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Published in Britain as a major historical novel, a best-seller in Spanish translation, MEXICA is the amazing full true story of Hernando Cortes’ conquest of Mexico, told in depth as only a novel could tell it--from both the Spanish and Aztec points of view, by Cortes, by Montezuma and by the only character in the novel who is not a real historical character, Alvaro de Sevilla, a secret Jew who presents yet a third and passionately neutral point of view.A novel that restored their own true name, Mexica, to the so-called “Aztecs” (an insult meaning “barbarians from nowhere” in Nahuatl) in Mexico.

Unable to find a conventional American publisher on the grounds that Americans would not be interested in a historical novel about Mexico, and this in a country with 40 or 50 million Mexican-Americans fluent in English, this ebook is the very first American edition. ... Read more

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First U.S. edition of important historical novel by noted author
MEXICA by Norman Spinrad is the first publication of a major novel as an ebook American first edition.Published in Britain as a major historical novel, a best-seller in Spanish translation, MEXICA is the amazing full true story of Hernando Cortes' conquest of Mexico, told in depth as only a novel could tell it--from both the Spanish and Aztec points of view, by Cortes, by Montezuma and by the only character in the novel who is not a real historical character, Alvaro de Sevilla, a secret Jew who presents yet a third and passionately neutral point of view.

Launched in Mexico with personal appearances, magazine, radio, and television appearances by the author and widely reviewed favorably on a literary level, MEXICA has also been appreciated there as performing a valuable cultural and political service to the Mexican people, and particularly the majority with at least partial descent from the so-called "Aztecs."

For "Aztecs" is really an insult in Nahuatl, the dominant language of the tribes of the empire of Mexico, roughly meaning "barbarians from nowhere, from the boondocks," and "Mexica"was their own true name for themselves, now being restored in modern Mexico thanks at least in part to this novel.

Nevertheless, MEXICA was unable to find a conventional American publisher on the grounds that Americans would not be interested in a historical novel about Mexico, and this in a country with 40 or 50 million Mexican-Americans fluent in English, this ebook is the first American edition.

Norman Spinrad is the author of over twenty novels, including BUG JACK
BARRON, THE IRON DREAM, CHILD OF FORTUNE, PICTURES AT 11, GREENHOUSE SUMMER, and THE DRUID KING.

He has also published something like 60 short stories collected in half a
dozen volumes. The novels and stories have been published in about 15 languages.

His most recent novel length American publication was HE WALKED
AMONG US, published in April 2010 by Tor.

He's written teleplays, including the classic Star Trek, "The Doomsday Machine," and two produced feature films DRUIDS and LA SIRENE ROUGE. He is a long time literary critic, sometime film critic, perpetual political analyst, and sometime songwriter.

He's also briefly been a radio phone show host, has appeared as a vocal artist
on three albums, and occasionally performs live. He's been a literary agent, and President of the Science Fiction Writers of America and World SF. He's posted 25 YouTube videos to date.

He grew up in New York, has lived in Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, and Paris, and traveled widely in Europe less so in Asia, and Oceania. And of course in Mexico.

This book deserves to be a bestseller.
... Read more

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2020 Hindsight
In his preface to "2020 Vision", Jerry Pournelle explains the driving force behind this collection of short stories.He wanted a focus on realism.It was 1970; he asked the authors to envision life in 2020 as it might actually happen, without invading aliens, parallel universes, or other such far out contrivances.Of course, by doing so he might seem to clamp down on the greatest potential of science fiction, originality.But a sufficiently skilled author should be able to bend reality and our heads while staying with the bounds of the possible.Most of these don't, however.

Without any doubt, the top story here is Dian Girad's "Eat, Drink, and be Merry".By 2020 we've grown so health conscious that dieting and exercise routines are enforced by law, and computers monitor the citizens nonstop for signs of unhealthiness.Against this tyranny, one woman wages a humorous battle and achieves a small victory.(Just please ignore Pournelle's hilariously sexist introduction.) The other flagship story in this collection is Norman Spinrad's "A Thing of Beauty", a melancholy look at a future where Japanese industrial giants dominate the world and loot the national treasures of other cultures, even America.

Dragging down the collection are the contributions of Harlan Ellison and Poul Anderson, boring Orwell ripoffs with nothing new to say.Dave McDaniel's "Prognosis: Terminal" doesn't seem to have much to say either.Ben Bova's "Build me a Mountain", a tale about the politics of space exploration, was at elast prophetic in predicting the collapse of support for exploring the planets, though it lacks excitement.Rounding out the collection is Larry Niven's mediocre speculation on anarchy, "Cloak of anarchy", and A.E. Van Vogt's "Future Perfect", where new technology allows the world government to police male sexuality.He doesn't quite have the guts to push the idea as far as it should go, however. ... Read more

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A experiment in writing a very different kind of autobiography, nothing like it every done before, as far as I know, in terms of form and style.

My (mostly creative)life from school through 2005--literary, musical, political--9/11 close-up, travels and adventures in Europe and Mexico, how I became a writer, etc. etc. ... Read more

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Chapters: Marvin Minsky, Robert Moog, Gregory Chaitin, Dava Sobel, Bobby Darin, Norman Spinrad, Barry Wellman, Samuel R. Delany, Stokely Carmichael, Neil Degrasse Tyson, Harold Brown, Alan Grayson, Jon Cryer, Daniel Libeskind, Steven Weinberg, Majora Carter, Jon Favreau, E. L. Doctorow, Gary Weiss, William Safire, Kevin Phillips, Ronald Lauder, Leslie Lamport, Donald L. Ritter, John Liu, Jeremy Stone, Leonard Kleinrock, Steve Lappas, Nita Lowey, Martin Peretz, Michael Kay, Sheldon Lee Glashow, Todd Gitlin, Bill Lann Lee, Wolf Wigo, Roy J. Glauber, George Yancopoulos, Steve Karmen, Michael I. Sovern, Marilyn Hacker, Jay Pasachoff, Leon Cooper, Gerald Jay Goldberg, Terence Tolbert, Ben Shneiderman, Martin Hellman, John T. Georgopoulos, Henry Stern, Richard Price, Joseph Capecci, Matthew J. Bruccoli, Hugh David Politzer, Frank Rosenblatt, Ira Black, Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy, Jonah Falcon, Russell Alan Hulse, Barry Mazur, Paul Provenza, Richard Danzig, Donald Marron, Bruce Ames, Joseph Lelyveld, Dash Mihok, Christopher "Kid" Reid, Lars-Erik Nelson, Harold O. Levy, Harrison J. Goldin, Anthony Marx, Dora Irizarry, Daphne Maxwell Reid, Nikita Mikros, Clyde Haberman, Carl Bialik, William Taubman, Eliot Wald, Howard Jonas, Joel Sherman, Robert Price, Jerald G. Fishman. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 390. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Bobby Darin (born Walden Robert Perciville Cassotto, May 14, 1936 December 20, 1973) was a two-time grammy award winning American singer, Oscar nominated actor and accomplished musician. Darin performed widely in a range of music genres, including pop, rock, jazz, folk and country. Although unknown to his public, his health was dangerously fragile and strongly motivated him to succeed within the limited lifetime he feared he would, and ultimately did, ha...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=100161 ... Read more

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Thought-provoking book on the original Star Trek
I'm amazed that there are not more reviews of this terrific book about the original "Star Trek" TV series. Does that mean that not many people are reading BOARDING THE ENTERPRISE? Fans should definitely read this book, because it's a great anthology of perspectives about the show, mostly positive, but since it's "completely unauthorized," some negative views as well. Most of the authors are, like me, clearly fans of the original "Star Trek" and have been much influenced by it, but are willing to admit that it had its shortcomings too. These essays are very wide-ranging, from D.C. Fontana's "I Remember Star Trek" that is largely behind-the-scenes anecdotes about the show, to "What Have You Done With Spock's Brain?" by Don DeBrandt about Vulcan society and identity, to "Who Killed the Space Race?" by Adam Roberts that looks at the relationship between science fiction and real space travel, to "The Prime Question" by Eric Greene that ponders meanings behind various episodes and aspects of "Star Trek," and so on through 15 usually fascinating essays.

Greene's "The Prime Question" was helpful to me in pointing out that the show's inconsistences in applying the Prime Directive (which advocated non-interference with alien societies) reflected a difference of opinion between two of the show's producers, Gene Roddenberry and Gene L. Coon, and those inconsistencies actually provide an interesting debate on the pros and cons of interference. Another of my favorite essays was "Star Trek in the Real World" by Norman Spinrad, in which the famous sci-fi author argues that the alien Mr. Spock was important to our society in promoting the acceptance of other ideas and cultures. Another well-known sci-fi writer and media professor, Paul Levinson, points out in "How Star Trek Liberated Television" that the show's success in syndication was the first salvo in the struggle to liberate us from the dominance of the big three TV networks: ABC, CBS, and NBC. Some essays I found less enlightening, but one must remember that from infinite diversity comes infinite combinations! Notice too that this is NOT a book intended to provide a huge amount of detail about the original Trek, but rather is perspectives about the meanings and impact of the show. I have read a substantial amount about "Star Trek," especially the original series, and BOARDING THE ENTERPRISE is the most interesting book of perspectives about the show that I have read.

Boarding the Enterprise
I enjoy this book because its like a bible of the 'inside information' on the specs and technical info about the Enterprise and the Federation. I enjoy writing fan-fiction, so this is a treasure chest of info. ... Read more

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Johnson's hands were clammy with fear. High above the Martian crowd the sun shone weakly through the Permaglaze dome while the flag of the Great Tyranny fluttered in the artificial breeze. There was a blare of recorded trumpets and the Hegemonic Councilor-absolute ruler of nine pianets-walked to the podium behind a screen of guards. Johnson edged closer, ready to kill- and to die. Out of assassination and social chaos freedom might grow. He drew the lasegun and pressed the button-trigger. A terrific beam of coherent light flashed from the barrel as the tiny electrocrystal in the chamber gave up its stored energy and crumbled to dust... ... Read more

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Word count: 4462. ... Read more

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a fantastic and unique compilation
Great collection of scifi stories with comedic twists.Loved it.Id even re-buy it for my kindle if they had it available.

One of my all-time favorite collections.

-d ... Read more

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Two printings through 1973. Introduction by Norman Spinrad; The Pleasure Garden of Felipe Sagittarius (1965) by Michael Moorcock; Driftglass (1967) by Samuel R. Delany; Sending the Very Best (1970) by Edward Bryant; Going Down Smooth (1968) by Robert Silverberg; The Garden of Delights (1969) novelette by Langdon Jones; Surface If You Can (1969) by Terry Champagne; Masks (1968) by Damon Knight; Pennies, Off a Dead Man's Eyes (1969) by Harlan Ellison; 198-, a Tale of "Tomorrow" (1970) by John Sladek; Flight Useless, Inexorable the Pursuit (1968) by Thomas M. Disch; The Last Hurrah of the Golden Horde [Jerry Cornelius] (1969) by Norman Spinrad; Down the Up Escalation (1967) by Brian W. Aldiss; Circularization of Condensed Conventional Straight-Line Word-Image Structures (1969) by Michael Butterworth; The Definition (1968) by Bob Marsden; The Jungle Rot Kid on the Nod (1968) by Philip José Farmer. ... Read more