March 2020

Eye of Cat by Roger Zelazny

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The novel “Eye of Cat” by Roger Zelazny was published for the first time in 1982.

Billy Blackhorse Singer is a very special hunter as he hunted alien prey for many years. He has now retired from that activity, but the world government requires his services for a slightly different mission for which his talents can still be very useful: to protect an alien diplomat from a member of his own species.

The mission requires some very special skills and Billy Blackhorse Singer decides to resort to the help of a unique alien, a shapeshifter who’s the last individual of his kind and has various mental and physical abilities. Known as the Cat, the alien agrees to help Billy but in return asks him for the chance to hunt him after the mission ends.

Artist's impression of Ikaria wariootia in a burrow (Image courtesy Sohail Wasif/UCR)

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An article published in the journal “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences” reports the identification of a worm-like animal that lived around 555 million years ago, in the Ediacaran period, in today’s Australia. A team of researchers led by Scott Evans of the University of California, Riverside, named this tiny creature Ikaria wariootia, identified by the impressions left in the burrows it dug. Its length ranged from 2 to 7 mm for a width between 1 and 2.5 mm, a very small creature which, however, could be a common ancestor to most animals.

Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and Dr. Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill) in Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2

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“Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2” is the tenth episode of the TV show “Star Trek: Picard” and follows “Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 1”. It’s the first season finale. It’s available in the USA on the CBS All Access streaming platform and in many other countries on Amazon Prime Video.

Dr. Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill) frees Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) but the problem is to convince Soji (Isa Briones) not to contact the synthetic civilization that could exterminate the organics. At the same time, a defense against the incoming Romulan fleet is needed. Dr. Altan Inigo Soong (Brent Spiner) makes a disturbing discovery.

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Patrick George Troughton was born on March 25, 1920 in Mill Hill, Middlesex, England. After the end of World War II, Patrick Troughton returned to work as an actor on stage. After a couple of years he started getting roles in television and cinema productions. His career developed mainly on television and in 1953 he became the first actor to play Robin Hood on TV in a BBC miniseries. During the 1950s, he earned increasing fame by participating in many television productions.

In 1966 the production staff of “Doctor Who” was struggling with the problem of choosing whether to end the show due to actor William Hartnell’s health problems or try to replace him as the Doctor. Patrick Troughton agreed to take over and played the Second Doctor until 1969, when he left the show for fear of getting typecast.

More Than Human by Theodore Sturgeon (Italian edition)

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The novel “More Than Human” by Theodore Sturgeon was published for the first time in 1953. It’s the result of the union of a novella previously written with two other parts written specifically to obtain the novel. It won the International Fantasy Award.

The idiot’s life has always been lonely, but when by chance he meets Evelyn Kew a mental contact between the two of them creates a human contact as neither of them had ever experienced. Unfortunately, the girl’s insane father attacks the idiot seriously injuring him and, when Evelyn tries to stop him, he mortally wounds her. The idiot gets rescued by the Prodds, a farming couple who takes care of him and somehow adopts him.

After some years, Mrs. Prodd gets pregnant and the idiot leaves the couple to return to live on his own. The meeting with Janie, a telekinetic child, and with the twins Bonnie and Beanie, capable of teleporting, starts a sort of symbiosis. The idiot returns to the Prodds and discovers that the son they had suffers from Down syndrome, yet he has superhuman mental abilities that make him become the mind of a gestalt.