February 2019

Engine City by Ken MacLeod

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The novel “Engine City” by Ken MacLeod was published for the first time in 2003. It’s the third book in the Engines of Light Trilogy and follows “Dark Light”.

Ancient cosmonauts gave humans the chance to fly again among the stars without having to resort to the services of the saurs and the krakens and even managed to communicate on their own with one of the gods. They also received a warning about enemies who want to overthrow a balance that has existed for a very long time.

Various species of hominids were transported to the Second Sphere and built new cities on various planets. Nova Babylonia is the largest of these cities and becomes the center of a new series of changes that follow interventions from humans and from a new alien species that seems to have a lot to offer.

Gobiraptor minutus was a feathered dinosaur that lived in today's Mongolia

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An article published in the journal “PLOS ONE” reports the discovery of a new species of feathered dinosaur that belongs to the group of oviraptorosaurs that lived between 80 and 70 million years ago in the Late Cretaceous period in today’s Mongolia. A team of researchers named it Gobiraptor minutus and studied the partial skeleton discovered concluding that it was probably a juvenile specimen that fed on hard food such as shelled molluscs and had jaws strong enough to break them up.

Saru (Doug Jones) and Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) in An Obol for Charon (Image courtesy CBS / Netflix. All rights reserved)

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“An Obol for Charon” is the 4th episode of the 2nd season of the TV show “Star Trek: Discovery” and follows “Point of Light”.

Number One (Rebecca Romijn) arrives on the USS Discovery to bring Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount) an update on the ongoing repair work aboard the USS Enterprise but also to bring him the information she found about Spock, in particular a trace to follow. The USS Discovery is on course to follow Spock’s route but is stopped by an unknown entity, very powerful and ancient, which attacks the internal systems while Saru (Doug Jones) also starts suffering serious health problems.

The Twilight Streets by Gary Russell

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The novel “The Twilight Streets” by Gary Russell was published for the first time in 2008.

People prefer to avoid the Tretarri district in Cardiff even if nobody understands exactly why. The houses are now old and shabby because nobody wants to live there even if there’s no crime, simply they all try to move as soon as possible and eventually the area fell into decline.

A new project aims to renovate the district and a company is running the task. It’s not just about building modern houses and ensuring adequate services to the population, there are also performances and parties in the streets to mark the new course. When Bilis Manger’s presence is discovered, Captain Jack Harkness and his team start investigating, a job made more complex by the fact that if Jack tries to get close to the area he feels too sick to enter.

Luna: Wolf Moon by Ian McDonald

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The novel “Luna: Wolf Moon” by Ian McDonald was published for the first time in 2017. It’s the second novel in the Luna series and follows “Luna: New Moon”.

After the attack to Corta Helio the other families that rule the Moon try to grab their assets. Some members of the Corta family survived while officially Lucas Corta died. The situation has greatly altered the balance of power on the Moon and all factions try to gain any advantage over their enemies.

Every significant event, especially if violent, helps to make the relationships among the various factions more complex and understanding who are the friends and who the enemies becomes more difficult. In a place where the the strongest make the rules, any weakness is exploited by some enemy and an instability can have a series of unexpected and unpredictable repercussions.