[Link] Ray Bradbury’s favourite books of all time

by Rachael Pimblett

In Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury writes about a future where books are banned and burned, and a darkness rules over everything, noting, “There must be something in books, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing.”

Before the author passed away in 2012 at the age of 91, he left behind a list of his favourite books of all time, which is a culmination of sorts because Bradbury began writing stories as a child, in reaction to the Great Depression, and at the age of 18, he was already publishing short stories in fan zines, which were enshrined in a slippery sci-fi sensibility.

While Shakespeare’s Hamlet lauds “Words, words, words”, both in and out of his madness, we might picture Bradbury meandering through the great hall of life, smiling, sighing, ‘Books, books, books’. The first of his very favourite works was The God of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs; forget the book, for he deemed Burroughs’ entire oeuvre “the most influential” of any “writer in the entire history of the world”.

Bradbury has similar tastes to the likes of Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Nelson Mandela, who have all recommended The Grapes of Wrath. Though we deem it today as one of the great American novels, Bradbury thinks differently: “every other character is a description, a metaphor, prose poetry, it’s not plot…”

Ernest Hemingway is known for a sharp writing style, depicting his adventurous life with a fruitful sourness; however, less than a decade before the end of his life, he penned the beautiful novella, The Old Man and the Sea, which follows an ageing Cuban fisherman in a solitary struggle to catch a giant fish in the Gulf Stream.

Bradbury and his friends read the mature work the very day it was published in Time Magazine, reminiscing, “We carried them off to a bar that was still open, and we sat and read The Old Man and the Sea, and we talked about Papa and how much we loved him."

Read the full article: https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/ray-bradbury-favourite-books-of-all-time/

AIRSHIP 27 PRODUCTION PROUDLY PRESENTS JEZEBEL JOHNSTON VOL. 10—NO QUARTER

Airship 27 is excited to offer the tenth chapter in the Jezebel Johnston Pirate Queen saga that has become one of the most popular New Pulp series in print today. Having won her own ship and crew, Captain Jezebel Johnston returns to her home island of Tortuga to find her friend, the Lady Antonia and her mother, Mosifa, in need of help to survive. Antonia’s husband, a landed businessman, has died, and to maintain his trading goods operations, she must procure new goods. Which is where Jezebel sees an opportunity for her pirate crew. By raiding the fat Spanish galleons, they can keep Lady Antonia’s shop supplied indefinitely. It is a simple plan, but one that will ultimately test her new crew in the ways of piracy.

 Meanwhile, in another part of the lower Caribbean, her old ally, Walter Armitage, has made a deal with the very devil himself, Captain Henry Morgan. In return, he will be given his own ship and command. But to do so means betraying Jez and leaving her and the Revelation to hunt alone. Once again, writer Nancy Hansen delivers a fast-paced, suspenseful chapter in the life of the daring queen of the high seas, Captain Jezebel Johnston. This is the adventure loyal readers have long been waiting for, and it does not disappoint.

 Award Winning Airship 27 Art Director Rob Davis provides the interior illustrations, while Michael Youngblood the gorgeous color cover.

 AIRSHIP 27 PRODUCTION – NEW PULP FOR A NEW GENERATION!

 Available now at Amazon in paperback and soon on Kindle.

Currently in Progress -- My Barbaric Yawp!

In this follow-up to Giddy and Euphoric: Essays on Reading, Writing, and Ray Bradbury, Sean Taylor continues his fascination with the nuts and bolts of the writer's life. 

Essays include:

1. Introduction by October Santerelli
2. The Sweaty-Toothed Madman: Reading Is Becoming; Writing Is Telling Who We Are
3. The Great White Savior (Or Why It's Way Past Time To Retire Tarzan, Sheena, and The Last Samurai)
4. Visceral Writing + Nostalgia = Effective Writing Every Time
5. Envy and Imitation
6. Help! I'm Stumped and I Don't Know What To Write!
7. 15 Action/Adventure Tropes That Need To Die a Painful Death
8. This Week's Theme Is, Well, Theme
9. Bono and Flannery: Harder to Believe Than Go Crazy Tonight
10. What I Learned from Dead People (Mostly)
11. Do, Do, Do, Da, Da, Da: The Day The Police Taught Me About Character Dialog
12. The Centre Is Not Central—Normal Heroes Among Dragons
13. The Description Toolbox: 3 Tools Every Writer Needs
14. Close to the Vest—Embracing the Mystery in Your Fiction
15. Writing for Comics—A Basic Primer for Newbs
16. O' Captain, My Captain: Taming the Writers' Group Monsters
17. 35 Books (Almost) Everybody Should Read
18. My Backstory Story
19. The ABC (Plots) of Ongoing Storytelling
20. Wrote Rage
21. Hard to Market, But It's Okay
22. Paying Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain, or Ruining the Magic Trick for All the Right Reasons
23. Tightening the Tension
24. Creating Religion in Your Stories
25. Geek Culture: Leading the Way AND Pulling Us Back?!
26. The Editing Onion
27. My Diversity Soapbox (Or Don't You Throw That "Woke" Shade at Me)
28. It’s the End of the Literary World As We Know It (But Don’t Be Afraid—It’s a Good Thing)