure for Captain Picard and crew. Though in talking to Ward about the novel, it turns out we also get there by going through a certain Canadian rock band…
While science fiction is often set in the future or some other version of our world, these stories are often really about issues from our time, from our reality. Sure, the original Star Trek was set in space…the final frontier, but it still explored contemporary problems from our world, including racism and the cost of war. It’s a tradition being continued by writer Joe M McDermott with his new military sci-fi novel, The Fortress At The End Of Time (paperback, digital), a book, he explains below, came from something he saw his family going through.
With some exceptions, short story collections are usually just a series of unconnected tales. And even when they do have a connection, it’s usually based on some narrative device (all the stories were written by God) or based by where they were first published (The Complete New Yorker Stories). But in Children Of The New World: Stories (paperback, digital), writer Alexander Weinstein connects his sci-fi short stories with a theme, one that not only makes for good storytelling, but good cautionary advice as well.
Funko have announced that they’ll release a pair of Wobblers bobbleheads and pen toppers of characters from the upcoming Star Wars spin-off movie, Rogue One A Stary Wars Story this December.
Though it’s only been out a month or so, the cyberpunk shooting adventure game Deus Ex Mankind Divided (Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC) is already getting a story-driven expansion. But while Deus Ex Mankind Divided System Rift (also Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC) isn’t a radical departure from the main game, it is a short but challenging one-off mission that has all of the elements, and all of the engagement, of the main game.
Though I’ve never had children, even I know that the worst thing imaginable would be for a parent to outlive their kid. But it is out of great tragedy that we sometimes get great art. In his new science fiction novel A Life Twice Given (paperback, digital), writer David Daniel has tried to deal with the death of his son by imagining what he, as a father, might’ve done if human cloning was a reality. But in talking to Daniel about the book, he revealed that immortalizing his son in a science fiction novel isn’t the only way he’s dealing with this immense loss.
In his debut novel Sleeping Giants (hardcover, digital), writer Sylvain Neuvel uses interview transcripts and journal entries to tell the story of how a young girl from South Dakota found an enormous metal hand, and then grew up to be a scientist searching for the rest of the giant robot. Though in talking to him about the book, it’s clear that this story may be larger than one young girl and one big robot.
While the original mission of the Enterprise only made it through three of its planned five year schedule, it’s more than made up for it thanks to numerous Star Trek novels (and comics, and games…). The latest of which is James Swallow’s Star Trek The Original Series The Latter Fire (paperback, digital), which presents yet another adventure for Kirk, Spock, and their coworkers. Though in talking to Swallow about this book, it’s interesting to learn that Star Trek novels come with their own version of The Prime Directive.