Auctioning off some books

books, news, sales & specials, science fiction No Responses »

Jan 222016

Auctions over.

~~Due to some recent expenses, I’m unloading some stuff. I figure a silent auction on my website would be quicker and easier than Ebaying it.~~ So what I have: two lots of sci-fi books. First lot:

Lot 1:

Hardback: “Dune, The Machine Crusade.” Good shape w/dust jacket.

Hardback: “The Forge of God.” Good shape, first edition, first printing, w/dust jacket.

Hardback: Haynes Owner’s Workshop Manual, Millennium Falcon. Like new.

Paperback: “revelation Space.” Decent shape, 2002 printing.

Paperback: “Spock Must Die!!” OK shape, 6th printing, 1970. The first real Star Trek novel published.

Paperback: “Sandworms of Dune,” got wet and puffed up a tad, but still perfectly readable.

Paperback: “Contact.” 1997 printing, good shape.

Lot 2:

Hardback: “The Integral Trees,” First edition/printing, good shape w/dust jacket. Some tears on the jacket.

Hardback: “God Emperor of Dune,” First edition, fifth printing. Books in good shape, dust jacket is a bit beat up.

Hardback: Haynes Owner’s Workshop Manual, Imperial Death Star. Like new.

Paperback: “Eon,” 1986 printing. Used condition.

Paperback: “The Making of Star Trek,” 6th printing, 1970. Good shape!

Paperback: “The Tranquility Alternative,” 1997 printing. Almost new condition.

Paperback: “The Time Ships,” I think 1st paperback edition. Pretty good condition.

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Either of these lots should be worth at least $30 or so, but I’ll set the minimum at $15. So if you are interested in either lot, email me your bid (*not* comment) here:

The winner(s) will also be dinged for postage. For the US, they’ll go out media mail, so it should be cheap. The auction will end Sunday. I’ve never done an auction like this; the process is that you bid without know what the other folks are bidding… if anything. Highest bidder wins. If by Sunday there are two or more identical bids, I’ll contact the bidders and let ’em know, see what they want to bump up to.

Those Wacky Germans

books, history, Hmm... 3 Responses »

Jan 102016

Two newsworthy events occurred in Germany at the turn of the new year: the copyright expired on noted socialist thought leader Adolph Hitler’s manifesto “Mein Kampf,” and a number of sexual assaults were reported, half by immigrants/refugees from the middle east. The two events are of course not related, but one might be tempted to suspect that a secondary result of the first event might be somewhat related to the second event:

New edition of Hitler’s Mein Kampf goes on sale in German bookshops and sells out instantly

The edition in question is a 59-euro TWO THOUSAND page “critical edition” (presumably with just a whole lot of new footnotes and commentary and such) that was limited to a print run of 4,000… but 15,000+ orders were made for it before publication.

Aero Art

aircraft, art, books, history, Hmm..., projects, spacecraft 11 Responses »

Jan 052016

I recently decided that I wanted to at least look at the idea of producing a printed and bound book or two of aerospace artwork. For copyright reasons selling coffeetable tomes filled with other peoples art is probably not a good idea, so this would likely be something just for myself, if it can be made affordable. But step one was gathering the artwork I have into one location so’s I can figure out what to include. So I dug through the ol’ hard drives and gathered stuff into one folder. A few conditions: the images had to be large/high-rez enough to be printed at at least 8.5X11; they had to be in color, not B&W; they had to be paintings (not CGI, not photos of models, not line drawings); they had to be “official” images, not fan art of the like; they had to be interesting.

I’ve been thinking of perhaps a few different volumes… “Saturn/Apollo,” “Shuttle Program,” “Conceptual Designs,” etc. I was looking for something on the order of 50 images per volume.

End result: the “Aero Art” folder has 982 files for a total of 7.73 gigabytes. I guess I have enough to take a stab at this…

What I’d *really* like to do is to have a larger format book… preferably 11X17 or so pages. But that’s probably a bit much.

Space Station V dimensions: at last

AARRRGH, art, awesomeness, blather, books, drawings, history, Hmm..., science fiction 7 Responses »

Dec 222015

I’ve finally received a copy of The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film which covers the work done by designer Harry Lange on “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Included within it is a *mass* of preliminary sketches and he like… and one “Space Station-5 Final Design Blueprint.” The model is shown as being 8 feet in diameter. ~~The scale of the model is given as 1/32″ = 1’0″ which, if I’ve done my math correctly equates to 1/384 scale. Und zo… overall diameter of Space Station 5 is 8*384 feet… 3,072 feet.~~

UPDATE, two years later: Welp, turns out I made a stupid mistake. The 1/384 scale is correct… but for the *drawing,* not the *model.* The Drawing was reproduced at 1/4 the full scale of the model, so the diameter of the full-scale space Station V would be 1/4 X 3,072 feet = 768 feet, much more in line with understanding and logic.

Around about a year ago I got some vague rumors that one of the forthcoming books would have a reliable blueprint of the Station; awaiting this was one of the reasons why my work on my Space Station V diagrams ground to a halt. I figured the diagrams would show the station to be smaller than I had estimated. I did not expect that it would be *way* bigger. Well, there it is. When the facts don’t match your cherished theory… change the theory to match the facts.

The diagram is a close match for the model as built; it’s not some really early concept (though there are lots of those). So it is as close to “canon” as you can get.

As for the book: this is one of those books us “2001” engineering nerds have been waiting for. it doesn’t commit the dreadful sin of trying the force the pages into some weird shape or size; the pages are about 10″ by 11.” It’s more than 300 pages, *filled* with sketches and art and diagrams, including many of the Orion III, the Station, Discovery, Moon bus, etc. Layout map of Clavius Base, satellite designs, secondary vehicles, the works. If you haven’t ordered a copy, do so. It’s worth the price.
The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film

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AGM-129 Flashback

aircraft, books, drawings, history, nukes, photography, weapons 5 Responses »

Dec 162015

I was reminded of the AGM-129 Advance Cruise Missile today, which reminded me of the small heavily illustrated booklet on the AGM-129 I put together a few years ago. It’s probably not too late to buy a couple hundred of these as Christmas presents for your friends and family. Here’s a retread of the original post from Back Then:

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Literally years in the making, I’ve put together two versions of a photo essay of several surviving examples of the AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile. Available free for the downloading is Stagger Around #3: AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile, Abridged Edition as a 13 page PDF booklet. This contains photos of the AGM-129s on display at Hill Aerospace Museum in Utah, the USAF Museum in Dayton and the Strategic Air & Space Museum in Nebraska, ready to print.

Also available is Stagger Around #3: AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile, Full Edition. This 34-page edition includes more photos of these missiles, along with the missile at the San Diego Aerospace Museum restoration facility, a rare General Dynamics display model, official USAF photos of the AGM-129 in test and in service and drawings of the missile, including 1/32 scale layout diagrams. This is available through MagCloud, either as a downloadable PDF ($5.75) or as a professionally printed and bound edition ($11.80).

Don’t forget to check out my other MagCloud publications, including Justo Miranda’s Reichdreams Dossiers, Aerospace Projects Review, Historical Documents, and Photographing Stuff.

And don’t forget to check out Stagger Around #1, F-104A Starfighter, and Stagger Around #2, Starship Enterprise.

NOTE:

If you liked this and want to see more like it… feel free to toss fifty cents, a buck, a hundred bucks, whatever, my way. Think of it as a donation to a worthy cause. Or a bribe. Whatever you’re more comfortable with.

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When I originally put this out in 2012, the PDF version was orderable through MagCloud. If anyone wants to order it straight from here like most of my other stuff, let me know.

Red Mars

books, news, science fiction 3 Responses »

Dec 082015

… is coming to Spike TV as a series.

Spike Gives Straight-to-Series Order to ‘Red Mars’

Best point: it’s being written by Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski.

The “Red Mars” trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson is kinda divisive… some people love it, some hate it. I read the first book 17 or so years ago… and don’t remember it overly much. Still, there’s no such thing as too much hard sci-fi on TV.

Pax Orionis update

art, blather, books, history, My Fiction, news, Nuclear Pulse Propulsion, Patreon, Pax Orionis, science fiction, spacecraft 2 Responses »

Nov 112015

I released a two-part tale in the Pax Orionis series back in September, but nothing since. Partially due to travel, partially due to stress not being terribly conducive to creative writing. nevertheless, I’ve been writing, and am within spitting distance of finishing the next yarn, “The Blast from Jackass Flats.” The earlier two-parter told of an incident during the Great War of 1984 from the viewpoint of civilians on the surface, with Orion spacecraft way off in the distance; this next story deals explicitly with an important incident in the history of the Orion program. It will almost certainly be a one-parter rather than two.

Most of the Pax Orionis stories will be in different styles. This one is in the style of an author trying to tell the story from some time later. The author is perhaps overly interested in technical details…

If interested, please take a look at and consider signing on to the Pax Orionis Patreon. Only a buck!

“The Martian”

art, awesomeness, blather, books, news, rockets, science, science fiction, spacecraft 5 Responses »

Oct 042015

Quick review: a damn fine flick. Sticks remarkably close to the book; the changes aren’t the usual sort of dreck that changes the meaning of the story, or adds needless characters, or any of that. The visual effects are largely flawless (though the gravity centrifuge was apparently static, unlike the USS Discovery’s centrifuge, with the result that in some scenes it’s pretty obvious that actors are walking “down” the floor). The science is pretty good, the acting is good, the dialog works. There are no villains; the drama comes from the situation, not mustache-twirling badguys or steaming morons.

“The Martian”

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The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film

art, books, history, news, science fiction, spacecraft 1 Response »

Sep 302015

Another heavily illustrated “2001” book is due out in November:

The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film

Another book that *looks* promising ( I haven’t seen it myself), ut here’s the description:

The Holy Grail
Harry Lange’s complete unseen archive

This stunning tome is a previously unseen look behind-the-scenes at the making of this most legendary of science fiction classics. It is an in-depth examination of the complete, largely unpublished archive of art director Harry Lange’s designs, concepts, roughs and photographs.

Lange’s strikingly realistic designs created an extraordinary vision of the future. By releasing this unpublished archive and explaining its significance, the book takes the reader/viewer on a journey deep into the visual thinking behind 2001, for the first time ever – visual thought that might actually work.

The book is about the process, as well as the finished product. It examines how Harry Lange’s experience with NASA fed into the innovations of the film. It includes rejected designs, concepts and roughs, as well as the finished works. It reveals how the design team was obsessed with things that actually might work. The book illustrates several innovations that were science fiction in the 1960s but have since become science fact, including a ‘newspad’ designed by IBM, which bears an uncanny resemblance to today’s iPad. The remarkable designs for 2001 created a credible vision of the future.

ISBN: 978-0-9572610-2-0
336pp; Hardback; 600+ illustrations
290 x 245mm / 11.4 x 10 in.

According to Amazon, it’s due out in mid November… just in time for you to buy a few dozen copies for your friends for Saturnalia or Christmas or whatever. If’n you don’t see the standard Amazon ad link below, you should be able to get there through THIS TEXT LINK
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The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film

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Artisanal Books

art, awesomeness, books, history 7 Responses »

Sep 232015

Now this is interesting… small book printing and binding company in San Francisco that makes books the way they were made a century ago, using machines a century old. Books are the sort of thing that can be fairly and properly produced in as cheap a fashion as possible. Many novels rate little more than the cheapest possible printing, good enough to last a few readings. Some rate no more than a pile of electrons for reading on a tablet or some such. But some books really would be appropriate for this sort of hand-made effort. Use the right materials, and these books could remain a millenium from now.

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