Who Reads My Books: Andy Plumbly

Andy Plumbly / Fader 209


Hey, my name is Andy and I’m a geek. I’m 26 and living in Norwich where I have been since forever. Reading sci-fi books, watching sci-fi movies and playing games takes up most of my free time when I’m not doing arty bits and pieces or writing.

Which leads me to when I first contacted Neal years back with a picture I did of some Frogwhelks after being inspired greatly by The Skinner. The lines were wobbly and it was a cartoon design but Neal kindly put it up on his blog and Myspace page which made me super happy.

Art and design was more of a hobby back then but over the years (after gradually gaining more skills & confidence) I realised I wanted to go into art and design as a job.

So here I am, trying to start up as an artist/graphic designer! It’s tough finding work (as it is in general for all unemployed at the moment) but I’m building up a portfolio in this spare time and doing work for free if friends need something done.

As mentioned at the beginning of this I would consider myself to be a geek. Been gaming since I was 3 when I first played Pac-Man on the Atari 2600. Chewing on the controller was also fun.

I have recently bought Pac-Man Championship Edition DX on the 360.…so yeah, full circle.

Chewing on the controller still sometimes happens.

Pics of my face, bookshelf and arty stuff included for your visual digestion!

Andy

Autoguns.

Thanks to Huan Tan for sending me this link.

Intelligent robot technology is one of the next generation new technologies which will lead the 21st century's industrial and military science technologies with the development of artificial intelligence (AI). For example, a monitoring and sentry system can be a sophisticated system employing a variety of technologies such as ultra-low brightness camera technology, image recognition technology, image processing and storing technology, voice recognition technology, servo technology, image tracking technology, and system control technology.


In The Departure they are called reader-guns.

The Tubbs I Missed.

I read 28 (I think) books of the Dumarest saga but gave up because I thought it unlikely he would ever find Earth. Todd informs me the saga does end and has now given me the evidence. I must start searching dealers in second-hand books for these:

Who Reads My Books: Todd Sanders.

Hi Neal,


I thought I'd take a few minutes to send over my library photos and a brief bio for your blog. It's hard to stand back far enough in my library to take full photos of each wall so excuse the slightly pieced together shots. My modest library has a little over 3000 books in it at this time. It is a mix of about half science fiction/fantasy with the other half comprising French literature and poetry (original and in translation), other fiction/literature and poetry from around the world, a library of books on ancient board games and a large collection of research books on surrealism. I also have a large collection of first edition French works of literature in translation and maintain several sites about French writing.

westwall.jpg - my collection of french first editions and other rare books in barrister shelves.

eastwall.jpg - most of my science fiction collection including a complete edition of ace 'doubles' science fiction paperbacks from the 50's to 80's [all the ones with the blue and white striped covers]. William Burroughs first book 'Junkie' was actually a detective ace double. Your books are sandwiched there between Poul Anderson and Issac Asimov.

southwall.jpg - most of the fiction/literature/poetry in my collection as well as my surrealism reference books and books on ancient board games.

asher1.jpg and asher2.jpg show the ubiquitous asher titles in paperback and hardcover

The brief bio:

I live in pittsburgh, here in the US, where I wear many work hats. Originally I trained as an architect, but I am now a graphic designer, book publisher, artist and furniture designer. I have a small press - http://www.aanpress.com/ - which publishes my translations of surrealist poetry along with other one of a kind artist books I create. My furniture can be found over at http://www.locusgraphic.com/woodworking.

I've recently started designing board and card games, often with steampunk themes, influenced by Neal's writing as well as Karl Schroeder, Steph Swainston, Alastair Reynolds and Benjamin Rosenbaum.

I have been reading and collecting books of all sorts all my life. My love for science fiction started at age 10 when I read 'Star Boy' by Andre Norton. I tend to prefer hardcovers and would never buy an e-reader unless really really forced to. I have an excellent bookdealer here in the city who finds me many of the gems I now own.

I've begun in the last few years creating artist books using the short stories of such authors as mary Robinette Kowal, Ben Rosenbaum, Ted Chiang and others, creating the book as an artifact of the world of the stories, and I am currently looking for a good Neal Asher one to use.

And yes, I've read every book in my library.

Thanks as always for the books you write.

Todd Sanders
 

Romanian Covers

Just received copies of the Romanian version of Polity Agent published by Nemira.

Future Reading

I've already read the Campbell, but I have the other three here...

Sea of Ghosts -- Alan Campbell

The sea bottles are bubbling away under the sea, each seemingly a gateway into another world, steadily raising the sea levels with brine whose touch will turn your skin to shark skin. The artefacts of a recently fallen alchemic and magical dictatorship lie under the poisonous waters for anyone brave enough, or insane enough to retrieve them. Steamships and sorcerous weapons abound, along with other fascinating devices in a steam/punk/fantasy world. Dragons are addicted to what can only be described as post human food. A madman conjectures about quantum physics and sorcery sources…

Sea of Ghosts is wonderful meaty stuff from Mr Campbell again – he’s a true original. When I read Scar Night I felt the same: fascinated by the ideas, by fantasy that’s stepped well away from the norm, and by the nuts and bolts of his world. I’m not highly interested in labels, but if you want to read something that definitely isn’t a Tolkien clone or even a close relative, something that engages you from page one and never lets go, this is for you.

Over on his blog last September Alan tells us:

Today I noticed that "Sea of Ghosts" is available for pre-order on the interweb. This is the first in a new fantasy series, which I've had the luxury of planning in advance. I have actually finished writing it, but it's not available until April next year, so you'd have to be utterly mad to order it now. The story begins with a man compelled to imprison his own family, and then head off on a high-seas adventure, dipping a toe into dragon territory, with a quick nod to Nikola Tesla. The wonderful cover art is by Larry Rostant.

Queensland Floods.

Because, apparently, Australia would be subject to increasing global warming drought, damming projects in Queensland were shelved and desalination plants built instead (now mothballed). This is a matter of record and a source of anger for many residents there. Also, it's not a great idea to build on flood plains. However, the usual suspects are claiming this one for ‘catastrophic climate change’ and, as is usual, their grasp of history is about as firm as chocolate pliers.

1841
17th January: Highest flood on record, occurred at Brisbane and Ipswich.

1844
10th January: Heavy floods at Ipswich.

1845
17th December: Flood at Ipswich.

1852
11th April: Heavy floods at Brisbane and Ipswich.

1857
19th and 20th May: Great floods at Ipswich and Brisbane; river at Ipswich rose 45 feet, and at Brisbane 12 feet.

The above is just a small sample. If you go and check here at 'Queensland Flood History' you’ll discover enough to boggle the mind. This has fuck all to do with ‘catastrophic climate change’.

The Technician -- Review

Nice review of The Technician here. Interesting in that it is from someone who is fairly new to my books:

As a relative newcomer to the Polity universe, with this only being my second Asher book, I wasn't sure how well I'd be able to follow the story. I was in for a pleasant surprise. Although the story does take a while to get started and I struggled a little with the technology of it, I thoroughly enjoyed the read.

Audio Books

They're not up yet. I'm told:
                  

I’m sorry to say that although we planned that your series would be live tomorrow it appears there was some glitch in the upload on the US side. We have tagged this as ‘urgent’ for them, and they have promised to try and get it live by Friday. As soon as we release it we will promote it in all our social media channels. Also, if you’d like, we can provide a trackable link to the product page for the series for your blog.

In further news, look who's narrated the three books: William Gaminara.

Before joining the cast of Silent Witness, William's last major role was as Will in the dot com drama Attachments.


His other TV credits include The Law, People Like Us, Hope and Glory, and Dangerfield.

William played Dr. Richard Locke in the BBC Radio 4 drama The Archers. He previously starred as Casualty's Dr Andrew Bower between 1989 and 1992, a character that returned in 2000 with Philip Bretherton in the role. William's also played a doctor in The Bill.

As well as acting, William is an accomplished writer. His work includes episodes of This Life and The Lakes, and he recently adapted Ella and the Mothers for TV from Rachel Morris' novel.

Another Book Collection

Here are Phil Middleton's books:

As part of my book collection is now organised, (the hardback/paperback part) I thought you might like a photo. I’m shocked to see how few I have now they are all in one place but we decided awhile ago it’s not possible to keep everything forever so the local PDSA gets regular boxes from us.

Orbus etc.

Here's a nice commentary:

Neal Asher is another of those British writers of far future high tech space opera, like Iain M Banks, Ken Macleod, Alistair Reynolds, & Charles Stross (about whom I hope to write later). He’s constructed a particularly interesting & nasty future history of a distant & much changed humanity & what it meets in the far reaches of the universe. In his various novels, the star spanning Human Polity, run by massively intelligent AIs, has met an enemy species, the Prador, who apparently look a bit like huge & armoured crabs or lobsters. Asher has written a number of novels about the Polity Agent, Cormac, a few about other aspects of the Polity, & 3 about the effects of the planet Spatterjay & a peculiar genetic virus found there (which affects both humans & Prador). Although the Polity & the Third Kingdom of the Prador have ended a long war between them, there are still lots of border battles & lots of spying, etc, all of which come into play in Orbus.

And I can't remember if I linked to Alex Cull's review of Orbus. I particularly like the last comment:

As you have probably realised by now, I had a lot of fun reading this novel; and yes, I’m rather a fan of Neal Asher’s books, generally. Orbus isn’t The Catcher in the Rye, or Anna Karenina, but then it never sets out to be. There are indeed days when I prefer to read something like Anna Karenina. And there are other days, mostly after having done my level best to help prop up this country’s ailing economy for another twenty-four hours, when what I really, really want to read about – and nothing else will do – is aliens trying to murder one another with absurdly powerful military hardware.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

You can probably guess the impression the book of this made upon me when you consider the name of Ambel’s ship in The Skinner. I called it the Treader, because that seemed like a good name for a somewhat weird ship undergoing a weird journey and, remember, Ambel’s ship even had a talking animal aboard…

However, if we are to judge by the way the last two books have been portrayed in film, I was missing the somewhat unsubtle message and the indoctrination bounced off my thick skin. When I read the books as a youngster I enjoyed the magic, swords, talking animals and not for one second did I think that I had ‘nothing without belief’ or that I had to ‘have faith’, nor did I notice that in our reality Aslan went under a different name. Even then I was realizing that suspension of disbelief was what I wanted, between the covers of a book.

The film was visually gorgeous and I would have enjoyed it immensely but for those two comments above dropped in like a roast pig in a mosque. From the first of them it lost me and I was sitting there with a bit of a sneer on my face, which became more pronounced at the end with all that Aslan’s kingdom nonsense.

Where the books so unsubtle? I don’t remember, maybe because as a youngster, having been brought up in an agnostic then firmly atheist household, I was making no connections at all. If they were then I find it surprising that my mother, a school teacher, used to read them to the kids at her school. One would suppose that they were, since in his other works C. S. Lewis was loudly banging his tambourine and arguing for belief, for faith. Or is it the case that those making these films too firmly bought into the idea of the Narnia books as a Christian allegory?

Where the books this loaded with doctrinal cudgels? Or were the products of this member of the Inklings not quite so consciously didactic? I don’t remember being quite so annoyed by the first film, The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe. Different directors, producers?

The Shield

With our relocation to Crete for a large portion of the year we decided that paying for Sky all year just for the five months during which we would watch it was a waste of money. Better, we felt, to spend the money on DVDs which could be watched at both locations. In fact, comparing DVD prices to a TV subscription is something many should consider if they feel they need to make savings, especially when taking into consideration how many programs you can get hold of with freeview or freesat now. £20+ a month can buy a lot of DVDs...

So, I've been reading reviews, checking the sites that sell DVDs -- generally seeing what might be available and worth watching. I've heard a lot about The Wire and The Shield so I bought the first seasons of those at £12.89 and £8.49 respectively. I'm presently enjoying Primeval but didn't get to see the last series, so bought all the first three seasons for £15.93.

We've just started watching The Shield, in fact watched the first three episodes in one evening, and it is very enjoyable. This is great because there are 8 seasons for us to see. We'll be giving The Wire a go next. Suggestions on anything else worthwhile are all welcome! 

Lensmen Movies

The old E. E. 'Doc' Smith books are no longer in my collection any more, having fallen foul of one of my general clear-outs, but I do recollect enjoying them when I was a teenager (Lensman and Skylark series). I think I dumped them because I was allowing myself to be influenced by the opinions of others at the time. They were also old, as in 'astrogator calculates course with a slide rule' old. It'll be interestng to see what kind of a movie these will make, since this was BIG space opera:

The internet movie database has the Lensmen movie listed as sometime in 2011.

Writer J. Michael Straczynski said in 2009 he's finished his second draft for Lensmen, and producer Ron Howard and Universal are happy with it. He said it'll be very character-based, typical of Howard's work, and yet the special effects will be cutting edge. And it'll keep the massive scale of the original novels, as much as possible.

The Babylon 5 writer and Ron Howard? Seems promising...

Another Book Collection.

Here are Rob James' books:

A Few More Bookmarks

Here's some more from K J Mulder, the competition winner, and one from Xanares that didn't quite make it in time.

Raki-Making on Crete

I've uploaded this one just to see if, by any chance, it runs better having been processed by You Tube. This is the 'kazani' right next door to our house - raki being stilled. Hell of a lot of wind noise and the last time I looked at it the picture and the sound kept breaking up.

You Gotta Laugh

Seems Ken Macleod is a lover of irony, and there's plenty here:

If the Greenland ice sheet slides into the ocean ...

... as the mystics and statistics say it will, I predict I'll still be laughing at this picture, until I've paid my final power bill.

Audio Books

Many of you have been asking about the possibility of my books being turned into audio books. Now, I heard that this was going to happen and that negotiations were in progress. Recently getting another query from one of you I inquired about the progress of this and have been told that this is how things stand right now:

The Spatterjay books, The Skinner, The Voyage of the Sable Keech and Orbus are being turned into audio books at audible.co.uk. Production was completed around 1st December but there was a glitch with the audio file for The Voyage of the Sable Keech. That has now been sorted and the books are being processed for uploading to the Audible site. Processing takes approximately five days, so the titles should be live for download by Wednesday next week, 12 Jan.

Enjoy!

Line of Polity and The Technician Reviews

Nice review here of The Line of Polity from Mark Chitty over at The Walker of Worlds.

The Line of Polity is the second novel in Neal Asher's Cormac series, following on from events in Gridlinked. I read Gridlinked quite a while back and enjoyed it and I've also read plenty of other works by Asher that I've thoroughly enjoyed. I picked up the complete series some time ago but, for some reason that eludes me at present, never got around to reading the sequels. Well, despite the long gap between reading the first and second I jumped straight in wondering what exactly I'd be getting here - and boy did it not disappoint!


 
 

Also another nice review here over at Temple Library Reviews of The Technician:

 

The Technician is about an intriguing alien mystery explored through the life of a few colorful characters. It is also a return to old familiar premises on the planet Masada for us old Asher fans.

Visiting Masada again for me was a bit like coming home and I got to enjoy some of the characters from previous books (You can read my review of them, links are below. The Line of the Polity is the one with most Masada in it).

Who Reads My Books: Spencer Van Schevensteen

My name's Spencer, I'm 24 and live in Harold Hill, Essex. Grew up around Upminster and Romford, left school at 16 to work for Ford Motor Company. Did an apprenticeship, stayed there for 6 years doing fibreglass modelmaking, toolmaking, some CAD and CNC but nothing too complicated or involved!! After leaving there and drifting from job to job, I finally settled in Harold Hill with my girlfriend, and became a househusband... ish. She earns ten times more than I ever will, and with our baby girl nearly here it seemed only sensible that I take care of the ankle bitter!

I've been reading for as long as I can remember. Started out on things like Goosebumps, Terry Pratchett, and the Hobbit. As I got older I discovered Science Fiction, among many other genres, and its basically taken off from there. I enjoy listening to music, anything from the thrashy, insane time signature metal, all the way down to jazz, country, some classical, all sorts. Just as long as its not a manufactured band or artist. Nothing is worse than emotionless, mass produced pop drivel! I watch a lot of films, television and stand-up comedy. Favourites include Deadwood, The Wire, Boardwalk Empire, Breaking Bad, The Proposition, anything the Coen brothers have done, Bill Bailey and Doug Stanhope. I also waste a lot of time playing Xbox, far too much time if truth be told!

I enjoy walks, with and without the dogs, bike riding, a bit of skateboarding, and golf. I don't drink, but occasionally indulge in other intoxicants. Moderation in all things.

Hope that's not too long, I attached a few photos of myself and a part of our book collection. A lot of my comedy and WW II books are upstairs in boxes, as the 2nd floor is being re-done and there's not enough space to get them all down yet. Antony Beevor's Stalingrad is definitely one of the top ones not shown, as well as Stirling's Men, a book about the birth of the SAS.

Anyway, enough of my rubbish!

Hope anyone reading this had a good break over Christmas and the New Year,

All the best,

Spencer & Rebecca.

Here's Spencer's book collection:

Books for Bob.

My eldest brother, faced with a knee operation, asked me what books I would recommend for him since he won’t be running around much. Recent books, generally. So, reacting to that on the spur of the moment and referencing some things I’ve read this year:

Science fiction:
Blindsight – Peter Watts, and any of his previous series if available (Starfish etc).
Alastair Reynolds, Gary Gibson, Vernor Vinge,
Blood Music – Greg bear
Stories of Your Life: And Others – Ted Chiang

Fantasy:
Scar Night – Alan Campbell, followed by Iron Angel and The God of Clocks
Farlander – Col Buchanan
American Gods – Neil Gaiman

Crime etc:
Lisa Gardner, Karin Slaughter, the Steig Larssen books (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo etc)
Archangel – Robert Harris
Flesh House – Stuart MacBride
Bait – Nick Brownlee

Humour:
Jeremy Clarkson, Littlejohn’s Britain,

That’s it for now. If I think of any more I’ll put them here.

Samuel and the Scorpion

Sound like a biblical story but its Richard P John's title over this picture of one of my latest fans:

Get the readers young I say, so their minds can be thoroughly distorted into nerd-dom. Mwahahaha!

Prince of Thorns -- Mark Lawrence

I can never find enough of the stuff I really enjoy reading – the science fiction and fantasy that really absorbs me. I make do with crime, police procedurals and the like, which are effectively nicotine patches when I want a rollie. Seeing a twitter about Harper Collins wanting reviewers for a new fantasy I thought I’d give it a go. No loss to me. I generally only review books I like because those I don’t like I simply abandon. I didn’t abandon this one.


Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence is the best fantasy read I’ve had since Alan Campbell’s Scar Night. It got hold of me from page one and didn’t let go until I finished it on my second reading session on the second day. There’s humour here, gut-wrenching realism, high adventure, something that might be magic in the story, and certainly is in the telling of it.

Jorg appears to be a fourteen-year-old psychopath. His approach to life reminds me of that scene in Troy where Bad Pitt, as Achilles, runs at the huge champion put forth by the opposing army and just kills him, and doesn’t look back as he approaches that army and demands, ‘Who next?’ Jorg is not a fighter; he’s a killer. No comfortable homey moralizing here, and the point that nice guys tend not to be the winners is driven home with a flanged mace. It was almost as if the shade of David Gemmell had returned, somewhat nastier for the experience.

Thoroughly recommended. Thanks Mr Lawrence.

Bookmarks Competition Winners.

Righto, I’ve finally come to a decision on this. As I noted before, the winner was an easy choice, but second and third weren’t so easy. It’s also the case that I feel a bit miserable having to make the decision. This was why I mooted the idea of winners and runners-up being picked by poll – pure cowardice. My commiserations to those who put in a lot of work (probably, in some cases, making a dent in the profits of the companies they work for in the process) and thanks.


Here then are first, second and third:

Third prize goes to Mark Chitty basically because I like the look of these, the way the pictures were blended together in tune with the order of the books (two there for the Cormac series, one for the Spatterjay series and the one that blends The Technician with The Gabble, which works) and, to me, they just look right. The best of them I feel is the one with the Brass Man scene on it, because the blog address is clear.

Second prize goes to Rob Hartwell. It’s probably the most contentious because my name isn’t there, but it’s quirky and I like it, so there. It also works in the respect that POLITY is going to grab attention, maybe cause someone to investigate further.

First prize goes to K J Mulder. The bookmarks look great, my name is clear, my blog spot is clear – in fact ‘clarity’ is the best word to describe these – and he is the only one who thought to make each of his bookmarks book-specific, which is something that never occurred to me. After printing these were the ones that really stood out, simples.

 
Thanks again to everyone who took part in this!

Bookmarks Competition

Okay, I've just printed up all the bookmarks and am now in the process of judging the competition. I have to say that picking the winner was easy, but picking second and third is more difficult. Before I go on about that I have to say that just about every one of the entries is better than the bookmarks I produced!

Though many of them are great visually, I've had to apply certain criteria. Obviously these bookmarks serve a purpose beyond marking the page in a book someone is reading. I wanted them to advertize me and this blog (and of course my books), so all of these needed to be clear. Quite a few fell down in that respect: small blog address, name unclear, either not showing up too well because of a busy background. So, right now I have the winner and some on the shortlist for second and third.

I'll be putting these up when I've finally made my choices. Thanks to everyone who put in an entry for this!