On Screen On Page: January 21, 2025
Nuclear evangelists?; a Sean Duffy mystery/thriller; movies tackling VAD and IVF; much more
Potentials (should I buy them?)
M. R. Carey writes all over the terrain of science fiction and fantasy. Next April comes a “medieval dark fantasy”: Once Was Willem.
Emma Pattee’s Tilt, described as “an epic natural disaster adventure story starring a pregnant woman on a mission,” out next March, might be worth buying.
Rarely has a nature writer been handed as many accolades as Robert Macfarlane but I have never read any of his books. Perhaps they daunt me as “overly lyrical.” In any event, Is a River Alive? will be published in May.
A June novel set in the 80s space program: Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid.
Can a recording of a lyrebid mimicking a murder catch the killer? The premise alone attracts me to Jane Caro’s April novel, Lyrebird.
After somehow “improving” my sleep during 2024, a recent bout of mild insomnia sends me back to the basics of “sleep hygiene,” i.e. I need to read a physical book during the last waking hour. So naturally I head to the library. I’ll try the first chapter or two of a book I rejected last March by a fabulous sci-fi author: Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Alien Clay.
He always takes on the most fraught issues. Lawrence Wright’s March novel, The Human Scale, tackles Gaza.
John Boyne’s Water, a wonderful short novel, is the first in a quartet. Earth, the second, came out a while back but for some reason is slid past me. Time to grab it?
Purchases for my bedside table
Boring to many, I can’t wait to read an April book, Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow’s Atomic Dreams: The New Nuclear Evangelists and the Fight for the Future of Energy.
Movie club time! I’ve been underwhelmed by Pedro Almodóvar’s recent films. Will The Room Next Door, a take on VAD (voluntary assisted dying) be a corrective?
Gruff, music-loving, reprobate Belfast detective Sean Duffy returns in March when Adrian McKinty publishes Hang on St. Christopher. A must-read for this fan.
Last December’s Joy attracted me and my wife because the film tells the story of the world’s first IVF baby.
Into Reject Bin
A hug cleanout of fascinating nonfiction books, some recent, some in the future, that I simply won’t get to. The Long History of the Future: Why Tomorrow's Technology Still Isn't Here by Nicole Koble.
Tom Nathan’s Lost Wonders: 10 Tales of Extinction from the 21st Century.
Duncan Mavin’s Meltdown: Scandal, Sleaze and the Collapse of Credit Suisse.
The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire: Why Our Species Is on the Edge of Extinction by Henry Gee.
Tae Kim’s The Nvidia Way: Jensen Huang and the Making of a Tech Giant.
Terrible Beauty: Reckoning with Climate Complicity and Rediscovering Our Soul by Auden Schendler.
Maggie Smith’s Dear Writer: Pep Talks and Practical Advice for the Creative Life.
And a number of films/shows won’t be fitted into a summer of work and evening walks. The Dead Don’t Hurt by Vigo Mortensen.
The Madness by Stephen Belber.
Black Dog by Guan Hu.
Black Doves by Joe Barton.