Author Archive

Heads Up/Periscope Down.

Hey Mammals. Just to let you know, rifters.com may be going dark in the near future, hopefully not for very long. If we’re lucky, you won’t even notice it.

Continue reading » 7 Comments

N.K. Jemisin, Alpha Gal

…and picking right up from where we left off last week, some of you may remember an ancient post about the Lone Star Tick, whose bite can provoke a fatal hyperallergenic reaction to “alpha-gal” (galactose-alpha-1,3-galactose for the pedants in the audience), a monosaccharide found only in the meat of nonprimate mammals. You may remember cool […]

Continue reading » 19 Comments

The Sulfide Solution. (Also, Who Sent Me All These Wombats?)

Before we get started: does anyone know anything about these? They appeared on my doorstep a few days ago, from Australia. No card, no clue. They’re pretty awesome, but they’re also a bit suspicious: I keep remembering that giant wooden rabbit rolling up to the door of the Frawnsh Castle in Holy Grail. Who knows […]

Continue reading » 23 Comments

HemiHive, in Hiding

If you’ve been following my writing for any length of time, you’ll know how fascinated I am by Krista and Tatiana Hogan, of British Columbia. I’ve cited them in Echopraxia’s end notes, described them in online essays; if you caught my talk at Pyrkon last year you might remember me wittering on about them in […]

Continue reading » 65 Comments

Extinction and the Reset Button

I’ve just finished reading The Re-origin of Species, by Torill Kornfeldt (2016 in the original Swedish). The English translation is just barely out in Australia and the UK; here in North America it’s slated for a November release. (I scored an early copy from a publisher eager for blurbs.) Re-origin is about the burgeoning de-extinction— […]

Continue reading » 12 Comments

The Man Behind the Infodump: Denis Lynn, 1947-2018.

There’s a chapter three-quarters of the way through Maelstrom— “Mug Shot”, it’s called. It’s an executive summary of the apocalyptic microbe βehemoth.  It contains such gems as βehemoth enters the cell via receptor-mediated endocytosis; once inside it breaks down the phagosomal membrane prior to lysis, using a 532-amino listeriolysin analog. βehemoth then competes with the […]

Continue reading » 4 Comments

Three Interviews and a Book Launch

For those of you who didn’t already see this over on Facebook, or who haven’t noticed it on the inconspicuous little “Upcoming Appearances” list to the right: Freeze-Frame Revolution is getting an official launch at Toronto’s premiere SF bookstore, Bakka-Phoenix. The announcement on the BP site sets the launch to both June 6 and June […]

Continue reading » 16 Comments

The Freeze-Frame AMA.

Last-minute Editorial Update: It’s actually happening at noon. Which is 44 minutes from when I’m typing this. I suppose I should have mentioned that sooner… * I’m doing another one of these Reddit AMA thingies next Wednesday.  Prior to that event, I’m supposed to post some kind of evidence that I am not, for example, […]

Continue reading » 20 Comments

Beijing.

Eight thousand kilometers out of Beijing, I already know I’m in China. The intercom welcomes me to CA962 while the plane’s still taxiing out onto the runway in Frankfurt: “I am the head of the security detachment for this flight. I and my staff have been charged with keeping order. You may suffer detention, sanction, […]

Continue reading » 22 Comments

Just So You Know.

Yeah, pretty quiet here lately. Those of you insecure and craven enough to be on Facebook (like, for example, me) might know it’s because I worked for a few weeks on this talk about the evolution of delusional optimism in Homo sapiens, to give at this weekend’s Asia-Pacific SF Con in Beijing. It was originally […]

Continue reading » 41 Comments