My new web site: http://www.pauldaytonscifi.com/

pauldayton — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 13:02:16 +0000

I’ve been fence sitting on this one. With my new book “We’ve Seen the Enemy” out and the second one “The Enemy is US” coming any day, I’ve finally decided to make it a go. As much as it exists to pump up good ol science fiction (and my book), you can also read excerpts and shorts. I’ll be adding a Chapter page, which includes a self contained chapter from my other book, “And You Thought Your Family was Dysfunctional” which is full of hilarious family stories. My family has no idea I wrote it, and you won’t believe it’s true.

Frozen peas up a nasal cavity? Aunt Vampira? Uncle Shroom and Aunt Penis? (Names have been changed to protect their identity, and my life.) Read them all there.

Here’s the website, in case you missed it in my title:

http://www.pauldaytonscifi.com/

THE GOLDEN AGE OF SCIENCE FICTION

pauldayton — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 19:09:58 +0000

The Golden Age of Scifi is DEAD.
LONG LIVE THE GOLDEN AGE!
I grew up on books. Asimov, Tolkien, Arthur C. Clark; swallowed up all of Doyle’s mysteries whole; loved Burroughs’ Mars stories, horrendous endings and all, and let’s see…George Wells, Jules Verne, Fred Saberhagen, and many, many more. Who can forget Dune, or Foundation, or the robot series? Berserker machines sent out to exterminate all life down to the tiniest microbe?
And yet, where is classic, good old fashioned science fiction now? I’m not talking Buck Rogers and rayguns here, I’m talking about good, solid fiction with real science backing it. Scifi has mutated, morphed, and evolved, in some cases into something less than the sum of its parts. Why do I say this? Because, Science Fiction should be FICTION, with SCIENCE in it. Apparently, I’m not alone in this idea either. How else could the popularity of Star Trek, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Stargate and other movies and shows be explained? But when it comes to books, although classic scifi can still be found, much of it now comes in the form of a heroin solidly planted in the future (scifi) carrying a sword and wielding some sort of fantastical power unexplained by science(fantasy). Worse yet, sometimes the sword (or whatever prop is used) is the power. This has become so popular today that you will likely no longer find a section at your local book store labelled ‘Science Fiction,’ Instead, you will see ‘Science Fiction/Fantasy’. This is weird. Do you see ‘Murder mystery/Fantasy’? ‘Thriller/Fantasy’? ‘Comedy/Fantasy’? Of course not. So, why should there be Science Fiction/Fantasy?

Are there two different groups of people – readers and watchers? What is your opinion?
Ive recently completed two books that I can happily classify as Science Fiction, in its purest form. You’ll find it solidly in the future, no magic swords anywhere, with good science backing the fiction. Does this work? Well, Clark’s 2001 and Rama fiction had serious fiction with solid science, as did Asimov’s Foundation series, as did Hubbard’s Battlefield Earth (the book that is, not the movie), as did Saberhagen’s Beserkers, as did…

Although I’ve kept science to a minimum so as not to interfere with the story, here is an excerpt from my book “We’ve Seen the Enemy”:

“The truth is, the ants stole it. They don’t have Einsteins or Jonathan Diazes.”
“But they have a lot of new stuff though,” Jack said. “Like that stealth craft we stole.”
“You’re right, but even that didn’t come from them, simply because they aren’t able to do it. Think of it this way. Think back to the discovery that most metals could be made transparent. When and how did that happen?”
Jack had to dig deep to remember the article from the teaching unit. “In 2010, a number of scientists expanded on the fact that glass is neither a solid nor a liquid.”
“Exactly! Regular glass, just like your drinking cup. And nobody could classify it. It was such a mystery!” Nan’mtek said as she clapped her hands. And yet, NASA did studies, applied the known information to metals and…
“Within 10 years we had our first continuously transparent piece of aluminum,” Jack finished off.
“Yes. And thirty years later?”
“We were able to turn various metals transparent with the flick of a toggle.”

In my opinion, this kind of brief science brings realism to the actual story.
That’s what this blog is about. If you want to read real, classic Science Fiction, please take a look at my two books, titled: “We’ve Seen the Enemy” available now on e-book at www.ireadiwrite.com and soon on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Books on Board, Mobipocket, Omnilit, Sony, Smashwords and the Apple ibookstore; and coming in early May, my second and final one in the series, “The Enemy is US”. Read people’s opinions on this work, copied from comments they posted on Authonomy on one of my pages.
Reach me here, or at pauldayton_scifi (at) hotmail.com
An excerpt of my work can be found here: http://www.ireadiwrite.com/We-ve-Seen-The-Enemy.html
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Pauldayton's Blog

My new web site: http://www.pauldaytonscifi.com/

THE GOLDEN AGE OF SCIENCE FICTION