Ancient Eyes

August 6, 2023

This is a photo of a reconstruction of a Neanderthal boy. Hair and eye color were derived from DNA found in the boy’s jaw. You can’t tell from the photo, but the jaw is quite small. The exhibit didn’t tell me how old the boy was when he died, or if any of his other […]

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William’s Brain

July 30, 2023

Monreale Cathedral— more formally Cattedrale di Santa Maria Nuova di Monreale; Duomo di Monreale— is a look into the mind of King William the Good, who built the place. I can see why a life of war and conquest didn’t suit him. This colossal building is a fantasia, a kind of theme park tour of […]

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Rock the Bosporus

July 29, 2023

Ayçe Sicimoǧlu rocks out on a classic. Feel free to give it a listen.

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Bundle Time!

July 27, 2023

The Science Fiction Writers of America have put out another novelbundle, and I am once more included! This time it’s fantasy. There’s something about fantasy that never fails to thrill readers of all ages and backgrounds. Stories filled with magical creatures, wizards, romance, and adventures, both big and small, continue to cast spells over our […]

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Rain in the Opera

July 26, 2023

The Duomo in Palermo was built at the command of William II the Good. (William was the son of William I the Bad. Father William doesn’t seem to have been particularly bad, as medieval monarchs go. He seems to have acquired his monicker because he had a tendency to promote competent commoners over the heads […]

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In A Parallel World Near Yours

July 25, 2023

Lots of stuff going on in the world of Wild Cards. A new original anthology, Pairing Up, has been published here in the US. I’m not in it, but these guys are: “Trudy of the Apes”   KEVIN ANDREW MURPHY“Cyrano d’Escargot”  CHRISTOPHER ROWE“In the Forests of the Night”   MARKO KLOOS“The Wounded Heart”    MELINDA M. SNODGRASS“Echoes From […]

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Loving Couple

July 17, 2023

From the National Museum in Reggio Calabria, a rare double burial dating from either the Paleolithic or Mesolithic, or maybe the boundary between the two. The two were buried in a cave. The man’s left arm is around the woman’s shoulders, and the woman rests her head on the man’s shoulder. I can imagine the […]

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The Best Peste!

July 12, 2023

Cover by Aurélien Police of the forthcoming French edition of The Green Leopard Plague, translated by Jean-Daniel Brèque. Pretty cool, no?

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Personal Appearance

July 11, 2023

Here we see Roger II of Sicily being crowned by none other than Jesus Himself. Usually it’s a bishop or pope doing the investing, but in this case Roger outranked both, at least in Sicily, so he went straight to the Savior. His father Roger I— who wasn’t a king, but gets a number anyway, […]

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Segesta

July 7, 2023

By Sunday everything had improved except the weather. Kathy reported that she was swiftly recovering from the worst effects of COVID, and my knee had improved to the point where I could walk nearly pain-free. (I think what might have happened was that my accident had knocked free a piece of cartilage, which was moving […]

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