Hating Humanity

[Tabu LaRaza]

I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
(he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
humanity hating protagonists?

Thanks,

TR

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Tabu LaRaza said:

S. M. Stirling's recent _Infiltrator_ (part of the _Terminator_ continuity)
features Serena, a mostly-human Terminator cyborg who hates humanity even more
than does Skynet.
--
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
--
"To urge the preparation of defence is not to assert the imminence of war. On
the contrary, if war were imminent, preparations for defense would be too
late." (Churchill, 1934)
--

[James A. Wolf]

"Tabu LaRaza" <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:

Does Marvin the Paraniod Android count? <G>
--

<*> James A. Wolf - jaw...@mediaone.net - people.ne.mediaone.net/jawolf <*>

"The jawbone of an ass is | "What you do should speak | "If Murphy's Laws
just as dangerous a weapon | so loudly that no one can | are religion, I
today as in Samson's time." | hear what you say." | must be a saint."
Richard M. Nixon | Marv Levy | Tom Smith

[Lawrence Person]

In article <VmXc7.6608$pg5.79...@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>,
"Tabu LaRaza" <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:

The platform of the Green Party.

--
Lawrence Person
lawrenc...@jump.net
Lame Excuse Books Now Online at: http://www.abebooks.com
Nova Express Website: http://www.sflit.com/novaexpress

[Brenda W. Clough]

Tabu LaRaza wrote:

Over in BATMAN the arch-villain Ra's al Ghul's avowed goal is to purify the
planet and off ninety percent or so of the human race. He will then of course
rule the remnants.

Brenda

--
What do you do with a secret?
Whisper it in a desert at high noon.
Lock it up and bury the key.
Tell the nation on prime-time TV.
Choose a door . . .

Doors of Death and Life
by Brenda W. Clough
http://www.sff.net/people/Brenda
Tor Books
ISBN 0-312-87064-7

[Richard Horton]

There's a '50s SF story -- I think it's by Asimov, or maybe Anderson,
about a scientist who discovers a secret that will inevitably lead to
the destruction of the Earth (super nuclear war, or something), and
after some internal debate about whether to suppress his results he
decides, screw it, these were the kids who beat me up because I wore
glasses, and laughed at me because I was smarter, and if they were
women never dated me -- kill 'em all. So he releases the terrible
secret.

--
Rich Horton | Stable Email: mailto://richard...@sff.net
Home Page: http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton
Also visit SF Site (http://www.sfsite.com) and Tangent Online (http://www.tangentonline.com)

[Fred Galvin]

On Sat, 11 Aug 2001, Richard Horton wrote:

> There's a '50s SF story -- I think it's by Asimov, or maybe Anderson,
> about a scientist who discovers a secret that will inevitably lead to
> the destruction of the Earth (super nuclear war, or something), and
> after some internal debate about whether to suppress his results he
> decides, screw it, these were the kids who beat me up because I wore
> glasses, and laughed at me because I was smarter, and if they were
> women never dated me -- kill 'em all. So he releases the terrible
> secret.

"Judgment Day" by L. Sprague de Camp. The first line: "It took me a
long time to decide whether to let the earth live."

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Richard Horton said:

>There's a '50s SF story -- I think it's by Asimov, or maybe Anderson,
>about a scientist who discovers a secret that will inevitably lead to
>the destruction of the Earth (super nuclear war, or something), and
>after some internal debate about whether to suppress his results he
>decides, screw it, these were the kids who beat me up because I wore
>glasses, and laughed at me because I was smarter, and if they were
>women never dated me -- kill 'em all. So he releases the terrible
>secret.

L. Sprague De Camp. And it was worse than that -- he _had_ been married, to a
terrible woman. It was basically a simple equation that would let anyone with
very moderate technical skill start a self-sustaining "Arkon bomb" type
reaction, turning the whole planet into a fireball.

[Robert A. Woodward]

In article <mE1d7.6904$3K6.83...@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>,
Richard Horton <rrho...@prodigy.net> wrote:

> On Fri, 10 Aug 2001 20:21:09 GMT, "Tabu LaRaza"
> <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
> >I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
> >scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
> >(he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
> >reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
> >humanity hating protagonists?
>
> There's a '50s SF story -- I think it's by Asimov, or maybe Anderson,
> about a scientist who discovers a secret that will inevitably lead to
> the destruction of the Earth (super nuclear war, or something), and
> after some internal debate about whether to suppress his results he
> decides, screw it, these were the kids who beat me up because I wore
> glasses, and laughed at me because I was smarter, and if they were
> women never dated me -- kill 'em all. So he releases the terrible
> secret.

L. Sprague de Camp, "Judgement Day" (ASF, August 1955).

--
robe...@drizzle.com http://www.halcyon.com/robertaw/
rawoo...@aol.com
robe...@halcyon.com

[Mark Atwood]

jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:
> "Arkon bomb"

Ref, "Arkon bomb"?

I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?

--
Mark Atwood | I'm wearing black only until I find something darker.
m...@pobox.com | http://www.pobox.com/~mra

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Mark Atwood said:

>
>jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:
>> "Arkon bomb"
>
>Ref, "Arkon bomb"?
>
>I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?

A very nasty weapon from _Perry Rhodan_ -- and the first time I encountered the
"planet buster" concept :)

[William Clifford]

In <lawrenceperson-107...@news.jump.net>,

Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
> In article <VmXc7.6608$pg5.79...@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>,
> "Tabu LaRaza" <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
>> I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
>> scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
>> (he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
>> reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
>> humanity hating protagonists?
>>
> The platform of the Green Party.

"Because you... are hurting... the green."

(which is my way of nominating Jason Woodrue from a particular issue of
_Swamp Thing_ by Alan Moore.)

--
| William Clifford | wo...@yahoo.com | http://wobh.home.mindspring.com |
|"Stick to what you know is good advice for a writing seminar, but it |
| will never get you in the ring with Homer." |
| --Joel Stein on Thomas Pynchon, Time, 7.9.01 |

[James Nicoll]

"Tabu LaRaza" <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
>I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
>scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
>(he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
>reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
>humanity hating protagonists?

Hrm. There is DeCamp's tale about the fellow who has devised a
way to easily destroy the planet, debating with himself whether or not
to publish. DOn't recall the name, though.

[jeff suzuki]

Lawrence Person wrote:
>
> The platform of the Green Party.
>

And, though it's only marginally SF, _Rainbow Six_ (Clancy's next to
latest).

Jeffs

[Peter Bruells]

Mark Atwood <m...@pobox.com> writes:

> jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:
>> "Arkon bomb"

> Ref, "Arkon bomb"?

> I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?

Perry Rhodan pulp fiction. A planet-killer weapon that starts a
self-sustaining "atomic fire" which consumes an Earthylike planet
within days.

[Geoduck]

On Fri, 10 Aug 2001 20:13:51 -0400, "Brenda W. Clough"
<clo...@erols.com> wrote:

>
>
>Tabu LaRaza wrote:
>
>> I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
>> scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
>> (he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
>> reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
>> humanity hating protagonists?
>
>Over in BATMAN the arch-villain Ra's al Ghul's avowed goal is to purify the
>planet and off ninety percent or so of the human race. He will then of course
>rule the remnants.

The title character in M. J. Engh's _Arslan_ essentially wipes out
humanity by deliberately sterilizing everyone.

Strieber and Kunetka's _Nature's End_ also has a religious leader who
is plotting a similar scheme.
--
Geoduck
http://www.olywa.net/cook

[Tabu LaRaza]

In what series would I find this arch villain? By the way I loved your last
two novels.

TR.
"Brenda W. Clough" <clo...@erols.com> wrote in message
news:3B7478BF...@erols.com...

[Tabu LaRaza]

Thanks for the DeCamp suggestion. It sounds a little like Herbert's White
Plague which I suspect the author of Blue No6 borrowed from.

TR

"James Nicoll" <jdni...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:9l34rs$r5f$1...@panix1.panix.com...

[Nancy Lebovitz]

In article <%Hcd7.7807$yf5.194...@newssvr15.news.prodigy.com>,

Tabu LaRaza <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>>
>> Hrm. There is DeCamp's tale about the fellow who has devised a
>> way to easily destroy the planet, debating with himself whether or not
>> to publish. DOn't recall the name, though.
>

It was in _A Gun for Dinosaur_--the title might have been "Judgement Day".
The scientist(?) inventor(?) had been bullied as a child, didn't get
involved with people as a result, and had just been the subject of a
nasty practical joke and/or vandalism.

--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com

[Nancy Lebovitz]

In article <VmXc7.6608$pg5.79...@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>,

The first Kage Baker novel (_Garden of Iden_?) had a protagonist who
hates the human race, but isn't doing anything drastic about it.

[Monte Davis]

jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) wrote:

Or with a nastier twist, Kornbluth's "The Words of Guru."

[Ide Cyan]

Well, nobody's mentioned it yet: The Last Flight of Dr. Ain.

--
"I knew a girl at school called Pandora.
Never got to see her box, though."
- Spike, Notting Hill.

[Tabu LaRaza]

Do you have an author's name to go with it?
TR

> Well, nobody's mentioned it yet: The Last Flight of Dr. Ain.
>
> --

.

[Richard Horton]

That's the one! (Thanks also to Fred Galvin -- and James and Nancy
were on the track of the same story, too.)

[Elf Sternberg]

In article <lawrenceperson-107...@news.jump.net>
Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> writes:

>> I saw this after reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there
>> any SF that features humanity hating protagonists?

>The platform of the Green Party.

The chairman of the Federal Stem Cell Research Ethics Committee.

Elf

--
Elf M. Sternberg, rational romantic mystical cynical idealist
http://www.halcyon.com/elf/

Dvorak Keyboards: Frgp ucpoy ncb. ru e.u.bo.v

[Ide Cyan]

Tabu LaRaza wrote:
> > Well, nobody's mentioned it yet: The Last Flight of Dr. Ain.
>

> Do you have an author's name to go with it?

James Tiptree Jr., of course.

[Jason Bontrager]

Elf Sternberg wrote:
>
> In article <lawrenceperson-107...@news.jump.net>
> Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> writes:
>
> >> I saw this after reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there
> >> any SF that features humanity hating protagonists?
>
> >The platform of the Green Party.
>
>The chairman of the Federal Stem Cell Research Ethics Committee.

Leon Kass.

Oh, wait, he's not SF. Damn, if he were I could
throw him at the wall:-(.

Jason B.

.

[Tabu LaRaza]

Thanks!

I plead ignorance to her work --could you give me a collection in which the
title is collected ,

TR
"Ide Cyan" <ide_...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:3B75FA62...@yahoo.com...

[Ide Cyan]

Tabu LaRaza wrote:
> Thanks!
>
> I plead ignorance to her work --could you give me a collection in which the
> title is collected ,

According to http://www.sfsite.com/isfdb-bin/pwork.cgi?564159

Publication History

For: The Last Flight of Dr. Ain

1.Galaxy Science Fiction, March 1969, Frederik Pohl, 1969, $.60
2.SF: Authors' Choice 4, Harry Harrison, 1974, G. P. Putnam's, hc
3.Warm Worlds and Otherwise, James Tiptree, Jr., 1975, Ballantine,
0-345-28022-9, $1.95, pb
4.Warm Worlds and Otherwise, James Tiptree, Jr., 1975, Ballantine,
#345-24380-3, $1.50, pb
5.Galaxy, Frederik Pohl+Martin H. Greenberg+Joseph D. Olander, 1980,
Playboy Press, 0-87223-568-8, $10.95, hc
6.Galaxy, Frederik Pohl+Martin H. Greenberg+Joseph D. Olander, 1980,
Playboy, 0-87223-568-8, $10.95, hc
7.Galaxy Volume 2, Frederik Pohl+Martin H. Greenberg+Joseph D.
Olander, 1981, Playboy Paperbacks 0-872-16926-X, $2.50, pb
8.Road to SF 4, James E. Gunn, 1982, Mentor, pb
9.Yesterday's Tomorrows, Frederik Pohl, 1982, Berkley, 0-425-05648-1,
$9.95 ($10.95 Can), tp
10.The Road to Science Fiction #4, James E. Gunn, 1982, Mentor,
0-451-62136-0, $4.95, pb
11.Her Smoke Rose Up Forever, James Tiptree, Jr., 1990, Arkham House,
$25.95, hc

[Charlie Stross]

Stoned koala bears drooled eucalyptus spittle in awe
as <je...@bu.edu> declared:

If you're not careful I'll post some spoiler-type comments for this one.

Clue: "Rainbow Six" was so incredibly _bad_ that I kept turning the pages
right to the end, looking for more idiocy to boggle at.

-- Charlie

"Your password must be at least 18770 characters and cannot repeat any of your
previous 30689 passwords. Please type a different password. Type a password
that meets these requirements in both text boxes."
(Error message from Microsoft Windows 2000 SP1)

[trike]

Brenda W. Clough <clo...@erols.com> wrote in message
news:3B7478BF...@erols.com...
>
>

> Tabu LaRaza wrote:
>
> > I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
> > scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear
war

> > (he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this

after
> > reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
> > humanity hating protagonists?
>

> Over in BATMAN the arch-villain Ra's al Ghul's avowed goal is to purify
the
> planet and off ninety percent or so of the human race. He will then of
course
> rule the remnants.
>
> Brenda

Well, if you're letting in comic books, then there's that Big Magnetic Dude
over in X-Men who has it in for humans.

Although I think all superhero comics are fantasies, but that's another
thread....

--
Doug
--
Moviedogs v3.0: your favorite dogs in your favorite films:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/1910

Spike, Tiggy & Panda's Pug-A-Rama:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/1910

[Pete McCutchen]

On 10 Aug 2001 21:03:37 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>Tabu LaRaza said:
>
>>I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
>>scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
>>(he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
>>reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
>>humanity hating protagonists?
>

>S. M. Stirling's recent _Infiltrator_ (part of the _Terminator_ continuity)
>features Serena, a mostly-human Terminator cyborg who hates humanity even more
>than does Skynet.

Is she a lesbian?
--

Pete McCutchen

[Jason Bontrager]

Based on the sample chapters at the smstirling website,
she's bi-sexual. Those chapters were posted well before
the book was published though, so he might have changed
that.

Jason B.

.

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Pete McCutchen said:

>>S. M. Stirling's recent _Infiltrator_ (part of the _Terminator_ continuity)
>>features Serena, a mostly-human Terminator cyborg who hates humanity even
more
>>than does Skynet.
>
>Is she a lesbian?

No.

Insofar as she has any sexual preference beyond "Kill humans," she's hetero.

[artyw]

"Tabu LaRaza" <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote in message news:<VmXc7.6608$pg5.79...@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...

> I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
> scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
> (he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
> reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
> humanity hating protagonists?
>

In the Robert Silverberg novel, The Man in the Maze, aliens do
something to the protagonist so that he can not co-exist with humans.
"Hating" may not be exactly the write word, though.

[Tabu LaRaza]

Again thanks--now its off to half.com!

TR

"Ide Cyan" <ide_...@yahoo.com> wrote in message

news:3B762447...@yahoo.com...

[TLambs1138]

A lot of Sheri Tepper books...

Jean Lamb, tlamb...@cs.com
"Fun will now commence!" - Seven of Nine

[Charles Dyer]

On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 3:49:01 -0500, Charlie Stross wrote
(in message <slrn9ncgnt....@antipope.nsl.co.uk>):

> Stoned koala bears drooled eucalyptus spittle in awe
> as <je...@bu.edu> declared:
>
>> Lawrence Person wrote:
>>>
>>> The platform of the Green Party.
>>
>> And, though it's only marginally SF, _Rainbow Six_ (Clancy's next to
>> latest).
>
> If you're not careful I'll post some spoiler-type comments for this one.
>
> Clue: "Rainbow Six" was so incredibly _bad_ that I kept turning the pages
> right to the end, looking for more idiocy to boggle at.

Clancy has acheived brain meltdown. _Rainbow Six_ is the worst book he's ever
written, and he's produced some stinkers. It's even worse than the 'in the
world of' sharcropping books he let loose under his name. (Well, it's worse
than the single example fo the type I've read, maybe some of the others are
as bad, though I doubt it.) He's producing stuff that if was written by
someone else would never be published, kinda like what RAH was doing, near
the end... and while it took RAH decades and much medical problems to get
there, Clancy has done it in less than half the time and with no medical
excuses. And Clancy at his best wasn't as good as RAH at his best, while
Clancy at his worst...

>
>
>
> -- Charlie
>
> "Your password must be at least 18770 characters and cannot repeat any of
> your
> previous 30689 passwords. Please type a different password. Type a password
> that meets these requirements in both text boxes."
> (Error message from Microsoft Windows 2000
> SP1)
>

I like it. I like it.

--
Newsweek on tradenames:

Microsoft is a bad tradename. Micro and soft... needs Viagra.

[David T. Bilek]

Charles Dyer <charl...@mac.com> wrote:
>On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 3:49:01 -0500, Charlie Stross wrote
>(in message <slrn9ncgnt....@antipope.nsl.co.uk>):
>

>> Clue: "Rainbow Six" was so incredibly _bad_ that I kept turning the pages
>> right to the end, looking for more idiocy to boggle at.
>
>Clancy has acheived brain meltdown. _Rainbow Six_ is the worst book he's ever
>written, and he's produced some stinkers. It's even worse than the 'in the
>world of' sharcropping books he let loose under his name. (Well, it's worse
>than the single example fo the type I've read, maybe some of the others are
>as bad, though I doubt it.) He's producing stuff that if was written by
>someone else would never be published, kinda like what RAH was doing, near
>the end... and while it took RAH decades and much medical problems to get
>there, Clancy has done it in less than half the time and with no medical
>excuses. And Clancy at his best wasn't as good as RAH at his best, while
>Clancy at his worst...
>

I take it you didn't read _The Bear and the Dragon_. Pound for pound
it might be more bloated than Tad Williams' just completed elephant
choker. And I never thought I'd ever be able to say that about
anything.

(Of course, there were 4 bloated books in Williams' series to the one
Clancy, so the sheer mass of bloat is still on Williams' side.)

-David

[Jordan S. Bassior]

I state publicly that I _liked_ BOTH _Rainbow Six_ and _The Bear and the
Dragon_. So nyah :)

[David T. Bilek]

On 13 Aug 2001 05:22:44 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>I state publicly that I _liked_ BOTH _Rainbow Six_ and _The Bear and the
>Dragon_. So nyah :)
>

Oh, I finished _TBatD_ which is something I haven't been doing a lot
of lately, so though I'd never begin to claim that Clancy, or the
stable of writers he has writing for him if what I hear is true, are
geat writers, they have *something* going for them.

But you didn't find the 3 or 4 pages of extraneous interior monologue
almost *every time* he switched POV's just the least bit tedious? It
was regular as clockwork! I wanted to slap him and yell "get ON with
it already!"

-David

[Jordan S. Bassior]

David T. Bilek said:

>But you didn't find the 3 or 4 pages of extraneous interior monologue
>almost *every time* he switched POV's just the least bit tedious? It
>was regular as clockwork! I wanted to slap him and yell "get ON with
>it already!"

I'm a fast reader.

[David T. Bilek]

On 13 Aug 2001 06:42:37 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>David T. Bilek said:

>
>>But you didn't find the 3 or 4 pages of extraneous interior monologue
>>almost *every time* he switched POV's just the least bit tedious? It
>>was regular as clockwork! I wanted to slap him and yell "get ON with
>>it already!"
>
>I'm a fast reader.
>

It's an artistic difference then, I guess. I've got nothing against
pure slam-bang action novels with no deeper meaning, but IMO if thats
what you're writing, you've got to keep the pace going a bit faster.
The book is about blowing the hell out of the Chinese armed forces.
We know it going in. Show me some Chinese armed forces being blown
up before page 900(!) dammit!!

-David

[Jordan S. Bassior]

David T. Bilek said:

>It's an artistic difference then, I guess. I've got nothing against
>pure slam-bang action novels with no deeper meaning, but IMO if thats
>what you're writing, you've got to keep the pace going a bit faster.

That isn't what Clancy writes. His novels have a _lot_ of "deeper meaning" --
you just don't agree with his themes.

[Charles Dyer]

On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 21:50:22 -0500, David T. Bilek wrote
(in message <3b773f94....@nntp.we.mediaone.net>):

> Charles Dyer <charl...@mac.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 3:49:01 -0500, Charlie Stross wrote
>> (in message <slrn9ncgnt....@antipope.nsl.co.uk>):
>>
>>> Clue: "Rainbow Six" was so incredibly _bad_ that I kept turning the pages
>>> right to the end, looking for more idiocy to boggle at.
>>
>> Clancy has acheived brain meltdown. _Rainbow Six_ is the worst book he's
>> ever
>> written, and he's produced some stinkers. It's even worse than the 'in the
>> world of' sharcropping books he let loose under his name. (Well, it's
>> worse
>> than the single example fo the type I've read, maybe some of the others
>> are
>> as bad, though I doubt it.) He's producing stuff that if was written by
>> someone else would never be published, kinda like what RAH was doing, near
>> the end... and while it took RAH decades and much medical problems to get
>> there, Clancy has done it in less than half the time and with no medical
>> excuses. And Clancy at his best wasn't as good as RAH at his best, while
>> Clancy at his worst...
>>
>
> I take it you didn't read _The Bear and the Dragon_.

I read it. It's better than _Rainbow Six_. It's better than _Executive
Action_.

Of course, being better than those two isn't hard.

> Pound for pound
> it might be more bloated than Tad Williams' just completed elephant
> choker. And I never thought I'd ever be able to say that about
> anything.

I take it that _you_ haven't read Harry Turtledov's 'Worldwar' and 'Second
Contact' books? If I read one more time, just one more time, about that
blasted knight in his blasted rusty armour on his blasted nag, I swear that
I'll go to LA and do somethnig that I'll need Johnny Cochran to get out of.

>
> (Of course, there were 4 bloated books in Williams' series to the one
> Clancy, so the sheer mass of bloat is still on Williams' side.)

The Turtledove count is seven. And he's moving on with the 'Great War' and
'American Empire' books, too. At least he kills off characters in those books
before they can bleat the readers to death.

And yet he _can_ write good stuff; _The Guns of the South_, _The Case of the
Toxic Spell Dump_, the Scarus books...
>
> -David

[Tabu LaRaza]

Is Tepper limited to just hating men or is there specific character's who
hate the race?

TR
"TLambs1138" <tlamb...@cs.com> wrote in message
news:20010812164002...@ng-bg1.news.cs.com...

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Tabu LaRaza said:

>Is Tepper limited to just hating men or is there specific character's who
>hate the race?

Don't know about "characters," but in _Galapagos_, Kurt Vonnegut pretty much
seems to hate everything about humanity that makes us human -- big brains,
hands, upright posture.

No, I'm not kidding -- and it's _explicit_ in the book. Read it.

[Geoffrey Kidd]

On 13 Aug 2001 05:22:44 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>I state publicly that I _liked_ BOTH _Rainbow Six_ and _The Bear and the

My problem with "Rainbow Six" was that every time one of the
snipers on the team fired, I kept hearing the name "Vicki Weaver"
whispering in my ear. Couldn't finish the book as a result.

[Geoffrey Kidd]

On 11 Aug 2001 07:27:56 -0400, jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll)
wrote:

>"Tabu LaRaza" <DIGIT...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>>
>>I recently saw an anime film called Blue Submarine no 6 which featured a
>>scientist who wished to extinguish the human race by causing a nuclear war
>>(he already had killed ten billion through a pole shift?). I saw this after
>>reading Heart of Darkness and my question is- there any SF that features
>>humanity hating protagonists?
>

> Hrm. There is DeCamp's tale about the fellow who has devised a
>way to easily destroy the planet, debating with himself whether or not
>to publish. DOn't recall the name, though.

The deCamp story is "Judgment Day". It's in print at
www.fictionwise.com

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Charles Dyer said:

>I take it that _you_ haven't read Harry Turtledov's 'Worldwar' and 'Second
>Contact' books? If I read one more time, just one more time, about that
>blasted knight in his blasted rusty armour on his blasted nag, I swear that
>I'll go to LA and do somethnig that I'll need Johnny Cochran to get out of.

Ah, but you miss the significance of that image. It _mocks_ the Race -- they
were _hoping_ that we hadn't progressed too far beyond that point. Instead,
they came to our system to find us within a century or two of their own
technology.

Nasty surprise :)

--
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
--
"To urge the preparation of defence is not to assert the imminence of war. On
the contrary, if war were imminent, preparations for defense would be too
late." (Churchill, 1934)

--

[jeff suzuki]

"David T. Bilek" wrote:
>
> Oh, I finished _TBatD_ which is something I haven't been doing a lot
> of lately, so though I'd never begin to claim that Clancy, or the
> stable of writers he has writing for him if what I hear is true, are
> geat writers, they have *something* going for them.

Martin H. Greenberg (I think) once did an analysis of Clancy's works
and why they were so popular (I'm a Clancy fan, just so you know which
direction this is heading in...) The main thing that came out is that
his works were popular for several reasons, the main ones being that:

1) His works suggest that, for the most part, the people of the US
aren't evil, fools, or incompetents, but neither are they
supermen: they do things well because they work hard at it.

2) As a corollary to #1, his books actually have heroes. So much
of modern so-called literature seems to enshrine the anti-hero.
Personally, I'd rather not read a story about someone I'd sooner
shoot than befriend.

His last few books, BTW, have been a lot _less_ bloated than my all
time least favorite, _The Sum of All Fears_.

Jeffs

[jeff suzuki]

Monte Davis wrote:
>
> Or with a nastier twist, Kornbluth's "The Words of Guru."

That doesn't really count as "hating humanity" per se: the main
character didn't have enough empathy with humanity to actually "hate"
it. Humanity was more a plaything, to be disposed of at will.

Jeffs

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Geoffrey Kidd said:

>My problem with "Rainbow Six" was that every time one of the
>snipers on the team fired, I kept hearing the name "Vicki Weaver"
>whispering in my ear. Couldn't finish the book as a result.

I'm not going to hate the FBI, or their snipers, in general, because of Ruby
Ridge.

--
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
--
"To urge the preparation of defence is not to assert the imminence of war. On
the contrary, if war were imminent, preparations for defense would be too
late." (Churchill, 1934)

--

[Geoffrey Kidd]

On 13 Aug 2001 17:12:07 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>Geoffrey Kidd said:

>
>>My problem with "Rainbow Six" was that every time one of the
>>snipers on the team fired, I kept hearing the name "Vicki Weaver"
>>whispering in my ear. Couldn't finish the book as a result.
>
>I'm not going to hate the FBI, or their snipers, in general, because of Ruby
>Ridge.
>--
>Sincerely Yours,
>Jordan

The problem is Clancy's overt assumption that the guys who work for
the government are AUTOMATICALLY the good guys, pure and noble.

And just try to tell ME that a man trained 1. To drive a tack with a
rifle at 400 yards and 2. Fire that rifle ONLY when he is absolutely
CERTAIN where the round will go (cf. the sniper in R6 who deliberately
hits a child-killer in the spleen to make him die as painfully as
possible) will "just spray some lead and happen accidentally
to hit somebody right in the carotid artery".

[Bertil Jonell]

In article <20010813012244...@ng-cr1.aol.com>,

Jordan S. Bassior <jsba...@aol.com> wrote:
>I state publicly that I _liked_ BOTH _Rainbow Six_ and _The Bear and the
>Dragon_. So nyah :)

The main problem with Bear & Dragon is that the Chinese high command
doesn't follow Chinese doctrine.
And their PR skills compare unfavorably with those of Serbia...

>Jordan

-bertil-
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
exercise for your kill-file."

[jeff suzuki]

Geoffrey Kidd wrote:
>
> The problem is Clancy's overt assumption that the guys who work for
> the government are AUTOMATICALLY the good guys, pure and noble.

Not at all; Clancy has many government workers who are not pure, not
good, and not noble. _Rainbow Six_ has Carol Brightling. _Clear and
Present Danger_ has Admiral Cutter. _Sum of All Fears_ has,
well, almost everyone above the level of Jack Ryan. In fact in
Clancy's corpus, as a rule, the higher a person is in the government,
the less good and less noble they are; only the "grunts" have
nobility of character.

Clancy's overt assumption is that the protagonists (the ones that
we're supposed to like) are the good guys, pure and noble. Nothing
wrong with that, unless you want to claim that no one could possibly
be good, or pure, or noble.

Now there is a class of so-called literature where the protagonists
are cynical, evil, bastards who deserve to die, and where no one is
good, or pure, or noble: John Grisham writes stuff like that. I
don't know why anyone would want to read fiction about such "heroes"
when they can just flip open any newspaper and read the real thing,
though Grisham's stuff seems to show there's a market for such
depressing material.

But if I'm going to read fiction, I'm going to read something that I
can't get in the daily news: something where, dammit, good intentions,
good planning, and hard work (plus a little good luck) do, actually,
win the day. I can't help it; I'm an optimist, and think that the
US has a future---if we're willing to work at it. That's one of
Clancy's main messages.

Now, maybe it's true that there are very few people who are good, or
noble, or pure; the daily news says they are pretty rare. But then
again, most people spend their lives working 9-5 jobs. This doesn't
mean I want to read about the life of Joe the Accountant, who goes
to work on the 8:30 and comes home on the 5:30, and whose major
excitement in life is when the cafeteria runs out of tuna.

Jeffs

[Mark Atwood]

jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:

> Geoffrey Kidd said:
>
> >My problem with "Rainbow Six" was that every time one of the
> >snipers on the team fired, I kept hearing the name "Vicki Weaver"
> >whispering in my ear. Couldn't finish the book as a result.
>
> I'm not going to hate the FBI, or their snipers, in general, because of Ruby
> Ridge.

I will, as long as they keep defending and hiding and justify him.

Fucking "blue brick wall".

--
Mark Atwood | I'm wearing black only until I find something darker.
m...@pobox.com | http://www.pobox.com/~mra

[Steve Hilberg]

Charles Dyer <charl...@mac.com> writes:
>On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 3:49:01 -0500, Charlie Stross wrote
>(in message <slrn9ncgnt....@antipope.nsl.co.uk>):
>> Stoned koala bears drooled eucalyptus spittle in awe
>> as <je...@bu.edu> declared:
>>
>>> Lawrence Person wrote:
>>>>
>>>> The platform of the Green Party.
>>>
>>> And, though it's only marginally SF, _Rainbow Six_ (Clancy's next to
>>> latest).
>>
>> If you're not careful I'll post some spoiler-type comments for this one.
>>
>> Clue: "Rainbow Six" was so incredibly _bad_ that I kept turning the pages
>> right to the end, looking for more idiocy to boggle at.

>Clancy has acheived brain meltdown. _Rainbow Six_ is the worst book he's ever
>written, and he's produced some stinkers. It's even worse than the 'in the
>world of' sharcropping books he let loose under his name. (Well, it's worse
>than the single example fo the type I've read, maybe some of the others are
>as bad, though I doubt it.) He's producing stuff that if was written by
>someone else would never be published, kinda like what RAH was doing, near
>the end... and while it took RAH decades and much medical problems to get
>there, Clancy has done it in less than half the time and with no medical
>excuses. And Clancy at his best wasn't as good as RAH at his best, while
>Clancy at his worst...

Hrm....while I have been pretty disgusted with Clancy since anything after
Sum of All Fears, I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
(no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very little Jack Ryan
involved in the book at all. :P What did you find so horrible about the
book? Was it the general quality of the writing or the science or something
else entirely? Or am I going to get "yes" as an answer? :)

--
Steve Hilberg <Necromancer> CCSO Workstation Support Group
<hil...@uiuc.edu> KB9TEV
Member, APAGear CCSO _still_ doesn't pay me enough to
http://www.apagear.org speak for them, so I still don't.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"As we were forged we shall return, perhaps some day. | VNV Nation,
I will remember you and wonder who we were." | "Further"

[David T. Bilek]

On 13 Aug 2001 09:19:20 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>David T. Bilek said:

>
>>It's an artistic difference then, I guess. I've got nothing against
>>pure slam-bang action novels with no deeper meaning, but IMO if thats
>>what you're writing, you've got to keep the pace going a bit faster.
>
>That isn't what Clancy writes. His novels have a _lot_ of "deeper meaning" --
>you just don't agree with his themes.
>

The theme seemed to be "Freedom and the USA kick ass, China is
horrible and much of the leadership evil! Oh, and we should help
Russia a lot more so that they can be free and kick ass too!" which I
agree with. I just don't consider that a "deeper meaning" since it
was so blatant.

Does _Red Storm Rising_ count as alternative history now that the wall
fell? It's far more plausible than, say, _Stars and Stripes Forever_.

-David

[Charles Frederick Goodin]

In article <20010812113019...@mb-mo.aol.com>,

Jordan S. Bassior <jsba...@aol.com> wrote:

>Pete McCutchen said:
>
>>>S. M. Stirling's recent _Infiltrator_ (part of the _Terminator_ continuity)
>>>features Serena, a mostly-human Terminator cyborg who hates humanity even
>more
>>>than does Skynet.
>>
>>Is she a lesbian?
>
>No.
>
>Insofar as she has any sexual preference beyond "Kill humans," she's hetero.

I'd say she's "none of the above", but the book shows her in a
"relationship" with a woman for part of the time. She may not technically
be a lesbian, but she'd look like one to an on the scene observer.

--
chuk

[Steve Hilberg]

Hrm....Sum of All Fears was the last one I thought was decent. Once
Jack Ryan starts becoming Pope (or whatever :P), I sort of lost
interest. To me, it read like one of those RPG fanfics where the
person's PC became an ubergod of 4 zillionth level for no apparent
reason. Barf. Jack Ryan was much more interesting as an everyman
caught up in extraordinary situations.

[David T. Bilek]

On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 6:35:14 -0500, Charles Dyer <charl...@mac.com>
wrote:

>On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 21:50:22 -0500, David T. Bilek wrote
>(in message <3b773f94....@nntp.we.mediaone.net>):
>

>> Pound for pound (re: Clancy's latest)

>> it might be more bloated than Tad Williams' just completed elephant
>> choker. And I never thought I'd ever be able to say that about
>> anything.
>
>I take it that _you_ haven't read Harry Turtledov's 'Worldwar' and 'Second
>Contact' books? If I read one more time, just one more time, about that
>blasted knight in his blasted rusty armour on his blasted nag, I swear that
>I'll go to LA and do somethnig that I'll need Johnny Cochran to get out of.
>

No, I haven't read those. I think I'll avoid them, given the above.

>>
>> (Of course, there were 4 bloated books in Williams' series to the one
>> Clancy, so the sheer mass of bloat is still on Williams' side.)
>
>The Turtledove count is seven. And he's moving on with the 'Great War' and
>'American Empire' books, too. At least he kills off characters in those books
>before they can bleat the readers to death.
>

On the other hand, I *have* read these. While I have some significant
problems with them, I thought they were much less bloated than the
Williams or Clancy. Their pace is fairly consistent, and so on.

-David

[J.B. Moreno]

Jordan S. Bassior <jsba...@aol.com> wrote:

> Charles Dyer said:
>
> >I take it that _you_ haven't read Harry Turtledov's 'Worldwar' and 'Second
> >Contact' books? If I read one more time, just one more time, about that
> >blasted knight in his blasted rusty armour on his blasted nag, I swear that
> >I'll go to LA and do somethnig that I'll need Johnny Cochran to get out of.
>
> Ah, but you miss the significance of that image. It _mocks_ the Race -- they
> were _hoping_ that we hadn't progressed too far beyond that point. Instead,
> they came to our system to find us within a century or two of their own
> technology.
>
> Nasty surprise :)

I wouldn't say "mock" exactly -- it is more trying to say that they are
inferior to humans because they don't progress as quickly and couldn't
even imagine a species that does.

Regardless, it doesn't need to be pointed out more than once per book
and it doesn't need to use the same image -- after the original it would
have been sufficient to say they had cultural statis down to an art
form, coming up with a new idea every 20 thousand years.

--
JBM
"Your depression will be added to my own" -- Marvin of Borg

[Steve Hilberg]

d9be...@dtek.chalmers.se (Bertil Jonell) writes:
>In article <20010813012244...@ng-cr1.aol.com>,
>Jordan S. Bassior <jsba...@aol.com> wrote:
>>I state publicly that I _liked_ BOTH _Rainbow Six_ and _The Bear and the
>>Dragon_. So nyah :)

> The main problem with Bear & Dragon is that the Chinese high command
>doesn't follow Chinese doctrine.
> And their PR skills compare unfavorably with those of Serbia...

The Chinese high command's PR skills are that bad though -- these are the
people that kept having generals go around saying they would nuke Japan and
Korea if Taiwan elected the wrong president and other assorted craziness.

[Chris Byler]

On 11 Aug 2001 06:19:32 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
wrote:

>Mark Atwood said:
>
>>
>>jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:

>>> "Arkon bomb"
>>
>>Ref, "Arkon bomb"?
>>
>>I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?
>
>A very nasty weapon from _Perry Rhodan_ -- and the first time I encountered the
>"planet buster" concept :)

Mine was the Molecular Disruption Device from _Ender's Game_.
Interesting question: do you think the adults knew what it would do to
a planet and didn't tell Ender, or did they genuinely not know either?
Does it make a difference?

--
Chris Byler cby...@vt.edu
Kubera: "It occurred to me that Sam would be the number one suspect,
except for the fact that he was dead."
Sam: "I had assumed that to be sufficient defense against detection."
-- Roger Zelazny, _Lord of Light_

[Captain Button]

Wild-eyed conspiracy theorists insist that on Mon, 13 Aug 2001 20:06:51 GMT, David T. Bilek <dbi...@mediaone.net> wrote:

[ Tom Clancy's writing quality or lack thereof ]

> Does _Red Storm Rising_ count as alternative history now that the wall
> fell? It's far more plausible than, say, _Stars and Stripes Forever_.

IMHO, No. It is a novel that has been overtaken by events.
This happens with anything written in the present or near future.

If it wasn't alternative history when written, it does not become so
later.

There is a fuzzy borderline area, however, when later books in a series
try and retcon around overtaking events, like the later CoDominion
novels by Pournelle (and co-authors) that taking about a ressurected
USSR or some such.

--
"Gee, who'd a thunk it? Turns out alien superintelligence is
no match for our Earthly can-do spunk." - Jane Lane, "Daria"
Captain Button - [ but...@io.com ]

[Rick]

"Steve Hilberg" <hil...@tower.cso.uiuc.edu> wrote in message
news:_oWd7.6008$A3.4...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu...

> Hrm....while I have been pretty disgusted with Clancy since anything after
> Sum of All Fears, I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
> (no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very little Jack Ryan
> involved in the book at all. :P What did you find so horrible about the
> book? Was it the general quality of the writing or the science or
something
> else entirely? Or am I going to get "yes" as an answer? :)

The problem with Rainbow Six is the same problem with any novel he wrote
after Sum of All Fears...Clancy has fallen so in love with his main
characters that he won't allow them to ever be in any real danger.
Also, the bad guys in Rainbow Six were a bit implausible and I found the
"good guys" a bit too slimy in nature for my taste. Much as I liked the
character of Clarke, the idea of an international hit team meant to kill
"terrorists" sends shudders down my spine when I think who various regimes
and administrations have wanted to label as "terrorists."

[Bill Twist]

> Charles Dyer <charl...@mac.com> writes:
> >On Sun, 12 Aug 2001 3:49:01 -0500, Charlie Stross wrote
> >(in message <slrn9ncgnt....@antipope.nsl.co.uk>):
> >> Stoned koala bears drooled eucalyptus spittle in awe
> >> as <je...@bu.edu> declared:
> >>
> >>> Lawrence Person wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> The platform of the Green Party.
> >>>
> >>> And, though it's only marginally SF, _Rainbow Six_ (Clancy's next to
> >>> latest).
> >>
> >> If you're not careful I'll post some spoiler-type comments for this one.
> >>
> >> Clue: "Rainbow Six" was so incredibly _bad_ that I kept turning the pages
> >> right to the end, looking for more idiocy to boggle at.
>
> >Clancy has acheived brain meltdown. _Rainbow Six_ is the worst book he's ever
> >written, and he's produced some stinkers. It's even worse than the 'in the
> >world of' sharcropping books he let loose under his name. (Well, it's worse
> >than the single example fo the type I've read, maybe some of the others are
> >as bad, though I doubt it.) He's producing stuff that if was written by
> >someone else would never be published, kinda like what RAH was doing, near
> >the end... and while it took RAH decades and much medical problems to get
> >there, Clancy has done it in less than half the time and with no medical
> >excuses. And Clancy at his best wasn't as good as RAH at his best, while
> >Clancy at his worst...
>

> Hrm....while I have been pretty disgusted with Clancy since anything after
> Sum of All Fears, I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
> (no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very little Jack Ryan
> involved in the book at all. :P What did you find so horrible about the
> book? Was it the general quality of the writing or the science or something
> else entirely? Or am I going to get "yes" as an answer? :)
>

For me, it was the use of the DKL LifeGuard in "Rainbow Six" that really
made me wary of reading Clancy for a little while. While I understand
that there are certain things that have to be guessed at (like the
caterpillar drive in "The Hunt for Red October"), and other things
it is prudent to fake (like the 'zipper' in the atomic bomb in SOAF),
there was no excuse for using what any technologically adept person would
instantly recognize as a gussied-up dowsing rod as a piece of technology
that is pivotal to some scenes. It fails the baloney detector instantly,
with loudly wailing klaxons.

I waited to get "The Bear and the Dragon" in paperback because of it, and
I'm not really sorry I waited. It was a vaguely interesting book for $5,
but I would have been pissed if I paid for the hardcover version.

I think perhaps my favorite book of his is the one that focuses on
Clark/Kelly in his early years (the name of which escapes me...).

--
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Real men use flintlocks... In the rain.
--------------------------------------------------------------------

[Steve Hilberg]

Fair enough....I can certainly see that, and like I said, I didn't think
it was nearly as good as anything previous to SoAF. I suppose I enjoyed
the book more having played the computer game, actually....

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Charles Frederick Goodin said:

>>Insofar as she has any sexual preference beyond "Kill humans," she's hetero.
>
>I'd say she's "none of the above", but the book shows her in a
>"relationship" with a woman for part of the time. She may not technically
>be a lesbian, but she'd look like one to an on the scene observer.

You're right, I was wrong. She's bisexual, to the extent that she's any sort of
sexual. Which isn't much -- to her, sexuality was just part of her mask.

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Steve Hilberg said:

>The Chinese high command's PR skills are that bad though -- these are the
>people that kept having generals go around saying they would nuke Japan and
>Korea if Taiwan elected the wrong president and other assorted craziness.

And note their totally inept handling of the recon plane collision earlier this
year. They recently rejected our offer _to pay them money for the housing of
the crew_ -- which is idiotic, it's to China's advantage to help us _forget_
that they held our crew captive for weeks, not _remind_ us about it!

[Sea Wasp]

Chris Byler wrote:
>
> On 11 Aug 2001 06:19:32 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
> wrote:
>
> >Mark Atwood said:
> >
> >>
> >>jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:
> >>> "Arkon bomb"
> >>
> >>Ref, "Arkon bomb"?
> >>
> >>I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?
> >
> >A very nasty weapon from _Perry Rhodan_ -- and the first time I encountered the
> >"planet buster" concept :)
>
> Mine was the Molecular Disruption Device from _Ender's Game_.

Mine was "The Doomsday Machine" in the original Star Trek. First
WRITTEN one was probably one of the many such in Doc Smith's Lensman
series.

--
Sea Wasp http://www.wizvax.net/seawasp/index.html
/^\
;;; _Morgantown: The Jason Wood Chronicles_, at
http://www.hyperbooks.com/catalog/20040.html

[Ryan Klippenstine]

On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 20:56:38 GMT, cby...@REMOVE-TO-REPLY.vt.edu (Chris
Byler) wrote:

>On 11 Aug 2001 06:19:32 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
>wrote:
>
>>Mark Atwood said:
>>
>>>
>>>jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:
>>>> "Arkon bomb"
>>>
>>>Ref, "Arkon bomb"?
>>>
>>>I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?
>>
>>A very nasty weapon from _Perry Rhodan_ -- and the first time I encountered the
>>"planet buster" concept :)
>
>Mine was the Molecular Disruption Device from _Ender's Game_.
>Interesting question: do you think the adults knew what it would do to
>a planet and didn't tell Ender, or did they genuinely not know either?
>Does it make a difference?

The way I recall it, they knew, and they _did_ tell Ender.

--
ry...@westman.wave.ca

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Sea Wasp said:

>Mine was "The Doomsday Machine" in the original Star Trek. First
>WRITTEN one was probably one of the many such in Doc Smith's Lensman
>series.

Well, Edmond Hamilton wrote some _very_ early stories in which planets got
scragged (which earned him the name of "World Wrecker") and Jack Williamson, of
course, had the ultimate weapon from his _Legion_ stories, which could render
anything the user could conceive of nonexistent (Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
cribbed that one, and put it on Galactus' spaceship).

[Matt Ruff]

Steve Hilberg wrote:
>
> I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
> (no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very
> little Jack Ryan involved in the book at all. :P What did
> you find so horrible about the book?

The good guys were so invincible it was boring. Instead of each new
terrorist encounter providing a greater challenge for the heroes, the
threat level seemed to peak around the second hostage situation, and by
the time the IRA baddies showed up I knew that nothing really bad could
possibly happen. The climax in the rainforest was a turkey shoot -- no
suspense whatsoever.

I also thought the whole evil environmentalist plot to snuff the human
race was ridiculous, although admittedly ridiculous in a fun way.
Towards the middle of the book I started rooting for the bad guys to
succeed, because I thought it would have made an amusing end to the Jack
Ryan series -- Clancy could have written one more novel in which
President Ryan officiates over the decline and fall of the United States
and the extinction of the human race. That would've been *much* more
interesting than what actually did happen.

-- M. Ruff

[Charles Dyer]

On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 15:04:10 -0500, Steve Hilberg wrote
(in message <_oWd7.6008$A3.4...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>):

that was the last of the good ones.

> I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
> (no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very little Jack Ryan
> involved in the book at all. :P What did you find so horrible about the
> book? Was it the general quality of the writing or the science or something
> else entirely? Or am I going to get "yes" as an answer? :)
>
>

1 there was no plot. He'd used the same damn McGiffin in _Executive Action_,
and I'd not been impressed then.

2 the only 'hero' in the book was the Russkie... and his motivation was
simply cash. The Rainbow team were purest cardboard.

3 the bad guys were simply unbelievable. Yes, I believe that there are
deep-fried greens who'd do that kind of thing. Yes, I believe that there are
people smart enough to genengineer that virus. Yes, I think that the
intersection of the two sets is the empty set.

--
Newsweek on tradenames:

Microsoft is a bad tradename. Micro and soft... needs Viagra.

[Shane Stezelberger]

On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 17:07:05 GMT, jeff suzuki <je...@bu.edu> wrote:

>"David T. Bilek" wrote:
>Martin H. Greenberg (I think) once did an analysis of Clancy's works
>and why they were so popular (I'm a Clancy fan, just so you know which
>direction this is heading in...) The main thing that came out is that
>his works were popular for several reasons, the main ones being that:

[snip a perfectly good analysis of Clancy's success factors]

Bull. :-) Well, Greenberg has part of it. Here's the other part:

Before Clancy, the genre we now call "techno-thriller" was a bleak and
desolate place.

Sure, there was Ludlum -- if you swung that way. There was Cussler
with his Yankee James Bond, except the typical Dirk Pitt scenario made
Moonraker look like frickin' LeCarre. There were strays like Lawrence
Delaney. There was Alfred Coppel, but he used rather unlikely
strategic backstories and improbable V/STOL strike-fighter
technologies in books like _Thirty-Four East_.

There was Forsyth. God, there was Forsyth. How infuriating he was!
So close! He would spend up to a paragraph describing the inner
workings of a SR-71 spyplane or a Special Boat Service squad ("...with
their hand-tooled Finladia rifles, perhaps the finest rifles in the
world."), but then all the FREAKIN' GEOPOLITICAL STUFF would
interfere!

What I am trying to tell you is that, before Clancy, there was no
manly-man author who would push the geoploitics aside and allow the
hardware, the military TECHNOLOGY, to tell the story. Let alone any
author who would do so with all the correct marks, models, serial
numbers, variants, mission loadouts, and ECM frequencies.

Clancy was that man. And THAT is why I, at least, snapped up _Red
Storm Rising_ and the like. Because the long drought was finally
over. At last, stories about real Abrams tanks battling the Soviet
Menace, instead of stodgy old Bourne fantasies in some East European
provincial capital.

--
Shane "but that's just me" Stezelberger
sstezel at erols dot kom
Laurel, MD

[Coyu]

Matt Ruff wrote:

>Towards the middle of the book I started rooting for the bad guys to
>succeed, because I thought it would have made an amusing end to the Jack
>Ryan series -- Clancy could have written one more novel in which
>President Ryan officiates over the decline and fall of the United States
>and the extinction of the human race. That would've been *much* more
>interesting than what actually did happen.

I suppose this would be a good time to tell you how much I enjoyed
the Clancy pastiche in _Sewer, Gas & Electric_.

[Sea Wasp]

Jordan S. Bassior wrote:
>
> Sea Wasp said:
>
> >Mine was "The Doomsday Machine" in the original Star Trek. First
> >WRITTEN one was probably one of the many such in Doc Smith's Lensman
> >series.
>
> Well, Edmond Hamilton wrote some _very_ early stories in which planets got
> scragged

My commentary was in line with the title of the thread: my first
WRITTEN (encounter with) a Planet Killer was probably one of Doc's.

[Shane Stezelberger]

On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 20:56:38 GMT, cby...@REMOVE-TO-REPLY.vt.edu (Chris
Byler) wrote:

>On 11 Aug 2001 06:19:32 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
>wrote:

>>>> "Arkon bomb"

>>
>>A very nasty weapon from _Perry Rhodan_ -- and the first time I encountered the
>>"planet buster" concept :)
>
>Mine was the Molecular Disruption Device from _Ender's Game_.

Dating myself: mine was [spoilers ahead!] the monolith cloud from
Arthur C. Clarke's 2010: ODYSSEY TWO.

--
Shane Stezelberger

[DaveMoore]

They knew, and they told Ender.

What they failed to mention was that in his last run,
he was actually hitting the Buggers' homeworld, not
just a simulation.

--
Dave Moore == djm...@uh.edu == I speak for me.
In the wrong hands, sanity is a dangerous weapon.

[Robert A. Woodward]

In article <GI1Eu...@world.std.com>,
pci...@antiabuseworld.std.com (Paul Ciszek) wrote:

> In article <3B7874...@wizvax.net>, Sea Wasp <sea...@wizvax.net> wrote:
> >Chris Byler wrote:
> >>
> >> On 11 Aug 2001 06:19:32 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> >Mark Atwood said:
> >> >
> >> >>jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior) writes:
> >> >>> "Arkon bomb"
> >> >>
> >> >>Ref, "Arkon bomb"?
> >> >>
> >> >>I glarked the meaning, but what's it from?
> >> >
> >> >A very nasty weapon from _Perry Rhodan_ -- and the first time I
> >> >encountered the "planet buster" concept :)
> >>
> >> Mine was the Molecular Disruption Device from _Ender's Game_.
> >
> > Mine was "The Doomsday Machine" in the original Star Trek. First
> >WRITTEN one was probably one of the many such in Doc Smith's Lensman
> >series.
>

> First written "planet killer" was "Adam and No Eve" by Bester.
> First written "planet buster" was something a lot like Ender's MD in an
> old story, I think it had Centaurus in the title, it ends with a mutineer
> and the captain's daughter watching from a safe distance as someone else
> disintigrates the homeworld of the carnivorous plants that want to eat
> the human race.

Mid-30s Murray Leinster story, "Proxima Centauri" - but Edmond Hamilton
has priority.

--
robe...@drizzle.com http://www.drizzle.com/~robertaw/
rawoo...@aol.com
robe...@halcyon.com

[David Johnston]

Geoffrey Kidd wrote:
>
> On 13 Aug 2001 17:12:07 GMT, jsba...@aol.com (Jordan S. Bassior)
> wrote:
>
> >Geoffrey Kidd said:
> >
> >>My problem with "Rainbow Six" was that every time one of the
> >>snipers on the team fired, I kept hearing the name "Vicki Weaver"
> >>whispering in my ear. Couldn't finish the book as a result.
> >
> >I'm not going to hate the FBI, or their snipers, in general, because of Ruby
> >Ridge.
> >--
> >Sincerely Yours,
> >Jordan
>
> The problem is Clancy's overt assumption that the guys who work for
> the government are AUTOMATICALLY the good guys, pure and noble.
>

I've seen villainous people in the government in Clancy novels on
occasion. Of course they espouse the "wrong" policies.

There's another technothriller author who pisses me off a bit. He wrote
a novel in which the Chinese bought a set of subs from the Russians, and
the Americans covertly attacked the pack of subs and murdered the
Chinese crews delivering them. Frankly, my sympathies were with the
Chinese in the next novel.

[Steve Taylor]

jeff suzuki wrote:

[Tom Clancy]

Disclaimer - the only Tom Clancy I've read is _Executive Orders_, and
I've heard this is from after the brain eater got him.

> 1) His works suggest that, for the most part, the people of the US
> aren't evil, fools, or incompetents, but neither are they
> supermen: they do things well because they work hard at it.

On the contrary - one of the prime marks of the bad adventure is the
scene where the commies/towelheads/other evil people are standing around
talking about taking over the world, and one of them says they're going
to squash the Americans like flies, and his wiser companion says 'No -
these Americans seem soft, but when roused, they have the heart of a
lion!'. Oh - and the scenes where the evil overlord (played by the
Prime Minister of India in _Executive Orders_) sees the American hero
doing something decent and kind and thinks "Mua ha ha! They are soft and
sentimental. Now I *know* I can defeat them, as *I* have no such
weaknesses!"

Honestly, it was a reasonably fun book, but at times it felt like an
infomercial for America. This may not be as nagging or obvious if you're
actually reading it as an American.

> 2) As a corollary to #1, his books actually have heroes. So much
> of modern so-called literature seems to enshrine the anti-hero.

Maybe sometimes. Genre fiction certainly enshrines the hero who finds
every problem morally unambiguous, and ultimately solveable. Both
approaches miss the complexity of real people.

> Personally, I'd rather not read a story about someone I'd sooner
> shoot than befriend.

I can't see that myself. I'd as happily read a book about one as about
the other.

> Jeffs

Steve

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Steve Taylor said:

>On the contrary - one of the prime marks of the bad adventure is the
>scene where the commies/towelheads/other evil people are standing around
>talking about taking over the world, and one of them says they're going
>to squash the Americans like flies, and his wiser companion says 'No -
>these Americans seem soft, but when roused, they have the heart of a
>lion!'.

Why is this a mark of a bad adventure? Historically, bad guys _have_
underestimated the willpower of democracies. And presumably, some "wiser
companion" (who knew some history) might point this out.

>Oh - and the scenes where the evil overlord (played by the
>Prime Minister of India in _Executive Orders_) sees the American hero
>doing something decent and kind and thinks "Mua ha ha! They are soft and
>sentimental. Now I *know* I can defeat them, as *I* have no such weaknesses!"

Guess who explicitly believed this, in real history, and found out he was wrong
the hard way.

[jeff suzuki]

Steve Hilberg wrote:

> Once
> Jack Ryan starts becoming Pope (or whatever :P), I sort of lost
> interest. To me, it read like one of those RPG fanfics where the
> person's PC became an ubergod of 4 zillionth level for no apparent
> reason. Barf. Jack Ryan was much more interesting as an everyman
> caught up in extraordinary situations.

Which is the tough thing about writing series. If Clancy had stopped
the Ryan series with _Clear and Present Danger_ (my own favorite),
he would have ended on a very nice high point.

Incidentally, the last few novels aren't really about Jack Ryan;
in fact, I don't think he appears at all in _Rainbow Six_, and he's
of minimal importance in _Bear and Dragon_. Perhaps the best
lesson here is that if you're going to write a series, make sure
you develop _other_ characters so that, later in the series, after
your character has Saved The Universe (tm), then one of the
undercharacters can go out and find stories of his own.

Jeffs

[jeff suzuki]

Steve Taylor wrote:
>
> Disclaimer - the only Tom Clancy I've read is _Executive Orders_, and
> I've heard this is from after the brain eater got him.

Oooh, bad choice to begin with. Aside from being towards the end
of the series about Jack Ryan, it's not one of his better ones.
IMHO, his best was _Clear and Present Danger_.

> On the contrary - one of the prime marks of the bad adventure is the
> scene where the commies/towelheads/other evil people are standing around
> talking about taking over the world, and one of them says they're going
> to squash the Americans like flies, and his wiser companion says 'No -
> these Americans seem soft, but when roused, they have the heart of a
> lion!'.

What makes this the mark of a bad adventure?

Is it that you think America is incapable of doing anything?
Well, of course you don't like Clancy, then; his stories are about
competence and what _can_ be done _if_ people are willing to do them.

Is it that the Evil Overlord would never have anyone who said this?
Again, Clancy's books are about competence, and he assumes competence
on both sides.

> Honestly, it was a reasonably fun book, but at times it felt like an
> infomercial for America.

This is, in fact, one of the traits that Greenberg pointed out that
made Clancy popular: he makes it feel _good_ to be an American.

> Maybe sometimes. Genre fiction certainly enshrines the hero who finds
> every problem morally unambiguous, and ultimately solveable. Both
> approaches miss the complexity of real people.

If I want "real people", I'll read the real news. As I said, I prefer
reading fiction about what _could_ be, not what _is_. The drunken,
morally ambiguous non-hero has about as much appeal as yesterday's
news.

Jeffs

[jeff suzuki]

Steve Taylor wrote:
>
> On the contrary - one of the prime marks of the bad adventure is the
> scene where the commies/towelheads/other evil people are standing around
> talking about taking over the world, and one of them says they're going
> to squash the Americans like flies, and his wiser companion says 'No -
> these Americans seem soft, but when roused, they have the heart of a
> lion!'.

Except it's happened before. Pearl Harbor is perhaps the best
documented instance, with Yamamoto playing the role of the wiser
companion. He didn't use "heart of a lion" (it's not a particularly
Japanese way of saying things), but he did say that Americans wouldn't
give up until they (the Japanese) could dictate terms at the White
House. He also gave the IJN "maybe 6 to 12 months" in which it
could operate, even if everything went according to plan, and after
that, they _had_ to conclude a peace, or else.

The High Command said, "Ah, but our great samurai spirit will overwhelm
that nation of peasants, who have no stomach for a real fight."

Jeffs

[Louann Miller]

On Tue, 14 Aug 2001 14:00:24 GMT, jeff suzuki <je...@bu.edu> wrote:

(re Tom Clancy)

>Incidentally, the last few novels aren't really about Jack Ryan;
>in fact, I don't think he appears at all in _Rainbow Six_, and he's
>of minimal importance in _Bear and Dragon_. Perhaps the best
>lesson here is that if you're going to write a series, make sure
>you develop _other_ characters so that, later in the series, after
>your character has Saved The Universe (tm), then one of the
>undercharacters can go out and find stories of his own.

From your mouth to David Weber's ear. I'm very fond of Honor, but
she's had more promotions than Marissa Picard and we're running out of
special cases for her to put her own personal bod between anything and
the war's desolation.

Louann

[Nancy Lebovitz]

In article <20010814063239...@mb-fy.aol.com>,

Jordan S. Bassior <jsba...@aol.com> wrote:
>
>Why is this a mark of a bad adventure? Historically, bad guys _have_
>underestimated the willpower of democracies. And presumably, some "wiser
>companion" (who knew some history) might point this out.
>

I thought that historically, anyone who gets into a war with a vaguely
equal opponent underestimates how much trouble it will be. Didn't
both sides of the American Civil War assume that it would be over
quickly, though with opposite outcomes?
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com

[Randy Money]

"Jordan S. Bassior" wrote:
>
> Steve Taylor said:
>
> >On the contrary - one of the prime marks of the bad adventure is the
> >scene where the commies/towelheads/other evil people are standing around
> >talking about taking over the world, and one of them says they're going
> >to squash the Americans like flies, and his wiser companion says 'No -
> >these Americans seem soft, but when roused, they have the heart of a
> >lion!'.
>
> Why is this a mark of a bad adventure? Historically, bad guys _have_
> underestimated the willpower of democracies. And presumably, some "wiser
> companion" (who knew some history) might point this out.

Historically, it might be that way. Fictionally, we've heard similar
stuff since at least Fu Manchu was grinning down Wayland Smith.

> >Oh - and the scenes where the evil overlord (played by the
> >Prime Minister of India in _Executive Orders_) sees the American hero
> >doing something decent and kind and thinks "Mua ha ha! They are soft and
> >sentimental. Now I *know* I can defeat them, as *I* have no such weaknesses!"
>
> Guess who explicitly believed this, in real history, and found out he was wrong
> the hard way.
>
> --
> Sincerely Yours,
> Jordan

Cliche, cliche, cliche, cliche ...

Who cares if the cliche is true? If you can't gussy it up and present it
with some freshness, some pizazz, it's just old.

Personally, all the hardware in Clancy means nothing to me because his
politics are so skewed one way that his characters are cardboard cutouts
-- I mean, really, shouldn't England reopen the Tower of London just to
house Jack Ryan the way he talked to Prince Charles?

I read _The Hunt for Red October_ long passages of description of
armament, far better characterized than his characters, and zippo
suspense -- 30-year-old Aleister (sp?) MacLean was a better romp for
Pete's sake. Got 100 pages or so into _Patriot's Game_ and if the whole
interaction with the Royal family had been just a tad worse I might have
been able to laugh my way through it.

You know what, the movies have been far kinder to Clancy than to Stephen
King (another writer who tends toward bloat) or MacLean. The movies
rarely get that King is capable of more than just, "Boo!" and usually
miss the emotional set-up for the "Boo!" when it does appear. And they
never got that MacLean was fun, but the fun stemmed from a plot momentum
anchored by the straight-faced gutsiness of the main characters. With
Clancy, they dig down to the core of the story, find a plot, present the
plot, and actually let the actors -- and he's been blessed by the likes
of Connery, Baldwin, Ford, etc. -- create some kind of understandable
and even likable characters.

Randy Money

[Mark Reichert]

"Jordan S. Bassior" <jsba...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20010813212830...@mb-mo.aol.com...

> anything the user could conceive of nonexistent (Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
> cribbed that one, and put it on Galactus' spaceship).

So that's where the Ultimate Nullifier came from. By the way, that
particular device is at the center of the current story in the Fantastic
Four series.

[Steve Hilberg]

Charles Dyer <charl...@mac.com> writes:
>On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 15:04:10 -0500, Steve Hilberg wrote

>> I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
>> (no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very little Jack Ryan
>> involved in the book at all. :P What did you find so horrible about the
>> book? Was it the general quality of the writing or the science or something
>> else entirely? Or am I going to get "yes" as an answer? :)
>>
>>

>1 there was no plot. He'd used the same damn McGiffin in _Executive Action_,
>and I'd not been impressed then.

Ah. I didn't read that, so maybe that was part of it.

>2 the only 'hero' in the book was the Russkie... and his motivation was
>simply cash. The Rainbow team were purest cardboard.

Hrm....I don't think his motivation was cash -- he was being paid to help
the crazies and then when he realized what they were doing he turned on
them -- I don't think he was being paid to turn on them.

>3 the bad guys were simply unbelievable. Yes, I believe that there are
>deep-fried greens who'd do that kind of thing. Yes, I believe that there are
>people smart enough to genengineer that virus. Yes, I think that the
>intersection of the two sets is the empty set.

Well, you may have a point....but I didn't think it was _that_ unbelievable.

[Steve Hilberg]

Matt Ruff <Storyt...@worldnet.att.net> writes:
>Steve Hilberg wrote:
>> I did read Rainbow Six and didn't think it was too bad
>> (no HFRO or RSR, but...), mostly because there was very
>> little Jack Ryan involved in the book at all. :P What did
>> you find so horrible about the book?

>The good guys were so invincible it was boring. Instead of each new
>terrorist encounter providing a greater challenge for the heroes, the
>threat level seemed to peak around the second hostage situation, and by
>the time the IRA baddies showed up I knew that nothing really bad could
>possibly happen. The climax in the rainforest was a turkey shoot -- no
>suspense whatsoever.

Yeah, I guess that's a good point.

>I also thought the whole evil environmentalist plot to snuff the human
>race was ridiculous, although admittedly ridiculous in a fun way.
>Towards the middle of the book I started rooting for the bad guys to
>succeed, because I thought it would have made an amusing end to the Jack
>Ryan series -- Clancy could have written one more novel in which
>President Ryan officiates over the decline and fall of the United States
>and the extinction of the human race. That would've been *much* more
>interesting than what actually did happen.

Hrm, that would have been much more interesting, although I'm really
not interested in Jack Ryan anymore (after Sum of All Fears, it seems
like he's got a case of what we call in RPGs "munchkinitis").

[Steve Hilberg]

jeff suzuki <je...@bu.edu> writes:
>Steve Hilberg wrote:
>> Once
>> Jack Ryan starts becoming Pope (or whatever :P), I sort of lost
>> interest. To me, it read like one of those RPG fanfics where the
>> person's PC became an ubergod of 4 zillionth level for no apparent
>> reason. Barf. Jack Ryan was much more interesting as an everyman
>> caught up in extraordinary situations.

>Which is the tough thing about writing series. If Clancy had stopped
>the Ryan series with _Clear and Present Danger_ (my own favorite),
>he would have ended on a very nice high point.

Hrm, was _Cardinal of the Kremlin_ after _CaPD_? I thought that was
fairly decent, although it's been quite a while since I read it. I don't
think any of them have been as good as _HfRO_ or _RSR_ since though.

>Incidentally, the last few novels aren't really about Jack Ryan;
>in fact, I don't think he appears at all in _Rainbow Six_, and he's
>of minimal importance in _Bear and Dragon_. Perhaps the best
>lesson here is that if you're going to write a series, make sure
>you develop _other_ characters so that, later in the series, after
>your character has Saved The Universe (tm), then one of the
>undercharacters can go out and find stories of his own.

Yeah, that's definitely the case.

[Steve Hilberg]

Lord yes -- I was thinking this too when I read that. She's cool, but
now she's just invincible, and it's time to pass the torch. Sadly, in
the last book they seemed to have gotten rid of the junior officers
I liked.... :/

[Rick]

"jeff suzuki" <je...@bu.edu> wrote in message
news:3B79317D...@bu.edu...

> Steve Taylor wrote:
> >
> > Disclaimer - the only Tom Clancy I've read is _Executive Orders_, and
> > I've heard this is from after the brain eater got him.
>
> Oooh, bad choice to begin with. Aside from being towards the end
> of the series about Jack Ryan, it's not one of his better ones.
> IMHO, his best was _Clear and Present Danger_.

I thought Cardinal of the Kremlin was the best of the lot.

[Nancy Lebovitz]

In article <k6be7.7314$_P1.2...@sjc-read.news.verio.net>,

OBprintSF: "Stanley Toothbrush" by Terry Carr, in which the narrator
finds that repeating a word enough times to make it meaningless causes
the corresponding objects to disappear.

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Nancy Lebovitz said:

>I thought that historically, anyone who gets into a war with a vaguely
>equal opponent underestimates how much trouble it will be. Didn't
>both sides of the American Civil War assume that it would be over
>quickly, though with opposite outcomes?

Well, yes -- but Churchill made the point, in more than one of his works, that
English-derived cultures tend to be underestimated more than most, owing to a
generally lower level of militarism in peacetime -- and are very tenacious
wartime opponents. His theory was that one of the reasons the ACW was so
fiercely fought was that _both_ sides of that war were English-derived
cultures. (I wonder if he thought the same thing about the English Civil War,
where this was even more true).

[Jordan S. Bassior]

Randy Money said:

>Historically, it might be that way. Fictionally, we've heard similar
>stuff since at least Fu Manchu was grinning down Wayland Smith.

Yes ... so what? All that means is that it's one of those things that becomes
"cliche" _because it's TRUE_.

>Cliche, cliche, cliche, cliche ...
>
>Who cares if the cliche is true?

I do.

I see nothing wrong with an old truth.