Robert Heinlein

The Superorganism The Beauty, Elegance, and Strangeness of Insect Societies Bert Hölldobler and E. O. Wilson W.W. Norton: 522 pp., $55 Ants lack human consciousness. They don't make decisions, they respond to stimuli -- with a limited number of...

He eavesdropped on our nightmares. That was the trick, right? That had to be it. How else could Michael Crichton have figured out just what would haunt, awe, terrify, agitate, provoke, intrigue and royally tick us off? From dinosaurs to airline safety,...

SEATTLE -- For all of Neal Stephenson's achievements, his most impressive may be his ability to attract a following equal parts hacker and literati. His popularity is all the more anomalous because his books are always long and often difficult. His last...

Astral Weeks Pop Quiz: Name the piece of music responsible for these flights of fancy: Example one: "About fifteen minutes [in] . . . I have entered a different reality and am in a strange part of the universe where you can sit on the tail of a flaming...

*Nim's Island: Jodie Foster and Abigail Breslin team up for this sturdy family adventure adapted from Wendy Orr's novel. Breslin stars as the title character, a fearless young girl left alone on an island after her scientist dad (Gerard Butler) vanishes....

REWRITING a famous story from a different character's point of view has become common enough that the results constitute a genre of their own. John Gardner saw "Beowulf" through the monster's eyes in "Grendel"; Jean Rhys' "Wide Sargasso Sea" excavated the...

Arthur C. Clarke, who peered into the heavens with a homemade telescope as a boy and grew up to become a visionary titan of science-fiction writing and collaborated with director Stanley Kubrick on the landmark film "2001: A Space Odyssey," has died. He...

Arthur C. Clarke, who peered into the heavens with a homemade telescope as a boy and grew up to become a visionary titan of science-fiction writing and collaborated with director Stanley Kubrick on the landmark film "2001: A Space Odyssey," has died. He...

In retrospect, I guess it was too much to expect Harry Potter to not only defeat evil Lord Voldemort, but also make the world safe for reading, too. I'm referring to the recent reports dispelling the myth of "the Harry Potter effect," the widely accepted...

Jon Burstein watches anything on television and spends too much time looking for stupid viral videos, according to his wife. He enjoys watching " Frontline", "The Office", "Cheaters" and those half-hour Time-Life music collection advertisements. He has...

Although George Takei is an actor, he really does have a connection with outer space. The "Star Trek" and "Heroes" actor has had an asteroid named in his honor, report news sources. The asteroid, situated between Mars and Jupiter, was previously named...

ABC is cleaning out its programming closet, giving summertime runs to a pair of projects that were initially scheduled to run last season. The game show "Set for Life," which way back when was slated to air in the fall, will finally premiere on Friday,...