Alien Resurrection

Almost two years ago I let this blog lapse, then when I tried to resurrect it a while back I found myself somehow locked out of my own account, gave up and thought no more of it. But just now I thought I'd have another look, and lo and behold it let me back in. I don't pretend to understand how these things work (or don't work, in my case). Anyway, some recent thoughts... I read the other day that ebooks have had their day, which is worrying, because while I personally much prefer the real thing, since I last posted on here most of the little money I have earned has come from checking scans of old titles for Orion's splendid SF Gateway ebook project (http://www.sfgateway.com/). Sadly they haven't included any Brian Aldiss, but I have discovered a few 'new' authors, including the late Keith Laumer, who wrote some wickedly funny titles about an interstellar ambassador called Retief, beginning with this one in 1963:



Go to http://www.keithlaumer.com/ to find out more about this sadly overlooked author. (What other kind of author is there, I hear you ask.) The older and wiser I get, the more I realize that the best writers are simply those who, like Laumer, tell a good story well. Not a particularly original thought, I know, but it is something that passes most writers of so-called literary fiction by. Personally I think anyone signed up to a 'creative writing' course would be best advised to watch 'Gladiator' instead. Now that's story-telling.