science-fiction

The front edge of the shockwave impacts the earth and you__e both shoved to your backs against the crumbling asphalt of the parking lot, and then crushed into oblivion as the Earth, along with every celestial body of your solar system, is disintegrated into tiny shards and then sucked unceremoniously into the resulting black hole.

How typical of a machine to think it knows better.

If there__ a zeppelin, it__ alternate history. If there__ a rocketship, it__ science fiction. If there are swords and/or horses, it__ fantasy. A book with swords and horses in it can be turned into science fiction by adding a rocketship to the mix. If a book has a rocketship in it, the only thing that can turn it back into fantasy is the Holy Grail.

I've got my own toilet." -- Grace Harper

You're a kid. I didn't know we taught kids manners anymore.

Enemy?_ Horus laughed. __hen did they become the enemy? They are men like us._ He glared up at the night sky, threw back his head and screamed a curse at the stars. Then his voice fell to a whisper. Loken was close enough to hear his words.__hy have you tasked me with this, father? Why have you forsaken me? Why? It is too hard. It is too much. Why did you leave me to do this on my own?

Science fiction makes the implausible possible, while science fantasy makes the impossible plausible.

The obsession with correct political belief and expression in art is stultifying the genre as it is necessarily exclusive. We are losing our voice in artificial, forced homogeny posing as tolerance. Propaganda-disguised-as-story drives readers away as agenda takes the place of wonder, excitement, character. and conflict.

As they walked, it seemed almost every building had some similar contrivance as decoration, adorning the street in a cacophony of clangs, bangs and whirs. The street__ surroundings danced with steam and smoke, the scent of oil and grease its perfume.

Sometimes it's hard for me to understand that people can believe in me, that they can trust that I'll be anything more than the sum of the skeletons in my closet. But I can be. And I am.

The Emperor, you see, protects... He protects mankind, through the Legions, through the Martial corps, through the war machines of the Mechanicum. He understands the dangers. The inconsistencies. He uses you, and all the instruments like you, to protect us from harm. To protect our physical bodies from murder and damage, to protect our minds from madness, to protect our souls... There are insane dangers in the cosmos, dangers that mankind is fundamentally unable to comprehend, let alone survive. So he protects us. There are truths out there that would drive us mad by one fleeting glimpse of them. So he chooses not to share them with us. That's why he made you... Remember, Garviel. The Emperor is our truth and out light. If we trust in him, he will protect.

Doubt is what keeps the heart and mind of every man alive. It 's what makes us think twice.

The mind is the reality. You are what you think.

I am Ubik. Before the universe was, I am. I made the suns. I made the worlds. I created the lives and the places they inhabit; I move them here, I put them there. They go as I say, then do as I tell them. I am the word and my name is never spoken, the name which no one knows. I am called Ubik, but that is not my name. I am. I shall always be.

Unfettered is an anthology filled with magic, wonderment, and hope. It is more than it's combined stories, though. It is the power of friendship. Of giving. Of a science-fiction and fantasy community that protects its own. Of humanity escaping the ugliness that often plagues it to instead create a testament to the goodness found in every heart.

A stitch in time saves uncontrollable blood loss

There is more important work to be done here. The strong must lead us into a new energy age before our world dies out. Who's going to do that? You, Caleb? Your face bears new marks__ou are not ready to win such a battle. - Adrian

I maintain that cultural sensitivity should be replaced by cultural awareness. Awareness implies research, consideration, thought, and judiciousness....Sensitivity denies equal access to language. It segregates and censors based on the background of the writer rather than the content of the story. No society can embrace cultural sensitivity and retain full capacity for freedom of speech.