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February 18, 2023
Coffee for foxes
Hello again, Reader. Or welcome, if you're new!
Spring is coming up on the hill. The snowdrops are starting to poke through, green buds are sprouting on the trees, and the local wildlife is getting... let's say 'excited'. I hope the wood pigeon who's taken up position outside the bedroom window finds someone soon, because he's making a hell of a racket. Every morning he's out there doing his calls, so you can't fault his enthusiasm. Less welcome are the scam artists. They're not outside the window, luckily, but they are all over the internet. One of their latest tricks is to impersonate authors and tell you that you've won something... Which is lovely, but then they ask for all your personal details so you can receive your prize. Now I did a giveaway a little while ago, and contacted people directly via email. The giveaway was linked to my website, and all I asked for from the winners was a postal address - which I needed to send the physical books. If anyone asks you for bank or paypal details, do not give them anything. While I think I'm still low-profile enough to avoid being targeted by scammers, author Ilona Andrews was unfortunate enough to be impersonated recently. She wrote a great article about it on her blog. ilona-andrews.com (Thanks, Sam, for letting me know about this.) On a lighter note, NASA has some great posters available for would-be Mars explorers! They're super-high resolution and completely free to download and print. I'm particularly fond of the 'Some User Assembly Required' one.
Space News
Enormous Polar Vortex on the Sun Is Unprecedented Scientists Say
I'm sure you're familiar with the idea of solar flares, those huge jets of gas from the surface of the sun, and coronal mass ejections that fling parts of the sun off into space. If they reach Earth we get wonderful displays of the aurora, and they can interrupt communications too. But this is new: one of those flares snapped off, and rather than hurtling out into the void, it circled around the Sun's north pole for hours! At speeds of almost a hundred kilometers every second, that's one heck of a vortex.
This sort of thing must have happened before, but it's the first time we've seen it. We have more satellites and observatories watching the sun than ever, and it's wonderful to see that there's still so much we have yet to learn about our nearest star.
You can follow along on Twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/SolarPolarVortex
Source: livescience.com
Other Books To Check Out
I've gathered a few great books from independent authors like me, I hope you'll check them out.
And let me know if you have any books to recommend! I'm particularly interested in indie authors, but anything you've read and loved would be awesome.
Buy it now
When Private Malcolm Dow went to clean up a crashed weather balloon, he came face-to-face with an alien instead.
Being an alien of sorts in his own otherwise all-white regiment, Malcolm instantly took on the Alien's plight - military help for his besieged planet, Zalma.
And it's not just Zalma; Earth will be next. But to do so, he must first overcome the obstacles he's faced since childhood and find a voice for himself. The trouble is, he's not the only one who knows they're here.
Surviving Chaos
Free
When ordinary life transforms into a fight for survival, can a young woman keep the chaos from pulling her under?
Go-getting twenty-six-year-old investigative journalist Cassandra Drews just wants her miserable day to end. And desperate to put her breakup behind her, she agrees to one last face-to-face to return belongings to her ex. But when they're nearly killed by an out-of-control car, she's horrified when the nightmare of her relationship takes a backseat to an eruption of violence.
In the blink of an eye, an EMP attack wipes out the nation's power and the world grinds to a stop. Surrounded by chaos, Cass is torn between tending to the injured or escaping her seething ex.
It doesn't take long before panic and violence erupt on the streets of Portland. Out of options, Cass has no choice but to race home, hoping to outrun a looming ice storm. Can she make it to safety before experiencing the wrath of the bitter winter storm? Or will she find herself the victim of far more than the elements in a town thrust into bedlam?
The Obstructed Engine
Free
A Madam, a Tinker, and a Resurrected Cat
This prequel short story to "The Adventures of Bodacious Creed" reveals how Anna Lynn Boyd, young brothel madam and secret inventor, resurrected her pet cat, met her partner Jonny, and how Jonny became mute. There's science, adventure, heartbreak, and love in this tale that won an honorable mention in the Writers of the Future Contest.
Discover Sci-Fi Giveaway!
From now until the middle of March, there's a collection of dozens of free Sci-Fi books available. Grab them now, and you can of course keep them long after the promotion is over.
Perhaps you'll find a new favourite author? There's certainly some very intriguing titles on offer...
Pick up a couple today, and then drop the author a line, telling them what you think! Believe me, it really makes a writer's day when they get an email like that.
Strange News
Did you know that ice can sing?
Once I encountered a frozen lake, and decided to skip a stone across it. Obviously it would be the easiest way to break my fairly poor record, so I selected a nice, flat rock and sent it on its way.
I did not expect the lake to respond with a bizarre, echoing sound that could have worked as a sound effect for a sci-fi blaster!
It turns out that the sounds of the ice can be even stranger, without being disturbed. Swedish YouTuber Jonna Jinton explores the curious sounds of signing ice (and does some wonderful cinematography into the bargain).
If you just can't get enough, she has a ten hour recording of the sounds too!
Source: youtube.com
Miscellany
'The Backrooms' in development at A24
I mentioned 'The Backrooms' a few newsletters back, and it turns out there's a movie being made, based on the remarkable short videos made by the seventeen-year-old Kane Parsons. A24 are the movie studio behind some amazing movies, not least Everything Everywhere All at Once
Source: deadline.com
More and more UFOs identified?
You've no doubt heard of the recent 'surge' in surveillance balloons over the US and Canada. This article makes a very convincing case that a lot of this sort of thing has been overlooked for years, due to the stigma around UFO belief. Reports get buried, and there's a good chance that the military are behind the times as a result.
Source: thedrive.com
Cracking Mary Queen Of Scots' codes
Mary, while imprisoned in the Tower of London by Elizabeth I, wrote a lot of letters to her allies and supporters. Naturally she couldn't use plain language, so she wrote in code. Unbreakable at the time (as far as historians can tell) they're simple enough that modern computing can decipher them fairly readily... assuming you can make a sensible guess as to which language she wrote in!
Source: theregister.com
And Finally
One of the perks of living on a hill is the view, of course. And one of the downsides is that low cloud is quite common at this time of year, limiting the view to the end of your own garden (or sometimes a couple of feet at most!) But when the clouds settle in the valley, it's beautiful. It happened again the other morning, and so here is the weather phenomenon that the Germans call 'Foxes cooking coffee', die Fchse kochen Kaffee:
Believe it or not, there's a whole town down in there...
