Angry Robot Books » scifi

BYOR (Bring your own robot)

Lee — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 23:01:14 +0000

You know, for a science fiction convention, there has been a distinct lack of robots at WorldCon. Good job, then, that we decided to bring our own.

Angstrom the Angry Robot has had his anger chip removed, though as part of a mad experiment, and we have installed a gigolo chip installed, instead. This is him chatting with author Lauren Beukes at the tremendous Angry Robot party at WorldCon in Montreal last night.

Lauren left the party early, and coincidentally, Angstrom left a discreet 10 minutes later. No insinuations – just sayin’…

We had enormous fun at the party with the robot, and you’ll see a few more clips over the coming weeks. Immense thanks to Steve, who chauffered the robot from his cyber-lair in Toronto, and did a fantastic job helping to keep our guests entertained. Head over to Steve and the robot’s home (they’re just good friends) over at Robot Promotions.

Beware – the future predicted is almost here!

Lee — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 19:00:00 +0000

That’s Toby on the left of the group shot on the cover of Moxyland. He’s a roguish slacker, living off his mother, while streamcasting his daily blog direct from his jacket, made from smartfabric. His jacket is the camera, and it is always on and broadcasting. What a twat.

A great idea? Definitely. Science fiction? Oh, yes. Impossible? Well, not so much… (and very soon not so sci-fi, which is kind of the point of the book).

MIT researchers developed light-detecting fibers that could eventually be woven into a “fabric camera.” Instead of counting on a single lens, the new system would use a web of the fibers as a distributed imaging surface. Imagine a shirt where the entire back is a “camera.”

This isn’t just similar to Toby’s coat, this is Toby’s coat!

Head on over to boingboing for more details. Well, when we link, we like to link to the best!

Also Moxy-related, there’s a great review of the book over at Stomping on Yeti (They don’t deserve it but that doesn’t make it any less fun).

Moxyland truly is a Jackson Pollack of ideas, rather than of color. The ideas are everywhere; more often than not intermingling in unpredictable but interesting ways. Cell phones for example, become more than communication devices, becoming wallets, game devices, security keys, and even behavior modifiers… Make no mistake; Moxyland is a work of art.

4.5 out of 5

Her antennae had the cutest curl

Lee — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:05:28 +0000

Hokus Bloke (aka Neil Gardner, the owner of the UK’s longest-established independent radio company, Ladbroke Productions) is an interesting character. On his personal blog he produces a new poem on a daily basis.

Yesterday, in honour of the Angry Robot launch he gave us “Robot Love” (without, thankfully, any lurid descriptions of hydraulic pump-action appendages).

Meanwhile, talking of appendages, Angry Robot head honco (what is a “honcho”, exactly?) Marc G popped up on Suite 101 talking more street jive about the hottest imprint alive. Oh yes.

A week in the life of an Angry Robot

Lee — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:32:40 +0000

SciFi Now Magazine – one of the UK’s premier genre titles (also available worldwide) asked me what it is I actually do in the Angry Robot office.

I’m not sure if they were genuinely curious, or if they doubted I did anything other than sip exotic cocktails all day while listening to live jazz played by a quartet of meerkats that live in the corner of the room.

(For the record, that isn’t true – it only happens on Tuesdays).

If - like the charming editors at this august periodical - you have any interest in the working week of an Angry Robot Assistant Editor, pick up a copy of SciFi Now at your local newsagent. It doesn’t have any Angry Robot reviews this month, but we still like it.