SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW SFR INTERVIEWS $i-25 Jmy Poumelle ALIEN THOUGHTS reject up to 10? of the completed mss. he has contracted for. This is an expensive NOTE FROM W. G. BLISS luxury. Because it is unlikely that any 'JUST HEARD RATHER BELATEDLY THAT AN editor or publisher is going to casually OLD FRIEND AND CORRESPONDENT, RICHARD throw away thousands of dollars in advance S. SHAVER, DIED ON THE 5tt OF NOVEMBER money; rejecting a manuscript under penalty AT THE AGE OF 68. OUTSIDE OF A LARGE of losing or tying up a bundle of cash is LITERARY LEGACY (PALMER HAS KEPT I RE¬ not a happy thing to do. Editors don't MEMBER LEMURIA IN PRINT), HIS MOST IM¬ last long if they have that habit, and pub¬ PORTANT WORK WAS WITH ROCK IMAGES.' lishers who do it or allow it too often end up in bankrupcy court.

Because—let's face it: how often will a publisher actually be paid back his ad¬ You probably noticed, as you flipped vance money even if the manuscript is later through this issue before settling down to Not all publishers are ogres... sold to another publisher with perhaps low¬ read this section: no heavy cover, and no And not all writers are saints. er editorial standards who pays less money advertising. even if the later sale is discovered? The So why no cover and ads? It has come to my attention (I get let¬ publisher of the first part is faced with ters, I get phone calls) that some major having to probably sue an author who prob- The cover first: I didn't think the hardcover and pocketbook publishers are now ablt hasn't the money to give back in any cover for SFR 15 would cost as much as it inserting into their contracts with authors event, having spent the second publisher's did. When I got the bill from Times Litho, a provision that if a completed manuscript payments on back bills and current rent, I blenched, and I don't blench easy. That (contracted for on the basis of an opening etc. The legal costs would likely equal or lovely Castilian Gold 80-pound Paramour chapter or two and an outline) is unsatis¬ surpass the money owed. And think of the cover stock doubled the printing cost of factory to the publisher and is either not bad press for the publisher as he "perse¬ the issue over a 48-page self-cover. The wanted under any conditions or the author cutes’’ the poor, abused writer. expense is not so much the paper; it's the is unwilling to rewrite to suit the publish¬ separate two-sides print runs on a smaller er, then the author is obligated to repay to So you see, while there are numerous offset press, and an extra collating cycles the publisher the money given as an advance (and probably far more) horror stories told against royalties upon signing the contract, of non-paying, rip-off publishers, there is The four extra pages and heavy cover i_f the work is later sold to another pub¬ another side to the coin which we rarely don't seem worth all that money. Especial¬ lisher. see: editors and publishers get together ly when it means drawing down the reserve and moan to each other about the sonofa- by $300., which is what I had to do. In other words, the author keeps the bitch writer who is a year late with a book sum paid him but if he sells the rejected Another reason to give up the heavy ...the wri er who sent in a thinly dis¬ cover is weight; it increased the weight of work to somebody else he has to pay back guised rehash of one of his earlier books the first publisher. SFR 15 over #14 by 30?—and that translat¬ ...the writer who moved and cannot be es to a lot of money in postage, especially OUTRAGEOUS! cry some authors; these pub¬ found...the drunk or doper author who sends with the late-December increases t>f 25-30? lishers and editors often reject manuscripts gibberish.... in every class of service. for capricious, unjustified reasons! They (The post office is a good way into a want their money back say ten years later if In writing and publishing, friends, it that work is dug out' of the trunk and sold is always Let The Buyer and Seller Beware, suicidal cycle of declining volume, increas¬ to another company? because too often writer-editor-publisher ed rates to compensate, and consequent fur¬ affairs are conducted by people who don't ther declines in volume.... What will hap¬ Yes. know each other personally. That's why pen, for instance, when local governments and corporations turn to bi-monthly billing Because the money given following the established professional writers are so and mailings, from monthly? I imagine the signing of the contract is an advance. It well liked and well paid by publishers and post office would love to ask congress to is conditional money, every time. And un¬ why writers who are known to be good and de¬ pass a law making monthly bills to consumers til the completed manuscript is officially pendable are usually busy, busy, busy...and mandatory! The p.o. is already spending accepted, that advance money is in essence why beginning, unknown writers of talent in escrow. often have a tough time breaking in. It is big money in an advertising campaign on TV why the established writers can often pick to hype first clash mailing (in competition with the phone company who is urging us to Of course most writers live off the ad¬ and choose to a degree among established, call a friend/relative). vance money as they write the balance of trustworthy publishers and editors, and why the book. the beginning writer must often deal with (The basic problem is the big payrolls. bastard editors and/or rip-off publishers. Eighty-five percent of the post office ov¬ But it has happened that some authors And why poor-but-honest editors and publish¬ erhead is in salaries, and most of us civ¬ during completion of the ms. have radical¬ ers often must deal with unreliable writers. ilians don't think mail clerks and handlers ly changed the plot and action of the out¬ and carriers' jobs are so complicated and/ line. Or have done such a slip-shod job It is ever thus, given the nature of the or onerous as to merit their average $17, the editor has had to reject the finished beast. 000. per year wages (including fringe bene¬ manuscript. Or have even failed to com¬ fits). The postal unions, of course, have plete the manuscript.

One major editor has told me he has to 2 (Continued on page 4) SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW P. O. Box 11408 Formerly THE ALIEN CRITIC £

COVER BY JIM SHULL Portland, OR FEBRUARY 1976 Volume Five, Number One BACK COVER BY TIM KIRK 97211 Whole Number Sixteen PHONE (503) 282-0381 RICHARD E. GEIS ALIEN THOUGHTS-4 Editor & Publisher ALL UNCREDITED WRITING IS AN INTERVIEW WITH BY THE EDITOR IN ONE GEIS JERRY POURNELLE-6 OR ANOTHER

LOVE, CARELESS LOVE, PUBLISHED QUARTERLY 0 CARELESS LOVE: THE TRUE Feb., May. Aug. Nov. AND TERRIBLE HISTORY OF Single Copy $1.25 SCIENCE FICTION THE GAMESMAH. 16 By Barry Malzberg-17 THE I MORTALS-16 WHEN THE WAKER SLEEPS-16 SUBSCRIPTIONS NOISE LEVEL ALTERNATE WORLDS: The Illustrated UNITED STATES: $4.00 One Year History of Science Fiction $7.00 Two Years A Column By John Brunner-20 Reviewed by Barry Malzberg-17 CANADA*: US$4.50 One Year THE ANIMAL DOCTOR-19 US$8.00 Two Years PROZINE NOTES-22 SHOCKWAVE RIDER-19 'Canadians may pay with personal cheques if the chequing acct. THE LITERARY MASOCHIST ALTERNATE WORLDS: The Illustrated number on their cheques is printed History of Science Fiction in computer numerals. (Thus we be¬ iy^lcRard A. Lupoff-24 THE SCIENCE FICTION BOOK come slaves to the needs of the Machine.) FANTASTIC SCIENCE FICTION ART PLUGGED IN UNITED KINCDOM: £1.98 One Year 2000 A.D.: ILLUSTRATIONS FROM £3.43 Two Years An Essay-Review THE GOLDEN AGE OF SCIENCE FICTION To Agent: ttn. Dawsqn & Sons By George Warren- gpl|NCE FICTION ART, THE FANTASIES Cannon House Folkestone, Kent, THE GIMLET EYE ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SCIENCE FICTION CT19 5EE ILLUSTRATION AUSTRALIA and all other Foreign & ffSITSSVFmttsyTf Strange Places: US$4.50 (toe Year Reviewed by Richard A. Lupoff-24 US$8,00 Two Years By Jon Gustafson-32 BLAKE'S PROGRESS-24 All foreign subscriptions must be paid in U.S. dollar cheques or THE COMPUTER CONNECTION money orders, except the U.K. WHATEVER HAPPENED TO Reviewed by George Warren-28 FAY WRAY? PASSAGE TO PLUTO-31 By Michael G. Coney-39 CREATURES FROM BEYOND-31 BEADBONNY ASH-31 COPYRIGHT 0 1976 BY The Publishers-45 NOW YOU SEE IT/HIM/THEM RICHARD E. GEIS FOR THE ALIEN CONCLUSIONS-46 Reviewed by Richard A. Lupoff-36 CONTRIBUTORS AUTIMI ANGELS Reviewed by Dave Wixon-36 THE WINDS OF ZARR Reviewed by Neal Wilgus-37 LETTERS Jerry Pournelle-15 STAR OF DANGER Pearl-31 THE BLOODY SUN Michael 6. Coney-39 Reviewed by Lynne Holdom-37 Harlan Ell ison-41 Isaac Asimov-41 SEEKLIGHT L. Sprague de Camp-41 Reviewed by Lynne Holdom-38 Barry Malzberg-42 BEYOND CONTROL-38 Robert Bloch-42 Rick Sternbach-43 STAR-LORD- 38 Charles W. Runyon-43 THE SCIENCE FICTION HANDBOOK Mike Ashley.43 Reviewed by Darrell Schweitzer-44 Lynne Holdom-44

TIM KIRK 2. 3. 29. 46, 47 ALEXIS GILLILAND 4. 6 3, 13, 36, JIM SHULL 7, 10, II, 12, 17, 24 SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW IS AVAILABLE SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW is published MIKE GILBERT 15, 19, 25, 40 at 1525 N.E Ainsworth, Portlwd.OR RANDY MOHR 26 WILLIAM ROTSLER 28 Appl i cat ion to mail at second class JON GUSTAFSON 32 postage rates is pending at Portland, JAMES MCQUADE 39, 41 the country by the balls, and the congress fice rewards the non-profit publication, tablishment is supposed to suffer contempt wouldn't allow the postal service corporat¬ and tends to inhibit the low-income publish¬ and abuse while funding and encouraging ef¬ ion to even try to break the unions, so er. forts to spread anti-Cstablishment writings. at intervals, the rates ani wages will go There are those (I among them) who feel The Establishment is supposed to feel up and up and up.... the post office should provide classes of guilty for making money and to expiate this service determined only by the speed of de¬ guilt by paying organs and organizations (There is also, I an told, a too-large livery, and should not concern itself at who will obligingly attack them. superstructure of supervisors, stipe rintend- all with what it delivers (aside from offal, ants, etc. who are drawing appropriately / explosives, and dead bodies). I think this ploy is wearing thin. heavy salaries. However, the conditions that prevail are To be specific, I am speaking about BE¬ (By the way, ny application for second beyond my control: I don't make the rules, YOND BAROQUE, an avante-garde, counter- class nailing privileges has recently been so I'll find those to my benefit. culterish little magazine and writers/poets complex in Venice, California (coincident- approved here and has been forwarded to If I publish ads (beyond marginal list¬ ally near where I used to live a few years Washington D.C. for final action...which ings of back issues, for instance, and pub¬ ago). nay take six nonths or aore. Until then lishing notices) I most send SFR to book¬ SFR is still in the linbo known as Second stores by parcel post. BUT if I carry no BEYOND BAROQUE is mostly funded by the Class Pending. I still pay third class ads I qualify SFR as a "book" and can send Rational Endowment of the Arts, the Coordin¬ bulk nailing rates each nailing, but if/, copies by the special 4th class book rate. ating Council of Literary Magazines, and a when the pendt cones through I will be (Two pounds of SFR sent by parcel post to few people who contribute. credited with the difference between 2nd zone one costs 77#, to zone 8—11.48. That Lately BEYOND BAROQUE was voted a 15 class and 3rd, for all the sailings I've sane two pounds, book rate, costs 30# to thousand grant by the Los Angeles Arts done during the Pending period. That will anywhere in the O.S.A.) help a lot.) Commission—but it is opposed by an Arts That little class difference can save Commissioner (female) who is urging Mayor So, it's back to the 48-page newsprint, me up to $100.1 Bradley to delete the grant from the budget self-cover format, with a different color because she didn't like the four-letter The nwber and extent of ads in SFR de¬ ink for the covers and (I think) six other words and 'underground elitist' tone of the termines how much second class postage I'll pages inside, to liven up the package a bit. BB publications. be charged, and this rate is determined by A color-change I an told is about $75. ex¬ a complicated formula having to do with George Drury Smith, President and Edit¬ tra. That I can afford. zones... I don’t understand it. But it is or of BEYOND BAROQUE is defiant and incense Are you asking yourself, "So why did he significant. ed. He will not impose censorship to get cut out advertising if he needs noney so The only way to make it wothwhile to money! He asks all those IX# of the read¬ much?" carry ads is to charge enough to overcome ership who are freeloaders to pony up some cash to keep the place going. In fact I did cut the advertising: sent the losses imposed by the post office rate back four full-page ads, a couple smaller structures. If I did charge those anoints He says: 'We pledge to go on and to display ads and a few classifieds. Be¬ I would not get a single ad. continue: cause, as I discovered, the post office So there is really no alternative: no '1. our fight for government support rates, rules aid excessively complicated aore advertising in SFR. This way I have of the arts regulations polish a small circulation an extra four or five pages for reviews, '2. our fight for freedom of the press magazine which accepts ads. The post of¬ letters and editorials. and of artistic expression '3. free distribution of our publica¬ And, too, I have never been comfortable tions as long as possible.' with advertising in syfzines; I always felt His appeal will fall on 8# deaf ears, vaguely pretentious, that I was playing at I imagine, and sooner or later BB will go being a big prozine publisher...and there down the tube...and rightly so. was vague guilt, too, because I never felt the advertiser was getting his money's But, ah, the illusions shown in #1 and worth in readers/exposure. #2 and #3. Smith is just beginning to dis¬ cover that those who pays the noney almost So it goes. always calls the tune. The government doesn't have to "say" behave this way and that way in stark, commanding voice; the subtle pressure of wanting to keep that And this editorial—or diatribe—ip precious money coming year after year will on the marvelously idealistic expectations promote a gradual, unconscious self-censor¬ and illusions of some counter-culture writ¬ ship, a delicious series of rationalizations ers and poets. in editing. The magazines and the organiza¬ They seem to believe that money grows tions which don't please the Givers will be on trees and tjiat those they scorn and re¬ cut off and will starve, and the ones which vile owe them a cultural living. Somehow, please the Givers (or at least don't offend) in the mindfe of these avante-garde creators, will be allowed to continue to suck at the the middleclass, capitalistic, puritan Es¬ government teat. Freedom becomes "freedom" when it is loans and stimulate the economy. legislators at all levels should have their .dependent on the government check. But the banks are having trouble find¬ salaries cut one dollar for every law they pass. As it is they seem to feel they must #2, now...that boggles me. 'Our fight ing loanees, and the leading banks are hav¬ justify their salaries by passing more and for freedom of the press and of artistic ing to lower their prime interest rate to more laws each session, with an inevitable expression.' How noble. How shit-eating lure people to borrow. hypocritical. What he means is freedom of percentage of stupid, unnecessary, contra- his subsidized press and freedom from re¬ It was desperation to use all the funds productive interferences in business and strictions by those who do the subsidizing. available to them which has gotten the banks private life.) into a dangerously vulnerable position the Freedom of the press doesn't mean a wel¬ last few years. Greed knows no bounds. Of course the federal government must inflate money yet again to 'get the country fare press. And now the Fed is throwing more fuel on moving again' because the higher costs of the fire. As for free distribution.... It con¬ energy are still forcing up prices...a pro¬ tinues to be true that people do not value The stockmarket,'extremely sensitive to cess that takes years in a complicated, what they get for nothing. They tend to any hint of lower interest rates and better layered economy such as ours. Higher real think it can't be worth much (in this con¬ business, has leaped through the 900 Dow- prices for energy means a real lowering of text) if it's a give-away magazine. And Jones Industrials "barrier" and is approach¬ our standard of living; less real wealth can even among BEYOND BAROQUE'S writers and po¬ ing 950. go for goodies. ets I suspect that attitude exists—the The conventional wisdom is that prosper¬ suspicion (or gut knowledge?) that if a wri¬ Instead of facing up to this by letting ity is on the wing again. Of course, some ter is first class, has real talent and The Market adjust itself and by encouraging jaundiced observers see it flapping rather discipline, he'll be published by paying production,' the politicians are putting off oddly, with one wounded wing and a trail of magazines with large circulations. the discomfort (and they hope getting re¬ feathers, but the mere fact that it is off elected) by their usual 'after us, the del¬ The bottom line is still: does some¬ the ground is enough, right? (Never mind uge* tactic of deficit spending (while WBep- one want to read your work badly enough to that Housing Starts just went down—con¬ ing at the resulting plight of the middle give some of his work (money) in exchange trary to expectations.) and lower classes, and while they slip the for it? That is the best compliment, the guilt by pretending "inflation" is an alien But look ahead a year-and-a-half; the most valuable (in every sense) praise. force nobody understands and which is be¬ current and last year's federal deficits yond control, like a plague from the stars). The thought occurs to me that from a (and they are massive!) will be translated cynical standpoint government funding of into a 10Z inflation rate (or more). The In the end, having inflated and mal¬ the BEYOND BAROQUE coterie (and others like* financial woes and weaknesses of the cities adjusted the economy to the brink (and ov¬ it/them) is probably worth it; the money and states and banks and the in-debt-to-their er the brink) of disaster, our leaders will keeps second and third-raters off the -ears corporations will become worse, and blase everyone but themselves and their streets, ties them to the government in a when, two years from now, the inevitable policies, and they will in panic slap on subtle way so they won't go too far in rad¬ "recession" begins again because of maybe wage-price-interest controls, set up a huge ical thought/expression/action for fear of 2QZ inflation and 15Z prime interest rates, bureaucracy to administer them, set up a losing their "free" money. This way the no the slump will be catastrophic and the en¬ huge enforcement force, be astonished and and low-talents can squabble among them¬ suing business, hank and local government dismayed at the resulting black market and selves oyer the few crumbs the National problems will scare the shit out of all of public dissatisfaction, continue to print Endowment and Coordinating Council throw us. funny money to p3y for it all (while the their way. And they can keep their illu¬ real producers of wealth are forced to stop, The news recently that the Chase-Manhattan sions and pretensions for a while...while or 'disincentived' to stop, working). (the Rockefeller bank) has tremendous po¬ they whine and beg for money. tential losses due to bad loans and too Yes, I do feel contempt for this type much New York city and state paper (see the Enough. The handwriting is on the wall. of welfare-for-writers operation, and I pretty bonds, see how they deteriorate before Only exceptionally tjood sense by millions of feel disgust for those who play the humil¬ our eyes) is croggling. It wipes out ffly voters can keep the Liberals from following iating game of noble-writer-with-palm-out. cherished conspiracy theory that Oavid Rock¬ this path. If we elect Humphrey or Kennedy efeller is the Secret Master of the Gigantic or anyone of that stripe this year, with an There are hundreds—probably thousands Fortune Grou() Which Controls the World. obliging Democrat House and Senate, you —of small-press publishers in this count¬ Who needs a Secret Master who can't even could find yourself in five to ten years ry who survive because they are able to being forced to register with the govern¬ manage a single bank well? (Yet—I cling print and distribute books and magazines ment (somehow, Liberals don't believe in to the theory that Nelson Rockefeller was . people value enough to buy. They survive voluntary programs) for mandatory placement not "fired" from the upcoming v-p slot on also because they are willing to subsidize of your labor skills during "the emergency". their presses themselves! They have the the Republican ticket, but in fact decided ultimate, true freedom of the press. And to cut loose from a sinking Ford, and that They'll call it something else, but it they have self-respect. And ay respect. Rocky's leaving is a signal that Ford is to will be slavery. be dumped; it is Ford who is being let go, for incompetence, probably, and for beconw* Thanks to Ballantine for sending THE ing infected with Presidential Fever.) INVISIBLE CRASH by James Dines (Ballantine The Federal Reserve, true to its usual 24870, $1.95) and THE BANKERS by Martin We are obviously in the hands of in¬ fealty to the President, is pumping a great Mayer (Ballantine 24750, $2.25). Both are competents, in government and out. deal of credit (money) into the banking sys¬ excellent. tem. The banks are supposed to make lotsa (It has been my belief for years that ,»*,***********.********•«**•.•*•*•••* s AN INTERVIEW WITH decided I'm not cut out to be a manag¬ er. Not only do I like to get my hands JERRY POURNELLE dirty in the labs, but there's this problem—I tend to get people upset September - October - November 1975 without intending to. All of which makes me a pretty poor candidate for management, so when I was offered a REG: Jerry, you seem to have "appeared" on professorship I took it. the sf professional scene rather quickly a- bout four years ago. Is that when you first I'm not really sure why I wrote my began writing fiction...science fiction? first novel. It sure wasn't lack of What prompted you to turn to writing sf? something to do—I was not only a pro¬ fessor and acting department head, POURNELLE: I guess it did look a bit sud¬ teaching far too many hours a quarter, den. Actually, I'd been involved in the but I was also the president of the space business for a long time, and had college's research institute, and wri¬ numerous friends among the writers. I used ting proposals and getting 6-figure to pick their brains before writing my own grants and directing studies. Maybe brand of SF, which was our input to the Na¬ it was my subconscious telling me I tional Space Requirement. It got to be a couldn't keep that up. Anyway I did running joke: I said I wrote SF, but I did¬ write a novel, a mystery-adventure n't need characters or plot, just good set¬ thing, and I asked a writer friend to tings for stories. read it and tell me if it ought to go to the wastebucket or what. He sent Then I'd tried to write SF off and on it off to his agent, which is why I've since my undergraduate days. When I was a always had one of the best agents in student I did manage to sell a few words, the business, and after maybe ten pub¬ but never any science fiction, mostly be¬ lishing houses, the novel sold. I was cause in those days the only SF I read was still professoring in this small col¬ cle on nuclear power plants, write that up for ASTOUNDING and I always tried to sell to lege and my characters in this spy sto¬ a good fee, and then write a half-dozen SF sto¬ John Campbell. He kept sending me back ry seduced each other and the Dean ries using the research. It was always more those 9-page letters telling me what was wouldn't have approved of having one fun doing the fiction than the fact article, wrong with the story and inviting me to try of his people writing like that, so it but fiction pay rates are pretty low, at least again. But come the late 50's and I hadn't sold under a pen name. for short fiction, and it doesn't much matter sold anything and after Sputnik instead of whether you're an unknown or a big name, the scrounging up space experiment equipment rates are still low for short fiction. out of leftovers from bomber weapons tests I still hadn't sold any SF, but I we had money crammed down our throats and decided to try again, and wrote John I think that's a bad situation, by the way. the Generals and GS—15's yelling DO SOME¬ Campbell asking if he remembered me— It means that new writers can't really support THING! So, I pretty well gave up trying to and damned if he didn't continue an themselves writing science fiction until they've write fiction of any kind, and got to work argument we'd had twelve years ago, as either written a whole book that's salable, or on trying to keep people alive in space and if not a day had passed. He also re¬ written and sold enough short fiction that they in environments the engineers thought peo¬ minded me that he'd tried to get some get a book offer. They can't support themselves ple might face in space. Turns out a lot non-fiction out of me back in the days out of short fiction sales while they learn of the work was not needed for space, al¬ when I was actively working the space their trade. On the other hand, the lower rates though the heat stress adaptation stuff I business. So I sent him some stories for short fiction mean that the old established did may be useful other places; and when we and he told me what was wrong with them, names get out of the way, and the competition got out of human factors and into systems and then one day he didn't send a let¬ for short length sales isn't as steep as it design we were even busier. ter, just a check, and after that he would be if they paid a lot, so maybe it bal¬ bought a lot of my stuff, most of which ances out. But I was talking to Stuart Cloete About I960 or so I began corresponding wasn't published until after he'd died. (RAGS OF GLORY, TURNING WHEELS, etc.) and he with a number of SF writers. And in the In fact, there was so much of my stuff told me that when he got into the writing busi¬ middle 60's I got a choice given me by the in the inventory that Kay Tarrant asked ness back in the AO's he got paid five thousand aerospace industry: go into management or if she could run one series under a pen dollars for a single short story! In those take a hefty pay cut. I was the junior man name. She wasn't buying anything, just days you could live a year or more on that much, on the scientist list, and they were per¬ making up issues out of what John Camp¬ and live pretty well. Nowadays a five grand ad¬ fectly fair about it—they couldn't afford bell had bought, and I had that serial vance is pretty hefty for a book. what amounted to internal consultants any¬ going, so we revived my mystery pen more. Up to then it had been a gas. I Anyway, I turned to writing because I was name for the other template. So all worked on what I wanted to and didn't have getting tired of teaching and writing proposals of a sudden there was a lot of my stuff management problems, there was only one and bringing in research contracts for other published. engineer and one secretary working for me people to have fun with, and somehow things be¬ directly, the project teams furnished all As to why I write SF, I like it. gan to click. The key decision was back about the other people and all the administration I can make more money writing non-fic¬ 1969 or so, when I was offered a high GS rating and management work. But when they gave me tion, and for a while I used to get an and a lot of money to manage some aspects of that choice I got to thinking about it and assignment for something like an arti- Army Aviation, and I thought about it and g thought about it—they'd gone to a lot of POURNELLE: You saw the Pocket Book once said that until you can tell the sto¬ trouble to get the Civil Service Commission to edition of MOTE before we did. We'd ry to a roomful of people without boring approve a really good offer, and I felt guilty been assured that the cover was truly them, you don't really know how to write not taking it—but we'd just made some good ugly, but last night I was presented it. Of course in our collaborations we sales and paid off all the credit card compan¬ with a copy to be autographed and may¬ have to discuss what we're doing in enor¬ ies, and I'd got some steady assignments doing be it's because everybody told me how mous detail, so all those early supersti¬ non-fiction columns and science features, and ugly it was, but I thought it wasn't tions I had—probably got them from those my wife and I decided we'd try to stick it bad. Has nothing to do with the book, tipster how-to-do-it publications—can't writing, although we knew that would be the but it's eye-catching and might get be true. But I still would rather write last professional job offer I'd ever get. So people to pick the book up—and sell¬ a story than talk about it. we stayed with it, and I'm glad. ing books is after all what we're in As to Roger’s usual restrictions, I business for. don't find them onorous. Certainly Roger REG: Care to reveal that Mystery/SF pen name will accept material that Kay Tarrant at this time? In general, do you think it mat¬ I guess some writers have control would have rejected out of hand. ANALOG ters if a relative few aficionados and fellow over covers, but I never have, and I don't think Larry ever has either. under John Campbell was a relatively prud¬ professionals know a given writer's pen names ish magazine, you know. Not that John and pseudonyms, so long as the mass of sf read¬ I've always thought editors and pub¬ lishers knew something about their was particularly blue-nosed, but Miss Tar¬ ers is unaware? And do you think (especially rant simply wouldn't put up with explicit now with a lot of biblioqraphic and academic business. I may be wrong on that— (or even very strongly implied) sex, or work going on in sf) a writer has an obligation a lot of writers have told me stories that are truly horrible—but I know profanity, or such like. But you know, to, at some time or another, reveal that type she wasn't all that much more restrictive of information to those interested? that I don't know anything about mark¬ eting and what makes a cover sell books, than the other magazines. I wasn't writ¬ ing SF at the time, but I've seen a let¬ POURNELLE: Oh, there's nothing mysterious about so I've always thought it would be ter from Fred Pohl to Larry Niven in which the name. One of the Wade Curtis mystery nov¬ silly for me to get involved in that Fred apologizes for taking the word "damn" els managed to get copyrighted in the name of part of the racket. out of one of Larry's stories. (Maybe it Jerry Pournelle, so— I mean, suppose I had cover con¬ was something stronger; but an expletive, trol and rejected a cover on the I did have fun over that once, though. and not motherfucker, either.) Fred's grounds that it wasn't very pleasing There was this English professor who wrote in rationale was that he didn't care, and to ANALOG saying he was going to cancel his to me, and they got another done and his readers probably didn't care, but subscription because of this idiot Pournelle's it was very pretty but nobody bought many of GALAXY'S subscribers were adoles¬ serial, SPACESHIP FOR THE KING, but one of his the book? cents' and their mothers would care, and students showed him an absolutely marvelous But some writers do get cover con¬ if they saw foul language in an SF maga¬ story about saving the whales and international trol. Harlan tells me he insists on zine they'd cancel the subscription. corporations and such like ("A Matter of Sover¬ it, and gets it. I know Spinrad has Now that wasn't ten years ago. Now¬ eignty") by one Wade Curtis so he was renewing lately had some say in the matter— adays I guess things like that don't his subscription after all. I met the fellow but he's had to go to New York to do happen too much, but I can't help think¬ at a convention a few months later, and intro¬ it. ing Fred had a point there. How many duced myself as Curtis. Then he saw my name early Heinlein stories had any scenes tag... REG: LOCUS #179 (Sept. 27, 1975) an¬ whatever that would have offended a Vic¬ As I said, I used a pen name because the nounces the news that Roger Elwood torian librarian? It's only recently Dean of my college wouldn't have approved of will be editing a new sf magazine (OD¬ that SF has sprouted explicit sex and what I was writing; and after that I was stuck YSSEY), and that the lead novelette strong language. Read any of the novels with it. And I'd used pen names earlier, back will be one by you. He is quoted as in my student days, because I wasn't proud of saying, "there will be no restrictions what I was writing (no, not the skin trade; except for my usual ones on sex and worse. True confessions, and in the 50's at profanity." that, when they were particularly dreary, and I haven't seen any specifics on no, —I'll NEVER tell what name those went un¬ his 'usual' restrictions. In your un¬ der.). But the usual reason for pen names is derstanding, what are they? (Appar¬ having more than one story in an issue of a ently he won't put anything on paper, magazine, isn't it? I never thought about ob¬ at least for publication.) ligations to reveal; I am damned if I'll ever What is that lead novelette about? reveal the name I used to write some of the penny dreadful stuff I did way back when- POURNELLE: Since I'm writing the nov¬ elette now, I'd rather not discuss it. That's a peculiar thing; sometimes I like to talk about work in progress, REG: I have just received the Pocket Book edi¬ and other times I don't. Spinrad hat¬ tion of THE MOTE IN GOD'S EYE. Are you happy es to talk about what he's doing except with that cover? It is dramatic and...er...eye¬ in very general terms. A lot of "how catching. Do writers ever, in your knowledge to write" books will say that you can and experience, have any say in covers for "talk a story out", so you can't write their books? it. Then there's Larry (Niven) who back in '67 or so. Mack Reynolds was making up his of guy who'd give up a very lucrative think my first draft of one scene in own terms, like "nardy" and such like, and invest¬ career as an oil driller, become a tiere was the worst thing I've ever ing them with obscene or blasphemous properties. priest, take one of the worst mission written in my life. I knew it, too, I haven't written all that much for Elwood— districts in the area—and pee against when I gave it to Larry. Fortunately one Laser novel, to be exact—so I'm not sure I a wall. I can't even imagine what he was able to rewrite it, not changing understand all the restrictions he's supposed to might have happened if a police car had the action much at all, and tum it in¬ have. I did BIRTH OF FIRE very quickly. It has come by during the proceedings... So to something effective. there the scatological incident is re¬ soldiers in it. They talk the way soldiers do. INFERNO went different from MOTE, quired. But most stories don't need to Roger accepted it as is and sent it on. The pub¬ and I guess every book does; the books sit the characters on the pot. Or put lishers in Toronto say they've taken out some of and their characters take on personal¬ them in bed, for that matter. the cuss words! Not Roger. ities of their own. I have never done I don't like that very much, by the way. I'm fiction in collaboration with anyone perfectly willing to write without using explicit REG: Your comment that you and Larry else. Stefan Possony and I wrote THE language if I know that's what I'm supposed to do. Niven discuss matters in enormous de¬ STRATEGY OF TECHNOLOGY together, and a But it's harder. How do you make barracks talk nat¬ tail during collaboration suggests the book called CONGRESS DEBATES VIET NAM ural and still keep it bowdlerized? So I'm looking next question. What are your proced¬ (which was more editing, job than writ¬ forward with some, uh, interest to seeing just how ures from begining to end, in collabor¬ ing) and a study privately financed on Toronto has "cleaned up" my novel. With the novel¬ ation? Is Larry the only one with whom ette, I'm just keeping things the way I would have you've collaborated? if I were writing for ANALOG and Miss Tarrant were Afterthought: did your procedures still there. vary from MOTE to INFERNO? You and Larry obviously had a lot of fun with You know, in a way Roger is more honest about INFERNO. Whose idea was it? his restrictions than the others used to be. Like Fred’s letter to Larry—I can agree with Fred, but POURNELLE: Larry had been toying with isn't Roger entitled to the same restrictions Fred the idea of writing a sequel to Dante's insisted on? Why is it worse because Roger believ¬ INFERNO since college lit. days. Some¬ es himself that such language is offensive, as op¬ how he could never bring it off. One posed to Fred who didn't care but thought his read¬ night we were discussing something else, ers' mothers would object? Actually, a skillful OATH OF FEALTY, I think—a "straight" writer can ge.t across almost anything he wants to without being explicit, can't he? Leave things to SF novel about arcologies and cities the reader's imagination. I can put a couple of in about 1990, one I originated—and characters in a bedroom and have them holding hands got to talking about INFERNO. I when the door closes. Now the next time you see thought of a couple of ideas, and he them they're madly in love or something. Readers •ran with them, and then I ran with a who think that would come about as a result of a couple of ideas he'd had, and the Parchisi game can think so, and more imaginitive sparks began flying; by morning we'd readers can think of something else. decided to write INFERNO and put the other book aside until we'd done it. I'm not sure I understand all the excitement a- bout these restrictions anyway. Sure, there are It went very fast. After all, you stories that just won’t work without explicit sex don't want want tu spend any more time scenes and very strong language. Nobody prevents in Hell than you have to. It was a those from being written. You just don't send that very painful book to write. We were story to Roger Elwood. But after all, most stories able to go fast, then, because we got don't need either one. People screw, say the "no obsessed with the thing, and couldn't work on anything else once we got into censorship" people, and thus it's unreal not to say trends in the US; Possony is at the so. But then people go to the'can, and pick their it. Hoover Institution at Stanford, and we noses, and dig ingrown toenails out, and fart, and It also went fast because we had had big phone bills, and mailed dicta¬ do lots of things. Everyone does. But most sto¬ the basic structure from Dante. We tion back and forth a lot; it was some¬ ries don't describe that sort of thing, and why didn't want to change Dante's geograph- thing like working with Larry except should they? I can think of a story that requires y any more than we had to, but we did that we didn't get back-and-forth a character to pee on stage. Happened in real life: want to work in C.S. Lewis's theology sparks flying that come when Larry and a priest friend of ours came over and we spent the rather than the rigid and unmerciful I have late night brandy and coffee evening drinking beer, and since he lived pretty cause-and-effect sin-and-suffer theol¬ sessions. close he was walking home. I was ready for a walk ogy of Dante. That turned out to ^>e As to how we do‘it: well, one of us so I went with him. About half-way there Father X easier than it might at first have ap¬ gets an idea and decides it's a big has to go, and there's no place to do it, and right peared. theme and that for one reason or anoth¬ there on a public street he hoists up his robes and er we don't want to do alone and the lets fly against a ,wall. Now if I ever use a char¬ We did have fun with the book; but other could help with. We discuss it, acter like that in a story I'm damned well going to not as much as you might think. It's and if the sparks start flying and it have to put that incident in, right? I can't even painful to put people in Hell. Some gets us both excited, we start outlin¬ imagine him now without thinking of him as the kind of the scenes were so hard to write that we kept putting them off; and I ing. After MOTE we've sold the books in outline, and so we're committed to the style differences will be washed It was left purposely ambiguous through most of the writing them. out; this has worked pretty well, I work simply because that'sthe way Carpenter's mind think. Few people, including ourselves, works; but I think he now knows where he is. And We'll by then Have decided just can find transitions between scenes I isn't his learning charity a requirement of his be¬ what must be done in the notes: what did and scenes Larry did. For a while ing able to leave at all? Had IF existed INFERNO problems h3ve to be solved, what engin¬ we could keep track of who did what be¬ would have been published there instead of in GAL¬ eering data we'll need, what research cause of type-face, but after several AXY; does that help answer your question? one or both of us must da. We get that re-writes that vanishes; and then Lar¬ done. Sequels: we don't know. INFERNO was a very ry sometimes uses my pen, or makes not¬ hard book to write. I would rather not live in Then we start writing. It's usual¬ es in the ms. from suggestions I've that world again for a while. Larry and I have ly obvious which scenes ought to be made, and later we'll wonder just whose toyed with sequel ideas—where is Billy? for ex¬ done by which of us, and which could idea that was. By the time the final ample. (Probably a guard at the lake of boiling be done by either. Sometimes Larry draft is done and ready to turn in the blood.) Who would Carpenter try for first? That will do a whole series of unconnected book is in one style, and the differ¬ sort of thing. But it wasn't written with a se¬ scenes and I take them and rewrite and ences are resolved, and it doesn't look quel in mind, and if the book is too symbolic for weave them into a continuous chapter. like a collaboration at all. Or so we your tastes I guess I can understand that without Whoever does the first draft, the other hope. agreeing. After all, BLACK EASTER and such life— rewrites; we do that continuously, pass¬ and A CASE OF CONSCIENCE as well—had ambiguities ing rewritten parts back and forth with REG: Will INFERNO appear soon as a but I think no one really doubted what the author one of us keeping a master copy; every paperback? thought was real. I really am sorry you didn't now and then we’ll xerox the master and care for the ending. I liked it a lot. archive the draft material. And the POURNELLE: That's a sore subject. We book just keeps growing that way. Wnen have a contract for INFERNO with Simon I see something Larry's just done it and Schuster, but they haven't been REG: The rational action isn't consistent with almost always sparks me into thinking answering inquiries about when the book man's past; we as a species are usually irrational. of incidents that ought to be added, will come out. We turned in the ms. So the odds are we won't behave as we 'should'. and Larry does the same thing with my over a year ago. They had a change of What scenario do you realistically project for the drafts; sometimes that will aim us out editorial staff at S&S shqrtly after next fifty years? to a whole new sub-plot, and we have to they bought INFERNO, and it seems to get together and decide how that will be an orphan there. We recently sold POURNELLE: If I really knew how to predict the fu¬ fit structurally into the book as a the English rights for a good sum; ture, I wouldn't write so much. I'd get rich prog¬ whole. you'd think the U.S. edition would be nosticating. There are so many ways we can go, and things have come to the point where I really be¬ It's all a lot easier than it out before the English one would. lieve that accidents, "Fortuna", blind chance, can sounds—easy in the sense that any We've got a lot of favorable com¬ have decisive effects on history; there are so many writing is ever easy, and of course it ments on INFERNO including some from irreversible things we can do now. In the past it isn't; all writing ip hard work. But professors of English lit. and one wasn't so true: even the Franco-German War of 1871, I've found that working with Larry is theologian, so we think the book will which had a lot of chance in its genesis, wasn't all generally easier than working alone, sell well—if it ever gets into print! that decisive over the general trend of the world; and I think the stuff the two of us do The GALAXY serialization is fine, of but nowadays we can blast ourselves right out of is better than most of what either of course, but there ought to be a book the high-technology civilization we've built. us has ever done alone. too. A book I read a good 20 years ago has stayed We also decide who will have final REG: Jerry, I squalled with outrage with me ever since: Harrison Brown (yes, that one; decision over what for any given book; at the ending of INFERNO. You and Lar¬ the man I got to be a keynote speaker at the SFWA but that's only so arguments can be ry went to great pains to constantly banquet) wrote CHALLENGE OF MAN'S VAST FUTURE a settled. Actually neither of us has ask questions about the nature and in¬ long time ago, and he points out that if we lose ever exercised a final authority; we've tent of Infemoland...and then you did¬ high-technology we can never regain it; the easily always convinced each other. I'll gen¬ n't answer the questions. The POV char¬ mined energy resources, the easily obtained oil and erally defer to Larry on literary mat¬ acter stays behind (how noble!) and the coal, the easily got-at iron ore, is all gone; it ters; plot points and how someone or reader is cheated. What gives? Is takes high technology to get the makings for high some institution will react are gener¬ there a sequel written and unpublished technology. ally decided by me; but there's nothing as yet, or is the ambiguous ending all rigid about that, either. We have so And it's true, and that should be what worries we'll ever get? much respect for each other that when us at least until we've got viable colonies in the there's a disagreement we'll work pret¬ asteroids (if you see a similarity to a situation POURNELLE: I'm sorry about your out¬ ty hard to understand what the other in MOTE I don't have to say....). rage; perhaps you were expecting more— one is saying and why he disagrees; or less—from the story than was in But realistically I expect we'll muddle along. and when we've done that, often as not there. I thought the ending was pret¬ We'll survive, but not with much style. We'll get we'll find something better to write, ty clear. Carpenter has discovered out to space, but it'll take a long time because something new that we both agree with charity—I'd rather use that phrase we'd rather have a bureaucracy protect us from de¬ and that incorporates both views. than nobility—and believes he now fective lipstick than invest in space. We'd rather Eventually, we have a next-to-final knows the purpose of Hell. The novel have subsidized social workers and "universities" draft, and one of us then rewrites the was an attempt to wed the theology of than get out there where we can all get rich. But whole thing from the beginning so that C.S. Lewis to the geography of Dante. 9 eventually we'll go there, although it may not be the U.S. of A. that does it; and after that wecarft kind of thing I'm told I do well, a into space, although it will help a help but have a lot of resources and energy, enough straight hard-science, no miracles, lot. With present energy methods and that maybe we can do some industrialization of the forced-events future story that I be¬ lots of big mirrors in space we'll have "developing" countries without polluting the planet. lieve really could happen. enough energy to do a great deal of our If you haven't seen Harry Stine's THIRD INDUSTRIAL polluting manufacturing out there; and REVOLUTION which Putnam's is bringing out as a book, By the way, you may h3ve noticed get our metals there, too. Hell, one I recommend it as one of the best works on what may that most of my stuff is that way: if minor asteroid contains enough metal to —and with any luck will—happen. I can't believe the story can happen, supply THE WORLD with the per-capita I probably can't write it, with some metal production now enjoyed by the I guess I remain a technological optimist and a minor exceptions like that "flying United States! And that's not count¬ political pessimist. I fear The Club of Rome and saucer" piece in VERTEX which was hum¬ ing any breakthroughs. How do we move all the other 'I've got mine and damnit stop pollut¬ or. an asteroid? A couple thousand hydro¬ ing my planet' people, most of them tenured or rich gen bombs will do the job if nothing or both. I worry about investment levels. I'm It's a limitation I have. Probab¬ else will; and laser triggers for fus¬ scared of the brand of democracy we have, because ly not a very pleasant one, either. ion weapons are hinted at by AVIATION with the global village problem the voters don't But I'm so far pretty nearly stuck with WEEK right now. I suspect although I really get a chance to make decisions; they are it, and it does at least make my stuff don't know that Defense already has presented with a mess of "facts" spewed out by half- reasonably consistent—readers can them; certainly they're not impossible educated "editors" more concerned with boxoffice expect reasonable realism and won't be to develop. In that sense we HAVE fus¬ than truth; they never meet their legislators or ion power. anyone who has control over their lives; and being basically pretty good people they put up with being The Rome bunch doesn't really inv- hyped until they finally get something crammed down press me. I know how to manipulate ex¬ their throats that they can't take, and they go ponential curves, too. But nature rampaging off to Do Something. So we have almost doesn't have exponentials. Why should the opposite of the kind of government the Framers exponentials be a model for predicting envisioned. In fact, we've got almost precisely the future? I fear that I find For¬ what they were terrified of, so frightened that we rester's models not a lot more convinc¬ nearly had a monarchy here instead of a republic. ing than observations of the sacred And that scares me. We've hedged freedom around ravens or examination of the entrails until we are fast approaching a pocket-money state, of slain sacrificial cattle. It's where the only economic decisions an individual can easy to take the model apart and show make are where he spends his loose change; we're what's wrong with it. And it definite¬ not allowed to blow our wad and take the con'segueno- ly assumes a closed system—yet why es—or invest it and get rich and keep the riches. assume that? There's all of space out How I do run on. there.

Sorry to be so late with this answer; had a Expense. Sure, space is expensive. couple of deadlines that just couldn't wait, and But ye gods, Zero Growth is FAR MORE the Elwood novelette was harder than I thought it expemsive. ZG condemns half the Earth would be. to eternal poverty! Now me, I'd rath¬ er give up some of the neat things I If you're still interested, "Bind Your Sons to amuse myself with, and maybe pay an¬ Exile" is an attempt to look at what kind of people other thousand a year in taxes (I'd might be the first to go live on an asteroid; to hate it, but I'd rather) if that's what put up with severe hardships to make Earth a garden it takes to subsidize getting into again. In "Tinker" I already had the viable Belt surprised by Arcturian octopi landing space. It might even be worth it in Civilization and it wasn't so hard to see why peo¬ in the last chapter to resolve all esthetics: getting strip mines off my ple would go there. "Bind Your Sons to Exile" is problems... Earth, leaving the condors in Los Pad¬ an attempt to look at the initial steps. It took a res National Forest alone, letting lot of work, because Roger's magazine is supposed REG: I'm not sure I understand how/why Death Valley be a Monument and not a to appeal to others besides fans and traditional SF mankind will go out into space and 'all strip mine; and in health, getting a readers, so I had to put in a lot of "Heinlein-type" get rich'. Isn't the cost of space lot of gup out of the air I breathe. detail that could have been hinted at in a story fa- travel still prohibitive? Doesn't the But even if it's not worth it in purely ANALOG;literature (or some of us do) and by critics. It's the easiest thing in 11-18-75 there'll be a market for stories that tell people, the world for a critic to say "the Announcement, etc.: Pocket Books has hell, things aren't so bad, look at the adventures characters are cardboard" (don't they decided to bring out INFERNO in April you might could have—especially in bad economic ever have any original phrases? aid of '76. Largely as a result of com¬ times such as we seem to be facing. usually that critic will complain about cliches, too!) but in fact most sf ments from the magazine serialization, But for my guesses: 3 years from now we'll have that has "well developed characters" and your own, Larry and I have sched¬ the beginning effects from the Laser line, and its generally either bores or appalls me. uled a conference to decide whether we imitators will start (if Laser does well). That want to make a few changes in the end¬ Appalls because too often the ide¬ will expand the number of markets for the SF-adven- ing. They won't be "substantive" as and the background have been sac¬ ture (PLANET STORIES) type of tale, and contract changes, but "explanatory" ones in the rificed to the "characters"; the peo¬ the market for other stuff. It won't kill the sense of nailing down points that we ple are "real" enough but the story is¬ "quality" market, but it will mean that fewer non- thought were dear, but which seem to n't, or the society isn't, and in par¬ adventure titles will be published. I'll also pre¬ be insufficiently so for readers for ticular the law-enforcement mechanisms dict that the magazines will stagger along, possi¬ whom we have respect. I don't guaran¬ aren't real at all. I can't at all bly one folding and another new one taking its tee we will make changes, but we're believe in either Mrs. LeGuin's twin place, that kind of thing, but there won't be any going to spend at least one evening worlds of THE DISPOSSESSED, for example. really significant changes in that picture. discussing the possibility. And I I don't think that the anarchist out¬ thank you for your comments, even if 1 Five years: Well, that's contingent on the 3, fit would work because I think some¬ regret that you weren't as happy as isn't it? If there's been a real expansion of the body would get tired of starving and you might have been. market caused by the popular adventure stuff, then put together an outlaw band, requiring I'll predict that there will now be an expansion that the "government" put together a LATER IN NOVEMBER: FYI, as a result of the "quality" market as well; the original crop police force; and from there things of your comments, those of my wife, of adventure SF readers will have "graduated" and would develop fast. Nor do I believe those of an English professor at U of want something a bit more complex, a bit more dar¬ in the soldiers she puts in the com¬ Michigan, and a couple of other people ing, a bit less formula. The adventure market will mercial nation on the other planet. whose opinions we respect, we're mak¬ continue, of course, although perhaps tapered down But that's my hangup, and I wouldn't ing some minor changes in the ending a bit. Magazine rates will either have gone up a at all say it wasn't a good novel with of INFERNO. bit, or the magazines will be all newcomers with good character development and such It doesn't change the book, merely almost no name authors at all (except for serials; like. And I've chosen one of the best amplifies: Carpenter, at the end, is magazine editors are in a buyer's market for nov¬ of that type novel to show what I mean; quite convinced that he is in fact in els now and that won't change)—if the magazines I could have picked a story that was the violent ward for the theological have survived at all. (ANALOG will be around for¬ obviously not so good. insane; that this is no Infernoland ever; don't know about the others.) Somebody will arid no fantasy of "builders" but the have tried paperback magazines, but it's going to I write to entertain. If my enter¬ real live Hell; but it is not quite what take a concerted effort to get some laws changed tainments tell people that there are the brimstone preachers have tried to to make that practical and profitable. ways to get places they never thought make out. It is, as C. S. Lewis tried we could go, and places we might go In 10 years we'll either have got the shuttle to say, a place of persuasion. that they'd rather stay out of, that's and started some real space operations, taking great, and not unintentional; but I I trust you did notice something newsmen into space and making space a possible don't write to preach at people (not about INFERNO: Carpenter wonders about career choice for a lot of people—or we'll be in even in my columns), and I never his quiet homosexual neighbors—but pretty bad shape on this here Earth, and escape thought you could teach anybody much doesn't find ttem in Inferno at all. literature will be in demand. Either way SF will while you bored them. I may work hard¬ survive. The people he does find in that partic¬ er at my "sociology" than most sf writ¬ ular circle are something else again. ers do (after all, I ought to get some REG: Any final thoughts in general about your sf Anyway, in the new ending, there's use out of my degrees in social sci¬ and sf writing philosophy? nothing objective happening (our U Mich ence) but I try to keep that from show¬ correspondent suggested that we have a POURNELLE: I write adventures, entertainments, and ing. Maybe I try too hard; I guess heavenly shout of triumph when Benito if there's a message in there—and of course I MOTE startled people with the aristo¬ mounts the last turn into the world of think I have something to say—I don't put big cratic society and no long explanation Purgatorio out of Carpenter's sight; hands pointing to it and shout that this is serious of why I think such things could hap¬ but we did not put that in. There's a and significant. pen in future; and maybe a bit more reason for this, and I guess if the preaching would have been better in 14 I have nothing against the "literary" type of reason isn't clear, there's not much we can do about it; but we don't be¬ treme and unending punishments exacted 'Up to the minute market reports would cost lieve we are defrauding the reader. for mostly minor sins. And with the more than SFWA's annual budget. Who would com¬ After all, Lewis's "Great Divorce" final knowledge that this is Hell, pile them? Who would check to see if the informa¬ turned out to be a dream; we haven't and that suffering is real, the reader tion as reported by the publisher were true? Pam done that to the reader. (me) rejects it. We are not the true Sargent does a magnificent job for the time she's And we've enough opinion now to believers of Dante's time. In his able to invest. Who do you have in mind to do show that many readers, once we've reality, God dead for us. We cannot more?' made clear what we're trying to do accept those draconian punishments be¬ ((Someone who lives in the heart of New York (and a number, including Prof. Aron at cause we are not sure of our free will, whose phone calls to editors and publishers would U Mich understood perfectly, but were we are not sure of determinism... But not be expensive, and whose phone number could be afraid that others wouldn't) are satis¬ we are sure we cannot buy a God that circularized to all editors and publishers when fied with the book as it stands.) inflexible and apparently sadistic. (Of they have upcoming needs to be broadcast. Easily course it is reassuring that we are so I'd hope you might change the opin¬ filled-in written forms might also be sent to the important to be worthy of all that at¬ ion expressed in SFR, because the last known sf editors and publishers. I would consid¬ tention and effort...but most of us thing we want to achieve is to leave er paying a non-writer sf enthusiast a small sum in our hearts don't really think we are readers feeling outraged; but as I say, per monthly report to insure promptness.)) that important.) It comes down to this: the best we can do is to make it very In this day and age, for most science clear what Carpenter believes has hap¬ 'A 10-page FORUM could be sent monthly for fiction readers, aliens conducting a pened to him at the end of the book— $100., provided that we got most of the work done strange, mass experiment for unknown and demonstrate that there's no evi¬ free. Who will do it?' reasons are more believable than a real dence that his opinion is wrong. But ((If SFWA incorporated and acquired a second- Hell as conceived by Dante and soften¬ we are not going to step in as omnisci¬ class controlled-circulation permit (non-profit), ed by C. S. Lewis. ent authors and make it any clearer astounding savings could be made in postage at than it is made to Carpenter. very little cost in delivery-time. I am unsure The ending changes amount to about if more than one publication can be sent under three paragraphs rewritten and two in¬ such a permit by an organization. The point is, serted; nothing major; and as I say, if SFWA really plans to be around for ten years the end is clear, that Carpenter, not or so, it would pay to incorporate in NY as a non¬ having adopted any formal religion or profit organization. religious views, now believes that he ((Failing that, with the increased postage rat¬ is in fact in the violent ward for the es, using a local budget printer, the cost of theologically insane; that he can es¬ printing and mailing a 10-page (8^ x 11) one ounce cape; and that he can take others with zine first class is now $117 for 500 copies. him when he escapes, provided that they *^************** ******* **4 ((Who will do it? I will, if the mailing want to go. labels are provided and if SFWA will pay me $50. Beyond that we can't go. I hope A LETTER FROM JERRY POURNELLE ON ANOTHER per issue for paste-up, collating, stapling, it helps. MATTER folding, sticking-on-the-labels and stamping. Oh, and if SFWA will give me a free membership in the 17 November, 1975 bargain. Some incentive must be provided to in¬ REG COWENT: I hope it's clearer in sure promptness. That's the American Way. If the revised Pocket Books edition than 'I fear I can't let your remarks a- SFWA can afford about 33.50 per copy, or a bit you make it in this letter. bout SFWA go unchallenged. The purpose over $4.00 per year for a monthly FORUM (out of Is he in the violent ward for the of Science Fiction Writers of America is $12.50 yearly dues), fine. (And I would not in¬ theologically insane in Hell, or in a not merely to help the kids; and most of dulge in sexist editorial humor.)) mental hospital on Earth—and has been the services you propose that it limit hallucinating this version of Hell? itself to would be of use to the begin¬ 'Grievance work runs less than $2,00 per mem¬ ning writers; there'd be little reason ber per year; not a magnificent saving. Elimina¬ But, on further thought, I think for the Grizzled Old Veterans to belong ting grievance work would not reduce the dues, there is a more fundamental problem to it. And without the GOif's, it would¬ especially if we add on "up to the minute market with the novel: n't be much use to the newcomers. reports", legal services, and a monthly FORUM. Maybe two points. 1. Carpenter is 'Now it's true that most grievance In fact what would be more likely to happen, were a science fiction writer and his task work involves small dollars and newer SFWA to adopt your proposals, is that the GOV's is to try to make rational what he sees writers; most, but NOT ALL. Further¬ would form their own new organization, dropping and experiences—he (like me, like most more, the very existence of SFWA and out of SFWA entirely; and leave the empty shell of the readers) cannot accept a real the knowledge that there is a mechanism for people who seem to need WRITER'S DIGEST more Hell! And he is there to "explain" for generating concerted action by the than they need a professional organization.' the phenomena in terms he (we) can live GOV's is itself sufficient to settle a with. And, incidentally, to make the lot of disputes before they start. ((I wonder what is so attractive about SFWA novel superficially sf and publishable now to the Grizzles Old Veterans?)) in an sf magazine, to an sf audience. 'All publishers aren't rapacious, As a "straight" religious/moral fantasy but it's amazing how many see things on¬ 'I would rather see SFWA increase dues for it might not have found a publisher. ly their way—until they discover that active (voting) members to about $50. a year, SF writers really can act in concert. tighten up active membership requirements (but 2. Through the journey through Hell, Then the viewpoint suddenly changes. leave room for non-career associates, and for Carpenter boggles at the cruel and ex¬ 15 newcomer? in non-voting relationship), hire it- self at least one full-time employee who is against the wall, shuddering, I know DOZE WERE THE GOOD OLD DAYS preferably the relict (widow or widower) of that I should do something now, I a former full-time SF writer, and do a lot should take some position, this is, Here we go, folk, into another review more of what it does now, plus adding on after all, Papa Joe's story and not about another Ron Goulart two-finger exer¬ some intelligence, investigatory, and rep¬ the story of any other Player; I cise: WHEN THE WAKER SLEEPS (DAW UY1210, resentational services. The number of pir¬ should be at the center of events, I $1.25). ated editions of SF works grows yearly; should be making matters change, He uses his usual funny/satirical style shouldn't someone try to stop that? But swinging them in some direction they in this story of philanderer Nate Kobean who of course I have in mind an organization would not take without my interfer¬ is injected with sleepy-time fluids by a useful to working writers who make a reason¬ ence, this is one of the principles jealous scientist hubby and wakes fifty able income from writing SF; I should think of the Game to say nothing of narra¬ years later on a devil cult's altar. fan organizations can handle other types of tion itself (why I have gone to such thing. As to market reports, again that's trouble to explain this if I intend¬ Worse, the injections ass'ure Nate an mostly agent work; ditto a good bit of the ed to do nothing I cannot explain) "immortal" life—he will sleep again for legal work and tax advice; not that this but I cannot move, something holds fifty years after a few months, aging not a whit as he snoozes, and then again...and isn't legitimate activity for SFVA, but me in place, it is not fear so much were it SFWA's only function, I wouldn't as a total disinclination... again...and... until he is perhaps accident¬ myself bother with the outfit.' ally killed while sleeping or while he is That is Malzberg speaking, I suspect. (with other 'nappers'—the scientist hub¬ That is his narrative credo; that is his by was very angry and jealous, and his love¬ THE GAMES MALZBERG PLAYS life view. ly wife was very promiscuous—trying to find a way to stop the process of recurring He may be right. There is the fatal attraction, somehow sleeps. ...the puzzlement...the lure to critical A sample of Ron's style of satire is destruction.... ONE MORE DOOM TO WORRY ABOUT Nat's discussion with the scientist-husband Barry's fiction does that to me. I Rene Barjavel's THE IMMORTALS (Ballan- while strapped to an examination table. can't leave it alone, even though I know tine 24626, $1.50) isn't very rational or The jealous husband asks: it'll leave me baffled or frothing or as¬ logical, but it has some interesting con¬ tonished. cepts and entrancing conspiratorial twists "What do you know about cryptobio- and turns. sis?" THE GAMESMAN (Pocket Books 8017k, $1.25) "Well," said Nate, wishing he could is his latest Kafkaesque metaphor of life. It is what happens when an Indian sci¬ scratch his ear, "we did a segment on It is right and proper that he dedicated entist and his team discover 'accidentally) it a few months back on the News For this one to Philip K. Dick, for it has a a virus that stops aging in any living Tots show. Of course when your chief kind of unreality about it, a soft at the thing it infects. newscaster is a hand puppet you have edges soft-focus field of view. Full of Anything! In this novel, immortality to be a little superficial in your—w agonized indecision and cynically outraged is totally democratic. idealism...or ideally outraged cynicism? After some strange and macabre adven¬ And full of easily skimmed talk-talk-talk. What would happen if every animal, ev¬ tures every fifty years, the 'nappers' have ery fish, every phytoplankton, every bird, hope that a series of counter-injections Maybe that's why I read Barry's fiction every spider could continue to live on and will halt their snoozing periods. The sto¬ —it's so easy to skim his dialogue and on? ry is rather arbitrarily cut off, like yard simply structured and repetitive books. goods. How do you control the spread of such a What is THE GAMESMAN about? In a fu¬ virus? How do you keep the few world lead¬ What Ron has done is construct a very ture society of infinite boredom the citi¬ ers who know of it from using it on them¬ good straight SF plot and stuff it full of zenry are permitted to enter the Game and selves? his patented silly putty. But the yen is to take Tests in the hope of Winning. But inspired in the reader for a serious, de¬ winning is virtually impossible and cheat¬ This story is set in NOW. So—how tailed adventure using the same plot and ing is almost always detected: punishment come Mao is still alive? What's the real incidents. is The Pit. reason for the assassination of Jack Ken¬ nedy. The Game is life, of course...and the And why is there an isolated island in LITTLE BOY: Are you an acrobat? central character, Papa Joe (also known as the Pacific ringed by a squadron of the U.S. Block) is trying to pass his test—to suc¬ DR. LAO: Only philosophically. Navy with orders to kill and bum anyone or —THE SEVEN FACES OF DR. LAO cessfully fuck a woman. He has failed so anything that tries to escape the island? often, though.... Why are Russian and U.S. atomic missiles "People like to have their sense-of- zeroed in on the island? Then his Gamesman suggests they cheat— wonder hard-on stroked. As a writer, you One thing leads to another—the Games Mas¬ THE IMMORTALS is a good, gripping, in¬ don't always want to do just that." ter enters.... triguing novel that starts slowly and —Jack Dann, "The Heaven and Hell builds to an explosive climax. Very near the end of the novel is this of Jack Dann" by Joe Salimando, passage: But true to his intellectual calling, SUNDAY PRESS, Binghamton, NY "You have no choice," he says, Barjavel couldn't resist an ambiguous, may¬ Nov. 30, 1975 "you have no choice at all," and be yes, maybe no ending. (Thanks to Lorenz J. Firsching) drags her toward the door. Poised LOVE, CARELESS LOVE, 0 CARELESS LOVE: THE TRUE AND TERRIBLE HISTORY OF SCIENCE FICTION

ALTERNATE WORLDS: THE ILLUSTRATED HISTORY the field. Gunn has provided for the first Here. The answer is here and in ALTER¬ OF SCIENCE FICTION by James Gunn. Prentice time in twenty years hereabouts the Sense NATE WORLDS I see for the first time (or Hall, $29.95. Illustrated, plus appendix of Wonder. maybe I merely mean the second) what all of and index, 239 pp. our valiant living and dead alike were pur¬ 1 have no idea what someone not famil¬ suing, what their successors, raddled as Reviewed by Barry Malzberq iar with this field will make of this book. they may be, pursue to this very moment be¬ Probably a good deal; Gunn has managed to cause this book lives, it is incontestably There is a banquet table snapshot taken put together a competent history of science alive, and looking at the full-page, four- at the 1955 Cleveland World convention on fiction with a rogues gallery of faces and color reproduction of the cover of INFINITY page 193 of this magnificent book catching covers which spills all of our dirty little SCIENCE FICTION, a magazine dead for lo eight people, one of them the author, an¬ secrets and some of our grander ones as these fifteen years, a magazine at the best other the late Mark Clifton in a variety of well. But I do not care about this hypo¬ in the high second rank of the forgotten... attitudes which I found stunning but this thetical someone not familiar; it is a it all came back. Uneven spurts of energy, is merely one instant at one table on one question of what we, the book's true audi¬ sympathetic storm, hint of tach...all of evening of but a single convention; 'it a ence, those of us who congregate here in it. This is what Gunn has done? true history of our field were to be com¬ this magazine month by month from a diver¬ piled it would have to be multiplied by at gence of motives but toward a single essen¬ least a thousand such conventions, a hun¬ Item: 1951. I am in Stephen's Book tial outcome...what are we to make of this dred thousand tables, six hundred thousand Service and back date magazines located in book? Or, to be most specific, adopting people, sixty million moments...and from the rear of a book store called Dayton's in my reviewer's position as surrogate, what all this chiaruscoro, the feeling lurks, the Fourth Avenue district of Manhattan now am _I to make of it? the best that could be done would be to long gone along with giant Wanamaker's painfully reconstruct the field inch-by- What am I to make of it indeed? In the across the street. I am staring at a red inch, a useless process. We already have early seventies I become embittered with cover amidst a stack of yellow and black, the field. We have our history now and at the field (the reasons for this will show my twelve year old palms sweating unevenly, last. Gunn has given it to us. up in another issue and time enough then) Steve giving me quick sidelong glances as and found myself late at night thinking of slowly, slowly I reach forward and then, How he has given it to us! not by text all of the great souls of the nineteen fif¬ my God, there it is, there it is and I am or snapshot alone although the book has a ties, our valient dead, our valient silenc¬ holding it, the April 19^3 issue of Street lucid and useful amount of the former, a ed, our valient scattered and considering & Smith's ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION. scattering of the latter, not even through all of this ask myself over and over again, "$2.00," Stephen Takacs says. I only have the illustrations, hundreds of them, of What did they think they were doing? What one. I walk to the apartment of my aunt covers and interior from the old magazines, were they after? What was the point? at 3 Gramercy and she gives me the other many of them in full color, not even by Aside from the three cents a word on ac¬ dollar. I return. The magazine is still virtue of the author biographies, of the ceptance, aside from the second serial there. Steve has held it for me. I give quotations from the Noted Basic Works... rights and Danish rights and Spanish rights him the dollar. I hold the magazine. but through some witchery and amalgam of ...were they after anything else? And if all of this and something else too, maybe Item: I read DREAMS ARE SACRED by Pet¬ so what has it come to? . I am confusing my own history with that of er Phillips in the September 19^8 issue of ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION and then I read have not thought of in many years also oo- energy. This is another offshoot. it again. For the next several months I curs to me. Gunn's text implies one thing; his book feel that someone has joined me in sleep, however says another. I submit that the fumbling and reconstructing the figures a- All right. This is part of what Gunn message of the whole package (and the book gainst the inner screen. In time this passr- has accomplished; I do not know, am not cannot be disentangled from its graphics) es but I still hear the stagehand's bustle equipped to say whether he has accomplish¬ is that what these people, what I sought is in nightmare. ed this for others who, unlike a couple more framed in that convention table snap¬ Item: Astor Place bookshop, 1953: a thousand of us, grew up feeling that this shot, is more visible in the reproductions funny-looking kid (I am pretty fumy-looking field was not a mere valid paradigm of the of the covers than could ever be discover¬ myself) says he doesn't believe 1 am a true universe but was in fact a satisfactory ed in the longest and dullest seminar of fan because I have never gone to a meeting alternate reality. Return to the question the Science Fiction Research Association. ‘of a club or for that matter even heard of which haunted the nights of my mid-thirties: Whatever it is, and in glimpses I see it in a fandom. He challenges me, at random, to What did all of these people think they this book, Gunn has caught it whole. were doing? What were they really after? recite the contents page of the September For the record, in the interests of 19^8 ASTOUNDING in proof of my credentials. Well, according to Gunn, who has wedged federal truth in review laws, one must make Oh joy! I reel it off. He falls back in a pretty lucid overview here amidst the some cavils. The book is littered with stunned. The Astor Place bookstore is suf¬ covers and the pictures of the anointed, small, probably insignificant inaccuracies fused with light, with radiance, with small, what most of them were trying tb do was to and one very large confusion: the confusion vaulting figurines of glory which waft me clamber out of the dismal pothole Hugo is Gunn's inability to decide whether or singing toward the subway kiosk. Gernsback had dug for them aid rejoin the not he is writing biography or history and Item: I have abandoned the faith; I great literary tradition of speculative to what degree his own personna should in¬ have walked in the way of the wicked, I fantasy from which they had been untimely tersect with the material. He thus begins have turned stiff-necked from glory and ripped as of March 1926 and super stories to tell us a fascinating anecdote about his have neither read nor thought of science- of scientifiction's coming. I think that first none-sale to H. L. Gold and then fiction for ten years; from 1956 to 1966 I Gunn is wrong here, he has fallen into the breaks it off cold ("but that's another did not consider it but I am sorry, I am same noble misapprehension in my opinion story for another place") without ever re¬ truly sorry and all that I ask now is that which haunts Brian Aldiss's otherwise worth¬ turning. At about the same point he seems I be permitted, permitted to return and to while BILLION YEAR SPREE, I think that what on the verge of explaining the mystery of do what I had always wanted: merely to we think of as science fiction was born H.L. Gold's GALAXY for the first and runs write it. That was last year. Now it is abruptly and without history in that very for it; he quotes long passages of Don Woll¬ heim dissecting JWC making disapproving Labor Day weekend 196? and I am in a hotel month of March fifty years ago and what comments in the margin but never comes to room near New York's Pennsylvania station, most of us have been trying to do since grips with Wollheim's thesis. I suspect the world convention is here, this is a then has been to stay within it; expand it, that at some point early on Gunn junked the professional's party and on the basis of correlate it, fashion it, raise the liter¬ idea of a memoir fur this much larger book my one published story, my bitter connec¬ ary or speculative or technical perceptions and although what has emerged is honorable tion to a bitter literary agency, I have if we will but do nothing whatsoever to I am not sure that he made the right decis¬ wangled myself in. I stand against the break out of the separateness. This is a ion. Gunn's own experience, like the in¬ wall with Terry Carr. I have never, you matter for debate; Isaac Asimov (who has a dividual experience of any fine writer, is understand, met a major professional writer gracious intorduction) agrees with me and of more lasting significance than any gen¬ except for Carr until yesterday when Jack so, I think, does A. J. Budrys but equally eralities, all overviews. Williamson visited the agency. I hold my respectable people do not and Gunn makes drink tightly. The door bursts open. In¬ his case, going back to the time of Chauc¬ The inaccuracies are less distressing to the room come Donald Wollheim, Isaac er (naturally the least interesting chapt¬ but from the point of view of absolute Asimov, Richard Wilson, Lester del Rey, ers in the book are those that deal with scholasticism undercut the book. My own Damon Knight, Thomas M. Disch...oh my God, s-f before it had its own name) and forward name is mispelled in the caption underneath oh my God, be still my heart and now Asimov with convincing specificity. Maybe some of my picture (it is one of the few encourag¬ turns upon the room, Richard Wilson calls these people indeed were trying all the ing aspects of being 36 to observe how much his name, Asimov embraces him, young girls time to get into MODERN MASTERS OF WESTERN worse I looked in my late twenties, even fall palpitating at Asimov's feet, I lean LITERATURE and the 0.HENRY PRIZE STORIES with hair and hopeful eye), my own first quickly into the wall, turning away, can no COLLECTION although, I will insist, not by appearance in the field is called 1969 in¬ longer take it...the ten years past do not a longshot all of them and not some of the stead of the proper 1967 or 1968 if you exist, neither do the eight years to come: very best. Indeed not to want to stay in date from my first important work. Kath¬ I am frozen in true time as I am frozen be¬ here was actually frightening to most of erine MacLean's entrance date is similarly fore the— the best, writers of the nineteen forties off by a year, Larry M. Janifer's five or and fifties and even now those of us who six, Tiptree's by one, that of Winston K. Item: January 1950 cover reproduction have had success within the category yet Marks by twelve. Minor, very minor, but in full color on page 18 of this book. wish literary recognition as well voyage in my school if you can't get it right "The XI Effect" by Phillip Latham (pen- in, voyage out with the terrifying feeling (which would be a trivialization if ac¬ name, of course, of Robt. S. Richardson) that to leave science-fiction is, perhaps, complished, who cares with the possible ex¬ and it is Brooklyn again, I am twelve years to leave a reality for an emptiness for ception of my wife and helpless children old, the series will surely come to us once modern fiction, in its bleakness and bar¬ when I came into the field let alone why?) more, they cannot deny the Dodgers... "To ren nature more and more is seeking some¬ it is best to leave it alone which I wish Explain Mrs. Robinson", a story which I thing from us is seeking, at least, our Gunn had. 18 FORECAST, THE VILBAR PARTY, I, ROBOT, First tern serve us not-wisely, but too well. Ev¬ Fandom, Second Fandom, GULF, THAT SWEET erything, every tool used for the benefit LITTLE OLD LADY, Street & Smith Publica¬ of mankind can be abused and used for evil. tions, Inc....ah Thomas Stearns, Thomas In SHOCKWAVE RIDER, too, there is the Steams Elliott, you may have said it aft¬ ancient formula: one man, disaffected, a er all in the quartet and nothing to do but maverick, rebels against the System and praise thy name and retire: with the help of Good People, overthrows it. THE SPIRIT KILLETH BUT THE LETTER The villains are very, very villainous GIVETH LIFE (although trapped in their evil by their old-fashioned beliefs and limited vision). New Jersey: Sept. 27, Again, the System is at fault. On the other hand he has summed up, 1975 briefly and with utter command of the point So change the system, improve it, set of their work, the careers of most of the up procedures to prevent the evil from hap¬ major writers: his paragraphs on Van Vogt pening again, right? So sayeth Brunner. are the first in many years to attempt to MORE OF THE SAME I have a few reservations. set the record right on this remarkable There seem to be two or three themes In THE SHOCKWAVE RIDER there is a good writer, he is neither awed by Asimov's con¬ "serious'' writers use over and over. They deal of low-key lecturing on favorite ideas tributions nor dismissive because of Asi¬ cannot resist telling us they have special and the Nice People are so nice it gets mov's youth at the time; he understands information about The Awfulness of Life and cloying at times (the ideal town of Preci¬ what Sturgeon was trying to do better than The Futility of It All (although it isn't pice, Arizona is too good to be true). anyone except Budrys and possibly Sturgeon too futile for them to expend great energy himself; he tells the truth about Gold (up to point these Truths out to us, again and The basic strength of the novel is its to a certain point, alas) fairly and as no again and again. Somehow, despite wide read¬ hero, the man who escaped a government super- one has ever before. He tends to overrate ing on their part, they imagine nobody else thinktank (near-genius children are recruit¬ certain writers a little while managing to has ever noticed the grim realities before), ed and trained and educated and trapped in ignore or minimize certain others. Why and the Evil of Big Business, Big Bureaucra¬ Service...alienated sociopath scientists are nothing on Kombluth? Why are Mark Clif¬ cy, Big Science... Anything Big will do. experimenting in human genetics) and with ton's contributions to social science fio- his superior knowledge of computers and the In THE ANIMAL DOCTOR, P.C. Jersild, a tion simply not touched upon? But taste, vulnerable country-wide computer net, man¬ Swedish writer, sets up a Big private re¬ as they says, is taste. ages to feed sets of new data into the sys¬ search institute...the Alfred Nobel Medical tem to change identities at will. -Surgical Institute, to be exact, in 1988— But this essay should not dribble off 89, and subtly, realistically, satirizes into cavil, into endless qualification: But after he falls in love and leams its inefficiency and mundane nuts and bolts this is how the literary writers do it, to trust...he is captured and systematical¬ stupidities. Rules and Regulations are the not science fiction writers. From the be¬ ly taken through the memories of his free point of mockery, but he is so soft and un¬ ginning we would destroy the universe for life by his government captors, to better obtrusive about it that the reader sometim¬ a plot pivot, change the chromosomes of understand his methods and psychology es doesn't notice—because bureaucratic man for a gimmick ending. There was no ("Where did we go wrong, Igor?"). idiocy is so prevalent Now in every area shame in it; this was what we had to do, that it takes wild, savage exaggeration to Eventually he subverts a government this perhaps is what they thought they were prick the insensitive hides of people who scientist/inquisitor and demolishes the doing in the fifties then, they were chang¬ have to cope with the IRS, Welfare, Licens¬ System by programming the computer data ing the nature of man, they were manipula¬ ing, HEW, FDA, Environmental Impact Studies, banks and network to reveal the true nature ting existence itself, slowly and invisibly Etc.... of the evil government and its evil allies in their special cachet these people were to the citizenry in such a way that the This is a Pantheon Book, 57-95. changing the way we lived. government cannot stop it; a masterful use That was what they thought they were of the tool against those misusing it. doing. It has been my considered opinion, CAUGHT IN THE COMPUTER NET Good suspense, good action, good basic recently, that they failed (and if one at¬ I am of two minds about John Brunner's structure and very, very good science. So tends to Gunn's last chapter closely I good that I have no idea where modern com¬ think it is fairly clear that he thinks so THE SHOCKWAVE RIDER: I am impressed at his ability to make his futures chillingly puter technology leaves off and Brunner is too) and that the field is collapsing now into extrapolation. into the decadence of repetition and self- realistic and believable, and I make note loathing while the new approaches and wri¬ here that his characterizations have improv¬ (Harper & Row, $8.95) ters from which it drew strength are get¬ ed markedly over the years. He is at the ting out or worse yet not getting in but I top of his form, a thorough-going profes¬ am not so sure of this, I am not so sure sional writer who delivers a top-notch sto¬ 'Children who are tired of lying in of anything after having long and prayer¬ ry- their cribs or sitting in a schoolroom find ...the penis's...reachability a great temp¬ fully considered this book. VANGUARD SCI¬ Yet—damn it, he does tend to run a ENCE FICTION, Kombluth's THE LITTLE BLACK theme into the ground, and he has been Want¬ tation. ("Their arms are made just long BAG, John Wanamaker's, the backdate maga¬ ing us now for years about Big Pollution. enough to reach it," as one mother said re¬ zines in the back, GRAVY PLANET, DREAMS OF In this novel we are warned against Big Com¬ proachfully to her clergyman.)' SACRED, MANNA, TROJAN HORSE LAUGH, The An¬ puters and the dangers in letting the sys- -Eric Berne, M,D., SEX IN HUMAN LOVING alytical Laboratory, IN TIMES TO COME, 19 NOISE LEVEL a. column jcBui bpunnep

No sign. Nor in the years preced¬ ing and following.

Now at this point I want to diverge in two directions. That not being pos¬ sible, I must digress. First: be it known that in tie spring of 1971* Ace Books sold UK and Commonwealth rights I ooking along the shelves, I found in my novel THE DRAMATURGES OF YAN to On Having Real and Unreal Enemies sundry copies of my own work in Italian, the British firm New English Library, some of which I didn't know existed. without having bothered to buy those The prospect of writing this piece Since on at least three occasions work rights beforehand from myself. This fills me with dismay; however, I shall of mine was sold in Italy by a "liter¬ drove me and Marjorie to conduct a grit my teeth and plough on with it, ary agent" who didn't represent me, had tiring and time-consuming inspection since I think it will be good for my no authority to make a deal, and kept of all our records connected with sales soul. Yesterday in a fit of impetu¬ the money, I bought six such items and to Ace, and the outcome was that we osity I did something really rather brought them home. discovered an alarming number of other awful, and it's not the first time I've "errors"—payments due to us not only had to pick up the pieces after acting In one case my memory had slipped a fcr normal royalties, but for book-club in a similar manner. If I carry on gear; I did already possess a copy of editions, and for a good few transla¬ like this, I'm bound to get myself in¬ the book. But the next three were in¬ tions too, were in some cases as much to trouble one day—quite apart from deed things I'd never seen, although a as four years overdue. the risk of acquiring a reputation as check of my records showed that I'd re¬ quarrelsome/arrogant/infuriating or ceived notification (through my agents what-have-you. in New York) concerning each sale. And done our homework, to quote my agent: the fifth was an item I had no knowl¬ "No one in living memory has seen That is absolutely not the way I'd edge of whatever: a short story includ¬ cheques flow so fast from Ace." wish anyone to regard me! And yet all ed in a collection with an introduction too often I find I'm drifting into a Moreover a friend of mine from by Harry Harrison. I still haven't state where my conditioned reflexes ' Brazil had recently brought me a copy worked out who sold the rights in that take charge. I suppose that is the of a Portuguese translation of TIMES case. Whoever it was omitted to tell nub of what I want to set down on pap¬ WITHOUT NUMBER, in response to a circu¬ me, at all events. Still, it was ten er: the evidence drawn from my own ex¬ lar request for missing copies of my years ago, too long for me to worry perience that indicates—whatever the foreign editions. I hadn't heard a- now. truth may be in respect of other forms bout that edition either, or been paid of mental derangement—paranoia is a Number six, however, was a real for it. (Ace declare that it's news response to real outside stimuli... at puzzle. It was a translation of TIMES to them, too—we may have a case of any rate to begin with. Later on, it WITHOUT NUMBER, part of the highly simple piracy here.) becomes a different matter. respectable Galassia series, dated And, just to top off the mix stew¬ March 1970. I've done other deals "What ij; he rabbiting on about?" ing in my skull, I found among the mail with that firm, and apart from an in¬ —I hear you cry. Well, it was like accumulated during our trip abroad a comprehensible dislike of sending copy of the Fall 1971* Bulletin of SF copies of their books to the authors I Writers of America. Why it arrived in have no fault to find with them. Fall 1975, I've no idea. But on open¬ Marjorie and I just managed to vis¬ Yet when I looked at my record card ing it the first thing I saw was an as¬ it our beloved Greece again for the for this book, I saw no mention of a surance from tne President that Ace had first time in nine years, since before sale of Italian rights. I went to the caught up with all outstanding obliga¬ the "colonels' coup". On the way out contracts file, to see who controlled tions, they were back in good odour, and back we detoured to visit science the sale of translations. and members might again sign Ace con¬ fiction friends and business contacts, tracts with a clear conscience. including Gian Paolo Cossato in Venice. Ah: reserved by Ace Books, exclu¬ Chairman of.the first Eurocon in Tri¬ sive power to lisence. So if this book We are now digressing within the este, 1972, he now works as an editor appeared in March 1970, our 1969/70 digressions, but worse is to come. and translator of SF and, in partner¬ accounts ledger should record a pay¬ ship with a couple of friends, runs a ment in respect of it. (Our company Unfortunately, shortly before we specialist SF bookshop called "Solaris". year runs from October to September.) went abroad, we'd had a clear demon- o( stration that even though this might no mention of it in the record card; Naturally.enough, we're determined have been true when the message was (c) there is no sign of a payment for not to let that happen twice. But the sent to SFVA, it had become tarnished it in the accounts for that year, nor problem is that, because it happened with the passage of time. Another of the year before or after... he drops once, it's reduced me to the sort of the Portuguese translations brought by a brief letter of complaint to SFWA, state where I'm prepared to believe my helpful friend from Sao Paulo was Ace, Galassia and his agents, thinking I'm being cheated even when I'm not. also of an Ace book; I hadn't been told that is that and now he can get on with Oh, hell! With real enemies the about the sale, and hadn't received any something really important. way an author can have real enemies, money. I don't believe I would have, who needs paranoia? except that I got Marjorie to write and No prizes are offered for guessing ask Ace for our share of the proceeds. where I went wrong. Yup: I forgot that the payment for this deal might have Now we digress in the second di¬ 'The countless reports on the efficacy been one of the four-year-overdue bunch rection. of cocaine in the treatment of gastro-in- that we pried loose from Ace in the testinal disorders have never been given For more than a year and a half early summer of last year. proper clinical trials. (Until recently, I've been unable to write owing to a It was. Marjorie found it for me a similar closed-mindedness prevented mari¬ succession of nagging disorders, each this morning—-after I had posted my juana's effectiveness in combating nausea minor, but taken together forming a letter of complaint in multiple copies. and restoring appetite from being scientif¬ ghastly total: trouble with a nerve in ically validated—although both effects my right eye, with an infuriating skin So I've just had to send out— are well known to users.) In the case of complaint; with hypertension and ex¬ hopefully in time to save my bacon— cocaine, the medical profession rejected a treme high blood-pressure; with insom¬ corresponding copies of a retraction. possibly useful drug for self-serving reas¬ nia, and so on. This bunch combined And I can picture people shaking their ons, while welcoming amphetamines, another to make me dreadfully depressed, even heads sorrowfully on hearing that once "feel-good" drug with potentially far more more than I'm accustomed to putting up again Brunner has flown off the handle. dangerous effects.' with, because every time I imagined I Which is entirely true; I should have —Norman E. Zinberg, thought of checking those 197? payments was well enough to start a new project THE NEW YORK REVIEW something else went wrong. Moreover, as well as the other accounts. October 30, 1975 the drug I was given for hypertension But I've become nervous. I've be¬ turned out tn have side-effects, damp¬ come conditioned into suspecting fraud "The monsters are destroying Tokyo! ing down the activity of the mind and automatically. I've had to put up with Fortunately, they're in the Negro section in particular reducing the powers of not only the sort of dishonesty de¬ of town!" concentration and imagination— the scribed above, but also cases of liter¬ —MONSTER FROM A PREHISTORIC PLANET worst conceivable drug for a working ally unbelievable inefficiency on the writer, hm? part of certain publishers (not once 'Many games are played most intensely Before I went on holiday, I asked but twice a firm I no longer deal with by disturbed people; generally speaking, my GP whether I could be taken off this put books of mine into production with¬ the more disturbed they are, the harder drug, because my blood-pressure was out bothering to issue contracts for they play. Curiously enough, however, some back in the’normal range, aid he ap¬ them!), while as for editorial inter¬ schizophrenics seem to refuse to play gam¬ proved. Result: during the trip my ference— Well, no regular reader of es, and demand candidness from the begin¬ mind has gradually begun to approach this column needs to be told more on ning. In everyday life games are played normal again, and I arrived back tired that subject. with the greatest conviction by two classes out but nonetheless eager to start And now look what's getting in my of individuals: the Sulks, and the Jerks or work. My real work—not this fiddling way! Squares.' business of checking on authorised and —GAMES PEOPLE PLAY by Eric Berne unauthorised foreign sales. (Why not Although she found that payment leave it all to my agents? Well, be¬ from Ace, when she came to tell me Mar¬ 'Soon-ok and I saw DEATH RACE 2000 the cause I already give my New York agents, jorie appended a disturbing footnote. other day. Soon-ok says it's the strangest on tlieir own admission, twice as much She can't find any trace of a payment film she's ever seen (she watches very lit¬ work as their other clients. Besides, for the next of my novels that Galassia tle stf). while I'm writing a letter explaining published... 'It was an uneven film that missed a lot to the agents what needs to be done, I I wish she hadn't mentioned that. of chances to spoof other films (such as might as well do it aid let the agency I wanted to get some real work done to¬ BEN-HUR, THE GREAT RACE, and THOSE DARING take over when the ball has started to day. I have no shortage of projects in YOUNG MEN IN THEIR JAUNTY JALOPIES). roll.) mind. 'Parts were too gory, sadistic, and gruesome to be really effective as satire. Instead, I find myself fretting, Summary, therefore. The best line in the picture was when Frank¬ unable to forget that when we totted enstein (David Carradine) showed a bomb Author comes back from holiday eag¬ up those delayed payments from Ace we that was built into his mechanical right er to resume writing, in a hurry to get found that, had we been paid when the hand. "What is it?" the girl asked. "It's rid of annoying minor problems concern¬ monies fell due, we would not have been a hand grenade," he said. But of course.' ed with foreign rights. Finding a case obliged to sell our lovely home in where: (a) he has not previously seen Hampstead and move out here, away from the book in this edition; (b) there is all our friends. PROZINE NOTES erous, sir, you wouldn't send a woman!" Let me share with you (if you haven't already read the story) some of the grand Thornwall would and did. Blackie (as The damage Jack Williamson has done to old phrases used: Snowfire affectionately calls him) is forc¬ his reputation as an sf master of the gold¬ ed to volunteer, too. Blacklantem peered at the red- en age with his two recent Benefactor sto¬ robed Benefactor, not quite daring ries is probably irreversible. During the black-moment crisis when all to hope. „ seems lost, Blacklantem asserts his male The first Benefactor story I read was superiority and changes from a cowed, pussy- Alarm struck him. "Has anything "The Eternity Engine" in the June '75 GAL¬ whipped nebbish to a strong-willed, keen- happened to her?" AXY, and I thought him clumsy and incompe¬ minded hero: tent in plot and dialogue. "Do they—" His breath caught. . Just beyond the nearest signal Now in "The Dark Destroyer" in the Jan¬ "Do they have Snowfire?" fire, he pulled her flat beside him uary '76 AMAZING, Mr. Williamson again mis¬ in the snow. The bomzeeth came roar¬ handles human relationships and flounders "A maggot!" Snowfire whispered. ing down, more appalling than any tly. in a swamp of WimLib role reversals and in¬ "A planet-eating maggot!" Her haggard The ice quivered when it struck. Slid¬ evitable male chauvinism. eyes looked at him. "Why is it after ing on to Larlarane's offering, it be¬ us?" * Through most of the story the heroine, gan licking up the broken iron with an Snowfire (O, is the Competent Woman who enormous rough black tongue. The 'maggot' is a giant Swarm Worlds min¬ expertly pilots a spacecraft, outranks her "Come along!" He hauled her up¬ ing machine. envious, less skilled husband, Blacklantem right. "We're going for a ride." (guess the skin colors), and gives orders She hung back, staring blankly. I like the following passages for their when they crashland on icy, primitive "Are you crazyT" Earth (after eons of benign neglect by "Maybe," he muttered. "But the pure PLANET STORIES flavor: star-borne humanity) and contact a conven¬ craziest chance is better than none." Stripped, she was streaked with iently approaching vnman-dominated sledge They board the alien beast, direct it sweat and grime. Her pale hands party with six husky man pulling the sledge. to their destination by prodding it with a gripped the lancegrass bars. Yet Blacklantem is held captive and for laser gun, and are rescued. she stood proudly straight. Her tactical reasons Snowfire joins the ruling green-gold eyes swept the gazing In the last line of the story Snowfire women. crowd, level and aloof, still some¬ squeezes Blacklanter's hand and tells him, how brave. There follows even more bad logic, un¬ "We're going to have a son.” They'll prob¬ believable motivation and idiot behavior ably name it Tanflashlight. Pity swept him. He thought.she for experienced, supposedly intelligent was too clean and fine and fragile, agents/scouts. But unless this idiocy is too highly cultured, to endure the swallowed the story cannot stand. The third Benefactor novelette has just primitive cruelties of Nggongga. appeared in the February 1976 F&SF, and it The metal-hungry alien life form and is the best of the three. It is "The Mach¬ the black hole menace steal the show from ines That Ate Too Much," and is the first "Mercy, sir!" Blacklantem shout¬ the stupid black/white duo. (As the gigan¬ of the trio, chronologically: it is Black- ed. "I was bom here. I'll take my tic mining machines and Swarmworld technolo¬ lantern's story (Snowfire is an off-stage own chances on the sacred uplands, gy stole the story in "The Eternity Engine." Benefactor agent on his home planet of but I beg mercy for Agent Snowfire. If only Jack Williamson, now, could Nggongga whom he is sent to rescue, and A tender girl. From a cultured world, write stories without people in them! when on-stage she is a classic pulp heroine where life is sheltered. The justice —helpless, afraid, incompetent and in of Nggongga is too cruel for her. I A sample of his "people writing" shows dire need of masculine strength, love and beg mercy!" something of what I mean: guidance. The next sound you hear is "If our ways are too cruel for "We were rather hoping you would¬ Joanna Russ grinding her teeth and think¬ her, hers are too cruel for us." n't want to go." Nodding calmly, ing black thoughts about Ed Ferman's choice Flintbreaker's strong teeth glinted Thornwall sipped his scalding tea. of fiction.) through his mask of scars. "Her "A very chancy mission. Our problem white kindred opened the portal with This novelette is what might be called is that the probe got caught by the promises of all good things—and came "good pulp" in plot and treatment; it is a hole and delayed too long. With Old through to steal our sacred treasures relic, a throwback, an example for new Earth next, the portal experts want us and profane our holy places, to buy readers to experience, written by a man in to scrub the whole project. I think our bodies and blight our souls, to his late sixties in the true style of the scatter the eggs of monstrous worms they're right—p pulps, complete with predictable plot, "Sir!" Snowfire burst past himm to eat our world. We have no mercy cliches and happy ending. a heady breath of sweetleaf scent, a left." blur of red-gold hair and green-gold Never mind that implausibilities a- Approval echoed around the pit. eyes and pale-gold allure. Eagerly bound, that the whole future Williamson "But we do pledge justice," he she seized Thomwall's lean old hands. has constructured is incredible, the ac¬ boomed again. "The game may be hard "I'm not refusing." tion forced and the psychology self-serv¬ but we play fair. We limit the hunts¬ "No!" Blacklantem gasped his ing. In the days of the pulps this would men to three. We allow you a whole protest, gazing at her in blank amaze¬ have been top-drawer. We've come a long, day to run, before the first takes ment. ... "If the mission is so dang¬ long way. 22 your trail. We promise you freedom, if you reach Nggooth alive.” I grant that it takes a superior writer A mystery: why does everybody seem to to make a tragedy work, because the charac¬ want an apparent copy of the statue? Why Of course the following passage could ters must inspire concern and caring in the will they kill and torture to find it? And not have seen print in the old days: reader to make the inevitable end effective. why is Cassidy hallucinating messages from But I do not like a writer who does that Somewhere? Bidders filed down from the seats, to me, for in a very real way I_ am that to peer and poke through the lance- A heady, interesting brew, I have to ad¬ character...and that character is someone grass bars. One huge slow pale bald mit, but at the end I was left vaguely un¬ I love and wish well. man stopped to squint at both of them. satisfied. He reached a huge yellow hand to tweak I can admire Michael Bishop's writing Maybe it is the casual, lighthearted, Snowfire's nipple, spattered Black- talent and skills in "The Samurai and the not-quite-serious approach Roger uses in lantern's penis with a hot squirt of Willows," but I leave the story disappointed this one. As when the baddies stake Cassidy purple spit. and...injured. I already know about death out in the Australian desert sun: Cassidy is and ruined lives and despair. I do not to turn into a raisin unless he gives the need instruction. I do not understand why And what would we do without: location of the star stone. He adopts the so many fine young writers feel it is With a stifled cry of fear, Snow- necessary to display these bitter truths in metaphor in his thinking and seems not real¬ fire touched his arm. their fiction. ly concerned as his body sugars concentrate as he dehydrates. He is also not very sur¬ I'd rather be adroitly, skillfully lied prised when a talking wombat comes along Yet—after easy sneers at the cliches to in the last two or three pages. That is and frees him.... and ancient plot, there is a vitality to why I invest money and emotion in fiction— the story that carries it forward, and the Roger treads lightly and skillfully a- those lovely happy lies. And perhaps a bit writing has a great vividness, a richness long the edge of whimsy and incredibility: of compassion on the part of writers is in of image and color. 'only his skill saves him. order. Have pity on us readers, if you're I imagine these three novelettes will really good at making us care for your be combined and published in paperback characters; you'd be surprised at how much we know of life and death...sometimes even sometime in the near future. I wish I knew where Joanna Russ was go¬ as much as you. * ing with the very real people in her serial, Oh, I know, you must do your thing, and WE WHO ARE ABOUT TO... in the January GAL¬ Putnams has just sent a review copy of follow your inspiration... But I'll tell AXY. This is the first sustained writing THE POWER OF BLACKNESS, by Jack Williamson; you, Michael Bishop, I'll be wary of you in of hers I've read that I consider first- the novel introducing Blacklantern and his the future. rate. It quickly became compulsive reading becoming a Benefactor and meeting Snowfire. for me once I started it. But I worry; she ($6.95) has killed off the three males and one of the women on a far planet where a lifeboat DOORWAYS IN THE SAND, a serial in the deposited eight passengers of a spacewarp June, July, Aug. issues of ANALOG, by Roger ship gone wrong. There remain only four In the Feb. issue of F&SF with the Jack Zelazny, and out in paperback by now, I women. Williamson novelette, is the featured nov¬ imagine, will strike some readers, as it Despite this, I admire the tough, in¬ elette "The Samurai and the Willows” by did me, as literary Chinese Food—three telligent central character, her philosophy Michael Bishop. hours after you've read it you're hungry and her ruthlessness. The contrasts between them are striking. again. Bishop is a very fine writer, able to hold Of course it is written with the Zelaz¬ There's a welcome aura of quality about a reader through goings and comings, work ny magic; that indefinable stylistic touch and play, casual everyday future living un¬ that makes him extremely readable. the March AMAZING...a fine cover by Barber, der the Atlanta city dome and down to a a restraint in the use of cover hype...aid cubicle on the ninth underground level... But...but...the impression remains that the positioning of the redesigned logo in able to weave a complicated, real culture in this novel he has used a lot of season¬ tne upper right comer. I note the 'AMAZ¬ ing to make up for a thin plot. into the lives of two dissimilar people who ING' of AMAZING SCIENCE FICTION is shrink¬ did not choose to live together. Seasonings like a central character, ing. Good move. 'Amazing' is too "pulp" a Cassidy, who likes to climb things—build¬ word for a title now. He chose to present two worthwhile peo¬ ings, mostly—and is a perrennial student, ple, to make them human—to make us care adroitly taking course after course, shift¬ about them...and then (with lots of "good" ing from major to major, in order to keep I'm going to have to disagree with Jon reasons planted) he chose to let one of collecting a handsome education allowance Gustafson, this issue, on his estimate of them commit honorable suicide...and I re¬ from the estate of his cryogenically limbo- the quality of the October, 1975 GALAXY sent it. ized rich uncle. cover. I think it functions rather well as In a tragedy, you see, the "black mo¬ a cover—provoking viewer curiosity and Seasonings like an alien team of cops ment" is when things appear to be working interest. who are on Earth to catch a galactic crim¬ out well, when it seems happiness might be inal... A "star stone" statue (that is not And while I'm thinking of GALAXY, a be¬ in store for the central character. But, a statue) from an incredibly old, dead lated compliment is due editor Jim Baen for no, inexorable, cruel fate dictates death, alien civilization on display and which and so it goes. has been stolen. 23 Continued on page 35 the Jew of category publishing! The wasps came to America/before SF entered the and the micks, the krauts and the wops and pulps), a much-deserved bow to the too- the frogs can have their westerns and who¬ often overlooked Frank A. Munsey, and then dunits, gothics and romances, and of course the real heart of Gunn's book, the familiar their fantasies dear and fey or thunderous but endlessly dear tale of how science fic¬ and blood-drenched. tion came up the river from Hoboken with Hugo Gernsback and John W. Campbell. But science fiction has been dominated The bulk of Gunn's book (five of thir¬ for fifty years by a crew of editors 3nd teen chapters, plus Isaac Asimov's infan¬ writers bearing names like Gernsback, tile introduction) is devoted to the pulp Schachner, Asimov, Bester, Silverberg, El¬ era and the major editors and authors it lison, Harrison, Harris, Haiblum, Davidson, produced. The book offers few startling Malzberg, Ferman, Friedman, Moskowitz, facts and fewer startling insights, but it Kombluth, Kidd, Grossman, Wollheim, Weis- is a good elementary history of the field, inger, Schwartz, Margulies, Kuttner, Russ, and the illustrations it contains—scores Merwin, Klass, Greenberg, Feldman, Cohen, of magazine and book covers, hundreds of del Rey (!) and doubtless scores of others. author and editor photos—are very at¬ As the Jews made their way from shtetl tractive. Shots of Murray Leinster at var¬ to American ghetto to suburb to diaspora, ious ages from dew to dottage, Jack Wil¬ so has science fiction made its way from liamson and Edmond Hamilton from the 1930s general magazine to pre-category pulp (e. to the 70s, mug-shots of Larry Niven and g. ARGOSY, BLUE BOOK) to category pulp (e. Alexei Panshin, Tom Purdom and Joanna Russ g. AMAZING, ASTOUNDING) to growing accept¬ and endless others. THE LITERARY MASOCHIST ance in the general publishing industry and And a stirring envoi painting SF as the A Column By Richard A. Lupoff a respect bordering on reverence in the Angel of Light, pretty near. There's also universities. a table of Hugo and Nebula winners since Starting just about a hundred years a- And as Jews have lately manifested an the inception of both series, and a tabular go, or a little less, millions of ashkena- almost inexplicable nostalgia for the ghet¬ history of "western civilization, science, zim poured out of the shtetls of eastern to, so has science fiction begun to exhibit technology, and science fiction" that's fun Europe in search of the bright promise of an overwhelming yearning for the good old/ to peruse. ' the New World, hoping to escape the pogroms bad old days of the pulps. Vide, a growing The major flaws in Gunn's book are the of arrogant imperial rulers, to find new stack of lushly produced books about the bibliographic flaws, with which the book .is freedom, dignity and prosperity for them¬ development of science fiction, ranging rife. There are other errors, minor ones, selves and their descendents. By the ship¬ from the basically text-oriented but heavi¬ such as the occasional startling solecism load they debarked at Ellis Island and ent¬ ly illustrated history by James Gunn to a in a work whose general prose level is ered the New World only to find themselves number of graphics-oriented volumes with quite adequate if not exemplary. ("Pence" crammed into the new ghetto of the Lower accompanying commentary. I have six of as a singular—I've come across this par¬ East Side, poor, oppressed, exploited, trap¬ these books on my desk at this moment; ticular flub only once before in my life, ped by their own oddities of dress, diet, their prices range from $A.95 for a large- the other time by Sam.Moskowitz)...the pho¬ by ignorance of even the language of their format paperback by Anthony Frewin to $29.- to of Bob Silverberg identified as Tom new homeland. 95 for the hardbound Gunn; total price for Scortia...an incredible piece of laziness Undaunted, they strove to learn English, the six would run you $73.90 (ten bucks ("A volume or two of STAR SHORT NOVELS al¬ to make a place for themselves, to scrimp more if you opt for the hardbound version so came out, beginning in 1953;" it was and save enough money to escape Henry of one title that goes either way), and be¬ either one volume or it was two, and could Street, Delancey Street, Chatham Square; fore you plunge that deep, I think you have been checked easily enough; what is few enough of the immigrants ever left the ought to listen to somebody who has studied this, a fanzine?; in fact, it was one)... all six books and can give you a rundown ghetto, but their children found their way the statement that SKYLARK OF SPACE had two on the validity of various efforts. to Williamsburg, to the Bronx, to Long In¬ sequels; in fact it had three...the identi¬ land; and their grandchildren to Scarsdale, The Gunn book, ALTERNATE WORLDS, strik¬ fication of the first issue of WONDER STO¬ to Connecticut, to Los Angeles. es me as the best place to start. It's by RIES as volume 1 number 1; in fact WONDER STORIES came about through the amalgamation Then, strangely, when it came to take far the most expensive of the group,v and the most ambitious. In 256 pages Gunn pre¬ of SCIENCE WONDER STORIES and AIR WONDER stock, those comfortable, respectable, dis¬ sents a good, if conventional, history of STORIES and never had a volume 1 number 1 persed, assimilated grandchildren began to ...the identification of a Pyramid Books discover that—they long for the ghetto! the field. He traces back to the days be¬ fore the usually-cited founding fathers cover as the product of a fan press...the The sense of warmth, of struggle, of unity- attribution of "When the Earth Screamed" to in-adversitv. And there beqan the flow of Jules et Herb to cover such proto-SF writ¬ Rider Haggard (it was by Conan Doyle)...the novels and dramas harkinq back to the days ers as Plato, Lucian (but of course!), Kep¬ identification of AUTHENTIC SF as an Ameri¬ of the ghetto and even of the shtetl. From ler, Swift, Mary Wollstonecraft and all the can magazine (it was British)...the identi¬ Russian Hill, Avenue D attains a golden rest of that gang, having first struggled fication of Curtis Newton's three aides as glow; from Cos Cob, Lublin looks beautiful! through a densely academic piece of what- is-SF-and-where-is-it-today. We have the "a robot, and android, and a beautiful Am I the first—surely I cannot be the usual pre-pulp treatment (before the Jews girl," thus substituting Joan Randall for first—to remark that science fiction is 24 Simon Wright...a strange reversal of the WONDER STORIES botch by stating that the utopias, two-thirds of the space given over like Gunn's, and that's it. Don't bother AVON SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY READER was to stills from CLOCKWORK ORANGE and 1984; with this one, even if it does turn up on an amalgamation of the AVON SF READER and six pages on robots that come down to one the remainder table. the AVON FANTASY READER; in fact it was a page of superficial text (the rest is pic¬ wholly separate publication...and so on and tures); five pages on "The 'New Wave'" that 9 on, culminating in a series of botched au¬ come down to less than one page of shallow Getting over from illustrated histories thors' names (James Schmidt, F. M. Bushby, discussion: a section on "Stanislaw Lem, to histories of illustration, we come to Janet Lepson).... the greatest contemporary sf writer" which FANTASTIC SCIENCE-FICTION ART 1926-1954 ed¬ is a ludicrous claim quite unsupported by If Gunn or someone else would go through ited (i.e., selected) and with an introduc¬ Rottensteiner's flimsy argument (but con¬ ALTERNATE WORLDS and clean up the scores of tion by Lester del Rey. There are forty sidering that Rottensteiner is Lem's ag¬ gaffes it contains, and then reissue the full-page, full-color plates here, and ent....); three pages on comics that are book in a trade paperback at one-third the strictly as a bunch of reproductions of worse than no coverage at all; and a sec¬ present price, it would be a good book at pulp-era SF covers they are a gorgeous tion on "The fabulous art of Hannes Bok." a reasonable amount. As for the present hour's worth of browsing-material (or may edition—look for it on the remainder ta¬ Now I happen to admire Bok's work, and be clipped as pin-ups), but as history or ble. to have known and hugely liked the man. survey, I'm afraid that the book is sadly But Rottensteiner's singling out of Bok lacking. 9 for Ms coverage, and by implication his Del Rey's choice of covers to repro¬ Franz Rottensteiner is the author of deprecation of the many other (and many duce is appallingly narrow, and his criti¬ THE SCIENCE FICTION BOOK, a volume super¬ more important) SF illustrators of the cal perceptions as displayed in the intro¬ ficially similar to ALTERNATE WORLDS, but past, is typical of the sloppiness, arbi¬ duction are appallingly shallow; the book only about half as big (160 pages) and only trariness, and fan-scrap-bookishness of might better have been titled THE COVERS about half as expensive (H4.95). Like the THE SCIENCE FICTION BOOK. FRANK PAUL PAINTED FOR HUGO GERNSBACK AND Gunn book it's blurbed as "an illustrated Rottensteiner also suffers from the A FEW OTHERS and it would have been more history" and like the Gunn book it contains same kind of sloppy scholarship, especial¬ honest. As for Lester's introductory es¬ many pages of reproductions of magazines ly bibliography, that mars Gunn's book. say, about the most penetrating observation and book covers, illustrations, pictures The major difference is that Gunn's is a he can bring himself to make is that Paul's of authors, stills from motion pictures and solid product with superficial flaws. Rot- "machinery" was "interesting." This is television shows, even comics. tensteiner's is just as flawed on the sur¬ criticism? This is kitten-poopoo. It opens with an introductory essay on face, but utterly lacking the solid under¬ All of the forty plates come from three science fiction, and it is an excellent es¬ pinnings of Gunn. Just for the record, sources: AMAZING STORIES, WONDER and its say indeed. Rottensteiner displays a clear here are a few of Rottensteiner's goofs: assorted spin-offs and successors, and perception of the place of science fiction the claim that Karloff was the first film ASTOUNDING. Eighteen of the plates are by and a firm grasp on its sources and relation¬ Frankenstein monster...the statement that Paul, five are by Earle K. Bergey (the king ships. "Modem science fiction is a mixed FAMOUS FANTASTIC MYSTERIES was a "pioneer" of the fem-bem-bum triad), and the remain¬ genre that has derived its concepts, story SF magazine (it appeared in 1939, sixteen ing seventeen have to be parcelled out in patterns and techniques from many sources, years after WEIRD TALES and thirteen after ones and two and threes among nine other both literary and non-literary, and has AMAZING STORIES, and was primarily a re¬ pulp-era artists including Hubert Rogers, transposed and assimilated them to such an print journal anyway)...the attribution of Howard V. Brown and Leo Morey. extent that it is difficult to tell what ASTOUNDING STORIES to Gernsback (!)...a There's not a single Finlay in the book! is 'pure' science fiction, and what is screw-up of the SCIENCE/AIR/THRILLING WON¬ Not a single Bok! 'contamination' or 'loan genre' (e.g. the DER family...gratuitously commissioning Ed¬ Not a single Wesso! Western or war story simply dislocated into gar Rice Burroughs during World War II (he Not a single Emshwiller! the future)." That sentence carries more was a war correspondent, not an army of¬ Not a single Bonestell! load and transmits it more effectively than ficer!)...stretching the serialization of Not a single Leydenfrost! a whole book of essays, aod Rottensteiner Campbell’s THE MIGHTIEST MACHINE through an Not a single St. John! goes on for page after page, making his extra year...calling the film FANTASTIC introductory essay one of the finest piec¬ VOYAGE, FANTASTIC JOURNEY (is this the re¬ The sources are AMAZING, WONDER, and es of criticism of SF that I've ever read. sult of translation and retranslation? If ASTOUNDING, as I mentioned—no sign of the so it m3y be the publisher's fault rather nearly 100 other SF magazines that appear- He deserves high grades for that essay, than the author's, but is still a flaw in but once he moves beyond it THE SCIENCE the book)...listing Bradbury's first book FICTION BOOK begins to slip. as DARK CARNIVAL, New York 1948 (it should The book's jacket identifies Rotten¬ be Sauk City 1947)...Advent: Publishers of steiner as a fanzine editor, and the book New York (they're in Chicago and always comes across as a rather naive fan's scrap¬ have been!)...the classic fanzine FANTASY book, with little two- and three-page sec¬ MAN (it was FANTASY FAN)...LORDS OF THE tions devoted to the author's favorite au¬ RING...SEEDS OF MARsT.-the Japanese author thors, illustrators, movie and TV spin-offs. who admired Poe so much he wrote as Edowaga As thoughtful and rigorous as is the intro¬ Rampo (no, Franz, he wrote as Edogawa Rampo) duction, these "essay-lets" are completely ...General Electrics... the opposite: shallow, incomplete, caprio- Rottensteiner gives a nice chronologic¬ ious. There's a three-page section on anti¬ al bibliography, a list of award winners ed during the years del Rey pretends to And so it goes, on and on and on. Frewin's text exhibits its little gaf¬ cover, nor even mention in.passing of the fes, of course: ANALOGUE magazine, FRANKEN¬ But when Sadoul finally gets going on many Sf stories (and covers!) that graced STEIN published in 1819, the Wright broth¬ SF art, he apparently knows his beans, and the general pulps during the same era. ers' great lighter-than-air-craft, the fam¬ he hasn't been betrayed by a bad translator iliar botch of WONDER lineage, and a total or a lazy or ignorant editor. He divides No mention of PLANET STORIES, GALAXY, jumble of MARVEL SCIENCE STORIES and the to¬ his book into sections by themes—aliens, F&SF, FUTURE, STIRRING, MARVEL, COMET, OTH¬ tally unrelated MARVEL COMICS. ER WORLDS, WEIRD TALES, FFM, UNKNOWN, SUP¬ robots, spaceships, "Women of the Cosmos," etc., and. the art that he uses is very var¬ Hey, just for the record, let's get ER, FLASH GORDON STRANGE ADVENTURE MAGA¬ ied, well selected, nicely commented upon, that WONDER lineage straightened out, shall ZINE, etc., ad ennui. (Heh, I threw in we? Here it is 1929; Gernsback has lost FLASH GORDON just to see if you'd sit up. and in general a pleasure to peruse. control of AMAZING STORIES (and its spin¬ It was a real magazine and it could really One drawback is that there are only a offs, the one-shot (1927) AMAZINir?TORIES be included here.) very few color plates in the book. A few ANNUAL and the ongoing AMAZING STORIES covers are reproduced in color, and many Lester's book is pretty, and it's fun QUARTERLY). Hugo sets up his new corpora¬ illustrations that originally appeared in for what's here, but it is so woefully in¬ tion and begins a line of magazines: SCI¬ black-and-white are reproduced in that form, complete that I have to give it a bad mark. ENCE WONDER STORIES, SCIENCE WONDER QUAR¬ but there are unfortunately many covers re¬ TERLY, AIR WONDER STORIES, SCIENTIFIC DE¬ Hey, we ain't doing so well, are we? duced to monotone (to save money, presuma¬ TECTIVE MONTHLY. Okay? The Great Depres¬ Well, onward.... bly), and these do not show up to good ad¬ sion strikes, Hugo can't keep up all the vantage. * Still, as a survey of science fiction Jacques Sadoul is another European like art accompanied by a well-intentioned and Rottensteiner (French, though; Franz is moderately well-executed commentary, give Autrian). Sadoul's 2000 A.D. ILLUSTRATIONS Sadoul a pretty good rating. This is far FROM THE GOLDEN AGE OF SCIENCE FICTION from a definitive book, but it's a lot of PULPS was previously published in France, fun, certainly head-and-shoulders above in French, and the translation botches a Rottensteiner or del Rey; for text it is lot of titles, much as was the case with not up to Gunn, but for illustrations it is the Rottensteiner book. superior to Gunn. Thus we get FOUNDATIONS, THE WORLD OF # THE A, THE ARMS MANUFACTURERS, TOMORROW THE DOGS, THE SUPREME MACHINE, ASTOUNDING STO¬ Unlike the other author-compilers in RIES OF SUPER-SPACE, THE ISHER ARMS FACT¬ this group, all of whom are basically wri¬ ORY, PLATO'S CRITIC, and INHABITANTS OF THE ters (or in Rottensteiner's case, an edit¬ MIRAGE. I'd be surprised if there's any¬ or-agent) and hence primarily oriented to thing there you can't decode, but just for text with the consequence that they view the record (knowledgeable readers skip to artwork as an adjunct of words, Anthony the next paragraph, please) I decode those Frewin is apparently an artist. His valu¬ as FOUNDATION, THE WORLD OF NULL-A, THE ation is thus primarily upon art, with text WEAPOM MAKERS, CITY, THE MIGHTIEST MACHINE, ranked as the adjunct. His ONE HUNDRED ASTOUNDING STORIES OF SUPER SCIENCE, THE YEARS OF SCIENCE FICTION ILLUSTRATION thus WEAPON SHOPS OF ISHER, PLATO'S KRITIAS, and contains.the most knowledgeable analysis magazines so SCIENCE and AIR are amalgamat¬ DWELLERS IN THE MIRAGE. Sigh. and commentary on artwork, with a relative ed to make WONDER STORIES. No volume 1 de-emphasis on the stories, their authors, There are other, factual botches, too. number 1, the lineage continues from the editors, and publishers. Mort Weisinger did not "invent" Superman. older titles. The quarterly also drops Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster cobbled him Frewin himself writes with something of SCIENCE and becomes WONDER STORIES QUARTER¬ together out of WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE, GLAD¬ a wise-ass, snide attitude, which is rather LY. SCIENTIFIC DETECTIVE MONTHLY becomes IATOR, a dollop of Doc Savage and a tiny offputting at first. But it's worth your AMAZING DETECTIVE CASES, drops its fiction¬ pinch of the Shadow; Weisinger edited the forbearance to read what he has to say and al content, is sold off, and eventually Superman comics for the thieves who to look at the pictures he presents. sinks without a trace. Selah! "bought" Superman from Siegel and Shuster For one thing, he offers excellent sec¬ As the depression deepens, Gernsback for 35d and two hamburgers. tions on two nineteenth-century futurist can't keep up even WONDER STORIES monthly THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES is made up of artists, Isidore Grandville and Albert Ro- and quarterly. The quarterly goes by the short stories, not novels. bida, whose drawings are astonishing and boards. The monthly struggles along, some¬ well worth observing—as Verne, Wells, and times bi-monthly at that, but by the mid- It's J. Harvey Haggard-with-a-jJ, Henry that crowd are the ancestors of today's SF 30s it's nearly dead; Gernsback is getting Hasse-with-an-H, P£ul-with-an-o Anderson, writers, Grandville and Robida are the fore¬ murdered by newsstand returns (God help us Raymond Z-not-A. Gallun. runners of Paul, Wesso, Gaughan and the all!). He tries a desperate gamble: a high- rest of _thejr bunch. Rottensteiner and pressure subscription campaign to line up Ray Palmer edited AMAZING STORIES and Sadoul said a little about these early art¬ mail-sales and he's going to abandon news¬ OTHER WORLDS plus some lesser magazines, ists, but Frewin's comments are more exten¬ stand distribution, but the scheme flops, but never did he edit THRILLING WONDER STO- sive and perceptive and his selections of he sells out to the Ned Pines chain and drawings are more attractive and coherent. WONDER STORIES is rechristened THRILLING WONDER STORIES in keeping with the other sentative, and the format of his book pro¬ are in the promised land beyond, but some¬ "Thrilling" magazines in the chain. vides for the largest and hence most lus¬ how, for some reason, things are worse! cious presentation of numerous color plat¬ THRILLING WONDER STORIES it remains un¬ That's why Judy Lynn del Rey has taken es. til its death in the early 1950s. After a Ballantine Books back to the 1930s, and is couple of years the publishers try to re¬ Even the knowledgeable Aldiss can't selling more books than anybody else in the vive it by reprinting stories from past keep his bibliography completely straight; field. years; the revival, ironically, goes back he has the STAR SCIENCE FICTION magazine Somehow this all makes me feel vaguely to the name WONDER STORIES. Again it flops turning into a paperback book series after sad. but the publishers still don't give up and one issue when in fact it was the book ser¬ they change the name to—are you ready?— ies that spawned the magazine; and he jum¬ SCIENCE FICTION YEARBOOK. But it still bles the MARVEL SCIENCE STORIES sequence doesn't make the grade and is finally al¬ too. This magazine was started before THE HARD FACTS lowed to rest in peace as the Pines chain World War II as a pulp, suspended during is gradually merged into the great corpor¬ the war, revived as a digest-size magazine, ALTERNATE WORLDS, The Illustrated History ate body of—are you ready for this one?! converted back to a pulp and then dropped of Science Fiction by James Gunn. Prentice —the Columbia Broadcasting System! for good. Good! Quits! Hall 1975, 256 pages, $29.95. (Hardbound)

As part of CBS it still exists under Aldiss's book comes across as a bit of THE SCIENCE FICTION BOOK, An Illustrated the name Popular Library, and the Popular a scrapbook too, but there's no pretense at History by Franz Rottensteiner. Seabury Library logo, if you examine it closely, anything else, and it's grand fun. What's 1975, 160 pages, $14.95. (Hardbound) reveals the outline of a stylized pine tree. most appealing is his presentation of thir¬ FANTASTIC SCIENCE-FICTION ART 1926-1954 by Yep, old Ned Pines rests uneasy. ty "mini-portfolios" of SF artists, ranging Lester del Rey, Ballantine Books 1975, 96 from the great and near-great (Paul, Bok, During the pulp booms circa 19^0 and pages, $5.95. (Paperbound) Bonestell, Finlay, Rogers, Wesso) to the again circa 1950, THRILLING WONDER had a minor-but-interesting craftsmen who managed 2000 A.D. Illustrations From The Golden number of spin-offs, the most famous being to produce, on occasion, a fine piece in Age of Science Fiction Pulps by Jacques STARTLING STORIES; for some years TWS and which they outdid themselves (Cartier, Sadoul. Henry Regnery Company 1975, 176 SS were known as "the TWinSS." Others were Dold, Orban, Jack Binder, Schneemann, Rod pages, $17.95 (Hardbound) or $7.95 (Paper- CAPTAIN FUTURE, STRANGE TALES, WONDER STORY Ruth). bound) ANNUAL (reprints), SPACE STORIES, and FAN¬ TASTIC STORY QUARTERLY (reprints) which The book is lush with color plus many ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SCIENCE FICTION IL¬ succeeded well enough to become a bimonthly well-chosen monotones, and while I think LUSTRATION by Anthony Frewin. Pyramid and changed its name to FANTASTIC STORY Aldiss includes a few clinkers (he's home- Books 1975, 128 pages, $4.95. (Paperbound) MAGAZINE. towning fcr the British audience) the gal¬ SCIENCE FICTION ART, The Fantasies of SF by lery is generally a delight. The last, not to be confused with FAN¬ Brian Aldiss. Bounty Books - Crown Publish¬ TASTIC ADVENTURES, FANTASTIC STORIES OF ers 1975, 128 pages, $9.95. (Paperbound) IMAGINATION, FANTASTIC NOVELS, FAMOUS FAN¬ What all of this means is—for me at ******************************************* TASTIC MYSTERIES, FANTASY STORIES, FANTASY least—the clear emergence of Frank R. TIME BOMB MAGAZINE, FANTASY FICTION, THE MAGAZINE OF Paul as the definitive pulp science fiction FANTASY which became F&SF, FANTASTIC UNI¬ artist, and through the artwork of Paul the What do you do when a friend sends his VERSE, SCIENCE-FANTASY...I have to stop single clear ringing note of the pulp ghet¬ first (I think) published novel with the now, I think I'm having a heart attack. to in which science fiction, the Jew of the inside cover message: "Merry Christmas to category fiction world, expressed its es¬ Dick Geis from Ray Nelson"? (And below Okay, Anthony Frewin (remember him?) sential spirit: optimism. that is a Nelson drawing of a fan with his knows a lot about art, and a helluva lot Paul saw technology as creating a propeller beanie raised in salute.) about science fiction art, and I recommend bright, clean, exuberant world; he saw the Well, you note that his novel is titled his book to you with very high marks for future as a golden road to glory; he saw BLAKE'S PROGRESS and is Laser Book #13, and the choice of plates and the commentary that space a panorama glittering with exciting maybe in anticipation you groan a little. accompanies them, but not (again) for the places for Man to visit and races for him reproduction of full-color covers in black- to befriend. Several of these commentators This is known as prejudging. and-white or monotone or for the placing of point out that Paul's machines are all With a sense of injured obligation I a color wash over drawings that were orig¬ clean, glowing, vivid; his aliens, even opened the book and began to read Terry inally published in black & white. when he attempts to make them monstrous and Carr's interesting introduction. He has # menacing, come out looking cuddly, friend¬ nice, perceptive things to say about Ray ly, funny. Those great slavering fangs Nelson and the novel. This brings us, last but by no means somehow seem more like the teeth of a puppy least, to SCIENCE FICTION ART, THE FANTA¬ who wants to chew on your finger than those Terry Carr is rarely wrong. SIES OF SF, compiled and introduced by of a beast that's going to eat you up. For it is a remarkably good novel. In Brian Aldiss. Aldiss is an accomplished fact (and I hesitate to admit this), it SF writer and critic; as an art critic his That's why, I suppose, the ghetto looks triggered some tears at the end. It got to judgements and comments tend to be somewhat nice to us in retrospect. It was a terrible me. It may get to you, too. naive, especially as compared to Frewin's place while we lived there, but we knew (or even Sadoul's) but his choices are most¬ things were going to get better. It is about a war between good and evil ly good, or at least interesting and repre¬ 27 We escaped from the ghetto and here we up and down the time stream, and it involv- es radical altering of human history, alter¬ PLUGGED IN nate civilizations, the fate of mankind, An Essay-Review billions of souls (yes, damnit, souls!), and more. By George Warren THE COMPUTER CONNECTION By Alfred Bester It is about love and loving in a physi¬ Berkley/Putnam, $6.95 cal and character climate that you'd swear Every writer worth a damn, on the way would result in divorce or murder ten times to learning his own mind and finding his over. It is about a kind of faith and loy¬ own voice, tries his hand at stealing what alty and character and virtue the existence he needs from his elders and betters. This of which one must today accept...as an act is not the same as what the crickety boys, of faith. up there in their academic haze, like to It is about the lives of the 18th cen¬ call literary influence. One simply sees a tury mystic poet and artist William Blake technical device lying around and, sending and (especially) his wife, Kate. It is up a quick prayer that nobody's looking, their struggle with Urizen, the bearded, tries to smuggle it out of the store under naked man from the far, far future who his coat. travels in time and who loves to make chang¬ The reason there are not more plagiar¬ es, to indulge himself and to exact a ter¬ ism suits these days, considering the sheer rible and strange vengeance. volume of print out there and the impossi¬ BLAKE'S PROGRESS by R.F. Nelson (Laser bility of coming up with a new plot, is #13, 95t) is worthy of a Hugo and Nebula that this form of larceny simply doesn't nomination. I kid you not. work. You're tired of the same old hamburg¬ er and you swipe a leg of lamb, but in tru¬ est Looking-Glass style by the time you get NESTLE'S SOUPTIME it home it's the same old hamburger again. (As Sir Donald Tovey put it once, there's The trouble is that you can only use as one thing every composition student would Cream Of ChTtken Soup with other natural much of another writer's stuff as you can love to be able to learn from studying flavors use, and that's the long and short of it. Haydn and Beethoven, but can't, and that's how to get out of trouble, and the reason Souptime is the full-flavored 10-second Exhibit A: I can remember trying to soup is that these guys never seemed to get into snitch a certain je ne sais quoi from James trouble in the first place.) Ingredients: CORN STARCH, HYDROGENATED VEG¬ M. Cain, or maybe it was Dashiell Hammett. ETABLE OIL, LACTOSE, SALT, NATURAL FLAVORS, It sounded like just what I needed. After So: the process can't be replaced, it DRY CHICKEN MEAT, CHICKEN FAT, MONOSODIUM hours of snipping and pasting, however, I can't be elided. Some people don't seem to GLUTAMATE (FLAVOR ENHANCER), SODIUM CASEI¬ had to admit that the damned stuff kept go¬ have the same trouble with it that others NATE, DEHYDRATED ONION, SUGAR, DIPOTASSIUM ing sour until I had reworked it my own way, have...but you'll notice I said seem. You PHOSPHATE, MONO AND DIGLYCERIDES (STABILIZ¬ and then it was so damned different from have to fail at being everybody else before ERS), SILICON DIOXIDE (FLOW CONDITIONER), the stuff I'd tried to swipe that you could¬ you can be yourself, and of course that's CORN SYRUP SOLIDS, SOY FLOUR, SODIUM SILI- n't really call it plagiarism any more. the only person in the world that it's any COALUMINATE (FLOW CONDITIONER), DEHYDRATED (You could call it stealing, though, and good at all for you to be. And nobody can PARSLEY, DEHYDRATED GARLIC, TURMERIC, TRI¬ acknowledge the debt. Thanks, fellas.) save you from the pain of finding this out CALCIUM PHOSPHATE, SPICES, THIAMINE HYDRO¬ first hand; it's dues stuff. What did I get out of all this...ah... CHLORIDE, LECITHIN, POLYSORBATE 60 (STABI¬ let us call it research? Only the slowly This should be self-evident, but we LIZER), DISODIUM INOSINATE AND DISODIUM dawning knowledge, which grew more secure keep on trying to steal and failing. Why, GUANYLATE (FLAVOR ENHANCERS), TURMERIC EX¬ as I went on, that nobody's voice but my I used to wonder, couldn't I steal from Ray TRACT, LACTIC ACID, ARTIFICIAL COLOR. own would do, and that when I found that Bradbury? Well, for one thing, my ear is Makes One 6 Oz. Serving voice I'd better trust it because it was better than his (we are talking about taste, all I was ever going to have. Same for mind you), but his eye is goddamn terrific, Distributed By you too, pal; if you're going to win any and mine is smudgy and inexact (I have to THE NESTLE COMPANY, INC. ball games it's goinq to be with your own work like hell to make you see anything at White Plains, N.Y. 10605 all when I write). Ray Bradbury's individ¬ nickel curve and forkball, not Nolan Ryan's smoke. And that's okay: when you've found ual mixture of strengths and weaknesses differentiate him from me absolutely; they 'Entrepreneurs are rejects. They em¬ your own voice and taken the trouble to make it as impossible for me to do the ploy themselves because they are, in one train it some, it will miraculously become "bad" (meaning not-to-my-taste) parts of way or another, unemployable.' the Almost Perfect Instrument for saying Bradbury as it is for me to do the gorgeous —Richard Cornuelle, DE-MANAGING AMER¬ the only things you're ever going to be flights of fancy I've envied for twenty- ICA, THE FINAL REVOLUTION worth a damn at saying. five years. I’m not only weak in all the You'd better learn to be satisfied with wrong places, I'm strong in all the wrong "I see a hungry mind. I shall feed it that. No apprenticeship you can put in, no places. on wormwood and gore." education no matter how expensive, is going —"Death's Other Domain," SPACE: 1999 Heinlein? forget it. First off, he's to do much more for you as a writer. Some the absolute, world's champion, totally non¬ (Thanks to Buzz Dixon) things simply have to be lived through. visual writer of them all. Sounds like a negative assessment; but just you try hold¬ sonality, and (just as you might exnect) Loss of voice! God, what a thought... ing the re-der's attention the way he does these were enough to make the old ideas particularly when the voice was as virile for Dages and pages without ever drawing a sound new and the tarnished old plot look and important a one as Bester's. There are, picture of things now and then. Try making shiny and golden. A couple of years later to be sure, a few "literary" writers of a character come alive without letting the he did the same sort of alchemist's stunt science fiction today, pushing the notion reader know what he looks like. (There is with an old plot called THE COUNT OF that the proper way to write is to ring un- only one guy in a Heinlein story of whom MONTE CRISTO, called it THE STARS MY DESTI¬ melodious changes on a static situation, you can say th’t you know what he looks NATION, and blew the dust off the old chest¬ and thanks to their uplifting influence we like, and that's the feisty old goat who nut even more expertly than he'd done be¬ now have three-and-a-fraction professional looks just like Robert A. Heinlein—and fore. Apparently I'm not alone in thinking science fiction magazines where once we had sounds like him, too, and usually steals this the best science fiction novel I've one or two dozen. Several of these are the show from everybody else.) And, worst ever read. making big noises about leaving the field; of all, you can't write so much as a page a good idea, if ten years too late for ev¬ Then, fortunately for him, unfortunate¬ of authentic Heinlein without throwing away eryone, but this defection business is in ly for the reader, Mr. Bester moved on; he forty ideas, because that's how many ideas their cases strictly twelve-point-bold was a man who knew other, more reliable he has to your one, and a less prodigal headlines on page sixteen. This, or any ways to make a buck, and science fiction talent would have mined each of those ideas other, field can afford to lose any number didn't pay him well enough to keep him. for a complete novel, all by itself. of small, bad writers. It can hardly af¬ Perhaps a dozen or so short stories follow¬ ford to lose even one good, big one. There was a writer once who came up, so ed, scattered over the years. And that was to speak, when I was just beginning to read it. And now, God help me, I'm faced with Is the loss permanent or temporary? science fiction, and who seemed to have the thB very messy personal problem of review¬ Voluntary or involuntary? I'm not sure, finding-your-own-voice problem solved to ing his first science fiction novel in but I'd put my money on the whoring-after- definitely that the mere contemplation of twenty years, THE COMPUTER CONNECTION (the false-gods syndrome, which is curable by a his separate gifts was enough to take my shorter version was published in ANALOG as return to the religion of one's fathers. breath away. At the time—and it was, be¬ THE INDIAN GIVER, a better, if less "com¬ How long the aberration will last I have no lieve me, a real Major League time for sci¬ mercial,'' title). ence fiction writers, beside whom the pale way of knowing, either, but I'd guess it's not over by a long shot. Mr. Bester shows talents of today seem paltry indeed—this (Messy? Personal? Well, I owe Bester more than a bit. Failing at the task of some signs of enjoying writing this way. man, more than anyone else around, seemed stealing at Bester was a necessary and im¬ And he constantly stops the action, blunts to have everything. Perfect voice: Like portant stumblina block along the road to points, spoils scenes, smothers promising Willie the Whale, he could sing quartets the limited enlightenment I possess. If characterizations and slows story motion to with himself, and every separate tonsil as absolute-zero stasis, all for the sake of true as a crystal glass. The guy could do it's not too highfalutin a term, he's a that ghastly, cutesy-wutesy style. Even anything: plot, characterize, visualize, literary father of mine, and as such I love him and revere him. But if the only cur¬ keep the crowd on the edge of the seat, that I could take, if the book had passed rency I have to repay him with is praise the A. J. Liebling Test ("The way to write and, for lagniappe, toss off world-shaking for THE COMPUTER CONNECTION, I'm in trou¬ is well, and how you go about it is your ideas as if they came in the mail. And his ble.) own business"); but there is about enough stories moved so swiftly, and so inexorably plot in that 220-page book for a forty-page to their smashing climaxes, that you never The problem: Mr. Bester seems to have novelette, and the padding shows, on all quite had the time to think about whether lost his voice. Or, perhaps, lost his sides. "Good" writing? I think not. he had any style or not. (And is th°re faith in it, which amounts to the same anyone out there so big a fool as to dis¬ thing. That lovely, supple, versatile in¬ All this seems to have given even ai pute my contention that this constitutes strument he had, that he could do anything experienced precis-writer like Ben Bova the finest style of all?) in the world with that any writer in his trouble, doing blurbs and synopses for the Yeah, Alfred Bester nearly put me out right mind would want to do, is now (if we serial version in ANALOG. Both times, in¬ of business...until I finally figured out are to believe THE COMPUTER CONNECTION is troducing the story for the second and that I couldn't win any ball games by bor¬ anything but a momentary aberation) walled third installments, Bova spent the bulk of rowing his fast ball, either. away from us behind a barrier of bad—pre¬ his space helping the reader straighten out tentious, pompous, "literary" in the worst the totally static scenes he'd been left sense of the word—style. In this book— with at the end of the previous sections. New? Not especially. The best explana¬ a mistake if ever a writer of genuine, God- Reading these precis one right after the tion I ever heard of Bester's impact on sci¬ given, self-honed-to-a-razor-edge talent other, you begin to notice how little has ence fiction was Larry Shaw's: Bester sim¬ made one—Mr. Bester has sacrificed sus¬ happened each time. ply took the novel more seriously than any¬ pense, empathetic identification, resolut¬ (And, of course, you're bound to ask one else in the field. Novelty isn't that ion, and virtually everything else that the one question which must must infuriate important; the best stories are the old on¬ would make a story worth re-readinq to the Mr. Bova most: would John Campbell have es anyhow. Bester wrote a book called THE ugliest, most forced, most artificial, most bought the book in this form? Would I my¬ DEMOLISHED MAN, in which he stole some tech¬ infuriating narcissistic literary style self, who complain about it, have bought nique—as much as he could use, rememb¬ since the darkest days of Nelson Algren or it? The answer is probably yes, reluctant¬ er?—from ULYSSES, and a plot from CRIME the worst excesses of Herbert Gold (whose ly, and we'd all three have cried our way AND PUNISHMENT, and made a story out of the THE MAN WHO WAS NOT WITH IT I recommend as to the bank. A new Bester novel after result that can still stand you on your ear. the very model of how to write an outline twenty years? Are you kidding?) I repeat, nothing was new—except Bester's for a serious novel and the very model of own marvelous mind and eye and ear and per- how not to execute it). 29 But compare. THE DEMOLISHED MAN opens this way: the Atlantic and extracting deuterium "a rare Nixon nickel." How about Agnew for energy transfer. Most of the fos¬ postage stanps? Explosion! Concussion! The vault sil fuels were gone; the sea level had doors burst open. And deep inside, the been lowered by two feet; progress. For the rest—and yes, the plot does money is racked for pillage, rapine, seem to be the least important thing, fit loot. Who's that? Who's inside the Ugh. to leave for last—there is a bit of plot there about a mad doctor of sorts and a vault? Oh God! The Man With No Face! Goethe once said something to the ef¬ Looking. Looming. Silent. Horrible. fect that the only problem the novel poses computer (the title), and some fairly inter¬ esting ideas on cryonics and epilepsy and Run. Run... is that of getting the reader to let you Run, or I'll miss the Paris Pneuma- treat of life from a specific point of immortality and a lot of other things, all of which might have seemed fascinating in tique and that exquisite girl with her view. If you can get his collaboration on the context of an honast-to-God story. flower face and figure of passion. that, Goethe said, you're home free—pro¬ There's a love story of sorts, but it There's time if I run. But that isn't vided you have a point of view. the Guard before the gate. Oh Christ! quickly settles into stasis. There's a The Man With No Face. Looking. Loom¬ Another problem, then, that I have with promising character in the Chinese Theatre ing. Silent. Don't scream. Stop Mr. Bester*s new book is that of point of girl, but Bester kills her off just as her screaming.... view. There are ways of thinking buried in relationship with his antihero (a very un¬ But I'm not screaming. I'm singing there that put me off horribly. For one likely sort of Amerind indeed) is getting on a stage of sparkling marble while thing, he seems to be going out of his way interesting; can't have any conflict in the music soars and the lights burn. to butter up every fashionably bellicose there, any growth, you know, any change. But there's no one out there in the minority of 197A-75. But this isn't bad All interest the story might have had for amphitheater. A great shadowed pit... enough (despite the perfectly workable ax¬ me died early on the Procrustean rack of empty except for one spectator. Silent. iom that the one sure way to write bad sci¬ that cloying style and that wrongheaded, Staring. Looming. The Man With No ence fiction is to make it "relevant" to unworkable, untenable literary theory, a Face. right now); hear him on the WASP, who is victim of Beste s relentless urge' to sabo¬ inevitably referred to as a "honk" (the ex¬ tage each and every faintest hint of a tra¬ This is Ben Reich's recurring night¬ act equivalent of "kike" or "jig"): ditional story value for the sake of silly mare, disturbing and unforgrttable. If verbal fireworks, better than half of which that doesn't make you want to read on, stop A capsule floated down on top of the fizzle like cheap Taiwan stuff. bods with its jets spraying fireworks. here; you won't like the rest of what I The curse of it all is that this is not A blue-eyed blond astronaut stepped out have to say either. But my, did I ever some poor floundering stiff of a twenty- and came up to us. "Duh," he mumbled in wish I could write like that, and did it year-old, struggling out of the cocoon, ever bother me for a long time until I Kallikak. "Dud-duh-duh-duh...." writing this dreadful guff. It's a master "What's this thing selling?" Uncas ask¬ learned to live with the fact that no, that who has lost faith in his own voice—in wasn't my proper voice either. ed. its validity and its viability in a world "Duh," Fee told him. "That's about all THE STARS MY DESTINATION, after a brief in which semiliterate rock poetasters not the honks can say, so they named the pro¬ only make millions but gather all the lit¬ preface, opens this way: duct after it. I think it's a penis erary goodies (Oxonian exegeses. Major Re¬ He was one hundred and seventy days amplifier." views in THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF EACH OTH¬ dying and not yet dead. He fought for A passage like that, which reflects, not ER'S BOOKS, demigod status in the fahion- survival with the passion of a beast tie prejudices of the characters but the able—left establishment) as well, and all in a trap. He was delirious and rot¬ prejudices of the author, and quite direct¬ for barely—just barely—manging to rhyme ting, but occasionally his primitive ly too, does not make me want to know the moon, June and runcible spoon. (On second mind emerged from the burning nightmare writer better. thought scratch "runcible"—it has three of survival into something resembling syllables.) In a world of bad values Mr. sanity. Then he lifted his mute face Other cavils come up here and there, Bester seems to have lost faith in the no¬ to Eternity and muttered: "What's a booboos that should have been caught in the tion that that One True Voice of his own matter, me? Help, you goddamn gods..." copyediting phase: one of the characters is named Fee-5 Grauman's Chinese after her individuality that he discovered many years And the damned story never lets up for birthplace; it's already been Mann's Chin¬ ago is more important than any he might as¬ a moment; with that first mood of bristling ese for some years, and locals simply call sume in what seems to be his present panic. tension established, Bester really pours on it "The Chinese." The narrator is called Halfway through the present book Bester the steam. "Guig" as a diminutive of "Grand Guignol"; gets off an epigram with a bit of poetry in Now try THE COMPUTER CONNECTION: I shudder to think how Mr. Bester pronounc¬ it (and a bit of truth, too, as is so often es bologna. If you're the type, too, to be the case with things that have a bit of po¬ turned on by the sort of tin-ear lingo An¬ I tore down the Continental Shelf off etry in them): "There mere fact of youth is thony Burgess made up for CLOCKWORK ORANGE, the Bogue Bank while the pogo made peri¬ beauty; the mere fact of longevity is au¬ with every damned word ringing false, Best- scope hops trying to track me. Endless thority." Yet here we find a man, the er's "Black Spanglish" version of the Beat¬ plains of salt flats like the steppes master of a difficult art in his sixties, itudes on page 121 will be right up your of Central Russia (music of Borodin bowing to the feeble authority of youth and alley. Otherwise.... here); mounds of salts where the new writing trendy-kid-writer stuff, fit only breed of prospector was sieving fi^r Much of this can, of course, be passed for some damn fool summer writing course. rare earths; towers of venomous vapors over. I would, however, like to think that Can Alfred Bester, at his age and with his on the eastern horizon where the pump¬ if I'd been copyediting the book I wouldn't accomplishments, be afraid to be Alfred ing stations were sucking up more of have stetted the reference on page 165 to TOMMY NELSON'S BOOKS stories of sf and fantasy, only two of LETTER FROM PEARL 11-14-75 which are recent. Here are the original Thomas Nelson, Inc. sent along three publication dates: 'Last Saturday, I went to Bookwest books for review recently, and they sat on '75 and had a marvelous time. For the kitchen table for a week before I im¬ "The Worm"’by David G. Keller (1927) starters, they admitted me for $1.00 pulsively grabbed them and spent an hour "Mimic" by Donald A. Wollheim (1942) because I'm unemployed and as a fellow, and some spotty reading during TV commerc¬ "It" by Theodore Sturgeon (1940) cost-conscious recluse, you can appre¬ ials to find out where they could be placed "Beauty and the Beast" by Henry Kuttner ciate how that jazzed me. Wambaugh was in the pantheon. (1940) impressive. Carobeth Laird, an 80- "Some Are Born Cats" by Terry and Carol year old woman in a wheelchair, was PASSAGE TO PLUTO begins on page one with Carr (1973) astonishing. Irwin Shaw—as interest¬ three astronauts being given information a- "Full Sun" by Brian Aldiss (1967) ing as a man can be who sounds like a bout Pluto. "Gosh!" exclaimed Tony Hale, "The Silent Colony" by Robert Silver- driver for a wholesale meat packer... the mechanic, "it must be awfully cold." berg (1954) And there were side benefits at the "The Street That Wasn't There" by Clif¬ authors/ and publishers displays. For Well now. An astronaut mechanic? And ford D. Simak and Carl Jacobi (1941) instance, I met a faggot who writes po¬ I doubt a grown man a few years in the fut¬ "Dear Devil" by Eric Frank Russell etry and calls himself MANROOT. My ure would say "Gosh!" in any circumstances. (1950) first glimpse of Ellison was off-putt¬ "God!", "Shit!", or "Christ!", but not ing since I'm leery of short men and "Gosh!" I doubt if there are even any kids It's a fair bet that most of these sto¬ biased toward pipe smokers but he was around who say "Gosh!" in real life. Only ries will be new to most readers. Some were witty and wildly entertaining in a way on TV and in Juveniles in which people to me, and I've been rotting my mind with Woody Allen only aSpires to be. That speak a special language called Nice Eng¬ sf since 1938. was for the first twenty minutes, and lish. These stories are written in a differ¬ then he read a story he had written— Later, on page 10 of the novel, the ent mode than most of the sf of today; they an allegorical put-down of the New York Project Director, in answer to a question, strive to startle and amaze, and the auth¬ publishing scene—and proved himself replies "Good gracious, no." It was then I ors were not afraid to be sincere and dir¬ to be a pipe-smoking shortie after all. realized I was in the hands of lazy editors. ect. The idea, the joy of revelation is There was no way to get him off; he ran the goal. 20 minutes over his allotted time while There is some Nice political philosophy the Kronhausens fidgeted in the wings expressed early on: the space probe is a anxious, no doubt, to make their pre¬ project on the United Nations Exploration sentation and get back to sex. Agency. The team is 'international in char¬ The third Thomas Nelson book is BEADBON- acter': Sir William H.R.O. Gillanders is NY ASH ($5.95), a novel by Winifred Finlay: 'I didn't stay for The Sex People. director, and the three astronauts are Mor- a densely written story of Scottish myth I think the subject has been exhausted rey Kant, American (team leader), Tony Hale, and time-travel from now to the sixth cen¬ and Eberhart K., an atrophied mummy of mechanic, an Englishman, and Serge Smyslov, tury and back. a man, looked like a horrible example Russian. All white, of course. Truly in¬ of what happens to you if you do it ternational. A young girl with emotional problems too much. But I did get to talk to who is visiting young friends in Scotland Michael Kearns (bright and adorable) Some allowance must be made for the becomes enmeshed in the embodiment of Scot¬ and my supper was paid for by Vernon fact that this novel was written by an tish myth—The Hag—who is part oracle Quick, a black, ex-thief who lives on Englishman. and part catalyst for the supernatural the royalties from a book he wrote on On the copyright/credits page a Summary (magic) taking of the three young people to how the citizen can protect himself is printed as part of the Library of Con¬ the remote, pagan past, to the kingdom of from thievery. Truly a splendid day! gress Cataloguing in Publication Data. It Dalriada. says: 'Three astronauts on a space flight Winifred Finlay knows a hell of a lot 'ON THE CONSUMER FRONT: to Pluto encounter a huge mass that pulls od Scottish lore, superstition, mythology 'Dinner Pot, the meal in a box with the spaceship toward it with a murderous and history, and she incorporates her know¬ flavored chunks of protein, is only attraction.' ledge in this story very well. marginally edible and will give you bad breath and turn your stools green. What we have here is a Juvenile, of It did seem to me she mucked around too 'Smoking a 120 mm. cigarette (Dawn) course. An extremely Nice Juvenile. Safe long, rather confusingly, in the opening is an incredibly boring experience. and suitable for any child who is not yet section of the book, with Bridie's problem 'Upton's Make-A-Better-Burger won't. old enough to know when he is being written and her interpersonal relationships with 'Old Dutch Cleanser not only doesn't down to (a very narrow time span). family and friends. But once the Hag does chase dirt, it barely nudges it. her thing and the young people find them¬ (PASSAGE TO PLUTO by Hugh Walters. 'The lemon scent of Fab is so over¬ selves with different identities in pagan Thomas Nelson, Inc., $5*95) powering, it will make whatever room Scottland the story becomes interesting ard it's kept in uninhabitable. Thankful¬ powerful. # ly, it disappears in the wash.' You might call this a heavy Juvenile. On the other hand, the movers and shak¬ ((And has everyone discovered by It has a "happy" resolution and the ers at Thomas Nelson had the good sense to now how long Teflon really lasts on kids make it back to the present. contract with Terry Carr for an anthology frying pans?)) titled CREATURES FROM BEYOND ($6.95): nine THE GIMLET EYE diagonal movements (this is important, be¬ Offer" thing that the publisher pasted on Commentary On Science Fiction cause diagonal movements attract the eye part of Fabian's painting. It looks stupid & Fantasy Art more than ones that are exactly vertital and ugly, and is an insult to a fine piece or horizontal). The skill in rendering the By Jon Gustafson of art. feel of metal is readily apparent, and adds to the effectiveness of the work. I'd like to open this column with a And now the Gimlet Eye turns to the oth¬ This is a strong and effective painting; short plea to the science fiction illustra¬ er side of the tracks; those magazine cov¬ DiFate has not always had this feeling of tors in the field, those men and women who ers that just don't have it. In a very real confidence and skill in his works (a good have done and are still doing so much for way I don't like to do this; I'd much rath¬ example of one Of his poorer covers is on science fiction; please help me in my quest er review only those covers and interior a recent paperback edition of John Brun¬ for understanding about the field of sf ner's POLYMATH), but has improved greatly illos that I think are noteworthy and good, illustration. in the past few years. those done with care and skill, those (this While my art background allows me to is a very subjective business) 1^ like. How¬ In this issue of ANALOG, there is a make cogent comments about the actual il¬ ever, this isn't possible, as art and il¬ special feature about DiFate; I wouldn't lustrations as they appear on the books and lustration need some criticism, some out¬ mind this becoming a regular feature as it magazines, there is still much about the side critique that isn't blinded by self¬ adds some insight about the artists' own artist-art editor-publisher relationships in te rest. feelings about their cover work. that I don't yet completely understand. I With these thoughts in mind, I now tum need information, and lots of it. I need to the October, 1975 issue of GALAXY. The opinions. I need complaints and praises, cover is by Pini and Pini; I presume Wendy from both the artists and the editors/pub¬ GALAXY is a magazine that has had its Pini is one half of the team, but the iden¬ lishers. If you feel that you have any¬ ups and downs lately, and its covers seem tity of the other Pini is as yet unknown to thing that might help, please write to me to echo this. The cover for the September, me. Ihe painting illustrates a scene from at: Box 2003 C.S., 1975 issue is definitely one of their "ups" Niven and Pournelle's INFERNO; in the fore¬ Pullman, WA 99163. and is by one of my favorite illustrators, ground is a car (that looks like it came Stephen Fabian. out of the horrible "sf movie, DEA1H RACE Now, on with the reviews. 2000) with an assortment of frightened hu¬ Fabian is another excellent artist and mans (and a couple of other characters of When I look for excellent examples of one whose use of dramatic darks and lights unknown lineage) scattered over it. The sf illustrations in the magazine field, my is equaled by very few in the field. car is careering across a desert and is be¬ first thought is to pick up the latest is¬ This cover shows an arrowhead-shaped ing bombarded by what look like small mete¬ sue of ANALOG because it consistently has starship, colored in blues with touches of ors. In the background, behind the smoke the best illustrations of the pro mags. magenta and yellow towards its bow, float¬ trailing the car, is what looks suspicious¬ Ihe cover on the November, 1975 issue ing (actually, it's moving quite rapidly ly like the demon from Walt Disney's FAN— is no exception. It is by Vincent Dilate, towarcjs the "nebula" in the left side of 1ASIA (specifically, from the "Night on a steadily-improving artist whose work I the picture) in space. It depicts what is Bald Mountain" sequence), though this demon have been familiar with for quite a number described in a "Forum" article by Poul An¬ of years. As far as I can determine, it is derson; i.e. what an observer aboard a star- his first cover for ANALOG (and I pawed ship would see at speeds approaching that through about fifteen years of mags to be of light. What looks like a nebula is a sure), though he has appeared with interior "starbow", the visual distortion of the art for some years, and has done some pap¬ light from the stars in those areas near erback covers. where the starship is headed. The colors in the starbow are quite lovely with red In a way, he seems to be like Jack red being the main color, complemented Gaughan; his forte is black-and-white illos nicely with some strong greens and small which he does with great skill and imagina¬ touches of yellow, blue and white. tion. It is his sense of chiaroscuro (the dramatic use of dark and light areas in a Again, there is a good use of diagon¬ work) which helps this painting become an als in this painting, and the arrow¬ attention-getter and very successful in the head shape of the starship pulls in artistic sense. the viewer's eyes. While it looks Ihe picture is a portrait of a robot; like a very simple painting, we can see the head, upper torso and one there is a wealth of detail in hard in the foreground; in the background the ship that isn't noticed is a rocky bit of ground, and Jupiter hangs immediately and there are in the sky, large and orange. A scattering subtleties in the handling of ■of stars completes the picture. Ihe robot the colors that tum a mere is mainly colored silver, with hints of illustration into a delight for violet on the body, and a violet "visor" the eye. T* there is one thinq a- on the head. It is tilted slightly, as if bout it that bothers me (and it isn't the the viewer were looking up at it, creating artist's fault), it is the "Special Trial lacks the aura of menace that the Disney Now, I can't go on bludgeoning Mazey works he used to do. The quality is defin¬ studio was able to impart to their demon and Schell's work forever, though sometimes itely not up to the level we are used to (in a cartoon, yet; there is a message in it seems that way, and I will have to give seeing from Kelly Freas and makes me wonder this somewhere). them credit for three things: whether or not he has become so much in 1. They sign their names very neatly demand that he no longer has the necessary The overall impression is not one of and keep the letters small. time to do a really good job on his illus¬ great heat, as Pini and Pini obviously in¬ 2. They have to be the gutsiest (or trations. This is a matter that I will tended, but rathar an impression of a movie least expensive?) artists in the field to press, as I would hate to see the quality set with a very large red light somewhere keep Ferman buying their stuff, and to keep of his work deteriorate (for whatever reas¬ just outside thp picture. In fact, the on¬ turning out the most consistent work I've on). ly parts of the work that do impress one as ever seen (it's all uniformly bad), and being hot are the meteors, which are flash¬ 3. On a slightly more serious note, ((REG NOTE: Jon may get an argument ing past the figures. The colors in this their cover for the December issue of F&SF from Kelly Freas, since Roger Elwood, in a picture are basically red and purple, with is a marked improvement, even though they phone conversation in mid-December, mention¬ a black cloud of smoke neatly dividing the made an evilmeanbadandnasty wind-god look ed that Kelly reads each Laser manuscript foreground and background. The effect is like a kindly Neptun.e with frostbite. before he does the cover, which speaks to too monochromatic to be really good and de¬ a high level of conscientiousness. I doubt tracts from the potential of the painting. he would scamp on the actual painting time Wendy Pini is an artist who has the talent So. Laser Books, edited by our friend after taking the time to read the full ms. to become an exceptionally fine illustrat¬ and resident missionary, Roger Elwood, has It is possible the 'unfinished' style is or; however, she will have to overcome a come out with their first dozen books (as deliberate and was chosen for subtle com¬ couple of minor problems such as her ten¬ of late November), although the last three mercial reader-impact reasons.)) dency towards a cloying sentimentality (her haven't hit the stands here in backwater interior illos in this same issbe are an Pullman, yet. example of this) and her rather poor use Another book I picked up recently is I was originally planning to do a com¬ of color. I will continue to look for her Pyramid Books' WEIRD HEROES, Volume 1, ed¬ posite review of all of them, but since work with a sense of hopeful anticipation. ited by Byron Preiss. I haven't read it they're all so similar, I'll just take the yet, and may not; that not why I bought the one I think the best and comment on it. book. I purchased it because it is a The works I look forward to with the The book is INVASION by Aaron Wolfe and "standard" paperback with interior illus¬ least amount of .anticipation are those of the cover is by Kelly Freas, as are all the trations, and lots of 'em. the team of Mazey and schell. I absolutely Laser covers. There are four standard ele¬ There are five stories in this book, by cannot understand the fascination that they ments in all of the Laser covers so far is¬ five different authors, and each one is il¬ apparently hold for Edward Ferman, the ed¬ sued: all have a portrait of a man or woman itor of F&SF. lustrated by a different artist. The art¬ in the lower right comer (apparently the ists are well known to followers of comic The cover for the October, 1975 issue protagonist, although sometimes the face art: Jim Steranko, Jeff Jones (one of my is the current leader for "The Worst SF Il¬ doesn't match the story description at all), favorites, regardless of category), Alex lustration of the Year." It's beginning all have some kind of cursory ullustration Nino, Tom Sutton and Dave Sheridan. Al¬ to look like Mazey and Schell are going to depicting some element or scene occuring in though most of the illos are not of a very come in first, second and third in the com¬ the story, and all have a heavy black bord¬ high calibre (with the exceptions of those petition. It's a particular shame, too, er running across the top and down the right by Jones and Nino), they are what I have as this particular one is on F&SF's Z&b An- edge. These elements lead to a sense of hoped to see for years; books with more niverary issue. monotony that will eventually lead to ar¬ than just a cover illustration, books with tistic stagnation in the series; I hope As you can see, the illustration seems a series of high-quality, black-and-white to be some sort of a symbolic work, since this can be avoided by some alteration in illustrations to break up the monotony of it makes no obvious sense (while, in sf il¬ either artist or, perhaps, elimination of a couple hundred pages of paper with noth¬ lustration, this is not an absolute pre¬ the portrait theme in some cases. ing but words on them. As I have said be¬ requisite, it does require some skill in So much for generalities. I picked fore, the human eye (and mind) really needs presentation). It shows an inverted pyra¬ this cover because the portrait on this some sort of break from the humdrum routine mid with another pyramid upright on its book showed the most emotion of the batch. of word after word after word after.... base, standing on a flat, Hallowe'en-orange The hero is showing his teeth and rolling I hope this is a trial effort (as op¬ surface. On this surface are lines, giving his eyes downward in fear at the "monsters" posed to a one-shot) and that Pyramid will it a feeling of perspective; on the top of lurking about the house in the background. receive a slug of letters asking for more the pyramids is their latest version of the Said house is abandoned in the snow and books with interior illustrations (hint, "magic eye", which, in this case, is creat¬ three of the yellow-eyed critters are com¬ hint). Wouldn't it be great to see a re¬ ed by an eye-shaped shape behind which is a ing towards him. In the story, they are print of, say, DUNE or STRANGER IN A STRANGE yellow-orange circle. This circle has an¬ described as insect-like; unfortunately, LAND or THE DISPOSSESSED or Clarke's new other circle in it, thus the "magic eye". that doesn't come across very well from the IMPERIAL EARTH with five or ten really good The background (the sky?) is a flat, un¬ painting. As with all these paintings, interior illos? relieved blue and has just about as much this one was probably done in a hurry; it character as cold oatmeal; this simile, I has that slightly unfinished look that suppose, pretty well sums up the whole pic¬ Freas seems to use more and more lately, in The last book I want to review is from ture, for that matter. strong contrast to the carefully delineated DAW Books (a company that seems to know the value of good cover illustrations by talent¬ creating it. There are, I might add, waits for death or spore-invasion of his ed artists) aid is STAR (Psi Cassiopeia) by three interior illustrations by Barr, none body. C. I. Defontenay. of which I am wild about...they seem too This is a gallant, all-out fight...and sketchy to be really effective. However, The painting is done by a very gifted miserable, humiliating defeat of Earthmen/ it is nice to see another book with inter¬ California artist, George Barr, who has Scientists! Pfaw! Ptooey! Ick! No ANA¬ ior illos; my thanks to Don Vlollheim. just recently (in the past couple of years) LOG reader wants that to happen. Not after George Barr is an artist from whom we will been "discovered" by the sf publishers (( living with and identifying with the Compe¬ see many more illustrations, I'm sure, and after years of fan artwork)); science fic¬ tent Man leader of the station personnel. for that I'm grateful. tion illustration is very much like the That ending is positively un-Heinlein! entertainment field in that the "overnight Ate a vista. Ted White bought it. It's a well-writ¬ discoveries" have invariably been around ******+*+***+*+*+******+*****************fc* ten piece of work...if you like downers. for years, working hard to perfect their J REG NOTE: Jim Baen wishes it to be J skills. George Barr is one of those "over¬ l known that he was not responsible J night discoveries"; two years ago I had no * for picking the Feb. 1974 GALAXY J idea he existed (for that matter, two years ago I didn't know fandom existed!), then I saw a cover by him on an sf book about 18 It's always an Event in my life when I months ago. Now, I can hardly turn around discover a fine writer. In this case my REG NOTE: I had some space left on the page without seeing something more by him. "finding" Algis Budrys this late in the devoted to covers analyzed in Jon's column, game is inexcusable, even if he hasn't writ¬ Back to the cover. One of the primary so I included the Feb. 76 FANTASTIC cover ten sf for ten years'. visual attracting stimuli used in the sf by Steve Fabian. It is the most lovely fan¬ illustration field (and has been used for tasy cover I have seen in years. Congratu¬ What triggered my recent gluttonous about 45 years) is the partly-clad, young, lations to all concerned. reading of Budrys (THE FALLING TORCH, Pyra¬ beautiful woman. This cover is a prime mid N2776, 95e; ROGUE MOON, Equinox 20925, example of that stimulus, and a very good $1.95; and WHO, Ballantine 24569, $1.50, PROZINE NOTES Continued one. Rarely is the female figure rendered all very good to superb novels) was his new with more grace than is found on this cover. the change in style and tone in the maga¬ novella in the November issue of F&SF: "The zine since ha took over. He recruited me Silent Eyes of Time." The painting shows the woman holding a and others as columnists, began art featur¬ Budrys is a writer of clean, detailed, fruit to a heron-like bird; in the near es, changed (and improved) the contents page absorbing fiction; the quality is also in background is a blue/grey-skinned alien format, created the "Forum''.... And he has, his control, his excellent, understated real servant holding a tray of more fruit. The I think, presented some very interesting and characterizations, his sureness of his pow¬ setting is idyllic and peaceful, with a provocative fiction, especially in the longer er. The reader is aware that Budrys knows gnarled tree in the background forming a lengths. GALAXY is a much livelier and and will give of his knowledge of the world, visual frame around the figures, making provocative magazine than before, and he de¬ of people, and give of his wisdom, and will them more pronounced and important. The serves recognition and credit. satisfy a hunger for maturity and serenity. colors are soft and radiant, and deny the "theory" that loud and glaring colors are The plot of "The Silent Eyes of Time" needed to attract the eye; the woman does isn't exceptional—hundreds of other sf that quite well simply by being beautiful. I read through "Men of Greywater Sta¬ writers could have conceived and written it There seems to be a subtle influence from tion" by Howard Waldrop and George R. R. competently. But Budrys fills it with calm Hannes Bok in the depiction of the alien Martin in the March AMAZING SF with increas¬ sureness, writing that unobtrusively will (though this is unconscious, George says). ing enthusiasm, wondering in the back of my not let the reader go, till the story has More influence comes from Maxfield Parrish, mind howcum Ben Bova didn't snap it up (as ended and the wish is born that it could particularly in the style of application of it must have been offered to him first, let continue. paint and the use of colors; the orange at us be realistic). their feet is very similar ta a favorite Then I read the final page and under- 'The authors do, however, take note of Parrish color. The alien's eyes, mouth and stood. The authors Do It to the readers. and illustrate Ghandi's quirkiness, espec¬ "ears" are very similar to the style of ially in his attitudes to sex. Unlike Bok; if an artist is going to be influenced The men are stationed on a vicious alien most of Ghandi's biographers, they are ex¬ by anyone, Bok and Parrish might as well planet, fighting for their lives against a plicit about what is often descrioed as be the ones (it would be hard to find bet¬ cunning alien spore-intelligence which can his darkest hour, a moment of horror and direct all animal life on the planet a- ter). extreme spiritual suffering, leading to gainst their base. Then a troop carrier of There is no such thing as a perfect weeks of self-punishing muteness on Ghandi's Earth soldiers crashes not too far away. work of art, let alone a perfect illustra¬ part-, and a profound pall of gloom over all Has the spore intelligence gotten into tion, and this is no exception (although it the inmates of the ashram where this cala¬ their air and taken them over as it had a comes pretty close). The flaws in this mity occurred: Ghandi, at the age of sixty- few unwary and careless men from the sta¬ cover seem to revolve mainly around the seven, had woken in the night with an erec¬ tion? Will the alien intelligence march pose of the woman; it seems too stylized tion.' the armored soldiers against the station? and, thus, loses some of its effectiveness. —Neville Maxwell, reviewing FREE¬ It is, however, better than almost anything The ending is a sourness. The alien DOM AT MIDNIGHT by Larry Collins I have seen for months (in the paperbacks, intelligence has, after all, outthought and and Dominique Lapierre anyway), and I applaud George Barr for outfought the humans. The last man, wounded. 35 SAY, DIDN'T I SEE YOU AT LAST want to know about this odd little sub- CHILDREN AT PLAY YEAR'S MIDWESTCON? genre. Let’s get back to NOW YOU SEE IT/ HIM/THEM... AUTUMN ANGELS by Arthur Byron Cover NOW YOU SEE IT/HIM/THEM by Gene DeWeese & Pyramid (paperback) July 1975, 191 pages, Once the narrator of the story, Joe Robert Coulson. Doubleday, $5.95. $1.25 Kams, discovers Tucker's corpse, the book Reviewed by Richard Lupoff alternates between con-report investiga¬ Reviewed by Dave Wixon tions of the SF fan world and conventional It's hard to maintain objectivity when (sorry, gang) mystery-detection with the This is a strange, weird book, the pro¬ you start reading a book and discover in hero unavoidably tangled up in the matter duct of an incredible imagination. The the first scene that you're a character in of whodunnit. Karns also manages to get author is a relative newcomer to SF, and it. involved with a nasty and possibly crooked in fact may not really be an SF author at visiting sheriff, some mafia types and a all. But the book is labeled No.2 in "The That's what happened with NOW YOU SEE number of characters possessing various Harlan Ellison Discovery Series," and El¬ IT/HIM/THEM... by Gene deWeese and Robert psi-powers like-"mood-reflecting" and may¬ lison's is an active presence. In an en¬ Coulson. It's a strictly minor romp of a be teleportation/telekinesis. tertaining and informative introduction, novel, only just science fiction at all he does just that—he introduces both au¬ The characters are quite standard typ— (it's mostly a formal detective story and thor and novel. not, to be as charitable as possible, like¬ ly to set that category on its collective Moreover, he was an active editor, mak¬ ear either) and I just enjoyed the hell out ing the author submit many rewrites. It of it. should not be surprising, then, if the ed¬ itor's influence can be found in the book. Coulson and deWeese are longtime fans And I thought I saw it there, most of all from the Middle America belt—I first met in the concept of the crawling bird, one of them in the 1950s when I was a poor forlorn the most painful creatures ever detailed in lost soldier boy and they welcomed me into literature. This bitingly real creation the fellowship of the Indiana Science Fio- has no purpose but to suffer, to pine for tion Association—and they have the verbal the unreachable, and to be frustrated. It facility of experienced fan writers. In was created, in the book, by godlike men, recent years both have emerged as good re¬ as an exercise in cruelty: a creature with liable genre writers turning out nice, safe, a bird's desire to fly, but without the enjoyable fiction pretty much at a lower end ability. And I think author and editor of the artistic scale, Coulson in SF, de¬ feel it to be the most human character in Weese (as "Jean" rather than "Eugene") in the book. gothics, and now together. The novel does not lend itself easily The book is full of Tuckerizations— to summarization, and is best experienced. real SF personalities woven into the story The action takes place long after aliens under either their own names or in trans¬ have given the human race such powers and parent diguises. In honor of Wilson "Bob" immortality as to make it "godlike," an ad¬ Tucker who instigated the custom eons ago, jective much used in the book. The people Tucker himself is murdered on page 1. Num¬ all modeled themselves—even to appearance erous other fans and pros appear, including —on characters of fiction or history, and Don (Cleveland) Thompson who is allowed to with time forgot they had ever been other¬ keep his own name. wise. (See how many you can recognize!) The idea of a story set in a science They have godlike powers but no goals, and fiction convention has a lot of appeal. the only thing worth striving for is fame They're colorful events at which a lot of among their peers, a truly fleeting thing. It is the quest for fame by the demon, the eccentric people are hauled together for a mafia don, and of course a whole crew of lawyer, and the fat man that precipitates brief, intense seguence of time. Tony science fiction fans. Boucher saw the potential way back in the the action. dawn of time and wrote his novel ROCKET TO James Blish used to say that a roman a THE MORGUE. Since then Barry Malzberg used clef was acceptable only when the reader In this book there are eternal child¬ who lacked the key could still read the a worldcon for his novel GATHER IN THE HALL ren, who are pets; the godlike men are book with full enjoyment and understanding OF THE PLANETS (and did a couple of other themselves childlike, and there is not one while the "in" reader got a bonus. By this adult in this book. That detracts from its novels about science fiction collectors, test, I think NOW YOU SEE IT/HIM/THEM... is fans and writers), Fredric Brown used a value, for now it is a tale of large per¬ just barely passable for the keyless reader prozine editor and a fan to build his book sons who are as cruel and unthinking, as (to whom it's "just a story"). But to any¬ WHAT MAD UNIVERSE, and short stories galore one-track-wnotivated, as unreal—as child¬ body who's seriously into science fiction, have been written with fandom or conven¬ ren, yet without childish charm. This book especially anybody who's ever attended a tions as backgrounds, most notably Robert is about what happened to the lost children science fiction convention, the book should Bloch's "A Way of Life" and most recently after Never-neverland lost all its dangers. offer a completely delightful few hours of my own "Whatever Happened to Nick Neptune?" Peter Pan would have loved this world. (In reading. (Doubleday, $5.95) fact, I'm surprised he wasn't a character All of which is maybe more than you in it!) 36 There is much action but little move¬ BY LOVECRAFT OUT OF DEMILLE and entertaining if not especially original. ment in the book. It is full of hints un¬ THE WINDS OF ZARR by Richard Tierney The surprising thing—given the inher¬ fulfilled and ends left loose: was the oth¬ Silver Scarab Press, $4.50 ent limitations of all the stereotypes er fat man really the secret master?; what Tierney juggles around—is that ZARR works happened to the crawling bird?; to the mat¬ Reviewed by Neal Wilgus as well as it does. In spite of one-dimen¬ ured eternal child?; did the lonely hawkman sional characters and the built-in defect and the godlike man with no name remain In THE WINDS OF ZARR Richard Tierney that everyone knows what's going to happen, lost in the anti-matter universe? attempts a three-way marriage between sword- and-sorcery, the Cthulhu Mythos and deMil- Tierney is a powerful enough writer that All the loose ends and the lack of re¬ le's version of Exodos—and he damn near once you get past the first chapter you're solution would suggest this is a not-un- brings it off. hooked. And there are some compelling typical first novel by an author not yet at scenes, such as the destruction of the city home in his craft, were it not for Ellisorfs This is familiar turf to just about ev¬ of Rameses and the parting of the sea by assertions of control. Harlan has not, of eryone: after the Pharaohs of Khem have the Zarrian wind-towers, which more than course, produced long fiction himself, but kept the Habiru tribes in slavery for sev¬ make up for the melodramatic climax in it would not seem likely that he wouldn't, eral generations the prophet Moshe ben Am- which Taggart's visit to the Flaming Moun¬ by now, know something about it. Double ram leads his people to freedom, aided by tain triggers the release of Yog-Sothoth. negatives aside, Ellison's association with an all-powerful god who brings radioactive this work suggests that it is more than a plague to the oppressors, then destroys With this title Silver Scarab Press is first effort, and that it is best judged by them under the waters of the Crimson Sea. attempting to make the leap from "amateur" other standards. However, the book does to "professional,"which explains the rela¬ But in ZARR the Pharaoh and the Prophet not seem to be effective as allegory, for tively high price for this paperback. Un¬ there is little real message in it, beyond fortunately, it doesn't look like a pro¬ the obvious lessons of. a humanity with pow¬ fessional book because it's printed in ty ers too big for its morals. Yet, in the x 11 fanzine format rathar than the stand¬ introduction, Ellison proclaims this is to ard pocketbook size. It looks thin, too, be an exercise in looking at things "from running only 77 pages (with six full-page the wrong angle;" apparently, he sees some¬ drawings by Randall Spurgin and two cover thing here. illos by Stephen Fabian)—but narrow mar¬ gins and small print squeezes close to 1000 In fact, the real clue lies in two places: words onto a page, making ZARR a full-length firstly, Ellison states that the book novel after all. "melds" a vast assortment of pop culture heroes and concepts "into a gestalt that This limited edition (1000 copies, 125 is fresh and different...” secondly, the signed by the author) promises better author includes Philip Jose Farmer in his things to come: a talented new author and dedication, for inspiration provided by his a potentially important independent pub¬ novels. Farmer is of course known for an lisher it'll be good to have around. assortment of novels which collect and mix the characters of other authors. Cover is FEAR OF THE DARKOVER either trying to outdo him, scale-wise, or else to parody the concept. STAR OF DANGER by Marion Zimmer Bradley Ace 77945, 160 pages, $1.25 Even more than in the Farmer books, the THE BLOODY SUN by Marion Zimmer Bradley game-playing has left little room for mean¬ Ace 06851, 191 pages, $1.25 ing, and I cannot, with Ellison, applaud character is Taggart, a rather faceless what I cannot find. Reviewed by Lynne Holdom time-traveling scientist, and the part of God is played by Yog-Sothoth. Taggart be¬ What I will applaud is style, story¬ Finally someone at Ace has realized gins as a captive of the priest of Khem, telling ability, and imagination. This is that people are looking for the older, out- but his knowledge of modern science and the a wacky.book of wild shifts, whether of of-print, Darkover novels and has reissued scene, direction or emotion; it is fantasy, aid of super-powerful aliens called the two of them that have been unavailable for Zarr soon springs him from life in the melodrama, and a place for every situation over seven years—two of the best. you could imagine. This is an entertaining brickpits and makes him and his sexless book—brilliantly so—even though it girlfriend witness to the real action— STAR OF DANGER takes place early in the lacks depth: after all, so do the godlike interference in human history by Cthulhu— history of Terran-Darkovan relations. Dark- ian powers who manipulate things to their ovans want nothing to do with Terrans and own unknowable ends. keep contact with them at an absolute mini¬ mum despite the Empire's desire to learn "Doc Savage, listen! You've got to help me! There are also links to Atlantis and more about Darkover. The automatic assump¬ Millions of people are going to die if you UFO/Ancient Astronaut themes which we'll tion by the Terranns that their culture is don't— arrrgh." probably hear more of, for this is the sec¬ superior annoys Darkovans who are just as —DOC SAVAGE: THE MAN OF BRONZE ond in a Zarrian trilogy, though the only sure that theirs is the better way. (Thanks to Buzz Dixon) one to see print so far. But despite n't read this if you value your sanity! ZARR's involvement in the Cthulhu/deMille Larry Montray, the sixteen year old son Mythos, it stands on its own feet as a of an Empire employee, has succeeded in Sorry about that, you nut! tightly-plotted adventure story, convincing winning the friendship and trust of an aristocratic Comyn family, the Altons, and with Elorie Ardais, the Keeper of Arilinn and army men to go to protect their good is invited to spend a holiday with them at and a consecrated virgin. Jeff has finally names and futures. their country estate. The Terrans, anxious found a home at Arilinn, but.... (The necessary scientific procedures to learn more of Darkover, practically ord¬ # inherent in this experiment in DNA using er Larry to accept, which he does. lower-class mothers and their pregnancies, All in all, these are both excellent While he is at Armida, Larry is kid¬ and the monsters produced, are utterly re- reading: STAR OF DANGER for its sheer ad¬ napped by bandits who mistake him for Ken- voltinq! If they show it on screen....T" venture, and THE BLOODY SUN for its puzzle nard Alton. Honor bound, Kennard rescues and its portrayal of a Tower Circle. (Ken¬ I hesitate to give away too much of the him from the bandits but, in order to get nard Alton is one of the Circle). It's a story. This short novel is written tight to safety, they must cross a completely un¬ shame that they have been out-of-print so and tough and is practically a screen treat¬ explored part of Darkover. long. ment for a film. It is detailed, convinc¬ During the journey Larry and Kennard ing, real in gritty, unflinching character¬ come to learn and trust one another com¬ ization and locale. It is a sad story and pletely and find that their strengths and SEEK AND YE SHALL... a tragedy and inspiring. weaknesses complement each other. Kennard SEEKLIGHT by K. W. Jeter Unfortunately—it has a plot hole big knows woodcraft and mountain climbing while Laser Wl, 192 pages, 95$. enough to fly a 7^7 through. But you don't Larry is willing to try new approaches realize it until you've finished the book Reviewed by Lynne Holdom rather than do what has always been done or and thought about it for a few minutes. It do nothing. The boys' relationship slowly comes down to Leonard needing his tense changes; Larry has felt inferior in a Dark- One of the better things that Laser finish, the chase on the empty, roaring sub¬ books is doing is allowing new writers to ovan setting because he is not as physical¬ way train, the final devastating volley of see their works in print. Jeter is just ly able to do things but his knowledge of shots, the final delivery of the incriminat¬ such a writer and SEEKLIGHT is very good science saves their lives more than once... ing scientific report to the free press. for a first novel and good for a third or and Kennard grows resentful at this as he And in order to have his way, Leonard had fourth. is used to being the leader and the idea of to turn his hero (admittedly in shock) into teamwork is distasteful to him as it is to SEEKLIGHT is a puzzle novel. Young a dumb cluck who can't think of but one way all Darkovans, but he slowly comes to ac¬ Daenek is the son of a traitor thane and to deliver the goods. cept it. These changes in attitude form so is hated by the populace. Upon assuming Well, even so, it's a hell of a good the core of the novel and are masterfully adulthood, he has to flee for his life and read. done. hopes to make his way to the Capital to find out about his father's death. He # learns that his father was the leader of a A CRASH OF SYMBOLS THE BLOODY SUN takes place roughly thir¬ movement that was attempting to fight the I've done it again. A reader in New ty-five years after STAR OF DANGER but Ter- stagnation and regression of culture on the York (sayeth my flawed memory) sent me a ran-Darkovan relations haven't improved planet. There are a few of his followers copy of Marvel's new STARLORD, and I have much. The Comyn still keep aloof from the still around but they don't seem to be able effortlessly forgotten his name and cannot Terrans and their affairs while the Terrans to help. Daenek wants to succeed where his find any clue among the last few days' de¬ are still trying to learn about Darkover father failed but doesn't quite know how to bris. (particularly about matrix sciences) and to go about it. open up the planet. However they have I say thank you, kind sir. My apolo¬ There are some nice touches in this learned to think in long-range terms. gies. novel: the sociology students at the Uni¬ Jeff Kerwin Jr., the half Darkovan son versity appear as angels when questioning And now on to a few comments on this ■of an Empire employee, returns to Darkover the people about trends; the priests are Stan Lee Marvel Preview of STAR-LORD ('He¬ to find out about his origins completely all robots. SEEKLIGHT certainly deserves roic Fantasy in the Far-Flung Future'). unaware that his presence sets off a Ter- to be read even if the ending of the novel For lack of a better descriptive phrase ran plan. is a bit weak. Jeter should be encouraged (and better phrases have been searched-for, to write more. He learns that his mother was a Keeper believe me), this is a comicbook SF-adven- **•******•***************•***•**********’38 at Arilinn who broke her vows by running ture about a boy, Peter Quill, whose mother off with a Terran and was murdered because HOW MUCH IS THAT DNA IN THE was killed by aliens in 1971 and who vowed of it. Some of the Comyn resent his very WINDOW? to get revenge! He grew up with a single- minded determination to get into space. He existence but Jeff has inherited his moth¬ Macmillan have published a small novel joined the NASA astronaut corps and... er's telepathic gift and it is desperately which, when it is made into an R-rated mov¬ needed to prevent the Terrans from taking ie, will shock the hell out of people. Peter Quill has big emotional problems over. With his aid the Circle at Arilinn and is misunderstood, and finally conforms BEYOND CONTROL L»7,'fy) is by George can find and use the planet's resources enough to get assigned to a space station Leonard and it is a gripping, suspenseful, without the help of Terran sciences. How¬ where the voice of (apparently) God informs horror story about a big city municipal ever, as soon as mineral deposits are locat¬ the crew that one of them must be chosen as (slum) hospital, about the ugly, apalling ed, the Terran dominated Aldarans claim a representative of Earth to be a (or the) alienation possible for a scientist, about them. Someone is obviously leaking informa¬ Star-Lord. tion to the Terrans and Jeff is the logical a very unwilling common-man hero, and about suspect—he even comes to believe it him¬ the lengths to which an illegal scientific Peter goes berserk and kills his way to self. Even worse, he has fallen in love experiment will force important government the spot, after a fashion. He is Taken and goes through Changes after taking his re¬ There _is the arrogant urge, of course, WHATEVER HAPPENED TO FAY WRAY? venge on the reptile-type aliens who had to protect other people from being manipula¬ An Article killed his mother. He becomes a cleansed ted and taken advantage of by "money-hungry By MICHAEL G. CONEY and balanced person and as the episode ends capitalists." Of course, in order to do he walks with God/all-powerful-benign-fath- that protecting we the elite who know what This article is an admission of failure. er-figure-with-beard-and-robes into an un¬ is best for others must impose our will on It is an admission that I am not a good e- known future. others, must tell thenuhat they can and can¬ nough writer, or maybe not a plausible e- not read, do, think, hear.... Depending on sales, I suppose, there nough liar, to get across a series of points will be a series of STAR—LORD adventures. It has always been necessary to destroy on the subject of bigotry and the character¬ freedom in order to save it. And how sad isation of women in SF. This article will Evaluation: damned good artwork by (but deliciously necessary) it is that in be self-contradictory because my own views Steve Gan and story-telling by Steve Engle- order to protect people from themselves and are self-contradictory too. As I wrote to hart. An amazing amount of story and de¬ from others we must enslave them to us. Joanna Russ once: I don't really hold views; tail and subtlety is conveyed. I merely pass among them, idly picking them The first STAR-LORD segment in this mag¬ But the real interest for me is in the up and putting them down, always hoping that azine took only half the pages, approximate¬ gut/psyche level of appeal that is engineer¬ someday I'll find the best pick of a lousy ly. The second half is another opening seg¬ ed into this story. STAR-LORD is a Christ bunch.... ment of a possible new series: SWORD IN THE figure, a Chosen One. He is, once he has STAR, the story of Wayfinder, a young prince The characterisation of women in SF has ruthlessly attained his position next to in the far future of mankind who battles the been a sore point with me for a long time - God, all-powerful, with a "magic" helmet alien black starships which have ravaged maybe since I first-saw Fay Wray fainting in and gun. He swoops through space at light Earth and killed his father and his people. Kong's hairy mitt. When I eventually got speeds or faster, never misses.... around to actually writing the genre, I Wayfinder is in the familiar mold of And as is unmistakeably shown in at knew that my women were going to be differ¬ one heroic man against aliens and incred¬ least one illo, the gun is his symbolic ent. My first female lead was a good strong ible odds. In the graphic illustration on penis. character who had as much to do with the page A2 his sword is (symbolicly) his penis. plot development as the hero. My second was SWORD IN THE STAR is written by Bill instantly forgettable. My third was a Mantlo and the art is by Ed Hannigan, Craig strong protagonist. I cast around for fur¬ Russell & Rick Bryant. ther ideas. Anti-heroines! Selfish women! Stupid women! Incompetent women! I wrote about them. Vonda McIntyre wrote back: LETTER FROM MICHAEL CONEY "Your women characters have a depressing tendency towards selfishness, stupidity and Dec. 20, 1975 incompetence." She was right. But aren't there enough nice women in SF today? Aren't 'I've stated elsewhere that I'm through there enough male villains? Vonda was reacting against minorities, and this in¬ right but others joined in with more sinist¬ cludes the self-proclaimed "queer" Denys er interpretations - particularly when I in¬ Howard and the multiple assumptions he mak¬ vented an anti-heroine named Carioca Jones es re my personality and station in lifeo I realize that ha is an unhappy person with a Question: Is all this leverage an ap¬ grudge against straight males, and I pre¬ Do you remember some years ago, in the peal to innate youthful frustrations and sent a ready target for his bile. So be it. days of sexual censorship, how forward-think¬ needs, or is it an appeal to paranoia, I can't dispute that it is the distaste which ing we were? How we derided the Establish¬ neurosis and damaged personalities? Are the majority of straight males—and femal¬ ment and wrote stories like BUG JACK BARRON, buttons being pushed here and in myriad oth¬ es—feel for his sexual preferences which aid NEW WORLDS was banned by certain narrow¬ er Heroic comic books merely to sell comic has caused his bitterness, and I sincerely minded bookstores? I was in England in books? believe it is we who are at fault. I can't those days aid by God did I hate tie Estab¬ do anything about it since I don't know him lishment! That particular Establishment Answer: Sure. Editors, publishers, personally, but in this case my shoulders consisted of a group of people who sincerely artists, writers have over the years found are broad enough to represent us all, if believed that detailed descriptions of var¬ that certain elements, certain appeals, your preferences run also to mixed meta¬ ied sexual practices might have a bad ef¬ sell books. They use them. EVERYBODY in phors.' fect on Society. But we weren't interested the marketplace does this. Those with know¬ ledge always use their knowledge to their ((Seems to me you make a number of as¬ in what they believed; what enraged us was own benefit. sumptions about him that you have no per¬ that they should seek to censor our prose! sonal knowledge to support. Your noble In due course they either changed their And if you go along with the belief in understanding of his affliction will no minds or died, and we won. Now we can say freedom for everybody (not just us intelli¬ doubt cause him to grind teeth and burn you what we like.... Or can we? gent few) you see that there's nothing wrong in effigy.)) with other people having their egos stroked Of course we can't. In the absence of and triggered one way or another. It pleas¬ global war we have sublimated into minority groups, each one terrified he is not getting es them (and jjs!) to have writing and draw¬ Death is life's way of telling you you’ve his share. His share of wealth, of terri¬ ing that satisfies our deepest emotional been fired. needs. 3S tory, of respect. And it is not respectful to speak badly of a member of a minority to let this deter me. You can contort all that around now, and I hope they will still group because it reflects on the whole. you like but the end result is approximate¬ be around in the year 2500. And admittedly The balloon of pomposity has inflated into ly similar. Just look at a crowded street because of my own prejudices, those are the a new censorship. Am I the only one with a sometime, and consider that every person kind of people I like to write about. A pin? Am I the only one who remembers NEW represents some bygone groan of ecstacy newly-formed 'family' unit will not consist WORLDS? followed - after a typical nine-month per¬ of a man, a woman and a baby-machine, or iod - by a childbirth of stultifying same¬ even a homosexual and a baby-machine. It It has become a sign of intolerance, ness. Boy, are we stereotyped. will consist of a man and a woman. Why? bigotry and prejudice to write about stupid Because it's economically sound, and be¬ and cowardly women, just as it is to write So in our science fiction we try to cause I say so, and it's my story. about stupid and cowardly Blacks. Ideology make a few changes, to get away from the has taken the place of characterisation and everyday life aspect. We invent new sexual That's my view of colonisation, reflect¬ literature is the poorer for it, because mores, we invent robots, antigravity mach¬ ing my preferences. So I'm naive, but I'm our fiction is being forced to assume that ines and alien invasions. But we can't not alone. The final draft of BRONTOMEK! certain people don’t exist. The hook-nosed change everything in an SF story otherwise was typed for me by a girl whom I can only miserly Jew went out years ago - yet I know the reader, having no points of reference to describe as a truly beautiful person; I ask¬ one now! The powerful but stupid Black current experience, will lose interest. ed her views on childbirth, since she has a (I've known a few!) was buried in the 50's Damon Knight once criticised a short story young daughter. She said: "I felt so proud and we changed the words of a few songs, and of mine which dealt with psi, FTL travel of myself. It was the best thing I ever a number of childrens' books ceased to ex¬ and sex reversal "....One fantastic as¬ did." She wouldn't have had it any other ist. They never existed.... And now we sumption per story is enough...." And he way. Now - we will reach a time when most have the purification of the female image. was right. But to criticise any story on women will not be obliged to undergo natural Suddenly, our fictional women must be intel¬ the basis that it contained no extrapola¬ childbirth; but this does not mean that we ligent, straight-dealing, flat-chested. tion on sex roles is just as meaningless as should deny a woman the right to natural They must never panic under pressure and as complaining that it contained no robots or childbirth if she wants it - or that we for the menstrual period - why, it doesn't antigravity machines or alien invasions. should despise her for wanting it. exist! It never existed! The complaint is simply a reflection of the critic's own unexpressed wishes. So we can go on talking about the char¬ Not surprisingly our fictional heroes acterisation of women in SF, if we have to; must have a different style of relationship And anyway - who in hell knows how dom¬ but let's not kid ourselves that we know with this new woman. (And so would I, so inant or subservient women are going to be what we're talking about, you or I. _I like would I) Because the rallying cry of the in 2075, or 32075? women to be as different from men as possi¬ critics is STEREOTYPES! Instead of attempt¬ Here's a quotation. "Marriage was, I ble, so I associate with that kind of women, ing to analyse a writer's style and content, think, the psychological result of the en¬ and I write about them. You may feel that our critic has only to shout Stereotype! vironment; that outside unadmitted peril the only difference should be in the sex and every red-blooded person born a person's which caused the strengthening of family organs, which are concealed anyway. So person will not its head wisely. So now the ties, drawing people together so that unit¬ write about that kind of woman if you must, new gimmick - stereotyped relationships. ed they could face whatever the hell the and fool around with them, if you can/ I'll "The sex roles are stereotyped." Familiar planet intended to hit them with. There grant you that freedom. Will you grant me words? In reality, the critic is saying, was no overpopulation problem; kids were mine? "The sex roles reflect elements in current precious and had to be protected for the human relationships which I, and certain of It seems a long time ago that Joanna sake of the social organism as a whole." my friends, would like to see changed." Russ wrote about the kind of men whom I despise - whom we all despise, I guess. The quote is from my recently-completed But she wrote "When It Changed" as though 40 novel BRONTOMEK! and is a rationale for this was the only type of man. And I was arranging things the way want them. It under treatment for hypertension at the describes the situation on an Earth-type time, and certain phrases hit me between planet some time after the first colonists the eyes. have landed by when - for various reasons - the more adventurous have moved away from "I can only say they were like the regimentation of the central colony and apes with human faces. have set up independent sub-colonies. The "As heavy as draft horses. human situation is akin to the old West. "Muscled like bulls." 3V}S*t VJEAp |*\>j'e<30K. There is little domination by a central government, sophisticated hardware is al¬ Inserted with the intention of exaggerating W^0U..-N0VJL most prohibitively expensive, and industry the insensitivity of the male, of equating him with animals. At no point in the story klejiASTAug xtWl, .„ consists of fishing, agriculture and ancil- does a man say one single sensible humane liaries. The parallels with the West end thing. Joanna was making a point and she Joanna Russ once said of a story of there, because the people are aware of the made it well, relentlessly well - but at mine, "The sex (act) and childbirth are immense technological resources of the the expense of the sex to which I feel a stereotyped." Well, yes. I try hard; planetary conglomerates (Big Business has great loyalty. years ago I even read the KAMA SUTRA, but reached new heights) but are unwilling (or still when indulging in sexual intercourse unable, due to expense) to call for help And I over-reacted. I have since grov¬ with the human female, it strikes me that except in grave emergency. They would elled to Joanna and our recent correspond¬ the performance is stereotyped. I try not rather go it alone. There are people like ence has been friendly if guarded - since we obviously hold opposing views on certain them to understand." How goddamned righto NOTE FROM-HARLAN ELLISON subjects. At the time, however, I was fill¬ I was arrogant enough to think I was able ed with childish temper which I vented in brilliantly to communicate my horror of war 12 November 75 two other ways. Firstly, I wrote an of¬ in an^ form — national, sexual, racial or 'I've read Mr. Thompson's report of my fensively sexist/racist story for Harlan whatever — and I failed because I wasn't panel appearance in Denver last April. I Ellison. He said in best Ellisonese, good enough. do not feel his comments reflect my posi¬ "....fairness, full exposure and open dis¬ tion accurately.' cussion will be sufficiently potent weapons The drawback to pacifism is that sooner to dissect the open wound of your sick or later you're going to have to fight for ((Harlan refers to "Spec Fic and the statement." I regret he may be right.... what you believe in. And in my case, this Perry Rhodan Ghetto" by Donald C. Thompson And secondly, I wrote THE JAWS THAT BITE, inevitability is accellerated by an unhappy in SFR 15. THE CLAWS THAT CATCH. personal quirk. You see — if I notice a ((A pity Harlan couldn't take the time whole mob of people running in one direc¬ to make his position accurately known, for Through the device of a first-person tion, then 1 am unable to prevent myself publication.)) anti-hero it attacks everything in sight rushing the opposite way. Sometimes I come except lust and scotch whiskey. As bad face to face with a tiger. Instead of luck would have it, this hostile book has crediting the mob with good sense, I try to LETTER FROM ISAAC ASIMOV been more widely reviewed than any of my confound the brute with logical arguments. previous novels. And 6ince it is a book 20 November 1975 about people, it is the comments on charac¬ It's only a logical argument for free¬ 'I read, in SFR 15, the material con¬ terisation which reveal the critics' pre¬ dom. Freedom to write about all women with cerning Silverberg's- reasons for retiring judices; these range from "a fascinating all characteristics: honesty, crookedness, from s.f., and for once I agreed with every¬ collection of characters... interesting, intelligence, vapidity, bravery, cowardice thing you said. believable people," to "Not one person acts — in other words, freedom to write about real women. And that includes the freedom in a rational manner." The protagonist, 'Who ever thought science fiction was Joe Sagar, is variously described as a to resurrect Fay Wray, if I so desire. the route to fame and glory, except among 'nerd', a 'chump', a 'bum', and, with com¬ She's real! I know a dozen of her! the very small world of science fiction mendable impartiality by Geis, as 'a vacu- And finally, having re-read all this, I readers? And who ever thought it was the can acknowledge and understand the incon¬ route to wealth? sistencies' in what I've said. I could go Readers, the anti-hero is me. Indispu¬ 'Actually, Bob has as much fane and back and smooth it all out — but I'm not tably Coney at his worst. He talks like glory as the field can deliver and as much going to do that, because then it would not me, drinks like’me, loves and hates like me. wealth as one can expect to make out of s.f., be an honest statement. It is my belief He is short on morals and long on prejudice. so I don't know why he feels bad. If anyone ever tells you again not to judge that any sincere person thinks in the way I 'Maybe he doesn't get the kudos from the a writer's personality by his work, don't do: that is, he will admit that his views great lights of literary criticism, but so believe him. Every author must put a little are open to reversal, that they are intern¬ what? The kudos and a dollar bill will buy bit of himself into everything he writes ally self-contradictory, that they have you a dollar's worth. Maybe publishers even though he may (as 1 do) frequently sup¬ weaknesses which invite rebuttal by those think primarily of money, but how can that port opposing viewpoints. The ego will show of opposing persuasions. I'm not going to possibly surprise a professional writer who through; cover my tracks, because I have no need to. I'm stepping down from the platform, perm¬ has been in the business for decades. — I'm hoping people will forgive Joe Sag¬ anently — yet.I'm fully aware that one day Think it over, Bob, and come back. We love ar because he will be appearing occasional¬ I might clamber back up there again, and you.' ly again, drinking and bitching on his Pen¬ sound off just as irrationally as ever.... insula, since it would be like suicide to kill him off. Bat I, personally, am through Acknowledgement.- I have used short LETTER FROM L. SPRAGUE de CAMP quotations from private letters written to with reacting against the more radical mani¬ 17 Nov 75 ' festations of feminism. It doesn't add any¬ me by a number of nice people who, I hope, are still my friends. I like and respect 'Thanks for sending me SFR 15, with thing to my life-expectancy, and it doe.sn't them a lot, but I just can't face writing Darrell Schweitzer's interview with me. I help me to write any better. to each one and asking if they mind the have no amendments to make to the inter¬ So future novels will exhibit the Jekyll tiny quotes. To Vonda, Joanna, Damon, Har¬ view. side of this delightful fellow pounding his lan, and Terry, please fprgive. 'I will say, however, that I agree with ,typewriter. A while back I wrote to Terry you in your comments on the comments of col¬ Carr, "I'm so goddamned obstinate that I leagues Schweitzer, Ellison, and Silverberg. will always use sexism, racism or any other These colleagues give the impression of ism if it helps me make my point. My point, sharing the illusion that H. P. Lovecraft incidentally, is pacifism." And Terry Carr, and Edmund Wilson- had in common: that they God bless him, wrote back, "You have to can look at an example of any one of the judge a story's success or failure to com¬ things that men do for the amusement or municate by what the readers get from it, entertainment of their fellow-privates and not just from what you put into it. And pick out certain ones as Great Art, or True maybe the readers are wrong — (out they're Art, destined to last for eons. the people to whom you're talking and it's up to you to put the story down there for 'Experience indicates otherwise. Any- body can say that any such production - even CARD FROM ROBERT BLOCH reporting: thus 90? of all analysis and/or a subway graffito, a painting of a tomato- reporting is not true as written or spoken. soup can, or a finger painting by an orang¬ Nov. 17, 1975 ((Does it follow that if 'the truth will utan - and call it True Art (which term has 'It seems my fate to encounter every make us free' we are doomed to continuing actually been seriously applied to all one of your featured interview subjects slavery? That 90? of us are into hopeless three of the foregoing examples). There is just prior to their appearance in the pages ignorance? That we are all lied to 90? of no way to measure or weigh the thing to of SFR. This time I met L. Sprague de Camp the time? As a friend of mine once said, prove him right or wrong. So to say: "That in Providence, where we both attended the "I'll tell the truth eleven different ways is True Art" is just another way of saying 1st World fantasy Convention. I hope the before I'll tell a lie.")) "I like it" or "I get a thrill out of it." next interview-victim is a Californian: I It is merely a subjective reaction, no more simply can't go rushing off to the four # significant on a broad scale than the fact corners of the world just to encounter fut¬ 20 November 1975 that I like the taste of almonds but dis¬ ure subjects of SFRticles. What's wrong like that of olives. with interviewing Mickey Cohen for a change 'Going through the new SFR slowly (and this letter you may indeed publish) I note 'As far as we can attach any objective —or some of those nice people Pearl men¬ James K. Burk's letter on page 23 acknow¬ meaning to the term "Great Art," it means a tions in her letter? I live practically ledging that criticism of his book review¬ work that was not only enjoyed when it was around the corner from where the action is, ing for Delap was in order and some pages made but has continued to be enjoyed long and it would be a lot easier on me than rao- down the pike your own man, Peter Mandler's, after its creator is dead. Hence we call ing off to Rhode Island to see whether review of Carr's THE BEST SCIENCE FICTION the works of Homer and Shakespeare, of Sprague intends to stay there or de Camp.' OF THE YEAR Praxiteles and Velazquez, of Shelley and ((You'll be thrilled to know I'm trying Brahms, Great Art simply because they have for an interview with Linda Lovelace. I 'Reading that review it strikes me that, outlasted the works of these artists' con¬ know you won't let her down.)) flawed as Burk's might have been, the advis¬ temporaries. ory service should begin somewhat closer to 'However I have no quarrel with the home because Mandler's review of this book 'But.we cannot, in any realistic sense, rest of the issue: in fact, I have no quar¬ is simply incompetent. He does not, for in¬ foresee which works of our own contemporar¬ rel, period. You are providing an excellent stance, appear to have read, let alone com¬ ies will continue to be enjoyed one hundred forum, and your Hugo was well-deserved. prehended the plot of Fred Pohl's "We Pur¬ or one thousand years hence. Most of them Personally, I was rooting for HUSTLER... chased People" (which appeared originally will be forgotten, and even those that fare But maybe next year....' in my co-edited anthology, FINAL STAGE) and the best have their ups and downs. Shake¬ synopsizes Silverberg's BORN WITH THE DEAD speare underwent an eclipse in late +XVII, in a fashion which indicates that he has and a survey taken at that time would have LETTERS FROM BARRY MALZBERG not read that story either. excluded him from the ranks of great art¬ 15 December, 1975 ists. 'The fact that he "likes" both stories 'Christmas doesn't bother me all that means as little to me as the fact that he 'So.there is nothing for it but to do much although I admit it bothers me a hell "dislikes" Phil Dick's "A Little Something such works of art as we think we can do of a lot more each year; it is the damndest for Us Tempunauts", also originally from well, and that will command a large enough paradigm for death that was ever created in FINAL STAGE, a considerable work of art public to enable us to live on the proceeds, the history of the world although the mass which he sums up and dismisses in something and do them as well as we can, and leave it media in the post-technological west must less than twenty inept words. to remote posterity to decide whether we share a lot of the blame. What really both¬ have committed Great Art or not.' ers me is stuff like the article on sf in 'I cannot conceive how this kind of re¬ viewing has any place in what is certainly ((I often suspect that 90? of the Great the issue of NEWSWEEK just on sale ((Dec. the best (maybe the only) journal of com¬ Art from the past is considered Great only 22, 1975)); the usually ill-informed and mentary the field has and I do not know how because of reputation and present-day vest¬ patronizing job with the added insult this you can let work of this sort get by you ed interests in the perpetuation and perpe¬ time around of grudgingly praising a few particularly with the example of Burk be¬ tration of new and old Great Art, in both of the modern writers who are not really fore your eyes. academic and commercial circles.)) deserving of the "recognition". This con¬ firms an old insight I've had about these 'This kind of reviewing; to swipe a line national fiction magazines; every once in from the much admired James Blish, is real¬ 'All games lave an important and probably de¬ a while they run an article on a subject ly an insult to any professional out there in the wilderness struggling to improve his cisive influence on the destinies of the about which one has firsthand knowledge and craft. No review at all would be better.1 players under ordinary social conditions; you realize that if they lie about every¬ but some offer more opportunities than oth¬ thing the way they lie about the checkable ((I'll let Peter Mandler respond if he ers for lifelong careers and are more like¬ then they have never printed the truth and wishes, in SER 17. Readers are invited to ly to involve relatively innocent bystand¬ most of our "insights" and "opinions" and check the review in SFR 15 for its compet- ers. This group may be conveniently called "points of vie^' are based upon information ancy and phrasing. Life Games. It includes "Alcoholic," "Debt¬ which is wholly lacking in veracity. The ((I accept reviews from readers if they or," "Kick Me," "Now I've Got You, You Son fact that this argument would not be disput¬ are well-written, seem knowledgeable and of a Bitch," "See What You Made Me Do" and ed one jot or tittle by Richard M. Nixon if I am unlikely or unwilling to read the their principal variants.' does not, for me, diminish its power.' book reviewed. If I must read a book in -Eric Beme, M.D., GAMES PEOPLE PLAY ((Sturgeon's Law (90? of everything is order to check on a submitted review of it, crud) obviously applies to all interpretive I might as well review it myself and be done with it. view, is meager, but only from certain com¬ QUAKE-GRAM panies. With the proper number of publish¬ ((If all the sf publishers would get FROM CHARLES W. RUNYON ers under an artist's belt, he or she can together and agree to limit their output to 5 December 1975 come off at the end of the year owing Uncle say 20 books every three months, this job Sam a few bucks after all the deductions. 'Your latest SFR arrived with the first would be manageable. Ha.)) mail delivery after the big shake. 'The next time he reviews covers, it might not be such a good idea to list what 'I know now what the squiggly lines on LETTER FROM RICK STERNBACH each company is paying. I don't know as a seismograph really mean, and I wouldn't the editors and publishers would take kind¬ trade the experience for a Hugo (speaking November 22, 1975 ly to it, since many times it is something of which, congratulations). There were just between them and the artists. Sure, times, though, when we were trying to leave 'A friend of mine sent along a xerox of I, as an artist, will have grumbles here our beachfront apartment house, with pieces Jon Gustafson's column on the SF art he saw and there with an editor, but it has never of concrete falling around us, the volcano around Westercon time. I have a little in¬ been anything worth elaborating. belching black smoke overhead, and water formation to fill in the questions he had piling up outside the bay in what promised about my work. 'The other point I'd like to comment on to be the end-all Tsunami (it wasn't) that is the discrepancy between the final paint¬ 'I haven't done much for Space Merchants 1 longed for the familiar peace and quiet ing on a paperback, let's say, and the sto¬ in a while, putting my work for ANALOG in a of a tornado-alert in Missouri. ry inside. Yeah, there's a squabble over different category than work dona in my that, but listen, the art directors for a 'My brain is just beginning to jell a- spare time. New one coming out for Febru¬ lot of these publishers are not SF-orient- gain, and I will have to run like hell to ary, by the way.' ed. Not in the least. They have other sub¬ find out how far behind I am.' ((Yes, your Feb. cover for ANALOG is jects to worry about. Their big thing is one of the most intriguing I've seen for a selling the book, not the cover art tying in LETTER FROM MIKE ASHLEY long time. The eye is trapped by the with the story. Maybe that'll change, but white spaceman, the green fractured globes, for now... 28!*! December 1975 the red Martian sand, the lander, and that 'Gee, I've never run into an art dir¬ 'I found Darrell Schweitzer's letter "star" which is upon close examination a ector with a preconceived cover idea. If about the time taken by promags to return recently departed spacecraft. Excellent the artist has different thoughts, he real¬ mss. most interesting. It may interest him composition.)) ly should make them known, shouldn't he? to know that for a while I acted as free 'Only the background on the September lance first reader for SF MONTHLY ((Eng¬ 'The description of the SF art "indust¬ ((ANALOG)) cover was airbrushed. The space¬ land)), and am frankly surprised he actual¬ ry" is not entirely true, though elements craft was done by hand (why do people in¬ ly got an answer within 4 months. of problems surface now and then. Example: evitably get it into their minds that if when Jon talks about the limited amount of 'The reason is that SFM has just a sin¬ they hear I use an airbrush, they immediate¬ story info to produce a cover or interior, gle editor - a young, rather pretty female ly think that is all I use. Brushes work I can tell you that one editor used to read for that matter - with no assistants at all. very well. They have for a few centuries). me a few paragraphs from a manuscript, and Since the mag is chiefly visual all the art I like working up a painting with brush expect me to paint a really catchy cover. side is left to the art department whilst equally well, and got some nice results These days, I get entire manuscripts (some¬ Julie Davis is left on her tod to do all with that cover. The new February one was times I don't know which is worse, getting the text side of things. With everything done almost entirely with brush. Hardly no info or getting too much if a ms. is else to be done, mss. pile up incredibly any spraying. like 300 typed pages long). there. I was only reading about 50 a month 'There is no such thing as "Sternbach for about three months, and that barely 'There's plenty of work to be done, not Purple." Although...wait a minute. Do I scraped the top. Consequently many of them enough really good artists, but that too is use violet all that much, really? Well, get left lying around for months, because changing. Look at all the people writing maybe for galactic backgrounds, but usually Julie has concentrated more on producing SF. I like to use oranges, blues, reds. some special issues aimed along a theme or 'Hope you can get around to some more whatever, and with regular contributors the 'I want to thank Jon for the incredible cons, Jon.' space for new stories is usually only 1 or number of compliments. Boy, if he liked 2 a month. Yet with submissions being the September ANALOG, wait til F&SF comes around 50 - 100 a month, not only is there out for around next summer or fall. I 'Many people think things would be bet¬ little chance of a story being accepted, would like to point something out, however, there's an even lesser chance of it appear¬ about the fact article in the ANALOG. I ter if the government were only more effic¬ ing this decade! did the cover for Harry Stine's Starflight ient. Happily, it isn't. For collectively, we are free to the extent that the govern¬ articled the October '73 ANALOG, and the 'Anyway, currently SFM seems rather ment is inefficient and unable to carry out following October did the Velikovsky cover. borderline. It has a circulation of around its coercive programs. And individually, 40,000 - which is good by AMAZING standards, you are free to the extent that you take 'I can make a pretty decent living off but considering its high cost of production, advantage of the government's inefficiency.' SF art, though some additional income is rather dangerous. But so far as I know it's the result of my purely astronimical art —HOW I FOUND FREEDOM IN AN UNFREE WORLD still going. I wouldn't know, though, as for technical and general publications. by Harry Browne I'm still waiting for a reply to my letter of five weeks ago.' 'Payment, as Jon mentioned in the re¬ 43 LYNNE HOLDOM HAS A LITTLE LIST by Heritage House in 1953 was not a colla¬ rytelling that few can match today. boration. I'm told that Catherine has (p.32) 12-31-75 • basically revised and updated Sprague's 'My ten (or rather, seven) best list is original, adding new chapters and rewriting "Selling an Imaginative Story"is of as follows. I couldn't find ten best books the old ones. The book is several things great value, and may come as a shock to this year. at once, a concise history of science fic¬ those who think that anybody who actively tion and fantasy, advice on the writing of hucksters their material is a "hack". In 1. THE HERITAGE OF HASTUR by Bradley. the same, and notes on how to conduct your¬ the real world of publishing you have to go 7. SHOWBOAT WORLD by Vance. self as a professional. Unlike most "writ¬ to the editors; they won't seek you out 3. THE GRAY PRINCE by Vance. ing books" you find advertised in the writ¬ just because you may have potential. Pre¬ 4. BLAKE'S PROGRESS by Nelson. ing magazines, this one doesn't give you sumably the purpose of a story is to com¬ 5. MARUNE: ALASTOR 933 by Vance. regurgitated writers conference peptalks municate something to a reader, and there¬ 6. THE WARRIORS OF DAWN by M.A. Foster. but good, solid, valuable information bas¬ fore getting the story published is as im¬ 7. A FUNERAL FOR THE EYES OF FIRE by ed on the experience of one who knows of portant as getting it written. Bishop. what he speaks, which explains the constant The final chapter, on "The Business 'The last three all have defective end¬ demand for the book. It is a rare item Side of Writing" is worth the price ol ings. MA933 doesn't end so much as stop; indeed. mission all hy itself. Its excellent WofD has a deus ex machina ending; while The chapters on the history of the not be overstated. It is an absolute FFFF has a lot of speech-making as if every¬ field are of the least interest, too brief I think, for anyone who has ever sold one is always explaining to everyone else. to be critical and unlikely to tell you single word of writing or ever intend: However in the case of Nelson, Foster and much you don't already know. The capsule This is the section that tells you how to Bishop, these are their first novels so biographies of leading SF writers read like copyright work, what should be in a book they may get better. dust-jacket copy. However, this.is only contract, how to manage your royalties, pay 'My ten worst SF list for 1975: the icing, and the cake follows. your writing income taxes, etc. Lester del Rey says on the back of the dustjacket: 1. THE FEMALE MAN by Russ. The two chapters entitled "Editors and 2. DHALGREN by Delany. Publishers" and "Readers and Writers" tell "I’d have been a richer man today 3. THE BIRTHGRAVE by Lee. you something about the conditions in the if I'd had it when I began writing; 4. WALLS WITHIN WALLS by Tofte. field, how book and magazine publishing and now that I've read it, I expect 5. THE KING OF EOLIM by Jones. works, how an editor deals with writers, to profit from it for many years to 6. UNPOPULAR PLANET by Smith. and so forth. Fans and semi-professionals come." 7. UNTO THE LAST GENERATION by Coulson might find a lot of it familiar, but still 8. TOMORROW MAY BE DIFFERENT by Reynolds. it's worth going through. You better believe it. This should be 9. THE GENETIC BOMB by Offutt. The following sections, "Those Crazy your writer's Bible. 10. TIME SLAVE by Norman. Ideas," "Plotting an Imaginative Story," "Writing an Imaginative Story," and "Sell¬ 'I only put one book per author on the Entropy is nature’s way of telling you to ing an Imaginitive Story" are worth any¬ list or Tofte, Reynolds and Norman would slow down. one's time. Sensitive Artists and other have been the list. naive persons might be rather horrified at 'If I wanted more Worst I'd add: the businesslike and almost mechanical way de Camp goes about these things, but one 11. SPACEJACKS by Well. must realize that imagination and talent, 12. SPACE RELATIONS by Barr. the basic ingredients of any good story, 13. RED TIDE by Chapman S Tarzan.' can't be taught or learned from a book, and it’s a waste of-time to write about isHHUiaMein VITAL INFORMAT I ON/HOW-TO-DO-IT them. So these chapters are devoted to what can be gotten from a book, internal MICROFORM THE SCIENCE FICTION HANDBOOK by L. Sprague consistency, plot logic, structure, effect¬ ...from de Camp and Catherine de Camp. Owlswick ive endings, proper use of language, read¬ Xerox Press, 1975, 220 oages, $8.50 er hooks, and even such things as how to handle a character who speaks imperfect University Reviewed by Darrell Schweitzer English. The advice given is all very sound and sensible, if elementary. I par¬ Microfilms Somebody on one of the panels at Colum- ticularly like this: biacon last summer mentioned an attempt to track down the original SCIENCE FICTION For those who want to write sto¬ HANDBOOK through a book-finder service. 35 Mobile Drive ries of this kind ((sword & sorcery)) Toronto, Ontario, They found it alright, but the price they we suggest they use plots more orig¬ Canada M4A 1H6 wantedjwas in three figures. This goes to inal than the simple one of the big show not only how much demand there has St. John’s Road, barbarian oaf who slaughters monsters, been for the book since its first printing Tyler’s Green, Penn, wicked wizards, and decadent civiliz¬ Buckinghamshire, England but what a great service Owlswick press ed scoundrels with equal ease. 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D0U8LEDAY, 245 Park Av., New York, Falmouth, Cornwall, U.K. (25c per NY, NY 1C017. (82.50 for 4) NT 10017. bonk for posl. and handling.) WILLIAM MORROW, 105 Madison Av., DOVER, 180 Varick St., NY, NY 10017. NY, NY It 016. .45 ALIEN CONCLUSIONS gazing up at me with reproaching eyes. Most of the time the mail load is too great to allow me the time to respond or Of course the worst reproach is in my reply...but I love the mail. own mind—for Terence Green's "Philip K. Dick: A Parallax View" had to be bumped again. The unexpected Malzberg review came in and I couldn't resist. NOW—to summarize and short-quote as NEXT ISSUE, I SWEAR—may my precious many letters as I can. member tum to purple jelly if I renege— RICHARD LUPOFF, puzzled at the lack of the article will be published. (How do you comment about his previous books, alerts us go about stiffening jelly?—no, no, I to his soon-to-be released THE TRIUNE MAN mustn't even think about it....) (Berkley/Putnam); THE CRACK IN THE SKY (Dell My problem is that my editorial eyes —Feb.); a non-fiction from Mirage, BARSOOM; are bigger than my publisher's stomach. I a Juvenile from Bobbs-Merrill, LISA KANE; The response to SFR 15 was interesting. accept too much. and later in '76, from Dell, NEW ALABAMA Most of those who wrote to comment were sym¬ BLUES. No Small Press Notes this issue, either pathetic to Bob Silverberg's position and Rich may or may not be happy to know —apologies. Damn, this endless recount¬ offered suggestions to reconcile him to sf that I have received THE TRIUNE MAN and ing of failure is a drag. and the market...but a few others said in will give it my full attention...one of effect, good riddance. Harlan Ellison was I had hopes that Steve Fabian would get these days. treated to the same suggestions, pro and to the cover idea I sent him, in time for con, by the fans/readers. this issue, but I imagine he is so busy HOWARD J. BRAZEE III found that reading The interview with L. Sprague de Camp with prior commitments he is very far be¬ P.J. Fanner's adaptations of other writers' was appreciated but brought little comment. hind. But it pleases me that he is becom¬ series inspired him to try the originals... ing so much in demand as a professional art¬ and he found the original Doc Savage, the The review column featuring Alter-Ego ist; it confirms my early judgement of his original Holmes—to be inferior! He thinks also went begging for reaction. Alter op¬ talent when he first began submitting work today's sf of high quality. ened each letter eagerly at first, then be¬ to the fan magazines about ten years ago. came bitter and discouraged. In the end he JACQUELINE LICHTENBERG reports that STAR So I'm using Jim Shull's drawing now. accused me of stealing his mail. Tsk. He TREK LIVES is in o its fifth printing (ap¬ I had planned to use it on the May issue. is sulking now and may never review again. prox. 500,000 copies) and is proof of the Ted White's column on the using of other authors' (Lichtenberg, Marshak and Winston) writers' characters and his dislike of this theory of wh^ people like Spock. She also practice touched a considerable number of NEXT ISSUE THE FEATURED ITEMS will be reports that Doubleday is almost sold out of her novel, HOUSE OF ZEOR. similar-thinking hearts. A few don't mind an interview with George R. R. Martin by reading "new" Doc Savage, Sherlock Holmes, Darrell Schweitzer, (Darrell, by the way, She and editor Sharon Jarvis at Double¬ day agree that Lynne Holdom's review of M. WIZARD OF OZ, etc., a few consider it a laz- has humbly accepted appointment to the post Z. Bradley's HERITAGE Of HASTUR in SFR 15 y man's way to make a buck, and a few more of Official SFR Interviewer; he gets around is a model effort. like the variety. to a considerable nunber of conventions, has a fine knowledge of sf and fantasy, has Jon Gustafson's "The Gimlet Eye" con¬ GEOFFREY MAYER, enraged at Harlan El¬ shown that in-person interviews are super¬ tinues to provoke response—the printing cf lison's quoted remark that he doesn't write ior to mail interviews, and asks keen-mind¬ the covers in question is approved heartily sf stories, he writes Harlan Ellison sto¬ ed questions.) the Green article mentioned —and a few disagreed with his value-judge¬ ries, wonders how come those stories appear above, a long review of Elwood's giant an¬ ments. One of the artists who was praised in sf magazines and how come Ellison accepts thology, EPOCH, by Mike Glyer, and some (but who has the work copyrighted in his science fiction awards like the Hugo and columnists—probably a lot more than I can name) objected to the cover being reproduc¬ Nebula? find space for. ed. Jon and I had assumed it was permis¬ A cheap shot. As long as the Hugo and sible to use a cover reproduction for re¬ Nebula awards are voted that way, Harlan view purposes. Thus far this is the only will accept them. ^ would. objection. It is curious that this artist Let me say now that I appreciate very would object since a publisher saw the cover, much the letters of comment many of you BUZZ DIXON reports: 'Several weeks ago read the review and asked for the artist's take time to write and send. I read them a large meteor crashed in the ocean off San address—to offer him work! all, I chuckle, I snort, I scowl, and I am Diego. It was reported on the late evening As usual a lot of you urged me to write tom up sometimes when I promise to publish L.A. news and then the story was squelched, more in SFR, and this issue I have expanded and can't squeeze them in. Your opinions despite tie fact that several people saw it help me, and often I forward your letters to my share of the space. And as usual a good hit. It landed about a mile offshore and those who would be interested. many things of mine have to wait for next according to the news would have done quite Often readers of SFR send along items a deal of property damage if it had hit from magazines they think I'd be interest¬ land. Two weeks later the Navy quietly an¬ ed in seeing. I am grateful...and interest¬ nounced it had found a sub that sank back Not only my opinions—a lot of letters ed. This feedback from the readers of SFR in the thirties "just offshore" of San Di¬ I promised to "ublish are languishing in the is one of the greater joys I get from edit¬ ego but no attempt will be made to recover box next to my left elbow as I type this, ing and publishing the magazine. any of the bodies. There were rumors of a UFO but such reports are rife whenever a BACK ISSUES ------big meteor lights the sky. Question: Where The Alien C ritic Some afterthoughts” by Harlan Ellison; and what did the meteor hit and why is Un­ Science Fiction Review "The Gimlet Eye" by Jon Gustafson. cle Sugar so eager to keep it hush-hush?’ No other numbers are available SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW #lk An Interview NEAL WILGUS and TOM COLLINS disagree ONE DOLLAR PER COPY With Philip Jose Farmer; "Dancing On the strongly with my "glancing blow" review of Titanic" by Charles W. Runyon; "Thoughts the ILLUMINATUS! trilogy, contending i t nay EACH ISSUE CONTAINS MANY REVIEWS. On Logan's Run" by William F. Nolan; "The be confusing and tongue-in-cheek, but s till EACH ISSUE CTTTTAINS LETTERS FROM Gimlet Eye" by Jon Gustafson. a hell of an interesting total conspiracy THL-HNOTM SF A FANTASY WUTO®, trip. EDITORS, R B LISB S AM) FANS. SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW #15 "Spec Fic and the Perry Rhodan Ghetto" by Donald TOM MONTAG, editor & publisher of MAN­ H E RXiOWING LISTINGS ATE W C. Thompson; An Interview With L. Sprague GINS—A Review of little Mags and Small FEATURED dMTRIBOTKKS de Camp by Darrell Schweitzer; "Offish Press Books, wrote: 'You are a creep for Thots" by Ted White; "The Gimlet Eye" by sending me your magazine at a time when I THE ALIEN CRITIC #5 .Interview with Jon Gustafson. have more work to do than can possibly be Fritz Leiber; "The Literary Dreamers" by done in one lifetime, your magazine forcing James 81ish; "Irvin Binkin Meets H. P. me to take the time to read it cover to Lovecraft" by Jack Chalker. cover, a couple of hours I can't afford,'' unable to put the dam thing down, and I THE ALIEN CRITIC #6 Interview with R. haven't even read sci-fi since I was in my A. Lafferty; "The Trenchant Bludgeon" by teens. I t ’ s no dam wonder you won the Hu­ Ted White; "Translations From the Edit­ go for best fanzine, you creep.' orial” by Marion Z. Bradley. Just for that, lorn. I ' l l keep oo send­ ing it to you! And, Tom, calling science THE ALIEN CRITIC #7 "The Shape of Sci­ fiction ’ sc i-fi’ is on a par with calling ence Fiction to Come" by Frederik Pohl; a black a n - - - ~ . "Noise Level" by John Brunner; "Up Against the Wall, Roger Zelazny", an interview. RICHARD W. BEGAN calls attention to the lyrics of "Crown of Creaticn", a song writ­ THE ALIEN CRITIC #B "Tomorrow's Libido: ten by Paul Kantner, rhythm guitarist for Sex and Science Fiction" by Richard Delap; the JEFFERSON AIRPLANE, in 1968. Richan) "The Trenchant Bludgeon" by Ted White; banquet Speech" by Robert Bloch; "Noise contrasts the lyrics to quotations from ★ BACK ISUE order fora + Level" by John Brunner. THE CHRYSALIDS by John Wyndham (1955) and $1.00 each nates many close similarities in text. THE ALIEN CRITIC #9 "Reading Heinlein Dear REB:-- I enclose f — . — CHERYL CLINE asks why don't I reprint Subjectively" by Alexei and Cory Panshin; Please send Back Issue(s) IS *6 my early personal journal, RICHARD E. GEIS. "Written To a Pulpt" by Sam Merwin, Jr.; 17 18 19 110 111 112 113 114 She and others, newcomers, would love to "Noise Level" by John Brunner; "The Shav­ 115 read those issues. er Papers" by Richard S. Shaver. (Circle Is desired) Yeah, but I ’ m into a secretive phase now, and wuld prefer to let my lurid past THE ALIEN CRITIC #10 An Interview With die as much as possible. Stanislaw Lem; "A Nest of Strange and SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW Wonderful Birds" by Sam Merwin, Jr.; S u b s c rip tio n coupon. Robert Bloch's Guest of Honor Speech; MICHAEL R. (Squiggle) complains that A ll you have to do is f i l l i t The Heinlein Reaction. io with your name (or soneone THE GREY PRINCE (Avon 26799, 11.25) by Jack you wish to destroy), enclose Vance, was serialized in Aug-Oct. AMAZING soney, and your l i f e (o r that THE ALIEN CRITIC #11 An Interview With o f tne other v ic tin ) m ill nev­ SCIENCE FICTION as THE DOMAINS OF KORYPHON. Avram Davidson; "The Foundation On Sands" er be the sane. One 'f ix ' of There is no mention of this in the Avon SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW and by John J. Alderson; "Footnotes To Fan you’ 11 be booked. book, so don’ t think you're getting a new & History" by larry Shaw. different Vance novel i f you've read the How else can you becoae so pleasurably addicted as inex­ serial. SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW #12 "Smoke and pensively? Glass"—a non-fiction fantasy about Har­ $4.00 One Year / $7.00 Two Yrs. There will be a long interview of me in lan Ellison by Richard Delap; "You can’ t the upcoming issue of EMPIRE, Mark J. McGar- say THAT!" by Richard lupoff; "Confes­ Name...... ^ ’ $ fanzine. We did it by mail. Mark is sions of a Wage Slave" by David M. Har­ Address...... a persistent, impertinent questioner. I am ris; "Tuckered Out" by Barry Malzberg; a shameless answerer. His address is: "Offish Thots" by Ted White. 631—€ South Pearl St. Albany, NY 12202 SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW #13 The Elwood City...... I'm not sure of the zine's price. A dollar, Controversy; "Visit To a Pulpy Planet" $ U M Z i p 1 9u e ss* NO MORE ROOM! by Milton F. Stevens; "HARLAN ELLISON— 4 7 ...... WELL, THERE GOES "THE. NEIGHBORHOOD.