Round Up Q3 2023

As we enter the last quarter of 2023, we are 100 days short of the tenth anniversary of daily posts to this humble blog!

I am going to try to keep posting all the way to the ten year mark.  Don’t pop the corks yet, but I think we can make it.

I have no idea what happens after that.

More Of The Same

This quarter saw more of the same.  Daily posts on technology and science and cryptocurrency. Robots, dinosaurs, and the cryosphere. Etc.

This quarter featured a number of posts about ChatGPT and friends. AI chat bot technology has replaced Bitcoin as the flavor of the month / enemy of all humankind.

In short, these chat bots are primo blog fodder!

Names for Bands

As always, I honor Sensei Dave Barry by offering ideas for names of bands.  My own suggestions are taken from real, I’m not making them up, technical articles.

This quarter’s entries include:

McDonald Ice Rumples (or just Ice Rumples)
Reduction of Buttressing
Grounding Line
Tensegrity Wheels  (…a great name for a band…or a motorcycle club…or a dance craze.)
Cryptic incubators
Abyssal hydrothermal springs
Brood success
Subglacial Sediment
Interglacial Exposure
Deglaciation
Summer Insolation
Camouflaging Cuttlefish

Weekly Book Reviews

As always, I review books I have recently read.  This quarter featured 12 fiction and 3 non-fiction works.

Non-Fiction

Fossil Legends of the First Americans by Adrienne Mayor
The Peking Express by James M. Zimmerman
Fancy Bear Goes Phishing by Scott J. Shapiro

Fiction

Ex-Wife by Ursula Parrot
The Stolen Coast by Dwyer Murphy
Girlfriend on Mars by Deborah Willis
The Book of Eve by Carmen Boullosa
The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl by Theodora Goss
Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Ink, Blood, Sister, Scribe by Emma Tõrzs
Viviana Valentine Goes Up The River by Emily J. Edwards
The Road To Roswell by Connie Willis
Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway
Titanium Noir by Nick Harkaway
Starter Villain by John Scalzi

Book Review: “Silver Nitrate” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Moreno-Garcia writes beautiful stories, lush fantasy, ghost stories, and Mexico City Noir.   Silver Nitrate hits all these themes, as well as SMG’s passion for twentieth century Mexican pop culture.  Silver nitrate is, of course, the ingredient of pre-war film, which figures both symbolically and literally in this story.

I’m not a giant fan of supernatural stuff, and I know pretty much zilch about Mexico City of any period.  But SMG is so good, I read right along, wanting more.

The protagonists are unglamourous, no longer young, and not especially successful.  Childhood friends Monserrat (AKA, Momo) and Tristán are hanging onto the edges of the Mexico City film scene.  Tristán and Momo have been friends forever, but never lovers.  (You know that’s gotta change, right? : – ) )

Monserrat’s perpetual freelance gig is crashing.  Tristán’s film career is now reduced to a few voice overs.  Troubled and going nowhere, what will happen to them?

Tristán moves to a new apartment, and discovers he is neighbors with an old man who used to make movies.  Momo has heard of him, and becomes interested in his famous last movie which was never released and is said to have cursed all the participants.

The old guy tells them he can lift the curse and bring all of them good fortune.  They will need to finish the key scene by dubbing in the dialog on a snippet of film (if the silver nitrate print has survived in his freezer).

The segment portrays a magic ritual, and the old filmstock is silver nitrate, for magical oomph.  Adding the voices and some special runes in the credits will supposedly make the film capable of sucking the power from the audience.

Tristán and Momo complete the dubbing, though they don’t really know what this will do.  At first, a series of fortunate events gives them hope that their luck has changed for the better.  But they have stirred up a bunch of magical forces; as multiple sorcerers and their minions want the film for their own agendas.  Ghosts take an interest, too. 

It becomes apparent that the crazy director didn’t exactly die all those years ago, at least not permanently.  And he wants to come back to life. Uh, oh!

Its all very complicated and full of loony occult nonsense, nasty people, and, what appears to be very real and very dangerous magic.

What have they got themselves into?  Can these two survive and maybe get back to a simple life?

---

1. Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Silver Nitrate, New York, Del Ray, 2023.

Sunday Book Reviews