S&L Podcast - #278 - Don’t Trust Turkey Data

A hot new approach to a fantasy trilogy, the real drama of rocket scientists involves cake, and why you can’t trust turkeys to rigorously use data to predict future results.

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QUICK BURNS
    
Geoff: Marlon James announces Dark Star fantasy trilogy: 'I hope 12-year-olds read this book' 
    
Nokomis.FL "Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies and more Lies" 
On his LiveJournal Martin wrote, “Not done yet, but I’ve made progress,” he wrote. “But not as much as I hoped a year ago, when I thought to be done by now. I think it will be out this year. (But hey, I thought the same thing last year).”    
    
Fresno Bob: Some random guy got the cover for this article on top SF+F for 2017 over on Kirkus Reviews 
Publishers Weekly calls it "Appropriately convoluted!"
Pilot X
    
Silvana: More books coming out from the amazing NK Jemisin, including a contemporary fantasy dealing with themes of race and power in New York City. It has a projected publication date of April 2019.
    
Sporadicreviews and David: Neil of the online magazine Clarkesworld finally quit his day job and is going to be an editor full time (see here: http://neil-clarke.com/frankly/) He changed the Patreon goals for direct salary & healthcare though.
    
Louie: CBS orders pilot for Andy Weir's NASA set drama, Mission Control 
Terpkristin: My coworkers and I are having a good laugh over this. Some of the comments on Facebook today:
"I like staying awake and eating M&Ms"
"I bet the CBS version will have way more explosions..well, OK, maybe not."
"Also probably not as many expletives."
"They have producers to make it more high drama. We just have I and T managers..."
"Oh, the I&T managers make it high drama"
"You forgot about the cake. Or, knowing there's cake but having to be on console and getting last picks from the seagulls who come to watch"

Definitely a couple of inside baseball jokes there, but also what it's really like. For the record, on the cake, if the launch scrubs, they put it in the freezer for the next attempt. This lead to what is now known where I work as "cakegate" and many "the cake is a lie" jokes. 
    
Lauren:  James Cameron is apparently working on a "History of Science Fiction" series for AMC.
    
BARE YOUR SWORD
    
Hey guys,

I was listening to your latest on the Three Body Problem - episode 277 - and thought you might be interested in a recent interview with Ken Liu on Chinese sci-fi. Check out the January 13 episode of the Sinica podcast, a podcast which primarily discusses topics related to contemporary China, but this time overlaps with the January read on S & L. Link here: Sinica Podcast: Ken Liu on Chinese science fiction
https://overcast.fm/+GuZKG8KEI

Regards,

David

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If the phrase "her eyes were bigger than her stomach" equates to getting too much food and not being able to eat it all, then in my case, "my eyes were bigger than my...mind?" I did not make it through the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy during my holiday break - I only made it through The Dark Forest and am now reading the third book, Death's End. Really liking the series! And I couldn't get into Stiletto, so I haven't picked that one back up yet.

Robyn

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When/How did you find Sword & Laser?
    
BOOK OF THE MONTH DISCUSSION    
    
January Pick: Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu

ADDENDUMS

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