The human colony on the planet Argo has long explored and exploited the technology left behind by an extinct alien race. But then an archaeology team accidentally activates a terrible weapon...
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"Seldom does a storytelling talent come along as potent and fully mature as Mike Brotherton. His complex characters take you on a voyage that is both fiercely credible and astonishingly imaginative. This is Science Fiction."
-- David Brin
"Star Dragon is terrific fare, offering readers a fusion of hard science and grand adventure."
-- Locus Magazine
"Star Dragon is steeped in cosmology, the physics of interstellar travel, exobiology, artificial intelligence, bioscience. Brotherton, author of many scientific articles in refereed journals, has written a dramatic, provocative, utterly convincing hard science sf novel that includes an ironic twist that fans will love."
-- Booklist starred review
"Readers hungry for the thought-provoking extrapolation and rigorous technical detail of old-fashioned hard SF are sure to enjoy astronomer Brotherton's first novel."
-- Publishers Weekly
"Mike Brotherton, himself a trained astrophysicist, combines the technical acuity and ingenuity of Robert Forward with the ironic, postmodern stance and style of M. John Harrison. In this, his debut novel, those twin talents unite to produce a work that is involving on any number of levels. It's just about all you could ask for in a hardcore SF adventure."
-- Paul di Fillippo, SCI-FI.COM
Vylar Kaftan is a talented writer who attended Launch Pad in its first year, 2007. She published a story in the Australian magazine Cosmos, which was in part inspired by the experience. “Pointing at the Moon” is now available for free online. Enjoy!
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »>When I travel and meet a lot of new people, they often ask what I do. When I tell them that I’m an astronomer, and they don’t immediately mumble something about liking astrology or make some other outrageous statement as sometimes happens, they’ll often follow up and ask what, specifically, is my specialty. “Quasars,” I […]
Posted in Uncategorized | 4 Comments »>This is pretty damn cool:
Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »>OK, maybe, maybe not, but Robert Lemos writing for wired.com, playing up the hyperbole, makes them sound like it with this pronouncement: Rocket Scientists Say We’ll Never Reach the Stars. Which I don’t think anyone quoted in the article ever quite says. Never say never, especially in cases of engineering. It isn’t impossible to reach […]
Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Comments »>One of the things I like doing as a writer is inventing something new in science fiction. It’s been said that there are no new stories to be told, and while that’s true at some level, every story is unique and there’s always the opportunity to bring something new to the table. I read sf […]
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »>I throw a lot of links at the writers attending the Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop for Writers. I usually do it on the fly before a lecture, or embedded within lecture slides. It made sense to pull them out and to put them in one place with a little organization. The idea is that these […]
Posted in Uncategorized | 10 Comments »>