This episode of Geek's Guide to the Galaxy is brought to you by World of Leathercraft.com,

featuring leather wallets, bags, and more, all carved with designs from your favorite fantasy and science fiction movies and TV shows.

Learn more at World of leathercraft.com presents the Geek's Guide to the Galaxy.

And here is your host, David Barr Kirtley.

Hello. David Barr curtly.

Hello and welcome to episode 184 of Geek's Guide to the Galaxy. Our guest today is Ginger Strand, author of the new book The Brothers Vonnegut, science and fiction in the House of Magic,

which describes how Bernard Vonnegut's experiments in weather control

helped inspire the novels of his brother, Kurt Vonnegut.

And today's show is brought to you by World of Leathercraft.com, which is run by leatherwork artisan

and lifelong fantasy and times fiction fan Ellen Sanders.

The bio on her website reads, I'm an original geek.

I started out with Star Trek the original series,

The Lost in Space TV show,

Space 1999, and Dr. Who with Tom Baker.

Back then, choices for science fiction and fantasy on TV were few, so I was a voracious reader too.

Fortunately, there was a great public library in my town. I lived there during the summers and read all the

Asimov, Heinlein, McCaffrey, Clark, and countless others I could absorb.

My cousin and I went to at least a dozen sci-fi conventions in the 90s, mostly in St. Louis and Champaign, Illinois.

We saw all the original Star Trek cast except to Forest Kelly and most of the next

gen folks. Most recently we went to the Wizard World Con in Chicago August 2014 where I was

a vendor and it was sheer madness in the best possible way. I absolutely love seeing

all the costumes and talking to people.

...