Ahmed Writes

LATEST BOOK LAUNCH ON KINDLE DIRECT: https://www.amazon.com/Kai-Lung-Flips-Open-Laptop-ebook/dp/B0FKZJFC5C/ Want to join me on facebook? Here is the link:  https://www.facebook.com/ahmedkhanwrites/ Want to provide me feedback on any of stories or articles? Email me at khan.ahmeda@gmail.com. ARTICLES Gaia and the Art of Fighting Marine Oil Pollution - in "Ships and Soil" . Non-verbal Communication: Fact and Fiction  -  "Strange Horizon" (26 Feb. 2001 Two Solitudes: An Interview With James Alan Gardner - in "Absolute Write" (Aug. 2005) Lateral Thinking for Writers  -  "Visions" (2006) Smell of Time - in "Suddenly Lost in Words" (Oct. 2012) The Future of Futuristic Fiction  -  in "New Myths" (2016) Islamic Speculative Fiction: Past, Present and Future  -  in "Samjoko" (April, 2025) SHORT STORIES SCIENCE FICTION The Presonic Man - published in "Anotherealm", reprinted in "Antipodean...

 A very nice review of "Kai Lung II Flips Open His Laptop" from Daniel Rice: https://www.danscifi.com/post/book-review-kai-lung-ii-flips-open-his-laptop

ALL THE MYRIAD WAYS Larry Niven (Fiction and nonfiction collection) Some interesting pieces here, including the article, "Man of Steel, Woman of Cleanex", but for me the most interesting piece was "The Theory and Practice of Time Travel". And in this piece, the passage that I found worth pondering over is given below in pictures.  

RITE OF PASSAGE by Alexei Panshin Timescape, 1982 I had high expectations of this book but it left me disappointed. The story is a first person account in the voice of a teenage girl living in a spaceship world that was akin to Heinlein's "Universe".  Things wrong with the book: - Mia Havero, the main character, is annoying. - The world-building is inconsistent, illogical in several aspects. - The book seems padded in spite of it being only 239 pages long. However, there are 2 passages in the book that are brilliant. These passages are Mia's views on ethics, utilitarianism and stoicism. These short passages are better than whole theses on these philosophies. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/zAUjXn2wieEexcHt/?mibextid=oFDknk

REVOLT IN 2100, by Robert Heinlein Baen Books (1986) This compilation consists of a novel, "If This Goes On...", and 2 novellas, "Coventry" and "Misfit". None of them is a major work though they form a part of Heinlein's Future History framework. The novel features a theocratic dictatorship in the US. Heinlein, realizing that this scenario might seem like an improbable scenario to some reader, provided a postscript - and part of that postscript is the reason why I include this book in my Bookscan series of blogs. And here it is: [With reference to] the idea that we could lose our freedom by succumbing to a wave of religious hysteria, I am sorry to say that I consider it possible. I hope that it is not probable. But there is latent deep strain of religious fanaticism in this, our culture; it is rooted in our history and it has broken out many times in the past. It is with us now; there has been a sharp rise in strongly evangelical sects in this country...

PEOPLE MACHINES  By Jack Williamson   Ace, 1971   After a long time I have across another book worthy of a Bookscan post.  "People Machines" is a collection of 9 short stories by Jack Williamson. The stories are very good but better than the stories are author's notes that precede each story. In these notes, Williamson discusses various elements of a story: characters, plot, scene, language, style, etc. In these notes, I found 2 things worthy of extra attention. First is what I consider the best definition of Science Fiction: "Fiction based on the imaginative exploration of scientific possibility."  Second is his mention of "stratificational grammar" postulated by Sidney Lamb. This was a new term for me and as I love going on excursions tangentially from a book, I started looking up transitional grammar. And I was disappointed. I was not able to locate a single resource for explaining the concept to a layman or to demonstrate any applicability. For my ...

Book: MY NAME IS LEGION Writer: Roger Zelazny Del Rey, May 1978 - Third Printing The cover of this edition of the book is quite unattractive. The book itself consists of 3 novellas, losely connected by the fact that they have the same protagonist. He, like almost all Zelazny protagonists, is a larger-than-life character. His real name is not known to anyone, including the readers. He appears under a different name in each story. The stories are told in first person. The first novella is titled "The Eve of RUMOKO". It is an interested read except that I detested the ending. I have found that other than larger-than-life characters, unsatisfactory endings are quite common in novellas and novels of Zelazny. However, he writes so well that most of his stories are worth reading in spite of unsatisfactory endings. This story made me look up more details about undersea drilling of earth's core. I found out about the American Miscellaneous Society and about project Mohole. I...

Book: THE ADVENTURE OF THE CHRISTMAS PUDDING Writer: Agatha Christie Fontana, 1990 This is a collection of 6 of Agatha Christie's stories: 1. The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding 2. The Mystery of the Spanish Chest 3. The Underdog 4. Four-and-Twenty Blackbirds 5. The Dream 6. Greenshaw's Folly The first 5 of the stories feature Hercule Poirot and the last one features Miss Marple. All the stories are pretty good and eminently readable. The title story stands out in being one of those rare Poirot stories that does not involve a murder. It is actually quite a pleasant little mystery. For me, "The Dream" turned out to be a rare story too - rare in the sense that I was able to solve the mystery way before the author revealed the solution. Go me! As I had expressed in one of my earlier blogs, when I read a book, I try to pick up a tiny bit more than what the book gives me. In the course of reading this book, I picked up two things. In one of the stories ...

Book: ISLE OF THE DEAD Writer: Roger Zelazny Ace 1969 - First Edition This is not one of the best Zelaznys but, written in first person, it has his usual larger-than-life characters, poetic settings and thought-provoking inner monologues. In fact, my reason for selecting this book to include in the Bookscan blog series is one such monologue. Starting on page 61 and continuing on to page 62, I found this gem of thought: Inwardly, I wept for thee, Mother Earth, and the prodigees wrought upon thee. A government is born, it flourishes, strong is its nationalism and great its frontiers, then comes a time of solidification, division of labor unto specialization, and layers of management and chains of command, yes, and Max Weber spoke of this. He saw beaureaucracy in the necessary evolution of all instituions, and he saw that it was good. He saw that it was necessary and good. While it may be necessary, put a comma after that word and after the last one add "God" and an exclam...

Book: SACKET'S LAND Writer: Louis L'Amour Bantam, Louis L'Amour Collection Edition, 1982 This book, like so many of L'Amour's westerns, is fluff but entertaining fluff. This is one of his series of novels about the Sackett family and features Barnabas Sackett, who was the first of the Sacketts to move to America from Britain. Though there is nothing really special about the novel, the reason for selecting it for a Bookscan blog is that it took me into some side excursions - and I like side excursions. The book mentions some people from history. One of them was Hannibal. Looking up Hannibal lead me to Pyrrhus who has the dubious distinction of giving the expression "pyrrhic victory" to the English language. As defined by Merriam-Webster, a pyrrhic victory is a victory that comes at a great cost, like most of the actual victories of Pyrrhus. Two other names from the book that I looked up were John Leland (an antiquarian from Britain) and Richard Hakluyt...

Book: THE DREAM MASTER Writer: Roger Zelazny Paperback, Ace, 1966 - First Edition This novel incorporates Zelazny's Nebula Award winning novella, "He Who Shapes". This book displays Zelazny's signature writing style - poetic and complex - but in spite of it (or because of it?) it is a smooth read. The main character, Render the Shaper, is a psychiatrist who tries to help his patients by shaping dreams for them - dreams that have the potential to aid the patient in coming to terms with reality. There are some very interesting, and even insightful, passages in the book. For example, at one point, Render muses on the rising rate of suicides: The power to hurt has evolved in a direct relationship to technological advancement. Man's potential for working simple mayhem has been multiplied by mass-production; his capacity for injuring the psyche through personal contacts has expanded in an exact ratio to improved communication facilities. This passage took me on a ...

In this new year of 2022, I will be blogging information about some of the books that I read and enjoy. If any of those books take me on side excursions, I will be sharing those journeys too. "Bookscan" is the name I have given to this series of blogs. And here is Bookscan #1 Book: THE STARCROSSED Writer: Ben Bova TOR Paperback, 1988 This is a novel that I thoroughly enjoyed, starting from the gorgeous cover itself. In a way, the book is a tribute to Harlan Ellison and is dedicated to Cordwainer Bird. If you don't know who or what Cordwainer Bird is, I suggest googling it. Ellison, in the guise of the writer Ron Gabriel, is one of the main characters of the book. Obviously, Ben Bova had great fun writing this novel and this sense of fun leaps of the written pages. Definitely a good start to my 2022 book reading.

My book, Sparks, is now available for purchase at Amazon . Please check it out - and if you do buy it, email me your feedback at khan.ahmeda@gmail.com and I will post it on my blog.

The anthology, SF Waxes Philosophical, edited by me is now available from ZC Books . If you want to order a copy, contact ZC Books. It is a limited edition and will go soon.

Just found out that "Guardian" is blogging the Qur'an on a regular basis. Should be an interesting blog to follow. The introduction is HERE and the actual blog link is HERE .

I have gone and joined the livejournal gang at http://ahmedakhan.livejournal.com .

My story, "Knock, Knock!", published earlier in the Australian print magazine, Skive, has been reprinted in their sister mag, "Skiveflash", which is a webzine as well as a downloadable magazine for mobile phones and pdas. Here is the link to the story: Knock, Knock! .

My critical essay, The Magic of the Rings is Temperamental , is now online at New Myths. Click on the link above, read the article and let me know what you think about it. ADDENDUM TO THE ARTICLE I have been receiving some very intelligent and interesting comments on my article and I plan to post excerpts from these comments right here as an addendum to the article. Those who enjoyed the article will definitely find enjoyment and information in these comments. "The serial publication of The Pickwick Papers was a hundred years before TLOTR was being written. Tolkien was addicted to reading and could easily have read it in his school library as a youth. I'll have to check if Snodgrass is anything like Fredegar Bolger, the fifth hobbit who stayed behind. (It's my personal theory that Neville Longbottom owes a lot in the last Harry Potter novel to Fatty Bolger and his resistance efforts on the home front while his pals were off in the wilderness.) But the clincher for the Pick...

The above story has been reprinted in the latest issue of "7th Dimension", in both print and web versions. Here is the link to the web version: Meaning of Life and Other Clichés . Now, I hope the title of this post does not invite some spam. The other day, when I mentioned this story in another post, I received a spam comment from some person about a book he has written which objectively explains the meaning of life. Don't go looking for that comment. I deleted it. Hence, the meaning of life still remains a mystery.

It has been ages since I updated my blog and therefore there is quite a bit of news to share: 1. My critical essay on Lord of The Rings, titled "The Magic of the Rings is Temperamental", will be appearing next month in the first issue of "New Myths" at NewMyths.com . 2. My story, "Synchronicity", has been published in Vulgata at www.vulgatamagazine.org . I am really happy about the publishing of this story because in spite of the fact that this is one of my stories that are very near and dear to my heart, I had a hard time placing it as this is one of those stories that don't seem to fit any known classification pigeon hole. [As an added bonus, I have found 2 more editors to be added to my list of good editors: Scott Barnes of New Myths and Melinda Selmys of Vulgata.] 3. My story, "Knock, Knock", will be published in the December 2007 issue of Skive, a print magazine. In fact the editor, Matt Ward, informed me that the cover of the magazine i...