Tag: alien

April 6, 2015

Speculating Canada on Trent Radio Episode 33: An Interview with Ursula Pflug

I was finally able to do an on-air interview with the brilliant Peterborough author Ursula Pflug. Ursula and I talk about teaching writing in anticipation of co-teaching a course through Trent’s Continuing Education, the power of creativity, the risk of exposing your inner self when you write, the educational power of writing speculative fiction, the relationship between travel writing, the...

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September 3, 2014

The Abduction of Women’s Voices

A review of Nancy Johnston’s “The Rendez-Vous: The True Story of Jeanetta (Netty) Wilcox” in Bending the Landscape: Science Fiction (The Overlook Press, 1999) By Derek Newman-Stille Nancy Johnston’s “The Rendez-Vous: The True Story of Jeanetta (Netty) Wilcox” is a wonderful feminist discourse on the tendency of men to overwrite the narrative and words of women. This is a story...

Categories Fiction Book Reviews Comment: 1

August 2, 2014

Speculating Canada on Trent Radio Episode 14: An Interview with Suzanne Church

In this episode of Speculating Canada on Trent Radio, Waterloo author Suzanne Church swings by the studio as part of her book tour for her new collection Elements: A Collection of Speculative Fiction (Edge, 2014). Suzanne Church’s work stretches across genre boundaries between Horror, Science Fiction, and Fantasy. She has published in several of the Tesseracts anthologies, in collections like...

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May 30, 2014

Speculating Canada on Trent Radio Episode 5: Disability in Canadian SF

How many spaceships are wheelchair accessible? Do office buildings create light shielding for the undead who might be singed by solar exposure? Can my guide dog be a werewolf? Does one need to simply WALK into Mordor… or can one wheel in instead? SF has an interest in the body, whether it is the augmented body of sci fi, the...

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October 2, 2013

Mistaken Behaviours

A review of Liz McKeen’s “A Season Begins” in OnSpec #92 Vol. 25, No. 1 By Derek Newman-Stille War is a confusing thing, like cultural contact in general. Liz McKeen’s “A Season Begins” explores the interactions of two alien lives – one primarily land-based and one aquatic. Both species’ see the other as a threat due to their fundamental bodily...

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September 25, 2013

Sci Fi Author in Space

A review of Gary W. Renshaw’s “Vacation” in OnSpec #92 Vol. 25, No. 1 By Derek Newman-Stille Most SF authors write from their offices or living rooms, venturing into space in the realms of the mind, touring imaginary landscapes…. but what happens when an SF author ends up on an alien world? According to Gary Renshaw’s “Vacation”, odds are he...

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May 27, 2013

Nostalgia for the Stars

A review of Steven Appleby’s The Captain Star Omnibus (Sybertooth, Inc., 2008). By Derek Newman-Stille Society tends to disregard humour as less significant than other forms of social discourse, but humour contains within it a mechanism for piercing status quo barriers and interrogating issues that people may prefer not to look at critically. Humour pushes boundaries, breaks down walls, and...

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May 21, 2013

Creating Community in Isolation

A Review of Julie Czerneda’s Riders of the Storm (Daw, 2008) By Derek Newman-Stille  Displacement is a factor that is prevalent in the lives of many people who have had to leave home for whatever reason. The finding of “home” is a nebulous, complex, and constantly changeable phenomena. Julie Czerneda explores the search for home in a foreign and confusing...

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May 9, 2013

An Interview with James Alan Gardner

An Interview with James Alan Gardner By Derek Newman-Stille I have been very lucky to get in touch with James Alan Gardner. As a disability scholar and someone who is interested in portrayals in Science Fiction of people who are Othered, I was extremely pleased that Mr. Gardner agreed to do an interview with me. I hope that readers enjoy...

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May 4, 2013

Upcoming Interview with James Alan Gardner on Thursday, May 9

On Thursday May 9, Speculating Canada will be interviewing James Alan Gardner. Gardner is the author of The League of People’s Universe novels Expendable, Commitment Hour, Vigilant, Hunted, Ascending, Trapped, and Radiant. I first encountered James Alan Gardner through the recommendation of Alissa Paxton (who has co-hosted several Speculating Canada programmed on Trent Radio). She had recommended Mr. Gardner as...

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