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The Cosmic Codex

Brian Scott Pauls

Living in a science fiction universe... www.thecosmiccodex.com

fiction science fiction

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4:28

“An Unexpected Grace”

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/10/05

Mars didn't work out. We're all packing up and going home. My estranged dad is refusing to leave, so I'm out travelling the Martian landscape to his solitary outpost to bring him back.If it were up to me, I'd say he'd made his choice. But my sister, back on Earth pleaded, "The kids want to see their Grandpa. I want to see him again."I've always had a soft spot for my baby sister…Get your FREE copy of Leaving Mars by Adeena Mignogna!Club Codex is continuing to read and discuss “The Kaiju Preservation

4:19

Disturbing revelations at the bottom of the world

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/09/28

My novelette "An Illicit Mercy" is part of a new promotion in September: Genetic Engineering Gone Bad.Check out sixteen novels, short stories, and excerpts available for free.Princess Serina, the last survivor of House Starfire, refuses to be crowned empress until she’s wiped out the rebels who killed her family. Only then will she prove to the bickering nobility, and herself, that she is worthy of the crown.Just when victory seems near, mysterious messages lead her to believe the rebels have

6:01

Before the moment of creation

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/09/21

My novelette "An Illicit Mercy" is part of a new promotion in September: Genetic Engineering Gone Bad.Check out sixteen novels, short stories, and excerpts available for free.Star Rider and the Golden Threads, by Heidi SkarieWhile Toemeka is living in a secret dome-city for refugees, an urgent message arrives from Queen Koriann of Jaipar. Planetary-conqueror and sorcerer, Samrat Condor, is threatening to attack unless they surrender.Toemeka goes to Jaipar, where she is reunited with Agent Erling

4:45

Mysterious mutations, and the Californian Faust

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/09/14

My novelette "An Illicit Mercy" is part of a new promotion in September: Genetic Engineering Gone Bad.Check out sixteen novels, short stories, and excerpts available for free.Back Drowning Earth by Sean Willson!Dive deep into a narrative where cutting-edge tech meets age-old legends.Join a submarine commander navigating both the tides of war and the mysteries of fate.Support the Drowning Earth crowdfunding campaign today!Club Codex is reading and discussing “The Kaiju Preservation Society” by John

3:18

"Probability Amplitudes" is growing

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/09/07

My novelette "An Illicit Mercy" is part of a new promotion in September: Genetic Engineering Gone Bad.Check out sixteen novels, short stories, and excerpts available for free.Club Codex is reading and discussing “The Kaiju Preservation Society” by John Scalzi in September. Please join us!Eight months have passed since I’ve provided an update about Probability Amplitudes. It will be my first science fiction collection.Several stories planned for the volume remain in the alpha-reading process.I

2:57

Club Codex (September 2023): “The Kaiju Preservation...

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/08/31

My science fiction novelette “An Illicit Mercy” is part of a new promotion in August.Over two hundred science fiction and fantasy novels, stories, samples, and excerpts available for download at no charge.September kicks off the first month of Club Codex!Our inaugural book is John Scalzi’s The Kaiju Preservation Society. This alternate-universe adventure won him the Locus award for best novel in June.From the publisher’s website:“When COVID-19 sweeps through New York City, Jamie Gray is stuck as a

5:51

Of monsters, missions, and mollusks

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/08/25

My science fiction novelette “An Illicit Mercy” is part of a new promotion in August.Over two hundred science fiction and fantasy novels, stories, samples, and excerpts available for download at no charge.In 1968, Charles N. Brown, Ed Meskys, and Dave Vanderwerf founded Locus magazine. Today, it's “the news organ and trade journal for the English-language science fiction and fantasy fields.” Each year, readers vote on the Locus Awards for works of science fiction, fantasy and horror.Participating

2:08

Introducing Club Codex

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/08/17

My science fiction novelette “An Illicit Mercy” is part of a new promotion in August.Over two hundred science fiction and fantasy novels, stories, samples, and excerpts available for download at no charge.Today I’m announcing a brand new addition to my Substack publication: the Club Codex science fiction book chat.Club Codex is a conversation space in the Substack app I have set up exclusively for my subscribers — kind of like a group chat or live hangout.The purpose of Club Codex is to read and

5:15

The neighborhood space monster

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/08/10

My science fiction novelette “An Illicit Mercy” is part of a new promotion in August.Over two hundred science fiction and fantasy novels, stories, samples, and excerpts available for download at no charge.If you want to identify an insect, Ruby Finley is your girl—unless no one’s ever seen it before. The amateur entomologist finds an unknown bug in her front yard. When she shares a picture of it online, things in her neighborhood get wild.Bradford tells the fast-paced story of Ruby and her friends

9:59

The greatest unsolved mysteries of science (fiction)

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/08/04

My science fiction novelette “An Illicit Mercy” is part of a new promotion in August.Over two hundred science fiction and fantasy novels, stories, samples, and excerpts available for download at no charge.Science fiction, by its most rigorous definition, is fiction about science. It can be genuine science. Or it can be speculative science, based on our best understanding and theories.Exceptions have existed from the beginning. The pulps abounded with imaginative technologies and abilities enjoying

9:19

“The Play of Light In the Present Moment”

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/06/10

This is the third story I’ve converted into a multimedia format. For now, it will be the last. One reason is creating the images and tweaking the AI narration takes a lot of time. The main reason is it’s only workable for me to do this with very short flash fiction pieces. Now that I’m writing at greater lengths, I’m not producing pieces appropriate for this format.Thanks for reading The Cosmic Codex! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Not that these pieces are going away

4:41

A fragile peace

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/06/03

I first encountered the work of C. J. Cherryh when I was in high school. My dad was a counselor, and worked with Terry Bachus, the father of my good friend Ty. One day when I was in Dad’s office, Mr. Bachus popped in and told me he wanted to show me something.Something was a gold mine of science fiction. As a member of the Science Fiction Book Club, Ty’s dad frequently received hardcover sf novels in the mail. He'd filled a cardboard box with several books he'd finished. Knowing I read sf, Mr

6:41

Download “An Illicit Mercy”

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/05/26

My novelette, An Illicit Mercy, is now available in ebook format with a free subscription to The Cosmic Codex.Sometimes justice and the law aren't one and the same.Infants in the Martian outpost of Basin have been plagued with birth defects for years—until recently. Corporate has dispatched Siwela and her team to find out why. What she learns will have profound implications for her job—and for who she wants to be.Here’s a short excerpt:An Illicit MercyBy Brian Scott PaulsThe first thing I notice is

6:04

The empire, the invasion, and the master

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/05/19

Recipients at the 58th Nebula AwardsThis past Sunday, the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Association (SFWA) celebrated the 58th Nebula Awards in Anaheim, California. The honors given included the Award for Novel and the Andre Norton Award—one to a tale of an empire bent on colonization, the other to an alien invasion story.SFWA also gave us a bonus—a new Grand Master!Award for NovelBabel by R.F. KuangCrawford Award, Crompton Crook Award, and Astounding Award for Best New Writer recipient Rebecca

3:42

Freelancer problems

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/05/15

One of the most important lessons I learned running my business is there are some customers you don’t want. The Extractionist begins with Eliza McKay meeting someone who may be just such a customer.Kimberly Unger’s Philip K. Dick Award-winning cyberpunk novel follows McKay, a former nanotechnology engineer. The U.S. government has revoked her licenses to practice her profession because of a previous incident that is never fully explained. She now makes her living as a freelance “extractionist”,

15:35

Twenty years away…

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/05/08

by Brian Scott Pauls, written using ChatGPTThis past December, the National Ignition Facility in California produced a fusion reaction which generated more power than that required to start the process—a first-of-its kind achievement.I’ve heard commercially viable fusion power is just “twenty years away” for the past forty years. Is it finally true this time? Or will we still be saying the same thing in another forty years?Imagine an energy source that can generate power with minimal pollution and

3:22

Love and death in another world

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/04/27

Well-crafted works of science fiction are often in conversation with one another. Authors frequently respond to earlier celebrated stories—sometime challenging their assumptions, sometimes exploring new facets of their premises.The 1973 anthology The Alien Condition includes James Tiptree, Jr.’s short story “Love Is the Plan, the Plan is Death” (free to read and listen to online at Lightspeed Magazine.) It describes the life-cycle, mating rituals, and emotional journey of a male from a vaguely

8:30

"A Valid Exchange"

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/04/20

Following-up on last week’s article about the enduring relevance of cyberpunk, my latest story is now available in Boundary Shock Quarterly 22.“A Valid Exchange” is a follow-up to my short cyberpunk piece “Critical Impact Vulnerabilities”. It continues the adventures of hacker extraordinaire Tilda Slash and the police detective assigned to investigate her:Tilda Slash has been a thorn in the side of the Seattle PD for years. Every time they think they have her dead-to-rights, she slips through their

3:59

The enduring relevance of cyberpunk

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/04/13

Hang out in sf circles long enough, and you’ll find someone declaring “cyberpunk is dead”. It appeared with the Big Bang of William Gibson’s Neuromancer in 1984, and vanished in a Big Crunch of self-satire with Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash in 2000. We got sixteen years, then it was gone—only a zombie remains, shuffling around, unaware its vital functions ceased decades ago.All of which ignores a fact obvious to anyone familiar with the real world of 2023:Cyberpunk is the science fiction subgenre

14:21

A year for fantasy and representation

The Cosmic Codex ·

2023/04/07

by Brian Scott PaulsFantasy has dominated over science fiction in the marketplace for many years. This year's final selection of books under consideration for Nebula Awards is no exception. Seven are fantasy, one is science fantasy, two are sf, and one is a contemporary mystery.A more important matter is representation. In recent years, the science fiction community has been working hard to make up for the decades-long lack of visible diversity among its most celebrated members. This includes who

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