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"It was [H.G. Wells'] adolescent fiction, his imaginative stories, that live forever - and yet are not acknowledged in literature classes as being great literature. So to hell with the academics!"
- Greg Bear
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| Cloud Sculpting | ||
| Using gliders and chemical showers to shape clouds artistically. |
A retired pilot finds his way to Vermillion Sands, and meets a kite-maker. Add a beautiful but mysterious woman to the mix, and you've got a great story.
| The tree gliders, brilliant painted toys, revolved like lazing birds above Coral D, waiting for the first clouds to pass overhead. Van Eyck moved away to take a cloud. He sailed around its white pillow, spraying the sides with iodide crystals and cutting away the flock-like tissue. The streaming shards fell toward us like crumbling ice-drifts. As the drops of condensing spray fell on my face I could see Van Eyck shaping an immense horse's head. He sailed up and down the long forehead and chiseled out the eyes and ears.
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| Technovelgy from The Cloud Sculptors of Coral D,
by J.G. Ballard. Published by Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1967 Additional resources -
|
I don't know if anyone has ever tried cloud sculpting. Cloud seeding (the attempt to produce or alter precipitation and weather by sprinkling materials into clouds) was done just after World War II.
Thanks to John for letting me know about the great cover art for this story; I read it in the 'Vermillion Sands' collection.
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'...the rocket’s landing-arms automatically unfolded.'
'...points and patches of light... sliding all over their faces in a programmed manner that had been designed to foil facial recognition systems.'
'...the combined Wind-Suncatcher, like a spray of tulips mounted fanwise.'
'I went to the control room where the three other men were manipulating their mechanical men.'
'The low-slung monorail car, straddling its single track, bored through the shadows on a slowly rising course.'
'It was a smooth ovoid floating a few inches from the floor...'
'... he thrust in his charging arm to replenish his store of energy.'
'...the terrible Jovian gravity that made each movement an effort.'
