Askance #42 The post-WorldCon Issue October 2017 VOLUME X, number 3 Whole Number 42 Edited and published by John Purcell, 3744 Marielene Circle, College Station, TX 77845-3926 USA This time, proofreading services rendered by Duckie, the wonder Labrador. Contents © 2017 by John A. Purcell. Contact information: [email protected] Even so, all rights revert to original artists and authors upon publication. Disclaimers are a dirty business, but are always included. You understand. I know you do. What you have here in your hands (or on screen) is another Mythical Publication. Copies of this fine, back on a quarterly schedule fanzine can be had for The Usual, which means expressed interest, submission and eventual inclusion of articles and artwork, letters of comment, expressed interest, and cold hard cash in the amount of $3.00 USD. Bribes are also accepted. Of course, if you send in locs, articles, and artwork, you just earned a life- time free subscription. Consider yourself lucky, indeed. Contents Bemused Natterings…………………………………………………….3 An Easter Story, by John Purcell……………………………………6 Loc on Askance 40, 22 May 2017, by Taral Wayne…….…9 A Nape, Beheaded, by Robin Bright, PhD……………………12 First Fandom, by Taral Wayne……………………………………19 From the Hinterlands, letters……………………………………..20 Regional Convention Calendar……………………………………23 What’s Next……………………………………………………………….29 Art Credits: Denny Marshall – front cover Sheryl Birkhead – 2; photo by Sanna Pudas – 3; photos by John Purcell – 6, 8, 11, 20, 23; Alan White – 8; clip art – 9, 21, 24; image Googled “Planet of the Apes” – 12; Denny Marshall – 22, 29; back cover photos taken in Geithoorn, Netherlands, by John Purcell **Scattered through this issue are bottom-page feeders plucked at random from a book off the sf and f shelves in my office at school. A die-hard, well read stfnal-loving fan should be able to figure out which book this is. If you guess, you don’t win a prize.** Member: FWA (since 2007!) 2 I’m back in the saddle again Metaphorically speaking, that is. As you can probably guess because you are reading this issue of Askance on efanzines.com, I have once again regained my fan-publishing jones after traipsing all over Europe – well, almost all over Europe; it was a goodly portion, I do admit – this past summer on my 2017 TAFF Trip to Worldcon 75, the latest edition in a long series of World Science Fiction Conventions that began back in 1939 in New York City. Valerie and I had a wonderful time visiting fans and friends in 2017 GUFF delegate Donna Maree Hansen and I, presenting the Best England, Netherlands, Finland, and the Czech Republic Fanzine Hugo Award at Worldcon 75 in Helsinki, Finland. (hereafter referred to as Czechia, its formally adopted name as of a few years ago), in addition to seeing sights in places we have always dreamed of, well, seeing: Wales, Stonehenge, Paris, and even a wee bit of post-Soviet era Latvia when we had an overnight layover in Riga. We survived dealing with airplane schedules and flight delays, trying to decipher the confusing cryptography of the Eurail system, and even adapted reasonably well to the bus, tube, and rail schedules of London’s extensive mass transit system. That last one may have taken us the better part of a week to master, but hey, we did it! Inquiring minds want to know when and where chapters of my TAFF trip will be appearing, and I have in place a nefarious scheme to spread the wealth over the next year. Naturally this report begins in this issue, although it technically began in Askew #21, which was published in early October. It is all beginning to come together as my mind has finally, FINALLY recovered and is again in full fan-writing and fan-pubbing mode. Be Very Afraid. People also desire to know about the next Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund Race, which will bring a deserving fannish soul from Europe to the 76th World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose, California, over the week of August 16-20, 2018. European TAFF Administrator Anna Raftery and I, your newly appointed North American Administrator, have been discussing this, and it is now official: nominations are open for next year’s TAFF race! Here is the official announcement I have posted to Facebook and elsewhere: CALL FOR NOMINATIONS! The 2018 TAFF (Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund) race is now open for nominations for the East to West (Europe to North America) leg. The winning delegate will attend the 76th World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose, California, from August 16—20, 2018, and will thereafter become the next European administrator of TAFF. More details about TAFF can be found at David Langford's excellent website at www.taff.org.uk. Nominations are open until the end of November 2017. If you 3 are interested in standing for the 2018 TAFF election, or would like to nominate some deserving fan, please contact John Purcell at [email protected] or Anna Raftery at [email protected]. One thing is for sure: the actual voting time frame will be shorter than the 2017 race. Stay tuned for all the sordid details. There is also a new TAFF Newsletter, independent of the TAFF website that Dave Langford unofficially maintains, appearing in November 2017, with hopes of being a bimonthly publication to keep fans informed of what they need to know, and as a cattle prod to remind voters to vote in the race, dagnabbit! The more people involved, the merrier. The new newsletter is going to be called – wait for it – TAFF News. Catchy, eh? Again, Be Very Afraid. So the Purcell Fan Publishing Empire (a.k.a., Mythical Publications, a name I began back in the days of my first fanzine This House in the Summer of 1976) is ramping it up. Even Valerie is getting the itch to pub her own ish, which I think is a fantastic idea. In fact, she is designing a proper header for the TAFF Newsletter. Obituaries This has fast become a sad feature in many science fiction fanzines these days. Granted, science fiction fandom as a community is very large now, especially when compared to fandom’s beginnings in the 1930s when being a fan truthfully was a Proud and Lonely Thing. We really shouldn’t really be surprised – in fact, we mostly aren’t – at this inevitable fact of life, yet still it hurts when we lose a member of our fannish community. Baron Dave Romm (1955-2017) I first wrote about the death of my friend David Romm in Askew #21, which appeared in the first week of October this year, and still I am having a hard time dealing with his loss. At the early fall relaxacon in Minneapolis, there was a proper memorial for Baron Dave, and from what I read and saw on Facebook postings, it sounds like it was a proper, joyous send off for a wonderful person. Dave is missed, yes, but he left behind a wealth of photographs and great memories. Dian Crayne (1942-2017) I never met Diane – at least, not that I am aware of – but knew her mainly through Facebook. Thanks to social media, what I learned about her was that she had a great sense of humor and wrote quite a few science fiction and mystery books (as Dian Girard, her maiden name, and J. D. Crayne). I already knew that she was previously married to Bruce Pelz and that they had a daughter, Cecy, but other than that, my contact with her is solely online. Even so, it was a shock to learn of her death at the age of 75. My deepest condolences to her family and friends. Milt Stevens (1942-2017) Milt was a regular at the Los Angeles Science Fiction Society (LASFS) meetings, which is where I got to know him when I lived in LA in 1985. We had first met at Iguanacon, the 1978 World Science Fiction Convention in Phoenix, Arizona, and then at LoneStarCon III in San Antonio, Texas (2013), Milt frequently stopped by the fanzine lounge I was hosting, so we had some time to sit and chat. In addition to chairing and working on conventions (notably LA Con and Westercons), Milt has long been a contributor to apas (amateur press associations) and a prolific loc-writer 4 to fanzines, such as this one. In his honor I will lead off this issue’s lettercolumn with a letter of comment from Milt. Thank you, sir, for all that you did for fandom. The Shockwave Sheep Stand on Jagged Zanzibar One science fiction author that I have not read very much of over the years is John Brunner (1934 – 1995), who was incredibly prolific beginning in the late 1950s and continuing practically non-stop through the next twenty years. Once Brunner won the Hugo Award for Best Novel with Stand on Zanzibar (1968) he began slowing down – sort of - and the quality of his work definitely improved, resulting in more excellent novels, such as The Jagged Orbit (1969), The Sheep Look Up (1972), and The Shockwave Rider (1975). Unfortunately, one does not usually write brilliant fiction unless one cranks out some pretty forgettable stuff to build up the necessary writing chops to eventually win awards. So over the past few weeks I have read the following early “novels” by Brunner in this order: The World Swappers (1959), The Skynappers (1960), and Endless Shadow (1964). The second and third stories are part of Ace Double books, respectively paired with Philip K. Dick’s Vulcan’s Hammer (1960) and The Arsenal of Miracles by Gardner F.