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OtherRealms Issue 22 Part 10
Electronic OtherRealms #22
Fall, 1988
Part 10
Copyright 1988
by Chuq Von Rospach
All Rights Reserved
OtherRealms may not be reproduced without written permission from Chuq
Von Rospach. The electronic edition may be distributed or reproduced
only in its entirety and only if all copyrights, author credits and
this notice, including the return addresses remain intact.
No article may be reprinted, reproduced or republished in any way
without the express permission of the author.
Words of Wizdom
Chuq Von Rospach
Copyright 1988 by Chuq Von Rospach
Ivory: A Legend of Past and Future
Mike Resnick
Tor, 374pp, September, 1988, $17.95, 0-312-93093-3
[*****]
Full Spectrum
Edited by Lou Aronica
Shawna McCarthy
Bantam, 483pp, September, 1988, $4.95, 0-553-27482-1
[****]
Anti-Grav Unlimited
Duncan Long
Avon Books, 170pp, $2.95, August, 1988
[***-]
The Blind Knight
Gail Van Asten
Ace Fantasy Special, 218pp, July, 1988, $3.50, 0-441-06727-1
[****]
Arabesques: More Tales of the Arabian Nights
Edited by Susan Shwartz
Avon Fantasy, 275pp, August, 1988, $3.50, 0-380-75319-7
[****]
Dance Band on the Titanic
Jack L. Chalker
Del Rey, 339pp, July, 1988, $3.95, 0-345-34858-3
[***+]
Tropical Chills
Edited by Tim Sullivan
Avon, 258pp, November, 1988, $3.95, 0-380-75500-9
[****]
Sword-Singer
Jennifer Roberson
DAW books, 382pp, September, 1988, $3.95, 0-88677-295-8
[*-]
Cradle
Arthur C. Clarke & Gentry Lee
Warner Books, 304pp, $18.95
August, 1988, 0-446-5 1379-2
[**-]
The Troupe
Gordon Linzner
Pocket Books, July, 1988, $3.50, 0-671-66354-2
[***+]
The Forever City
Dick Lupoff
Walker & Company, 1987, $15.95, 0-8027-6742-7.
[***]
Mirror Matter: Pioneering Antimatter Physics
Joel Davis&Robert Forward
Wiley&Sons, 256pp, 1988, $18.95, 0-471-62812-3.
[****+]
Roger Zelazny's Visual Guide to Castle Amber
Roger Zelazny
Neil Randall
Avon, 222pp, November, 1988, $8.95, 0-380-75566
[**]
Shaggy B.E.M. Stories
Edited by Mike Resnick
Nolacon Press, $14.95, 262pp, no ISBN
[****]
The Palace
Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
Tor, 471pp, August, 1988, $3.95, 0-812-52802-6.
[****]
A Trio for Lute
Damiano
[****]
Damiano's Lute
[***]
Raphael
[***-]
Bantam, 680pp, July, 1988, $4.95, 0-553-27480-5
Ripper!
Edited by Gardner Dozois and Susan Casper
Tor, 427pp, September, 1988, $3.95, 0-812-51700-8
[***]
Retread Shop
T. Jackson King
Questar, 276pp, August, 1988, $3.50, 0-445-20674-8.
[***]
Welcome to Moonbase
Ben Bova
Ballantine, 253pp, November, 1987, 0-345-32859-0
[***+]
Once on a Time
A.A. Milne
Signet, $3.50, 0-451-15558-0
[*]
Surfing Samurai Robots
Mel Gilden
Lynx/Omega, $3.95, 1-55802-001-2
[]
Ivory, by Mike Resnick, is a tough book to review. It's a Science
Fiction novel written about a pair of elephant tusks that first showed
up in 1898. Elephant tusks. If that sounds boring to you, it's simply
because I can't successfully explain what this book really is.
What Resnick has done is span 4000 years, numerous planets and
civilizations, telling many stories that together tell the story of the
tusks of the Kilimanjaro Elephant, the largest tusks ever to be
documented. What he is doing is telling myth, in the classic sense, set
in a science fiction format. A white man, creating a classic Maasai
myth that a Maasai storyteller would be proud of. In Ivory, Resnick
shows a greater sensitivity for a culture that is inherently foreign to
him than many authors do to their own. He cares about this, and it shows.
The late Robert Heinlein was generally considered to be the great
storyteller of Science Fiction. Since his death, people have wondered
who would don the very large shoes left behind. Many have championed
David Brin, but with Ivory, Resnick shows himself to be the heir
apparent. Brin tells a very good story, but Resnick is the storyteller,
and is finally taking his place at the front ranks of the Science
Fiction field. Ivory should be a contender for the major awards this
year, and is one of those books that may well redefine what we think of
as Science Fiction in the years to come. Resnick has taken some very
unusual concepts and ideas and melded them into a classic framework,
and has come up with something that is pure SF, but also something
much, much more.
Original fiction anthologies have a long, honored track record in the
SF world. Orbit and Universe being the premier examples. Now comes Full
Spectrum, a labor of love from Bantam editors Lou Aronica and Shawna
McCarthy, with 25 stories that they feel define the leading edge of
Science Fiction.
If that's true, then Science Fiction is going to be in good shape in
the coming years. From Gregory Benford's vignette "Proselytes" to
Norman Spinrad's "Journals of the Plague Years," there is not a clinker
in the bunch. Even the weaker stories, such as Kevin Anderson's and
Doug Beason's interesting, but seemingly unfinished "Reflections in a
Magnetic Mirror," are merely good. And the best?
Some of the stories will make you put the book down and just think for
a while. There's "Dead Men on TV" by Pat Murphy and "My Year with the
Aliens" by Lisa Goldstein. My favorite fantasy work, by far, as Fred
Bals' "Once in a Lullaby" [duty forces me to warn people that Fred
writes for OtherRealms, and I saw "Once" in a very early draft. It
made my cry then, and after a number of rereadings I still find myself
reacting that way. Friend or not, it's one hell of a story].
And then there is "Journals of the Plague Years" by Norman Spinrad.
Spinrad is not my favorite author. Something about his writing just
doesn't click with me. Some of his stuff I actively dislike. And having
said that, I think that "Plague Years" may be the most important piece
of less-than-book-length fiction published in the last few years.
You're not going to like this story. It's written to upset you, to make
you angry. To sit you down and force you to think about things you would
much rather avoid. It's about AIDS, and a future in which AIDS forces
changes in society that many people (myself included) will find repulsive.
But changes that are all too possible, and Spinrad is the first author
to sit down and deal with what AIDS really means, in a story that
demands that you read it, even as it hurts. "Plague Years" should be
another award contender, and you owe it to yourself to check it out.
Anti-Grav Unlimited, Duncan Long's first novel, takes a new look at
some well-worn territory. The plot is familiar: Good Scientist
Discovers Something That Will Change Society, And Fights Nasty World
Corporation For His Life. While the plot sounds somewhat moldy, Long's
interpretation of it is fresh and interesting, familiar without being
derivative. Phil is a scientist for a Major Corporation who has just
discovered a metal that acts like a gravitational magnet; when one pole
is facing mass it is attracted, the other pole repels. Anti-Gravity.
Free Power for everyone.
The Major Corporation chooses this moment to sack him and his staff.
Phil grabs the material, the files and the machinery needed to build it
and decides to bring the power, literally, to the masses. He outfits
his van with an anti-gravity motor (unlimited energy, and it flies),
and starts planning large scale manufacturing.
About now, of course, someone tries to kill him. They blow up his house.
They remove him from the databases, making him dead. And the chase begins.
To his credit, Long doesn't let the chase get out of hand. Phil runs
off to his friend, Nikki, who happens to be a recently unemployed
rocket pilot. This is rather handy, as they decide the only safe place
to get away from the Nasty World Corporation is to go to the moon. In
the van, of course.
The first two thirds of the book are quite good. The science behind the
anti-gravity material is well presented and easy to accept. The setup
of the van, the trip to the moon, and the entire time spent on the moon
hiding and setting up manufacturing in an abandoned lunar mine are well
thought out and enjoyable. The only flaw with this part of the book is
the relationship between Nikki and Phil, which consists of Nikki saying
"I'm not ready yet" and Phil acting like a seventh grader suffering
from Puppy Love. The relationship got a little saccharine for me after
a while, and kept getting in the way of the narrative.
The final third of the book unfortunately unravels a lot of the good work.
They return from the moon to give their discovery to the people of Earth.
This quickly degenerates into a non-stop chase scene, as Phil and Nikki
try to find out who's trying to kill them and track them back to their
boss (who else would be the logical person to give the discovery to?).
They finally meet the head of World Power, the force behind the
assassins. He's an obese, decadent Nero type whose primary interests
seem to be eating and little boys. He already has the formula for the
anti-gravity material, of course, and is actively suppressing it
because it would be bad for profits.
Nikki and Phil kill him, destroy World Power, leak the secret, and the
riots begin.
The ending is left muddled, nothing really solved, and a last minute plot
device tossed in in what seems to be a made-for-sequel setup. The first
part of the book is really good, the final part is disappointing; in all,
I can give Anti-Grav Unlimited a qualified recommendation, but what I'm
really interested in seeing is his next book. This one isn't bad for a
first novel, but it isn't especially good for a first novel, either.
Gail Van Asten's The Blind Knight is the third of the Ace Fantasy Specials
and her first published novel. Set in the time after the death of King
Arthur, it is the story of a boy coming into his inheritance, a woman
thwarted of hers, and of the life they build together. The book is set
in an Arthurian mythos, but Van Asten uses and builds on the Arthurian
legend rather than simply copying or rehashing it. It's a well written,
pleasant first novel that you'll find enjoyable and interesting.
Arabesques is an original anthology of stories set in the time of the Arabian
Nights, an area that fantasy writers haven't heavily explored to date.
This book is chock full of good stories. My favorite, by far, is Larry
Niven's "The Tale of the Djinni and the Sisters." Another good story is
Gene Wolfe's "The Tale of the Rose and the Nightingale (and What Came
of It)" but really, there aren't any bad stories at all. Other authors
represented include Tanith Lee, Jane Yolen, Esther Friesner, Andre Norton,
Melissa Scott, Harry Turtledove and M.J. Engh. A strong cast of writers,
a strong anthology, this is a book Fantasy readers don't want to miss.
Jack Chalker doesn't write many short stories. The tapestry he prefers
is large and complex, and he builds stories in terms of books, not
chapters. Occasionally, however, a shorter work comes to life, and
Chalker has now collected them together in a collection, Dance Band on
the Titanic. This collection is full of interesting stories (the title
piece will, frankly, stay with me for many years -- a very un-
Chalker-like and haunting piece set on a very different coastal ferry)
and autobiographical pieces and story prefaces.
It's a good, solid collection with a couple of true gems. Even if you
don't normally read Chalker, you should try it out for Dance Band.
It's well worth it, just on its own.
Tired of cold, drafty cellars and graveyards at midnight? For a
different look at horror, let's go to the tropics. That's what Tim
Sullivan does with Tropical Chills, a new anthology of horror stories
with a single theme: that the heat can be as horrible as the cold.
About half the anthology is original fiction, including works by Dean Koontz,
Gene Wolfe, Steve Rasnic Tem, Edward Bryant, Charles Sheffield, Pat Cadigan
and George Alec Effinger. The front cover pushes Koontz's story "Graveyard
Highway," and Sullivan himself pushes "Houston, 1943" by Gene Wolfe as a
potential award winner. While I won't disagree with either, "Dead Meat"
by Sheffield and "Talking Heads" by Effinger were the two stories that
did the most for me. There really isn't a bad story in the entire
anthology, and you can't go wrong by picking this one up.
I was really looking forward to Sword-Singer, the sequel to Jennifer
Roberson's wonderful Sword-Dancer. While a bad book is disappointing, a
bad sequel to a very good book is worse. Expectations are set, and
when they aren't met, the disappointment is greater.
In Sword-Singer, Sandtiger and Del head north to meet her fate and
(hopefully) clear her name of the death of her advisor. On the way up,
they run into many dangers and fight many foes, including one set of
persistent magical beasts that she never does begin to explain,
seemingly leaving them to the next book (the only thing worse than
throwing in a mystical magical foe is throwing in a mystical magical
foe and leaving it mystical through the entire book).
The best description of the book is tired. Roberson, the writer, seems
to be going through the paces, and the book plods along without any
real motivation or interest. Roberson doesn't seem to care -- and
telegraphs that into the story and then into the reader.
Sandtiger is a cardboard cutout who not only can't understand what's
going on in Del's mind, he doesn't even try. Many of the things he
seemed to learn about her in the first book have flitted from his mind.
Del, on the other hand, is an automaton, running around stone- faced.
Roberson tries to build in some personal conflict by having Del try to
decide whether to track down the leaders of the group that killed her
family or clearing her name. What really happens is that Del seems to
twitch around at the whim of the author. The relationship between the
two is cold, forced, and entirely artificial.
The only decent character in the book is Sandtiger's horse, the stud.
He's lively, obnoxious, and upstages everyone else in the story
whenever he's around. In a novel full of cardboard stereotypes, he's
the only breathing thing there. He's wonderful, which only adds
contrast to how drab and lifeless the rest of the book is.
And then there is the ending. People who dislike spoilers should skip
along, since there's no way to talk about this without giving some
nasty ones away. At the end, Del and Sandtiger are manipulated into
fighting each other in the circle. Sandtiger has his new, unbloodied
sword screaming for a soul. Sandtiger moves in for the kill, and....
Cut to the final chapter as Sandtiger, his blooded sword and his stud,
go riding off into the sunset to find out who set those mystical beasts
after them. Is Del dead, soul powering the Sandtiger's sword? Roberson
never says, although she implies it. If Del is dead, why doesn't she
say so? If Del is dead, why is Sandtiger leaving on a quest without any
feeling of remorse or pain? One would think that if you killed your
mate, you'd at least feel something. Sandtiger showed more emotion when
he lost the stud.
And if Del isn't dead, the author's played some unfair mind-games on her
readers. The ending really bothered me. The book was ended in a way that left
the reader hung out to dry, and I resented it. You have to play fair with
your readers. I don't like "who shot J.R." type endings -- the author isn't
trying to convince you to read the sequel, they're trying to force you
to. A good series doesn't require coercion. Sword-Singer left a bad
taste in my mouth, and I expected better from Roberson.
There are whales beaching themselves in unreasonable numbers off the
Florida coast. At the same time, the Navy is searching for something
out there, and isn't talking about what it is. Carol Dawson, a journalist,
thinks the two may be related and decides to find out for herself.
This is the beginning of Cradle, the first collaboration between
Grandmaster Arthur Clarke and Gentry Lee. The Navy is searching for a
lost missile, Carol Dawson is searching for a Pulitzer, and the whales....
The whales sort of get forgotten along the way. Clarke and Lee use them
as a hook to get Dawson out onto the ocean, looking for what she thinks
is a lost missile, hoping to find it before the Navy does, but once the
search is started, the whales more or less disappear, being explained
away quickly, towards the end. In their place comes the Colony, an
Alien civilization Out There somewhere, which, along with the folks
from the Navy and Carol and her compatriots, are the three
point-of-views used in the book.
Unfortunately, by bringing in the aliens, the authors defuse what could
have been a good action-adventure-suspense story. Instead of hanging
the reader on "What's Happening?" we know -- the aliens are causing the
problems with the whales, and all that's left for the reader is
following along and seeing how the authors pull it together.
A major subplot -- the search for the missing missile, doesn't really
do anything to help. Carol's looking for the missile, thinking it's the
problem with the whales. So is the Navy, with the added problem are
some people who are convinced that the missile was stolen by the
Russians, and that Carol is working with the Communists to recover it.
A confrontation is looming, but it's one you don't care about because
you know it's a red herring. The aliens are really the cause of
everything, and the rest is filler; marking time for the final climax
where all three groups come together and everything resolves out.
The resolution comes, but it's more an anti-climax than anything else.
Cradle has potential, but potential unrealized. It sputters along,
never quite taking off, but never crashing in on itself in total
collapse, either. Overall it's a disappointing book from Clarke.
In a fascinating updating of the vampire legend into a modern urban
setting, Gordon Linzner makes the move from short fiction and small
press books into the mass market with The Troupe.
In it, a group of urban vampires hit New York City. They are the
classic vampire archetype, with two variations: sunlight doesn't
disturb them, and they eat the soul of their victims rather than their
blood, leaving corpses without a mark. Linzner implies, but never
explains their existence as a mutation of some sort. But this is a
story of their existence, not their creation, so the lack of an origin
isn't a problem.
Against this group of ruthless nasties are two people. Benny is a drop out,
a drug addict; the kind of hopeless slime New York is famous for, looking
only for enough cash for the next fix. And Nan, a former member of the
troupe who has realized that killing the cattle, so to speak, isn't right --
a crisis of faith that puts her at odds with the rest of the troupe and
has forced her to either convert her fellows, or destroy them.
Against a modern urban setting, we have the classic evil force, which
kills silently and at will, and seems unstoppable. At the same time,
though, Linzner has given them their own life and dimension. You can
sympathize and understand the vampires, even if you can't agree with
their principles. Their actions are not those of the mindless Evil Nemesis,
but of a group of people in a life or death struggle of their own.
The book has a complex plot and a lot of deep, complex characters going
for it. The pacing sets up a sense of crisis for the reader, carrying
them along for the ride to the final climax, which is ultimately very
satisfying.
The only criticism I have is the opening. Linzner spends about the
first quarter of the book introducing the characters. One by one you
meet the Troupe, and the Troupe kills and feeds. For me, this ran
overly long -- I found myself waiting for something to really happen.
It could have been cut somewhat without losing anything and evening out
the pace, since the start of the book is significantly more sluggish
than the rest.
All in all, though, this is a minor criticism, and the book as a whole
is a nice read. If you don't read horror, this would make a good
introduction, and for horror fans you will have, I feel, a real feast
with this one.
The Millennium series, a Young Adult oriented series of novels created
by Byron Preiss and written by well-known Science Fiction authors,
continues with The Forever City by Richard Lupoff. Each book in the
series takes a new look at a standard theme in Science Fiction, and
this time it's Cities in Space. The orbital city Yukawa sends a
research ship out to the Oort Cloud in search of knowledge and (not so
coincidentally) the fate of another research ship lost in the area.
What they find is a substance that redefines their perception of the
Universe, and gives them what seems to be an insurmountable problem.
This is a good book, but while the other books in the series were
accessible to adult readers as well, The Forever City is a simpler book
and definitely aimed at a younger market. While Lupoff is dealing with
the orbital city (unfortunately all too peripheral to the story for my
tastes) the book moves wonderfully, but once out in space and dealing
with The Problem, it bogs down and seems to get off track. The
characterization and interpersonal relationships are also simplified
and of the kind you're likely to see in Young Adult fiction.
It's still a good book, and the entire Millennium series would be a
fine introduction to Science Fiction for the younger readers, as well
as good entertainment for older readers.
It looks like popular science is back in vogue. Last issue I looked at
Stephen Hawking's book, A Brief History of Time. As I write this, it is
still on the best-seller lists, and there's another, even better, book
now out. Mirror Matter! Pioneering Antimatter Physics by Joel Davis and
Robert Forward is a very well researched and written book on an exceptionally
esoteric subject. Unlike History of Time, which was primary an
autobiography of Stephen Hawking's life in physics, Mirror Matter puts
the people in the background and talks turkey about the physics behind
the universe. A must for anyone with an interest in science, while this
won't have the best seller draw of the Hawking book, it's a much better
science book and well worth tracking down for your library.
How can you tell your series is a success? They start publishing books
about your books. One current example is Roger Zelazny's Visual Guide
to Castle Amber, in which Neil Randall, with input from Roger Zelazny,
takes you through Castle Amber and talks about what goes on within.
This is, from the start, of interest only to Amber fans. It's a tribute
to Zelazny that Amber is popular enough that a publisher thinks a book
about Amber would be profitable.
If you're an Amber fan, is this book worth your time? I'd call it a
qualified maybe. There are two sections to the book. The first is a
tour of the Castle and the area around it, given by Flora, a Princess
by Amber. The second section is an encyclopedia of Amber that includes
biographies of the royal families, articles on the history of Amber and
other items of interest from the series. Each biography is illustrated
with the family member's trump.
Unfortunately, the writing is uneven, ranging from the terminally cute
to the truly inspired (the description of Flora's apartments, by Flora
herself, is hilarious). The illustrations tend to be rather pedestrian
and uninspiring, looking more like a drafting assignment than a set of
illustrations in a book.
Until you get to the trump cards. I'm working from a galley, with the
horrible art reproduction a copy machine implies, and the trumps are
still gorgeous. It's obvious that a lot of time and detail has gone
into drawing the royal trumps. The biographies that go with them are
generally well done, and I found them useful in trying to keep track of
the rather complex relationships that Zelazny builds into the story.
If this was a mass market paperback, I'd give it my recommendation just
for the biographical material. At the more expensive trade paperback
size, it is harder to justify. For serious Amber fans, yes. For the
rest, take a look and see for yourself. It's uneven, but it is also
full of interesting information and a handy reference if, like me, you
can never keep the various characters separate in your mind.
Shaggy B.E.M. Stories is a limited distribution (1000 copies) anthology
of parodies of famous Science Fiction authors and themes. It was
initially published for Nolacon, the 1988 Worldcon, and about 800
copies were sold at the convention -- so if this book hasn't sold out
by now, it will soon. It includes pieces by many famous writers,
including Clarke, John Sladek, Randall Garrett, Dick Lupoff, Isaac
Asimov and Poul Anderson. Some of the pieces are rather famous,
including Asimov's classic Thiotimoline piece or George Alec Effinger's
Muffy Birnbaum stories. Others, like Cathy Ball's "Love's Prurient
Interest," (a classic romance set at a SF convention, as Our Heroine
looks for True Love, or at least A Good Time) are getting their first
wide distribution. There is even the first pure Cyberpunk parody,
"Nutrimancer," by Marc Laidlaw.
It's a hoot. If you like parodies, you'll want this book. The ordering
information is in the Stuff Received section. But you had better hurry.
Short Takes: Back in print after too long is Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's The
Palace, a historical horror/romance set in Renaissance Florence. It's
a well written vampire tale with a twist: the vampire is the hero. The
Palace, like the entire St. Germain series, is highly recommended.
Another series brought back to print, this time in a single volume
omnibus, is R.A. MacAvoy's A Trio for Lute, containing the books
Damiano, Damiano's Lute and Raphael. About a witch and the Angel
Raphael, it's a fascinating series of fantasies.
Similar in feel to Roger Zelazny's Alien Speedway series is Retread
Shop by T. Jackson King. It's an orphan-human-in-alien-society-
makes-good story. Well written and entertaining, it could be read
either as a Young Adult or as straight SF with equal enjoyment.
Gardner Dozois and Susan Casper have collaborated on a new theme
anthology about the most famous mass-murderer in history, Jack the
Ripper. Ripper! includes a few reprint stories, but is mostly new
fiction about a time in English history that has grabbed a piece of the
cultural mind and never let go. It's full of good stories and is well
worth it for Horror readers or anyone with an interest in Jack.
Many stories have been written about bases on the moon, but how about a
User's Manual? That's what Ben Bova has done in Welcome to Moonbase, a
fictional (for now) book that describes everything you need to know to
get around and enjoy the permanent space enclave that the United States
in 2001. This is both a highly entertaining work and chock full of
facts about the moon and how a permanent moonbase could be built and
survive with current technologies. It's also a convincing work on why
this should be done.
Long out of print, Once on a Time is a Fairy Tale for Adults by A.A.
Milne, author of the classic Winnie the Pooh. I'm a hardcore fan of
Winnie, but I had real problems with this book. It's old, tired, not
terribly amusing and much too self-indulgent for my tastes. It's
obvious to me why this has been out of print so long, and I can
recommend it only to Milne completists and masochists. Unlike many, I
feel that an author's lesser works should be allowed to rest in peace,
and this is a good example of why.
From the disappointing to the horrid. Mel Gilden's Surfing Samurai Robots
is the first category book I've seen from Lynx/Omega, and as soon as I saw
the cover, I had this feeling I wasn't going to like it -- it was going to
either be unreadable or high camp. While Lynx/Omega was the publisher,
it was packaged by Byron Preiss, so I had some hope there might be
something interesting behind that cover.
Wrong. If this is the kind of book Lynx/Omega is going to put out,
anyone willing to admit to reading SF in public can write off the
entire line. I have to admit it -- this is one of the few books I
review that I didn't finish. I tried, but it wouldn't let me.
It's that bad.
----
End or Part 10
