July 2016

Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke

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The novel “Childhood’s End” (cover image ©Brendan Riley) by Arthur C. Clarke was published for the first time in 1953. The first part was published in 1946 with the title “Guardian Angel”.

After a series of alien spaceships have appeared over the major cities of the Earth, everything has changed. The aliens have established indirect contact with humans, saying they want to prevent the extinction of humanity. They haven’t invaded Earth, however, they prove to be so more advanced than the humans tha they can easily impose peace in the world.

The UN Secretary General Rikki Stormgren regularly meets Supervisor Karellen, the leader of the Overlords’ expedition but never sees him in person, only with a wall between them. The Overlords are never seen by humans and even the term “Overlords” is a human invention. After some time, Karellen tells Stormgren that after 50 years the Overlords will reveal their appearance to humans.

Culex Molestus, the London Underground mosquito

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An article published in the journal “Proceedings of the Royal Society B” describes a research on the influence of human activities on the evolution of various species of animals and the plants. According to a team of researchers from the Center for Macroecology, Evolution and Climate at the University of Copenhagen in collaboration with the University of Queensland, humans they are causing the emergence of new species but they can’t replace those that are getting extinct.

Video Kill by Joanne Fluke

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The novel “Video Kill” by Joanne Fluke was published for the first time in 1989.

Erik Nielsen and Tony Rocca are trying to sell the script they wrote for a possible movie called “Video Kill”. It’s a horror / slasher movie in which a psychopath is filming the murders he commits and his victims are actresses. A producer is interested but the production studio’s owner doesn’t want to buy the rights and the deal remains in a limbo when the producer acquires an option on the script.

Months pass and it seems that the option will expire without the movie getting produced when an actress is killed in a way that reproduces the famous shower scene from “Psycho”. The killer’s style is similar to the screenplay for “Video Kill” and for the two authors that’s advertising, though of an unwanted type. Fiction and reality start crossing path in a disturbing way.

Sylvester Stallone in 2014

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Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone was born on July 6, 1946 in New York City, New York, USA. In his long career as an actor, screenwriter and director he had many successes and won some Oscars with the movie “Rocky”. In particular the characters of Rocky Balboa and John Rambo have already become cinema icons.

Rama Revealed by Arthur C. Clarke and Gentry Lee

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The novel “Rama Revealed” by Arthur C. Clarke and Gentry Lee was published for the first time in 1993. It’s the sequel to “The Garden of Rama”.

Nicole des Jardins Wakefield is helped to escape the prison where she was locked up awaiting execution by her husband Richard and together with some other opponents of the Nakamura regime that holds absolute power in the human colony. The group takes refuge in the area of Rama where the aliens called octospiders live.

For Nicole, her family and her friends it’s a period which is very interesting for what they discover about various alien species but it’s not an easy situation. For some of them it’s difficult to live among aliens who have a lifestyle very different from that of humans and what they discover about what’s happening in Rama’s human colony adds further tension.