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Hi all, The Future Happens Twice is one of the better science-fiction novels I have read. Its originality and Matt’s uncomplicated writing style made it a delight to read. Matt’s extensive research for the novel also shines through as I never found myself thinking an element within the novel was implausible. It is a hard science-fiction novel. By hard I don’t mean it’s hard to read, far from it. Matt Browne writes in a simple style that doesn’t intrude on the story. His style is reminiscent of the uncomplicated writing of Dean Koontz, Margaret Atwood and Peter Carey. You won’t be re-reading jargon laden and unnecessarily complicated sentences in The Future Happens Twice. By hard science-fiction I mean that Matt Browne has created a universe true to today’s science and what scientists think will be possible in the future. Some of the hard science-fiction elements in the novel include: cloning, nanotechnology matter-compilers, artificial wombs, believable androids, realistic alien li...

Hi all, If you didn't know, Sophie Mirabella was one of three or four opposition members to boycott Kevin Rudd's apology for past government policies to the Stolen Generation. Unfortunately Sophie is my local member. The local regional newspaper, The Border Mail, calls her the "darling of the far-right". I would tend to agree. There has been a strong response against her boycott from the electorate of Indi. 150 people took out a newspaper ad in the Border Mail, and about 40 letters, 34 or so against her stance, appeared in last Saturday's edition of that paper. On regional ABC radio phone calls and read out texts went about 50/50, but that was probably the ABC trying to show a lack of bias. Last Thursday 400 people attended a rally in Wangaratta to show that they were against her boycott and supported the apology. Sophie evaded a question on radio about whether she thought that Aboriginal children had been stolen by stating that none had been taken in Victoria acc...

Hi all, In a previous post (January 6th) about the future of the book, I mentioned a few articles I had read that suggested novel writers might have a greater chance of fighting off the distractions of computer games and movies if they wrote stories that did the one thing that movies and games can't do as effectively: explore the inner working of their character's mind. There seemed some logic to doing this: why read an action adventure story if you can play an action adventure game or watch an action adventure television program. In Japan a new phenomenon suggests that novelists might be more successful if they don't explore the inner workings of their character's minds at all. Novels written and read on mobile phones have become all the rage. Five of the top ten selling novels in Japan last year first made their appearance as mobile phone serials. These mainly romance novels use pauses to indicate that a character is thinking. What they are thinking is obviously up to...

Hi all, I enjoyed my first day back at work, partly due to my nemesis not being there, but more due to a new teacher-librarian who is there two days a week - she seems open to suggestions. There also wasn't the mad rush to return books before the end-of-year overdue letters were given to students. I got the quickest turn around for an application and then interview on Monday. I applied for a long shot - I thought anyway - with an email and got a phone call for an interview thirty minutes later. I had the interview today and did okay, I think. I've written some of my novel every day this year. Habits become habit forming, I hope. I am still not up to my ideal modest word count per day, but it is on the increase. I've been fooling around with technocrati, a search engine for blogs. At the moment I have three blogs, one at myspace, one at livejournal and one at blogspot. I will probably eventually ditch blogspot and then carry on with one of the others, depending on which one ...