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Space billionaires take the spotlight

Image: Jeff Bezos and champagne
Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon and Blue Origin, sprays champagne from a bottle after a successful rocket landing in November 2015. (Credit: Blue Origin via YouTube)

Space is hard: That used to be the excuse for explaining why sending people into space would always be something only governments could do. Now it explains why even billionaires find the feat difficult.

As SpaceX CEO Elon Musk told me back in 2010, even before he was officially recognized as a billionaire, rocket science is “super-frickin’ damn hard.”

To persevere, even billionaires have to have a passion for spaceflight, most likely fostered at an early age, and an iron resolve to weather adversity. That comes through loud and clear in two newly published books, plus a TV documentary that’s premiering tonight.

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Portland sci-fi great Ursula K. Le Guin mourned

Ursula K. Le Guin
Award-winning science fiction and fantasy writer Ursula K. Le Guin, 1929-2018. (Copyright © by Marian Wood Kolisch / via UrsulaKLeGuin.com)

Science fiction and fantasy writers around the Pacific Northwest and around the world are paying tribute to award-winning author Ursula K. Le Guin, who died peacefully at the age of 88 on Jan. 22 at her home in Portland, Ore.

“She left an extraordinary legacy as an artist and as an advocate of peace and critical thinking and fairness, and she was a great mother and wife as well,” The Associated Press quoted her son, Theo Downes-Le Guin, as saying. He told The New York Times that her mother had been in poor health for several months.

Le Guin was best-known for her exploration of feminist themes in books such as “The Left Hand of Darkness,” a 1969 novel set on a planet whose inhabitants have no fixed sex. Her magic-infused Earthsea series of novels made as much of an impact in their day as J.R.R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy and J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books.

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Science fiction duo looks at life after ‘The Martian’

Neal Stephenson and Andy Weir
Sci-fi author Andy Weir (“The Martian,” “Artemis”) makes a point while Neal Stephenson (“Seveneves,” “The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O.”) looks on. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)

What could be better than hearing a science fiction writer talk about how to create whole new worlds? How about doubling that to two science fiction writers?

That was the case for a Seattle-area appearance by Andy Weir — the author of “The Martian” and “Artemis,” a just-released novel set on a moon colony in the 2080s.

When he showed up at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park on Nov. 30, he brought along Seattle’s own Neal Stephenson, the author of science-fiction novels ranging from “Snow Crash” to “Seveneves” to “The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O.”

A standing-room-only crowd of 600 or so heard Weir and Stephenson hold forth on the writing racket. Here are some gems from the conversation:

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Holiday book guide: Give them the cosmos

Science books
This year’s science reading list includes “Magnitude,” “Big Pacific” “People of the World,” “Otherworlds” and “Soonish.” (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)

When it comes to holiday gifts, books are tricky things: How do you know your gift book will resonate with the recipient? If they’re geekily inclined, at least one of the books on this science reading list should strike a chord. And if you’re on the other side of the gift-exchange algorithm, chances are you’ll see something worth adding to your Amazon wish list.

We’ve put together a selection of 16 recently published books that hit a variety of genres, from astronomy to zoology, and are suitable for the coffee table, the kids’ table or your favorite geek’s bookshelf. Follow the links for more information, and still more recommendations.

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Get a double dose of ‘Year in Space’ lore

Scott Kelly
Former NASA astronaut Scott Kelly recounts his “Year in Space” mission during an event at the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center in May 2016. (NASA Photo / Bill Ingalls)

Space fans are used to seeing double when they’re keeping track of twin astronauts Scott and Mark Kelly, but this week Seattleites can get a double helping of pure Scott.

Tonight, the U.S. record-holder for continuous time in orbit is the star of “Beyond a Year in Space,” a PBS documentary done in cooperation with Time magazine.

The hourlong TV show is a follow-up on an earlier program that aired just after the end of Scott Kelly’s 340-day stint on the International Space Station in March 2016. Part 2 delves into Kelly’s return in depth, including his painful readjustment to Earth’s gravitational pull. At first, even the weight of his clothes gave his skin a burning sensation.

“Gravity definitely gives you a beat-down when you get back,” he says on the show.

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Seattle wins UNESCO’s laurel for literature

Seattle Public Library
Seattle Public Library. Photo via Flickr user PsychaSec.

It only makes sense that Seattle is now officially one of UNESCO’s Cities of Literature, considering that it’s home to the world’s biggest bookseller (Amazon) as well as America’s most well-read citizens (at least according to Amazon).

One might even ask what took UNESCO so long: A nonprofit group called Seattle City of Literature has been campaigning for years to win recognition from the Paris-based U.N. cultural agency, but missed getting onto the list two years ago.

Don’t expect a City of Literature to be so impertinent as to ask. Instead, leaders of the campaign graciously welcomed word that Seattle was being added to UNESCO’s Creative Cities Network.

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‘Modernist Bread’ finds new twists in ancient food

Nathan Myhrvold
Technologist Nathan Myhrvold is on a mission with “Modernist Bread.” (The Cooking Lab, LLC)

BELLEVUE, Wash. — Did you ever try inflating bread dough with a bicycle pump? Gourmet technologist Nathan Myhrvold did — and after thumbing through the 2,642 pages of his latest opus, “Modernist Bread,” you just might, too.

Like “Modernist Cuisine,” his earlier work, the new five-volume set of books is bigger than a bread box and costs hundreds of dollars. But although “Modernist Bread” offers hundreds of recipes, these are no common cookbooks: Myhrvold and his co-author, head chef Francisco Migoya, delve into the history of one of the world’s oldest foods, the science and technology of breadmaking, and why stunts like pumping up bread actually work.

“Some people ask me how I could possibly make a 2,600-page book on bread,” Myhrvold told GeekWire, “My answer is, ‘Because I had to hold the line somewhere.’ Seriously, we had lots of material that we had to cut.”

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Dan Brown’s latest thriller: Will AI replace God?

Dan Brown
Dan Brown’s “Origin” weaves scientific themes into a thriller set in Spain. (AuthorDanBrown via YouTube)

Imagine an age when artificial intelligence takes the sum of human experience and turns it into a “global consciousness” that becomes a replacement for God.

That scenario could serve as the plot for a science-fiction novel, but novelist Dan Brown suggests that it’s a real-life possibility, thanks to anticipated advances in technology.

“Over the next decade our species will become enormously interconnected at a level we are not used to, and we will start to find our spiritual experiences through our interconnections with each other,” the AFP news agency quoted Brown as sayingtoday at the Frankfurt Book Fair in Germany. “Our need for the exterior God that sits up there and judges us … will diminish and eventually disappear.”

God’s place would be taken by “some form of global consciousness that we perceive and that becomes our divine,” Reuters quoted him as saying.

Brown’s talk focused on his latest thriller, “Origin,” which follows a plot line that’s almost as far out there.

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Waterproof Kindle e-reader makes a splash

Kindle Oasis
Amazon unveiled its waterproof Kindle Oasis e-reader. (Amazon Photo)

Amazon has unveiled its first waterproof Kindle Oasis e-reader, which takes its place on the top end of the Kindle spectrum with a list price starting at $249.99.

The upgraded Oasis boasts a 7-inch illuminated screen, a long-life battery that can take on a full charge in less than two hours, and IPX8-level waterproofing that’s designed to protect the device even if it’s dunked in a bathtub or a lake.

The device is rated to survive immersion in up to 6 feet (2 meters) of fresh water for up to 60 minutes.

Amazon is also highlighting the 7-ounce (194-gram) device’s slim profile, tapering to a 3.4mm display, and the fact that it has a built-in Audible app that lets you listen to audiobooks over Bluetooth headphones or speakers.

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‘Seat 14C’ tales imagine 20-year time warp

Time warp for Seat 14C
The short stories of “Seat 14C” imagine that an ANA Boeing 777 jet has passed through a wrinkle in spacetime. (Illustration for XPRIZE / Seat 14C)

Imagine you’re a passenger on a jet that mysteriously time warps to the year 2037: That’s what a team of world-class science-fiction writers did for “Seat 14C,” a project created by XPRIZE and Japan’s ANA airline.

Now you can imagine as well, and your tale may well earn you a trip to Tokyo for two.

But wait … there’s more: The winner of the “Seat 14C” contest also earns an honorary seat on the XPRIZE Science Fiction Advisory Council, alongside such greats as Margaret Atwood (“The Handmaid’s Tale), Paolo Bacigalupi (“The Windup Girl”) and Seattle author Nancy Kress (“Beggars in Spain”).

Those writers are among the more than two dozen contributors to the online “Seat 14C” short-story anthology, all focused on technological visions for 2037.

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