Nonfiction
Linguistic Expectations
Languages simply differ from one another, in ways both great and small. If you’re a linguist, it’s part of what attracts you to the field. And if you’re not…it can be confusing.
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Nonfiction
Author Spotlight
Author Spotlight: Ursula K. Le Guin
Some of the more intelligent speculations about their silence are in the story, shortly before the Sayings of the Elder: that they don’t speak because they are listening; because they are hiding something.
Nonfiction
Five Upcoming Plagues (We’re Doomed)
Of course, now we’re living in an era of face transplants, flu vaccines, and bionic lungs, and can develop a cure for bird flu practically in real time; so…we’re in the clear, right?
Author Spotlight
Author Spotlight: David Tallerman
This society has eradicated illness, and most people, of course, see that as a good thing. But the more you fix things, the more you have to watch to make sure they don’t start falling apart again.
Nonfiction
Interview: Greg Bear
Hugo and Nebula Award winning author, Greg Bear, has authored over forty books, including Quantico, Darwin’s Children, and The Forge of God. His latest novel is Hull Zero Three, and Halo: Cryptum is due out in January.
Author Spotlight
Author Spotlight: Kristine Kathryn Rusch
I became a history major just after Vietnam to understand why humans went to war in the first place. I never really did figure that out, but it led to a lifelong obsession.
Nonfiction
Black Holes: Starving and Misunderstood
The Earth’s pull—even a pea-sized Earth’s pull—on the moon only depends on mass. In making the Earth into a black hole, all we changed was the radius. The Moon never has, and never will, care about the Earth’s size.
Author Spotlight
Author Spotlight: Ted Kosmatka
Where is the sacrifice in a martyr who believes he’ll live eternally in paradise? I was trying to think about the idea of true martyrdom—the sacrifice of not just your life, but of the hope for an afterlife.
Editorial
Editorial, December 2010
Welcome to issue seven of Lightspeed! On tap this month… Fiction: “In-fall,” by Ted Kosmatka, “The Observer,” by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, “Jenny’s Sick” by David Tallerman, “The Silence of the Asonu” by Ursula K. Le Guin. Nonfiction: “Black Holes: Starving and Misunderstood,” by Dr. Pamela Gay, “Feature Interview: Greg Bear” by John Joseph Adams and David Barr Kirtley, “Five Upcoming Plagues (We’re Doomed),” by Genevieve Valentine, “Linguistic Expectations,” by Lawrence M. Schoen.
Artist Showcase
Artist Spotlight: John Picacio
I’ve always favored art that was evocative rather than literal. I think my art is a balance between the two, and that balance shifts depending on the nature of the assignment.
