Modernmoonman song of the day: Loomer by My Bloody Valentine

Peter Falk RIP

Peter Falk passed away this week...this isn't sci-fi, but here's a great scene from the Wim Wenders' classic film "Himmel Uber Berlin" ("Heaven over Berlin" is how it translates, but for some reason in the U.S.A. it is known as "Wings of Desire"):

So great!

Stars My Destination

Gully Foyle is my name
And Terra is my Nation
Deep Space is my dwelling place
The stars my destination


Stars My Destination was written by Alfred Bester and Published in 1956.  Many consider it to be the best sci-fi book ever written.  It's in the top ten, surely.

This book is like a Jack Kirby Comic; so much vitality, nobody can keep up with it.  Pages 228-235 are so great.  Here:

"You pigs, you.  You goof like pigs is all.  You got the most in you, and you use the least.  You hear me you?  Got a million in you and spend pennies.  Got a genius in you and think crazies.  Got a heart in you and think empties.  All a you.  Every you..."  "Take a war to make you spend.  Take a jam to make you think.  Take a challenge to make you great.  Rest of the time you sit around lazy, you.  Pigs, you!  All right, God Damn You! I challenge you, me.  Die or live and be great.  Blow yourselves to Christ gone or come and find me, Gully Foyle, and I make you men.  I make you great.  I give you the stars."

"He hung in space for a blinding moment, as helpless, as amazed, and yet as inevitable as the first gilled creature to come out of the sea and hang gulping on a primeval beach in the dawn-history of life on earth."

This book is a classic among classics; for 1956, this book slays....and is better, perhaps, but not necessarily, better,  than his 1st one: The Demolished Man...man, Alfred Bester should be a household name by now, cos he had some style, and more importantly, some substance to his contributions to sci-fi literature...

He also came up with the oath for comic book hero Green Lantern:

In Brightest Day, In Blackest Night,
No Evil Shall Escape My Sight,
Let those Who Worship Evil's Might,
Beware My Power....Green Lantern's Light! 

Alfred Bester.  Fantastic.

Spin

Spin is a novel written by Robert Charles Wilson and published in 2005.  Stephen King calls him "a hell of a storyteller" right on the cover, yo, so if King says it, it's just gotta be true...and it is to a degree.  This book is the "Secret History" (by Donna Tart) of Sci-Fi...but not as good...and not as bad....but still, it won the Hugo for 2005, so it's gotta be good right?  It's pretty good, glad I read it, and the scene at the end with the brother receiving transmissions from the stars.....that's a quality scene; haunting even......but still, I just can't wait to get to my next review...seems that the Hugo, a sci-fi popularity poll, not a critical one.... in 2005 and the Hugo in 1965 whatever...well they are different times now, eh?  If you see this and have to sit on a beach, make it a groovy sci-fi beach read.....

Modernmoonman song of the day: Life on Mars by David Bowie

Modernmoonman song of the day: Sun Ship by John Coltrane

Modernmoonman song of the day: Whitey on the Moon by Gil Scott Heron, RIP

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