BOOK REVIEW: Broken Angels by Richard Morgan

Richard Morgan's Takeshi Kovacs novels have a stellar reputation among hard core science fiction fans. I have previously enjoyed reading Morgan's first book in the series, the exciting Altered Carbon, which introduces the Takeshi Kovacs character to the world.

In the second book Broken Angels, Morgan puts Kovacs in another compelling and very dangerous situation, while still maintaining the character's unlikeability. The themes of the first book, explicit sexuality, corporate greed, capitalist malfeasance, dangerous technological advances, and dehumanizing violence, all return in even greater amounts in the sequel.

Altered Carbon made Richard Morgan seem like the second coming of Dashiell Hammett with Takeshi Kovacs a 24th century Sam Spade, like a cross between Blade Runner and The Maltese Falcon. I am chosing movies to relate Morgan's book to on purpose. Although Broken Angels is very different from Altered Carbon, it is also so vividly written that the story has substantial cinematic potential. It really seems like it is only a matter of when, not if, we will see major motion pictures based on the works of Richard K. Morgan.

The story this time begins with Kovacs as a mercenary fighting in a civil war on a planet called Sanction IV, as part of a unit called Carrera's Wedge which is helping a company called the Mandrake Corporation achieve its goals during a bloody, planet-wide, military conflict. One of the basic tenets of Broken Angels is that war is commerce conducted by other means (and vice versa!)

Kovacs leaves his unit when he meets Jan Schneider, who says he needs help for a scheme to smuggle an ancient Martian treasure off-world. In order to make their score they need to break out an archaeologist named Tanya Wardani, which Kovacs does and then enlists a mid-level executive named Matthias Hand at the Mandrake Corporation to finance the logistics of the retrieval operation, which of course have to occur dead smack in the middle of the war zone.

The story turns into a cross between Raiders of the Lost Ark and (the first exploration-heavy hour of) Alien. Again, as in the first book, the most important draw is Kovacs, with his near-superhuman reflexes and situational loyalty. Kovacs find and trains an elite team of experienced warriors to go on the expedition with him, but he's really the only one we care about is Kovacs. Kovacs protests (too much) that he only cares about his survival as well but his actions belie this expressed belief. Morgan's action scenes are another highlight of the book, especially when told from Kovacs perspective and internal monologue.

Broken Angels is a memorable entry into the genre of hard-core, hard-bitten military science fiction by another talented British writer. Fans of Peter F. Hamilton and Alastair Reynolds (which includes yours truly) will be thrilled to discover another author who possesses similar adeptness at creating rich, believable future worlds peopled with intelligent characters fighting battles against powerful (and sometimes alien) forces.

Title: Broken Angels.
Author: Richard K. Morgan
Length: 384 pages.
Publisher: Del Rey.
Published: March 2, 2004.

OVERALL GRADE: A (4.0/4.0).

PLOT: A+.
IMAGERY: A.
IMPACT: A-.
WRITING: A.

How Many LGBT Americans Are There? 9 Million!

The Williams Institute, a UCLA Law School-based academic think tank on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy, has issued a report entitled How Many Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered People Are There? written by Distinguished Scholar Gary Gates.

In the report, Dr. Gates analyzing multiple data sets and national and international surveys which include LGBT people to obtain an estimate of approximately 9 million LGBT Americans, roughly 3.8% of the general population, or the population of the state of New Jersey.

From the executive summary:

 An estimated 3.5% of adults in the United States identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual and an estimated 0.3% of adults are transgender.
 This implies that there are approximately 9 million LGBT Americans, a figure roughly equivalent to the population of New Jersey.
 Among adults who identify as LGB, bisexuals comprise a slight majority (1.8% compared to 1.7% who identify as lesbian or gay).
 Women are substantially more likely than men to identify as bisexual.  Bisexuals
comprise more than half of the lesbian and bisexual population among women in eight
of the nine surveys considered in the brief.  Conversely, gay men comprise substantially more than half of gay and bisexual men in seven of the nine surveys.
 Estimates of those who report any lifetime same-sex sexual behavior and any same-sex sexual attraction are substantially higher than estimates of those who identify as LGB. 
An estimated 19 million Americans (8.2%)  report that they have engaged in same-sex
sexual behavior and nearly 25.6 million Americans (11%) acknowledge at least some
same-sex sexual attraction.

This is a very important contribution to the debate about LGBT rights in this country. Interestingly, if one believes in an equivalent "one-drop rule" for sexual orientation, the canonical 10 percent rule looks to be about right!

Pictures from the 2011 NOGLSTP Awards

As I blogged about earlier, I was named the 2011 Educator of the Year by NOGLSTP (National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals) and flew to DC during the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAS) conference to accept the award this weekend. The other winners were Bill Hendrix, 2011 Scientist of the Year, and Bill Huffman, 2011 Engineer of the Year.

Well, here are some of the pictures from the event (I have no idea why the last one is rotated 90 degrees). Enjoy!

Mad Professah Named NOGLSTP's LGBT Educator of the Year

I wasn't sure if I should really blog about this but I decided that if I had found about it about someone else, I probably would have blogged about it, so here goes. Plus, I usually give some indication of my travel schedule (although not always why I am travelling) so I figured I would do so this time.

Mad Professah is in DC this weekend, to pick up the National Organization of Scientists and Technical Professionals' LGBT Education of he Year Award!

Two Occidental College professors have been recognized for their scholarly and teaching acumen by national academic and professional organizations. 

Associate mathematics professor Ron Buckmire has been chosen as the 2011 Educator of the Year by the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals, and psychology professor Nancy Dess has been elected a fellow of the Association for Psychological Science. 

Buckmire was chosen for his "outstanding achievements in mathematics and education on race and [gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender] issues," said John Burke, a member of the organization's board of directors. Buckmire's research areas include computational aerodynamics, numerical analysis, and applying mathematics to "real world" situations. He joined the Occidental faculty in 1996. 

The Oxy mathematics professor will be honored at a reception and dinner on February 20 during the annual conference in Washington of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which is affiliated with the gay and lesbian scientists and technical professionals group.

So, yeah that's why I'm in DC this President's Day weekend. (And blogging will be light)

If you have suggestions for people who should win the award next year, here are the criteria.