Another very brief post, but some odd and welcome flowers of end 2010/start 2011:

Michael Moorcock has written a Dr Who novel. Not only that but the jacket text of The Coming of the Terraphiles suggests that it involves both LRP(/re-enactment) and the Eternal Champion (Arrow of Law, a certain Captain Cornelius…). Haven't read it yet but the simple combination is surely pushing for weirdest & neatest juxtaposition ever.

Primeval series 4 debut'd a few days ago (presumably still watchable on whatever ITV has instead of the BBC iplayer). Given that, last I heard, they'd cancelled the thing entirely, this caught me utterly by surprise. Whether it's good news depends on your feelings about the show, but I confess to a strong fondness for it in those moments when it remembers its palaeontology and physics and, you know, stuff. I was particularly keen on the 3rd series, where they seemed to draw together the strong story-driven approach of 2 with the logical consistency of 1 (1) for the best of both worlds. And giant insects, but that couldn't possibly influence my reaction to it. Difficult to know where series 4 is taking us, but I'm more than happy to give it time to get there.

On a personal note, Barnes and Noble, noted US book chain, popped Empire in Black and Gold in at number 10 on its best fantasy and SF of 2010 (from context, as a marker for the series as a whole) which is very nice indeed.

I've also been informed that rights for the the Polish and Czech translations of the series have been bought up to book 6 (Sea Watch), which book is of course due out here in the UK next month.

(1) The first series was very good, and gave more of a nod to actual science than one might expect. The second series rather disregarded both the historical and the possible (a whip scorpion the size of a buick and the shape of a frisbee cannot burrow faster than a running man, sorry. Even if the (modern-looking) thing had existed back then, the simple physics of moving a non-streamlined object through a dense medium conspires against you). Also the second series suffered from sub-par villain mentality. If you have access to that futuristic technology there are perfectly legitimate ways to get very very rich indeed from it, and using it at great expense  to control monsters is a plan that even Bond villains, or indeed Wiley Coyote, would reject. The third series, although plagued by changes of cast, had a good plot and reasonable science.