MT VOID 10/22/21 -- Vol. 40, No. 17, Whole Number 2194

MT VOID 10/22/21 -- Vol. 40, No. 17, Whole Number 2194


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Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society 10/22/21 -- Vol. 40, No. 17, Whole Number 2194

Table of Contents

      Co-Editor: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net Co-Editor: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net Sending Address: evelynchimelisleeper@gmail.com All material is copyrighted by author unless otherwise noted. All comments sent or posted will be assumed authorized for inclusion unless otherwise noted. To subscribe or unsubscribe, send mail to eleeper@optonline.net The latest issue is at http://www.leepers.us/mtvoid/latest.htm. An index with links to the issues of the MT VOID since 1986 is at http://leepers.us/mtvoid/back_issues.htm.

Bond Songs (Part 6) (LICENCE TO KILL, GOLDENEYE, TOMORROW NEVER DIES) (comments by Mark R. Leeper):

If you are just coming in on this, I am making comments on the title songs from the Bond films.

Next up is LICENCE TO KILL.

Ooooh
Ah-aaah
I need, I need, I've got to hold on to your love

	{Just what part of his anatomy was she holding onto?}

Ooooh

	{Ooooh.}

Hey baby, thought you were the one who tried to run away
Oh, baby, wasn't I the one who made you want to stay?
Please don't bet that you'll ever escape me

	{What must this woman look like?}

Once I get my sights on you
I got a licence to kill (to kill)
And you know I'm going straight for your heart

	{I think I see why you are running running away.  This 
	sounds like a case for the police.}

(Got a licence to kill)
Got a licence to kill (to kill)
Anyone who tries to tear us apart

	{This is getting scary,}

(Got a licence to kill)
Licence to kill
Hey baby, think you need a friend to stand here by your side?

	{To do what?  Ride shotgun?}

Yes you do (Your side)
Ooh, baby, now you can depend on me to make things right 
	(things right)

Please don't bet that you'll ever escape me (Ooh)
Once I get my sights on you
I got a licence to kill (to kill)
And you know I'm going straight for your heart
(Got a licence to kill)
Got a licence to kill (to kill)
Anyone who tries to tear us apart
(Got a licence to kill)
Say that somebody tries to make a move on you
In the blink of an eye, I'll be there too
And they'd better know why I'm gonna make them pay
'Till their dying day

'Till their dying day
'Till their dying day
Got a licence to kill (to kill)
And you know I'm going straight for your heart
(Got a licence to kill)
Got a licence to kill (to kill)
Anyone who tries to tear us apart
(Got a licence to kill)
Licence to kill
Gotta hold onto your loving
Licence to kill
Ooohooo!
Kill

	{This is why we need stricter gun control. Ooohooo, Kill}

Next is GOLDENEYE.

See reflections on the water
More than darkness in the depths

	{Sorry, I'm not seeing it.}

See him surface in every shadow
On the wind I feel his breath

	{Phew!  Dead fish!}

Goldeneye I found his weakness
Goldeneye he'll do what I please

	{Introduce him to soap.  Have him to take a bath.}

Goldeneye no time for sweetness
But a bitter kiss will bring him to his knees

	{I it would also fell an ox.}

You'll never know how I watched you
From the shadows as a child

	{She has been stalking him for years.}

You'll never know how it feels to be the one
Who's left behind
You'll never know the days, the nights
The tears, the tears I've cried
But now my time has come
And trust me time is not on your side

	{Neither is the wind.}

See him move through smoke and mirrors
Feel his presence in the crowd
Other girls they gather around him
If I had him I wouldn't let him out
Goldeneye not lace or leather
Golden chains take him to the spot
Goldeneye I'll show him forever
It'll take forever to see
What I've got
You'll never know how I watched you
and bedenied
You'll never know how it feels to get so close
	and be denied

	{This is getting seriously creepy.}

It's a gold and honey trap
I've got for you tonight
Revenge it's a kiss, this time I won't miss
Now I've got you in my sight
With a Goldeneye, golden, goldeneye
With a goldeneye, goldeneye.

	{I guess revenge is sweet.}

And finally this week is TOMORROW NEVER DIES.

Darling I'm kill
I'm in puddle on the floor
Waiting for you to return
Oh what a trill

	{You should have been house-broken.}

Vacillations good lord
How to tease
How you leave me to burn

	{What are you, a pie in the oven?}

It's so deadly my dear
The power of wanting you near
Until the day
Until the world falls away

	{Now that is one heavy pie.}

Until you say there will no more good-byes
I see it in your eyes
Tomorrow never dies

	{What would you do with a dead tomorrow?}

Darling you won
It's no fun
Martinis, girls, and guns

	{It sounds like a 12-year-old's idea of a good time.}

It's murder on our love affair
You bet your life
Every night
While you chase every morning die
You're not the only spy out there
It's so deadly my dear
The power of wanting you near
Until the day...

	{It's getting worse.}

[-mrl]


NEEDLE IN A TIMESTACK (film review by Mark R. Leeper and Evelyn C. Leeper):

NEEDLE IN A TIMESTACK is based on a story by popular science fiction author Robert Silverberg. Though he has been a prolific author for the last seventy years(!), little of his work has been filmed. The only major exception is THE BICENTENNIAL MAN (based on "The Positronic Man").

This film has a jazzy score and a diverse cast (and a touch of food porn), and is divided into three sections, representing three timelines, centering on Nick, Janine, and Tom. Each starts in the boardroom of a wealthy corporation with somebody is giving a talk that sounds like double-talk. In the middle, a "time shift" (or "phase"--they seem to use the terms interchangeably) makes reality change. Apparently changing timelines is "time crime" but that seems to happen anyway. Nick thinks someone is trying to change his timeline in specific.

Throughout the film people's lives get screwed up just the same way they have been with time shifts. Things get entangled, and one character says, "We can't change the past; we can just clean up the future a little bit." (It sounds a bit like relationship counseling.) Also, people tend to speak in aphorisms (like that one, or "Happiness is the only thing more fleeting than time.")

Nick signs up for a service called "Past Protect" which presumably saves your memories from this timeline in case a time shift changes something. Oddly, memories from one timeline last for a few hours when the timelines shift, but gradually fade. Past Protect has somehow lost most of his memories but he can remember Janine for a while. The idea in general creates situations similar to those in TOTAL RECALL, though in this film Nick is looking for someone to be with him forever in love rather than trying to have an adventure.

The mechanism for the time travel is not clear, though the body (or a body) does go back in time (rather than just inhabit the person's earlier body). Not surprisingly, Nick's attempts to "fix" things have a somewhat different effect. (One nice touch is a close-up of Nick's hand in each segment, revealing his different marital statuses.)

Released in theaters 10/15/21. Rating: high +1 (-4 to +4), or 6/10.

[-mrl/ecl]


"The Living Dead" Saga, James Bond Films and Songs, and the MT VOID (letter of comment by Guy Lillian III):

In response to the MT VOID in general and various specific comments in the recent issues of the MT VOID, Guy Lillian writes in ZINE DUMP #53:

Since summer, Evelyn and Mark have brought forth the following topics in their terrific weekly e-zine: FORBIDDEN PLANET (in LOCs), BLACK SUN, THE RELENTLESS MOON, CAPTAIN VIDEO (by a contributor), the NPR poll on the decade's best SF/fantasy (including EXHALATION and PIRANESI), a genealogy of zombie movies from NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD on (the linkage should go back to WHITE ZOMBIE and I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE, if not further), weeks of discussion on THE FLY (1958), and lots on James Bond films and their theme songs (for me, GOLDFINGER is absolutely the best film, "You Only Live Twice" the most effective song; ahh, the drive-ins of Contra Costa County) ... and that's only part of it. Every week there's more, centered on fine reviews from both editors and solid commentary from the Chorus and contributors. [-gl]


This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper):

Okay, here are (most of) the Hugo Award novella finalists.

COME TUMBLING DOWN, Seanan McGuire (Tor.com, ISBN 978-0-765-39931-1): I gave up on this one.

THE EMPRESS OF SALT AND FORTUNE, Nghi Vo (Tor.com, ISBN 978-1-250-75030-X): This was not available.

FINNA, Nino Cipri (Tor.com, ISBN 978-1-250-24573-1): This book seems to be dedicated to anyone who has ever found themselves stuck in an Ikea. (Clearly the store is called "LitenVarld" only to avoid a lawsuit.) I've been in one only once, and that was more than enough, thank you. The floor plan of an Ikea seems to make the wormholes to other universes almost reasonable. In actual fact, except for unlabeled doors that provide shortcuts, the problem with the Ikea path is that it is a labyrinth, not a maze--it is a single path with no branches or dead ends, which are characteristics of a maze. So it doesn't have features that would be conducive to wormholes. I also found the pronouns confusing--I have no problem with using "they/them/their" as singular, but the author needs to try to avoid confusing the reader with whether these pronouns are referring to a single person or multiple people in a given sentence, just as they would be careful to make clear which of two women the pronoun "she" is referring to. The story itself was reminiscent of classic science fiction, though whether I would put it in GALAXY or ANALOG wasn't clear. (I particularly liked all the themes for the display rooms, starting with the room for the "Pan-Asian Appropriating White Yoga Instructor, complete with tatami mats and a statue of Shiva.")

RING SHOUT, P. Djeli Clark (Tor.com, ISBN 978-1-250-78702-8): This was a little harder to read than the other novellas; it is written in two dialects: one is (I assume) Black English ("She stay seated in her big chair.") and the other is Gullah ("Dem buckrah debbil gii hunnuh trouble?"). But the slower reading pace is not a bad thing (although given the total length of the works on the Hugo Awards ballot, it would not be practical to read everything at this pace). This seems to be part of a new literary movement--African-American Cthulhu--by authors such as Victor LaValle and Matt Ruff. In RING SHOUT, the Ku Klux Klan of 1922 is involved in bringing beings from another dimension to our dimension, and the protagonist needs to end this invasion.

RIOT BABY, Tochi Onyebuchi (Tor.com, ISBN 978-1-250-21475-1): I read this back in April and honestly cannot remember it.

UPRIGHT WOMEN WANTED, Sarah Gailey (Tor.com, ISBN 978-1-250-21358-7): This is a future dystopia with LGBTQ characters by way of Margaret Atwood and Zane Gray. Either that makes you want to read it or it doesn't. (One note: "People like us" is, or at least used to be, a coded phrase meaning LGBTQ people. It is used in this novel and carries that meaning, but I suspect most non-LGBTQ people will not recognize it as such.)

Ranking (of what I read): RING SHOUT, UPRIGHT WOMEN WANTED, FINNA, no award, COME TUMBLING DOWN

And one novel:

PIRANESI by Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury, ISBN 978-1-63557-7) is a Hugo Award finalist. It sounded fascinating when described on the Coode Street Podcast. But when I got it from the library, it totally didn't work for me. Obviously, your mileage may vary.

And what have I learned from all this? Even with the extra time because of the delayed Worldcon, this took too much time away from things I really *did* want to read. So the chances of me doing this next year are pretty slim (at least for this many categories). [-ecl]



                                          Mark Leeper
                                          mleeper@optonline.net

Quote of the Week:

          This country has come to feel the same when Congress 
          is in session as we do when the baby gets hold of 
          a hammer.  It's just a question of how much damage 
          he can do with it before we take it away from him.
                                          --Will Rogers
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