Sci-fi finds new inspiration and a new audience The film collaboration between Arthur C Clarke and Stanley Kubrick in 1968 was a landmark in the history of science fiction cinema. 2001, A Space Odyssey did indeed go boldly into new sci-fi territory. Yet, though it won an Academy Award for special visual effects and BAFTAs …
Author: Andrew G Lockhart
My name is Andrew Lockhart and I grew up in Coatbridge, Scotland. I studied at Glasgow University. After spending three decades in planning, statistics and international sales and marketing, I am now an author, family historian and owner of Magda Green Books. Apart from writing (and reading great books) and blogging, my other interests are science, music of all sorts, and traveling the world.
It's all in the DNA!
The Seven Daughters of Eve Bryan Sykes's book is one that bears reading a second and even a third time. It is the story of mitochondrial DNA. I first read it shortly after its publication in 2001. Science has moved on. There has been much new research and while scientists do not always agree on …
We are not alone … yet!
"How would you feel if a Martian vomited stale liquor on the White House floor?" Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles is a novel that should be read at least twice. Read it first as the quaint, inventive work of fantasy that it is. The Red Planet of Bradbury's imagination is peopled with small, light brown, …
To Boldly Go (2)
Asimov and the Golden Age of Science Fiction The mid 20th century ushered in a golden age for science fiction writing and space opera. Drawing from new scientific discoveries and aided by advances in cinematography, the settings for the stories became more exotic and more colourful. Science fiction began to lose its pulp image. Now …
To Boldly Go
The Magic of Space Opera - when Science Fiction came of age Seventy years have passed since Isaac Asimov penned the first of his Foundation stories. Tens of thousands of years in the future, humanity has colonised far beyond the Solar System and has established a galaxy-wide empire, dependant for trade and communications on faster-than-light …
Not all universes are the same (part three)
The Amber Spyglass "While the beasts of prey, Come from caverns deep, View'd the maid asleep." These three lines by William Blake from his poem The Little Girl Lost preface the first chapter of The Amber Spyglass, the final volume of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. Aficiandos of Blake will know that his maid …
Continue reading Not all universes are the same (part three)
Not all universes are the same (part two)
The Subtle Knife A Review The Subtle Knife is the second book of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. At the end of Northern Lights, we left Lyra on the bridge from her universe to another. Now the author leaves us in suspense to introduce a new protagonist. Will Parry is a twelve-year-old boy who …
Species!
On the Natural Selection of Charles Darwin A Review of The Origin of Species Around the middle of the nineteenth century, an Augustinian friar, physicist and mathematician called Gregor Mendel experimented with pea plants and, without realising it, founded a whole new field of scientific endeavour. Mendel's valuable contribution to science became known and recognised …
Not all universes are the same
A Review of Northern Lights The first book in Philip Pullman's fantasy trilogy for young adults The main protagonist in Northern Lights is Lyra, a twelve-year-old girl who lives in one of Oxford University's many colleges. Only Lyra's Oxford is a different Oxford. It lies in an alternate universe, an upside-down world with zeppelins, witches …
Shall we eat the cabin boy?
Jamrach's Menagerie by Carol Birch A Review Long-listed for the 2011 Man Booker Prize, Jamrach's Menagerie is an absorbing story of the sea, a sort of cross between The Life of Pi and The Ancient Mariner; at any rate it has a tiger and a cursed ship. Jaffy Brown is eight years old. He runs …
Magda Green Books 