Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 1)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 1

Table of Contents

Part 1

Editor's Notebook
Chuq Von Rospach

Historical Realism
Harry Turtledove

Part 2

Two Books on Robert Bloch
Jerry Boyajian

Double Nocturne
Danny Low

The Uplift War
Fred Bals

Part 3

An Interview with Mike Resnick

Part 4

Scattered Gold
Charles de Lint

Stuff Received

Part 5

Rebellion, Counter-Revolution, Blemishes and Potential
Jim Brunet

Part 6

Words of Wizdom
Chuq Von Rospach

Part 7

Loose Ends
Alan Wexelblat

Publishing Notes

Part 8

Much Rejoicing
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes

Part 9

Letters to OtherRealms

Editor's Notebook

Chuq Von Rospach

Conspiracy

As I write this, I've finally recovered from jet lag having returned from two weeks in England playing tourist and attending Conspiracy. Since OtherRealms is a reviewzine I'm going to limit my personal comments here (and point you instead at Hard Hat Fanzine #1, which should be in the envelope as a special added bonus this month) but I did want to thank all of the OtherRealms readers (from seven countries, by my count) who took the time to track me down and say hi. The feedback I got on the magazine was both enlightening and encouraging, and it was nice to finally put some faces to names I've only known via mail and computers. So, for all the friends I met for the first time (and also to those I got to see again) thanks for sharing part of your vacation with me, and I hope this was just a beginning.

Partings

I read with some regret, but to be honest, not much surprise, the termination of Fantasy Review as of issue #103. I recommended Fantasy Review as a source in my Reviewing the Reviewers article in OtherRealms #9, but since that time the magazine, with a new publisher, has shown a continuing drop in the quality of its material. In issue #102, there was an irresponsible article attacking Orson Scott Card that had me wondering whether to renew my subscription --Jit now looks like this might have been a last ditch effort to generate some controversy in the hopes that people would buy the issue. I'm sorry to see Fantasy Review go, although the Card article left a bad taste in my mouth that tarnishes all of the good things that editor Robert Collins and the magazine did -- nevertheless, Collins should realize that he did some very good things with FR, and did them amazingly well considering the financial and other problems that seemed endemic to the publication.

Heinlein's Women

Is Robert Heinlein sexist? And why is everyone interested?

I bring this up because I have had three people query me in the last two months about writing articles on this exact topic. My answer to all three was the same:

It's none of our business. The question ought to be "Are Heinlein's works Sexist?"

This may seem like a trivial difference to you, but it is critical to understand if you plan on writing for OtherRealms. One of the most common mistakes critics make is to believe that the author and the work are the same thing, and that you can do a study of the author's books and use them as a basis to judge the author.

This may be true of some authors and some books, but as a general case I believe it to be false. The purpose of a review is to review the book, not call the authors beliefs into question, nor is it to abuse the author, make fun of the author, or to espouse the reviewers political beliefs. The idea is to help the reader of the review decide if they want to read a book.

Many reviews (although, hopefully, none in OtherRealms) have hidden agendas -- the reviewer is more interested in getting their viewpoint aired than they are in discussing the work -- if you disagree with that statement, read the review section in any major newspaper or the New York Review of Books and see how many of the reviews actually have much to do with the work in question. In the latter, having the first mention of the work on the second page of a review is common -- an act I find completely unjustifiable.

So if you want to write an article that proves that Heinlein's works are sexist, be my guest. But leave Mr. Heinlein out of it. (For the record, when given that option, all three authors declined). If you have to bring the person into it, there is a flaw in your article.

[And as an aside, I don't believe that Heinlein's works are sexist. He does write about women from another, more traditional generation, but that should not be mistaken with sexism. And I feel that Sailing on the Sunset, reviewed in this issue, has one of the most positive and effective female characters ever written by a male author. But if you still disagree, and want to prove it, I want to see it -- but leave the people out of it].

Contributor
Notes

Congratulations are in order for Contributing Editor Jim Brunet. His latest story, Symphony in Ursa Major, can be found in the July/August issue of Aboriginal SF. Also, congratulations are in order to Stephen Fox for his nomination and Brad Foster for his long deserved award for Best Fan Artist in the Hugo's this year. Foster continues to show up in the pro and semi- professional markets as well -- the latest being the cover of the August Science Fiction Chronicle.

I'd like to welcome a new artist to the OtherRealms family, with a twist. Alf Yngve sent me some fascinating material all the way from Sweden, along with a couple of Swedish fanzines. In his letter, he mentioned that the fans in Sweden are rather few, so I thought I'd drop him a plug and mention that if you're interested in sharing SF with folks with different perspectives, consider becoming a penpal of someone like Alf. If you want to drop him a note, write him at Alf Yngve, Kullasgatan 20A, 463 00 Lilla Edet, Sweden. You'll be seeing more of his art over the next few issues (and hopefully more international art as OtherRealms penetrates the continental boundaries further).

Finally, I'm very proud to announce the addition of a new name in the OtherRealms masthead. Charles de Lint, an author (his latest being The Jack of Kinrowan: A Novel of Urban Fairie from Armadillo/Ace) and former reviewer for Fantasy Review has joined OtherRealms as a Contributing Editor. His column debuts this month, and I think you'll agree with me that he is a strong addition to OtherRealms and a voice that deserves to be heard. Please join me in welcoming him aboard!

This Issue

This is the first quarterly issue of OtherRealms, but it isn't the final form that the zine will take. I tried to put it together on a six week schedule in time for Worldcon, and almost made it. From the looks of it, I'm going to be right around 48 pages in eight weeks, which isn't bad and gets the magazine in your hands the end of September, a nice tradeoff between wishes and reality. OtherRealms will probably continue to be about 48 pages for the next few issues, since that is about the limit that I can handle financially. I'm working on the budgets and getting quotes to see if I can afford to take OtherRealms offset, so it can be saddle stitches and to improve the reproduction of the art; if it works out OtherRealms may be offset next issue, or perhaps the one after.

The limiting factor for magazine size right now is financial -- I have enough good material to double the number of pages and still give me a good start on the next issue, but I simply can't afford to use it all. My hope is that the paid subscription base will continue to grow -- as my subscription base goes up, my per copy costs go down and I can add pages without changing the subscription costs.

I've made a number of layout changes in my continuing attempt to figure out how to design a magazine and make it look good. I'm still playing around with the way the title section of an article looks -- trying to make sure it stands out without overwhelming the page and get the information out in a clear way. A couple of people mentioned (justifiably so, in retrospect) that it was difficult to tell who was actually writing the reviews, since that information was sometimes on the second or third page of the article. This new layout should take care of that.

Corrections

I accidently misspelled Ardath Mayhar's name as Ardath Mayhay in the Stuff Received section last issue. Her book is out from Space And Time, and is titled The Wall. Sorry for any confusion.

Apologies

It looks like my comments on Ace and Dave Smed's last issue were not researched as carefully as they should have been. The time between The Sorcery Within and The Talisman of Alemar is a very long one as series go, but it isn't as long as I first reported it, and there are contributing factors on all sides that explain the publication delay. I made some comments about Berkley that weren't true and weren't fair, and I want to apologize to everyone involved for not being as careful in my reporting as I should have been.

And to everyone, especially Brad Foster, for the reproduction problems of the art in issue #17. I'm still not sure what went wrong, but last issue simply didn't reproduce well, and a lot of the wonderful detail in the cover got lost. The work I've done with book covers isn't up to what I'd hoped, either, so I'm going to hold off on printing any more until I can get the quality up. It makes no sense to take a nice cover and reproduce it in a terrible way, so until I can do the art justice, I won't.

Future
Issues

Next issue will feature the first article in the Behind the Scenes series, by author and Campbell award winner Melissa Scott. Melissa takes us behinds the scenes of her new book The Kindly Ones (A Baen Books paperback). There will also be an interview on Jack Chalker as well as a bibliography, an article on Brian Aldiss (who just won the Hugo for his reference book The Trillion Year Spree) and all the normal stuff.

Laurie is also working on an article about post-apocalyptic agriculture and how our current dependency on technology in the fields will affect us. You will probably be surprised and perhaps frightened by what she's found.

The Pico review section (missing this month due to space problems) will return.

Future issues will feature interviews with Gardner Dozois of Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine and the new Isaac Asimov Presents imprint of first novels and author Joel Rosenberg. They will have lots of material that hasn't been written yet, too, so get busy!

Deadline for the winter issue (which is pretty full already, from the looks of it) is November 15, and should be on your porch for Christmas.

Finally, the long delayed OtherRealms index to reviews may finally see the light of day. At least, I hope so ("This time for sure!")

See you then! ("I take a size seven and a half...")

Historical Realism
Or
Oh My God, Not Another Movement

Harry Turtledove

Copyright 1987 by Harry Turtledove

[Harry Turtledove's latest novel, An Emperor for the Legion, is available from Del Rey Books]

Cyberpunk, or The Movement, or whatever the folks who write it and like it want to call it, has been getting a lot of ink lately. No wonder: it's the Miami Vice of SF. It's fast paced, it's exciting, and it has a lot of flash, all of which draw attention to it. It's not what I want to talk about.

Much more quietly, a fair number of people have started turning out a kind of Science Fiction and Fantasy that used to be rather rare: historical realism is probably as good a name for it as any. For whatever it's worth, I'm one of those people. If cyberpunk is Miami Vice, what we do is more like I, Claudius -- work for the mind as well as the glands.

Now that I've named historical realism, I suppose I ought to define it. One way to do that is to say that it's the place where the techniques of good SF and Fantasy meet those of historical fiction: where the research that goes into the background of the world presented, whether it's a Fantasy world, an alternate history, or the "real" world with odd types of characters running around loose, gives that world a depth and authenticity it couldn't get any other way -- a sense that there's more going on in that world than you or the characters actually see, that pieces of the world don't disappear when you or the characters aren't looking directly at them.

Another, probably better, way is to point at some examples. Here are three: L. Sprague de Camp's Lest Darkness Fall, Poul Anderson's Three Hearts and Three Lions, and H. Beam Piper's Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen. Of the writers whose careers began before 1950, de Camp, Anderson and Piper most clearly exemplify historical realism at its best; indeed, along with their SF and Fantasy, both de Camp and Anderson have published historical fiction. de Camp's historical novels, in particular, rank with those of Mary Renoult as the best and most painless way to get a feel for the history of classical Greece.

Newer authors whose work fits the mold of historical realism include Katherine Kurtz, Barbara Hambly, Judith Tarr, the team of Roland Green and John F. Carr, Susan Shwartz, and myself. Some of us write only Fantasy, some only SF (John Carr says he can't write Fantasy because he doesn't believe in it), and some, like Susan Shwartz and I, do both. One thing most of us have in common is graduate work in medieval history or literature -- Jthere may be more people doing historical realism these days because there are fewer academic jobs around. Or maybe, as Judith Tarr has remarked, it's just that writing fiction is more fun than academic prose. God knows that's true!

Katherine Kurtz was in the UCLA Graduate Program in History when I was an undergrad there, back in the late sixties. Even then she was publishing her Deryni tales, and she has for the most part stuck to the Deryni universe ever since. Her stories draw heavily on her knowledge of English medieval history, church history and canon law; her people are very much part of her quasi-medieval world in their attitudes, not, as is all too often true, misplaced twentieth-century types who somehow happen to be toting swords instead of AK-47s.

Barbara Hambly would have been perfectly at home in the pages of the old Unknown. If ever there was Fantasy with rivets, she writes it: the magic in her stories is as rational and self-consistent as an inherently chaotic business like magic could be. She also has a master's degree in medieval history from UC Riverside, and it shows, for her backgrounds are as meticulous as her magic. She is also honest enough not to leave out the dirt, sweat, and pain that are inevitable parts of any pre-technological society. Add to all that a smooth style and a gift for sharply defined, quirky characters and it's no wonder that she's established a large and loyal audience.

Judith Tarr's trilogy, The Isle of Glass, The Golden Horn, and The Hounds of God explores the boundary between the medieval world and Faerie. In that way, the books remind me of a Christianized version of Anderson's The Broken Sword. But Tarr's work is very much her own. The research she's done for her own studies (she's finishing up a Ph.D at Yale) gives her world -- well, it's actually ours, but with some very strange things going on --Ja you-are-there verisimilitude it couldn't get any other way. Her people have a gentle strength to them that's most appealing.

Writing pastiche is hard work. I know, I've done it. Writing well is tough enough by itself; writing well and trying to sound like someone else at the same time is at least four times as hard. In Great Kings' War, their continuation to Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen, Roland Green and John F. Carr sound so much like H. Beam Piper that they make what's left of my hair stand on end. Only Piper, I would have thought, could have described an ineffectual king as not even reigning over his country, just drizzling on it a bit. But that's Green and Carr, both of whom have also published on their own. They're currently working on the next book of the adventures of Calvin Morrison, AKA Lord Kalvan. Look for it.

Susan Schwartz has a doctorate in medieval literature from Harvard. She describes herself as a renegade academic. She has an upcoming Fantasy trilogy set in a universe where Antony and Cleopatra beat Augustus at Actium instead of the other way around; the first volume, Byzantium's Crown, will be out this spring. She has also appeared often in Analog; she's in the process of turning two powerful stories there, "Heritage of Flight" and "Survivor Guilt," into a novel. Along with that, she has edited several Fantasy anthologies, including Moonsinger's Friends, a collection to Andre Norton: the Festschrift for a distinguished elder professor is an academic tradition of long standing. Shwartz and Judith Tarr are also two of the founders of the cyberprep movement, perhaps out of an atavistic fondness for pink and green. Oh, well, nobody's perfect.

Finally, me. I flunked out of Caltech after my freshman year, and ended up with a Ph.D in Byzantine history from UCLA. Among other things, I've written Byzantine-flavored SF (my Basil Argyros stories, set in a universe where Muhammad converted to Christianity and the Empire stayed strong) and Fantasy (my Tetralogy, whose first volume, The Misplaced Legion and the just released An Emperor for the Legion, drops three cohorts of Caesar's legionaries into a Fantasy world based on eleventh-century Byzantium). I've also done a series of stories, most of them in Analog, set in a world where the Americas were populated, not by Indians, but by Homo Erectus -- the land bridges worked out a little differently than they did here. That series was harder for me to put together; I had to work hard both on anthropology and on real American history from colonial days to close to the Civil War, to see parallels and divergences in my alternate universe, and also to make what I was doing seem authentic.

I doubt historical realism is the wave of the future for SF and Fantasy, as some have claimed the cyberpunks will be. Frankly, I doubt any one movement will swallow the whole genre. I certainly hope not. Diversity is one of the things that makes SF and Fantasy as enjoyable as they are. But to my admittedly biased point of view, the possibilities in twisted history, when it's twisted by people who know what they're doing, are among the most exciting and thought-provoking the field has to offer.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 2)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 2

Two Books on Robert Bloch

Reviewed by
Jerry Boyajian
boyajian@akov68.dec.com

Copyright 1987 by
Jerry Boyajian

The Complete Robert Bloch

Randall D. Larson

Fandom Unlimited Enterprises
P.O. Box 70868
Sunnyvale, CA 94086
126+ pages, $10.00

[*+]

The preface starts with "The Complete Robert Bloch is intended to provide the first complete [emphasis in the original] and comprehensive bibliography of all of the work of Robert Bloch..." Obviously, the quality of such a work depends on its completeness and accuracy. I regret to say that Larson fails on both counts. It would be both time-consuming and silly to both check each entry for accuracy and search down other items. The reason for getting Larson's bibliography would be so that I wouldn't have to do the work myself. So, what I did was to use a variation of the Budrys Test. Algis Budrys, author and book reviewer for Fantasy & Science Fiction judges a biographical reference work based on what it has to say about him. If his entry is accurate (presumably, he knows his life better than anyone), he figures that the rest of the book is equally so; if his entry is full of errors, he figures other entries are likely to be as well. To judge The Complete Robert Bloch, I cross-checked information against two other works: Michael Cook's Monthly Murders (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1982), an index to mystery magazines, and Frank Parnell and Mike Ashley's Monthly Terrors (Greenwood Press, 1985), an index to fantasy and horror magazines.

The first thing that becomes obvious is that Larson is missing (or perhaps ignores) completely the British editions of such American magazines as The Saint Mystery Magazine, Ellery Queens Mystery Magazine and Unknown Worlds. This might be because Larson, if he was aware of these, assumed that these were exact duplicates of the American counterparts. In fact, the contents of these British editions do not match the American ones, but are usually shuffled from various American issues (sometimes there is a 100% match, and usually a 60-75% match, but quite often it's almost a totally separate set of contents). Bibliographically, these are completely different magazines, and bibliographically, they should be treated as such. In some of the cases in which a Bloch story was reprinted in a magazine's British edition, the British appearance followed the American one by a few months. In at least two cases, the British appearance preceded the American one by up to five months, which illustrates the importance of including these citations. I also noted a few other missing citations, but the lack of above mentioned British editions is a major hole. So much for comprehensiveness.

As to the information that is present, I noted several instances in which the citation is a month off (reading, for instance, June when it should be July). In a couple of other cases, it's a year off (e.g. 1971 instead of 1970). The most jarring was a citation that read "Ed McBain Magazine, Jan 1961" -- not one element of that citation is correct. Since I have that issue, I can say that (1) the actual title of the magazine is Ed McBain's Mystery Book, (2) there is no month listed in that issue, and (3) the year is 1960, not 1961.

From what Larson says in his preface, the impression given is that Bloch allowed him access to the author's files for much of the information. This certainly has its advantages in noting obscure appearances (though at least one obscure appearance, cited in Monthly Terrors, is missing), as well as foreign sales. But there are also disadvantages in that the published story may differ in some way from what it says in Bloch's records. This may account for the aforementioned Ed McBain's inaccuracy, for example, or for the lack of the British editions of American magazines, since they probably counted only as a single sale in Bloch's files). Another example is in the case of a story that appeared in Hustler called "The Shrink and the Mink." Undoubtedly, that was Bloch's original title, but it actually appeared in the magazine as "The Shrink and the Nympho." It's my guess that Larson relied too much on Bloch's files, and didn't avail himself of the bibliographic works that had gone before. It's also likely that Larson did not ultimately check his information against actual copies of the works themselves. This is something that any would be bibliographer must do, if possible, to ensure accuracy. It's obvious that Larson is a dedicated fan of Bloch's and that this book is an attempt to show that dedication, but it's equally obvious that in the field of bibliography, he's a fish out of water, and isn't aware of what resources already exist.

All these seem like small quibbles, and indeed, in one respect they are. But, there are two points to be made. First, if one claims to be complete and comprehensive, one should make damn well sure one is. Secondly, if in cross-checking a small amount of information, I find a fair number of incorrect citations, how much can I trust the rest of the information to be accurate? Some typos and a certain percentage of error are inevitable (having compiled and published some indexes myself, I well know this), but the error rate for what I checked I judge to be rather high.

I don't wish to totally denigrate this work. There certainly is some welcome information in here regarding foreign editions of Bloch's work, as well as his work for radio, TV, and the movies (but again, can I trust it?). And the book is full of reproductions of covers of Bloch's books and magazines with Bloch's stories in them. For those who aren't picky about every citation, but are interested in finding out what Bloch has done and where his work can be found, this bibliography can be a useful guide.

Robert Bloch
Starmont Reader's Guide 37

Randall D. Larson

Starmont House
P.O. Box 851
Mercer Island, WA 98040
148+ pages, $8.95

[***]

Unlike The Complete Robert Bloch, this book I can recommend. First, at the back of it, there is an abbreviated bibliography of Bloch's work. It's not as detailed or comprehensive as The Complete Robert Bloch (and, of course, containing the same errors where applicable), as it only lists first appearances, though in the case of short fiction, it also cites reprintings in Bloch's collections). As a guide to finding out what Bloch has done and where he has done it, this is as useful as The Complete Robert Bloch, and not as cluttered with details.

But the bibliography merely serves as something of an appendix to the main body of Robert Bloch, which is a discussion of Bloch's work itself. Larson divides Bloch's work up into discrete groups: his early work, his Cthulhu Mythos stories, his Science Fiction, humorous fiction, psychological terror, and so forth. A brief plot synopsis is given for each of Bloch's short stories and novels, and for the more "important" works, a critical analysis of Bloch's style follows, as well as an assessment of where the work stands in Bloch's oeuvre.

At first, Robert Bloch seems superficial, but it serves its purpose well, being just what the series title suggests it is: a reader's guide to Bloch. It introduces the reader to the subject, and helps him find other work in the same vein as stories that he has sampled. If, for example, you liked one or two of Bloch's Cthulhu Mythos tales, this will tell you what others Bloch has written. If you liked the suspense of Psycho, herein you will find out what else Bloch has written along the same lines, as well as assessments of the relative merits of each work. Larson obviously knows his subject well, and has a readable style. Since he is a fan and not an academic, his approach is more oriented toward whether a particular story succeeds or fails than where it falls in some imagined Literary Scheme of Things.

I'm not sure that the hard-core Bloch fan will get much out of this book. It's really aimed (whether intentionally or not) at the reader who has sampled some of Bloch's work and would like to try more. The person who hasn't read anything of Bloch's but is curious about his work would probably spend his money better by first buying a novel or collection or two of Bloch's (if you like down-to-Earth suspense or terror, I recommend his work) and reading the material itself, and then come to this book to get an idea of what else to look for.

Double Nocturne

Cynthia Felice

DAW Books, $3.50

[****]

Reviewed by
Danny Low
hplabs!dlow

Copyright 1987 by
Danny Low

The basic plot of this book is similar to Jack Vance's Planet of Adventure series. There is a similar richness and "alien-ess" in the cultures described in both stories. Yet, the two stories are very different in flavor.

The planet Islands were cut off during the Homeworld wars. During the interregnum, the stranded colonists developed their own culture. This appears to have been partially due to a faulty AI (Artificial Intelligence) unit that was supposed to govern the planet. The Homeworlds wars are now over. Hark is a member of a team sent to Islands to repair the faulty AI. The first landing party is shot down. Hark, while trying to rescue his fellow crewmates, is forced to land by a storm and is captured by local Islanders. He discovers that the Islanders have a religious matriarchal society where men are treated as inferiors. The Islanders are also divided into three nations and each nation is in turn divided into various political and religious factions. The Islanders are split as to whether they want to reestablish contact with the Homeworlds. Some Islanders see Hark as a means to gain ascendancy over their religious and political rivals. Hark is in a lot of trouble.

Hark has three tasks. The first is to escape from his captors. This is not an easy task as his captors know his value as a prisoner. The second is to rescue his fellow crewmates. However both of them are seriously injured and held under close guard in a hospital. The third is to leave this planet. Unfortunately, one of the two landers is destroyed. The other is damaged and hidden under guard. Furthermore, the AI that controls the mothership will automatically leave Islands for the Homeworlds if it cannot find any trace of the landers or the crew after conducting a standard space search. Hark is not a Vancian super competent hero. In fact, he is foolish, stubborn to the point of being pigheaded, lacks social tact and can take some time to figure out what's going on. On the other hand, he is a rather good looking blond that many of the Islander women find attractive. Their desire for him as a sex object clearly saves Hark in several instances.

Felice has created a credible religious matriarchal society that is clearly not our patriarchal society with all the sex roles exactly reversed. She has clearly thought out how a matriarchal society would be different from a patriarchal society aside from the simple change in the sex of the dominant sex. Much of the society is hinted at but never explained which gives the society more richness and at the same time, gives the reader a sense of culture shock because so much of the society cannot be comprehended. In addition, social statements on sexual equality, while important, is not allowed to get in the way of the story. This is a very well done book and well worthwhile reading.

The Uplift War

Dave Brin

Bantam Books, $4.50
ISBN 0-553-25121-X

Reviewed by
Fred Bals
bals@nutmeg.dec.com

Copyright 1987 by
Fred Bals

It's always dangerous to meet -- and hear -- writers. They never match your preconceptions of what they should be. For instance, I'm unable to enjoy one writer's stories anymore simply because he speaks in a strange whine of a voice. Certainly not his fault, of course. But the problem is exacerbated because he writes "tough-guy" hard-boiled stories. I used to enjoy them a lot. Now, I burst out laughing every time I start reading one of them. All I can hear is the sound of the author's voice in my head.

On the other hand, some writers are exactly like what they write. I recently "met" David Brin at a book-signing. "Met" is in quotes because it's the wrong term. I viewed a performance. In the space of a couple of hours Brin kept up a running monologue as he signed books, alternately happily haranguing the crowd to sign some sort of petition he was flogging, and lambasting the cyberpunks for what he seemed to feel was their negative world-view.

No one would ever accuse David Brin of a negative world-view. He's more like Pollyanna as author. He's so cheerful and positive. I expected people in the crowd to start going into diabetic convulsions at any time.

Before I'm accused of making an ad hominem attack on David Brin, let me note that this unrelieved optimism spills over into his writing, and that is the crux of my problem with The Uplift War. In many ways, the book -- as are the other books of the Uplift series -- is designed as a didactic, instructive manual to promote Brin's view of mankind's relationship with nature and the creatures sharing this planet with us. It is propaganda, pure and simple. Brin himself implies as much in his Postscript to The Uplift War. So, if Brin wants his game on that sort of playing-field, then the reviewer has to take into the consideration the man himself, as well as his writing, in order to review his works adequately.

I have nothing against optimism per se. I play the lottery every week and have been known to go the track once or twice, too. I just prefer my optimism tinged with some realism, which is usually a quick lesson if you're into serious gambling. Perhaps David Brin should take up gambling, as anything approaching realism is sadly lacking in The Uplift War.

The statements that I heard Brin make of his problems with the cyberpunk crew's depressing world-view are very indicative, as the best of cyberpunk extrapolates from the firm foundation of present-day trends. If the worlds evolving from that extrapolation are often bleak, grimy, and depressing, they also can trace their roots quite clearly to the world of today.

Brin's Uplift universe, on the other hand, operates in a vacuum, simply ignoring present-day reality and the way people really act. To give the series its fair due, Brin does postulate a far, far future, one in which Man has evidently come to his senses through unknown means, halted his ecological rape of the planet, and has become rational enough to want to "uplift" the lesser creatures of the Earth -- most notably chimpanzees and dolphins -- for altruistic reasons.

Yet, while Brin addresses some of the "hows" of his universe fairly well, he leaves the "whys" to the reader's imagination. "Whys" such as: why did mankind get so smart and nice all of a sudden? Why uplift other species at all, unless you're going to use them as slave labor (See Jerry was a Man by Heinlein, for instance, as a well-thought-out example of what really would happen if chimps were instilled with intelligence). If you can swallow those base premises with the lack of rational explanation -- which I find difficult -- you may be able to suspend your disbelief enough to enjoy The Uplift War.

The Uplift War relates the story of various humans, aliens, and uplifted chimpanzees on the planet Garth, its animal inhabitants themselves victims of a previous uplifted race's reversion to savagery. Mankind has inherited the planet in their continuing bid to become an acknowledged patron race, an important consideration in a universe where a race's "face" is measured by the number of species it caretakes. Because mankind is thought of as a "wolfling" species, that is, one which has attained intelligence without the dubious benefit of a patron, our credibility among the other members of the Five Galaxies is tenuous at best. Thus, the mandate of the humans in The Uplift War is to restore the dying planet with their "clients," the neo-chimpanzees, as helpmates.

Unfortunately for both men and chimps, the events told in the previous book of the Uplift universe, Startide Rising, has thrown the so-called Five Galaxies into turmoil. A dolphin-crewed starship has made a discovery that may have repercussions upon every race. War has broken out among the Five Galaxies, and one alien race, the bird-like Gubru, has taken the opportunity to seize Garth, embarrass Mankind, and possibly become the neo-chimp's new patron race.

The Uplift War deals with the battle for Garth conducted by an irregular army of one young, human male, an alien female, and various neo-chimps versus the Gubru. A sub-plot that later becomes important to the story's resolution is the search for a mysterious race of "Garthlings," creatures with the potential for uplifting that may have survived genocide.

To praise Brin with faint damns, the plot itself rollicks right along. The Uplift War is an entertaining read if taken at pure mind-candy level. Brin, however, has the annoying habit of interjecting ten-dollar adjectives into otherwise mundane descriptive phrases ("Shadows were stark, acherontic, and surprising"). Being nicer to you than Brin, I'll not that "acherontic" is a Brin-invented adjective derived from "Acheron," the main river in Hades. But except for similar authorial lapses where Brin seems determined to add as many new words to Webster's as possible, the reading is easy and fast-paced.

On the negative side, the characters are so one-dimensional that they'd disappear if turned sideways. All seem created to advance the plot, mere stick figures who act and react to the circumstances Brin throws at them. Brin himself seems to have realized this, as he begins an interesting sub- plot early in the story concerning the growing sexual attraction between the main human male character, Robert Oneagle, and an alien female, Athaclena, in an apparent attempt to develop the characters of both. Yet, what could have become a welcome emotional counter-point to the overwhelming action of the plot is simply allowed to fade away in an unsatisfactory nonresolution.

The neo-chimp characters in the book are more human than ape-like, so much so that one has to keep reminding himself that Brin is talking about nonhuman characters. On the other hand, the Gubru are fairly well- done, their motivations nicely extrapolated from their avian ancestry.

Ultimately, The Uplift War is a direct descendant of the pulp novels of the `50s, with a dash of `70s ecological awareness tossed in for good measure. For readers who ask no more from their science fiction than a good, entertaining action yarn, The Uplift War should be satisfying. But for those who like to be challenged by what they read -- even when that challenge leads us into depressing, bleak, worlds, The Uplift War is unsatisfying fare indeed.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 3)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 3

An Interview with Mike Resnick

[This interview was held on October 25, 1986
on the Delphi timesharing system by Sysop
Mike Banks (Kzin) and other Delphi members.

If you are interested in joining the Science Fiction group, the local access number can be located by dialing 800-544-4005. Log onto the computer with account JOINFICTION and password URANUS which will qualify you for a special discount]

Kzin> OK. It's my pleasure to introduce Mike Resnick, author of Tor's current bestseller Santiago, the "Tales of the Galactic Midway Series," the "Velvet Comet Series," et al. Anything you want to say at the start, Mike?

Resnick> Hello, all. No, I think I'll just start by answering questions. After all the lectures I give, it's a pleasure not to have to make an opening statement that is slyly geared to eliciting easy questions.

Bob> Uh, excuse me, Mr. Resnick, but where do you get your ideas?

Resnick> I wish I knew. I got the notion for the carnival series from The Elephant Man, which I felt left an interesting story untold. For Walpurgis III, it was an argument with my wife. For Santiago, it was a brief speech in the Leone film, Duck You Sucker!

Bob> Do they pop unbidden into your mind, or do you have to sit down and think about them?

Resnick> Ideas are a dime a dozen. After you've been writing as long as I have (25 years), they not only pop unbidden into your head, but you've already sifted through and edited them by the time they make it to your consciousness.

Ralph> Mike, what's the count on books you've written now?

Resnick> Ralph, I've written 19 SF books, and about 270 others, all but a handful under pseudonyms.

Kzin> Walpurgis III is one of my favorites of yours.

Resnick> I had been writing a weekly column on the supernatural for 4 years, and had totally backgrounded a world that had been colonized by Satanists. But I had no story to tell. Then one night Carol and I had one of our few knock-down drag-outs. I stalked down the stairs thinking that she was the most evil woman in the universe and before I hit the bottom stair I had the story (and ran back to kiss her and tell her so): What happens when a society that pays lip service to Evil is confronted by Evil Incarnate?

Kzin> Great...especially in the mood you may have been in. Do you find the story development more difficult than the inspiration?

Resnick> Certainly. Inspiration is easy; mechanics and technique are more difficult. My own recurring problem is that I frequently choose the wrong viewpoint character for the opening chapter, and then have to totally rewrite it.

Kzin> ...made much easier with a word processor of course.

Bob> Of course... How many times do you find yourself rewriting a story?

Resnick> This will sound like a glib answer: as many times as Carol sends me back to the drawing board. She is my wife, my co-author in all but the typing, and my editor. I have never listened to her advice and had a story fail to sell first time out of the box, whereas I occasionally ignore her advice, and usually have a much harder time selling. She has mastered the most difficult discipline, which is the art of finding stories and characters that play off MY strengths, rather than selecting those she would write were she at the computer.

Philipob1> What kind of schedule do you have for rewriting?

Resnick> My schedule is usually this: Carol and I will discuss and research as story until I'm ready to write it (i.e., I know every scene, every character, etc.). This can take from a week to five years. Next, I write a brief outline and obtain a contract. Then I go to work. I write 4 or 5 nights a week, usually from 10:00 PM to about 4:00 AM. I leave what I've done on the dining room table for Carol (who wakes up before I do), and when I get up, her corrections and comments are waiting for me. If it's a easy fix, I do it then and there, and write more new material in the evening. If I was 'way off base. I rewrite the whole damned thing at night. Usually I write between 10 and 18 pages at a sitting. Once in a while less, rarely more.

Kzin> Mike, just how fast do you type?

Resnick> I'm self-taught, but I'd guess I do a good 50 words a minute. Back in my anonymous hack days, I used to write and sell 150-200 pages a week, so I know I'm fast. Now I'd rather be good, and you can't know what a luxury it is to be able to rewrite and polish your prose unless you've been denied the opportunity, as I was in the sex and gothic fields in the 60s and early 70s.

Stan> What other names have you used for SF writing?

Resnick> None, for SF writing. All my pseudonyms were in hack fields: soft-porn, doctor/nurse romances, gothics, that kind of shit. I'm proud of my SF, and I'm happy to use my own name of it.

Philipob1> Do you have any thoughts on the future of SF, where its going, what's going to be popular, etc .

Resnick> Yes. I think traditional good-storytelling will carry the day. Critics and editors didn't kill the New Wave; lack of sales did. I think the same will hold true for cyberpunk. We'll keep the best of Gibson's methodology and throw the rest on history's junk heap. In fact, I think cyberpunk has a lot going against it, because its advocates are trying to narrow the definition of what is already a category field, whereas the New Waveicles claimed that their stuff was too broadbased to be included in the narrow confines of SF. Which is why guys like John Shirley and Bruce Sterling and the rest are cutting their own financial throats with their polemics. Further, except for Gibson, I don't see that any of the cyberpunks has sold very well. The best-seller lists still include our dinosaurs (Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke), and our story tellers (Anthony, Foster, McCaffrey, Chalker, [blush] me, and the like.

Bob> What is cyberpunk??? And how does it differ from new wave?

Resnick> Well, that's a tricky question. The term was invented by Gardner Dozois, and picked up by a handful of our Youngish Turks. Essentially, it's near-future, high-tech stuff with information-laden sentences. The prose is very dense. Example of non-cyberpunk prose: He turned on the faucet and the water flowed out. Example of information- laden prose: He turned on the fresh-water faucet and the water trickled out. Same action, but much more information about a society that's running out of fresh water. See Gibson's works for the best examples.

Kzin> But wouldn't it be easier, in the first example, to simply write "He turned on the faucet?" Water flow is implied. In the second example, saying the "water trickled out" is important.

Resnick> I think it would be easier -- but I write simple, bare-bones prose. Cyberpunk has two non-commercial problems that I see: one, it's harder to read, because you daren't skim, and two, it's limited to the next couple of centuries, since even Arthur Clarke couldn't extrapolate a high- tech computerized society much beyond that.

Bob> Which of the 'old dinosaurs' do you like the best. Did any have an effect on your writing style?

Resnick> My favorite dinosaurs are C. L. Moore, Ray Bradbury, and Fritz Leiber. No, I don't think any SF writer influenced my style; you must remember that I was 15 million words into my career before I turned to writing serious SF, and by then I had pretty much developed my own voice and style...

Kzin> Which of your own books is your favorite?

Resnick> My favorite is Adventures, because it was far and away the most enjoyable to write. My best in print is Santiago. My best of those not yet in print is probably The Dark Lady (Tor, November 1987). But since every writer ought to believe that his current book is his best, I'm working on one titled Ivory: A Legend of Past and Future, which I think will be better than any I've done.

Kzin> Adventures and Ivory are two books out of Africa as it were...you have a third one?

Resnick> Actually, I have three more. On the contract that I'm negotiating with Tor, there will be one entitled Paradise, which will be a science-fictionalization of the history of Kenya. And in the next 2-3 years, I'll be writing companion books (not sequels) entitled Purgatory (a stfnalization of the history of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe) and Inferno (Uganda).

Outdoorsman> All from Tor?

Resnick> I hope so. I've been very happy with them. But right at the moment, the only one I'm negotiating with Tor is Paradise.

Stan> by any chance was one of your earlier books called Birthright: The Story of Man?

Resnick> Yes, it was. Birthright: The Book of Man, actually. It's been a nice income maker for me: I've sold it to a number of countries, and it's earned about 300% more abroad than here.

Stan> Anybody that could kill off the human race like you did, ain't someone you are going to convince easily of anything he doesn't what to be convinced of!

Resnick> The human race had a pretty fair run of it in Birthright. As any of the characters in the book might say, next time we'll do it better. I enjoyed writing it. In truth, it's not one of my favorites, in that it's probably the only one I've written that could have been published, as is, in the 1940s.

Kzin> What conventions will you be attending the rest of this year and next?

Resnick> I'm toastmastering Lunacon next March in NYC. I always hit Midwestcon and Rivercon. And in 1988, I'm toastmastering the worldcon in New Orleans.

Bob> What got you into writing? I mean, any kind of writing, not just SF?

Resnick> My mother was a writer -- not a very successful one -- but she gave me an interest in it. And when I looked around for a profession upon leaving high school, I realized that there was an awful lot of money to be made if you were a quick and facile writer. I was just bright enough to realize that no 20-year-old has anything important to say, so I forsook Art for 15 years and became an anonymous millionaire. And, as my pal Barry Malzberg says, you learn an awful lot writing for a penny a word that they don't teach you in creative writing courses. Unlike most writers, who hate writing and love having written, I enjoy the actual act of writing. I feel guilty when I go more than 2 days without working at my computer, and I'm at my happiest when a chapter comes out exactly the way I had hoped it would when I sat down to write it.

Bob> Any hints?

Resnick> The usual: writers write. Non-writers talk about writing. There are various ways to "practice" while you're learning your craft. For dialogue, I know of no better way than taking a play you didn't like and re- writing it. Ditto for short stories, if only to learn structure. Novels are supposed to be hardest -- I don't find them so, but I've been writing them all my life -- because most writers never master the ability to pace a novel. You've got to be able to look at your first 40 pages and know how to structure th next 300 from there -- not to hit your climax too soon, not to write at a scream, not to spend so long building that you become dull. It's an instinct, but an acquired one.

Kzin> Tough job, and I agree. I guess the big question is how many novels it takes to acquire that skill.

Resnick> Well, it not only varies with the writer, but also with the type of novel. Now that I'm a "lead" writer, my publishers want thicker books -- and I've learned that structuring a 600-pager is a hell of a lot different -- not necessarily harder, but definitely different -- from structuring a 275- pager.

Kzin> Why do they want thicker books? So they can raise the price?

Resnick> Absolutely. Lead books tend, these days, to go about $3.75; the rule in the pub industry is a penny a page. Therefore, they want a thick enough ms. so that the typesetter can come up with those 375 pages, which probably means 500 to 600 mss. pages. Just as lesser-known writers are required to turn in shorter mss., because their names on a cover won't justify a price of $3.50 or $3.75.

Stan> what attracted you to SF specifically?

Resnick> I've always been an SF reader. My science is nonexistent, but I do write morality plays -- and it's a lot easier to set up a moral parable if you've got all of Time and Space to play with. And, Ellison to the contrary, it's easier to sell and to make $$$ if your book is marketed as SF.

Kzin> What's the hardest part about writing for you, Mike?

Resnick> The beginning. As I said earlier in the interview, I frequently toss out two or three beginnings before I come up with a start I like. As I get closer to the end, I become more aware of my own mortality. I become convinced that I'm going to wrap my car around a tree with 43 pages to go, and they're going to farm out the finish to Lin Carter. So I race like crazy. Once the book is finish, I'm immortal again -- until I get toward the end of the next book.

Nap2> I run a SF SIG on a local board that seems to have mostly Star Trek types. How do I get them turned onto written SF?

Resnick> Star Trek is a swipe -- probably unknowing -- from Van Vogt's The Voyage of the Space Beagle. Have them read it and see what happens. Or, have them read Fred Brown's "Arena," the only SF story that Trek knowingly adapted, and see if you can get them discussing the differences...and reading more SF.

NowBob> Do you think that anybody can become a good writer?

Resnick> No, I don't. I think anyone can become an adequate writer -- which is what the racks are full of. Good is a little harder. Also, timing helps. A good fantasy writer would have starved before JRR Tolkein and Lin Carter turned fantasy from a sometime thing into a marketable category. And Barry Malzberg, probably the finest literary writer the field has ever seen, might have made a fortune if he'd come 10 years earlier or later, instead of just scraping by and getting lost among the New Waveicles.

NowBob> Who is Barry Malzberg? What did he write?

Resnick> Malzberg wrote some 25 novels and 300 short stories from 1969 to 1976. Galaxies and Herovit's World were the best of them -- probably the best novels of the 1970s. He won an award for Beyond Apollo.

Ellen> Can I have your autograph? <grin>

Resnick> I'd be delighted. And you have no idea the things I have been asked to autograph in the wee small hours of conventions! I know I was shocked; probably no one else here would be. But I signed anyway... I can tell you my favorite SF groupie story, if you wish?

Kzin> sure, Mike.. Go ahead!

Resnick> I was sitting on a panel with Budrys, Sheckley, and Dozois at Windycon a few years ago, and I was supposed to meet Carol (my wife) in the hallway outside the panel room when it was over. As I was looking for her in this huge crowd, a girl, maybe 15 years old, walks up and says, "Didn't I just see you on that panel?" I said that she did, and she says, "Are you a pro?" I said I was, and she says, "Wanna fuck?" Now, this girl is younger than my daughter, and I gently explained that I didn't want to fuck... So she lowers her head in thought for a moment, then looks up brightly, and says, "Well, can you point out another pro to me?"

Ellen> Wonderful! Did you?

Resnick> I pointed out Algis Budrys. I don't think he's forgiven me yet.

Ellen> Was his wife there?

Resnick> Of course. I was flabbergasted. But that was years ago, and I've heard and seen a lot stranger things since. I really thought only rock stars had groupies. I now think the science fictional definition of Virgin is a girl who hasn't been to bed with Bob Tucker!

Ellen> Who (or whom) is he??? (or should I know?)

Resnick> Wilson Tucker, author of The Long Loud Silent and The Year of the Quiet Sun...but more importantly, a Truefan since 1933.

Kzin> Well-known personality at cons, especially in the Midwest...he doesn't look that old.

JIMSB> What is your favorite book?

Resnick> My favorite of my own works is Adventures, because it was a joy to write; my best (among those that have seen print) is Santiago. My favorite novel is Nikos Kazantzakis' The Last Temptation of Christ, and my favorite SF novel is Olaf Stapledon's The Star Maker. And while we're at it, my favorite films are Lawrence of Arabia and They Might be Giants, my favorite plays are Sweeney Todd and Pacific Overtures, my favorite food is veal parmesan and my favorite pasttime is being with my wife. It's a dull, satisfying life. Oh, and my favorite colt and filly are Seattle Slew and Ruffian.

NowBob> Did you ever try to talk about religion in your works? also, do you think that authors can write about religion in SF, and get away with it?. I know that in Dune, Herbert tries to.

Resnick> I've had no problem writing about religion. In fact, I have a novel, still in print from Signet (its 4th printing, actually -- blush!) entitled The Branch, that is about the Jewish Messiah (as opposed to Jesus, who wasn't). My lead character in Eros Decending (Signet, 1985) is Dr. Thomas Gold, a Jerry Falwell type who is overcome with passion for an alien prostitute... My narrator of Adventures is the Right Reverend Honorable Doctor Lucifer Jones, whose religion is a little something him and the Lord worked out betwixt themselves one afternoon, and whose Tabernacle, once established, becomes known as The Best Little Tabernacle in Nairobi. A major character in Santiago (Tor, 1986) is Father William, a gun-wielding, overeating, bounty-hunting preacher who sends criminals off to work in the pits of hell a little ahead of schedule and one of the demonstrations (they're not really chapters) in Birthright is about religion. So yeah, I do write about it quite a bit. I have given God speaking roles in 3 books and stories. Reason: it would be sacreligeous for a Jew or a Christian to do so, so I seem to have become his Literary executor.

NowBob> What do you think of hard SF?

Resnick> I think it's an art in itself, and I appreciate it when it doesn't interfere with what's important. But to me, the only purpose of serious literature (and SF qualifies as such) to is to chronicle the struggles of the human heart against itself to the extent that a hard SF background detracts from this, it's detrimental (in my admittedly minority opinion). Thus, I can appreciate Neuromancer because the high tech -- and man's adaptation to it -- WAS the story. Whereas I didn't think much of the classic Mission of Gravity, because it was nothing but a mathematical exercise in building a high-gravity planet and hoping the readers couldn't catch any errors.

NowBob> Did you read A Mote in God's Eye?And what did you think of it?

Resnick> I read The Mote in God's Eye, and liked the 2nd and 3rd parts; the 1st and 4th parts left me cold. I must confess, at great personal risk given his popularity, that Niven has never been one of my favorites. I find his prose clumsy, his characters shallow, and his science brilliant. Since I don't rank him among my favorites, I guess you know what's important to me in an author. I did like his Ringworld concept, but he didn't do anything but describe it.

NowBob>You can use the forces of science as an enemy, especially in short stories. Niven carries that off well.

Resnick> Sure you can. Bradbury made a career of it, without ever understanding the forces of science. (Which is not a put-down: he's one of my favorites.)

NowBob> Well, in Neutron Star, tidal forces play the role of a main adversary. But the mystery of what the killer force is kept me on my toes. I also liked the characterization of the puppeteers.

Resnick> He's not a bad writer; please don't misunderstand. I simply meant that his strengths, of which he has many, are precisely those that don't appeal to me; and his weaknesses, of which we all have some, are those that bother me most.

NowBob> Did you ever read A Canticle for Leibowitz?

Resnick> Brilliant book, by a brilliant writer. I wish he hadn't disappeared for a quarter of a century after writing it. (He's back this year, after all this time, as a co-editor of some anthology.)

NowBob> I heard it was one of top five SF novels ever, which include: The Demolished Man, The Left hand of Darkness, A Canticle for Leibowitz, something by Zelazny, and another which totally escapes me.

Resnick> There's no official list. My own top 5 (modestly excluding 5 of my own books) would be The Star Makers and Last and First Men by Stapledon, Galaxies and Herovit's World by Malzberg, and probably Dimension of Miracles by Sheckley. But I'd put two Bester's in the top dozen.

tan> Have you read anything by James Hogan?? What do you think of him??

Resnick> I've not read any Hogan, though we share the same agent. I find that I tend not to read any fiction when I'm writing, not that I'll swipe ideas or characters, but that I subconsciously start writing in the author's voice, and sometimes it takes me a day or two to catch it, which means a day or two wasted... And since I write 8 or 9 months a year, and am contracted way into the future, my fiction reading suffers accordingly. As I keep saying, writers don't have time to read.

Tim> Have you ever had a chance to read any S. Lem -- comments?

Resnick> I read Solaris, which I liked somewhat, and Tales of Prix the Pilot, which I didn't. From the title, I had rather hoped Prix would be like Italo Calvino's Cosmicomics, but it wasn't. And I hated Memoirs Found in a Bathtub. But I'll be lenient on Lem, and blame it on the translator.

Tim> Have any of your works been translated? How do you feel about the translations?

Resnick> I've sold 13 of my SF novels to Germany, 8 to Italy, 6 to Japan, a few to Holland and the Scandanavian countries, and some to Spain. Since I have trouble with English and am even worse in other languages, I have no idea how the translations read, but I hope the translator paid more attention to them that the cover artist did. It's very disconcerting to get your high-tech novel in the mail from some distant land, and see a naked barbarian on the cover. And, in my Japanese translations, they come with attached bookmarks. On one of the bookmarks there is a photo of me, surrounded by seven little Japanese gentlemen in suits and ties, and we're all looking happy, and smiling at the camera. But I never posed for that picture. They cut my photo out of Locus and pasted it on someone else's body, and I'm going crazy trying to figure out what I'm doing there and what we're all so happy about! Nobody out there wants to know how to sell books, or who's buying, or how to read a contract? This is a first!

Stan> Can you tell us how to write them?

Resnick> The standard answer is to apply seat of pants to seat of chair and type. However, there are a couple of tricks. One of them is to write an outline (for yourself, not your publisher), and include about 7 to 10 things that must happen in each chapter. These can be anything from lighting a stick of pot to killing an emperor -- it'll give you an idea of how the book's action flows. If you come to "Gets into trouble" followed shortly thereafter by "Gets out of trouble" you'll quickly see that there's a little something lacking in your plotting. Also, people tell beginning writers to draw upon their friends for characters. I don't know about you, but my friends are a pretty dull lot: they spend all their time reading and/or writing. Your lead characters should be unique constructs, of course, but your bits players can be taken from the persona of actors and actresses. In other words, give a character Peter Lorre's speech patterns, and his language will be unique and always ring true, because you know how Lorre talks -- and if you make the character a 6-foot female, no one will know it's Lorre, or give a nasty guy Sydney Greenstreet's reactions but Clifton Webb's diction and Darren McGavin's looks, and it'll ring true, sound true, and not be spotted. Now, please understand: this is a trick for spear-carriers only. If you haven't got a couple of lead characters who are uniquely your own, you aren't ready to write your book yet. Which leads me to another point: most failed books fail because they were written too soon (not too fast; too soon). You can't stare at a blank screen or a blank sheet of paper and wait for inspiration. Inspiration is the impetus, but then mechanics take over, and you've got to meticulously work out what your characters feel and believe and must do, and how your plot must thread its way across the pages. And when a competent author produces a turkey, 99 times out of 100 he sat down and wrote it before he'd done his homework (by which I mean his mechanics, not his research).

Stan> Earlier you defined cyberpunk. Can you define New Waveicles?

Resnick> The New Wave came about in the early 1960s, originating in England and being imported to the US by Judy Merrill and Harlan Ellison (in editorial capacities). Basically, it was a generation of writers who felt confined by the accepted definition of science fiction, and wanted to expand the parameters of the field: keywords were "inner space," "speculative fiction," "experimental writing," and "mainstream." The latter was the operative word: they felt that SF was a ghetto. In England, J.G. Ballard was the foremost exponent of the New Wave school writing; at various times, Malzberg, Silverberg, Ellison, Delaney, Zelazny, Spinrad, Disch and others were considered New Wavers here. But all of them denied it, while vigorously defending the concept of the New Wave. Ellison in particular didn't want his stuff classified or advertised as SF because he'd seen the success Vonnegut and Bradbury had by "breaking category," in other words, by being accepted as mainstream writers. Well, the New Wave died, not because of editorial or critical rejection, but because it couldn't sell in the marketplace. These days, of course, the average SF writer makes more money than the average mainstream writer, SF books dominate the bestseller lists, and no one except Ellison minds being labeled as an SF writer. Still, it was good for the field, because we kept the better experiments and incorporated them into the body of the literature, and got rid of the rest.

Stan> Why Africa?

Resnick> I went to Africa last winter, and am going back after the worldcons in 1987 and 1988. I have always been fascinated by British East Africa -- the history, the animals, everything about it -- and have incorporated it, in bits and pieces, into more of my SF books than you might think. In fact, Adventures was set entirely in Africa. The next 4 books I plan to write all have their basis in African events, and since I have signed lucrative contracts on them, the IRS allows me to deduct my safaris.

Stan> Is Adventures the full title? Is it still in print?

Resnick> It's in print from Signet. It's a parody of every bad B movie and pulp story ever set in Africa, and lampoons Tarzan, elephant's graveyards, slave trading, ivory poaching, lost races, naked white goddesses, etc. I noticed that I mentioned Lucrative book contracts. This is a necessity. It's hard to get the IRS to allow you to deduct a $10,000 safari as research for a $5000 book.

Stan> Yeah, but you're doing more than 1!

Resnick> I'm spreading the books out so that I can spread the safaris out. Also, we go with a private guide, a former white hunter who allows us to make our own itinerary, introduces us to old-time hunters and explorers with stories to tell, takes us to locations we want (or have) to see that normal safaris don't go to, and we don't have to share his time or 4-wheel- drive Landrover with anyone else.

Stan> need a baggage carrier??

Resnick> If you knew how many shots were required, you might not volunteer. I felt like a goddamned pincushion between the cholera, malaria, yellow fever, gamma globulin, diphtheria, typhoid, polio, and tetanus.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 4)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 4

Scattered Gold

Reviews by
Charles de Lint

Copyright 1987 by
Charles de Lint

I'd like to mention something straight away which is that I prefer to talk about books I like. Approaching this column, I do so as though I were sitting down with you to talk about a few good books over a beer or a cup of coffee. So While I'll warn you away from the odd clunker or disappointment -- as we would do for each other in such conversation -- mostly we'll be talking about the Good Stuff.

I don't consider myself a critic -- I'll leave that to weightier souls -- but more a reviewer. Though what I really want to do is just sit down and chat.

As you get to know my tastes, you'll be able to gauge for yourself whether we think along similar lines, or whether I'm so far out in left field you don't know what I'm doing here in the first place, mouthing off about books and the like. Either way, I hope the actual reviews (yes, yes -- we'll be getting to them) will steer you to some good reads, or conversely, save you some cash on a clunker you were just about ready to spend your hard-earned money on.

The title for this column, by the way, comes from a fiddle tune by the Scots bard Robin Williamson called Her Scattered Gold. She is the Muse, and her gold is that ten percent of the Good Stuff -- by Sturgeon's reckoning -- that's scattered in amongst the foxfire, flash, and fizzle.

But enough preamble. Let's get on to that Good Stuff.

Land of Dreams
by James P. Blaylock

[*****]

Arbor House, August, 1987
264pp, $16.95, Cloth
ISBN 0-87795-898-X

Jim Blaylock won the 1986 World Fantasy Award for his short story "Paper Dragons" (Imaginary Lands, Robin McKinley, ed. Ace, 1985) -- a story that six years ago was a part of the original draft for this novel. As the mood's similar, those of you familiar with that story should have an inkling as to what lies in wait for you in the pages of Land of Dreams. If you haven't....

Imagine a Dickensian cast of characters in a Northern California that never was, where the fog rolls in from the sea to creep down the streets of the village of Rio Dell with its haunted orphanage and ramshackle buildings; where 19th century technology mingles with magic and every twelve years during the Solstice a carnival appears, crabs migrate from the ocean, curious figures are seen in the fields and woods nearby, and the otherworldly Land of Dreams can be seen and sometimes crossed over to by means of various potions.

The principal characters are three young orphans: Helen the artist who paints in the orphanage's attic with a ghost for company; the pudgy Skeezix who's as much concerned with food as he is adventure; and Jack, whose father crossed over to the Land of Dreams during the last Solstice.

Blaylock's principal skill is as a stylist -- his prose is so rich it literally sings -- and a creator of idiosyncratic characters that are either utterly charming, or utterly evil. His earlier books were much like those described as Jack's preference -- "the sort of book that didn't seem to need a beginning or end, that could be opened at any page without suffering for it -- slow, candlelight reading." Land of Dreams shows that Blaylock can plot when he wants to -- but then a Blaylock plot proves to be just as idiosyncratic as his characters can be.

The carnival appears, run by the insidious Dr. Brown, who is sneaking about trying to steal a bottle of potion that was given to Jack by a mouse- sized man in a mouse costume. Jack's friend, Dr. Jensen, is collecting giant artifacts found washed up on the shore -- an enormous shoe, an immense set of spectacles. Jack and Skeezix follow clues that they hope will lead them to the Land of Dreams through one of the carnival's rides....

In other words, a great deal goes on, in fact there's the usual rushing about that one comes to expect from a Blaylock novel, but rather than remaining unresolved, this time Blaylock ties it all together with some fascinating plot twists, as well as some original ideas about magic and time. And one can just imagine the grin on Blaylock's face as he trots out a fight between miniature people using salt shakers and forks for weapons, or the strange wheezing sound that accompanies one of the somewhat human- looking Solstice fish drawn out of the ocean. His vision is slightly askew, but its strength is such that it allows us to see our own world through his glasses, and realize that there are wonders all around us, as magical as in any tale.

Stylistically, I'd place this on a shelf all its own, but very near to John Crowley's Little, Big (Bantam, 1981) and AEgypt (Bantam, 1987), Paul Hazel's Winterking (Atlantic Monthly Press, 1985), Evelyn E. Smith's The Copy Shop (Doubleday, 1985) or even Jonathon Carroll's The Land of Laughs (Viking, 1980) -- all of which undoubtably tells you more about me than Blaylock's work.

You're better off reading it for yourself, and discovering the magic in Blaylock's charming prose on your own. But for those of you who did read "Paper Dragons," if you remember that enormous crab everyone was waiting for --

But no. That would be telling.

To Make Death Love Us
by Sovereign Falconer

[***]

Doubleday, Summer 1987, 181pp, Cloth
ISBN 0-385-17628

Every once in a while Doubleday slips in a truly original Fantasy or SF novel -- with very little fanfare, no advertising, often not even as a part of their SF/Fantasy line. The above mentioned smith title is a good example. Or Joe Landsale's charming The Magic Wagon (1986) that was marketed as a Western. Or how about To Make Death Love Us by Craig Kee Strete writing as Sovereign Falconer?

The book is a fascinating character study of six members of a carnival freakshow who, during a storm, become trapped in a truck balanced on the edge of a cliff. Past and present mingle as the carnies struggle to win their freedom, while Strete's deft ability to show emotion without sentimentality provides a solid backbone of understanding that reaches out beyond the pages to touch the reader.

(This column appears to be developing a carnival theme. By that reckoning, perhaps I should find room in it to have a look at Dean R. Koontz's wonderful Twilight Eyes (Berkley, 1987) as well. If there's time....)

I don't really want to discuss what the Fantasy element is in To Make Death Love Us -- the novel's so short, and tightly written, that if I was to say much more about it, I'd just be spoiling it for you. But I will say that it has to do with that wonderfully odd and entirely appropriate title.

The only unfortunate thing that I have to mention is that the book's divided into very short sections and in some of them Strete makes that cardinal error of telling instead of showing -- slightly spoiling what could well have been a much better book.

War for the Oaks
by Emma Bull

[****]

Ace, July, 1987, 309pp
$3.50, Paperback
ISBN 0-441-87073-2

Before this first novel, Emma Bull was better known as the attractive half of the editing team for the Liavek shared-world series (sorry, Will) and as a short story writer. But for all her lack of experience with novel-length fiction, she still comes up aces.

In Scottish folklore there are two warring factions of Fairy -- the Seelie (which could well come from the world "sainly" which also means "blessed") and Unseelie Courts. In Bull's Minnesota folklore (entirely her own, I might add) those same Courts are still busily at war -- only this time it's in the contemporary streets of Minneapolis, rather than the highlands. Caught up in their struggle is the young musician Eddi McCandry who's been unwillingly drafted to fight the good fight.

There's plenty of excitement in this novel, but its true heard is the relationship between Eddi and the phouka that the Seelie Court assigned to guard her. Never mind the magic, or the fact that the phouka's a creature of Fairy (and Bull handles both with consummate skill), its the relationship here that's honest and draws you in.

Combined with elves playing rock'n'roll, the very real trials and tribulations of a new band trying to get off the ground, and the fairy element, this is a contemporary fantasy that takes a large step ahead of the ever-growing pack. There are so many find touches, from the song titles used to name chapters to the perfect balance bull uses to play the contemporary world against the realm of Fairy.

If you like some grittiness with your magic, this is what you've been looking for -- a fairy tale set to a rock'n'roll beat. And to complete the musical connections, at this summer's Fourth Street Fantasy Faire in Minneapolis, Bull had a party in a local bar to launch the book, complete with electric traditional band Boiled in Lead to put everybody in the proper mood. Wish I could've been there.

Wyrms
by Orson Scott Card

[***]

Arbor House, July, 1987, 263pp, $16.95, Cloth
ISBN 0-87795-894-7

Seventh Son
by Orson Scott Card

[****]

Tor, July, 1987, 241pp, $17.95, Cloth
ISBN 0-312-93019-4

Some time ago -- way back in the 1970's -- Orson Scott Card burst upon the SF/Fantasy scene, writing some good books, copping some awards and big advances, and all sorts of people started dumping on him -- not so much because they didn't like what he was writing, but because they felt he hadn't paid his dues and didn't deserve the recognition he was getting.

Card withdrew for a while, then came back with fiction stronger and better than ever, copping some more awards and one assumes some more big advances, and once again people are lining up to dump on him. And again it seems that the greater portion with nothing to say about him are cutting him down, not because of his writing but because he's winning awards they feel they should have won. Because they feel he's not writing their version of Great Literature. Or, as in a recent case chronicled in the now-defunct Fantasy Review, because the critic is putting her own bizarre interpretations upon the thematic thrust of his work, attacking things that just aren't there.

It's too bad. With his short fiction and novels, Card's giving readers some good solid helpings of the Good Stuff.

Wyrms, though, just squeaks by. On the surface, it's a quest novel set on a distant planet where, through genetic manipulation, a number of various humanoid races exist. The young Heptarch (read Empress of the world) Patience journeys across her world with an unlikely band of companions (well, only unlikely if you've never read a quest novel before) to confront her planet's greatest foe -- the Unwyrm.

The writing here is as good as Card's writing ever is, and at the heart of the novel is a symbolic journey through the human heart and mind that rewards the reader far more than the simplistic plot would seem to promise. But there's too much a sense of predestiny involved. While I was pleasantly engaged through my reading of Wyrms -- strong characters, insightful speculation, deft writing -- I was never really taken with the quest; never really feared that it would not succeed.

Ah, but Seventh Son. Now that's another matter.

I've been waiting for a writer to use the Matter of America properly -- Native beliefs, folk lore, and magic, the frontier -- and Card does just that in this first mostly self-contained installment of a projected six novel sequence set in an alternate American where magic works, mostly through the various "knacks" that people have -- second sight, dowsing, charms and hexes, etc.

The opening section of the novel chronicling the young Alvin Miller's birth first appeared in Asimov's (August, 1986). From that point we skip ahead in time to find Alvin as a young boy, protected from danger by his family and neighbours and a mysterious benefactor who never appears on stage in this book. (If you're curious as to who this is and don't want to wait for the second volume of this series I recommend "Runaway" in the June 1987 issue of Asimov's.)

Alvin is the seventh son of a seventh son, destined for greatness, perhaps even to become a Maker -- one who can use Earth, Wind and Fire to create new things -- though there hasn't been a Maker in hundreds of years. His great enemy is Water -- the unmaking element -- but while Water threatens him time and again in this first novel, it is the enemy's more human agents that dominate the stage here, especially the preacher who teaches that all knacks and the like are the work of the devil and Alvin's brother-in-law Armor-of-God who suns all magic and knacks.

Card's ability with characterization shines throughout this book. The antagonists are realistic -- not wholly evil; more disturbing because they are good men led astray. The protagonists are wonderful, especially Taleswapper, a wandering vagabond-type who trades stories to get by in the world. The narrative voice has an old-fashioned country flavour to it without ever descending into an incomprehensible dialect.

This is Card at his best -- mixing the fresh and the familiar in a heady brew that would charm even his severest critics...if they'd only read it. Unfortunately, they won't, although I don't doubt they'll critique it all the same. But that shouldn't stop the rest of you from enjoying it. And if, like me, you find that Seventh Son and "Runaway" have only whetted your appetite for more Hatrack River stories, the September 1987 Asimov's has yet another installment, "Carthage City."

The Shelter
by Mary Kittredge
&
Kevin O'Donnell, Jr.

[**+]

Tor, August, 1987
376pp, $3.95 Paperback
ISBN 0-812-52066-1

The city of Meadbury is sentient and takes care of itself. Those who wish to harm it, or don't fit in, are either dealt with in a permanent manner, or recycled to become productive citizens.

It's not a new idea -- John Shirley's City Come A-Walkin' springs to mind as another example, and a good one -- but there's nothing wrong with using an old idea. The real problem with this first collaboration between Mary Kittredge and her husband is that the book's narrative thrust has a certain lack of focus.

The prose here is good -- it's smooth and lean, and that's partly what kept me reading. I was also interested in the characters: Nicki Pialosta, the gung-ho news reporter; Tommy Riley, the teenager in love with her; Ben Ibrani, the newspaper editor and closet rebel; and many of the others. The trouble is, there's something lacking in the novel's multiple viewpoint narrative. We're with characters at the beginning of the book, then lose them for stretches of fifty pages at a time. Major characters don't take on their larger roles until two-thirds of the way through the book.

The root at the heart of many horror novels is silly to begin with -- vampires, monsters, sentient cities -- so the writer has to work twice as hard to keep the tension building. Mostly it's done through characterization, especially a strong sharp focus on one or more characters that the reader can follow throughout the book. When this focus becomes diffused, the reader starts to think about the silliness that's at work at the heart of the book, and then everything begins to fall down like a knocked- over house of cards.

And that's just what happened for me here. It's too bad, because with a bit more tightening, the authors of The Shelter could have had themselves a real winner.

A Mask for the General
by Lisa Goldstein

[****]

Bantam/Spectra, November, 1987, 201pp
$14.95, Cloth
ISBN 0-553-05239-X

The only other book I've read by Lisa Goldstein was her fascinating, but to my mind flawed, The Dream Years (Bantam/Spectra, 1985) concerned with the surrealistic movement in Paris during the early part of the century, the student riots in the 1960's, and in the far future. It was in the latter segment that the book fell apart for me -- it just got too off the wall - - although considering the nature of surrealism, it was obviously necessary direction for the book to take.

Her new novel, however, while it's also dealing with rebels, is a whole different kettle of fish. After a collapse of the American banking system, a General Gleason -- the General of the title -- takes military control of the U.S. and retains it through a systematic tyranny that outlaws anything even smacking of individuality. The rebels in this case are the tribes -- people who wear masks of their totem animals and reject the current system. The new shaman of the tribes are the maskmakers who travel in dreams or visions to the land of animals to discover a person's animal spirit before making that person a mask.

While the background of her near-future setting, and her sections dealing with the maskmakers and tribes, make for some wonderful sections of writing, it is with her characters that Goldstein really shines. No black and whites here, but real people. Grey. Trying to get by. Wanting to do well, but screwing up.

It's a "small book," in that the plot is focused on just a few individuals rather than a major take-over of the harsh political system, but it's all the more satisfying for that, with an ending intelligent enough that readers can make up their own minds as to the greater impact this small story had on that future world.

On Stranger Tides
by Tim Powers

[****+]

Ace Books, November, 1987
325pp, $16.95, Cloth
ISBN 0-441-62683-1

Tim Powers. Pirates. Voodoo.

If you're already familiar with Power's sure-handed prose and the wild antics of his imagination, I doubt I'll have to say more than the above to have you snap up a copy of his latest book. What's that? You haven't already been captivated by the time-tripping Egyptians of The Anubis Gates (Ace, 1983), the future world of Dinner at Deviant's Palace (Ace, 1985), or the magical use to which the darkest of brews is put in The Drawing of the Dark (Del Rey, 1979)?

Trust me on this one.

In the best traditions of Robert Louis Stevenson, Alexandre Dumas and Dickens, young puppeteer John Chandagnac is on route to Jamaica when his ship is boarded and captured by pirates. Given the choice between death and joining the buccaneers, Chandagnac logically opts for the latter. Soon he's known as Jack Shandy and becomes enmeshed in a complex webwork of plots involving the famous pirate Blackbeard, voodoo ceremonies and magic, any number of despicable villains, and a True Love, who naturally, once she finds out he's a pirate, wants nothing to do with him.

There's a wonderfully grotesque scene near the end of the book -- and no, I won't spoil things by telling you what it is -- but it's a pivotal scene, which has its roots in the opening chapters, showing just how intricately Powers plots his work. And how in control he is at all times. Come back to me after you've read the book, and we'll talk some more about it.

The prose is rich, the characters painted with full, broad strokes, the story flies along from one improbably but highly appropriate moment to the next, and there's never a missed beat. If you enjoy realistically conceived historical Fantasies, or just admire superb writing, don't do yourself a disservice. Read this book.

Well I'm already out of room and I haven't nearly covered everything I wanted to. Like a couple of recent books by Richard Bowker. Or that Koontz title. We'll have to leave them until next time.

What say we meet here again -- at that table in the corner where the lights aren't so bright -- and talk some more. If you've something you want to share with me in the meantime -- that doesn't necessarily fit into the OtherRealms lettercol -- drop me a line care of the magazine and I'll try to get back to you. Until then.

Cheers.

Stuff Received

Ace/Putnam

Heinlein, Robert A. To Sail Beyond the Sunset, 416 pages, $18.95. July
original novel.

Arbor House

Blalock, James P. Land of Dreams, 264 pages, $16.95.

Card, Orson Scott. Wyrms, 263 pages, $16.95.

Atlantic
Monthly Press

Kennedy, Leigh. Faces, 152 pages, $15.95. First American printing of a
British collection.

Avon/Discus

Boyer, Robert H. and Zahorski, Kenneth J. Fantasists on Fantasy, 287
pages, $3.95, 1984. A collection of critical essays on Fantasy
by Fantasy authors including Lovecraft, James Thurber, Tolkien,
C.S. Lewis, Peter Beagle, Andre Norton and Ursula K. LeGuin.

Avon
Fantasy

Anthony, Piers. Vale of the Vole, 324 pages, October, 1987, $3.95. Start
of a new Xanth trilogy.

Bisson, Terry. Talking Man, 192 pages, $2.95.

Avon
Fiction

Penman, Sharon Kay. Here be Dragons, 773 pages, $4.95. Historical
Romance set in the time of King John.

Townsend, Sue. The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole, 243 pages, $3.50.
First mass-market of a 1982 book.

Avon
Science Fiction

Arnason, Eleanor. Daughter of the Bear King, 239 pages, $3.50.

Baen Books

Baen, Jim. New Destinies Volume II, 232 pages, $2.95. Fall 1987
edition of the paperback magazine.

Dalmas, John. Return to Fanglith, 280 pages, $2.95.

Mitchell, Betsy, ed. Free Lancers, 248 pages, September, 1987, $2.95.
Anthology of three novellas by Card, Drake, and Bujold.

Scott, Melissa. The Kindly Ones, 371 pages, $2.95, September, 1987.

Zahn, Timothy. Triplet, 369 pages, $3.95.

Bantam

Benford, Gregory. Across the Sea of Suns, 353 pages, August, 1987, $3.95.

Cadigan, Pat. Mindplayers, 276 pages, August, 1987, $3.50. A First Novel.

Flint, Kenneth C. The Dark Druid, 326 pages, $3.50. Conclusion of a
trilogy that includes Challenge of the Clans and Storm Shield.

Hogan, James P. Endgame Enigma, 408 pages, August, 1987, $16.95.

Bonus Books

Melamed, Leo. The TENth Planet, 304 pages, $8.95 trade paperback.

Carroll & Graf
Publishers

Wolfe, Bernard. Limbo, 413 pages, $4.95. reprint of a 1952 cautionary novel.

Dell Books

Fuller, John G. The Interrupted Journey, 350 pages, $3.95. Non-fiction
reprint of a 1966 book about the fully documented travels of a
couple abducted by extraterresterials.

Pocket Books

Bonanno, Margaret. Strangers from the Sky, 402 pages, $3.95. July
original novel. A Star Trek novel. The story of the first
meeting of Humans and Vulcans.

Johnson, Shane. Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise, 126 pages (8.5x11
format) $10.95. July, 1985. A Star Trek book. Based upon the
engineering logs of Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott.

St. Martin's
Press

King, Bernard. Starkadder, 243 pages, October, 1987, $16.95. A Nordic Fantasy.

Signet Books

Cook, Glen. Sweet Silver Blues, 255 pages, August, 1987, $3.50. Mystery
Fantasy.

Irwin, Walter & Love, G.B. The Best of TREK #12, 206 pages, August,
1987, $2.95. Latest collection of stories from TREK, the Star
Trek fanzine.

Rosenberg, Joel. The Heir Apparent, 319 pages, $3.50. Book Four of
the Guardians of the Flame series.

Spinsters/Aunt Lute Books
PO Box 410687
San Francisco, CA 94141

Hall, Sandi. Wingwomen of Hera, 180 pages, $8.95. ISBN 0-933216-26-2.
First book in the Cosmic Botanist Trilogy.

Starblaze Graphics

Asprin, Robert & Abbey, Lynn. Thieves' World Graphic #5. Art by Tim
Sale, 63 pages 8.5 x 11 b&w graphic novel, $3.95.

Tor Fantasy

Anthony, Piers and Margroff, Robert E. Dragon's Gold, 282 pages, $3.95.
July original novel.

Bear, Greg. The Forge of God, 474 pages, October, 1987, $17.95.

Norton, Andre and Adams, Robert. Magic in Ithkar 4, 278 pages, $3.50.
July original anthology.

Norton, Andre. Tales of the Witch World, 343 pages, September, 1987,
$15.95. Anthology of stories set in Norton's Witch World.

Tor Horror

Bloch, Robert. American Gothic, 246 pages, $3.95. July reprint of a
1974 novel.

Laws, Stephen. Spectre, 275 pages, $3.95. July reprint of a 1986 novel.

Pfefferly, Seth. Stickman, 279 pages, $3.95, July original novel.

Tor
Science Fiction

Carr, Terry. Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year #16. October,
1987, 416 pages, $16.95. The last best of the year by one of
the best editors in the field.

Chalker, Jack L. The Shadow Dancers, 284 pages, $3.95. July original
novel. G.O.D. Inc. number 2.

Dalmas, John. The Varkaus Conspiracy, 285 pages, $2.95. July reprint
of a 1983 novel.

Dickson, Gordon R. Beyond the Dar Al-Harb, 253 pages, $2.95. July
reprint of a 1985 collection.

Robinson, Kim Stanley. The Planet on the Table, 241 pages, $3.50. July
first mass market anthology.

Saberhagen, Fred. The Veils of Azlaroc, 216 pages, $2.95. July reprint
of a 1978 novel.

Writer's Digest
Books

Williamson, J.N. How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy & Science
Fiction, 242 pages, $15.95.

Fan & Other Zines

Delineator #4. Edited by Alan White. Irregular from Alan White, 455 E.
7th St. #4, San Jacinto, CA 92383.

Entropion #7. Edited by Nick Shears. Irregular British
personal/genzine, available for the usual or #1.00 from Nick
Shears, 27 Chiltern Road, Wendover, Aylesbury, Bucks. HP22 6DA, UK.

File 770 #68. Mike Glyer. Fannish newszine, on this year's Hugo
ballot. 5/$5.00 from 5828 Woodman Ave. #2, Van Nuys, CA 91401.

Hardwired Hinterland Volume 1 #3. Edited by Rich Jervis. Irregular
personalzine that includes parts of an computer mailing list,
available from P.O. Box 743, Notre Dame, IN 46556.

Loco #10 & #13. Edited by Janne Wallenius. Available from Pl 2215, 460
20 Sjuntorp, Sweden. Interesting looking, but in Swedish, so I
can't comment on the content. Where is my English to Swedish
dictionary?

Pandora 17. Edited by Jean Lorrah. Short Fiction magazine. Pandora has
been sold to Reluctant Publishing, 44825 Cass, Utica MI 48087,
so it may change in the future. According to Scavenger
Newsletter, will be bi- monthly, digest size, #18 will have a
Piers Anthony story. Acting editor is Meg MacDonald.

Remember Lindisfarne. Edited by Heidi Lyshol. Norwegian APAzine
published (in English) for Worldcon. Maridalsvn. 235 A, N-0467
Oslo 4, Norway.

Scavenger's Newsletter #42. Small Press market report by Janet Fox, 519
Ellinwood, Osage City, KS 66623. $8/yr.

Spung #1, The Fanzine that Stands at Attention. Ted White, 1014 N.
Tuckahoe St., Falls Church, VA. 22046. Irregular.

Starline, Volume 10, Issue 3. Newsletter of the Science Fiction Poetry
Association, 18 pages. bi-monthly. $6.00 for six issues and
membership to P.O. Box 6398, Albany, CA. 94706.

The Texas SF Enquirer #21. Pat Mueller, editor. Irregular. For the usual
for $6/6 issues. A Hugo nominee for 1987.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 5)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 5

Rebellion, Counter-Revolution
Blemishes and Potential

Commentary by James Brunet
jimb@ism780c.uucp

Copyright 1987 by
James Brunet

Books in this column:

Hardwired
Walter Jon Wiliams
Tor, 1986, 343pp.

Voice of the Whirlwind
Walter Jon Williams
Arbor House, 1987, 248pp.

The Uplift War
David Brin
Bantam/Spectra, 1987, 638pp.

Neuromancer
William Gibson
Arbor House, 1986, 278 pp.

Count Zero
William Gibson
Arbor House, 1986, 278pp.

Speaker for the Dead
Orson Scott Card
Tor, 1986, 415pp.

The Year Before Yesterday
Brian Aldiss
Franklin Watts, 1987, 227pp.

Fire Watch
Collection from Connie Willis
Bluejay, 1985, 274pp.

Cyberpunk now comes in a spray can. At least that's the impression fostered by some current novels cashing in on the latest hot trend within SF.

'What should Science Fiction be?' is just an allotrope of the
old question 'What is Science Fiction anyhow?' We all know that
the only proper answer to that one is 'Shut up.'   -- Joe
Haldeman**

Well, okay, but before we talk about cyberpunk spray, what is cyberpunk, anyway? Someone needs to know.

Cyberpunk is held by some to be merely a marketing label; others hold that it is the only worthwhile work being done in SF today. With literary antecedents that include Alfred Bester, John Brunner, and P.K. Dick, the current cyberpunk movement catapulted to prominence with William Gibson's Neuromancer, which swept the major SF awards of 1984. Which is not to say that the current wave labeled cyberpunk began with Neuromancer. Certainly Gibson's short fiction "Burning Chrome" and "Johnny Mnemonic" had received critical attention two to three years previously and writers such as Gibson, Bruce Sterling, and John Shirley were already influencing each other.

But it was Neuromancer that brought cyberpunk to the masses. Defined by Gibson's example, cyberpunk is marked by high-tech flash, dwelling particularly on human-computer interfaces and biological modifications to the human body. Cyberpunk prose traditionally (traditionally? already?) is intense and energy-filled, hard and glittery. Cyberpunk's heroes come from the ranks of the anti-heroes residing in the underside of society.

But these characteristics are superficial. Cyberpunk is most intensely a matter of rebellion. Rebellion permeates its tone -- the attitude of the authors toward their material. But rebellion against what?

The rebellion takes on two forms. Many cyberpunk writers and fans are fond of saying that the future is different now, meaning that the old futures of SF -- optimistic techno-imperialist visions where virtue and hard work pay off an upgraded version of the American dream, replete with success on technical, social, and personal fronts -- have been dumped into the dustbin of history. Cyberpunk's visions are different, drawing upon a legacy of urban decay, political corruption, assassination, formation of an international corpocracy, and social decadence.

Cyberpunk's characters are no less revolutionary than the vision. Many characters from traditional SF are idealized. They never seem to have a problem finding a parking space or an empty bathroom stall (some seem as if they never need the facilities of the latter anyway), they've never had a baby vomit in their hair, their family relationships are either well within bounds of tolerable normality or else conveniently absent.... Cyberpunk rebels against this image, choosing as its heroes the sleazy, the losers, and, well, the rebels.

Beyond vision and character, cyberpunk's whole ethos is different. The ethos of traditional SF seems to be, "Things will work out if we try hard enough and in the right direction." Cyberpunk seems to counter with "Life is a bitch, and then you die, but a little hedonism and nihilism in the meanwhile is not a bad thing."

In some ways, cyberpunk seems to be a redirection of the New Wave which swept SF in the late 60's and early 70's. But New Wave seemed to concentrate most intently on matters of form, considering content mostly in terms of what it should not be as exemplified by traditional SF.

Returning, then, from our thumbnail exploration of cyberpunk, consider Hardwired, a first novel by Walter Jon Williams. Hardwired is the story of Cowboy, a panzerboy. As a panzerboy, Cowboy plugs into the computer of his heavily armed and armored vehicle and smuggles compact, high-priced products such as scarce pharmaceuticals from one side of the Balkanized ex-USA to the other, eluding the state militias, competing smugglers, and agents of the rich, powerful, and oppressor Orbitals, corporate space-based de-facto states.

In the course of his adventures, Cowboy links up with Sarah, the hard- bitten, tough-as-nails bio-enhanced freelance mercenary. Thrown together as allies -- neither can afford to have friends -- they fight to survive against lethal doublecrosses and the intrigue of some Orbitals who get the idea that smallfry like Cowboy and Sarah can upset their nice little status quo. While passing time on their escapades, they punctuate bouts of taunts and suspicion by screwing each other silly, which I suppose demolishes any notion that emotional environment has something to do with sexual response.

Among other things, Hardwired is an homage to Zelazny and Gibson. The panzerboy dash across country is right out of Damnation Alley; at least Williams has the good grace to acknowledge Zelazny and Alley in his dedication. The Orbitals, the mercenaries, the computers, and the drugs are all ripped-off from Gibson, much as the fotocopy-fantasy writers rip-off Tolkien.

To Williams' credit, at least the ending is a reasonable compromise. If Evil does not triumph, at least Case and Molly, er, I mean Cowboy and Sarah, do not amble off to live happily after.

But when all the dust settles, this is not the cyberpunk novel that you might expect from the cover illustration and superficial indications like prose style. Yes, we have a whole slew of cyberslang terms such as mudboy, dirtgirl, zonedancer, buttonhead, etc. And all the computer-jacking terms are there. But it's all sprayed on. What Williams has written is a good old- fashioned adventure romance and then lacquered it over with cyberpunk imagery.

Now I happen to like some good old-fashioned adventure romances. As such, Hardwired isn't bad. But it will give aid and comfort to those who see cyberpunk as a marketing label, and it will betray any reader who picks it up expecting something of a cyberpunk sensibility.

Beyond the issue of a horse in camel's clothing, Hardwired fails to convince on its own terms. The world has a papier-mache feel to it. As an example, the Orbitals are supposedly rich and powerful, keeping the earthbound states fighting over dregs and scraps. Yet in this allegedly impoverished society, arms and armament are everywhere, as are bio- enhancements and recreational pharmaceuticals. Who pays for all of this, and how?

Another problem is the lapse into pseudo-profound philosophical reflections that are difficult to take seriously, to wit:

""He and the other deltajocks were not an abstract response to market conditions, but a continuation of some kind of mythology. Keeping a light burning in the darkness, hope in the shape of an afterburner flame. The last free Americans, on the last high road....""

Hardwired is not a novel I would hand someone as introduction to SF. It is, however, the sort of passable entertainment suitable for a plane trip or a day at the beach.

But a first novel is a first novel. For every writer that breaks in with a brilliant best-seller, another dozen begin slogging at the bottom of the ramp, hoping to work their way up. Williams' second novel, Voice of the Whirlwind is less self-conscious, more original, and shows some promise.

The story is that of Steward, a ex-corporate mercenary. The Steward in this book is a Beta, a clone of the original who was murdered. Only the original (the Alpha) was sloppy in keeping his memories updated, so Beta Steward must figure out who murdered his original, and why, or else life could be terminated just as easily a second time. And this time Steward doesn't have the financial resources to set up clone insurance.

Steward careens around the solar system in pursuit of his mystery. He comes into contact with the aliens who maintain trading posts in the asteroid belt, dirty tricks operatives from various corporations, a hard- bitten female with whom he maintains a shaky alliance (does this sound familiar?), another ex-mercenary who served under Steward's Alpha, and a full menu of sleazy, conniving, no-goodniks that would make Boris Badunov proud.

Voice of the Whirlwind has two outstanding flaws. Considering how useful it would be to produce various characters in the flesh on demand, it's amazing that this very corrupt universe doesn't find clone insurers running off illegal copies of people for various purposes. Secondly, Steward always winds up getting to where he needs to go, regardless of what part of the solar system and how tight the security, never questioning the apparent serendipity. If I were into duplicity and paranoia as part of my trade, I would surely have suspicions if a taxi always appeared, heading toward my destination, just as I needed it. Yet this is what effectively happens to Steward and he never stops to consider whether or not someone might be setting him up, and if so, why.

Michael Swanwick wrote "A User's Guide to the Postmoderns," an essay which appeared in the August, 1986 issue of Isaac Asimov's SF Magazine. It was a coherent, insightful analysis of the cyberpunks and the humanists -- the two main camps of post-New Wave groups of SF writers.

Unfortunately, Swanwick's novel Vacuum Flowers represents a triumph of incoherence over accessibility, plot, character, and other literary values. The story concerns a woman who steals a hot personality implant, the equivalent of getting a copy of next month's hot video release that everyone will want and bootleg distributors will pay dearly for to have an advance copy. Of course the problem is that the woman, Rebel Elizabeth Mudlark, is essentially wearing this new personality, with her original personality, which went by the name of Eucrasia Walsh, completely suppressed and gone. More than this, I can't tell you, because I found it impossible to continue. Pity, because Swanwick has previously demonstrated that he has an understanding of what is going on in the SF field and has written some good fiction in the past (In the Drift, et al.).

David Brin is a clever man. With The Uplift War he has managed to avoid that affliction of so many SF writers, sequelitis tedious. For instead of a sequel to the Nebula- and Hugo-winning Startide Rising, Brin has given us the third piece of a four-dimensional jigsaw puzzle (Brin's first novel, Sundiver, was the first piece).

The pieces are related in time, plot, and theme, but strictly speaking they are not sequels to each other. The distinction is important, because it means that Brin is not trapped trying to flog new life and new complications out of a set of continuing characters. While I think that ultimately some characters may reappear, in cameo roles or otherwise, they will still be fresh enough, unfettered enough, that they can still be dynamic -- changed as a result of their previous experiences but subject to being affected by the new adventures -- instead of being forced into a static mode like so many on-going characters of endless series.

In response to questioning during a signing at The Change of Hobbit, Brin said that he expected that there would be six or seven novels when the grouping is complete. He also indicated that the Streaker and its crew from Startide would probably figure in a future novel, that he (Brin) wanted to find out what happens to them.

The Uplift War takes place on the planet Garth, one of the Earth's few colony planets in a Galaxy (actually, Galaxy cluster) teeming with intelligent races, all of whom have been "uplifted" to intelligence by other races, their patrons. This chain of uplifts extends back millions of years, back to the mythic progenitor race. When life with potential for intelligence is discovered on a planet, it is subjected to genetic manipulation by the discoverers. The client species, in turn, must serve their patrons for a period of 100,000 years.

As established by Brin's two previous novels set in this universe, Earthlings have stumbled out into the Galaxy without the benefit of Uplift. Furthermore, they themselves have already begun uplifting two of their own "client" races, dolphins and chimpanzees. From the standpoint of many of the races in the Galaxy (called Galactics), Earthlings are a "wolfling race" due to their own lack of patron, and as such are effectively religious heretics. The tension erupts to a flashpoint in Startide Rising, where a Terran starship, captained and crewed mainly by dolphins, discovers a derelict fleet of spacecraft. To the conservative Galactics, possession of the derelict fleet would be an enormous advantage in their internecine religious and political disputes. As a result, they are determined to wring the location of the fleet from Earth by whatever means possible, and war ensues.

The Uplift War concerns Earth's colony named Garth. The only reason that Earth has this colony is that the Galactics consider it to be hopelessly ravaged by ecological mismanagement of a now-exterminated client race. Poor possession that it is, one race of Galactics, the birdlike Gubru, decides to invade Garth and hold it hostage in exchange for information regarding the location of the Progenitor derelict fleet.

Garth defends itself sharply before being overrun, thereby gaining points in Galactic politics, which resemble nothing so much as an elaborate game of shifgrethor[*] Most of the colonists -- a mixture of humans and uplifted chimpanzees, the mineral salts of Garth's waters being poisonous to dolphins -- either sullenly or actively collaborate with their overlords.

The three main characters are Robert Oneagle, son of the Planetary Coordinator; Fiben Bolger, a chimpanzee military pilot; and Athaclena, daughter of the Tymbrimi Ambassador. (The Tymbrimi are one of the few Galactic races openly sympathetic to the Terrans.) The Gubru expect an easy occupation of Garth because they have used biological weapons to cause all humans to surrender (Robert escapes the effects of the biological agents) and they hold the Terran's chimpanzee clients in disdain. Yet Robert and Athaclena forge a band of chimpanzees into an effective, er, guerilla fighting force.

Brin handles the chimpanzee personalities and culture fair enough, certainly in a more satisfying manner than the lone chimpanzee, Dr. Charles Dart, who seemed something of a buffoon stereotype in Startide. The treatment of the chimpanzee characters falls short, however, of the inventiveness Brin displayed in capturing the soul of his dolphins in Startide.

Brin does carry over, though, one of his greatest strengths from Startide, the treatment of the various Galactic races. He manages to convey alien cultures, alien ethos, alien personalities in a multi-dimensional manner captured by few writers. And he has done this with not one or two alien races, but several. Indeed, I often found the chapters written from the Galactic's points of view to be among the most interesting.

One of the threads buried in Uplift that seems as if it might warrant future development is the existence of hydrogen-breathing races in the galaxy which remain almost entirely outside the political and cultural commerce of the oxygen-breathers.

A substantial sub-plot of Uplift is the romance between Robert and Athaclena. The Tymbrimi, who look somewhat like elves with tentacles in their hair, have the useful ability to adapt their physiologies, within limits, under conscious control. If Brin ever takes a stab at writing SF porno, this is a natural. (Which shape do you prefer? This? Or this? Is this tight enough? Tighter? Etc.)

The basis of the cross-species romance is explained, though I found my credulity wavering at that point. And unfortunately the romance is not resolved in any satisfactory manner. But what struck me as most interesting was the psychological resemblance of Athaclena to any number of adolescent heroines from Heinlein's work.

Which brings us to a controversial contention. Brin is making a move to occupy the niche held by Heinlein for so long, that of the master storyteller. In terms of tone and content, Brin's work is a throwback to the fifties and early sixties, but with a fresh coat of paint. His work is optimistic, there is a sense of wonder, the heroes are drawn from the ranks of the heroes, the good guys -- at least so far -- do win. Brin belongs to the counter-revolution and his work is sure to grate the teeth of any dedicated cyberpunk.

And yet Brin is a counter-revolutionary, not a reactionary seeking to restore status quo ante. His plotting, themes, and general literary craft are superior to most of the work from the fifties and sixties. And the optimism is not pure; there are cautionary notes, explicit reminders that we are on the edge of disasters -- technical, economic, political, and ecological.

Writing is a curious, complex activity. One way to make distinctions between parts of the activity is to divide the whole into the storytelling and the writing (literary craft) -- the way the story is told. Certainly the two aspects are interrelated, one affects the other. Quibble with labels, if you will, I use them only as reference points. Brin does not declaim from under a proscenium arch on the stage of an amphitheater. No, instead he is squatting in front of the fire, telling us a tale that begins "There were these guys, see..." as we listen and try to forget for a moment the howling of the wolves away in the night or the fact that the morrow's hunt will be long and demanding.

Brin is a storyteller. He leaves to others the finely polished prose, instead just trying to tell a tale, but well. His narrative breaks every now and then to throw in an aside seemingly intended for only the reader, the single listener at the edge of campfire to the exclusion of all the others.

It is in this capacity as a storyteller that Brin is taking aim at Heinlein. Heinlein, who these days seems to be writing a series of valedictory novels (his latest may prove me wrong), secured his place in SF history not on the basis of his writing per se, but his ability to spin out engrossing yarns from his fecund imagination, year after year.

There are literary 800 lb. canaries who, having established a popular reputation, manage to get published anything that rolls off their printers. This is because as long as their name is on it, the masses will continue to buy it, even if it's nothing more than a translation of the Albanian national anthem. If Brin continues in his present vein, assuming that he does not let himself become one of the aforesaid 800 lb. canaries, he will be pressing hard to claim Heinlein's niche. It may be premature to declare Brin heir to Heinlein's mantle, but perhaps it's time to start measuring the fit.

"It seems to me that we are too ready in SF to praise or condemn too loudly, and without perspective. Too often what passes for real criticism...reads not much different from the blurbs on the backs of paperbacks." -- John Kessel ***

The 1987 Hugo Awards are history. Two of the leading contenders for Best Novel were William Gibson's Count Zero and Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead, with Speaker garnering the award. Both are decent novels. Yet in the context of discussion about the best that SF has to offer, both present problems that make them fall short of the ideal.

Count Zero is a good flash-and-grit novel of the cyberpunk variety. It's characters include a cynical corporate-world mercenary, a bright but naive punk kid with ambitions of becoming a bright punk wheeler-dealer, a betrayed down-and-out artist given a shot at achieving financial, if not artistic, status, and a whole gaggle of opportunistic, manipulative, street- wise, electro-cunning, software-enhanced morally-zeroed thugs.

Gibson does a nice job of threading our heroes -- and compared to their opponents, they're certainly the morally superior human beings -- through their intense, high-energy adventures, which are interesting.

Only... the ending. If the name Joe Schlobotnik had been on the manuscript instead of William Gibson, an editor would have written back, "Gee, this is nice. But do you think the ending could have a little more to do with the actions of the characters?" The plot lines converge only for the characters to find themselves in one hell of a pickle, and what happens? A minor character -- out to revenge another minor character killed early in the story -- comes in and wipes away the Threat, Deus ex Machina.

Gibson creates a brilliant background. He tells his stories lucidly, brilliantly at times. His characters, even if they aren't the people you want to have living next door, are adequately drawn, if at times they rely upon novelty rather than depth. Against this background, a failure of the storytelling apparatus is frustrating.

SF is renowned for its nitpickers, particularly those of the flavor that write authors to inform them that they missed a technical nuance that would have affected the fifth and sixth decimal points of an equation's result. Curiously, the nitpickers fall silent when it comes to non-technical details. The situation is not unlike a conference on computer animation where some individuals sneer at those who don't know what an algorithm is, only to be sneered at in turn because they lack any training in art or even a sense of esthetics.

Before I make my first nit at Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead, I should make it clear that I don't particularly care for Steven Spielberg movies. The connection is one of manipulation. Spielberg pulls the heartstrings by using scenes and components that are all but guaranteed to get an emotional reaction. Sure, I got bleary eyed during ET; I was also angry at the palpable manipulation on a level not far removed from showing Lassie run over by a truck, Bambi being vivisected in a laboratory, or Snow White being molested by the dwarves.

Card performs similar manipulations with his characters in Speaker . He isn't content to let us feel sympathy or pity for the orphaned girl or the abused children, he makes sure we sympathize.

A separate, more astonishing point in Speaker is Card's treatment of the Catholic church, which is portrayed more than 3,000 years in the future as having regressed by 250 years as an institution. The conservative bent of the present Pope not withstanding, even a cursory review of Church history finds that attitudes and doctrine continually evolve, if at a glacial pace in some areas.

Card trips up on the rendering of practical details of Catholic communities as well. Speaker features a woman who has several children, even though her husband suffers from a lengthy disease, of which one of the first symptoms has been sterility in every other case ever observed. The resident medical expert writes this off as an anomaly, and it never occurs to anyone that the woman is having her children fathered outside of marriage.

Catholic communities and Catholic priests are well acquainted with human frailties. In practice, Catholics are expected to aim at perfection, while simultaneously holding that such perfection is impossible to achieve. From a sociological point of view, the institutions of confession and penance (or reconciliation if you prefer the newer terminology) provide a method for containing and controlling moral transgressions. Note, contain and control; there is never any serious expectation that such transgressions will not occur, even though Christ-like perfection is the aim. Therefore a Catholic community will not find adultery impossible to conceive and will not be terribly surprised when it does occur.

A third facet of Speaker to argue over is the character Jane, a computer-resident consciousness that, via instantaneous ansible link, is connected to computers on a network spanning light-years. Jane maintains that she has 50,000 levels of awareness, and that government, academic, corporate, and personal computer files are an open book to her; not a significant action occurs anywhere without her knowledge.

Furthermore, she manipulates these files to the ends of Ender Wiggins' needs, sometimes without his foreknowledge or consent, thereby causing desired actions to occur. Thus, Jane is effectively both omniscient and omnipotent. She also seems omnibenevolent. Folks, forget the technobabble explanation of how Jane came into awareness. What we have here is the Fourth Person of the Holy Trinity and Ender Wiggin is the first human to experience Her grace. Card ducks all but the most trivial implications of Jane and misses a lot of potential for it.

Finally, Card sets up a major moral conflict and then simply washes it away with a convenient accident to keep things from getting too sticky. Because of the adulterous relationship previously referred to, two characters find that they are half-brother and half-sister, not completely unrelated as they had thought. The discovery shatters a deep romance. But instead of struggling with conflicts involving the nature of love and the potential of incest, Card ducks the entire question by having one of the characters become severely crippled -- effectively aged by several decades -- and shipped off-planet on a mission for the Good of the Planet. Fooey. Card has set up a powerful situation between love and morality, worthy of some compelling storytelling, and then bails out. This is not a signpost of superior writing.

One curiosity finding its way into my reading pile lately was Brian Aldiss' The Year Before Yesterday. I say curiosity, because it's difficult to know what to make of this book.

Year is published by Franklin Watts Press as part of a handsomely designed hardcover line that also includes a reprint of Alfred Bester's The Demolished Man. The cover of Year is right out of a pulp tradition, portraying a blaster-carrying hero wearing an Izod tunic (complete with alligator symbol), with a Union Jack fluttering in the background. Nothing unusual except that the Union Jack has a large swastika superimposed on the center. The cover also informs us that Brian W. Aldiss is a winner of the Hugo Award.

The story begins in an alternate universe, one where the USA stayed isolationist as German and the Soviet Union, the latter aided by their Japanese allies, gobble up most of the world. The main character is a Finnish composer whom we meet walking home from a concert. Finland has managed to maintain its independence between its powerful neighbors to the east and south, but the independence is so precarious that concert music has its political implications.

On his walk home, our composer discovers the body of a murdered woman by the side of the road. He carries the body to his house, where he discovers two American science fiction novels, which he characterizes by the Finnish term "Maybe-Myth," in her knapsack. He calls the police, checks on his wife sleeping in the other room, and then sits down to read.

Most of the rest of Year is an excuse to tell the two condensed novels found in the knapsack. Each is mildly entertaining in their own right, and there is something of a nod to P.K. Dick's Man in the High Castle with the alternate views of history.

Surfacing from the Maybe-Myths every now and then, we learn about the composer's unsatisfying relationship with his wife, a bit of Finnish international politics, and that the composer ultimately is arrested as the prime murder suspect. Add to this melange the fact that the policeman who arrests the composer periodically metamorphoses into a reindeer.

Either I am Missing Something, or this is what passes as a literary joke among the British, or the publisher wanted a manuscript by a Hugo- winning author (cf., 800-lb. literary canary).

"I try to write about adults. A lot of readers don't understand that. I try to write about adults who matter, men and women who are in the midst of the great forces of change that swirl around us. Like any writer, I am not always successful. And sometimes I relax and write something that is not meant to be taken all that seriously."-- Ben Bova **

Connie Willis will be an acquired taste for readers accustomed to wish- gratification adolescents-disguised-as-adults science fiction. A nice sampler of her work is her short story collection Fire Watch.

Willis writes for and about adults. Her characters have adult sensibilities and adult problems. Many of Willis' stories feature what could be called ordinary characters in extraordinary situations, though often the situation itself is muted, lacking the splashy pyrotechnic plots of conventional SF.

In the Fire Watch collection we meet a collection of characters. As with any group of people that we meet, we will like some more than others and our tastes will not necessarily be in agreement with that of others. I particularly liked the stories "All My Darling Daughters," "Mail Order Clone," "Samaritan," "And Come From Miles Around," and the wonderful "Blued Moon." I won't reveal much of the stories except to say that few authors have tackled orangutans wishing to be baptized, hell-for-leather students at an orbital boarding school (complete with sandstone buildings), the universality of the scientific persona, or the interrelationship between language and reality.

I'm afraid that Willis may be a writer's writer, which is perhaps odd for someone whose literary career began by writing women's confession stories, such as "I Called for Help on My CB...and Got a Rapist Instead." In an introductory note in Fire Watch, Willis says that she still enjoys writing confessions when she gets the chance.

Whatever, Willis writes some nicely crafted adult-centered science fiction. Give her a try.

Footnotes:

* Shifgrethor -- From Ursula LeGuin's The Left Hand of Darkness, an
elaborate social game governing all important relationships,
taking into account fine points of etiquette, protocol, and
"face."

** Quotes from Joe Haldeman and Ben Bova reprinted from the Spring 1987
issue of the Bulletin of the Science Fiction Writers of
America, by permission of the authors.

*** Quote from John Kessel, reprinted from The Humanist Manifesto,
published in Science Fiction Eye, Volume 1, Number 1, by
permission of the author.

Plugs

Some sources for this Column

Science Fiction Eye
Box 3105
Washington, DC 20010-0105

$7.00/year semi-prozine devoted to cyberpunk. First issue includes
interviews with Gibson, transcript of panel discussion including
Spinrad, Shirley, Benford, Brin, et al.

The SFWA Bulletin
Box H
Wharton, NJ 07885

$10/year to non-SFWA members. Includes articles, reviews of non-fiction, market reports.

A User's Guide to the Postmoderns
Michael Swanwick.

Published in Isaac Asimov's SF Magazine, August, 1986.
Excellent article on the two current "literary camps."

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 6)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 6

Words of Wizdom

Reviews by
Chuq Von Rospach

Copyright 1987 by
Chuq Von Rospach

Reviewed in this column:

To Sail Beyond the Sunset
Robert A. Heinlein
[*****-]

Across the Sea of Suns
Gregory Benford
[****]

Bimbos of the Death Sun
Sharyn McCrumb
[***-]

Dreams of an Unseen Planet
Teresa Plowright
[**]

War for the Oaks
Emma Bull
[****]

Wyrms
Orson Scott Card
[***]

A Dark Travelling
Roger Zelazny
[***-]

Strangers from the Sky
Margaret Wander Bonanno
[***+]

Writers of the Future
Volume III
A.J. Budrys, Ed.
[***+]

The Planet on the Table
Kim Stanley Robinson
[****-]

Guns of Darkness
J.E. Pournelle
[***]

Fantasists on Fantasy
Boyer & Zahorski
[****+]

How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy
and Science Fiction
J.N. Williamson, Ed.
[***-]

Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise
Shane Johnson
[**]

The Science Fiction and Heroic Fantasy Author Index
Stuart W. Wells III
[***+]

Arthur C. Clarke's July 20, 2019:
Life in the 21st Century
[]

To Sail Beyond the Sunset, subtitled The Life and Loves of Maureen Johnson (Being the Memoirs of a Somewhat Irregular Lady) [Ace/Putnam, 407 pages, $18.95] is the latest from Robert A. Heinlein, one of the acknowledged masters of the field. The book seems to finish the trend started in The Number of the Beast, as Heinlein carefully and methodically ties together the universes in his many stories and novels into a single unified whole.

This book will be controversial, as every Heinlein work has been since he discovered sex in the classic work Time Enough for Love. This book is about sex and, almost incidentally, the history of the human race. It sports an, um, interesting cover by Boris. No, to be honest, it sports an anatomically perfect naked Boris female cover, tastefully arranged and perfectly static -- I don't like Boris, because all of his covers look like something out of Gray's Anatomy -- biologically perfect and at the same time very lifeless, static, and boring. This is no different -- when you see the cover at a distance, it will make you take a closer look, but when you do, there is nothing there.

What really matters are the words. And words there are, 400 pages of a more-or-less monologue by Maureen Johnson (later Maureen Smith, later Maureen Long), born 1882, mother of seventeen, including Woodrow Wilson Smith, later known as Lazarus Long.

Readers should be aware that this is not Science Fiction, in any real sense. A better classification might be Historical Romance, a romantic and erotic biography that happens to be set in the fictional world that Heinlein developed. It is, strictly speaking, a sequel to both The Number of the Beast and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, but it is also spiritually a sequel to his entire canon. This book, however, stands on its own, and is one of his best works.

That is a statement that cries out for justification. Heinlein polarizes readers like few authors do; it isn't a matter of whether you like his works, but whether you're a fan of his "early" works, or his "later" material, the boundary falling somewhere around Time Enough for Love. Heinlein is, the best active writer of dialog. When the dialog is under control and working with the story, as it does here and in Friday, his books live and breath. When it isn't, however, and the dialog becomes an end to itself, pages and pages of cloying triviality show up as the characters try to show each other up. In the meantime the plot, stuck off in a corner, dies of loneliness. Both Beast and Cat suffered from this disease -- to the point where I was unable to finish either.

This book avoids that trap. It is almost 100% dialog (actually monologue, Maureen to reader), and unlike Beast or Cat, the primary purpose of the book is to tell Maureen's story. The story does tie up many loose ends, but within context, not simply for the sake of tying things together.

There are two stories in this book. The primary story is that of Maureen, from her early childhood to her present time in the far future, but the primary focus is from the late 1890's to the end of World War II. The secondary story is barely a subplot -- Maureen in captivity awaiting trial and execution on some unknown parallel world, hoping for rescue. This subplot leads off each chapter for a few paragraphs, and then steps out of the way for Maureen to continue her tale.

The memoir is two things: a continuing dialog of her sexual beliefs, exploits, and encounters, and a critique (and occasional rewrite) of American society and morals. Maureen lives in the world that is, but talks about the world that should be, as seen through the eyes of Heinlein. The erotica (for it is that, and not pornography) is mental, not graphic. Maureen isn't afraid to tell you exactly what she thinks or feels, but Heinlein avoids the nitty-gritty details. It reminded me of an updated, low key Fanny Hill. She is upfront about her moral and social values, and lives by a Libertarian standpoint that is critical of and different from our reality.

I'm sure lots of people will find reasons to dislike this book -- the sexuality portrayed, the morals, the attitudes --JHeinlein has written a lot into this work without being particularly afraid about who he offends. That this book could be as important to the genre as Stranger in a Strange Land or Time Enough for Love were; it is also possible that it will be written off as another throwaway book by a man obsessed with S*x. I hope the latter doesn't happen -- and I feel sorry for the folks who feel that way, for being unable to see past their own inhibitions to the work behind it.

This book feels as if it was written to be the last Heinlein book. I sincerely hope not -- I want to see if he can top this.

Last month Jim Brunet talked about the troubles in the Hard SF field. This month I'm happy to point out that Hard SF isn't quite dead -- Gregory Benford is alive, well, and delivering good, solid, Hard SF. His latest, Across the Sea of Suns [Bantam, 353 pages, $3.95] is a case in point.

This book is related to In the Ocean of the Night, and tells the story of an interstellar ship sent to look for life among the nearby stars. Interweaved through this story is a subplot on Earth -- something has come from the stars and seeded the oceans with a breed of deadly animals. Between these, we get an extrapolation of the local bit of the universe. Benford's primary purpose in the book, though, is to try to answer the age- old question "If there is life throughout the Universe, why haven't we heard from them before now?" His answer, very plausible, is also very chilling, and one that I hope fails the test of Occam's Razor.

This book is much more than a technology tome, though. Unlike many Hard SF writers, Benford uses the hardware as a base and builds a strong story around it, populating it with strong characters. The protagonists of the story are involved in a group marriage, and there is a lot of byplay about the stresses and compromises this involves (this book, as a matter of fact, makes a good counterpoint to some of Heinlein's overly simplistic "Group Marriage is simply wonderful -- with an emphasis on the simple"). The primary focus of the action of the book is also slanted away from the technology to the political interactions of a group of people on a long-term space voyage.

Across the Sea of Suns isn't perfect. Benford uses a couple of experimental dialog tricks to try to get around the hated expository dialog problems -- with limited success. While he gets his information across, I found that the style was very hard to follow and rather confusing, forcing me to break my train of thought and have to backtrack through it two or three times trying to figure out what he was saying. Other than that, though, there isn't much to complain about here, and this is definitely a book worth reading.

How could anyone resist a novel with the title Bimbos of the Death Sun [Windwalker books/TSR, 219 pages, $2.95]? I certainly couldn't, and not even the well-endowed woman in the leopard fur bikini space suit on the cover could keep me from trying it out. This book is marketed as a mystery, but it really isn't. What it is is a satire of Science Fiction conventions, and for the most part it is a lot of fun.

The first half of the book describes many of the places and caricatures that show up at many cons -- the wargamers, the costumes, the art show, the huckster room, the total chaos behind the scenes. McCrumb tells the story by tossing a complete novice, Dr. Jay Mega, author of his first novel (which happens to be the same title as McCrumb's book) into the grinder and letting him try to explain it. By the time the Guest of Honor Appin Dungannon, author and resident obnoxious boor, is killed, the book goes downhill rapidly and dissolves into a real-life D&D game used to trap the murderer. The first half of the book, with one exception, is a real hoot, and a must read for anyone who has ever been stuck in a middle of a con wondering why they enjoy going to these things.

I do want to point out the exception, however. Early on McCrumb makes a comment that female fans fall into two classes: if you weigh less than 120 pounds, you wear as little as possible, and if you weigh more, you wear lots of velvet and try to hide your bulk. She also has one character, an obese woman who's two aims in life seem to be eating and finding a nerd to sleep with to save on hotel costs. Now, while all of the other characters are amusing caricatures, I found this character very offensive. She's shown to be slow thinking, conniving, a compulsive eater, manipulator and with very little self image or motivation. Nothing, from my experiences from conventions, is further than the truth, and this reinforcement of stereotypes in a nasty way really bothered me, and I think it is unfortunate that this one problem mars an otherwise enjoyable look at a fun part of fandom. Don't expect much from the mystery, but enjoy the scenery.

Teresa Plowright's first novel, Dreams of an Unseen Planet [Arbor House, 273 pages, $16.95] shows potential, potential unfortunately to some degree unrealized in the first encounter. She's taken on an ambitious task, trying to meld together many different ideas and themes: Earth is on the edge of a world war, an outpost is sent to a foreign planet to make a fresh start, the planet seeming has a sentient intelligence that is affecting the colonists, although only one colonist seems to notice its existence. She also weaves in both dystopian and feminist subtexts.

Ventura is the American outpost on Gaea, settled (along with sister outposts from China and Russia -- none of whom talk to each other, just like on Earth) in a hurry because it looks like the Earth is finally going to blow itself up.

Things are in pretty bad shape. Fertility is zero, despite ever attempt by Center (the nameless controlling administration) to promote births and reproduction. Crops are in bad shape, livestock isn't reproducing, the colony is failing, and nobody can figure out why. Miera, a working in the botanical gardens, is haunted by shapeless, sensual red dreams, and is fascinated by views of the planet outside -- views most colonists shun.

Plowright writes well, and I'll be in line for her next book, but Dreams never gels. There are simply too many things running around looking for attention, and she doesn't quite get it all tied together. I ended up feeling vaguely confused about what she was really trying to say because the book lacks a strong focus. There are no major flaws, but no real enchantment, either, potential, but potential unrealized.

Another first novel is War for the Oaks, by Minneapolis writer Emma Bull [Ace Fantasy Special, 309 pages, $3.50]. This is the book in the Fantasy sister to the highly regarded series of first Science Fiction novels edited by the late Terry Carr, and if this is any indication of what editor Terri Windling is going to do with the series, you can put the entire line on your buy list right now.

Bull tells a modern Fantasy, a battle for ownership of Minneapolis between the Seelie and Unseelie courts of Fairie. Thrust into the middle of this is Eddi McCandry, who is a musician in the Minneapolis bar band circuit. She is the Seelie talisman, for only with a human on the battleground may a Fairie die, and this battle is for keeps.

Bull tells the story at two levels. There is the story of Fairie and all that is done out of the site of the humans living in the city. She also weaves in a second story about the music -- not the top forty big business music, but the intense, personal music scene in operation in any big city. I'm frankly not a big fan of music, but I still found this entire book entrancing. The right folks win in the end, although the victory is not without its losses as well. This is a very enjoyable book, and a great start for a new author.

Wyrms [Arbor House, 263 pages, $16.95] is the latest from Hugo and Nebula winner Orson Scott Card. It's a rather simple book, the story of Patience, a young diplomats daughter trained in diplomacy as well as the arts of the assassin. She is, it turns out, heir to the throne of the Heptarch as well as the prophesied seventh daughter of the seventh daughter of the seventh daughter, whose geas is to mate with the Unwyrm, ruler of the underworlds.

This book rapidly turns into a rather standard quest novel, as Patience chases the her destiny, meeting interesting people and having interesting meetings along the way as she tries to find the information and tools she needs to defeat the prophecy, kill the Unwyrm, and assume her rightful place on the throne.

The trappings are Science Fiction, although the story is a Fantasy. If your mumbo-jumbo mentions magic, it is Fantasy, if that same mumbo- jumbo is genetics, its Science Fiction. The story has echoes of both Tolkien's Lord of the Rings and Wolfe's New Sun series, in fact I think an argument could be made that it is an homage of Wolfe's work. The worst I can say about this book is that it is harmless -- it isn't challenging to read, it isn't a complex plot and there aren't a lot of new ideas, but it is well written without any serious flaws. An enjoyable, minor book from a major writer.

A Dark Travelling is the second book in the Millenium series [packaged by Byron Preiss and published by Walker and Company, 143 pages, $14.95] where major authors take a new look at some of the traditional themes of Science Fiction. In this volume, Roger Zelazny takes a look at parallel universes with a good dash of witchcraft, psychics and lycanthropy tossed in for good measure. It's written very much like a juvenile, and is a fast, fun read.

Parallel universes come in three flavors -- light bands, the good guys; dark bands, the bad guys; and dead bands, the dead guys. The dark bands are constantly trying to take over the light bands, as you might expect, and the light bands are constantly trying to take over the dark bands to put them out of business. One night, Tom Wiley, keeper of the transcomp machine on one of the light bands is attacked and kidnapped -- evidently by a dark band group. It is up to his fourteen year old son, Jim, to find him and set things right.

The book never really sets up the premise that well or uses it to its full potential. What it really seems to be is a juvenile oriented coming of age story about Jim, as he learns to deal with himself in adult situations and come to grips with being a werewolf. Another book that covers this same idea much better is Gene DeWeese's The 10-Minute Werewolf, and while there is nothing really wrong with this book, there's nothing really worth calling attention to it, either. Another minor work from a major author.

From the Star Trek folks, a first contact novel with a difference -- what really happened when Earth first met the outsiders? In Strangers from the Sky (Pocket Books, 402 pages, $3.95) we get a look, not at the official doctrine of the Federation, but of what really happened and how the Earth nearly blew it.

This book contains three stories told in two parts. The first, and most interesting, is Strangers from the Sky itself, an account of the original encounter as read by Dr. McCoy or Kirk. The first half of the book switches between this story and the Star Trek folks themselves, acting on, around, and because of the story. Kirk, reading the novel, starts having strange nightmares and other psychological problems. At the same time, so does Spock. The coincidence is too strong, of course, so the two lock themselves up in an apartment with McCoy watching to try to get to the bottom of these strange occurrences.

The third story takes up the second half of the book as Kirk and Spock mind meld and go back to a previous adventure in which they and a landing party are whisked to Earth at the same time the first Vulcans crash land on the planet. The Earth authorities are hostile and secretive and considering any number of actions (all of them nasty, of course) so the Star Trek folks get involved and help put things to right and steer Earth to the stars, so that everybody can live happily ever after.

There's a very good story here, but it looks like the Star Trek people were afraid to publish a book that didn't have the regular characters in it -- which is too bad, because they've wrapped a couple of subplots around the core and weakened what they were trying to say. This book could have been cut by a third and some of the maneuvering to get the Good Doctor and friend front and center removed and a good book could have been turned into a great book. I think a series of stories about the early days of the Federation is a good idea -- but I don't think that trying to shove current people into the ancient past is a bad idea, and the justifications used here to tie everything together are forced and unconvincing.

Before he died, Author L. Ron Hubbard put together a contest to try to find and promote the best of the next generation of authors in the field. To date, it has been an overwhelming success. Among other aspects of the contest is a yearly anthology of the best stories. Writers of the Future, Volume III [Bridge Publications, 427 pages, $4.50] is out, and continues the tradition of publishing a highly varied collection of (for the most part) previously unpublished authors. Where you might have looked to Clarion for the new writers of the Seventies, I've come to believe that most of the major players in the Eighties (and perhaps beyond) will first be seen within the volumes of this anthology series -- reportedly contracted through Volume Seven.

There are rough edges on some of the stories, and there are sure to be stories that you won't like, not because they aren't good, but because there is such a wide variety of topics and styles that some simply won't click. But there isn't a clinker in the bunch. Writers of the Future is a major proving ground for the next generation of superstars, and as such it deserves your support. If that isn't enough, though, you'll 14 good stories and a lot of enjoyable reading time. Highly recommended.

Kim Stanley Robinson's latest collection, The Planet on the Table [Tor Science fiction, 241 pages, $3.50] is out, and is a strong collection of short fiction from one of the better young writers. Many of the works will probably be unfamiliar to you, because they are primarily collected from Terry Carr's Universe anthology series. There are also a couple of stories from Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine and Damon Knight's Orbit anthology series. If you know anything about Terry Carr, you can guess that there isn't a bad story in the bunch. My personal favorite has to be "The Disguise" which is a view into how theater might be in the far future. This book is one of the better collections you'll see this year.

Does politics and Science Fiction mix? Jerry Pournelle, a well known pro-space and pro-Defense conservative as well as SF author, has been publishing a series of anthologies under the title There Will be War. The basic premise seems to be that War is a necessary evil, and it will happen. You prepare for it, because it is inevitable.

If you think that these books are propogandist, however, you'd be dead wrong. Guns of Darkness [There Will be War, Volume VI, Tor Science Fiction, 405 pages, $3.95, edited by John F. Carr and created by Jerry Pournelle] is an anthology of stories as bleak as the blackest anti-war works by Harlan Ellison or Joe Haldeman. It includes both new stories and reprints, as well as a few factual or historical articles. In general, the stories are quite good, especially Battleground by Gregory and Jim Benford, Doughfoot Sanctum by James William Holzer (a dead ringer for Lucius Shepard's R&R) and The Eye of Argos by Harry Turtledove. The only place it falls down are the factual articles, which seem a bit strident, and The Highest Treason, a story by Randall Garrett that is one of the very few works by that author I haven't liked. Overall, though, the quality is high, and this book should be attractive to people across the political spectrum. Perhaps the best propaganda is that that doesn't preach to the converted.

This month somehow turned into a month for catching up on reference books. One that I ran into that I recommend very highly is Fantasists on Fantasy, edited by Robert H. Boyer and Kenneth J. Zahorski [Avon/Discus books, 1984, 287 pages, $3.95]. This is an anthology of various pieces about the field of Fantasy by the people who write it. The pieces date from 1893 to the present day, and include pieces from G.K. Chesterton, James Thurber, H.P Lovecraft, C.S. Lewis, Andre Norton, Ursula K. Leguin, Michael Moorcock and many others. My favorite quote, which relates to my anti-censorship diatribe last issue, was from G.K. Chesterton, who said:

"Some solemn and superficial people (for nearly all very superficial people are solemn) have declared that the fairy-tales are immoral [....] This objection, however, is not only false, but very much reverse of the facts...."

What I found most interesting about his comments was that they were made in 1908, and they show that the small thinkers have always been with us, and probably always will -- censorship is a battle never won, but not one that can be left to others.

For people who are trying to learn more about the background of Fantasy, a wonderful book. Highly recommended.

For people who are trying to learn more about writing, Writer's Digest Books has just published How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction, edited by Horror author J.N. Williamson [205 pages plus recommended reading list and index, $15.95]. The material is slanted rather heavily towards Horror, almost to the point where it looks like the SF and Fantasy material was added to broaden the market for the book. Despite this slant, most of the material can be used for any style of writing, and it includes chapters on plotting, characterization, naming, world building, and writing mechanics among others, from authors like Darrell Schweitzer, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Ramsey Campbell, Dean R. Koontz and Charles L. Grant. If you're a working pro, you've probably passed this book far behind. It sometimes tends to fall into cheerleader mode ("Kids! You TOO can grow horrible monsters in your basement and sell them for lots of money!"). At the same time, there is a lot of good information on the mechanics of writing and the practical aspects of getting your work read and sold. For the beginning writer and the person trying to get serious about selling, this book can be of help. For the advanced amateur it will be too basic.

Many years ago a set of blueprints were published for the Enterprise, the interstellar vessel in the television series Star Trek. They were highly detailed, and showed the entire layout, deck by deck. They also showed, much to the amusement of Star Trek fans everywhere, that there were basically no bathrooms on the Enterprise, lending itself to many convention discussions of exactly what the 400+ members of the crew did for their five year mission.

Pocket books has updated the blueprints to include design changes from the four Star Trek movies and published them as Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise [written and illustrated by Shane Johnson, 125 pages 8.5x11" trade paperback, $10.95]. The new edition is a mixed blessing. On the positive side, there are bathrooms everywhere -- private ones, public ones, small bathrooms and multi-station latrines. They exist in the bridge, in Engineering, in the rec areas. Everywhere. I'm sure the crew will be eternally grateful. There is even a bathroom in the transporter room these days!

On the negative side, however, there is a lot less detail than in the original, and a lot of pages used for secondary items (details of the shuttles, hatches, uniforms, and the like). I was rather disappointed with the book, frankly, because so much seems missing. Some of the areas are rather poorly thought out, also -- my personal gripe is the sick bay and operating arena, which was very tiny and didn't include either scrub areas or an air dam into the operating room -- both of which would be necessities to keep an area sterile for an operation.

I think that, for what you're getting here, this is an expensive book. If you can find the original blueprints used, you'll get a lot more detail for a lot less. If you can't, take a look at this and see if it has enough information for what you want -- but don't be surprised if it doesn't.

The Science Fiction and Heroic Fantasy Author Index was published in 1978 by Stuart W. Wells III and Purple Unicorn Books (4532 London Road, Duluth, MN, 55804, 185 pages, $9.95). It is an attempt to cover every novel and collection published or reprinted between 1945 and 1978. It specifically excludes areas such as horror, anthology, or foreign publications, but after browsing it, it looks pretty complete. As a reference work of things published in the field, I think it'll be pretty useful, although I hope it is either revised or a companion volume for the years since its publications are done.

Finally, Omni Magazine has come out with Arthur C. Clarke's July 20, 2019: Life in the 21st Century [Macmillan/SFBC, 276 pages hardback]. The name is misleading -- not only isn't it written by Clarke, but he didn't have editorial control of the content. The only real contact Clarke seems to have with this volume is the cashing of royalty checks. Inside are a series of articles written about various subjects: Medicine, Robots, Entertainment, Sex, War, Death and others by uncredited contributors (their names are in the acknowledgments, but they don't get credited to a given article -- this way, I guess, we don't know who to blame).

Some of the articles are written from the viewpoint of how things are today in 2019. Other articles are written about how things will be in 2019. Still others try both viewpoints at once. If this sounds chaotic, you've got it. Many of the articles seem to be lightly researched gosh-wow pieces, and the book is illustrated in the traditional Omni style: glitzy stock photos with cute (not not necessarily relevant) captions.

Skip this one. It's frankly an insult that something this schlocky would have a name like Clarke's on the cover -- an insult to readers who pick it up thinking they'll get Clarke on the inside, and an insult to the visionary Clarke, whose name is being prostituted for a piece of commercial garbage.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 7)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 7

Loose Ends

Reviews by
Alan Wexelblat
wex@mcc.com

Copyright 1987 by
Alan Wexelblat

You know how it is. I try and find some common thread, some theme to tie together the books I read. Sometimes it's easy -- they're all part of a series. Sometimes, it's not so easy. And sometimes it's just downright impossible. This was one of the downright impossible times.

This month we have a mixed bag -- a John Crowley novel, a Frank Miller graphic novel, a shared-world anthology I promised to get to some months ago, and a new novel by an old master. Let's start with the Crowley this time, instead of leaving it for last.

Engine Summer

[****+]

John Crowley

Bantam, 209 pages.

I had just started reading Crowley's Engine Summer when Chuq blessed me with a copy of AEgypt, which I reviewed in my last column. Then other things came up and Engine Summer was forgotten for a while. I've finally gotten around to reading it, and I'm glad I did.

Regular readers of this magazine have heard me rave in the past about Crowley's skill -- his mastery of the language. He has a rare ability to put words together in almost magical combination. Sentences of thirty or forty words are not uncommon. And his descriptions are excellent, giving just enough detail to evoke an image without overpowering the reader.

As I've reviewed his works, I've seen his mastery of this talent grow. Engine Summer is not Crowley's best work; published in 1979, it is obvious that Crowley was still learning. However, Engine Summer is a fine story.

Unlike Crowley's other works -- notably the award-winning Little, Big which came immediately after Engine Summer -- this book has a basically linear plot. It is the story of Rush that Speaks, told in the first person in a straightforward earliest-to-latest manner. The basic plot is a timeless one: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy seeks girl. But Crowley's telling makes the ordinary plot a special one.

Like Beasts and Little, Big, Engine Summer takes place in Earth's future after the fall of the old civilization. Reduced population allows the survivors to live off the land in small agricultural communities with low technology levels. In this case, the title of the novel tells a lot; it is the "engine summer" of the world, before the descent into true winter.

Little Belaire is the community where Rush is born and where he meets Once a Day, an older girl whom he grows to love. When she leaves the community in search of her destiny, Rush feels compelled to follow. The story of their meeting as children, growing up together, and Rush's search for her and for his true self make up the body of the novel.

Rush tells his story to an 'angel.' This allows Crowley to unobtrusively explain details which might otherwise have confused the reader. The story is filled with "snake's hands," little side detours that flesh out the basic plot line and give it the reality of a person's life. The presence of the angel also allows for an unexpected but very interesting ending.

Crowley has done a good job telling this story. The futuristic setting 'feels' right. The reader can play guessing games with the author, trying to figure out which icons of the future are which symbols of the present. As with many future-set stories, it is interesting to see which ideas the author thinks will survive the fall of civilization.

In addition, Crowley gives the reader a good sense of how the society that Rush lives in developed. We see how the pieces fit together, and how the people of the future deal with the memory and aftereffects of the Storm -- the cataclysm that destroyed the old society.

As always, Crowley's writing is a joy to read, though not as smooth- flowing as his later works. I recommend Engine Summer highly to those of you who have not yet been introduced to John Crowley. For Crowley-lovers, this is one not to miss.

Ronin

[****+]

Frank Miller (creator, author, artist); Lynn Varley (paints); John Costanza (lettering)

DC Graphic novel
ISBN 0-930289-21-8

This year, Frank Miller is causing quite a stir. With his innovations he is turning heads all through the comic-book world and the ripples have even reached the world of science fiction. Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns will be talked about for years to come. But when I sat down to write about it, I found myself using words like 'misanthropic,' and in general writing a review that reflected the unpleasantness of the work.

So I decided to go back a few years to 1983-84, when Frank Miller was still developing the style and techniques and gaining the experience that would later allow him to create Dark Knight.

In '83/'84, DC published a five-issue limited series that told the story of a ronin (a masterless samurai) and the demon he hunted. This hunt, which should have ended in the Japanese Middle Ages, is carried by the demon's magic into the twenty-first century. There, the experiments of a scientist on the ronin's magic sword allows the trapped spirits to escape and to resume their battle. The five original comics are now collector's items and are hard to find. However, DC has recently republished the story in a five- chapter softcover book which is a must for any fan of the graphic arts.

Miller is infamous for the bleakness of the future he painted in Dark Knight. In Ronin, he shows a bleak world, but the New York he creates is not irredeemably lost. Much of the city's population lives in dull middle- class fear as wage slaves to large corporations like Aquarius, the battleground chosen by the freed spirits of the demon and ronin.

As with other Miller tales, a large segment of the population lives in a blood-spattered struggle for survival in streets which know only the law of the gang. The gangs are punk and brutal, engaging in casual murder, watching and laughing as rival gang members are eaten alive by cannibalistic sewer-dwelling people.

In addition to the middle class and the gangs, there is a privileged upper class, traveling far above the filth in aircars or armored tanks. Miller draws people from all these segments of his society well; they are not uniformly good, nor uniformly bad. During their battle, the demon and the ronin come into contact with many of these people.

The spirit of the ronin inhabits the body of Billy, an adolescent boy. Billy was born with no arms or legs; however, he has unusual mental powers, the extent of which is not truly known. Billy is in the care of Virgo, the intelligent computer that runs the Aquarius complex in New York.

Aquarius's security chief is Casey McKenna. She starts out disbelieving in the ronin when it manifests. She scoffs at the magic and the legends. But as the story progresses, she becomes increasingly caught up in the ronin's struggle. Partly this is out of necessity, as the battle poses a direct threat to Aquarius. However, her interest grows beyond the professional.

In addition, Virgo is involved in the ronin's fate in some strange way. Early on in the story, she risks self-destruction in order to save him from Agat, the demon. But her ultimate loyalty is not so simple, and as the battle between the ronin and the demon continues, it becomes increasingly clear that she has her own agenda.

Miller tells this story with both broad and subtle styles. Paint and color are spattered and carefully stroked into the scenes. Violence and love are depicted explicitly, but with rare style and craftsmanship. Miller also plays with a variety of techniques in each issue, making each one different from all the ones that came before. This process is fascinating to watch.

It is particularly interesting to see how he uses the black inks - they are at times both background and foreground. They are used to represent pain, and to show the grime of the city air. Miller is also a master of the use of pastel colors. Usually, pastel hues are used to show softness and to take the edge off a scene. Miller, however, turns this idea on its head, giving his pastel colors a bite I have not seen before.

I liked Ronin; I think it's better than Dark Knight. Both present a very bleak picture of the future. But where Dark Knight is unremittingly negative, Ronin shows the positive side of humanity as well. Love, loyalty, honesty, and more are all present and play their part in the ronin's tale, as well as the darker side of humanity.

I won't say which triumphs in the end, but I will say that the ronin is as engrossing as any character in an 'ordinary' SF novel, and Miller's graphics give the book a level of intensity not often found in the pure-print medium.

Bordertown

[***]

Emma Bull, Will Shetterly, Midori Snyder,
Bellamy Bach, Ellen Kushner

Signet paperbacks, 251 pp

A couple of months ago, I reviewed Borderland, the first collection in this shared-world series. I found it to be lacking something which, for want of a better word, I called continuity. Bordertown is better, but not much. It also lacks the togetherness that characterizes successful shared- world series, such as the early Thieves' World books. Bordertown has better stories, but that's about all.

Bordertown is the name of the city that exists in the Borderlands, the area between the normal, technological World and the strange, magical Elflands. Bordertown is home to gangs of elves, humans, and 'halfies.' Life for these gangs revolves around punk rock dance clubs and the bands that perform there. One of these clubs is Danceland, the title club of the first story, written by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly.

"Danceland" is the best of the four stories in this volume. Bull and Shetterly tell a story of murder and intrigue. They fill "Danceland" with interesting characters and set them in a whirl of action. This leads to a fast-paced story which sweeps the reader along.

Someone in Danceland has bloodily murdered an Elf. Not just any elf, he was clearly someone of some importance in the Elflands. Which means that the police cannot afford to overlook his murder. Unfortunately, most of the people with the best motives are the good guys, friends of Orient, the narrator. Most of the story revolves around their attempt to clear their names and to find the real murderers.

The action ranges across most of Bordertown, giving Bull and Shetterly an opportunity to show the reader around. The action continues at a fast clip until the climax, which is handled quite well.

The second story, Midori Snyder's "Demon," is the worst of the four. It is the story of a young girl's struggle to control a magically-enhanced demon within herself.

The idea is good, it's just not carried off well. Too many extraneous elements are introduced and they clutter up the story. In addition, the climax is a real letdown. Snyder seems bent on developing certain themes and introduces whatever he thinks he needs to that end. The characters and the story both suffer as a result.

"Exile," by Bellamy Bach, is third. It's a strange story of a woman exiled from the Elflands to Bordertown and the man she takes up with. The story is strange in part because Bach deliberately makes Hector -- the narrator -- and Dez -- the elf -- distant. They never get close to each other emotionally; consequently, the reader is held at arm's length throughout the story.

Also, Bach seems to be writing something of a parable. The action in the story centers around a hunt for a 'monster' from the Borderlands that has, supposedly, wandered into town. We see several minor characters preparing for and engaged in the hunt, while Hector and Dez are mostly spectators.

Bach seems to want to point out that we are all, to some extent, monsters. Most of the minor characters are pretty dislikeable. Some are thrill freaks, some are cowards hiding in the 'bravery' of a crowd, and some are just out to see something bleed.

Bach plays up these weaknesses and the reader is left wondering who the real monsters are. All in all, "Exile" is well-written, but doesn't draw the reader in the way "Danceland" does.

The last story is "Mockery," cowritten by Ellen Kushner and Bellamy Bach. As with "Exile," the characters in this story are cold and hard to like. The story starts off slowly, but picks up as it moves along. I am not familiar enough with the authors to say which parts were written by whom, but based on "Exile," I'd say that Kushner mellows Bach quite a bit.

"Mockery" is a tale told by Hale, a now-famous painter, about the wild and wooly days of his youth. It is a sad story of struggling artists and their inability to handle success. It is made even sadder by its remoteness in time. The reader knows from the start that he's getting a "history lesson," to use Hale's term. Thus, when things go wrong, we know there is no way to go back and fix them.

Still, Kushner and Bach make a good team. When the action starts to roll, the reader is drawn in by the cleverness and determination of the struggling artists. For a brief while, the characters open up to each other and allow the reader to like them. Unfortunately, it is all over too soon.

However, "Mockery" leaves many loose ends. Some of the characters in the story are said to be still around. The fate of others is clearly left hanging. I hope that these authors decide to write the stories that will tie up at least some of the loose ends.

It is hard to sum up Bordertown . As I said before, it lacks the continuity I like to see. Each author seems to want his or her own corner of the city to write in. Some characters cross story boundaries, but they don't make much difference when they do. It's a mediocre collection, but it still shows a great deal of promise. Should there be a third volume, I will probably buy it.

Pyramids

[**+]

Fred Saberhagen

Baen Books, 311 pages

How do you go about saying bad things about a good author? Is everyone entitled to have a bad day, or should big-name writers be judged by a higher standard than the rest? Fred Saberhagen has, in the past, written some very good and very successful stories including the long-running Berserker series and the recently revived Swords series.

Pyramids is supposed to be the first of a new series centering around Pilgrim, one of the major characters in this story. I can only hope that the the other books will be better than this one.

Pyramids is a science fantasy about time travel between modern Chicago and ancient Egypt. The protagonist, Tom Sceffler, is given access to a time lock that transports him between his strange great-uncle's strange apartment and Egypt during the building of the great Pyramid at Giza.

The story suffers from an excess of irrelevant subplots. There are Set- worshipping tomb robbers, whose daily lives are described in far too much detail. There is a totally superfluous female body named Becky who sleeps with Tom a couple of times and ends up stuck in ancient Egypt with him. There are the bizarre aliens who travel with Pilgrim who never speak and who perform no important function that I can see.

In addition to the extraneous subplots, Saberhagen has littered the book with detailed bits that seem designed only to show that the author has done his homework. For example, we are told at least four times that five thousand years ago, the stars are in unrecognizable configurations. I don't know if this is true or not and since it doesn't matter at all to the story, I don't care.

The main thread of the story concerns the attempts of the Set worshippers, with the help of the time travelers (including Tom, his great- uncle, his great uncle's brother, and Pilgrim) to rob Khufu's tomb in the pyramid. Each player has his own reasons for wanting to rob the tomb. Saberhagen shows great skill in that he manages to manipulate so many separate actors at once, though why he tries to is beyond me.

The last major problem with the book is the ending. It is, first of all, a major letdown. After a protracted chase and battle sequence, the location suddenly shifts and 'poof' we're home again. It's almost as though Saberhagen ran out of steam at that point and so decided to stop writing. The objective of the chase remains uncaught and uncatchable. No explanation is given for why things end this way.

And, speaking of explanations, Saberhagen would have done better not to have had Pilgrim explain what was going on. I can't give details without spoiling the entire book, but I found my credulity quite strained. It's not just bad mumbo-jumbo, it's bad mumbo-jumbo combined with characters acting in stupid ways.

All in all, a big disappointment. Two stars for being a Saberhagen effort; he is a good writer. An additional plus if, like me, you are fascinated by ancient Egypt and its myths, mysteries, and lore.

Publishing Notes

Arbor House has become an imprint of William Morrow rather than in independent publishing operation. Both are owned by Hearst Corporation, and after cutting their titles from 70 to 40, it no longer makes economic sense to keep the lines separate. Arbor House is one of the premier SF Hardcover publishers -- what this will do to the field is unknown.

New Infinities Productions has been created by Gary Gygax, founder of TSR and creator of Dungeons & Dragons. The new venture will be producing books, games, and gaming accessories. Gygax and TSR has severed relations -- New Infinities will not deal with TSR products, and TSR will not be handling any future work by Gygax.

The fall line for Franklin Watts publishers includes Warhaven by M. Elayn Harvey, a first Science Fiction novel (October, $15.95); The Haunted One by Jay Bennett, a Horror/Suspense Young Adult novel (October, $11.95); Alqua Dreams, a Science Fiction novel (November, $16.95); and Merlin by Norma Lorre Goodrich, a historical view of the man beside the King (January, $24.95).

Melissa Scott and Lisa Barnett have sold an historical Fantasy novel The Armor to Baen Books for the Baen Fantasy Imprint. Melissa Scott's The Kindly Ones will be a Science Fiction Book Club Main Selection, with the Baen edition published in September. The final book in the Silence Leigh trilogy, Empress of Earth, will be published by Baen in November.

Fantasy Review, a literary journal of Science Fiction and Fantasy, has announced that it is folding as of issue number 103 due to financial reasons. Editor Robert Collins reported that his publisher will be replacing the monthly with Annual Review, a clothbound book that will attempt to review the entire field each year. The first issue of Annual Review will be published next May, and Fantasy Review subscribers that have issues left will get a copy. Annual Review is aimed at the library market and will list at $57.50 a copy.

The Pinnacle Books bankruptcy problem seems to be solved, as Zebra books has agreed to purchase the remaining assets of the publishing house and has announced a plan to get the works back into print. What this means for authors who have works tied up in the proceedings isn't completely clear, although getting them away from the court will give them a chance to get them into circulation or have their rights revert so that they can be remarketed.

St. Martin's Press has signed up K.W. Jeter for Farewell, Horizontal, the first book of the Cylinder trilogy, to be published in the Fall of 1988. Also due from St. Martin's: Kate Wilhelm's latest, Crazy Time; Interzone The 2nd Anthology of material from the British magazine, and The Journal of Nicholas the American by Leigh Kennedy.

Ginger Buchanan has been promoted to Senior Editor of Ace Science Fiction and Fantasy. Lou Aronica has been named Publisher of Bantam/Spectra books, and will also retain his title as Senior Editor.

Donning/Starblaze has announced a new imprint: Starblaze Classics. The first book published will be The Thief of Bagdad, illustrated by P. Craig Russell, to be published in October. Following that, Mike Grell will illustrate The Adventures of Robin Hood and his Merry Men for Summer 1988.

Also at Donning/Starblaze: a art book from the worlds of Pern by Anne McCaffrey and artist Robin Wood. Phil Foglio has signed a six book contract to adapt the works of Mark Twain in a graphic novel format.

Kevin Anderson has sold his first novel, Resurrection Inc. to NAL/Signet. Richard Curtis was the agent.

David Keller has joined the staff of Donning/Starblaze to edit the Starblaze Graphics Fantasy and Science Fiction graphic novels. Kay Reynolds has left Donning to freelance full time, after seven years as an editor.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 8)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 8

Much Rejoicing

Reviews by
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes
djo@ptsfa.uucp

Copyright 1987 by
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes

Reviewed in this column:

How to Write Tales of Horror,
Fantasy and Science Fiction
J.N. Williamson

Lincoln's Dream
Connie Willis
[****+]

To Sail Beyond the Sunset
Robert A. Heinlein
[*****-]

The Children of Arable
David Belden
[***+]

Yearwood
Paul Hazel
[**]

The Reality Matrix
John Dalmas
[***]

Firebird
Kathy Tyers
[**+]

The American Shore
Samuel R. Delaney

"Science Fiction is the search for a definition of man and his status in the universe which will stand in our advanced but confused state of knowledge (science)...

"Corollary: the more powers above the ordinary that the
protagonist enjoys, the closer the fiction will approach to
hardcore SF." --Brian W. Aldiss, Billion Year Spree

Episode 3: Last and First Books

A slight digression before we move on to a new crop of SF and Fantasy books. If you have no interest at all in ever writing fiction, skip to the first blank space in this column; I'm going to discuss a book on the subject.

Very well. Now that those three are gone, the rest of you might want to know about "Writers Digest Books." Writer's Digest magazine publishes all sorts of articles on all aspects of writing, and any given issue may contain little or nothing of interest to a beginning SF writer, or may be fascinating from cover to cover.

But Writers Digest also publishes a series of books on writing, from the annual Writer's Market to Damon Knight's excellent book on Writing Short Fiction, to (and here we come to the point) a book issued just this spring, called How To Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction, edited by J.N. Williamson[1987, $15.95. ISBN 0-89879-270-3] -- no relation to Jack Williamson. How To is, like any book on writing, of use only to those who are willing to live with it and figure out what in it works and doesn't for them; furthermore, it is quite uneven.

It is uneven because it is written by a large number of people -- it's a collection of (all new) articles by people ranging from Ray Bradbury and Robert Bloch, to George Clayton Johnson and a whole bunch of people I've never heard of and don't expect you have either. Some of the articles are full of pithy, useful advice; others are anecdotal and entertaining. Johnson's article is about narrative hooks, and consists almost entirely of a collection of his own first sentences; it's easily the most pointless thing in the entire book. Bradbury's article is personal but helpful. Most have at least one or two insights that a would-be writer might do well to heed -- even the Johnson.

There are also articles by people connected with the publishing business including an agent and a couple of editors. These are excellent perspectives on what these people do, what they can do for you, and what you can do to avoid making them hate you or your manuscript. This isn't one of the best books on writing I've ever read, but it's far from the worst: I give it a tentative recommendation.

So, from a book on learning to write let's turn to some books by people learning to write: I've got four first novels in this crop, and I'm pleased to say that not a one of 'em is a real stinker.

The prize of the bunch is unquestionably Connie Willis's Lincoln's Dreams [Bantam-Spectra 1987, $15.95. ISBN 0-553-05197-0]. A lot of people have been waiting for Willis to publish a novel, and damned if it wasn't worth waiting for.

The premise is like nothing I've ever seen before. Jeff is a researcher, working for a fellow who writes best-selling novels set in the Civil War. Jeff meets a woman named Annie who's been having dreams, strange dreams which seem to take place at the sites of some of the Civil War's worst battlefields. More; they seem to be visions of the battles as seen by Robert E. Lee.

Her psychiatrist who is Jeff's former college roommate, which is how he meets Annie -- has drugged her in an irresponsible manner. This may or may not be connected to the fact that said psychiatrist has become her lover in complete defiance of all canons of patient-doctor relations.

Why is she having these dreams? Is she being possessed by Lee's ghost, or is she merely, as the psychiatrist thinks, a very sick woman? The dreams are filled with details, vivid and accurate details that only an expert on the period can really understand; but even Jeff can't understand why.

The book has a flavor that reminds me of the old South, with its sadness and nostalgia, but without a sign of the decadence so often associated with Southern art and fiction. Its characters are alive; you come away with the feeling that something strange has just happened to a close friend.

And you will never in a million years guess why Annie is dreaming those dreams, but when you find out, you'll think you knew all along.

The other masterpiece before me today is Robert A. Heinlein's To Sail Beyond the Sunset [Ace Putnam 1987, $18.95. ISBN 0-399-13267-6]. This is Maureen Smith's story, told by herself, and it may well be that the best parts of the book take place before it really becomes stfnal, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Maureen, as most of you already know, is the mother of Woodrow Wilson Smith, better known as Lazarus Long. To Sail Beyond the Sunset is a novel as personal and as touching as the best parts of Time Enough for Love, Lazarus' book; it is the story of a daughter, wife, mother, and ultimately an independent, intelligent woman surviving and thriving in good and bad times.

Much of the story is narrated by Maureen from a jail on an unfamiliar version of Earth. She is a member of Lazarus' Time Corps, and has been arrested for an unlikely crime while on an equally unlikely mission; to pass the time, she dictates her memoirs to a recorder built into her abdominal cavity.

The device works. She tells her tale, up to the point (in The Number of the Beast) where she is rescued/abducted by the Long clan and brought into their polymorphous family and futurity. Each chapter is framed with comments on what is happening in and around her cell, or wherever she happens to be -- a court- room or whatever. There's plenty of whatever. Eventually, she's rescued by the Time Corps and allowed to take part in the completion of her odd mission -- a mission so ridiculous that only Heinlein can pull it off with a straight face.

But pull it off he does, and the result is some of the best writing Heinlein's ever given us. This may well be his last book; if so, he's built himself a monument worthy of his life and work.

Onward, ever onward. A book came out at the beginning of this year with almost no trumpeting or foofaraw, which I'd like to commend to your attention. It's called The Children of Arable [Signet 1987, $2.95. ISBN 0- 451-14660-3], and it's the first novel by a British emigre' named David Belden. On the strength of this novel, I'd like to submit that Belden is a Man To Watch. (Remember: You read it here first.)

The book is not without flaws. Belden begins with an audacious concept; a human society literally without a concept of gender, where the sexual organs are completely superfluous except for pleasure, and nobody forms special attachments. The people of this "Collectivity" speak English, but without the sexed pronouns. His solution to this is clever enough that I don't want to give it away -- but this is also where the book begins to crack, because he explains his solution in the same passage where he explains why he isn't using it. He fails to follow through his concept, and refers to characters as "he" and "she" before it is logical to do so.

You see, it does become logical to do so. Children is about a woman who brings about the fall of this genderless collective state, and, if it happens in an unbelievably easy manner, it is no more so than in dozens of other SF novels where a single protagonist brings the Revolution, changes the world, etc. And Mary/Martin/Mariammo, the protagonist, pays a much higher price for her revolution than the typical stfnal demigod.

The imagined culture is rich and full in texture, and damn near every odd corner we're exposed to turns around and plays a key part in Martin's victory. The complexity of Belden's imagination and plotting promise excellent books in the future. Children, though flawed, is an excellent (though not an easy, or a fast) read, and well worth your attention now.

What's this? Yearwood [Bantam-Spectra 1987 , $3.95. ISBN 0-553- 26681-0] by Paul Hazel; another first novel. It says here it's...Oh, no...it's the first in a Fantasy trilogy. Worse; it looks Celtic as hell. Another damn Celtic Fantasy trilogy. What, Oh Mighty Editor, did I ever do that you inflicted this on me? Oh, well, I said I wanted a batch of first novels...

Still, let's read it. Matter of principle; every book gets a fair reading here. H'mmm. A one-eyed man, with talking crows named Thought and Memory. That's not Celtic, that's Norse. But this here is Welsh, and Finnish, and...

Well. Surprise, surprise. It's still Celtic as hell, but it's pretty damned original, if only in its blending of traditional elements from all over northern Europe..

What have we got? A boy raised by a backwoods nobleman who isn't his father, who turns out to be the True King's son. Ships of the dead. Standing stones. Seal-people. A mishmash, which somehow coalesces into a coherent geography and culture; not a bad trick, if you can pull it off.

The plotting's pretty good too, so far. Hazel's telling us the ever-popular tale of the Doomed King, but with enough changes rung on it that I never guessed -- not correctly, at any rate -- what was going to happen next. I rarely even guessed at all.

Hazel's biggest problem is his style; it's full of poorly-handled mock- archaic phrasings that annoy without building flavor. The entire trilogy is written and published (this is the first paperback edition of a 1980 Atlantic-Little Brown hardcover), so I imagine the subject-predicate inversions and other signs of would-be archaic writing continue through the trilogy; but they aren't so bad that they keep me from wanting to read the rest of it, as it comes out. (For one thing, volume one ends on a cliffhanger.)

Still, I can't help but wish that a good copy-editor had banged Hazel over the head with Fowler or Strunk and White a few times, to teach him the difference between style and stylishness.

John Dalmas boils an honest pot: or so is my impression after reading his excellent pot-boiler, The Reality Matrix [Baen 1986, $2.95. ISBN 0- 671-65583-3].

Poul Anderson proclaims on the (rather garish) cover that this book "makes the reader think." Well, maybe it made Anderson think. It kept me turning pages -- I read the last 150 in a single sitting -- but no more.

We have an engaging set of characters, notably a Swedish psychic named Ole who talks vit yust a tiny accent, and a cop who doesn't believe in ESP, and a concept that should have been the subject of a profound, thoughtful novel: reality "as we know it" is actually a game played by beings -- what we might call our "souls" -- who agree to forget the higher reality while playing. The game is scheduled to end in six months, unless Our Heroes can defeat the usual incredible odds to stop it. That Matrix is not the subject of a profound, thoughtful novel is annoying, but not fatal.

The plotting is tight. Dalmas starts at a nice, gentle pace, and accelerates it a bit at a time until the reader is nearly out of breath. Along the way, he introduces a set of villains that, while they didn't set me booing and hissing, wrung a cheer out of me the first time one got himself killed (and killed in a particularly villainous manner, too -- rather reminded me of Patrick McGoohan's death in Silver Streak).

But the plotting gets in the way at times. Dalmas makes everything too easy for his heroes. Toward the end, some of them get killed, but by that time, it's okay for them to get killed. We're so indoctrinated with the idea of the game, and the idea that dead people just "recycle" into new roles, that it doesn't have the impact it should.

He also drops things. Two of the heroes are ghosts; at one point, he tells us that they're going to haunt the home of one of the villains -- in, I believe, Texas. When we see them next, they're on the Canadian border, with no explanation of how they got there or why they aren't busy haunting the villain.

Similarly, when he first introduces Ole, we're told that he received his psychic powers in a head injury which also left him half-witted. He never once shows a sign of half-wittedness -- unless, of course, his accent is half- witted, v'ich concept I know some Svedes who vould gladly argue vit.

Still, Dalmas delivers solid entertainment and original characters. I don't think anybody will feel cheated at the end of The Reality Matrix.

I promised four first novels, and here's the last: Firebird [Bantam- Spectra 1987, $3.50. ISBN 0-553-26716-7], by Kathy Tyers. A good old- fashioned space opera. More or less.

Our heroine, Firebird, is the third daughter of the Queen of a matriarchal planet: Naetai. Or sometimes N'Tai -- I think the latter refers to the empire ruled from the planet, but it never became quite clear to me. I'm also not sure it's a matriarchy; the ruler is always female, but most of the aristocracy seems to be male.

Anyway, the N'Taian empire is a small wart at the edge of a half-a-galaxy ruled by a Federated mankind. The Federacy is bigger than the empire, has incredibly powerful telepathic operatives, and probably has an advanced technology. The Federacy has been asking the empire to join them in peace and harmony for hundreds of years. What does the empire do? Why, it launches a sneak attack to wrest a relatively minor planet from Federal control, of course!.

And Firebird is right there in the front lines. You see, Naetai has strict rules limiting the number of heirs to any noble house, even the royal house. She is expected to die gloriously in battle. Instead, she manages to get herself kidnapped.

The rest of the story is fairly predictable. She discovers that the Federacy is Good and Just; she falls in love with her captor (a repeated occurrence in SF stories whose underlying psychosexuality should be examined some time); she joins a mission to stop her homeworld from developing an Ultimate Weapon.

Firebird is a good read for an airplane, or the bathtub, but I wouldn't send it to Mom as proof that this sci-fi stuff really is great literature.

If I did want to convince someone of the literary value of SF, I'd ask them to read this Closet Classic. I began this column with a book about the writing of Horror, Fantasy, and SF; I'm concluding with a book about reading SF.

Samuel R. Delany is well-known as a writer of erudite but popular SF and Fantasy (Nova, Dhalgren, Tales of Neveryon, etc.), as well as several Hugo- and Nebula-award stories and novels (The Einstein Intersection, Bable-17, "Aye, and Gomorrah," "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi- Precious Stones," and "Prismatica"). He is also quite well-known in the circles that care about such things as one of the foremost critics and theoreticians of SF.

In 1977, Dragon Press published a collection of his essays, The Jewel- Hinged Jaw, which has since appeared in paperback. The following year, they brought forth a book-length work, The American Shore, which had only a single printing, and I would like to suggest that this is simply a crime.

The American Shore is a close analysis of a short story by Thomas Disch, "Angouleme." It is not a critical evaluation of that story, though it certainly does speak in places of the story's "meaning" and worth. Rather, The American Shore is a close and closely-reasoned analysis of the processes in the reader's mind as she reads a tale of Science Fiction.

Consider: when you read an SF story, you actually build a world, complete with culture, economics, sociology, arts, business, military and political history, etc., etc. in your mind, all from a very few words. The classic example, and one Delany cites, is Heinlein's sentence in Beyond This Horizon: "The door dilated." The experienced SF reader gleans from this a technology capable of building irising doors, a society that finds them desirable, a culture in which they are common, etc., etc., and this radiates outward from the single detail and interacts with the other details the writer offers, and builds a surprisingly complex image of what this future world is and is not like, to the point where the reader can spot a detail that doesn't actually contradict anything else but feel that it doesn't "fit."

Delany tears the story into 200+ short sections -- some as short as a single word -- and analyzes what each of them does to build the world and society in the reader's mind. He does not discuss, except peripherally, what causes the author to select those details, or what they "mean" to the author: this essay is about a story, and a story is judged by the reader, not the author.

Like all the Closet Classics so far, The American Shore is not going to interest everyone. But if you are interested in knowing about SF, not just reading it, you may find much of value here to support many rereadings.

Some paperback publisher should grab this puppy; it should be one of those books that never sells heavy, but sells steailyy for year after year.

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

Issue 18, Fall 1987 (part 9)

Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 9

Letters to OtherRealms

Judy-Lynn isn't forgotten. This is the dedication for
2061: Odyssey III (due out in Jan 88):

To the memory of Judy-Lynn Del Rey,
Editor Extraodinary,
Who Bought this book for one dollar

-- But never knew if she got her money's worth.

A.C. Clarke Sri Lanka

Chuq;

Oh well, I'm sorry you'll be going to quarterly publication (since it means I will have read most of what you review before I see OtherRealms). I hope this means you'll have more long reviews (I agree that the pico reviews are much less useful). I can live without horror reviews, too (a hint) -- so if horror dies due to lack of editors/reviewers, I will not be terribly upset.

[[I don't think that's strictly true -- the major books, yes, but one thing I try to emphasize with OR is the books that you don't hear about, but should. That will probably take a higher profile in the future, along with all my new material I'm working on. At least, that's my hope -- anyone can find the latest david brin book these days -- I'd kind of like to help people find the decent stuff they probably missed. We'll see. -- chuq]]

Are the reviewers really trying to defend their "importance" in the scheme of things? Seems pretty strange -- though it may come from some confusion between book reviewing and Literary Interpretation, generally thought to be a Good Thing by literature professors, and would-be literature professors like me. I'd say that the two are quite distinct; book reviews (and reviewers) should be trying to say "buy this" or "don't bother" -- value judgements with enough description so the reader can interpret (or, perhaps, review) the review. Literary interpretation (which may be almost as important as literary creation) is rather different -- and I can't see much use for it in most Science Fiction. Somehow, though, I can't see anyone claiming that either book reviews or literary interpretation are as "important" in the scheme of things as creating the silly things in the first place. I'd be out of business if Euripides & Co. had never existed -- and I'd give a limb or two to be able to write as well as Plato or Aristophanes (though, presumably, in English). Such feuds have a long history, though, so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised (you might see traces of one in Aristophanes, I guess).

-- Martin martin@scruz2.sc.intel.com

[[Oh, yeah -- all over the place. Read the New York Review of books, where the book gets mentioned somewhere on the third page of a review, or the San Jose Mercury News, where the theater reporter says things like "I walked out at intermission -- I will say that most of the folks in the theater seemed to be enjoying themselves, but I still thought it sucked...." - - or the book section of the San Francisco Chronicle, which not only tells reviewers what books they'll write about, but what they'll think about them. Or the San Jose Mercury News book section, where the editor doesn't like SF, and so, despite a very large contigent of pros, enough readers to support three genre bookstores, and a large fan population, we have a paper with no SF coverage at all.

I read LOTS of reviews -- the LA times periodically, the local papers, the NYRoB, the Chicago Tribune stuff, Publisher's Weekly, ALL the genre columns and magazines I can get my hands on -- everything I can touch that more or less does what I'm doing in OtherRealms. And I think fair reviews are a rarity outside of the field -- AJ, Baird and Tom Easton are the most level headed folks in the entire group I read. Outside the Family, it seems like reviewers are little more than Folks Who Can't that want to pull Those Who Do down a peg.

of course, we aren't perfect -- read the Spinrad 'criticisms' in IASFM, or the latest Fantasy Review, where a reviewer likened Card's Ender to Hitler (to which Orson appropriately responded: "Huh?")

Few reviews or criticisms really review or criticise -- they are either a literary ego stroke by the critic (masturbation for the masses -- look how much smarter I am than he is....) or a critic attempting to tell the world how THEY would have written this. foo -- I try to avoid this stuff in OR, personally. -- chuq]]

Chuq,

There are a couple of points of bibliography in error in the reviews this time. First up, Davis Tucker, in reviewing Dark Seeker, refers to it as "[Jeter's] first attempt at horror". Not so, as Tor had published a previous horror novel by Jeter, Soul Eater, back in 1983. Secondly, in your review of Dianna Wynne Jones' Archer's Goon, you call it her second book. She's actually had published more than a dozen novels and at least one short story collection.

A left-over point from the previous issue (#16), regarding Peter David (whose Knight Life was reviewed by Jim Johnston) and what else he's written. Aside from Knight Life -- which, by the way, has been optioned for a movie -- David has written two book tie-ins to the game Photon, with a third to follow, all written under the pseudonym David Peters. As for his comic book work, he's generally held up as one of the better currently- practicing writers of mainstream comics. Of perhaps some interest to fans of Star Trek is that David is going to be writing DC's Star Trek comic starting in a few issues.

Jerry Boyajian boyajian@akov68.dec.com

Dear Chuq;

James Brunet made some excellent points in his article on Hard SF in OR#17, but I'd just like to add to his commentary that every form of fiction requires research -- some of it very specialized -- not just Hard SF. If you're setting your novel in a contemporary setting, using police as characters, for example, you have to know how it all works -- terminology, heirarchy, routines, etc. you have to know your settings, their history and such, even if most of the research material never gets into the book.

Yes, Hard SF takes a certain amount of specialized -- and, for some laymen -- difficult research. But research is research. I spent months researching Romany for my novel Mulengro before ever putting a word down on paper -- everything from interviews to secondhand bookshops and library stacks. I've ben researching my current project, Svhaha, a near future SF novel based on Ojibway legends, off and on for almost five years. Even high Fantasies require research, if only in such simple things as geography.

I'm not alone in this. Greg Frost spent years researching Tain for Ace books. Ditto for Pete Godwin's roman Britain books. Even heroic Fantasy isn't immune -- you should see the research library Charles Saunders has built up over the years for his African Fantasies.

The problem with a great deal of the current crop of generic high Fantasy is that the authors' only research appears to be other Fantasy novels, giving us second and third generation material. No wonder so much of it reads the same. But that's not a good reason to say that Fantasy, or any other fiction, doesn't require a great deal of research as well.

I understand the point that Brunet was making -- hard SF is particularly difficult to research because it's constantly changing. I'm only adding these comments because I believe extensive researching is necessary for every form of fiction. And it's always time-consuming, but it is fun. And if it's not, then you're working on the wrong kind of mateerial, because if you like it enough to write about it, then the research should just be one more part of the process -- and a pleasurable one to boot.

Cheers, Charles de Lint

Dear chuq;

James Brunet is all too right about Hard SF. It IS getting harder to write as the standards of the field rise. I try to keep scientifically scrupulous, and if I must finesse a point I try to sin by omission, dodging a clean exposition of what's unworkable. The most intersting question in Hard SF is the aesthetic boundary -- when is a clear scientific cheat woth the dramatic payoff? You're got to write pretty well to commit obvious crimes, that I know...

I've attempted my most ambitious synthesis of Hard SF elements and Narrative tightness, with social inventiveness in my next novel, Great Sky River -- and I agree, it's truly exhausting to keep to the ever-higher standards of the sub-genre.

Gregory Benford

Chuq,

James Brunet's article on SF made me quizzical. What makes him think Hard SF is under siege? David Brin won the Hugo as I recall, and is one of the more popular writers in the field. Greg Benford, Greg Bear, James Hogan, Robert Forward, Arthur C. Clarke, and others aren't having any trouble at all getting published. Even in the "Good Old Days" Hard SF was a numerical minority. Most SF from the 1950's and 1960's was transplanted adventure fiction, space opera, disaster stories, after the bomb stories, and such. I don't think there's been much change in the place of Hard SF at all.

I do agree, however, that errors of science don't necessarily ruin a novel. Rings of Ice by Piers Anthony is one of my favorites, a novel of the reaction of people when faced with a global tragedy. Now, someone pointed out to me that the mechanism by which Anthony sets up the ecological upheaval is meteorologically impossible, which is an interesting observation but has absolutely no relevance to the story, only to its background. I would prefer that he had gotten it right, but it does not materially affect my enjoyment of the novel that he did not do so.

Speaking of Anthony, the review of Chthon amused me. This was his first novel, a complexly plotted, original idea that marked him as a writer to be watched. And his novels immediately following were unusually interesting as well. It wasn't until he reached Xanth and found that he could churn out funny Fantasy and make lots of money that I found myself enjoying his stuff less. I suspect your reviewer did not understand much of the underlying themes of the novel if he found it so hard to understand. It certainly does not match the kind of Fantasy that Anthony is doing now.

Yours, Don D'Ammassa

Book Ratings in OtherRealms

All books are rated with the following guidelines. Most books receive [***]. Ratings may be modified a half step with a + or a -, so [***-] is somewhat better than [**+]

[*****] One of the best books of the year
[****] A very good book -- above average
[***] A good book
[**] Flawed, but has its moments
[*] Not recommended
[] Avoid at all costs

OtherRealms Reviewing the worlds of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror.

Editor & Publisher
Chuq Von Rospach

Associate Editor
Laurie Sefton

Contributing Editors
James Brunet
Charles de Lint
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes
Alan Wexelblat

OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987

Copyright 1987
by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.

One time rights have been acquired from the contributors. All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.

OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted without the express permission of the author.

OtherRealms is published quarterly (March, June, September, December) by:

Chuq Von Rospach
35111-F Newark Blvd.
Suite 255
Newark, CA. 94560

Usenet: chuq@sun.COM
Delphi: CHUQ

Review copies should be sent to this address for consideration.

Subscriptions

OtherRealms is available for the usual bribes & trades: a copy of your zine, submissions, letters, comments, artwork or because I want you to see it.

People who don't like to write can still get OtherRealms for money: $2.50 for a single issue, or $8.50 for four issues.

Folks in the publishing industry can qualify for a free subscription. Just ask.

OtherRealms is available at Future Fantasy bookstore, Palo Alto, California. Stores interested in OtherRealms should contact me.

Electronic OtherRealms

An electronic, text-only version of OtherRealms is available on a number of different computer networks and bulletin board systems.

On the Arpanet, Bitnet, CSNet, and UUCP networks, send E-mail to chuq@sun.COM to subscribe. On USENET, OtherRealms is distributed in the group rec.mag.otherrealms.

It is also available on the Delphi timesharing service and a number of Bulletin Board systems across the country.

Electronic OtherRealms subscribers who want to see the real thing can get a sample copy for $2.00, or a one year subscription for $7.50. Just tell me what your E-mail address is or what BBS you read OtherRealms from when you send in the request.

Submissions

OtherRealms publishes articles about Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror. The primary focus is reviews of books that otherwise might be missed in the deluge of new titles published every year, but the magazine is open to anything involving books.

Authors are welcome to submit articles for the Behind the Scenes feature section, where you want to talk about the research and background that went into your book. I'm also interested in author interviews.

Any thing of interest to the reader of book-length fiction is welcome at OtherRealms. We don't cover shorter lengths, media, or fannish news.

Submissions can be made on either Macintosh or MS-DOS disks (disks will be returned), via one of the computer networks, or the old-fashioned, typewritten way if you.

Submission deadline is the 15th of the month prior to publication or when I run out of space in an issue. Lettercol deadline is the first of the month of publication.

Publishing News

OtherRealms is interested in publishing news about the happenings in the genre -- contracts, promotions, happenings, deals, if something has happened to you that you want the world to know about, let OtherRealms pass the word.

Artwork

OtherRealms is always on the lookout for good genre art, from small clip-art pieces to front and back cover. Cartoons, line art, anything with a genre flavor is welcome here!

Please submit reproductions, not originals.

Those Funny Runes

The hieroglyphs attached to the names of many of OtherRealms' contributors are, believe it or not, addresses. If this makes no sense to you, you aren't a computer, as these addresses are designed to allow a person on one computer to send mail to a person on another computer electronically. It works, too.

The Details

OtherRealms is published using a Macintosh computer and a Laserwriter Plus. The main text is Palatino, the headers Bookman and Zapf Chancery.

Layout is done with Ready, Set, Go! 3.0, Microsoft Word 3.01, and various and sundry other toys. People interested in more detail on the layout should contact me.