In the style of....

 A description of the first lunar landing, but in the style of J.R.R. Tolkien (via Google Gemini):

As the fourth age of Middle-Earth dawned, and the memory of ancient wars faded into legend, a new tale began to unfold, far above the shadowed peaks and sun-drenched plains of the world. From the Undying Lands of Men, from the bustling shores of the Great Western Sea where mighty engines of thought and craft were forged, an enterprise of unparalleled audacity was conceived.

A vessel, wrought of gleaming metals and intricate mechanisms, named Columbia by its creators – a name echoing the very spirit of exploration and discovery – set forth from the coastal lands, bearing within its heart three valiant sons of Men. Among them were Aldrin and Collins, skilled and resolute, but it was Armstrong, the quiet leader, whose destiny it was to be etched forever in the annals of time.

For three days and three nights, they journeyed through the vast, star-strewn Ilmen, the very space between worlds that had ever been the domain of the Valar and the Eldar. Their destination was no earthly shore, nor a hidden vale, but the very countenance of the Moon itself, that pale orb, distant and mysterious, which had for countless ages hung silent sentinel above Middle-earth.

As they drew nigh, two of the voyagers, Armstrong and Aldrin, descended into a smaller craft, fashioned for a singular purpose. This vessel, named Eagle, for its swiftness and keen sight, began its perilous descent towards the Moon's desolate bosom. Below them lay a land unlike any seen by mortal eyes: a vast, grey waste, pockmarked with craters like the scars of ancient battles, and strewn with dust as fine as the ash of forgotten fires. The silence that reigned there was profound, a silence older than the mountains of the Earth, broken only by the quiet hum of their own intricate machinery and the measured words of their communication with the distant Earth.

With a skill born of long training and an innate courage, Armstrong guided the Eagle through fields of treacherous boulders and over gaping chasms, seeking a level ground, a place where their bold quest might find its footing. The shadows were long and stark in that airless realm, and the light of the distant Sun beat down with an unearthly clarity. Then, with a gentle shudder, a faint tremor that ran through the very structure of their craft, the Eagle settled. "The Eagle has landed," came the voice, calm and clear, across the immeasurable distance, a declaration that echoed with the weight of ages.

Then, from the Eagle's belly, a ladder was extended, reaching down into the silvery dust. And behold! Armstrong, the first of Men, stepped forth upon that alien soil. His first stride, a small step for a Man, was indeed a giant leap for all Mankind. He looked upon a landscape of stark, unadorned beauty, where the Earth, a jewel of sapphire and cloud, hung suspended in the blackness of the heavens. Aldrin soon joined him, and together they walked upon the Moon, gathering samples of its ancient dust and stones, planting the banner of their distant home, a testament to the enduring spirit of courage and curiosity that burned within the hearts of Men.

For a brief span, the silence of the Moon was broken by the footsteps of Men, by the whisper of their voices, and the glint of their visors reflecting the distant Earth. And when their task was done, they ascended once more into the Eagle, leaving behind only their footprints and a few tokens of their visit, symbols of a journey that transcended the boundaries of the world. They rejoined their companion Collins in Columbia, and together, they turned their faces homeward, bearing tales of a world unseen, and bringing with them a new chapter in the great saga of Men, a chapter that spoke of dreams made manifest and horizons pushed back, forever changing the way they looked upon the silent, watchful Moon.

Reading List

 From Roderick, by John Sladek (1980)

Most nights he simply read one book after another; he might before dawn get through two or three like Call Me Pig, Doc Bovary’s Wife, The Ego Diet, Ratstar II, God Was My Co-conspirator, Dream New Hair, Sink the Titanic!, Dragons of Darkwound, or Aversion for Happiness. He could shift easily from a spy thriller like The Pisces Perplex to a guide to courtroom-drama therapy, Make a Federal Case Out of It; and on to an unusual medical theory in Your Eyes: Do They Leak Light?

In the Style of...

 The opening scene of Neuromancer in the style of... who?

The flickering neon signs of Chiba City bled into the rain-streaked windows of the bar, each letter a distorted glyph in some alien language. Case nursed his drink, a synthetic concoction that tasted vaguely of regret and stale electricity. The sky outside wasn't a sky at all, just a dead channel, a static hum of nothingness that mirrored the emptiness in his gut. He felt eyes on him, not the usual predatory gazes of the Sprawl, but something colder, more calculating. Were they real, or just echoes of his own fractured psyche? He blinked, and the bartender's face seemed to shift, the familiar features replaced by something subtly inhuman. "You looking for something, cowboy?" the voice rasped, a digitized whisper that seemed to crawl directly into his brain. Case swallowed hard, the synthetic liquor burning a trail down his throat. "Just a way out," he muttered, knowing even as he said it that there was no escape, not in this city, not in this life. The matrix shimmered at the edge of his vision, a promise and a threat, a world where reality itself was a negotiable commodity. And somewhere, in the tangled web of data and delusion, he knew they were waiting.

Early mention of cryonics (1865)

 From Guy Deverell (1865) by Sheridan Le Fanu - an early mention of cryonics:

“But there’s another process, my uncle, Monsieur Varbarriere, says, by slow refrigeration: you are first put to sleep, and in that state frozen; and once frozen, without having suffered death, you may be kept in a state of suspended life for twenty or thirty years, neither conscious, nor growing old; arrested precisely at the point of your existence at which the process was applied, and at the same point restored again whenever for any purpose it may be expedient to recall you to consciousness and activity.”

Eclectic editing

From Patrick S. Tomlinson's book "In the Black", an actual published book edited by an actual editor and published by an actual publisher (namely Macmillan):

The Citogenesis of Adam Roberts

A while back I noticed that the Amazon listing for "The Compelled" by Adam Roberts and François Schuiten had something of an oddity in the "About the authors" section, in reference to Mr Roberts:

His science fiction has been praised by many critics both inside and outside the genre, with some comparing him to genre authors such as Pel Torro, John E. Muller, and Karl Zeigfreid.

[Pel Torro, John E. Muller, and Karl Zeigfreid were some of the many pen-names used by super-prolific British author Lionel Fanthorpe for his 1950s pulp sci-fi novels, some of which were famously churned out at a high rate, sometimes one per week... someone was clearly having a laugh at Adam Roberts' expense - but who, and how did it make it on to Amazon?]

A little research (read: Googling) revealed that the text seemed to have been copied and pasted from an earlier version of Wikipedia's Adam Roberts page, which bizarrely enough had a genuine citation.

Delving into the history of the Wikipedia page, it appeared that the text was first inserted by a mischevious Wikipedian in December 2017, naturally without any citation. It lingered until November 2018 when it was removed by a passing editor who recognised it for the limp attempt at humour that it was.

However, the offending sentence was later reinstated in September 2019, this time with an actual citation from a real book, the Portuguese Verdadeira História Da Ficção Científica (The True History of Science Fiction). However, the book in question appears to have merely copied & pasted the original sentence from the mischevious earlier Wikipedia entry.... Needless to say there's a name for this sort of circular reference generation, and that is citogenesis. Wikipedia naturally has a list of such incidents.

Edit: It received a mention in the April 2023 edition of Dave Langford's Ansible newsletter:

Adam Roberts’s Amazon blurb for Stealing for the Sky has an ‘About the author’ coda that after the mention of his being a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature ends: ‘His science fiction has been praised by many critics both inside and outside the genre, with some comparing him to genre authors such as Pel Torro, John E. Muller, and Karl Zeigfreid.’ [JB]

"Sci-Fi" : a definition

 As seen in the Guardian's comment section:

Steampunkopedia

 From the Steampunkopedia (link to PDF), my entire bibliography (click to embiggen):

"The Best of All Possible Worlds" is a stand-alone alternate history SF story which isn't part of the "Barrington Smythe" series. But then again, there's nothing to rule it out being set in the future of the Smythe sequence.... hmm!

Also, The Great Race, The Great Airship Scare, and The Man Who Knew Too Much, while set in the same sort-of steampunk Edwardian milieu as the Barrington Smythe stories, do not actually feature Mr Smythe; they are a series of connected stories featuring one Dr Kilmarnock and Bart Smythe, Barrington Smythe's smarter brother (or is he?). The Man Who Knew Too Much ended on something of a cliffhanger, and the projected sequel, The Mancunian Candidate, was never published.

Gnostic SF?

So basically, all carbon-based life is satanic. Very Gnostic, which made me think of the vanishingly small handful of science fiction stories with Gnostic themes/tropes. Such as"The Final Equation" by Adrian Vonner, where the ending has God being revealed as Satan. I remember it as being as Gnostic as a bag full of Cathars.

And of course Mitch Greig's comical short story "Madame Zuleika Goes to Hell", which only appeared in a couple of small press 'zines in the 90s before sinking without trace. It features Charles Lubbock's notorious erotic character ending up in Hell, discovering that Satan is the Creator, and receiving a heartfelt apology from God.

Poe's Law

The Secret History of Science Fiction

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
- Keats

---

WHAT IS SCIENCE FICTION?
By Dr. Marco Bitetto

In the total cumulative genre of fiction there exist five other genres. These genres are the hard science fiction, soft science fiction, speculative science, historic fiction and finally fantasy.

The term speculative science was originally coined by Mr. Hugo Gernsbach back in the early 1930's in his fiction magazine called "Amazing Stories" and his other subsequent fiction magazine called "Amazing Science Stories" that were sold during the 1930's up until the name of these two magazines changed to "ANALOG SCIENCE FACT AND FICTION" magazine.

In the 1950's, Mr. Hugo Gernsbach gave the editorial control over to Mr. Joseph Campbell. After Mr. Joseph Campbell died the editorial control of ANALOG magazine transferred over to Dr. Stanley Schmidt and was under his control until for a brief time Dr. Ben Bova was the editor in charge. Then Dr. Stanley Schmidt once again was the editor. Presently, Dr. Stanley Schmidt has been replaced as editor of ANALOG.

During the time of Dr. Schmidt's editorial control of ANALOG magazine, he termed the phrase "historical fiction" to define a newly emerging genre of fiction that was historically based.

It should be noted that during the reign of Mr. Joseph Campbell, the term hard science fiction replaced the old term speculative science and also the term soft science fiction came to define the genre of science fiction that dealt with all things relating to psychology and sociology in fiction as a whole.

In all manner of science fiction stories there exist three parts. The first part is the introduction this is followed by the plot and then the ending of the story.

In the story introduction, there reader is introduced to the characters in the story, the brief backgrounds of the characters and the problem that the characters must soft during the entire story.

The plot on the other hand consist of a brief synopsis of what the story is all about.

The ending of the story tells the reader both that the characters in the story have solved the problem and how they solved the problem.

The best fictional stories of all kind make use of a twist in the ending of the story. This technique is used to provide the reader with a surprise ending that they could not have imagined by reading the previous parts to the story.

These above detailed parts of all manner of fictional story writing are what you should know as a new writer of fiction of any sort.

Link

The Joy of Coding

From Bugs, by John Sladek (1989):

Radio with pictures