American fantasy, horror, science fiction, and mystery writer Ray Douglas Bradbury passed away at the age of 91. He was best known for his dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 (1953) and for the science fiction stories gathered together as The Martian Chronicles (1950) and The Illustrated Man (1951). Bradbury was one of the most celebrated among 20th century American writers of speculative fiction.

Bradbury’s journey as a writer started when he was a boy. As a child, an aunt read him short stories and throughout his youth, Bradbury was an avid reader and writer who spent much of his time in the Carnegie library in Waukegan, Illinois, reading such authors as H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, and his favorite author, Edgar Rice Burroughs, who wrote novels such as Tarzan of the Apes and The Warlord of Mars. He loved Warlord of Mars so much that at the age of twelve he wrote his own sequel. Bradbury was also influenced by the writings of Edgar Allen Poe. What impressed Bradbury most about Poe was his ability to draw readers into his stories and poems.

Bradbury’s love of the library and books can be seen in many of his works. He used this library as a setting for much of his novel Something Wicked This Way Comes, and depicted Waukegan as “Green Town” in some of his other semi-autobiographical novels such as Dandelion Wine, and Farewell Summer as well as in many of his short stories. As he grew older, libraries continued to play an important part in Bradbury’s life. When he graduated from high school, Bradbury did not attend college and sold newspapers instead. In discussing his education, in a 2009 interview with the New York Times Bradbury stated,

“Libraries raised me. I don’t believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don’t have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was during the Depression and we had no money. I couldn’t go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years.”

The writer’s lifelong habit of writing every day can be attributed to two incidents during his childhood in which he wrote about in a column on his website titled ‘In His Own Words’ in 2009 and 2012. The first of incident occurred as a three year old when his mother took him to see Lon Chaney‘s performance in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. The second incident occurred in 1932, when a carnival entertainer, called Mr. Electrico, touched the young man on the nose with an electrified sword, that made his hair stand on end, and shouted, “Live forever!” Bradbury remarked, “I felt that something strange and wonderful had happened to me because of my encounter with Mr. Electrico…[he] gave me a future…I began to write, full-time. I have written every single day of my life since that day 69 years ago.”

Writing every day proved to be extremely productive for Bradbury as he is credited with writing 27 novels and over 600 short stories. More than eight million copies of his works, published in over 36 languages, have been sold around the world and many of Bradbury’s works have been adapted into television shows or films. Bradbury’s legacy will continue to live on in the many writers, artists, teachers, scientists, comic book readers, sci-fi lovers, and in all people who were influenced and continue to be influenced by him and his work.

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Odyssey Con 2012 got off to a stimulating start, with a series of panels discussing everything from space combat to the morality of Amazon.com.

The convention, which is affectionately nicknamed ‘OddCon,’ has been held in Madison since 2001, and is dedicated to all things fantasy and science fiction. This year’s theme is ‘Apocalypse Cow,’ in keeping with the convention’s longstanding tradition of having a bovine mascot.

One of the first offerings was a panel on combat in sci-fi and fantasy. Moderated by Alex Bledsoe, the panel also consisted of Nicholas Beeson, Shane McCook, Patrick Tomlinson, and Lee Schneider. Bledsoe, Beeson, and Tomlinson are all sci-fi or fantasy authors, while McCook is heavily involved in stage production. Schneider is a military history buff.

The panelists started by discussing some of the most egregious examples of inaccurate portrayals of combat, before elaborating on the nitty gritty of combat. Although there are plenty of instances where authors did not do their homework (fiery explosions in space, for example), there are also authors and directors who get it right. Schneider singled out Babylon 5 in particular as an example of excellent ship design, and Tomlinson praised David Weber’s Honor Harrington series for its realistic space combat.

After mulling lasers and spaceships, the panel took a technological leap back in time to discuss fantasy combat. Tomlinson, who has a plethora of real-life combat experience (including two knife fights), explained that swords are much heavier than they seem, and so it would take an extraordinarily fit person to swing them around as energetically as we see in the movies.

The panelists also reminded the audience that, in real life, combatants try to defeat their opponents as quickly as possible, without the elaborate thrusts and parries that are depicted on the silver screen. “If your opponent sees your knife blade before it’s in them, you’re doing it wrong,” said Schneider.

The next panel Toonari Post attended was about the suspension of disbelief in speculative literature, which included Shane McCook, Alex Bledsoe, and Monica Valentinelli. Unfortunately, this one proved to be less well organized than the others, and the discussion meandered around quite a bit. In essence, the panelists believed that the key to suspending disbelief was the reader’s ability to identify with the protagonist. But if that connection is severed, everything collapses.

Valentinelli cited the example of the ‘midi-chlorians’ from the Star Wars universe. In the original trilogy, Luke Skywalker was just an ordinary young man who had greatness thrust upon him. But the advent of the midi-chlorians in the second trilogy turned the Force from something mystical to something biological. In essence, being a Force adept was no different than being left handed or having red hair. According to Valentinelli, this makes it difficult for viewers to identify with the Jedi, since the Jedi are now superhuman from birth.

The panelists also agreed that general believability can also help foster a connection with the reader/viewer. According to Valentinelli, one of the reasons Dan Brown’s work is so phenomenally successful is that it is grounded in just enough fact that it seems plausible. The line between fact and fiction can be hard to see: Valentinelli cited a survey in Britain that showed a 20 percent rise in the number of people who believed that Christ had children, following the publication of Brown’s books.

By far the best panel of the day was the one about Amazon.com. It asked a simple question: are they an evil empire, or a writer’s best friend? Sitting on the panel were Benjamin Billman, Anna Black, Lori Devoti, Fred Schepartz, and Kimberly Gonzales.

Although all the panelists were broadly supportive of the online superstore, they voiced a certain ambivalence about its effect on readers and authors alike. While Amazon offers readers access to a dizzying array of goods, every dollar spent with Amazon is a dollar denied to main street retailers.

Because of Amazon’s vast buying power, they are almost always going to be the cheapest option. Yet brick and mortar stores do have one thing going for them: atmosphere. As panelist Benjamin Billman explained, “when I want something specific, I go to Amazon. But if I just want to browse, I go to Frugal Muse [a bookstore in Madison].”

But while Amazon’s business practices may generate controversy, many panelists believed that the company had done a great deal to help authors. For example, Amazon offers royalties of 70 percent on books published through the Kindle, which is far above what an author can expect to receive from a traditionally-published book.

Also, Amazon offers authors whose work is aimed at a niche audience (and is therefore ill-suited to traditional publishing) a chance at publication. According to Lori Devoti, Amazon also makes efforts to ensure that the books they publish are free of typos, and they will even go so far as to take books down if readers complain of errors.

Given Amazon’s dominance of the book trade, it is not hard to see them becoming a monopoly. Overall, the panelists were quite sanguine about the prospect. Billman said that it did not matter, provided they maintained the same high quality that they have now. But, as Devoti pointed out, consolidation in the publishing industry reduced overall selection. Anna Black said that the internet, which allowed Amazon to rise to power, could ultimately prove to be its undoing, by ushering in the next wave of technological progress.

Paradoxically, the evening ended with the opening ceremonies. The main event was a playful skit performed by OddCon’s organizers. This being Wisconsin, much of the humor was cow-themed. After a group sing-along to REM’s “It’s the End of the World as We Know It,” the conference goers dispersed for some late-night fun, including a sci-fi poetry slam and a wine and chocolate reception.

Stay tuned for Toonari Post’s continuing coverage of OddCon!

Eli Parke contributed to this report.

Image Courtesy of    http://odysseycon.org

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February’s Super Bowl featured the first sneak-peak into director Jon Favreau’s upcoming fantasy embarkment Cowboys and Aliens – an eclectic mix of conventional western and uhm… extra terrestrials?

Admittedly, when I first read that Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig were strapping on their hats and boots to fight an alien invasion on horseback – even I shook my head in disbelief. Had Hollywood really hit rock-bottom of ideas this time? Were there no remakes left to soak their creative dry-spell?

Of course, that was before I learned that ‘Cowboys & Aliens’ was in fact a successful graphic novel from Platinum Studios, controllers of the largest independent license library of comic book characters, created by the Studio’s founder Scott Mitchell Rosenberg and published in 2006. The unconventional genre-clash gained so much attention that Universal Studios and DreamWorks soon got their hands on it and next month, movie audiences will get to explore the result. It is considered the dark horse this season – “the true wild card among the summer 2011 popcorn films – a gritty cowboy tale that just happens to be interrupted by an alien invasion flick,” writes herocomplex.latimes.com.

Blockbuster filmmaker Jon Favreau has purposely put together, along with producers Ron Howard and Brian Grazer and executive producer Steven Spielberg (there he is again!), this hybrid cowboy tale in such way to avoid the obvious entrapment of comedy or camp – all considering the ‘on-the-nose’ title. According to herocomplex.latimes.com, much effort was put into the screenplay so to make the story a western first, a sci-fi second. Speaking about the universe of the movie; “The audience knows what [the aliens] are after years of Spielberg movies but the guys on the horses in the movie have no words for what they’re seeing,” explains Roberto Orci, one of the writers and producers.

The cross-franchise action has Daniel Craig starring as the stranger who stumbles into the town of Absolution with no memory of his past but with a mysterious shackle on his wrist.  Little does he know that the city is held in an iron fist by Harrison Ford’s Colonel Dolarhyde who’s cruel reign leaves no room for strangers. However, the tale of dust and true grit is abruptly interrupted when scarcely comprehensible objects attack the desolate city from the sky and abduct the stunned and helpless. Soon the hard-eyed stranger is the small town’s only hope for salvation.

Also starring is Olivia Wilde, Paul Dano and the charismatic Sam Rockwell. But it’s Ford’s turn as Absolution’s menacing Colonel which is drawing most attention in the cast, and according to an interview with the icon himself: “Ford seemed as surprised as anyone by the fact that he hadn’t starred in a cowboy movie since Jimmy Carter was in the White House.”

“For years, I’ve thought the western – as a genre – needed this guy,” said Ron Howard. “Harrison has this persona that fits the western. In a way he was a cowboy in ‘[American] Grafitti’ and ‘Star Wars’ and when you see him on screen in this setting it just feels right.”

With expectations heightening each week for phenomenal visual effects and competent acting, the ultimate clash of universes is bound to keep cine-fanatics on their toes. And think about it – is the idea that far-fetched after all? Plenty of time to make up your mind before July 29.

Image provided by cowboysandaliensmovie.com

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