Book: For Fans of 'The Twilight Zone'

Posted on January 3, 2009 by planetmagazine

Book by Martin Grams, Jr.

Author Martin Grams, Jr. has published “The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic”, an 800-pager that contains not only episode details for even the most earnest fans but also plot synopses that should be of interest to writers of SF/Fantasay/Horror.

“There is plenty of material about sci-fi stories that were considered for the series and never purchased, or purchased and never used. Plenty of material for all genres,” Martin says. “CBS granted me hundreds of hours of research in their legal files, which are not open to the public, to gather the information in the book; so it is as detailed and definitive as it can possibly be.”

The book also features exclusive memories from cast and crew as well as production details.

To read an excerpt and for more details, visit www.martingrams.com (the link to the book is on the left side of his website).

'The End of the Cycle' by Thomas George

Posted on August 31, 2008 by planetmagazine

Illustration (c) Romeo Esparrago

I was going back again, but this time would be the last. I don’t know how many times I’ve gone back, only ever really managing to remember the last two. Time plays tricks on the mind. I laughed at the irony. Explosions from outside the complex shook the room. I switched on the machine and focused on the destination. An hour after my first meeting would cut down on the explanations. Climbing into the machine, it spooled up, charging the exotic matter needed to slip through space and time.

It fired as the room started to break apart and released me into the void, away from the armageddon that was occurring around me. Once again, I had escaped my fate and once again, I went to change it.
The change from now to before was almost instantaneous. There was an after-effect that left me reeling, much like sunspots after looking at the sun directly, except with an all-over-body experience. It always took me a while to reorientate.

Once the world returned to a perceptible normality, I got up and went to find myself. It was a good forty-seven years since my last meeting with myself, but my augmented memory was crystalline clear and rich with vivid details. My other self, the younger version of me, would still be reeling from the first encounter with myself, from what I recalled. He would be at home, in his room alone, and it was there that I found me.

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'Xavier's X-ray' by Kristan Ginther

Posted on April 21, 2008 by planetmagazine

Illustration (c) 2008 by Romeo Esparrago.

Illustration (c) Romeo Esparrago

Before putting the X-ray on the market for copious amounts of money, Xavier could not wait to try it out on himself. What secrets or inspirations lurked below the surface? He imagined that his soul was a stately jazz musician. Or, he thought, his soul could be that of a Labrador Retriever – smart, steady, and loyal. Or, was it the soul of a child full of endless possibilities?

The X-ray was actually an entire room rather than some flashy gadget. A person could walk into the quiet space, hit the activation button tucked inside the armrest of the centerpiece couch, and wait for his or her soul to be bared on the large movie screen in the south end of the room. Once broadcast onscreen, the person could then converse with his or her soul on any topic imaginable in comfort.

Knowing one’s soul more intimately provided incredible benefits, Xavier believed. If your soul was troubled, you could put it into therapy or give it drugs to set it on a better path. Also, if your soul noticed something lacking in you, it could help you look deep within your soul to become a better person. Either way, the discourse between people and their souls was bound to make the world a better place.

Xavier knew his soul was going to be pretty impressed with him. What wasn’t to like? Xavier had built his entire life on scientific creation. He had scores of patented inventions to his credit. He was one of the smartest people in his field. Accolades and grants had been showered upon Xavier ever since his time travel invention. And he had a family who adored him, a wife who enjoyed tending to the house, and two children who were showing impressive scientific aptitude (just like Xavier).

Xavier entered his X-ray, hit the activation button, and waited for a seemingly endless amount of time until his soul appeared onscreen. He was greeted by a man who seemed to be quite similar to Xavier – middle-aged, smartly attired, and confident. Xavier said “Hello”, and waited for his soul to answer.

“Why have you not accepted the Lord as your Savior?” Xavier’s soul demanded.

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'A Child's Voice' by Darren Joy

Posted on April 20, 2008 by planetmagazine

Illustration (c) Romeo Esparrago

Madmen know. They shout it in the streets and in the fields but go unnoticed. Those dying know. They whisper it with their last breath but no one understands. The dead know. They touch the living in warning, passing silently over what were once their homes, yet go unheeded. And I know, though I no longer bother to tell anyone. I will tell you, though I do not do so in warning for it is already too late. I tell you more out of a desire to understand what has become of our world; what has become of me.

It began years ago, in the silence of man’s ignorance. Warroks, they are known as. They were once men, fools who dabbled in what they did not understand. They were the first to see that essence of our existence, that whisper of magic which lives within our world and all things upon it. When understanding came, they began to leech it from the earth, living on it as man lives on bread, ravaging it until it became as rare as the life it once sustained. It is the reason for our existence, and our end.

I have run from them since I was a boy. I remember a late morning not long ago, standing in a forest. They had been closing on me lately, though I still could not understand what they wanted of me. Weeping branches hung above, lifeless forms reaching down with their cold touch. Cadavers of wood littered the rise of ground, limbs frozen by death in a last futile gasp for light. A smell of putrefying wood wrinkled my nose; one can become used to the decay when constantly faced with it. Amid a swirling mist that gave life to the decomposed, I barely noticed it anymore.

A forest stream ran through the birthing bog, gurgling with pity for the death of the land. I knelt before it and, throwing back my hood, careful not to wet the ends of my cloak, I splashed my face, enjoying the coolness and sharpness of life for I was alive. I stared at my reflection then, its form broken in the foraging water. Amon Rush is my name, though I no longer recognise the man that goes with it; black eyes set within a pale face, hair and beard rusty red as the mulching leaves at my feet. A thinner form that has lost its youth, though I am no more than twenty five.

For as long as I remember I have run from them and their hunger, wandered through the dying lands in search of peace, for hope is too much to ask for. I had wandered into a valley in the Arfael region that day, somewhere in the Northlands. I had hoped I might find a place to rest for the night, for forest land offers neither food nor shelter anymore.

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'Three Tears' by Shaun Haiste

Posted on October 14, 2007 by planetmagazine

Illustration (c) Patrick Stacy

Portentia Clarke looked out the window and watched the cameraman struggle to get his legs into the contamination suit; he was a heavier man, and the producer and tech crew were helping out. It was five in the morning, and they weren’t scheduled to begin until after nine. Four hours of preparation, all for their safety.

“This is it!” Portentia said aloud. “We made it… we’re here.”

Grabbing the steaming pot of ‘NiCoffee’, she filled her cup with the warm sludge and added a squirt of freon and a tablespoon of Aspartame before taking it to her lips. She couldn’t help but laugh at herself — she was dressed and ready to go already. Too bad none of the crew had evolved yet; it would have made things so much easier.

Trying not to think about all the fuss being made outside, Portentia decided to make sure everything was ready with the house. Grabbing a cloth, she started to clean out the doorless microwave; of course, she had to make sure it was pristine. This was Derek’s first big invention, and she had come up with the slogan for it: “The easiest way to cook healthy!”.

Derek! Dear, brilliant Derek. He was on a lecturing tour now and would not be home for two weeks; the children were at summer camp in Chernobyl and would not be home for another week. Portentia wished they could be there with her on the pedestal, but she was more than prepared to shine alone. After the microwave was cleaned, she went on to the other inventions she was planning to showcase.

She took a deep breath of the carbon-monoxide-filled coal sauna when checking to make sure it was orderly. She thought about cooking something for the crew on the indoor BBQ, but realized they would have to open their suits to eat… or to go to the bathroom, for that matter. That was their problem, she decided, as she made sure the fridge was full of ‘Clarke’s Coala’. The fire pit was cleaned of its melted plastic and Styrofoam heap, and there was a fresh batch of polystyrene egg cartons and bags piled neatly nearby.

Seeing all of these wonderful things they had come up with had brought a tear to Portentia’s eye, and she felt it roll down her cheek. Quickly, she ran to the bathroom to wipe it off before it destroyed her dress, her dark, leather-like skin smoking where the tear had rolled down it. She always wondered what external pain felt like when she saw that.

Gathering her senses while she wiped the tear away with the asbestos cloth, she looked into the mirror to make sure she looked OK.

“It’s fine. You checked everything last night. The bathroom and septic pool are contained and clean in the backyard. Bedrooms are nice and clean, with a nice layer of soot covering the new lead-paint job. You outdid yourself with that, by the way,” she said to her reflection in the mirror. “We’re here.”

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'Into Exo: A Review of Oz's New Sub-label' by Brandon Myers

Posted on October 4, 2007 by planetmagazine

The owner of Ozymandias has just gone over the edge of the horizon, and we love it. With OzymExo, he’s taken his well-established outlandish obscurantism and gotten rid of the landish. OE’s virgin catalog is pure weird candy for the unhinged and the mutated. I promise you — heavy rotation at Bebe Monster and Monkey Bar.

Someone once said, “Tuning a mellotherium doesn’t.” Well, listening to what OE’s offering up doesn’t. Take OZM(exo)020: Origin unknown. Species unknown. Just an artifact (“Vessel with Biotic Interior [Possibly Analog]”) floating through Pavonian space a few centuries ago that had “an Interior Communicative Organ Beeping and Whistling” (as the subliner helpfully clarifies). The “organ” makes non-repetitive, arhythmic beeps, squonks, and hoots for about three minutes. In the background, various hummings and swellings are punctuated by raspy clankings and crescendoes.

Intelligent? What’s the criteria? Music? As I was listening to this track, I imagined an alien “listening” to our industrial exhaust pipes churning out “music” via radiation signatures and asking a similar question. He might deduce our intelligence correctly, but be totally wrong in reasoning the purpose of these byproducts. For the same reason, I wondered if this semi-vivified soundmaker weren’t a “vent” of some kind. The Rosetta Sphincter.

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PLANET MAGAZINE

Wild SF & Fantasy :: Online Since 1994

Tag Archives: Science Fiction

Book: For Fans of 'The Twilight Zone'

'The End of the Cycle' by Thomas George

'Xavier's X-ray' by Kristan Ginther

'A Child's Voice' by Darren Joy

'Three Tears' by Shaun Haiste

'Into Exo: A Review of Oz's New Sub-label' by Brandon Myers