Sci-fi

As anyone who has ever had to pry bits of shattered Pyrex out of the walls can attest, experiments do not have to be successful to be interesting or worthy of attention. Publishing, for example, has seen any number of innovative ideas that for one reason or another failed to thrive. Failure does not necessarily reflect poorly on the creator-sometimes, it's just not steam engine time.  Read more

Military planning is a complicated endeavour, calling upon experts in logistics and infrastructure to predict resource availability and technological advancements. Long-range military planning, deciding what to invest in now to prepare armed forces for the world in thirty years' time, is even more difficult.  Read more

Expectations for the new Dune movie from director Denis Villeneuve are sky-high after the release of a promising first trailer earlier this month. But anyone who's seen the David Lynch version from 1984 knows that Dune is a hard book to adapt. Science fiction author Rajan Khanna notes that the Lynch film struggles to balance storytelling with exposition.

In 1909, long before the invention of the World Wide Web or the prospect of a world where we must live socially distant from each other, the English writer E.M. Forster arguably predicted both.  Read more

You can't have a good thriller without a nasty and formidable opponent for your hero. But it isn't enough to just write a character and call him "the bad guy." Just as it's important to create a well-rounded, three-dimensional hero, you must create a villain who is well-developed and not just your standard killer, robber, or kidnapper.  Read more