Old Tea Leaf Reviews 3: 1983 Locus Poll Best
James Nicoll
Best First Novel
1 Courtship Rite Donald Kingsbury
The title comes from a series of deadly tests that a
prospective bride is put through (without, note, the inconvenience
of having consented or even having been informed that she is being
courted). The story is set on a world that has only a handful of
foods humans can digest and one of them is other humans.
I liked it at the time but I have not reread it in years.
Kingsbury's career began in the 1950s and it is still ongoing
today. He works at roughly the same pace as continental drift so he
does not have a lot of novels to date. I think the current count is
three.
Part of the problem may be that he's better suited for
novellas and there is not as much of a market for those as novels.
2 The Red Magician Lisa Goldstein
This is a fantasy set during the Holocaust. I have not
read it.
She has written a respectable number of books, most recently
as Isabel Glass.
3 The Windhover Tapes: An Image of Voices Warren Norwood
If I remember this correctly, it's about an interstellar
diplomat. If I am thinking of the right book, it was deadly dull.
He was quite prolific in the 1980s but I don't think he has
had much published since then.
4 Lady of Light Diana L. Paxson
I did not read this. My impression is that she writes
fantasies seemingly designed to annoy me.
Paxson is prolific and still active as an author.
5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
I like it at the time.
I think that this and a reworked version called SHAMAN is
the extent of her SF novel writing career.
6 The Space Eater David Langford
An unfortunately soldier and a companion are sent to a
distant planet to prevent its colonists from exploring a field
of science that previously trashed the US's eastern seaboard,
triggered WWIII and blew up a surprisingly high fraction of the
stars in the universe. Step one in this process involves being
crammed through a small hole.
This is one of my favourite books.
Langford hasn't written a lot of fiction but as far as I know
there's no reason that he couldn't get something published tomorrow.
7 God Stalk P. C. Hodgell
A young woman who is a calamity magnet visits a city known
for its vast number of gods. Hijinks ensue.
I enjoyed this a lot. Oddly, I don't think I ever reread
the sequel.
I believe that that there was a long gap between her second
book and her third and the implosion of her publisher last year is
inconvenient but as far as I know her career is ongoing.
8 Earthchild Sharon Webb
I did not read this.
I believe that she was quite prolific in the 1980s but
that she has not had much published recently.
9 The Delicate Dependency Michael Talbot
I assume this is a vampire novel.
He wrote a number of what look like horror novels in the
1980s but he appears to have been more interested in supposed
nonfiction about pseudoscience and the occult. He died in 1992.
10 Magician Raymond E. Feist
Young man chooses character class and presumably has
adventures. I didn't actually finish this one, being repelled
by the rpg-influenced elements.
Feist is a highly successful fantasy author.
11 The Kalevide Lou Goble
This is a fantasy novel based on Estonian mythology. I have
not read it.
I think this may be his only novel to date, although his
website said "A second novel is currently in preparation" circa
2006.
12 Sorcerer's Legacy Janny Wurts
Almost certainly a fantasy. I did not read it.
Wurts is prolific and still getting published.
13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
This is a fix-up of some novella(?) length stories. A
young man goes out on a beer run only to find himself caught
up in a pan-dimensional war.
I liked this a lot, enough to have bought most of his
books even though none of them quite hit the right spot for
me (In retrospect, I strongly prefer him at lengths shorter
than a novel).
I've never understood why he wasn't more popular. He
wrote a number of books for Del Rey in the 1980s and early 1990s
and then either got dumped by them or fed up with how he was
being treated. This puts him in the same company as Alexis
Gilliland, to name just one worthy author no longer found
at Del Rey.
His works can be found at this site:
14 The Shadow Hunter Pat Murphy
Forgive me for there is a Pat Murphy I not only
did not read but didn't know existed. I assume it's great.
She tends to have alarmingly long gaps in her
output (Seven years in one case, as I recall) but is
still getting published.
--
http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
http://www.cafepress.com/jdnicoll (For all your "The problem with
defending the English language [...]" T-shirt, cup and tote-bag needs)
Will in New Haven
> Best First Novel
>
>
> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>
> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
>
> I like it at the time.
>
> I think that this and a reworked version called SHAMAN is
> the extent of her SF novel writing career.
I think so. However, she has written some interesting analysis of SF,
especially the works of Poul Anderson. Interesting enough that I am
going to go look for her novel.
--
Will in New Haven
Ted Nolan
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
>
>Best First Novel
>
>1 Courtship Rite Donald Kingsbury
>
> The title comes from a series of deadly tests that a
>prospective bride is put through (without, note, the inconvenience
>of having consented or even having been informed that she is being
>courted). The story is set on a world that has only a handful of
>foods humans can digest and one of them is other humans.
>
> I liked it at the time but I have not reread it in years.
>
> Kingsbury's career began in the 1950s and it is still ongoing
>today. He works at roughly the same pace as continental drift so he
>does not have a lot of novels to date. I think the current count is
>three.
>
> Part of the problem may be that he's better suited for
>novellas and there is not as much of a market for those as novels.
>
>
I urged it on several people, though I remember very little of
the plot now.
The food problem was the result of the place being an unplanned colony.
Ted
--
------
columbiaclosings.com
What's not in Columbia anymore..
rexg...@yahoo.co.uk
> defending the English language [...]" T-shirt, cup and tote-bag needs)
I did try and reread Courtship Rite recently, though my version has
the UK title Geta, I was quite enjoying the reread but somehow I never
finished it again. Definitely an interesting novel for its time
Rex
Lawrence Watt-Evans
Nicoll) wrote:
>5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>
> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
>bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
>and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
>LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
Otters. It had talking otters.
I remember it as involving time travel -- the talking otters were in
the far future. But I may be misremembering.
>12 Sorcerer's Legacy Janny Wurts
>
> Almost certainly a fantasy. I did not read it.
It was fantasy-romance, twenty years ahead of its time. I read it,
enjoyed it, but was not tempted to re-read it or seek out a sequel,
and no longer remember the plot at all.
>13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
>
> I've never understood why he wasn't more popular. He
>wrote a number of books for Del Rey in the 1980s and early 1990s
>and then either got dumped by them or fed up with how he was
>being treated. This puts him in the same company as Alexis
>Gilliland, to name just one worthy author no longer found
>at Del Rey.
Don't forget Lee & Miller.
As someone who was a Del Rey author from 1979 to 1996, I could explain
what happened as far as their dumping of good authors goes, but it's
long and complicated and might get me sued for libel. The short
version is that when Judy-Lynn del Rey died in 1986 she had no heir
who actually understood how she'd run the company, and when the
inevitable decline became obvious around 1990*, they floundered in a
morass of office politics and recriminations over dropping sales. The
way to succeed as an editor (or above) at Del Rey in the early 1990s
was to find "hot" new authors while dumping anyone who'd been
discovered by someone else and whose sales were flat or dropping.
Whether an author was any good, or actually profitable, was irrelevant
-- what mattered was, "Is this an author with rising sales I can claim
credit for?"
This is a large part of why I'm now a Tor author, rather than Del Rey.
==
* It took that long before they started seeing real sales figures for
books they'd acquired after Judy-Lynn's death. Publishing lead times
are a bitch sometimes.
--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The eighth issue of Helix is now at http://www.helixsf.com
rexg...@yahoo.co.uk
> On Wed, 18 Jun 2008 03:14:35 +0000 (UTC), jdnic...@panix.com (James
> The eighth issue of Helix is now at http://www.helixsf.com
Its one of those assumptions we all make that companies, governments
etc are all competently run, and after dealing with a state agency
that pissed a huge amount of money away, I learned that such
assumtions are dangerous
Rex
ronincats
> 7 God Stalk P. C. Hodgell
>
> A young woman who is a calamity magnet visits a city known
> for its vast number of gods. Hijinks ensue.
>
> I enjoyed this a lot. Oddly, I don't think I ever reread
> the sequel.
>
> I believe that that there was a long gap between her second
> book and her third and the implosion of her publisher last year is
> inconvenient but as far as I know her career is ongoing.
The first book (Godstalk, 1982) is one of my top fantasies all time. I
was not impressed with the sequel at the time (1985), but when the
third book came out in 2000, I remember that it improved with re-
reading. The collection, Blood and Ivory, came out in 2002, and To
Ride a Rathorn in 2006. It was only thanks to Meisha Merlin that the
last three books ever got published, and I hated to see that publisher
go down. But the SFBC, probably thanks to Andrew, had them all
available at one time, although only the last now. However, Baen is
publishing a hardcover omnibus of the first two books next January,
and all of them appear to be available through Amazon.
I also have the Miesel, the Feist, and the Wurtz, although I am no
longer reading the new stuff by the latter 2 and, as you point out,
the first no longer is writing. And I can't seem to read Paxson
either. Thank heavens, though! I didn't know ANYBODY in the 1982 list.
John Schilling
Nicoll) wrote:
>Best First Novel
>13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
> This is a fix-up of some novella(?) length stories. A
>young man goes out on a beer run only to find himself caught
>up in a pan-dimensional war.
The only pan-dimensional war I've ever seen where someone
figured out that if there are rare but useful dimensional
portals scattered to the four corners of the Earth, there
might be more like them scattered on *other* worlds...
> I liked this a lot, enough to have bought most of his
>books even though none of them quite hit the right spot for
>me (In retrospect, I strongly prefer him at lengths shorter
>than a novel).
You know, I'd never thought of it that way, but you're quite
right. Everything McCollum writes, I read - and I kind of
sort of like it, because it kind of sort of reminds me that
this is the guy who wrote _A Greater Infinity_.
Not great, but memorably good.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*John.S...@alumni.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-718-0955 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
David Librik
>5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
>bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
>and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
>LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
Set in a grim Soviet University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
alternating with a Ren Faire world of sexy rock 'n' roll otters.
I came away with
(1) the feeling that the author really hadn't liked graduate school
(2) a vague, unplaceable disquiet about the romantic subplot which
wasn't assuaged until I learned the words "erotic furries."
- David Librik
lib...@panix.com
Mike Schilling
> On Jun 17, 11:14 pm, jdnic...@panix.com (James Nicoll) wrote:
>> Best First Novel
>>
>
>>
>> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>>
>> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
>> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
>> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
>> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
>>
>> I like it at the time.
>>
>> I think that this and a reworked version called SHAMAN is
>> the extent of her SF novel writing career.
>
> I think so. However, she has written some interesting analysis of
> SF,
> especially the works of Poul Anderson.
Some good stuff on Dickson's Dorsai as well.
Robert A. Woodward
Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
> On Wed, 18 Jun 2008 03:14:35 +0000 (UTC), jdni...@panix.com (James
> Nicoll) wrote:
>
> >5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
> >
> > If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
> >bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
> >and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
> >LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
>
And a brief glimpse of a SFWA launch party at the Cape (SF
professions at least).
> Otters. It had talking otters.
>
> I remember it as involving time travel -- the talking otters were in
> the far future. But I may be misremembering.
>
It had alternate time lines; the talking otters were in a time line
(in the far future) that didn't have WWI (or at least didn't have a
disastrous WWI followed by a worse WWII), but did have a
catastrophic event in the 3rd Millennium.
<snip>
--
Robert Woodward <robe...@drizzle.com>
<http://www.drizzle.com/~robertaw>
Robert A. Woodward
t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan) wrote:
I think it was a planned colony; but something went very wrong
while they were landing the colonists and supplies. The ship is
still in orbit.
news.iglou.com
news:g39uiq$cct$1...@reader2.panix.com...
>
> Best First Novel
Somehow, though this was in my poverty era, I read more of these.
>
> 1 Courtship Rite Donald Kingsbury
>
> The title comes from a series of deadly tests that a
> prospective bride is put through (without, note, the inconvenience
> of having consented or even having been informed that she is being
> courted). The story is set on a world that has only a handful of
> foods humans can digest and one of them is other humans.
The group marriage wanted to take on one woman, those in power wanted
them to have another, so they put the candidate through tests designed to
evalute her suitability to live. In one, as I recall, she was knocked out
and woke up in a cage in rising water with her hands nailed to the bars.
Why they just didn't arrange for one of the tests to be fatal puzzled
me.
>
> I liked it at the time but I have not reread it in years.
>
> Kingsbury's career began in the 1950s and it is still ongoing
> today. He works at roughly the same pace as continental drift so he
> does not have a lot of novels to date. I think the current count is
> three.
He does one every ten years, that is.
>
> Part of the problem may be that he's better suited for
> novellas and there is not as much of a market for those as novels.
>
>
> 2 The Red Magician Lisa Goldstein
>
> This is a fantasy set during the Holocaust. I have not
> read it.
>
This had a duel of wizards and the Holocaust, and yet I found it utterly
boring.
>
>
> 3 The Windhover Tapes: An Image of Voices Warren Norwood
>
> If I remember this correctly, it's about an interstellar
> diplomat. If I am thinking of the right book, it was deadly dull.
>
> He was quite prolific in the 1980s but I don't think he has
> had much published since then.
I believe he's been ill. He wrote a fantasy based on the assumption
that Guatemalan Indians share the same spiritual universe as Utes in Utah.
Sure, right, step along . . .
>
>
> 4 Lady of Light Diana L. Paxson
>
> I did not read this. My impression is that she writes
> fantasies seemingly designed to annoy me.
Lost of post-destruction fantasies where the New Age Wiccans now rule.
>
> Paxson is prolific and still active as an author.
>
>
> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>
> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
As others pointed out, this involved time travel.
The young woman traveled only mentally. Into the body of a mentally
retarded boy, and the accomodation was interesting.
>
> I like it at the time.
>
> I think that this and a reworked version called SHAMAN is
> the extent of her SF novel writing career.
As was pointed out, she wrote nonfiction about Anderson and Dickson. I
believe she switched to Dickson after being spectacularly enraged at
Anderson's _The Avatar_, or more precisely a promiscuous female character
therein.
She last wrote a book debunking _The Da Vinci Code_, which shouldn't
have been necessary but was.
> 10 Magician Raymond E. Feist
>
> Young man chooses character class and presumably has
> adventures. I didn't actually finish this one, being repelled
> by the rpg-influenced elements.
>
> Feist is a highly successful fantasy author.
Book got started as a rpg, I believe, and was involved in a spectacular
controversy because one of the settings was lifted from another rpg.
> 13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
>
> This is a fix-up of some novella(?) length stories. A
> young man goes out on a beer run only to find himself caught
> up in a pan-dimensional war.
And getting laid by all the hot interdimensional babes. Oh don't we
wish . . .
Joseph T Major
Will in New Haven
wrote:
I had heard that and was determined to look it up. Then I forgot about
it. Thanks for reminding me.
--
Will in New Haven
17
- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
James Nicoll
news.iglou.com <jtm...@iglou.com> wrote:
>"James Nicoll" <jdni...@panix.com> wrote in message
>news:g39uiq$cct$1...@reader2.panix.com...
>>
>>
>>
>> If I remember this correctly, it's about an interstellar
>> diplomat. If I am thinking of the right book, it was deadly dull.
>>
>> He was quite prolific in the 1980s but I don't think he has
>> had much published since then.
>
> I believe he's been ill.
Very ill: his wikipedia entry notes that he died in 2005
of liver disease and kidney failure.
>> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>>
>> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
>> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
>> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
>> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
>
> As others pointed out, this involved time travel.
>
> The young woman traveled only mentally. Into the body of a mentally
>retarded boy, and the accomodation was interesting.
>>
>> I like it at the time.
>>
>> I think that this and a reworked version called SHAMAN is
>> the extent of her SF novel writing career.
>
> As was pointed out, she wrote nonfiction about Anderson and Dickson. I
>believe she switched to Dickson after being spectacularly enraged at
>Anderson's _The Avatar_, or more precisely a promiscuous female character
>therein.
I've never seen her final Anderson essay, only read about it.
>> 10 Magician Raymond E. Feist
>>
>> Young man chooses character class and presumably has
>> adventures. I didn't actually finish this one, being repelled
>> by the rpg-influenced elements.
>>
>> Feist is a highly successful fantasy author.
>
> Book got started as a rpg, I believe, and was involved in a spectacular
>controversy because one of the settings was lifted from another rpg.
That would be Tekumel, a cursed RPG setting whose publishers
almost always tank soon after acquiring it (The exception is TSR,
which dumped it). I own both one edition of TEKUMEL and both of
MAR Barker's novels but I will admit I've never been able to finish
the novels.
>> 13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
>>
>> This is a fix-up of some novella(?) length stories. A
>> young man goes out on a beer run only to find himself caught
>> up in a pan-dimensional war.
>
> And getting laid by all the hot interdimensional babes. Oh don't we
>wish . . .
>
Really? I don't remember that part. Time for a reread.
James Nicoll
John Schilling <schi...@spock.usc.edu> wrote:
>On Wed, 18 Jun 2008 03:14:35 +0000 (UTC), jdni...@panix.com (James
>Nicoll) wrote:
>
>
>>Best First Novel
>
>>13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
>
>> This is a fix-up of some novella(?) length stories. A
>>young man goes out on a beer run only to find himself caught
>>up in a pan-dimensional war.
>
>The only pan-dimensional war I've ever seen where someone
>figured out that if there are rare but useful dimensional
>portals scattered to the four corners of the Earth, there
>might be more like them scattered on *other* worlds...
>
>
>> I liked this a lot, enough to have bought most of his
>>books even though none of them quite hit the right spot for
>>me (In retrospect, I strongly prefer him at lengths shorter
>>than a novel).
>
>You know, I'd never thought of it that way, but you're quite
>right. Everything McCollum writes, I read - and I kind of
>sort of like it, because it kind of sort of reminds me that
>this is the guy who wrote _A Greater Infinity_.
>
>Not great, but memorably good.
I see that he has a collection of short fiction out,
GRIDLOCK AND OTHER STORIES, which includes the following:
Beer Run
The first part of A GREATER INFINITY.
Duty, Honor, Planet
Is this the one where mean old Mexico picks on the helpless USA?
Gift (1980)
Life Probe (1983)
The basis for the novel of the same name, I'm guessing.
Scoop (1979)
Who Will Guard the Guardians? (1982) (cowritten with Catherine McCollum)
The Shroud (1981)
Man of the Renaissance (1988)
Gridlock (1989)
Dream World (1993)
Lysenko's Legacy
Gibraltar Stars (Chapter 1)
The first part of the novel of the same name,
Has anyone read the others?
James Nicoll
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>Not great, but memorably good.
>
> I see that he has a collection of short fiction out,
>GRIDLOCK AND OTHER STORIES, which includes the following:
>
>Beer Run
>
> The first part of A GREATER INFINITY.
>
>Duty, Honor, Planet
>
> Is this the one where mean old Mexico picks on the helpless USA?
If it is, it's part of the same universe as LIFEPROBE.
Howard
>
> Don't forget Lee & Miller.
>
> As someone who was a Del Rey author from 1979 to 1996, I could explain
> what happened as far as their dumping of good authors goes, but it's
> long and complicated and might get me sued for libel. The short
> version is that when Judy-Lynn del Rey died in 1986 she had no heir
> who actually understood how she'd run the company, and when the
> inevitable decline became obvious around 1990*, they floundered in a
> morass of office politics and recriminations over dropping sales. The
> way to succeed as an editor (or above) at Del Rey in the early 1990s
> was to find "hot" new authors while dumping anyone who'd been
> discovered by someone else and whose sales were flat or dropping.
> Whether an author was any good, or actually profitable, was irrelevant
> -- what mattered was, "Is this an author with rising sales I can claim
> credit for?"
>
> This is a large part of why I'm now a Tor author, rather than Del Rey.
I wondered about this. I used to read a ton of Del Rey titles, and
now I read very few. I wasn't totally sure if it was that my taste
had changed that much or if their editiorial mindset had changed.
John M. Gamble
ronincats <croch...@cox.net> wrote:
>James Nicoll wrote:
>
>> 7 God Stalk P. C. Hodgell
>>
>> A young woman who is a calamity magnet visits a city known
>> for its vast number of gods. Hijinks ensue.
>>
>> I enjoyed this a lot. Oddly, I don't think I ever reread
>> the sequel.
>>
>> I believe that that there was a long gap between her second
>> book and her third and the implosion of her publisher last year is
>> inconvenient but as far as I know her career is ongoing.
>
>The first book (Godstalk, 1982) is one of my top fantasies all time. I
>was not impressed with the sequel at the time (1985), but when the
>third book came out in 2000, I remember that it improved with re-
>reading. The collection, Blood and Ivory, came out in 2002, and To
>Ride a Rathorn in 2006. It was only thanks to Meisha Merlin that the
>last three books ever got published, and I hated to see that publisher
Well, also Hypatia Books, which published all three in the mid-nineties,
plus a short story collection, plus a novella.
Hypatia, as far as I could tell, was a one-man operation whose
catalogue consisted of "stuff I like that I want to see in print
and in hardcover." To be honest, that's something *I'd* like to
do someday, although I'll be realistic and base my business
model on expectations of red ink.
>go down. But the SFBC, probably thanks to Andrew, had them all
>available at one time, although only the last now. However, Baen is
>publishing a hardcover omnibus of the first two books next January,
>and all of them appear to be available through Amazon.
>
--
-john
February 28 1997: Last day libraries could order catalogue cards
from the Library of Congress.
Denis Trenque
>
> Don't forget Lee & Miller.
>
> As someone who was a Del Rey author from 1979 to 1996, I could explain
> what happened as far as their dumping of good authors goes, but it's
> long and complicated and might get me sued for libel. The short
> version is that when Judy-Lynn del Rey died in 1986 she had no heir
> who actually understood how she'd run the company, and when the
> inevitable decline became obvious around 1990*, they floundered in a
> morass of office politics and recriminations over dropping sales. The
> way to succeed as an editor (or above) at Del Rey in the early 1990s
> was to find "hot" new authors while dumping anyone who'd been
> discovered by someone else and whose sales were flat or dropping.
> Whether an author was any good, or actually profitable, was irrelevant
> -- what mattered was, "Is this an author with rising sales I can claim
> credit for?"
>
> This is a large part of why I'm now a Tor author, rather than Del Rey.
>
>
> ==
>
> * It took that long before they started seeing real sales figures for
> books they'd acquired after Judy-Lynn's death. Publishing lead times
> are a bitch sometimes.
Or Katherine Kurtz, who had also problems with Del Rey, and is now with
Ace for the Deryni serie.
Konrad Gaertner
> 7 God Stalk P. C. Hodgell
>
> I believe that that there was a long gap between her second
> book and her third and the implosion of her publisher last year is
> inconvenient but as far as I know her career is ongoing.
Yup. In addition to the Baen omnibus coming out in January, her website
says she has a publisher deadline next Feb 14, which I would assume is
for the fifth book.
--
Konrad Gaertner - - - - - - - - - - - - email: kgae...@tx.rr.com
http://kgbooklog.livejournal.com/
"I don't mind hidden depths but I insist that there be a surface."
-- James Nicoll
ronincats
> >The first book (Godstalk, 1982) is one of my top fantasies all time. I
> >was not impressed with the sequel at the time (1985), but when the
> >third book came out in 2000, I remember that it improved with re-
> >reading. The collection, Blood and Ivory, came out in 2002, and To
> >Ride a Rathorn in 2006. It was only thanks to Meisha Merlin that the
> >last three books ever got published, and I hated to see that publisher
>
> Well, also Hypatia Books, which published all three in the mid-nineties,
> plus a short story collection, plus a novella.
>
> Hypatia, as far as I could tell, was a one-man operation whose
> catalogue consisted of "stuff I like that I want to see in print
> and in hardcover." To be honest, that's something *I'd* like to
> do someday, although I'll be realistic and base my business
> model on expectations of red ink.
>
I had forgotten about that. I couldn't afford them at the time, so
just lusted after them in my heart!
Rhonda
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>
> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
Beckmannesque? Bruckheimeresque <http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000988>
I could understand, but who's this Beckman(n)?
> 13 A Greater Infinity Michael A. McCollum
>
> This is a fix-up of some novella(?) length stories. A young
> man goes out on a beer run only to find himself caught up in a
> pan-dimensional war.
Somewhere a character in Barbara Hambly's THE TIME OF THE DARK
is exclaiming "Hey, the nearly exact same thing happened to me!"
--
William December Starr <wds...@panix.com>
James Nicoll
William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <g39uiq$cct$1...@reader2.panix.com>,
>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>
>> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>>
>> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
>> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
>> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
>> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
>
>Beckmannesque? Bruckheimeresque <http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000988>
>I could understand, but who's this Beckman(n)?
>
of Not Going Nuclear has a little bit about the awesome destructitudinous
potential of LNG tankers, if you assume perfect air/fuel mixing (Also
coal trains, IIRC). He was also not keen on relativity and he came up
with his own model called Galilean Electrodynamics, which if memory
serves he posted about on the physics newsgroups. I seem to recall he
was never too forthcoming about the particulars of GE. Oh, and he
didn't like quantum mechanics either.
Dangers was published by Ace while Baen was there and both
versions of Miesel's book were edited by Jim Baen.
As I recall, Beckmann tended to see communist tendencies
behind any disagreement with him.
Wayne Throop
: Petr Beckmann, famed right-wing wingnut. His The Health Hazards
: potential of LNG tankers, if you assume perfect air/fuel mixing (Also
: coal trains, IIRC). He was also not keen on relativity and he came up
: with his own model called Galilean Electrodynamics, which if memory
: serves he posted about on the physics newsgroups. I seem to recall he
: was never too forthcoming about the particulars of GE.
IIRC (and assuming I don't conflate him with somebody else) his notion
was an entrained ether theory, with a local prefered frame of "the dominant
mass", ie, near earth the prefered frame *is* the earth, near the sun
it's the sun, etc. Where he got a bit fuzzy was just how this dominance
was defined, and why there weren't visible refraction effects between
domains, and why there wasn't a noticeable rotation of the prefered
earth frame, and so on and on.
He started a magazine/journal/whatnot called "Galilean Electrodynamics"
(or maybe "journal of GE") but I don't know if it's still around.
There's no shortage of anti-relativity folks out there so it probably is.
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
James Nicoll
>
>
>He started a magazine/journal/whatnot called "Galilean Electrodynamics"
>(or maybe "journal of GE") but I don't know if it's still around.
>There's no shortage of anti-relativity folks out there so it probably is.
Enjoy!
http://home.comcast.net/~adring/GEEditors.htm
John M. Gamble
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <g3kuhm$2il$1...@panix2.panix.com>,
>William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>>In article <g39uiq$cct$1...@reader2.panix.com>,
>>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>>
>>> 5 Dreamrider Sandra Miesel
>>>
>>> If I recall this correctly, a young woman from an over-
>>> bureaucratized Earth somehow gets access to one where magic works
>>> and animals talk. I believe it featured a Beckmannesque exploding
>>> LNG tanker and a predatory lesbian antagonist in a minor role.
>>
>>Beckmannesque? Bruckheimeresque <http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000988>
>>I could understand, but who's this Beckman(n)?
>>
> Petr Beckmann, famed right-wing wingnut. His The Health Hazards
>of Not Going Nuclear has a little bit about the awesome destructitudinous
>potential of LNG tankers, if you assume perfect air/fuel mixing (Also
>coal trains, IIRC). He was also not keen on relativity and he came up
>with his own model called Galilean Electrodynamics, which if memory
>serves he posted about on the physics newsgroups. I seem to recall he
>was never too forthcoming about the particulars of GE. Oh, and he
>didn't like quantum mechanics either.
>
> Dangers was published by Ace while Baen was there and both
>versions of Miesel's book were edited by Jim Baen.
>
> As I recall, Beckmann tended to see communist tendencies
>behind any disagreement with him.
>
Huh, I didn't realize he posted to newsgroups. I only knew of him
via his (mostly good) *A History Of Pi*, and a really strange
newsletter he published that a co-worker subscribed to and insisted
on sharing.