TODAY is the famous “day of rest” before cast and crew of the STATIC movie (https://kspllc.media/the-static-movie) appear on set to film the “bar” scene. While the crew is frantically gathering all the necessary materials, cameras, sound booms, lights, I’m relaxing at the famous Northshore of Oahu island. No whales. They’ve gone north for the summer to feed and party. Just warm sun, cool, frangipani-scented trade winds and magnificent mother ocean gently stroking the course of the...

I have a theory: Be it romance, love, gender, adventure, drama, science fiction, erotica or sex, t’s been wrapped up in literature and movies for a long time now in the form of gratuitous violence. Darkness, especially in the form of gratuitous violence or overall pessimism in science fiction, isn’t “necessary.” Cities, if they will exist in the future, don’t necessarily have to be foreboding, constantly raining and filled with violent characters. Depending on detailed gratuitous vi...

YOU guessed it: not viewed. Despite all my raving in yesterday’s post about this event, last night we had a “round table” full-cast reading of the “Static” movie script and I was so tired afterwards I slept right through the alarm. Go figure! On the other hand, the full-cast reading brought several to tears while others openly shared “goosebump” moments, meaning, in my mind, this drama will exceed even the most stringent viewer expectations. I also hear that the round table was ...

ONE thing authoring THE EDGE OF MADNESS (Aignos 2020) by Raymond Gaynor (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0999693859) has taught me is a new respect for astronomy, a hobby I’ve always been interested in, ignited further by the recent acquisition of a Skywatcher Maksutov-Cassegrain telescope. There aren’t many nights in the Bay Area perfect for viewing planets, but tomorrow is a sure winner, with Venus exceptionally bright and a full moon eclipsed. Didn’t know about it? In any field of interest...

IN the immediate aftermath of the TOTAL MELTDOWN (Borgo/Wildside 2009) by Raymond Gaynor and William Maltese (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1434403556), something happened. The dis-integrating world proved a playground for “Fast Eddies” and con artists. But who, I ask, let them out? Who let the “dogs” out?

A dis-integrating world means that things, especially integrated technological products; businesses that require other business partners to create, distribute and market a product; and...

I’VE been wondering lately what is it that makes morality so important, perhaps even essential, to humans, but not as far as we know, to other animals? It’s always been my opinion that morality is a sort of mental barbed-wire fence to keep what I consider the eighth deadly sin, hubris, in check, though hubris is commonly regarded as synonymous the first deadly sin, pride. Personally and as an author, I make a distinction between the two, pride being about about unnatural self-aggrandizeme...

I’VE often heard that the storyline, narration, dialog and outstanding editing are what make a successful book. Of course, I have to agree. Makes total sense. And yet…there’s something, almost intangible, that elevates a well-authored and edited story to something, well, more. It’s the difference between a great performance and one that elicits goose bumps. It’s having just the right “edge.” Something more. One of my publishers, Savant Books and Publications | Aignos Publishing,...

AS a registered performance and competitive dancer, every day I practice “tripping the light fantastic” to improve and enjoy my skills and keep in shape. It was my “crutch” throughout the 2020 plague year when my living room had to serve as my studio; it was something I could look forward to when, pre-vaccination, all the dance venues closed and even just going for a walk with a mask while carefully distancing from others outside was verboten.

These days, in addition to authoring and...

THE past few days, I’ve been in conversation with my friend and sometimes co-author, the incomparable William Maltese, over a new phase in my life: Several weeks ago, I auditioned for a part in an upcoming made-for-television movie entitled “Static” (https://kspllc.media/the-static-movie), to my surprise, landing the leading role of Will Gardner, a crotchety old man suffering onset of Alzheimer’s Disease. It’s a dramatic piece, originally written by the outstanding Savant screenwrit...

WITH all the recurring reports of excessive police violence in the news, I find myself wondering what can possibly be done about it. Awareness of its existence and effects of violence on both the victim and the public are, of course, a first step, given that not all victims are purely innocent, and all police officers aren’t willing perpetrators of violence. But awareness isn’t enough, especially in the field, in the heat of a life-threatening situation quite possibly requiring lethal for...

BEING a “mostly” vegetarian by choice and not obligation, I’ve always been one to favor fruit, something I’ve never regretted, being also a hedonist, epicurean and succulent fruit lover. However, every year for the past ten or so, the fruit in the grocery stores has continued to improve visually indirectly proportional to smell and taste as well as ripeness and sugar content. Today I bought a package of apricots, one of my personal, seasonal favorites. Grown in the good ol’ USA, und...

THERE is an interesting conundrum, a fluke of human nature, that is challenging humanity’s shared perception of reality, whether it be the cosmos, physics, science, the humanities, the human story, romance, love, gender or amorous eroticism: It isn’t so much that seeing is believing, but that we see what we believe, want or can see through our cultural blinders. That “seeing is believing” has already been highjacked, this time by politics, in that after spreading an opinion as factual...

CORRESPONDING today with my dear friend and colleague, the multi-talented, multi-award-winning author, William Maltese, the question arose: Which is better? To think or to do? It all stems from discussing with him my having been asked to audition for a role in an upcoming made-for-television movie, “Static,” written fellow author and screenwriter Richard Rose and purchased for cinematic treatment by K. Simmons Productions (kspllc.media).

You know, “To be, or not to be? That is the ques...

I’M not jokingly referring here to political refugees or “resident aliens” with “green cards.” I’m talking about, yes, real aliens from other worlds. Pretty much everyone sci-fi has read or seen author and filmmaker Michael Crichton’s “The Andromeda Strain” in which a not-from-this-world microbe hitches a ride on a military satellite returning to Earth to wreak havoc on the human race.

Interesting, in light of a 24 November 2000 CNN article by Richard Stenger entitled, “S...

REFLECTING on my authoring career in during a recent interview, I was once again impressed with the chasm that exists between writing and authoring, one that took me thirty plus years to successfully bridge. And I wasn’t undecided; I knew I wanted to be an author from the start, having written my first novella at sixteen years of age. I sent my 100+ page (25,000+ word) sci-fi manuscript entitled “The Parabolic Curve” to seventy-five publishing houses. It never went to publication, thoug...

SEVERAL decades ago, when I began my authoring career, it was rare to meet another author. Published authors were celebrities in their own right, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with television and movie celebrities, sometimes shining even brighter than their actor/actress colleagues. And I say colleagues, because at the heart of television and movie production is screenwriting, which I still hold is a form of authoring.

With the appearance of self-publishing and the aging and decrease in read...

OKAY, so this may sound a but surprising, given the title of today’s post, but “I’m Raymond Gaynor and I’m a plant lover” (if you haven’t already guess that). I live in a high-rise condo and have a small two-foot wide outdoor porch upon which I exercise my secret love, openly, yes, in public. Right now I have three pots of Japanese cucumbers, one of Charentais Cantaloupe, one of Japanese onions, one of hybrid bush tomatoes and one of tiny, mildly spicy Oriental green peppers. One ...

IN the publishing world, a writer writes for him or herself, while an author writes for a target audience, commonly designated by a “genre.” A writer doesn’t need a publisher; an author may or may not, depending on whether one wishes to “self-publish,” or contract with a vanity or “regular” press. Usually, contracting for the first time with an established press is considered one’s author debut.

I read that in today’s market, there is no need for a regular publisher. In fac...

LATELY, I have been delving into the dark sea of neurobiological “romance” that ebbs and tides so strongly about human relations, especially sex. In essence, romance is about assuring each other of conjugal safety, trust, fidelity and devotion while releasing the sexual tigers within. A quixotic, even paradoxical thing, romance. And it has to happen in the above sequence to be most effective and ultimately, satisfying, both in the short and long term.

The neurobiology of romance suggests...

RECOGNIZE the refrain from Disney’s version of Lewis Carroll’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND? Actually, in the novel, the White Rabbit said, “Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!” which, I believe, should be the cry of contemporary America and the world.

My newly released Science Future novel, THE EDGE OF MADNESS (Aignos 2020) by Raymond Gaynor, is actually the sequel to the decidedly naughty gay novel, TOTAL MELTDOWN (Borgo/Wildside 2009) by Raymond Gaynor and William Maltese, in which the ...

IF that doen’t catch your attention, then I fear nothing will. But it’s not just a literary hook. I mean to address the issue of how to escape this universe into which we’re so solidly tied. Call it “spiritual gravity” if you like, but the basic premise is that you can’t leave this universe unless you die.

In my recently released SciFu (science-based future) novel, THE EDGE OF MADNESS (Aignos Publishing 2020) by Raymond Gaynor, and the sequel, tentatively entitled “Prophecy,”...

THERE are many opins regarding the origin of the lullaby but the one I find most personally intriguing (in an Edgar Allen Poe or Stephen King sort of way, and, yes, mentioned in that font of all true knowledge, Wikipedia) is that the word “lullaby” is a homophone of “Lilith-Abi” (Hebrew for “Lilith, begone”).

Okay, so who is Lilith? Again, consulting that same encyclopedia of truth, in The Book of Adam and Eve she is Adam’s first wife. Eh? Wasn’t that Eve?

Nope. But be aware...