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SF-LOVERS Digest            Monday, 8 Feb 1993         Volume 18 : Issue 79

Today's Topics:

             Books - Glen Cook (5 msgs) & Effinger (2 msgs) &
                     Herbert (7 msgs)

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Date: 3 Feb 93 22:30:50 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Steve Lyle)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Black Co. sequel - Glen Cook

[e-mail] (Patrick Nielsen-Hayden) writes:
>[e-mail] writes:
>>Does anyone know if the latest installment to the Black Company series by
>>Glen Cook has been published, or if not, when it will be out ? I believe
>>it was to be called Glittering Stone.
>
>Quite so.  And as soon as Glen writes it, we'll publish it like a shot.
><g>

On a related note, are you going to publish the new Garrett novel 'like a
shot'?  According to Glen, while speaking at Chattacon, it had been turned
into the publisher during the second week of January (and I'm assuming that
Tor is publisher for the Garrett novels as well as Black Company).  What
does 'like a shot' translate to in number of months?

For those interested, the title will be "Deadly Quicksilver Lies", if my
memory has not betrayed me.  Also, Glen said he might consider early
retirement from GM _if_ GM offered another ER program and _if_ he could
qualify for it.  I believe he was not old enough to qualify under the last
one.  (So, to get Glittering Stone => Don't buy GM (:-))

And lest I forget in the impatient desire for the 'next one': Thanks,
Patrick, for publishing what is available.  I have just been reading Glen's
work for the last couple of years and have gotten a lot of enjoyment out of
it.

Steve Lyle
uupsi!stiatl!steve

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Date: 4 Feb 93 18:50:01 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Patrick Nielsen-Hayden)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Black Co. sequel - Glen Cook

[e-mail] (Steve Lyle) responds to my message about how
we'll publish the next Black Company book "like a shot" as soon as Glen
turns it in:

>On a related note, are you going to publish the new Garrett novel 'like a
>shot'?  According to Glen, while speaking at Chattacon, it had been turned
>into the publisher during the second week of January (and I'm assuming
>that Tor is publisher for the Garrett novels as well as Black Company).
>What does 'like a shot' translate to in number of months?

"Like a shot" translates into "we don't publish the Garrett novels."  :-)

Glen has always spread his work around a variety of publishers.

Patrick Nielsen Hayden
senior editor
Tor Books
[e-mail]

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Date: 5 Feb 93 16:29:08 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Ken Garrido)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Glen Cook -- Garrett (Was Re: Black Co. sequel - Glen Cook)

You know, I just started reading this group, and I'm not sure whether
knowing that new Black Company and Garrett books are coming cruelty or not.

I've taken so much pleasure from Cook's writing over the years that I'd be
willing to just send the money straight to him.

Well, I'll just have to bite my nails and swill lots of beer in
anticipation.

Ken Garrido
Martin Marietta Aerospace
[e-mail]

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Date: 5 Feb 93 21:04:55 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Bob McQueer)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Glen Cook -- Garrett (Was Re: Black Co. sequel - Glen Cook)

[e-mail] (Nathan Bardsley) writes:
> Actually, I think the Garrett books are published by ROC.

Yes.  I just checked.  Some of them are stamped with the ROC mark, which
actually means Signet Publishing, and some of them are stamped with the
Signet mark itself.

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Date: 6 Feb 93 20:18:49 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Patrick Nielsen-Hayden)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Glen Cook -- Garrett (Was Re: Black Co. sequel - Glen Cook)

[e-mail] (Bob McQueer) writes:
>Yes.  I just checked.  Some of them are stamped with the ROC mark, which
>actually means Signet Publishing, and some of them are stamped with the
>Signet mark itself.

Signet is an imprint of New American Library, a division of Viking Penguin.
Roc is an imprint of Viking Penguin.  Roc inherited the old "Signet" SF
list.  There is, by the way, no entity called "Signet Publishing"; the
rubric is "Signet Books."

Hope this clears everything up.  :-)

Patrick Nielsen Hayden
senior editor
Tor Books
[e-mail]

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Date: 6 Feb 93 06:50:09 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Michael I. Lichter)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re:  Maureen Birnbaum

[e-mail] (Eric Oppen) asks:
>These stories by George Alec Effinger always amused me.  Have they ever
>been collected in one place?  (M. Birnbaum is a Jewish American Princess
>who has adventures all through space and time, usually in the worlds of
>famous SF/F works such as the Horseclans books.)

I don't know the answer to your question (and I suggest that "Jewish
American Princess" is not a value-free label and ought to be used with
delicacy).

A question I have about these stories is that Maureen, known to her friends
as "Muffy", bears a startling resemblance to "Buffy, the Vampire Slayer" of
yore and film.  Is this coincidence?

As long as we're on the subject, I was in the SF bookstore "Dangerous
Visions" last weekend, and some author named Dennis Something was signing
books.  One of the signees was a guy from a film production company who got
in an extended dialogue with Dennis about the biz and so on.  Eventually
Dennis says "hey, did you see the article in the LA Times where they
mentioned that Disney is putting out a film called 'Johnny Zombie' about
this guy who gets killed and finds out that he has to eat human flesh in
order to stay alive so he can take his girl to the prom?  Well, I have this
script that I finished a while back called 'American Zombie' which is
pretty similar.  I bet if we made something quick we could scoop Disney.
What do you think?"  Serious.

By the way, there's a Muffy story in _Foundation's Friends_ called "Maureen
Birnbaum After Dark." It's about Muffy getting teleported to the world of
_Nightfall_ where everybody goes crazy at dusk.  It's bizarre and
incoherent, but who could criticize a parody of Asimov?

Michael

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Date: 7 Feb 93 08:58:32 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Eric Oppen)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re:  Maureen Birnbaum

[e-mail] (Michael I. Lichter) says:
>[e-mail] (Eric Oppen) asks:
> These stories by George Alec Effinger always amused me.  Have they ever
>>been collected in one place?  (M. Birnbaum is a Jewish American Princess
>>who has adventures all through space and time, usually in the worlds of
>>famous SF/F works such as the Horseclans books.)
>
>I don't know the answer to your question (and I suggest that "Jewish
>American Princess" is not a value-free label and ought to be used with
>delicacy).

Granted, however, she _is_ characterized as Jewish, from a wealthy East
Coast family, and this is the only term I know for persons of her type.
"Valley Girl", the closest equivalent I am aware of, describes a different
sort of person.  The dialects they speak are similar, though.  If you've
got a better _short_ nickname for people like Maureen, let me know.

>A question I have about these stories is that Maureen, known to her
>friends as "Muffy", bears a startling resemblance to "Buffy, the Vampire
>Slayer" of yore and film.  Is this coincidence?

I doubt it myself...names like that are standard-issue for high-school and
college-aged young fictional women with more popularity and looks than is
really good for them, IMHO.

>By the way, there's a Muffy story in _Foundation's Friends_ called
>"Maureen Birnbaum After Dark." It's about Muffy getting teleported to the
>world of _Nightfall_ where everybody goes crazy at dusk.  It's bizaare and
>incoherent, but who could criticize a parody of Asimov?

The ones I've seen are:
Maureen Birnbaum, Barbarian Swordswoman (don't remember where)
Maureen Birnbaum and the Art of War (in _Friends of the Horseclans_, an
anthology of stories based on Adams' Horseclans books)
Maureen Birnbaum After Dark (referenced above.)

Are there others?  Despite her obnoxious affected speech, I really rather
like Muffy.

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Date: 5 Feb 93 19:21:25 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: The White Plague, was Re: Frank Herbert

[e-mail] (Christopher J. Lentz) writes:
>I'd suggest "The White Plague".  It's about a genetic engineer that
>creates a plague in response to the IRA's killing of his family.

   I`d suggest NOT reading "The White Plague".  I`m a professional woman
and not a militant feminist.  I think all people, regardless of gender
deserve the same choices and respect, and that's as militant as I get.
Just thought I'd make that clear before I said the next bit.  This book was
the most stupidly sexist bit of recently written doggie doo-doo I have ever
read.  It should have been a great book.  The basic plot is wonderful, the
premise is intriguing, the execution was extremely disappointing.  Maybe
it's just me, but very few of the characters in the book rang true, and
none of the women were even close to real.  In fact the women were silly,
insipid and lifeless.  To tell much more would be revealing great spoilers.
However, I will just say that through the whole book I kept thinking that
all the women were weak fainting flowers (without brains) from some
horrible story in a turn-of-the-century women`s magazine.  I was horribly
disappointed since I had enjoyed so much of Frank Herbert`s writing til
that point.

Sandra Lowe

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Date: 5 Feb 93 20:08:36 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Herbert

In response/addition to the Dune comments.

I must say that Dune has followed the classic movie sequel track.  The
problem is that only Dune was made into a movie.  Usually, books manage
(unlike movies) to give you a tolerable story, even after a few books.  As
for the Dune saga...  (I shall self-censor.) suffice it to say that Herbert
should have quit after #3 (no one blames an author for 1 bad novel in a
trilogy, but 4 out of 6 is too much.

whk

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Date: 5 Feb 93 00:26:47 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Wilson M. Clements)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

Actually the books are The Lazerus Effect, The Ascension Factor, and The
Jesus Incident.  Whipping Star is also very good.  So is Hellstroms' Hive.

Will

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Date: 5 Feb 93 04:15:02 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Paul McGuire)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: White Plague (was Herbert (was blah blah))

[e-mail] (Wilson M. Clements) writes:
>Yes, the central science was crap.  I think he butchers most of the
>central dogma of DNA-RNA-Proteins, but, the science in it was not the
>central issue.  If you let a bad version of science and biochemistry get
>in the way of a delightful story (in which the science was only a
>sideline) then perhaps you should reconsider your views about most science
>fiction books.  Read them for the story and the message - not the science.

I can tolerate, for example, the way Cherryh's space ships dock at her
space stations, but she is not writing stories about designing stations and
good ways to dock.  Regardless of the quality of the huggermugger around
the edges, the White Plague was about the plague, how it worked and how to
cure it, and it was rotten at the core.  Rather the way a locked room
mystery, with excellent writing and characters, would be a poor mystery if
the culprit was revealed as the tooth fairy, who, by the way, can walk
through walls.

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Date: 5 Feb 93 21:50:34 GMT
From: [e-mail] (MONTGOMERY ROBERT PH)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

Some more specific, yet still general, opinions:

1. Dune             - very good!
2. Dune Messiah     - simplistic in comparison to the first book,
                      like a Dune for little kids (worth a quick read)
3. Children of Dune - medium in complexity and interest between the 1st
                      and 2nd books (worth reading)
4. God Emperor of Dune - this is where I couldn't take it any more, and
                         suggest that others "call it a trilogy" ;-)

I do enjoy the vast majority of the books I read, and a lot of different
writing styles, but some of Herbert's techniques got to me round about the
4th book.

1. He would often "spoon feed" the reader what to think about the
   characters.  Rather than showing the traits in the character, he would
   tell what one character was thinking about the other, e.g., "Wow, this
   person is so brilliant to have said that."  What was said or done
   frequently didn't have the attributes as thought by the observing
   character.  This technique was fine for 3 books, but I got sick of it by
   the 4th.  (I prefer to be shown qualities, rather than being told all of
   the time exactly what to think.)

2. The other thing that got to me involved the quotations at the start of
   each chapter, and the mysteries.  At first, I let myself believe that
   Herbert was a "genius" in having all of the mysteries (including their
   solutions) planned out in advance, and that the quotes had double and
   triple meanings related to them.  By the 4th book, I realized that
   Herbert had very little planned out, was just "winging" the mysteries,
   and that the quotes were intentionally ambiguous without any specific
   deep connections in mind.

I am curious about his other works, though, and will read some more when I
get the time. (...got a lot on my reading list :-)

Rob

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Date: 6 Feb 93 06:15:11 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Michael I. Lichter)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

[e-mail] (Rowan Hamilton) asks:

>Is this correct? I've only read Dosadi Experiment and Whipping Star. Are
>The Jesus Incident and Destination: Void also set in the BuSab universe?
>If so I'll have to go out and find them....

Of these, I've only read _Dosadi_, _Destination_, and _Jesus_.  I don't
think the latter two are supposed to have anything to do with the former.
I liked _Dosadi_, despite what I saw as a rather silly ending (the part
about the joining of souls).  _Destination_ was good old fashioned SF, but
_Jesus_ and its sequels were ruined by (my guess) Herbert's co-author.

[e-mail] (Sea Wasp) writes:

>This is completely a matter of opinion, and hotly contested. In my
>completely godlike opinion, ONLY the original, DUNE, is worth reading (and
>very, VERY worth reading); the remainder...  well, DUNE MESSIAH is utter
>drek. THe third book is tolerable, but not compared with its original
>predecessor, and the rest... Well, I can't use language like that on the
>net.

And [e-mail] (MONTGOMERY ROBERT PH) adds:

>4. God Emperor of Dune - this is where I couldn't take it any more, and
>    suggest that others "call it a trilogy" ;-)

>1. He would often "spoon feed" the reader what to think about the
>   characters.  Rather than showing the traits in the character, he would
>   tell what one character was thinking about the other, e.g., "Wow, this
>   person is so brilliant to have said that."  What was said or done
>   frequently didn't have the attributes as thought by the observing
>   character.  This technique was fine for 3 books, but I got sick of it
>   by the 4th.  (I prefer to be shown qualities, rather than being told
>   all of the time exactly what to think.)

Personally, I think that _God, Emporer of Dune_ is the low point of the
series (though in some ways better than _Dune Messiah_).  I think that the
last book, _Chapterhouse Dune_ is *good* and the one preceding it (can't
recall the title) isn't too bad.  The Miles Teg character in both of the
latter two is fun, as are Darwe Odrade, the Nth Duncan Idaho, and Marbella
(?).  The Tleilaxu master and Bellonda are tiresome, but oh, well.

Re. spoon feeding, I agree that Herbert skirts the edge of the tolerable
with this, but I don't feel it's a big problem in the latter two books.
Punch line: if you liked _Dune_ and gave up after one of the first four
books you really should consider the last two, particularly the last.

Michael

------------------------------

Date: 5 Feb 93 06:41:49 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Wilson M. Clements)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: White Plague (was Herbert (was blah blah))

Okay.  I can accept that you read science fiction for the science.  To me
the White Plague was the story of a man gone mad - a very bright
intelligent man who journeys to find himself again. The psychological side
of the story is the truly interesting part.  The story was not about the
curing of the plague; it was about the curing of humanity and the ills that
modern day society had.  The science in the white plague was horrible - I
don't have my copy here or I would cite examples and tell why they were
wrong but the science was only a trapping.  It was like a bad cranberry
sauce on a damn good Christmas goose.

Will

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End of SF-LOVERS Digest
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