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Name: Sean Williams
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2006, 23, adelaide, adelaide fringe, adelaide pen, adelaide water, adelaide writers week, agatha christie, alien, altair australia, amanda, anime, antarctica, appearances, archives, arses, art, articulate, arts sa, asa, ascent, asim, assholes, astronomy, astropolis, audible, audio books, aurealis awards, australia, automated sprinklers, awards, barnes & noble, batmobile, bed e buys, bibliography, big book club, biggest loser, bios, birthday, birthdays, black holes, blog like it's the end of the world, blurbs, boing boing, books, booksense, brains, cat sparks, cataclysm, cenotaxis, cephalopods, charity, chocolate, chris roberson, christmas, clarion, clarkesworld, collaboration, collections, comet, commandments, commentary, community, computer games, cons, contest, covers, cowell, crime, d-mat, daikaiju, daleks, david cornish, deepspace, descent, destination prague, devo, dictionaries, dirigibles, ditmar awards, djing, doctor who, dr martens, earth ascendant, echoes of earth, echoes of earth geodesica, einstein, elemental, eon, exercise, fade to grey, family, fantasy, fantasy book critic, fashion, faster than light, fatman, festivals, flight of the conchords, food, france, frank zappa, fringe, galway, garth nix, gary numan, gemini, geodesica, germany, getting old, ghosts, glitter, global warming, god, grange jetty kiosk, greg bridges, haiku, hamlet, hard fantasy, heidi's pick six, heirs of earth, hi-fi, history, holidays, home, honeymoon, humour, internets, interview, interviews, ireland, iron maiden, jade monkey, japan, jason nahrung, jeff wayne, john scalzi, jon pertwee, jonathan strahan, jpl, judging, juvenilia, kim wilkins, kirsty brooks, launches, lee child, light bodies falling, limericks, lists, locus, lolz, lou ander, lou anders, lyrics, magic dirt, mawson, maze of death, memes, metal fatigue, midgets, midnight oil, monkeybrain, movember, movies, moving house, music, my elves are different, my father, natasha stott-despoja, neologisms, new scientist, new space opera, new york, news, nick drake, nostromo, office, omnibus, orbit, orphans of earth, out, panels, pen, phd, philip k dick, photos, pirates, podcasts, poetry, politics, presents, privacy, profile, pyr, queensland, quiz, quizzes, quotes, rants, reading, readings, releases, religion, reprints, restaurants, reviews, robert j sawyer, robin potanin, robots, romance, russia, sa writers' festival, saturn returns, sawc, schedules, school, schools, schrödinger's cat, science, science fiction, scott westerfeld, scrubs, sean williams, sebastian, secrets, sf, sfwa, shane dix, shaun tan, shelley jackson, short stories, signings, simon brown, sleep research facility, snapshot, soap bubble, solaris, sounds, south australia, space, space archaeology, space opera, spam, speeches, star wars, stephanie smith, steve roach, strand beasts, surflen street, survey, swancon, sydney, sydney observatory, sydney writers festival, symbols, synopses, tags, talking squid, television, the big book club, the blood debt, the books of the change, the broken land, the bulletin, the changeling, the changing, the crooked letter, the devoured earth, the dust devils, the dying light, the force unleashed, the future, the grand conjunction, the hanging mountains, the prodigal sun, the resurrected man, the scarecrow, the seventh letter, the sky warden and the sun, the stone mage and the sea, the storm weaver and the sand, thog, ticonderoga, titles, tobias buckell, transgender, travel, tsunami, tv, twins, typos, uk, uni, us, weather, wedding, white christmas, word, wordfire, wotf, writers' festivals, writing, xmas, zombies
3rd-Jan-2007 12:17 pm - the list of lists
It, HC Headshot, copernicus 2, outhouse, magic dirt, fly, saucer men, grattis, flight to mars, unleashed logo, Orphans head, gedosenki A, man from planet X, WOTF 23, saturn returns, crab monsters, fingers, cenotaxis, saturn title, psycho, changeling close, red moon, destination moon, zombie, boot, Movember 1, suicide pistol, squid, haiku, energy dome, inflatable dalek, beach, silent p, dalek & madonna, dog collar, earth ascendant, dalek & kylie, squid fancy, Movember 3, dirt 1, Movember - FZ wallpaper, city painting, south park, seth bullock, askew, aurealis head, Movember 2, glitter negative, trouvelot mars, Washington, destination: prague, gedosenki C, pink pills, Movember - FZ water, bert, Wig, bear, Mischevious, kev07, Lodo, tux, movember - wolfman, cosmic monsters, denied a voice, trouvelot nebula, russian egghead, sorry, kittens, blob, tubeway, glitter - not, unleashed, pirate, kb's party, gedosenki B, berserker, Movember - FZ black, hanging mountains, quantum lolcat, beast with 10000 eyes, Gazza, cenotaxis - audible, killers from space, destroy all monster, cosmic man, wedding 1, magritte, invaders from mars, robot, fringe ticket, in the name of the law, gary numan ticket, goldfrapp A&E, copernicus, giant claw, numan's eye, green sun, trouvelot jupiter, simpsons, Imre, PEN, saturn returns - audible
Another top ten listing, and this time it's huge!

Barnes & Noble has put The Crooked Letter at number four on its Explorations Newsletter's Editor's Choice of 2006, alongside John Scalzi, Rudy Rucker, and many other excellent authors. Hurrah!

Wonderful to see so many other Pyr titles in these lists, too. On this one, in fact, Pyr gets the #1 spot. Lou Anders once again confirms the rumour that he is a legend.
1st-Jan-2007 10:51 am - "for you"
It, HC Headshot, copernicus 2, outhouse, magic dirt, fly, saucer men, grattis, flight to mars, unleashed logo, Orphans head, gedosenki A, man from planet X, WOTF 23, saturn returns, crab monsters, fingers, cenotaxis, saturn title, psycho, changeling close, red moon, destination moon, zombie, boot, Movember 1, suicide pistol, squid, haiku, energy dome, inflatable dalek, beach, silent p, dalek & madonna, dog collar, earth ascendant, dalek & kylie, squid fancy, Movember 3, dirt 1, Movember - FZ wallpaper, city painting, south park, seth bullock, askew, aurealis head, Movember 2, glitter negative, trouvelot mars, Washington, destination: prague, gedosenki C, pink pills, Movember - FZ water, bert, Wig, bear, Mischevious, kev07, Lodo, tux, movember - wolfman, cosmic monsters, denied a voice, trouvelot nebula, russian egghead, sorry, kittens, blob, tubeway, glitter - not, unleashed, pirate, kb's party, gedosenki B, berserker, Movember - FZ black, hanging mountains, quantum lolcat, beast with 10000 eyes, Gazza, cenotaxis - audible, killers from space, destroy all monster, cosmic man, wedding 1, magritte, invaders from mars, robot, fringe ticket, in the name of the law, gary numan ticket, goldfrapp A&E, copernicus, giant claw, numan's eye, green sun, trouvelot jupiter, simpsons, Imre, PEN, saturn returns - audible
Happy New Year! May it be everything you hope for, and more besides.

Once again, for the time travellers among us, here's last night's gig. It's not often I'm able to play a song by one of my very favourite bands and make a (mild) political statement, so I was very pleased to kick-start 2007 with Devo's "Beautiful World", which manages in two words to turn a syrupy pop-anthem into something much more subversive.



And here's a happy note to start the year on: The Crooked Letter is number nine on a list of the top ten books of 2006. Hurrah! Thanks, Pat.
30th-Dec-2006 12:28 pm - a few of my favourite things
It, HC Headshot, copernicus 2, outhouse, magic dirt, fly, saucer men, grattis, flight to mars, unleashed logo, Orphans head, gedosenki A, man from planet X, WOTF 23, saturn returns, crab monsters, fingers, cenotaxis, saturn title, psycho, changeling close, red moon, destination moon, zombie, boot, Movember 1, suicide pistol, squid, haiku, energy dome, inflatable dalek, beach, silent p, dalek & madonna, dog collar, earth ascendant, dalek & kylie, squid fancy, Movember 3, dirt 1, Movember - FZ wallpaper, city painting, south park, seth bullock, askew, aurealis head, Movember 2, glitter negative, trouvelot mars, Washington, destination: prague, gedosenki C, pink pills, Movember - FZ water, bert, Wig, bear, Mischevious, kev07, Lodo, tux, movember - wolfman, cosmic monsters, denied a voice, trouvelot nebula, russian egghead, sorry, kittens, blob, tubeway, glitter - not, unleashed, pirate, kb's party, gedosenki B, berserker, Movember - FZ black, hanging mountains, quantum lolcat, beast with 10000 eyes, Gazza, cenotaxis - audible, killers from space, destroy all monster, cosmic man, wedding 1, magritte, invaders from mars, robot, fringe ticket, in the name of the law, gary numan ticket, goldfrapp A&E, copernicus, giant claw, numan's eye, green sun, trouvelot jupiter, simpsons, Imre, PEN, saturn returns - audible
Where did 2006 go? Looking back on it, I don't seem to have encountered very much new stuff, although I'm sure that isn't true. It's probably just been buried beneath all the books I've been reading.

I've already covered said books, and I haven't seen enough movies to consider myself any kind of authority on the subject (like everyone else, it seems, I liked "Children of Men" and "Casino Royale"). My TV watching consisted of keeping up with new seasons of Deadwood, Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Scrubs and Doctor Who (not on Australian commercial networks, of course) and finally watching through the anime classic "Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex" (which reminded me, in a very pleasing way, of parts of The Resurrected Man).

The only area in which I feel at all knowledgeable is ambient music, so here's my top five albums that I discovered this year (even if, in at least one case, they were released ages ago):

Steve Roach, "Proof Positive"
Biosphere, "Shenzou"
Carbon Based Lifeforms, "World of Sleepers"
Global Communications, "76:14"
Maneki Neko, "Auracle"

A couple of soundtracks I'm really enjoying at the moment are those to "Breaking & Entering" (Underworld and Gabriel Yared) and "The Prestige" (David Julyan). And I really liked Fourplay's new album, "Now to the Future" (not just because the title always makes me think of Devo's "Duty Now for the Future", honest). Gary Numan's "Jagged" was, of course, a personal highlight, as was Frank Zappa's posthumous CD of guitar solos, "Trance-Fusion". The only album I picked up by anyone remotely contemporary was José González's "Veneer"--not because there isn't good music out there, but because I just don't have time to listen to anything with lyrics.

So that's it. Thanks to everyone who recommended I watch, read or listen to this or that. Sorry if I didn't get to all of it. The backlog may be growing, but it's good to know that there will never be a shortage of good material to distract myself with. In fact, just today I bought the first season of Sopranos. That, no doubt, will consume any spare moment I might find in the coming weeks...
16th-Dec-2006 10:36 am - the year that was
It, HC Headshot, copernicus 2, outhouse, magic dirt, fly, saucer men, grattis, flight to mars, unleashed logo, Orphans head, gedosenki A, man from planet X, WOTF 23, saturn returns, crab monsters, fingers, cenotaxis, saturn title, psycho, changeling close, red moon, destination moon, zombie, boot, Movember 1, suicide pistol, squid, haiku, energy dome, inflatable dalek, beach, silent p, dalek & madonna, dog collar, earth ascendant, dalek & kylie, squid fancy, Movember 3, dirt 1, Movember - FZ wallpaper, city painting, south park, seth bullock, askew, aurealis head, Movember 2, glitter negative, trouvelot mars, Washington, destination: prague, gedosenki C, pink pills, Movember - FZ water, bert, Wig, bear, Mischevious, kev07, Lodo, tux, movember - wolfman, cosmic monsters, denied a voice, trouvelot nebula, russian egghead, sorry, kittens, blob, tubeway, glitter - not, unleashed, pirate, kb's party, gedosenki B, berserker, Movember - FZ black, hanging mountains, quantum lolcat, beast with 10000 eyes, Gazza, cenotaxis - audible, killers from space, destroy all monster, cosmic man, wedding 1, magritte, invaders from mars, robot, fringe ticket, in the name of the law, gary numan ticket, goldfrapp A&E, copernicus, giant claw, numan's eye, green sun, trouvelot jupiter, simpsons, Imre, PEN, saturn returns - audible
It's been a good one. One of the best, I reckon, and not just because of the amazing Amanda (who is now an Associate Professor, belying her uni homepage). Some pretty powerful stars must have been in alignment because it's hard to find a low-point.

( the highlights... )
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