I’m thrilled to have Holly Hunter back on the TV screen. Hunter plays, Nahla Ake, the Chancellor of Starfleet Academy and has her hands full with the various cadets who she’s responsible for. Star Trek: Starfleet Academy is an eight-episode series on Paramount+. Two episodes are available and one episode will be dropped every Thursday for the next couple of months.

The target audience for this series doesn’t really include me. It’s aimed at teenagers. The first year students are teenagers with typical teenage problems. Starfleet Academy unfolds sometime in the 32nd century, roughly concurrent with the later seasons of Paramount+’s Star Trek: Discovery but centuries after most of the rest of the Star Trek canon. The starships look very different from what previous Star Trek ships looked like. If you’re a long-time Star Trek fan, you will surely be pleased to see some familiar faces here, including Tig Notaro’s Jett Reno, Oded Fehr’s Charles Vance, and Robert Picardo’s hologram Doctor.

Even though the target audience is teenagers, I’m young at heart so I’ll watch this new series with nostalgia. How about you? Are you a Trekkie? GRADE: Incomplete but trending towards a B

“November 19, 2007 was the birth date of the Kindle, a day I had dreamed of with messianic anticipation since that movement, some twenty-two years earlier, when I flashed on the notion of a portable e-book reader.” (p. 113)

Richard Curtis, famed literary agent, tells the story of the development of e-books (and e-book readers) from the 1980s to today. Plenty of obstacles needed to be overcome. New technologies needed to be invented. And resistance to e-books–from authors to readers–needed to be dealt with.

“Harlan Ellison was not just skeptical about ebooks but downright hostile to them… But one day in 2008, he called. ‘I’m up the creek, We’re broke, and I’m gonna lose my house.’ ” (p. 124). Curtis convinced Ellison to have his books converted to e-books with advances of $1000 per 32 titles. That $32,000 saved Ellison’s house. Sales of the e-books stabilized Ellison’s finances for years.

Curtis shares stories about many of his clients: Dan Simmons, John Norman (of GOR fame), Elizabeth Lynn, Greg Bear, and Richard S. Prather.

“According to Tidbits.com, ‘In 2009 AMAZON controlled 90% of the e-book market.’ Within three years, Forrester Research’s James McQuivery reported, AMAZON had sold 4 million Kindles in its various versions. In 2014 alone, $5 billion worth of Kindles were sold.” (p. 116)

“The digital transformation of the past fifty years has been widely chronicled, but the story of how the book industry went from print to digital has never been adequately told. As a widely admired literary agent and the founder of one of the very first e-book publishers, Richard Curtis was present at the creation. He knows the whole story as only an insider can. Digital Inc. is the first book to recount in detail the conversion of printed books to digital and the struggles of publishers to embrace a new business and creative paradigm after five hundred years of dedication to print on paper. The upheaval changed not just books but the people who write, read, and publish them. Digital Inc. blends a thoroughly researched history with an account of how Curtis and a team of hotshots built their electronic book company from scratch and turned it into a multimillion-dollar company in the vanguard of digital transformation, pioneering innovations that still shape the book business today.

The story of how the e-book morphed from an idle fantasy into an industry-shaping powerhouse is told against the backdrop of decades of tumult in publishing, from the birth of international media conglomerates and the explosion of social media to the rise of Amazon and the emergence of new business models unimaginable a generation ago. In the tradition of Hackers, Fire in the Valley, and Soul of a New Machine, Digital Inc. explores the personal, social, and creative complexities-as well as the daunting technical and economic hurdles-that the progenitors of the e-book revolution had to overcome. Curtis’s wise and witty voice brings to life the colorful characters who revolutionized publishing and continue to transform it in the rapidly-dawning age of AI. For everyone who cares about books and their continuing impact on our culture-from writers and publishing professionals to countless avid readers-Digital Inc. is an absorbing, eye-opening guide to today’s new world of books and how it came to be.” Digital Inc. tells a fascinating story and Curtis’s insights on the state of publishing today are impressive! GRADE: A

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Introduction — 1

PRELUDE: Appointment in Gaithersburg — 3

1. Analog Agent — 13
2. The Dream of Portability — 23
3. Content and Discontent — 33
4. The Age of Miracles — 39
5. Turning Point — 48
6. Consolidation — 53
7. “Puh…” — 69
8. The Big Sleep — 85
9. Shifting Sands — 93
10. Slouching Towards Kindle — 99
11. The Road to E-Day — 107
12. Game On — 113
13. What Were They Thinking? — 131
14. Displaced Persons — 143
15. The Dark Side — 162
16. Indelible Ink — 171
17. For Sale — 179
18. Rescued — 184
19. The End — 196
20. Back From the Future — 199

ACKNOWLEGEMENTS — 208

APPENDIX A: STANDARD E-READS PUBLISHING CONTRACT — 209

APPENDIX B: SAMPLE E-READS NEWSLETTER — 220

SOURCE NOTES — 223

INDEX — 244

ABOUT THE AUTHORS — 259

Most Buffalo Bills fans will be rooting for the Houston Texans to beat the New England Patriots. The Patriots are 3 point favorites over the Texans. In the late game, the LA RAMS are 3 1/2 point favorites at snowy Chicago. I’m mildly hoping the Rams win…but I admire what the Bears have done this season. Plenty of late game comebacks!

Who do you think will win these games?

If you’re a fan of Pulp Fiction from the 1920s and 1930s, you’re familiar with Spicy Detective Stories, Spicy Adventure Stories, Spicy Mystery Stories, and Spicy Western Stories.

But, what about Spicy Zeppelin Stories?

In his clever and informative INTRODUCTION, Will Murray traces the genesis of this fictitous pulp magazine back to the 1970s. Years went by and the myth of Spicy Zeppelin Stories grew. Finally, Murray admits there came a point when he had to create an issue Spicy Zeppelin Stories before someone else did.

And here it is! Spicy Zeppelin Stories, Volume 1, Number 1, October 1936 appears just as it would have…if it really existed back then.

The prolific Will Murray, known for his many Pulp Fiction inspired novels and author of 40 books in The Destroyer series, decided he would write all the stories in Spicy Zeppelin Stories using a number of pseudonyms. Murray took the approach that the stories would be written in Depression fiction style and feature a Doc Savage-like story–Gondola Girl”–a Western story, a Science Fiction story in the Captain Future and C.L. Moore’s Northwest Smith mode, a typical weird menace story, a G-man story, and an air-war yarn. The common element to Murray’s Spicy Zeppelin Stories is every story features an airship of some type.

My favorite story in Spicy Zeppelin Stories is “Zeps of the Void” by “Jason Rainbow.” Solar Smith’s vengeance on Space Pirates is focused and cunning. I also enjoyed “Catwalk Creeper” by “D. E. Need” where beautiful women are attacked by “Medusa the Destroyer”–turned to stone–and shattered into pieces aboard a Zeppelin. Neat mystery!

If you’re looking for something different and exciting, Spicy Zeppelin Stories might be exactly what you’re in the mood to read! GRADE: B+

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

INTRODUCTION By Will Murray — 1

Gondola girl By Wray Murill — 9

Gasbag buckaroo By Noah Count — 71

Hydrogen horror By Page Turner — 101

Zeps of the void By Jason Rainbow — 135

Rail lair By Philip Space –165

Catwalk creeper By D. E. Need — 191

The Celestial Airship By Anonymous — 219

Chane By Ray W. Murrill –221

The 1980s offered a wide range of musical styles. Blondie’s “The Tide is High” has a reggae vibe. Hall & Oates “Private Eye” has a catchy  pop-rock sound. Olivia New-John’s “Magic” was recorded  for the soundtrack to the 1980 musical fantasy film Xanadu, which starred Newton-John and Gene Kelly. The J. Geils Band’s “Centerfold” makes it on both #1 Hits of the ’80s and American Bandstand’s Greatest Hits of the Century: 80s along with “The Power of Love” by Huey Lewis and The News. #1 Hits of the the ’80s does a nice job including many of the 1980s most popular songs: Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love” (great music video, too!), Kenny Loggins’s “Footloose,” Kim Carnes’s enigmatic “Bette Davis Eyes,” and the Fine Young Cannibals’s “She Drives Me Crazy.”

American Bandstand’s Greatest Hits of the Century: 80s includes some disco with “Love Come Down” by Evelyn “Champagne” King and Taylor Dayne’s “Don’t Rush Me.” I still love “Jessie’s Girl” by Rick Springfield and “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper and “867-5309 / Jenny” by Tommy Tutone. Do you remember these hits from the 1980s? Any favorites here? GRADE: B+ (for both)

TRACK LIST:

TRACK LIST:

David Greig’s novella starts with a savage Viking attack on a small island off the coast of England. The monks in the isolated monastery are butchered and their meager religious valuables ransacked. The Vikings capture the women who kept the chickens and farm animals who supported the monastery and put them aboard their dragon ship to sell as slaves.

After the Vikings sail away, we discover there are three survivors: a young boy who was in training to be a monk, the wife of the blacksmith, and a surprise survivor. Greig then spends most of the rest of The Book of I showing how the survivors repair the wreckage and learn to work together.

Of course, a year later, the Viking ship returns and all hell breaks loose again…but with a different result. If you’re in the mood for a clever story with an unusual cast, The Book of I delivers a quick and compelling reading experience. GRADE: B

Eight years ago I watchedThe Night Manager (you can read my review here), after I read John le Carre’s book of the same name. Le Carre liked the production and encouraged Tom Hiddleston, Hugh Laurie, Olivia Colman, Tom Hollander, David Harewood and Elizabeth Debicki to make a sequel. Then John le Carre (aka, David John Moore Cornwell) died in 2020 but the plans for more episodes of The Night Manager progressed.

“In April 2024, it was announced that BBC and Amazon Prime Video had ordered a second and third series, with Hiddleston and Colman returning in lead roles and Laurie as an executive producer.  Alistair Petrie, Noah Jupe, Douglas Hodge and Michael Nardone also reprise their roles from the first series, while Camila Morrone, Diego Calva, Indira Varma, Paul Chahidi and Hayley Squires joined the cast in lead roles. Georgi Banks-Davies serves as director for the second series.”

If you’re a fan of John le Carre’s books and enjoy spy stories, you might want to check out this new 6-episode series on AMAZON Prime Video. GRADE: Incomplete but treading towards a B+

Judith Viorst–well known children’s book author and poet–could have titled Making the Best of What’s Left…A Guide to Widowhood instead. Viorst is 94 years old and a realist.

“Milton, my husband of almost sixty-three years, died in December 2022. He wasn’t supposed to die before me–I told him this was something he COULD NOT DO– but when did he listen? I write, in this book, about widowhood, but I also want to explore the challenges that I and the people I’ve talked with…dealing with these years beyond age eighty, in what I’m calling the Final Fifth of Life” (years 80 to 100). (p. 1)

Viorst explores options in housing–depending on health. She deals with loneliness. Health issues get a comprehensive analysis. Is there romance after 80? Viorst thinks so.

Viorst counsels not to wait too long to say the things that you need to. And to show how you feel about the people in your life before it’s too late. This short book addresses all the important Aging Issues with humor and sincerity. How is aging going for you? GRADE: A

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

ABOUT THIS BOOK — 1

A valentine for the extremely married — 3

Home — 5

Our sensible safe retirement community — 17

Old — 19

Losing it — 32

What’s left — 35

Grow old along with me and my home health aide — 49

A little while — 51

Stop being dead — 65

Counting the dead — 67

What else I remember — 83

Afterward — 85

An afterlife — 99

Happiness — 103

Getting out the vote — 119

Loneliness — 121

A Jewish widow’s country-western love song — 138

Community — 139

Princess Margaret, Pearl Harbor, “daffodils,” etc. — 149

Wisdom — 151

Prescription — 161

Epilogue — 163

A FEW ENDNOTES — 167

Acknowledgments — 173

According to Vegas, the Buffalo Bills should win this Playoff game. The Bills are favored by 1 1/2 points. But Jacksonville has won 8 games in a row and their Quarterback, Trevor Lawrence, is on fire. I’m expecting a close game and hoping the Bills will find a way to win!

No. 6 San Francisco 49ers at No. 3 Philadelphia Eagles, 4:30 p.m. ET, FOX

I’m rooting for Art Scott’s 49ers even though the Eagles are 6 point favorites.

No. 7 Los Angeles Chargers at No. 2 New England Patriots, 8:00 p.m. ET, NBC

All Bills fans are hoping the Chargers can upset the 3 point favorite Patriots. Who do you think will win these games?