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SF-LOVERS Digest            Monday, 15 Feb 1993       Volume 18 : Issue 102

Today's Topics:

           Books - Anvil & Benford & Brin & Burroughs (2 msgs) &
                   Card & Eddings & Effinger & Herbert (4 msgs) &
                   Hogan & King

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Date: 11 Feb 93 18:25:05 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Mark L. Stackpole)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Christopher Anvil

   I'm a sucker for Anvil's stories too. One of his best however was first
published in Galaxy, not Analog. It's called "Mind Partner" and forshadows
a lot of PK Dick's themes, particularly "We Can Remember it for you
Wholesale". I think it dates from 1961.
   Of his recent stories, there's a good one in Analog some 3-5 years back
which speculated what if the development of the automobile industry was
just like how PCs were developed. (Road which needed tire adapters for
different car models, etc.)

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Date: 11 Feb 93 21:13:59 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Dave Lampson)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Benford

Ross Smith ([e-mail]) writes:
>(BTW, does anyone know if Benford has written/is planning to write any
>more books in the GSR/TOL series?)

Yes, there are two more books.  They cover the first contact between humans
and the mechanized lifeforms.  They are:

   In The Ocean Of Night     1977
   Across The Sea Of Suns    1984

These two form a set, much as the other two do.  A lot of time passes
between these two and the GSR/TOL pair.  I liked these books, but the
"hero" has to be one of the most angst-ridden characters in SF.

Dave
[e-mail]

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Date: 11 Feb 93 03:24:20 GMT
From: [e-mail] (David Zink)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Brin: The Uplift Wait (was Re: How do you lose a planet?)

[e-mail] (Andrew Solovay) writes:
>You know how Brin could drive us all into a blind, screaming fury? After
>years of wait, he finally releases the fourth Uplift book...

Was there ever a book or story about the needle event so prominent in
Sundiver?

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Date: 14 Feb 93 17:22:45 GMT
From: [e-mail] (John Kohler)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Burroughs - John Carter of Mars

David.Chappell of Trinity College posted a question asking about the 11th
book in Burrough's John Carter Mars series.  Yes, the 11th book is called
"John Carter of Mars" (first printed in US 1965), it is the combined work
of the following two stories:

"John Carter and the Giant of Mars", January 1941 Amazing Stories Magazine
"Skeleton Men of Jupiter", February 1943 Amazing Stories Magazine.

It was a 2-part series, albeit drawn out over 2 years.  It was indeed
written by Burroughs, who died in 1950.  You can find a copy published by
Del Rey/Ballantine in your used book store.

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

Date: 11 Feb 93 22:42:40 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Mark Dakins)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: ERB Mars Series number 11 (long)

[e-mail] (David Chappell) writes:
>Does anybody know anything about a book entitled "John Carter of Mars"?
>It is published by Del Rey as volume 11 of Edgar Rice Burroughs's Mars
>series.
>
>One advertisement I saw indicated that there are only ten books in the
>Mars series.
>
>The 11th book is actually two very short novels entitled "John Carter and
>the Giant of Mars" and "The Skeleton Men of Mars".

I think you mean "Skeleton Men of Jupiter."

>They have copyright dates of 1940 and 1942 respectibly.  The copyright
>holder is Ziff Davis.
>
>Though the name Edgar Rice Burroughs appears as the author, the stories
>are so very different from the other Mars books and are of such poor
>quality that I suspect a ghost writer.  Who wrote these stories?

I will quote part of the introduction to my copy of _John Carter of Mars_.
Ballantine Books, copyright 1964, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. The
introduction is by Richard A. Lupoff.

"_John Carter and the Giants of Mars_ (or Giant for short) first appeared
in AMAZING STORIES Magazine for January, 1941, and created an immediate
furore.  Dozens of readers wrote to the magazine challenging the
authenticity of the story, which was strongly defended by Raymond A.
Palmer, the editor.  The complaints were based mainly on two points. ...

   In planning the current book, JOHN CARTER OF MARS, it was my hope to
verify or refute the charges against _Giant of Mars_ once and for all.  In
order to do this, I wrote directly to Ray Palmer and asked him outright
whether (a) the story had actually been written by Edgar Rice Burroughs,
and (b) if it had, whether or not Palmer or anyone else had tampered with
the manuscript before publication: or (c) if it had _not_ been written by
Burroughs, who _did_ write the story.

   Simultaneously, I wrote to Hulbert Burroughs, the author's son, and
asked him to check through his father's files and records, and determine if
possible (a) whether his father did write _Giant_ and (b) if he did,
whether a copy of the manuscript still existed for purposes of comparison
with the magazine version.

   Palmer's reply was the first to arrive, and in it he stated that (a) the
story had indeed been written by Burroughs and (b) no one had changed it
_in any way_ prior to publication.  Unfortunately, according to Palmer, the
manuscript had been kept in the files of the Ziff-Davis Publishing Company,
publisher of AMAZING STORIES, and had been destroyed some years later in a
records clearance move.

   An initial reply from Hulbert Burroughs was equally mystifying - a
search of the records of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc., had produced an entry
for the sale of _John Carter and the Giant of Mars_ to Ziff-Davis.  But an
examination of ERB's notebook, ... did _not_ uncover the expected entry for
_Giant_.

   ... I was surprised and gratified to receive a further communication
from Hulbert Burroughs, unravelling the mystery ...  The story which was
pieced together is this:

   In 1940 the Whitman Publishing Company ... asked ERB for a "Big Little
Book" featuring John Carter. ...

   Edgar Rice Burroughs ... asked his son John Coleman Burroughs ... to
collaborate with him in producing the story...

   At the same time, Ray Palmer of AMAZING STORIES was seeking a new
Barsoomian adventure from ERB, to feature in his magazine.  Taking the
as-yet unpublished collaboration as his basis, Edgar Rice Burroughs
lengthened it by some 5000 words and adapted it "upward" for adult
readership, producing finally _John Carter and the Giant of Mars_."

He goes on to say that there is no such mystery about _The Skeleton Men of
Jupiter_ which was certainly written by ERB.

Hope you found this interesting.

Mark Dakins

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Date: 11 Feb 93 05:58:21 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Robert N. Stonehill)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Card's _The Call of Earth_ is out

I just finished The Memory of Earth today. It was a pretty good book, but
disappointing from Card. His work is usually much better. The
characterization was of course excellent, but the plot and scenarios were a
bit cliched. Read it anyway, though, it's better than most science fiction.
I can't wait to read the second book.

[e-mail]

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

Date: 14 Feb 93 17:16:42 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Dani Zweig)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Eddings: Domes of Fire -- Speculation (minor spoilers)

I read Eddings's "Domes of Fire" - the first novel in his 'Tamuli' trilogy.
(Don't look at me like that.  I knew what I was doing.  I found myself in
desperate need of some good fluff to read, and Lord knows, this qualifies!)
Reading a new Eddings novel is a lot like rereading an old one - something
I've done often enough.

Domes of Fire opens a few years after the end of the Ellenium.  There is
considerable unrest in the land.  Social unrest is being stirred up, and
there seems to be some unsavory magic at work.  Then an envoy arrives from
the next continent over (think of it as 'boundless Malloria' and you'll get
the general idea) to ask for help: The same troubles are at work there.
The rest, as they say (or, if they don't, they ought to), is travelogue, as
our party of heroes sight-sees and banters its way across that continent,
to the court of the Tamuli emperor.

Sure enough, some force - the evidence suggests that both mortals and
divinities are at work, is stirring up trouble.  The first book ends with a
decision to recover Bhelliom - the sapphire rose they went to all that
trouble to ditch at the end of the Ellenium.

Speculation time.  Pulling together the following observations:

  - It was the Styric wizard Zalasta who suggesting asking Sparhawk for
    help

  - Zalasta virtually threw a fit when he found out that Sparhawk no longer
    had Bhelliom

  - I'm reasonably sure that the 'h' in 'Bhelliom' is silent

  - The decision to retrieve Bhelliom is made against Aphrael's better
    judgment

  - Ehlana takes an instant dislike to Zalasta

  - I'm inclined to consider the 'h' in Ehlana silent as well

  - Aphrael decides, on intuition, not to trust Zalasta with her secret

  - Zalasta's magic is theurgic - he calls upon a God or Goddess

  - It is a Styric peculiarity that different Styrics worship different
    Gods or Goddesses from among the thousand Younger Gods, and it seems to
    be poor manners to ask which

  - At the end of Domes of Fire, Sparhawk's latest nemesis makes an
    apparently unmotivated appearance to tell him what God he is facing,
    and to tell him that all he has encountered so far has been meant only
    to test him

  - There is evidence that there is a traitor in their midst

As you've doubtlessly gathered, my conclusion is that Zalasta is their
traitor, that he worked to bring Sparhawk over because he wanted to get his
hands on Bhelliom, and that there is a good chance that it's not one of the
Styric Gods that he's calling upon to work his spells.

Dani Zweig
[e-mail]

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

Date: 10 Feb 93 20:48:20 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Laurie Mann)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: George Alec Effinger

>Effinger has a pre-existing condition leaving him uninsurable...There is a
>fan/writer fund which has benefitted Effinger and other writers who cannot
>get insurance to cover prexisting/and or excluded conditions. I don't have
>the address or contact.

The George Alec Effinger Medical Fund
c/o Niagara Falls Science Fiction Association
PO Box 500, Bridge Station
Niagara Falls, NY 14305

Different conventions and clubs have had various fundraisers.  I think
NFSFA is still running their "Worldcon for a Buck" Raffle - you might want
to send a self-addressed stamped envelope to that address and ask if a
raffle is currently being run or not.

The next fundraiser I know about is a "Punday Benefit" at Boskone on
Sunday, February 21.

[e-mail]

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Date: 11 Feb 93 03:11:01 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Peter Cash)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

[e-mail] writes:
>Well, I've found that many of the people who saw Paul Atreidies as a hero
>in DUNE didn't like the other five for the following reasons...

The problem isn't that Paul is an absolute schnook as a hero (though he
is), the problem is that after the Old Duke dies and Thufir Hawat changes
jobs, there isn't a _single_ likeable person in any of the Dune books. The
first Dune novel got by on intertia after the Sardaukar landing; the rest
never got moving at all. They never get moving because there is no one in
any of these books to _care_ about.

So somebody tell me: what do you find so laudable about all those Dune
books?

Peter Cash
[e-mail]

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Date: 11 Feb 93 03:07:23 GMT
From: [e-mail] (David Zink)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

[e-mail] (Wilson M. Clements) writes:
>Actually the books are The Lazerus Effect, The Ascension Factor, and The
>Jesus Incident.  Whipping Star is also very good.  So is Hellstroms' Hive.

Whipping Star and The Dosadi Experiment also form a set, along with a
number of short stories involving the Bureau of Sabotage, especially (check
spelling) special agent Jorj McKie, the human admitted to the Gowachin Bar.

Does anyone have a list of the stories, and where to find them?  I have
lost all my Herbert books (grumble) so I need to find them again.

David Zink
[e-mail]

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

Date: 11 Feb 93 20:32:14 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Dave Lampson)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

Peter Cash ([e-mail]) writes:
>So somebody tell me: what do you find so laudable about all those Dune
>books?

Well, even if the characters aren't all that sympathetic, they are
sometimes well-drawn.  Also, the world-building continues to be
interesting, eventhough most of the best work was in Dune.

Dave
[e-mail]

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

Date: 14 Feb 93 00:19:01 GMT
From: atlantis![e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Frank Herbert

[e-mail] wrote:
>Well, I've found that many of the people who saw Paul Atreidies as a hero
>in DUNE didn't like the other five for the following reasons, see if they
>are yours as well, (not saying that they are, but still, this may make for
>an interesting experiment, providing I'm not flamed off the net!)

Well, maybe that had something to do with it.  I didn't see Paul
Atriedes[sp?]  as a hero, but then I was exposed to the Dune boardgame
before the book, and always had better luck as Harkonnen.  ;-}

>2. I didn't think CHILDREN OF DUNE was as bad as Dune M,
>   But I still didn't like it 'cause Alia's a lamer, and
>   all of the good guys in the first book are bad.

Heavens!  People switched sides?  Or is it perhaps that Herbert was being a
bit more sophisticated than "good guy/bad guy" characters?  Alia's
arguable, but I can probably agree with your dislike of her...

>3. I didn't like GOD EMPEROR OF DUNE, because Leto turned
>   bad, and because the end was lame.

Am I the only one in existence whose favourite Dune book is God Emperor?
Maybe this is just proof of Eric's thesis (which I just read), that it's
not the despots that take over the system, but the system which tends to
create despots.  (Apologies, Eric, for mangling and oversimplifying your
thesis...)  But, in a nutshell, Leto became the person he was as a result
of living so long, and being no longer quite human...  If you dislike it
because he became a "bad guy", then perhaps you should go back to your
Eddings...

>4. I didn't like HERETICS OF DUNE because......
>      a. Too much sex! (I HAVE heard this one, funny as it may seem!)
>      b. Dune got destroyed! :(

Oh, no!  Yes, I see the trend in these "dislikes".  It's the general lack
of happy endings in post-Dune books!  That's it!  Well, I take a fiendish
and perverse joy in downbeat endings, irony, frustrated expectations, and
the like.

I don't like Heretics of Dune, but that's only because I have the severest
problem remembering what it was about for more than a few days after I read
it.  IMHO it's by far the weakest.

>5. Didn't like CHAPTERHOUSE: DUNE because the END SUCKED!
>   (I'm sure everyone agrees with 5! :) )

Well, to be fair, Herbert never got to write the seventh novel that was
being cried out for at the end of Chapterhouse.  We'll have to go to
Morpheus' Library and check it out sometime.

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

Date: 11 Feb 93 21:13:59 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Dave Lampson)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Hogan

[e-mail] (Louis Sivo) writes:
>Another author I like that is James P. Hogan. He has lately been writing
>near future techno-thrillers. But two of his earlier books that I liked
>were: (Two Faces Of Tomorrow & Inherit the Stars...)

The Giants cycle is indeed good as a previous poster pointed out.  If you
like Hogan, you should try Code Of The Lifemaker, particularly if you have
any interest in artificial intelligence.  The story is based on a rather
plausible description of self-replicating machines becoming sentient and
creating a culture (over a 500,000 year timeframe) and then man's first
encounters with their culture.  As with much of Hogan's works (Voyage From
Yesteryear, for example), he does a good job of inventing an alternative
culture and then exposing the prejudices of earth society by juxtaposing
the two and generating conflict.  Code Of The Lifemaker is one of his best.

Dave
[e-mail]

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Date: 12 Feb 93 03:26:16 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Sarah E. Smith)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: _The Waste Lands_ (possible minor spoiler)

*POSSIBLE MINOR SPOILER*

This has been driving me crazy ever since I read Stephen King's _The Waste
Lands_ for the first time.  I can trace most of his allusions to Robert
Browning, T.S. Eliot, himself, or whomsoever as he happens to choose but, I
have not been able to think of where he might have gotten the names Blaine
and Patricia from (the trains whose Cradle is in Lud).  Does anyone know
what they might be in reference to?  Or did he just pull them out of thin
air?  (This seems unlikely, considering what he's doing with _The Dark
Tower_ series.)  Or what?

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End of SF-LOVERS Digest
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