ANALOG PLUS 50: Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact October 1971

ANALOG PLUS 50: Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, October 1971

The tenth issue in my Analog Deep Dive. One Year is now in sight -- I didn't think I would keep it up this long! For anyone finding these reviews, my purpose is two-fold: enjoying some "classic" sci-fi, and looking for stories that I think could be adapted for TV broadcast since so much of what shows up on anthology shows is rough to awful. Additional Note: I do NOT work in television. I just watch it.

The issue starts with a sad notice of the passing of legendary editor John W. Campbell, but notes that he had finished three more editorials. This was also the first issue of my readthrough that was poorly scanned -- the pages are visibly tilted toward the upper center of the magazine and the print quality isn't as good. But it's definitely readable.

In this issue:

John Wood Campbell 1910 - 1971

The Editorial: "Antipollution Device", by John. W. Campbell. John hatest the Instant Ecologyu Experts (see last month) but that doesn't mean that he thinks nothing should be done. What he's opposed to is doing useless things at great expense or doing things that in fact make the situation worse in the "glorious name" of improving the situation.

He then talks about automobile exhaust, which might've been taboo back then because every legislator and so many of the voters had cars. Lightning produces nitric oxides high up in the atmosphere. Cars do it more down to Earth. Nitic oxides are about 1/5 as deadly as cyanide. He then gets into electric cars, which didn't exist except for golf carts, and how wonderful they could be if someone would make then and others would buy them. Note that he expects them to be powered through electricy provided by nuclear reactors, which would produce less heat than all the IC engines would.

Turbine engines have also been developed for automotive use. They burn their gas in an excess of air instead of exploding it in a piston, which leads to lower inherent pollution. And the engine is low-maintenance and could outlast a long-haul truck using it. Unforutnately, they weren't practical for everyday cars.

Campbell gets into describing a horsepower tax, which is probably one of the first things I ever really disagreed with in an editorial that I didn't just skim over, before moving on to creating low-pollution machines. That idea is politically salable, but at the time it was unworkable. Which brings him back to zero pollutiuon, rechargeable feul cells, if they could get made.

Serial: "Hierachies" by John T. Philifent, with an illustration by Kelly Freas, showing a rodent-looking animal with very long ears like airplane wings. The caption reads, First of Two Parts. Theoretically Special Agents Sixx and Lowry had the ridiculously simple job of escorting one Royal per sorki-dog from Khandalar to Earth. But for some reason some organization was fanatically opposed to their movement --"

I'll get back to it. The last time I read a two-parter in separate months, I didn't enjoy the ending.

Novelette: "The Golden Halls of Hell" by John Paul Henry, with an illustration by Kelly Freas, showing an empty clear container, cap off, in the foreground on the left, and the silhouette of a person, likely a woman, in the background, walking into the water from a beach under a full moon. The caption reads, Hell is, by definition, an evil place. But what you think of as "evil" must then define the nature of a hellish place!

That caption told me nothing. Felicity North lives in a modest residence in San Sebastien, in the West Indies, not in a tourist section. Her husband travels a lot, and at times she travels with him. Right now, she's by herself. Her kids are in school in England and spend vacations with their aunt, Felicity's sister-in-law. She feels she has nothing and plans to kill herself by taking pills and walking out into the sea in the middle of the night, leaving her things on the beach to found. She has it planned so it won't look like a suicide.

Her plans are interrupted when a man who appears to be a 17th-century religious fanatic comes running out the beach toward her house. His name is Jeremiah Dickenson, and he doesn't know where he is, but he's just come from "Hell". he was from Ashby-de-la-Zouche in the county of Leicestershire. He believes that he betrayed the Lord to wind up in Hell, and his sin was taking his own life. She takes him in for the night so she can get him help in the morning. To add to the craziness, a man named David Lesley, Controller of the FIrst Area in the Western Hemisphere, appears and renders Jeremiah unconscious. He has come from the History Research Center that will be located on San Sebastien in a couple of centuries. He's a time traveler.

In short, researchers from an early century than Lesley used to pluck people out of history right at the moment that they were about to commit suicide, so they wouldn't be missed from the timeline. They did this to learn more about the time period, putting aside for the moment that they were interviewing people who were so despondent about their time periods that they were going to kill themselves. This practice has stopped by Lesley's time but he still oversees some of the earlier attempts.

The problem with Dickenson was that he did not adapt and thought himself in Hell. Somehow he escaped and wound up in 1971. A team will be coming to collect him and bring him back, erasing his memories.

Lesley also tells North that he's familiar with her work, too. She protests that she hasn't done anything noteworthy. He mentions that she will. Just not in the 1970s but in the last quarter of the 21st century. And that she would go willingly. She scoffs at this, and at the idea of doing anything noteworthy. Her science skills are 17 years out of date, and would only be worse a century later. Nonetheless, Lesley states she would thrive in a different time, but can say no more (and will likely erase this conversation).

North comes up with a plan to save Dickenson by shipwrecking him with some Quakers in the Caribbean back in his time, and ends up going to the future, but not as far as Lesley's future.

This could make a great show for television. It would have to be a period piece set in 1971, whem a woman might have given up her career to be a wife and mother, and then somehow gave up her kids to travel with her husband. There are five speaking parts: the three mentioned about and the two people from the History Research Center who show up. Diverse casting is possible for the time travelers, but less so for North and Dickenson. I enjoyed this story.

Science Fact: "Supernova" by Edward C. Waltershcied. Image shows a supernova. The caption reads "One of the most fascinating of all phenomena in the universe is the appalling and ineffacle biolence of an exploding supernova -- when one star suddely blooms with greater energy emissions than all te rest of the stars of a galaxy combined!"

This was a very lengthy Science article with a lot of images. I made it through as much as I could. Keep in mind that it's 50 years old, so we've probably learned a lot more since then. This is pre-Hubble, mind you. If I read this correctly, the size of the largest solar mass mentioned is likely an order of magnitude incorrect. I think I've read some of this information before (more recent works or older Analogs) although maybe without all the science involved. It's interesting, but it's dense. (Kinda like those supergiants! Or the remaining dwarfs! Yuck, yuck!)

Short Story: "The Crier of Crystal" by Joseph Green, with an illustration by Leo Summers, showing a wooded or jungle scene with a predatory animal, four-legged with a tail, claws, and fangs, running between three men who are wearing protective clothing, goggles and lighted helmets like miners. Two of the men are shooting laser guns at the beast, while the third holds a box-shaped device with an attached tripod. The caption reads, Convincing a man of something he knows is impossible involves the truth of "I wouldn't believe it if I saw it with my own eyes!"

The caption has little to do with the story, except the ending, unless any earlier skepticism flew right past me. And my first thought about the illustration was that it was going to be a war story because I thought the picture was conjuring up something (metaphorically) out of Viet Nam.

There's a planet named Crystal after its unusual silicone-based lifeforms. Everything is sparkly in the daylight and you need protective gear to move around. The creatures have unbreakable crystal teeth. Humans and the planet's fauna are generally safe from each other because they cannot feed off each other, but animals act on instinct and could attack before realizing that such attacks are wastes of time.

Conscience Allan Odegaard is the first person we meet. Conscience is his title, and his job is to determine if any of the local fauna are intelligent. He walks out at night among the giant chandeliers with trunks of shimmering crystal and leaves of tinted glass. There's an elusive creature that could be intelligent. The station director, Cappy Doyle, has several recording of a thin voice of something like a high-pitched child that unsterstands a few words of English and utters a lot of gibberish. Council Member Kaylin goes along on the assingmnet to witness the conscience in action. (He'll be the doubter from the opening caption.)

Odegaard discovers a primitive looking speaker grown from one of the trees. The tree itself is the intelligent life, and everything in the woods and the continent is part of the Unity. Allan comes back with a better speaker and a microphone that he is able to incorporate into the tree so it can communicate.

The planet has intelligent life, but Kaylin thinks it was all a show, a put-on, for his benefit.

It's a cute little story which would make good television if someone could afford the CGI to make a Vancouver forest look like a Crystal wood, or digitize any of the animals properly. The cast is a decent size and diversity shouldn't be an issue.

Short Story: "Mr. Winthrop Projects" by Tak Hallus, with an illustration by Leo Summers, showing the face of an older male, partially obscured by an American flag wrapped around him. The caption reads, The compulsive power of a gun is obvious -- but there's also the not-always-gentle art of persuasion!

It was a little confusing to start. There's a guy named Browning in a cabin, and he refers to another guy as "Swami" who is actually Mr. Winthrop. Note that he is also "Mr." while Browning never is. I don't know why but this stuck out. Winthrop starts in a full lotus position on the floor before he's sent to work barefoot in the basement on the Wintrop Projector, where he hopes not to electrocute himself. It's called a "telethesia projector". (Definition: The supposed perception of distant occurrences or objects by means other than the known senses.)

We next have a flashback to 40 years earlier to when Mr. Winthrop was a graduate student. He was terrible when it came to predicting ESP cards, worse than guessing, but he was great at transmitting information, particularly on days when he was elated. He decided he was going to go into advertising, at which he became successful. By the 1990s and the invention of visiphones (which is what they were usually called in scifi stories but in real-life they were just "phones"), he has successfully started marketing 3-second ads to play during busy signals, which feature the bare back of a Swedish model. His next advancement would be not subliminal advertising but pre-conscious advertising, such as implanting ads while people sleep, driving around in a van at night (okay, that's my summary, and I might use that).

This causes him to get kidnapped by a Mr. Nicolson, who wants to be President Nicolson. He orders Mr. Winthrop to build the projector. He does, and he builds his escape plan into it. Not surprising.

Not a great story, but definitely filmable. It'd have to be modified, of course, but you can get the gist of it easily enough. It doesn't need a lot of people, although it would need a few extras milling about some scenes.

Short Story: "Motion Day at the Courthouse" by Ted Thomas, with an illustration by Leo Summers, showing a woman's face in the foreground on the left side. There's someone in uniform holding a baton in one hand and grabbing the collar of a clown running past him, a trashcan knocked over in the background. The caption reads, Which has to do with the problems faced by The Mob when a law-abiding telepath starts throwing emery in their gears...

Why one would throw "emery" in their gears, I don't know, assuming that emery is the stuff from those boards.

Okay, so it wasn't a clown. It was just a guy, a crook to be sure, someone bad off, but not a clown. The image had me wondering.

It starts with a lawyer being hired by a guy looking out for his business interests -- i.e., a crook. They were testing the cops with a drop, but the cops knew about it in advance and snapped out everyone involved. Mr. Louisa wants to get his guy out of jail and he wants to find out if the cops obtained their information illegally somehow.

An investigation leads to a woman who works as a clerk in the DA's office. She is apparently an ESPer, and she's the one who told the cops. The lawyer releases that she can read his mind word for word repeatedly. He decides that he will acknowledge ESP exists so he can file a motion that use of ESP is unconstitutional. After a weekend of preparation, he is ready to cite case law about illegal wiretaps and other such stuff. This is interrupted by scientist and academia types who want the entire concept of ESP discredited. (If it's discredited, then she can go on snitching to the cops and there would be no defense against it.)

This leads to the judge testing the woman herself before any final decision can be rendered in court.

This is a great little short story and is easily filmable, given all the courtroom dramas on TV and the number of sets that must be available (not to mention actual courthouses). Very enjoyable story. Were this 50 years ago and I had a stamp, I would've voted this number one for that month.

The Reference Library , by P. Schuyler Miller.
Introduction discusses the results of some reader vote for their favorite story or series of stories, with many authors getting a lot of votes for a lot of stories. "Nightfall" was the favorite, followed by the robot stories and Zenna Henderson's "People" stories. (I don't know who that is or what those stories are.) It's a long list and worth searching for on the Internet.

Reivews include The Methuselah Enzyme by Fred Mustard Stewart; and Tactics of Mistake by Gordon R. Dickson.

Brass Tacks: Nothing stood out enough to worth mentioning, but I made it through. Interesting snapshot of opinion 50 years ago.

On to November, and whatever else is in the TBR stacks in Kindle, iBooks, and the physical nightstand, including a book of poetry by a former student.

My Monster Secret, Vol. 2 (Eiji Masuda)

My Monster Secret, by Eiji Masuda (2013)

I read the English version, naturally, 2016

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I wasn't going to list every manga book separately, but I don't think I'll be reading more in this series for the times being. The second book introduced a bigger cast of "monsters" as has gotten a little more silly, which is fine, actually. But it's just a bunch of disjointed stories, starting with one where Shiragami discovers sunscreen which allows her to walk around during daylight without getting a bad sunburn. (The sun doesn't kill her.)

The book introduces Shiho Shirou, who is a wolfman tasked with bringing Youko Shiragami back to her father. He is a childhood friend, who transforms when he sees even a picture of the Moon. Excpet that his non-wolf form is also a non-man, aka, Shiho Shishido, a female childhood friend. Who is also a self-described nympho. She has designs on Asahi Kuromine, and Shiragmi seems to be a little jealous even though she doesn't state it (because Asahi is just a friend, after all).

And then there's a devil child with horns, which at first seem to be an accessroy, but they are not, and she sometimes has a tail. She looks too young to be in high school. This would be interesting enough, along with the fact that her name is Akane Koumoto, and Koumoto Sensei is Asahi's homeroom teacher. They assume that they're sisters, but it fact, the child, the devil, is the teacher's great-great-grandmother. The teacher is human, not a devil, being that she's at least five generations removed. Again, this would be fine, but then it's made known that the devil is actually the principal, who hasn't appeared before, and no one has noticed that a child is the principal. Granted, she does have illusion powers, but this is a little silly.

Nothing objectionable, but nothing compelling me to read more. Maybe after some other things, I'll get back to it. I don't know.

Ninth House (Bardugo)

Ninth House, by Leigh Bardugo (2019)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This was a book group selection. I don't remember what the other choices were, but I think they were all supernatural for October and Halloween. I'm surprised I finished it so quickly after getting off to a slow start. I didn't reference the maps of New Haven at all, mostly because I was reading an ebook, and it's too much of a pain to flip back and forth in an ebook.

The story follows the life of Alex Stern, in a non-chronologocial way. It's not told in flashbacks, but instead certain chapters take place before other chapters, or before the main story of the book. This made it difficult to get into the book. If I went back and reread the first chapter, I'd probably be very surprised because I likely remember none of it. Part of the confusion was the code names uses as titles and the fact that Alex's name is actually Galaxy, not something more obvious like Alexandra. And there is power in names.

The story takes place at Yale University where the Secret Societies are all real and have real magic. Each society has its own House and the Ninth House is Lethe, which watches over, monitoring the other houses. Alex is special because of her ability to see ghosts. And unlike the members of the societies, who can only see the ghosts as "Greys" when they drink certain drugs, Galaxy sees them in full color, and always has.

This obviously led to problems when she was a child because only she could see them, and she saw them all the time. This led to Child Protective Services being involved. We later learn that there was an incident when she was younger where a ghost was able to physically assault her, but no one could see it. This happens again at Yale. She used drugs to avoid seeing the ghosts, and fell in with a drug dealer. We learn that she was the sole survivor of an attempt that left everyone in her apartment dead. It was while she was recovering that this high school dropout was approached about a free ride to Yale.

Alex's title is Dante, who is the apprentice to Virgil, who is Daniel Arlington, known as Darlington. He is always a gentlemen and he is interested in the history of New Haven and the societies. He's preparing Alex to be the next Virgil. Many of the chapters take place after his disappearance, when he's supposedly away in Europe, but the actual disappearance is chronicled much later in the book, along with the attempts to get him back.

One night, a townie by the name of Tara is murdered in New Haven. She's not from Yale, but it was on a ritual night, so Alex investigates in case there was some rogue magic at work. Dean Sandow tells her to stand down because it doesn't appear connected to the societies, and besides, it's a funding year, and the Dean doesn't want to unnecessarily ruffle feathers. Detective Turner, known as Centurion, doesn't know much about magic or really believe in it, but he acts as a liaison between the societies and the law. He starts to reget that position. Alex also gets help from The Bridgegroom, a ghost named North, but you shouldn't call a ghost by its name because it might form a bond or connection with it. The nature of Tara's death connects it with at least four houses, between students on her phone, the text of her tattoo and the kinds of magic in play (both portals and glamors). It's a lot to unravel, especially with Darlington missing.

There isn't much I need to add because it's a popular book and anything I might want to remember is posted is a bunch of spots.

It turned into an enjoyable book but it became obvious that one plot point was going to be left for a sequel (or not resolved at all, but it was heading toward a resolution). That was a minor annoyance.

Circle (Miller)

Circe, by Madeline Miller (2018)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

My first actual book in a while. I logged into the Brooklyn Public Library system to reserve manga, and it suggested Circe, which I knew was a Book of the Year (or at least a finalist for such) on GoodReads a couple years ago. So I downloaded it. Didn't hate it. Actually, I enjoyed it.

Before now, all I knew of Circe was what appeared in the mini-series The Odyssey. I've never read that book, nor do I have plans to. Unlike in that show, Circe doesn't keep Odysseus on her island for five years. However, she does turn his men into pigs, at least temporarily.

Miller weaves a tale from the pieces we have of Circe throughout Greek literature (and from one summary of a work that no longer exists). It starts with her birth to Helios the Sun god (Titan) and Perse the water nymph. She was mostly ignored because she wasn't as beautiful and her voice was irritating. Actually, it was a voice that was pleasant to humans. Circe and her three siblings were something new in Olympus. They were witches. And as such, Helios and Zeus came to an agreement that Helios would sire no more children with Perse.

As Circe grows and finds her place, she interacts with Prometheus, punished for giving fire to humans. She turns a human into a god and Scylla into the monster of myth. She is banished to the island of Aiaia, where she can enjoy her solitude and refine her witchcraft skills. She meets Daedalus and his son Icarus, encounters the Minotaur (whom she helps birth at the cost of a couple of fingers, which regenerate), and meets her niece Medea who will one day run off with Jason. Before returning to her island, Circe receives a loom from Daedalus.

Nymphs are banished to her island by their parents for a year at a time, and she gets used to them being there, along with her trained lions. Hermes is a semi-frequent guest, but aside from being a messenger, he is also a trickster god. He usually has stories to tell, but you know he's telling stories of Circe elsewhere. He doesn't come unless he wants something, and once satisfied may not come around again for a while.

Men come to the island and Circe turns them into pigs when they find that she is alone and they mistakenly believe that they can take everything they want, including her. Finally Odysseus's men come and then the warrior himself, who has been warned by Hermes not to eat or drink anything. Circe starts to admire the man, and transforms his men back. They stay the winter before setting off again for Ithaca. After they leave, Circe gives birth to a son named Telegonus, whom I'd never heard of before and thought to be a fabrication. However, a web search tells me otherwise. (Also, things work out differently according to the web sources.) The son's life is immediately threatened by Athena because of a horrible prophecy. However, she cannot directly harm the child (she can send scorpions though) and Circe refuses to hand him over. Circe enchants the island every year for 16 years.

Finally, Telegonus builds a boat after learning skills from some other men who came to the island, and sails to Ithaca to meet his father and half-brother. He is given a spear from Circe with a poison tip to protect him from Athena, but it cuts Odysseus, who appears half-mad. He returns mid-winter with Telemachus and Penelope, who have fled Ithaca. Circe thinks they mean to kill Telegonus in front of her, and perhaps her as well.

Athena arrives to tell Telemachus that she will see that he founds a new dynasty. He turns it down, so she offers it to Telegonus, whom she no longer desires to kill (since the prophecy has come to pass). He accepts and leaves. Finally, Circe decides it is time to confront her father with threats of confronting Odin to end her exile. She wants no more of him or the gods. She sails off with Telemachus, leaving Penelope on the island with the loom and all the herbs. There's a final section that reads like she's dreaming of the future she will have, whether or not that is what come to pass.

It was a quick read, but a little longer than the books I've been reading. And now I need to hurry to read my book club selection and this month's Analog.

My Hero Academia Volumes 4 through 7

My Hero Academia Volumes 4, 5, 6 & 7, by Kōhei Horikoshi (2015-2017)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

Thanks to the library app, Libby, which my sister-in-law just loves and uses exclusively, there are more volumes available electronically, and libby lets me zoom in a little on the tiny print between the larger word balloons. This is a game changer. Seriously.

These books are about an hour each to read. However, I need to finish the other book I'm reading so I can get to my book club book already.

As for these four volumes, the students have completed the Sports Festival competition, encountered the League of Villains, picked their hero names, had their first interships, and are getting ready for summer vacation camping in the woods.

It's all going according to the anime series, which was announced at the end of the sixth volume, with details to follow. You can see how some things were still not fully defined up to that point which were more solid earlier in the anime.

I don't know when it will diverge, and I don't know when any of the spinoff books take place. I'll read more of these, but I do have other stuff to get to.

The books were published in 2015-2016, but the English translations were about a year later.

An old year-end Review for 2007

While cleaning up my hard drive, I found files where I kept track of the books I read for a given year. Someone had given me the idea (back in the 90s, I believe) to open a text file, and add the name of the book I'd read. What follows below looks like an "end of the year" post made to a bulletin board somewhere. It's past my time on Usenet. Many of these may have appeared elsewhere in this blog, if not the entire post itself. I'll post these files one per month.

It looks like 2007 was the last year that I have a file for. But that point, I was using a small notebook. Plus, I started this blog in December 2008.

2007: The Year in Review

The History of the Pelopennean War, Thucydides -- Intro, Books 1 and 2. Gave up. I'll be back

Knights of Dark Renown, Dave Gemmell -- loved it.

Asimov's Sherlockian Limericks, Isaac Asimov (1978) -- more of a chapter book, really. One limerick per adventure of Sherlock Holmes. Quick read

The Life and Times of R. Crumb: Comments from Contemporaries, edited by Monte Beauchamp, intro by Matt Groening (1998) -- Fanboy praise from writers and artists about a guy I'd barely heard of who created comics that I never read.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, J. K. Rowling (2004) -- re-read prior to the movie and the new book.

The Enjoyment of Mathematics, Hans Rademacher and Otto Toeplitz (1957) -- sucked all the "joy" out of the subject. Tedious.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, J. K. Rowling (2006) --

Mathematical Recreations, Maurice Kraitchik, (1953)

C is for Corpse, Sue Grafton (1986)

D is for Deadbeat, Sue Grafton (1987)

At this point, I was still catching up with the Harry Potter series --- it looks like I found another "reread" for my list. And decided to read the Alphabet mysteries at a rate of 2 per year, just because I didn't want to get bogged down with an entire series. (Plus, it gives you something to look forward to.) The math books may have come from the library, or they may have been tossed out from my high school's library (or by the Math Dept). The R. Crumb book, I wasn't familiar with although I had vague recollections of my older brothers reading some of his stuff when I was younger. I won that in a raffle and might've traded it away if someone had something worth trading for.

Note that in the past 14 years, I have NOT gotten back to Thucydides and it's highly unlikely that I ever will. I gave it that second chance, so many years after college, and now I've put it behind me. That said, if it turns out that the paperback is still in my closet and I one day find it, then who knows. But I wouldn't count on it when there are so many other things to read which aren't challeges and when there's little chance of me using the "History" as research for some writing project.

My Hero Academia Volumes 1, 2 & 3

My Hero Academia Volumes 1, 2 & 3, by Kōhei Horikoshi (2014)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

Set in a world where most people have "Quirks" or superpowers to a greater or lesser degree, the series focuses on the quirkless Izuku Midoriya, and his desire to be the greatest hero in the world, like the Number One Hero (they're ranked) All-Might.

The first three volumes follow the series closely -- although obviously the books came first. I've seen four seasons of the show, so I'm hoping that it will flesh out more of the characters within these pages. That's not likely to happen for a while though.

So far, Midoriya has shown his value and trained to be a successor to All Might, who passed his power onto the boy just in time for him to take the entrance exam at UA High School, the elite school for training the next generation of heroes. Between Class 1A and 1B, there are some 40 heroes to be introduced, along with some from the General Studies track. There isn't much need to make notes as there are a lot of pages out there catalouging all this.

I'll keep up with this one for a while, and probably go farther with this title than I did with One Piece, which I don't even remember where I left off. (I read a few more books after my last entry.) Also of note, I watched one episode of the One Piece show and it wasn't following the comic at all. Maybe they would've synced up at some point. I don't know. So many things I want to watch, and that isn't on the radar right now.

Ultraman Volumes 3 & 4

Ultraman Vol 3 & 4, by Eiichi Shimizu and Tomohiro Shimoguch (2016)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This is likely the end of my Ultraman readings. Not that I didn't enjoy it. It's very quick reading as it relies mostly on action. However, neither the Brooklyn nor the New York Public Library have volume five on their shelves, nor do they have it as an ebook. So unless I can find a copy -- and, no, I'm not likely to pay full price plus shipping -- here is where I put a pin in it.

The story continues with Shinjiro deciding if he will be Ultraman (get on with it already) and Moroboshi not really caring. Moreover, Moroboshi is ready to become Ultraman himself. The Science agency has developed its own Ultraman armor so he can be an Ultraman wannabe who doesn't have a problem with killing aliens. On the other hand, Shinjiro is provoked enough that he suddenly starts to fly with powers that he inherited.

Aesop's Fables (Aesop/Jones)

Aesop's Fables, translated by V.S. Vernon Jones (unknown)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I like fables and fairy tales, so when I saw a free ebook of Aesop's Fables, of course, I downloaded it.

And like all collections of this sort, I had to read it over time because of repetitive overload. It gets to be too much at once.

I did not expect how many stories would be included. Fully the first 4% of the text is the Table of Contents. (And there's a second listing at the back of the book.)

Many of these stories I'd read before, and others I knew because they are "Aesops" after all. Only a fraction of them ending with added morals. Most stood on there own. And it was funny see tales that I remembered from readers in early school grades.

I did take a book of Aesop's Fables out of the library long, long ago, and I remember the first few, but I don't think I read very far. Or maybe it just didn't have as many tales in it because there were quite a few that where new to me.

Glad I read it, but now I have to find something else to read in-between other books.