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************************************************************** * * * R E A D I N G F O R P L E A S U R E * * * * Issue #9 * * * * * * * * Editor: Cindy Bartorillo * * * * * * TIME TRAVEL * ************************************************************** CONTACT US AT: Reading For Pleasure, c/o Cindy Bartorillo, 1819 Millstream Drive, Frederick, MD 21701; or on CompuServe leave a message to 74766,1206; or on GEnie leave mail to C.BARTORILLO; or call our BBS, the BAUDLINE II at 301-694-7108, 1200-9600 HST. NOTICE: Reading For Pleasure is not copyrighted. You may copy freely, but please give us credit if you extract portions to use somewhere else. Sample copies of our print edition are available upon request. We ask for a donation of $1.50 each to cover the printing and mailing costs. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: DISTRIBUTION DIRECTORY Here are a few bulletin boards where you should be able to pick up the latest issue of READING FOR PLEASURE. See masthead for where to send additions and corrections to this list. Accolade! BBS Round Rock,TX Jack Moore 512-388-1445 Ad Lib Monroeville,PA John Williams 412-327-9209 The Annex Dayton,OH John Cooper 513-274-0821 Beginnings BBS Levittown,NY Mike Coticchio 516-796-7296 S Billboard Bartlett,IL Gary Watson 708-289-9808 P Blcksbg Info Serv Blacksburg,VA Fred Drake 703-951-2920 Boardello Los Angeles,CA Bryan Tsunoda 213-820-4527 P Bruce's Bar&Grill Hartford,CT Bruce 203-236-3761 P Byrd's Nest Arlington,VA Debbie&Alan Byrd 703-671-8923 P CC-BBS ManhattanBchCA Chuck Crayne 213-379-8817 P Center Point PCB Salt Lake,UT Kelvin Hyatt 801-359-6014 P Chevy Chase Board Chevy Chase,MD Larkins/Carlson 301-549-5574 P Computer Co-Op Voorhees,NJ Ted Hare 609-784-9404 Daily Planet Owosso,MI Jay Stark 517-723-4613 Death Star Oxon Hill,MD Lee Pollard 301-839-0705 P Del Ches Systems Exton,PA Peter Rucci 215-363-6625 Diversified Prog PacPalisadesCA Jean-Pierre Denis 213-459-6053 P Farmington Valley Hartford,CT John Walko 203-676-8920 P Future Tech Boston,MA Napier & Moran 617-720-3600 P Futzer Avenue Issaquah,WA Stan Symms 206-391-2339 P Gentleman Loser Laurel,MD Robert West 301-776-0226 P HeavenSoft Dayton,OH John Wampler 513-836-4288 House of Illusions Louisville,KY Pittman/Schardein 502-458-7666 IBMNew CompuServe Library #0 Inn on the Park Scottsdale,AZ Jim Jusko 602-957-0631 P Invention Factory New York,NY Mike Sussell 212-431-1273 P JETS Philadelphia T.A. Hare 215-928-7503 P JForum CompuServe Library #8 KCSS BBS Seattle,WA Bob Neddo 206-296-5277 P ()Lensman() BBS Denver,CO Greg Bradt 303-979-8953 P Litforum CompuServe Library #12 Lost Paradise Washington,DC 202-370-7795 P Magpie HQ New York,NY Steve Manes 212-420-0527 P NiCK at NiTE Salt Lake,UT Nick Zahner 801-964-1889 P Nostradamus Los Angeles,CA Al Menache 213-473-4119 P Oak Lawn Oak Lawn,IL Vince & Chris 708-599-8089 P Poverty Rock PCB Mercer Is.,WA Rick Kunz 206-232-1763 PS Quantum Connec. PacPalisadesCA Richard W. Gross 213-459-6748 P Riverside Premium Lyons,IL Don Marquardt 312-447-8073 P Science Fiction GEnie Library #3 SF & Fantasy CIS Hom-9 Library #1 Shallow's Fontasy Alexandria,VA Mark Shallow 703-683-7981 P Suburban Software Chicago,IL Chuck Valecek 312-636-6694 P Sunwise Sun City W.,AZ Keith Slater 602-584-7395 Technoids Anon. Chandler,AZ David Cantere 602-899-4876 P Writers Happy Hr Seattle,WA Walter Scott 206-364-2139 P Writers' RT GEnie Library #1 Your Place Fairfax,VA Ken Goosens 703-978-6360 P RFP Home Board (all issues available all the time): Baudline II Frederick,MD the Bartorillo's 301-694-7108 (RFPs downloadable on first call; 9600 HST) Any board that participates in the RelayNet (tm) email system can request RFPs from BAUDLINE. P = PC Pursuit-able S = StarLink-able NOTE: Back issues on CompuServe may have been moved to a different library. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136 What's News . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193 On The Horizon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280 Bestsellers of the Christmas Season . . . . . . . . . . . 307 Obscenity Ruling Reversed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343 Good Reading Periodically . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363 Some Mysteries by Barbara Paul . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399 Time Travel (Darryl Kenning) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 464 Featured Author: Jack Finney. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 510 Time Travel Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 638 New From Carroll & Graf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1054 Redshift Rendezvous (advertisement) . . . . . . . . . . . 1133 Memory Blank by John E. Stith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1180 Births and Other Important Dates . . . . . . . . . . . . 1208 Random Reviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1320 New From Meadowbrook . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1738 Tom Clancy Speaks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1774 The Turner Tomorrow Awards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1797 Roc Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1860 Time Passes For Baby Boomers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1949 New From Simon & Schuster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2035 Dvorak's Guide to PC Telecommunications . . . . . . . . . 2174 Number One Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2222 Back Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2263 Bestsellers Trivia Quiz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 416 Bestsellers Trivia Quiz Answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2321 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are. --Somerset Maugham :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: EDITORIAL Welcome to our Time Travel Issue. Somewhere here you'll find a list of novels and short stories about Time Travel, a list that's no where near complete but will at least give you a lot of material for your next trip to the library or bookstore. This is one particular area where the SF section of your used-book store will be most helpful. Good luck to you in your hunt. It doesn't take a genius to realize why we like Time Travel stories so much--time is our one big enemy, the one we can never beat and who will ultimately have victory of us. All those things you did and said yesterday are permanently in the log books, never to be altered or deleted. Would it help if we considered, each morning as we get out of bed, that this will be our last chance at this day? That this one particular day will never come again and that we'd better make the very best of it we can? Yeah, you're right. Probably not. There's the invincibility of time and then there's human nature. The irresistible force meets the immovable object. A clash of titans. Check the heading on this issue and you'll notice that RFP no longer has a month on it. It's not that we plan to significantly change the frequency, it's just that we're all tired of racing the calendar. A magazine that I just started getting, called ANYTHING BUT MONDAY (more on this in a future issue), declares itself published not "monthly" or "quarterly" but "chaotically". I like that. Actually, we hope RFP will be more regular than "chaotically", but perhaps a bit less regimented than "monthly". Whatever. Please notice we have another new reviewer appearing in this issue--Marsha Via. We hope to hear more from Marsha in upcoming months too. Speaking of RFP contributions, let's shape up out there! I mean, congratulatory letters are very, very nice, but let's not forget that something printable is even better than nice. For instance, can I get a little help with the Distribution Directory? If you call a BBS on our Directory and can't find RFP, let us know about it. Also be sure to let us know if you find a BBS carrying RFP that ISN'T on our list. Any board that would like to carry RFP (and be listed) can get it from any place already on our list, or, if their BBS is reachable with PC Pursuit, they can contact me for Personal Delivery (I'll upload RFP each month myself). I particularly would like to hear from authors. If you've gotten something published, let me know so I can pass the word around. It couldn't hurt. In any case, thanks for all the nice letters, and accept my apology if you've gotten no response. My desk here is...well, it's a good thing you can't see it, because it's disgusting. And whatever falls on the floor generally winds up getting thrown out, which must be where a number of addresses have gone lately. Just keep sending anything you have to say to one of the addresses listed on the masthead--it's all read and appreciated. See you next month, or whenever. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: WHAT'S NEWS * Are you ready for Ted Turner Books? There's a new company called Turner Publishing Inc. which is a subsidiary of Turner Broadcasting System Inc. of which Ted Turner is the chairman and president. The new company will take advantage of shows produced for Turner's four TV stations (WTBS, CNN, Headline News, TNT). The first book will be arriving this spring to coincide with a miniseries called PORTRAIT OF GREAT BRITAIN, and the second will be "drawn on" SEASON OF GIANTS, a series on TNT dealing with the lives of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, and will be released in the fall. * Bookish types shouldn't miss: THE DIARY OF H.L. MENCKEN edited by Charles A. Fecher (Knopf, $30, ISBN 0-394-56877-X). * From Publishers Weekly (Nov. 24, 1989): "The November issue of Barry R. Levin's Science Fiction & Fantasy Literature, a rare book newsletter, has a listing for what is unquestionably the rarest edition of THE SATANIC VERSES. It's part of an English first edition, a numbered set of 12 copies of the Salman Rushdie novel; bound in full Morocco leather with gilt lettering, printed on vellum antique laid paper and signed by the author. And if that's not rare enough, the publisher, in a weirdly prophetic gesture, had the late Ayatollah Khomeini's autograph tipped into one copy before the controversy over the book began. Rare and notorious--an expensive combination--it sells for $6750." * A company called Xiamax has made electronic books a reality. They have complete multi-volume reference books stored in electronic form on a "smart card" which is about the size of a credit card. A hand-held device called the Xiamax-2 is used to read the cards, and allows the reader to highlight, search, and cross-reference with ease. Future enhancements will involve voice modules, graphics and color. Look for the Xiamax-2 to be released this spring. * Steven Spielberg has optioned FADE THE HEAT by Jay Brandon, soon to be a Pocket Books hardcover. It's a courtroom drama about a district attorney whose son is accused of rape (Brandon is a D.A. in Texas). I suppose legal plots are back "in" now, probably because of Scott Turow's PRESUMED INNOCENT. * Remember THE READER'S CATALOG I told you about? It's a huge catalog of books currently in print that you can buy for $24.95. It also includes an 800 number to call and order any book your local bookseller can't provide. Well, you'll never guess what the top sellers are on their 800-number order service. They average 35 orders a day and the hottest titles by far are the Loeb editions of the Greek and Latin classics, followed by the works of Hegel and Theodore Dreiser. * Remember AMONG SCHOOLCHILDREN by Tracy Kidder that we mentioned in RFP #somethingorother? It's about a dedicated teacher in a town beset with problems, and the news is that it's supposedly going to be made into a movie for Universal by Steven Spielberg's Amblin' Productions. More movie news: Carol Burnett's company at Disney, Kalola, has optioned THE SENSITIVES by Herbert Burkholz, a psychic spy story. And Sylvester Stallone's White Eagle Enterprises has exercised its option on the thriller THE MIDNIGHT CLUB by James Patterson. * Still more movie news: Lawrence Gordon Productions has exercised its option on Walter Wager's thriller 58 MINUTES (Macmillan). The movie version will be called DIE HARD 2 and will star Bruce Willis. * For Baby Boomers Only: Grace Metalious' daughter, Cynthia Geary, is writing a sequel to PEYTON PLACE from notes left by her mother. 20th Century-Fox plans to produce a pilot for TV with a possible series spinoff. * Ballantine has won the reprint rights to the Christmas season's big hit: FOUCAULT'S PENDULUM by Umberto Eco. * For Ripperologists, there's a good-sounding book just out: JACK THE RIPPER: The Uncensored Facts by Paul Begg (Robson/Parkwest, $19.95, ISBN 0-86051-528-1). I've heard that this is an in-depth, unbiased account, with good coverage of 1888 London and the people involved in the case, and it includes material on all of the popular suspects. * The Sci-Fi Channel looks like it's going to become a reality. It's going to be a 24-hour basic cable network for SF, Fantasy, and Horror programming, and will be transmitted throughout the U.S. from GE Americom's SATCOM C-4 satellite. Nothing really definite seems set yet, but it's due to begin broadcasting "later this year". They'll start with vintage TV shows, movies, sitcoms, and game shows, with more and more original programming as they get rolling. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: ON THE HORIZON This information is early and therefore tentative, and is for the obsessive reader only. Greg Bear: Anvil of the Stars (sequel to Forge of God) Moving Mars Mayer Alan Brenner: Spell of Intrigue (second in the "Dance of the Gods" fantasy series) J.M. Dillard: Specters (horror) Elizabeth Hand: Aestival Tide (second in the Winterlong series) Patricia A. McKillip: The Sorceress and the Signet (adult fantasy) Kim Newman: Bad Dreams (horror/fantasy) Jago (horror/fantasy) Andre Norton & Mercedes Lackey: The Elvenbane (A fantasy collaboration and, of course, the first of a series.) Jerry Oltion: Isaac Asimov's Robots and Aliens #6: Humanity William Sanders: Pockets of Resistance The Hell-Bound Train (sequel to Pockets of R.) (both the above to be listed as by "Will Sundown") William Shatner: TekLords (sequel to TekWar) Brad Strickland: Wizard's Mole (3rd in "Jeremy Moon" series) Dragon's Plunder (for "Dragonflight" series) Robert Weinberg: The Black Lodge (contemporary occult novel) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: THE BESTSELLERS OF THE CHRISTMAS SEASON Hardcover Fiction: FOUCAULT'S PENDULUM by Umberto Eco; THE DARK HALF by Stephen King; CARIBBEAN by James Michener; STRAIGHT by Dick Francis; TALES FROM MARGARITAVILLE by Jimmy Buffett; CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER by Tom Clancy; and DADDY by Danielle Steel. Hardcover Nonfiction: LIAR'S POKER: RISING THROUGH THE WRECKAGE ON WALL STREET by Michael M. Lewis; WONDERFUL LIFE by Stephen Jay Gould; MY TURN by Nancy Reagan with William Novak; AMONG SCHOOLCHILDREN by Tracy Kidder; A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME by Stephen J. Hawking; and ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED IN KINDERGARTEN by Robert Fulghum. Trade Paperbacks: LOVE IN THE TIME OF CHOLERA by Gabriel Garcia Marquez; RADIANT SILHOUETTE by John Yau. Mass Market Paperbacks: BREATHING LESSONS by Anne Tyler; SANDS OF TIME by Sidney Sheldon; ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED IN KINDERGARTEN by Robert Fulghum; CAT'S EYE by Margaret Atwood; THE SHELL SEEKERS by Rosamunde Pilcher; ANYTHING FOR BILLY by Larry McMurtry. Children's Books: THE GREAT WALDO SEARCH by Martin Handford; THE POLAR EXPRESS by Chris Van Allsburg; SWAN LAKE by Mark Helprin; THE ELEVENTH HOUR by Graeme Base; CARL GOES SHOPPING by Alexandra Day; AMY THE DANCING BEAR by Carly Simon; THE WAY THINGS WORK by David Macaulay. Gift Books: THE WAY TO COOK by Julia Child; THE NEW BASICS by Julee Rosso & Sheila Lukins; MARTHA STEWART'S CHRISTMAS by Martha Stewart; I DREAM A WORLD: PORTRAITS OF BLACK WOMEN WHO CHANGED AMERICA (Stewart, Tabori & Chang); BRUCE WEBER (Knopf); THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY DESK REFERENCE (Prentice-Hall). :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: OBSCENITY RULING REVERSED In December of 1986, the manager of Friendly Frank's Comics store in Illinois, Michael Correa, was arrested for selling 15 comics that included scenes of nudity and sexual conduct to an undercover police officer. The trial judge decided that 3 of the comics were obscene, and Correa was sentenced to a year's supervision and $750 in fines and costs for selling obscene material. Recently, however, the First District Appellate Court of Illinois reversed the conviction, and the three-judge panel stated that sexuality is "not synonymous with obscenity" and that they would not attempt to further define obscenity. The opinion continued with, "However, we know it when we see it," and the 3 comics in question "are not hard-core obscenity". The panel also ruled that the lower court erred by disregarding evidence of the literary and artistic value of the comics. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: GOOD READING PERIODICALLY MENTOR is dedicated to the idea of mentoring, the passing along of information, skills, and knowledge. It's a forum for the exchange of ideas, methods for learning, and methods of teaching. You get book reviews; information on seminars, conferences, workshops, and other publications; articles on teaching and mentoring; news items on mentoring. It seems to be half Learning Resources and half Inspiration. MENTOR is published quarterly by Watermarks, PO Box 4382, Overland Park, KS 66204. Subscriptions are $14.50 per year and they just might send you a sample issue if you ask nicely. A large SASE (self-addressed, stamped #10 envelope) probably wouldn't hurt, either. AFRAID is subtitled "The Newsletter for the Horror Professional", which seems to get the point across very well. If you are a writer in the horror field (or want to be, or are interested in), you should try this out. I'm not a "Horror Professional", but I've seen an issue of AFRAID and I've seen the Horror Writers of America Newsletter--and it seems to me that AFRAID is the more informative and useful of the two. That's not entirely fair since HWA may (and probably does) perform services for its members behind the scenes of the newsletter. But there's much more to the AFRAID newsletter, anyone can subscribe, and there's not a whole lot of insider political talk. The issue I saw was loaded with news, it had an article on forming a writers group, book reviews, articles of writers' personal experiences and opinions, entertainment pieces, and market reports. One year of AFRAID (12 issues) is $20, two years $40. Make your check payable to AFRAID and mail to: AFRAID, 2170 S. Harbor Blvd., #270, Anaheim, CA 92802. If you have a publication that our readers would be interested in hearing about, send a sample issue and all relevant information to Cindy Bartorillo, c/o Reading For Pleasure, 1819 Millstream Dr., Frederick, MD 21701. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: Some Mysteries by Barbara Paul The Fourth Wall (Doubleday, 1979) Liars and Tyrants and People Who Turn Blue (Doubleday, 1980) First Gravedigger (Doubleday, 1980) Your Eyelids are Growing Heavy (Doubleday, 1981) The Renewable Virgin (Scribner's, 1984) A Cadenza for Caruso (St. Martin's, 1984) Kill Fee (Scribner's, 1985) Prima Donna at Large (St. Martin's, 1985) But He Was Already Dead When I Got There (Scribner's, 1986) A Chorus of Detectives (St. Martin's, 1987) He Huffed and He Puffed (Scribner's, 1989) Good King Sauerkraut (Scribner's, 1989) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: BESTSELLERS TRIVIA QUIZ A. Here's the January 12, 1990 Publishers Weekly Hardcover Fiction Bestsellers list, if you can figure it out: 1) D. by D.S. 2) C.a.P.D. by T.C. 3) T.D.H. by S.K. 4) C. by J.A.M. 5) F.'s P. by U.E. 6) T.f.M.: F.F.a.F.F. by J.B. 7) S. by D.F. 8) T.P.o.t.E. by K.F. 9) J.S.a.H.P. by J.S. 10) C.G. by J.J. 11) T.E.H.: A.C.M. by G.B. 12) T.J.L.C. by A.T. 13) S.L. by L.D. 14) T.S.o.D. by D.E. 15) M. by P.S. B. And here's the January 12, 1990 Publishers Weekly Mass Market Paperback Bestsellers list. The 15 titles below have been translated with a simple substitution cypher, meaning that each letter of the alphabet has been replaced by another letter. Hint: Each group of five titles uses a different substitution cypher (#1-#5 uses the same code, #6-#10 uses another code, #11-#15 uses a third code). 1) Frr B Wpfrrv Gppa Km Ngmc B Rpfwgpa Bg Nbgapwefwkpg 2) Kxp Dfgad Mh Kbup 3) Kxp Afwn Kmcpw: Kxp Awfcbge Mh Kxp Kxwpp 4) Dkmrpg Qrpddbged 5) F Kxbph Mh Kbup 6) Yjr Djraa Drrlrtd 7) Yjr Nappfomh 8) Ntrsyjomh Arddpmd 9) S Yeody Om Yjr Ysar 10) Vsy'd Rur 11) Buxvjauxpr 12) Ewgwyc Bumjrcv 13) W Ecwexj Zj Ucpp 14) Lcwfubvcc Vxwr 15) Ela Uxxo :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: TIME TRAVEL by Darryl Kenning Time travel has been a subject that has fascinated the human species for as long as we could wonder, "what if I could change what happened..?...". I think the first TT book I read was Mark Twain's A CONNECTICUT YANKEE IN KING ARTHUR'S COURT. I was in the 6th grade, and my teacher let me read it on the bench next to me (well heck, I wasn't bothering anyone and she probably thought it was a classic) for however long it took me to finish it. I remember that it was a story I just couldn't put down, as Mr. Twain's magic with words transported me to a particularly American view of our particular timeline in history. What has fascinated me for years is the multitude of ways authors have found to either make TT a major part of their stories, or have had it fade so far into the background that you can't even see it. A lot of mainstream fiction uses TT without anyone even noticing it. Even more interesting is the fact that Time Travel, into the future, is already a real possibility using Einstein's theory, a spaceship, and a small atomic engine for thrust. WOW..That's the stuff dreams are made of! Unfortunately, I rather think that going backward in time is altogether unlikely (my personal view is that we may well be able to SEE back, but not GO back). Of course, that's where we all would really like to go to undo past mistakes, and just enjoy living in what seem to be simpler times. And I suppose that's the REAL appeal of it all. It is also a lot of fun to try to unravel the Gordian Knot of going backwards in time and setting up an unresolvable puzzle. This aspect alone provides a major amount of grist for the imaginations of authors. If you haven't really tried Time Travel as a genre, you should. It will give you the opportunity to let your imagination really SOAR, and maybe, just maybe, we can learn some real life lessons from what might have been. Darryl can be contacted through RFP, on CompuServe (76337,740), on the ANNEX Bulletin Board (513-274-0821 -- J 3 to join the Science Fiction conference), or by writing to him directly at: 6331 Marshall Rd., Centerville, Ohio 45459. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: JACK FINNEY Jack Finney often wrote about time travel, making him entirely suitable as this month's Featured Author. Indeed, he wrote one of the genuine classics in the subgenre--TIME AND AGAIN--as well as the well-known short story, "The Third Level". Like Stanley Ellin, Jack Finney's writing is gratifyingly consistent: his style is simple and clear, and his stories are always fascinating. Scour the bookstores and the libraries and I can pretty well guarantee that if it has Jack Finney's name on it, you'll have a good time reading it. Finney's most common theme was The Perfect Crime, the most elegant way to accomplish the seemingly impossible. Even when the goal is not technically a crime, it's always something that's not entirely socially acceptable--like the desire to just get up and leave your current life, with all its baggage and responsibilities, and start again with no penalties to pay. By its very nature, this theme lends itself to witty and unconventional treatments (like Time Travel). I decided to perform a valuable public service in this space by providing you with a brief biographic rundown on Jack Finney, so I sat down amidst my large library of literary reference volumes armed with a pencil and a large pad of paper. First I checked the giant American Literature-type books for a Finney, Jack entry. No luck. Then I searched the American Science Fiction-type books, but only found that Finney was the author of the book from which the famous INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHER films were made. That's not exactly hot news. So then I turned to my small cache of Finney books, looking for a biographical preface. Nope. It wasn't until I was reduced to reading dust jacket blurbs that I finally struck pay dirt: "He lives near San Francisco." That's it, folks. That's the biography. It now remains for some industrious reader to produce a new analysis of the Finney canon in the light of this startling information. I'm afraid I'll have to leave it to you to accomplish, however. I'm completely worn out by my research. 5 AGAINST THE HOUSE (Doubleday, 1954): A great suspense novel about a group of college kids that decide to rob a casino, a supposedly impossible job. It was made into a film in 1955, directed by Phil Karlson and starring Kim Novak and Brian Keith. THE BODY SNATCHERS (Dell, 1955): The basis of the Don Siegel film in 1955 and the Philip Kaufman film in 1978. Finney, and the following movies, touched on a lot of sore spots: the menace from within, the menace from the sky, the enemy who's not interested in negotiating. And what if Uncle Ira really isn't Uncle Ira? This story (once again, book and movies) has provided more material for intellectual interpretation than almost any other this century. Just ask someone about the Red Scare aspect of the Siegel film--you'll get a complete lecture (or is that you giving the lecture?). This story is also the source of a now-worn gag: Whenever someone tells you that so-and-so isn't acting like themselves, the correct response is, "Have you checked the basement for pods?" THE HOUSE OF NUMBERS (Dell, 1957): Another suspense novel in the Finney fashion, this time about married couple Ben and Ruth who are going to help Ben's brother Arnie escape from San Quentin. An ingenious plot. THE THIRD LEVEL (Rinehart, 1957): This is a collection of short stories, and the title story is probably his most famous, about an unknown part of Grand Central Station that transports people to the year 1894. ASSAULT ON A QUEEN (Simon & Schuster, 1959): Yes, Jack Finney wrote the original book that was made into the famous 1966 Frank Sinatra movie (directed by Jack Donohue). The screenplay was written by somebody named Rod Serling. I LOVE GALESBURG IN THE SPRINGTIME (Simon & Schuster, 1963) GOOD NEIGHBOR SAM (Simon & Schuster, 1963): You're probably more familiar with the 1964 movie, directed by David Swift, that starred Jack Lemmon; but Jack Finney wrote the novel in the first place. THE WOODROW WILSON DIME (Simon & Schuster, 1968): Ben is a struggling advertising copywriter, stuck in a dull marriage. Then one day he finds a Woodrow Wilson dime, which leads him into a parallel world of his dreams where he runs his own ad agency and shares life with a dazzling red-haired bombshell. TIME AND AGAIN (Simon & Schuster, 1970): Jack Finney's masterpiece. Did illustrator Si Morley really step out of his 20th-century apartment one night--and right into the winter of 1882? The U.S. Government believed it, especially when Si returned with a portfolio of brand-new sketches and tintype photos of a world that no longer existed--or did it? A terrific mystery story. MARION'S WALL (Simon & Schuster, 1973): Nick and Jan move into an old San Francisco house only to find it possessed by a screen queen of the twenties who takes over Jan's body and wreaks marvelous comic mayhem. With a nostalgia for old movies, this mysterious tale of lost destiny is touched with the spirit of flappers, Fitzgerald and lost innocence. Made into a movie starring Glenn Close. THE NIGHT PEOPLE (Doubleday, 1977): Lew Joliffe is a hip San Francisco lawyer who lives with his girl, Jo. They share parties, ambition and lovemaking with friends Harry and Shirley. Then the four try a new game: late at night they roam the deserted streets playing pranks. Suspense mounts as the consequences of their increasingly bizarre tricks take a decidedly dangerous turn. FORGOTTEN NEWS: THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY AND OTHER LOST STORIES (Doubleday, 1983): Jack Finney did much research on the 19th century and read many magazines and newspapers of the period. This is a collection of some of the most mysterious, lurid, and fascinating stories he uncovered. ABOUT TIME: TWELVE STORIES (Simon & Schuster, 1986): These are stories that were originally published in THE THIRD LEVEL and I LOVE GALESBURG IN THE SPRINGTIME. Includes "The Third Level", "Such Interesting Neighbors" (you may know where your neighbors are from, but what about when they're from?), "Of Missing Persons" (a travel agency for people who need a new start somewhen else), "Where the Cluetts Are" (a Victorian house becomes a time machine), "Second Chance" (a vintage car is the time machine), and "The Face in the Photo" (another time travel detective story). THREE BY FINNEY (Simon & Schuster, 1987): (contains: The Woodrow Wilson Dime / Marion's Wall / The Night People) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: TIME TRAVEL BOOKS compiled by Darryl Kenning & Cindy Bartorillo annotated by Cindy Bartorillo When I mentioned to Darryl that we'd be doing a Time Travel Issue, he sent me a personal database of book titles. I added a few titles of my own, plus a bit of research, and here is the result. I had planned to send the whole thing back to Darryl for a final check, but, as usual, time ran out on me and I never got around to it, so any typos and inaccuracies are mine. The integers that appear after some titles are the Kenning Rating System (0-5, 0=worthless, 5=classic). Aldiss, Brian: Cryptozoic! (1968) Frankenstein Unbound (1973). Possibly more enjoyable than the original. Anderson, Poul: Brain Wave (1954). The intelligence of all mammals increases suddenly. The Dancer From Atlantis (Signet, 1972) 2 The Guardians of Time (1960) 5 "The Man Who Came Early" (1956). A man gets transported to 10th-century Iceland. Past Times (Tor, 1984) 4 There Will Be Time 5 Time Patrolman (Tor, 1983) 4 Anonymous: Missing One's Coach (1838). The narrator falls through a hole in time and winds up back in the days of the Venerable Bede. This story was reprinted in August Derleth's anthology, Far Boundaries (1951). Anthony, Piers: Orn 1 Appel, Allen: Time After Time (Carroll & Graf, 1985). Are they just nightmares, or is history professor Alex Balfour really travelling back to the time of Tsar Nicholas, Anastasia, and Rasputin? Asimov, Isaac: "The Dead Past" (1956) The End of Eternity (1955). Andrew Harlan makes Reality Changes, rearranging past and future according to the dictates of the Allwhen Council. Ballard, J.G.: Hello America Barr, Robert: The Hour Glass (1898). A man from the past shows up to claim a recently purchased and now antique hour glass. Bayley, Barrington J.: Collision Course (DAW, 1973) 2 The Fall of Chronopolis (DAW, 1974) 1 Benford, Gregory: Timescape (Pocket Books, 1981). Once we've destroyed our planet, how could we send a warning message to the past? Would they believe us? Includes fairly heavy passages on theoretical physics. Bester, Alfred: Extro (1974) "The Men Who Murdered Mohammed" (1964). An unusual perspective on how time works. Bishop, Michael: No Enemy But Time Blish, James: Midsummer Century (1972) Blumenthal, Curley & Williams: The Complete Time Traveler (Ten Speed, 1988, 2038). A guide to time travel, written in standard travel book style and originally published in 2038. A lot of fun. Bond, Nelson: Exiles in Time (Paperback Lib., 1965) 2 Bradbury, Ray: "A Sound of Thunder" (1952). A classic about parallel universes. Brunner, John: Quicksand (1967) The Tides of Time (Del Rey, 1984) 1 Chalker, Jack L.: Downtime (Tor, 1985) 3 Cook, Glenn: A Matter of Time (Ace, 1985) 3 Cummings, Ray: The Exile of Time (Ace, 1964) 1 Darney, Arsen: The Purgatory Zone (Ace, 1981) 3 Davies, L.P.: Genesis Two (1970) DeCamp, L. Sprague: Lest Darkness Fall (1941) 5. An anthropologist, who gets transported back to 6th-century Rome, tries to circumvent the Dark Ages. Del Rey, Lester: The Scheme of Things (Belmont, 1966) 3 Dick, Philip K.: Counter-Clock World (1967) Dr. Futurity (Berkley, 1984) 2 Dickson, Gordon R.: Time Storm (1977) Dorn, Frank: Appointment With Yesterday (Manor, 1978) 4 Dozois, Gardner, ed.: Time Travellers (Ace, 1989). Stories by John Varley, Brian W. Aldiss, Steven Utley, Tim Sullivan, Lewis Shiner, Robert Silverberg, Ian Watson, Kim Antieau, Andrew Weiner, John Kessel, and Lucius Shepard. Drake, David: Bridgehead (Tor, 1986) 0 Edmondson, G.C.: The Ship That Sailed The Time Stream (1965) Eklund, Gordon: Serving In Time (Laser, 1975) 4 Elder, Michael: The Alien Earth (Pinnacle, 1971) 4 Farmer, Phillip Jose: Time's Last Gift (Del Rey, 1977) 3 Fearn, John Russell: The Intelligence Gigantic (1933) Finney, Jack: (see article elsewhere in this issue) About Time (Simon & Schuster, 1986) Marion's Wall (Simon & Schuster, 1973) The Night People (Doubleday, 1977) Time and Again (Simon & Schuster, 1970) 5 The Woodrow Wilson Dime (Simon & Schuster, 1968) Fox, Gardner F.: The Hunter Out of Time (Ace, 1965) 4 Frankowski, Leo: The Cross-Time Engineer (Del Rey, 1986) 5. Modern man in medieval Poland. Garner, Alan: Red Shift (Del Rey, 1981) 4 Gerrold, David: The Man Who Folded Himself (1973) 3. The classic book about time looping, where you visit yourself at various ages and create a time containing numerous "copies" of you. Gordon, Rex: First Through Time (1962) Gordon, Stuart: Time Story (DAW, 1973) 3 Goulart, Ron: The Panchronicon Plot (DAW, 1977) 3 When the Sleeper Wakes (DAW, 1975) 3 Green, I.G.: Time Beyond Time (Belmont, 1971) 3 Greenhalgh, Zohra: Trickster's Touch Hamilton, Edmond: City At World's End 3 Return to the Stars 3 Harrison, Harry: A Rebel In Time (Tor, 1983) 5 The Technicolor Time Machine (1967). How to make a movie with the help of a time machine. Don't recreate a period, GO there! Don't hire an actor to pretend to be a Viking, get a REAL Viking! Don't waste today on something that can be done yesterday! West of Eden (Bantam, 1985) 2. An alternate past where mankind must battle intelligent dinosaurs. Hawke, Simon: The Timekeeper Conspiracy (Ace, 1984) 2 Heinlein, Robert A.: "All You Zombies" (1959). A man becomes his own mother and father. "By His Bootstraps" (1941). Famous story about the problems of time loops. Hogan, James P.: Thrice Upon A Time (Del Rey, 1980) 5. Another story about using the past to change the present. More technical than most. Hoyle, Fred: October the First is Too Late (Harper & Row, 1966). What if each area of the world was currently experiencing a different section of the time stream? England is in the 1960s, Western Europe is in World War I, Greece is in the Golden Age of Pericles, America is thousands of years in the future, and Russia and Asia are a lifeless, glasslike plain. What has happened? Whose time is "correct"? Hoyle, Trevor: The Gods Look Down (Ace, 1982) 4 Through The Eye Of Time (Ace, 1982) 4 Jones, Raymond: Renegades of Time (Laser, 1975) 2 Kilian, Crawford: The Empire of Time (Del Rey, 1978) 3 Rogue Emperor (Del Rey, 1988) 4 Kilworth, Garry: Split Second (Popular Lib., 1985) 3 Kipling, Rudyard: Puck of Pook's Hill (1906) Klein, Gerard: The Day Before Tomorrow (DAW, 1972) 3 The Mote in God's Eye (DAW, 1975) 3 Kurland, Michael: Tomorrow Knight (DAW, 1976) 4 The Whenabouts of Burr (DAW, 1975) 3 Laumer, Keith: The Day Before Forever (Dell, 1969) 4 Dinosaur Beach (DAW, 1971) 4 The Great Time Machine Hoax (1964) 3 The Long Twilight (Berkley, 1970) 4 Time Trap (Baen, 1987) 2 Leiber, Fritz: Changewar (Ace, 1983) 4 Leinster, Murray: "Sideways in Time" (1934). An examination of parallel universes. The Time Tunnel (Pyramid, 1967) 3 Lewis, Hilda: The Ship That Flew (1939) Lionel, Robert: Time Echo (Uni, 1964) 2 Lymington, John: Froomb! 2 McCollum, Michael: A Greater Infinity (Del Rey, 1982) 3 Maddock, Larry: The Time Trap Gambit (Ace, 1969) 2 Maine, Charles Eric: Timeliner (Bantam, 1956) 2 Malzberg, Barry: Scop (Pyramid, 1976) 3 Manning, Laurence: The Man Who Awoke (Ballantine, 1975) 3 Matheson, Richard: Bid Time Return (1975). Good book that was made into a so-so movie with Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve. Maxim, John R.: Time Out of Mind (Houghton Mifflin, 1986). Whenever it snows, Jonathan finds himself in the 1880s, about to kill someone, and he doesn't know why. But when he's in the 1980s, someone's trying to kill HIM and he doesn't know why. Obviously, Jonathan had better figure out what's going on before it's too late. Maynard, Richard: The Return Meredith, Richard C.: Run, Come See Jerusalem! (Ballantine, 1976) 3 Merwin, Sam, Jr.: The Time Shifters 3 Mitchell, Edward Page: The Clock That Went Backward (1881). Possibly the first story to use a machine to travel through time. Was reprinted in a Mitchell collection, The Crystal Man (1973). An Uncommon Sort of Spectre (1879). A man is visited by the ghost of his son from forty years in the future. Mitchell, Kirk: Never the Twain (Ace, 1987) 2. No matter how hard you try to change the past, history will manage to stay consistent. Montana, Ron: The Sign of the Thunderbird 4 Monteleone, Thomas F.: The Time Connection (Popular Lib, 1976) 4 Moorcock, Michael: Dancers at the End of Time (series started in 1972) Behold the Man (1970) Moore, C.L. & H. Kuttner: Earth's Last Citadel 2 Moore, Dan Tyler: The Terrible Game (Signet, 1969) 3 Moore, Ward: Bring the Jubilee (1953). A parallel universe where the South won the Civil War. Nesbit, E.: The Story of the Amulet (1906) Norton, Andre: The Defiant Agents 5 Galactic Derelict 5 Key Out of Time 3 Operation Time Search (Ace, 1973) 3 The Time Traders 5 Norwood, Warren: Time Police (Lynx-Omega, 1988) 3 Trapped (Omega, 1989) 2 Padgett, Lewis: "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" (1943). (Lewis Padgett was the pseudonym used by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore for their collaboration.) Two boxes of toys from the future get sent back to the past. Paul Barbara: Pillars of Salt (Signet, 1979) 2 Pearce, Philippa: Tom's Midnight Garden (1958) Powers, Tim: The Anubis Gates (Ace, 1983) Preuss, Paul: Re-Entry (Bantam, 1981) 2 Priest, Christopher: Indoctrinaire (Pocket, 1971) 0 The Perfect Lover (1977) Randle, Kevin & Cornett: Remember the Alamo! (Charter, 1986) 3 Reynolds, Mack: After Utopia (Ace, 1977) 3 "Compounded Interest" (1956) Equality: In The Year 2000 (Ace, 1977) 4 Looking Backward, From the Year 2000 (Ace, 1973) 4 Perchance To Dream (Ace, 1977) 4 Reynolds, Mack & Dean Ing: The Other Time (Baen, 1984) 5 Saberhagen, Fred: After the Fact (Baen, 1988). Time travellers trying to save the life of Abraham Lincoln. Saberhagen, Fred, editor: A Spadeful of Spacetime (1980) Schmidt, Stanley: Sins of the Fathers (Berkley, 1976) 1 Shaw, Bob: Who Goes Here (1977) Sherred, T.L.: "E For Effort" (1947). About movies made with real footage of past events. Shupp, Mike: With Fate Conspire (Del Rey, 1985) 2 Silverberg, Robert: Hawksbill Station (Berkley, 1978) 5 "Many Mansions" (1973). A clever murder puzzle. The Masks of Time (1968) Time Gate (created by R.S.) (Baen, 1989). Stories about computer simulations of historical figures; by Robert Silverberg, Robert Sheckley, Poul Anderson, Gregory Benford, and Pat Murphy. The Time Hoppers 4 Up The Line (Ballantine, 1969) 5. The rippling, domino effects of time travel illustrated with humor and intricate detail. Silverberg, Robert, editor: Trips in Time (1977) Voyagers in Time Simak, Clifford D.: Mastodonia 3 Time And Time Again 3 Smith, Dean Wesley: Laying the Music to Rest (Pop Lib, 1989). A college professor seeks the answers to mysteries and gets caught in a time warp. He meets a gang of mutant time bandits and finds himself on the deck of the R.M.S. Titanic. Smith, L. Neil: The Gallatin Divergence (Del Rey, 1985) 2 The Probability Broach (Del Rey, 1980) 2 Snyder, Guy: Testament XXI (DAW, 1973) 1 Sohl, Jerry: The Time Dissolver (Avon, 1957) 2 Stephenson, Andrew M.: The Wall of Years (Dell, 1980) 3 Taine, John: Seeds of Life (1931) Tenn, William: "The Brooklyn Project" (1948) Tiptree, James, Jr.: "The Man Who Walked Home" (1972). Haunting post-holocaust story. Tucker, Wilson: The Lincoln Hunters (1957) 3 The Time Masters 5 Year of the Quiet Sun (Ace, 1970) 2 Twain, Mark: A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889). I was going to describe the plot, but all you have to do is read the title. Uttley, Alison: A Traveller in Time (Ace, 1986) 2 Vonnegut, Kurt: Slaughterhouse Five (1969) Waldrop, Howard: Them Bones (Ace, 1984) 1 Weinbaum, Stanley G.: The New Adam (1939) Wellman, Manly Wade: Twice In Time (1940) 4 Wells, H.G.: "The New Accelerator" (1901). What would happen if you drank an "accelerator" that causes time, for you, to move more quickly? The Time Machine (1895). Don't expect to find the movies here. The genuine original is a sober and philosophical story. Wessel, Johan Hermann: Anno 7603 (1781). A comedy. A young couple are transported to a future where the genders have changed places. White, Ted: Spawn of the Death Mac (Warner, 1974) 2 Whyte, H. Walter: Deep Freeze (Manor, 1977) 2 Williamson, Jack: The Legion of Time (1952) 0 Wyndham, John: "Pawley's Peepholes" (1956). A small town in the past becomes a tourist attraction for time travellers. Yulsman, Jerry: Elleander Morning (St. Martin's, 1984). The first two-thirds set up a fascinating plot about going back to the past and shooting a young painter named Adolf Hitler. It's unfortunate that the last third is a fizzle. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: NEW FROM CARROLL & GRAF PATTERN FOR TERROR by Hugh Pentecost Hugh Pentecost, a founding member of Mystery Writers of America, has long been recognized by both critics and his legion of fans as one of the most consistently entertaining of mystery writers. He has created several successful series detectives, one of the most popular of whom is Uncle George Crowder, hero of PATTERN FOR TERROR. A former county prosecutor, he has become a town character. "Uncle George" to everyone and highly respected for good advice as well as his skill in solving curious crimes. Uncle George is aroused one morning by calls for help from his young nephew Joey, who has found the body of the new teacher from the local private school lying in a water-filled ditch. The teacher is dead of drugs contained in a ruptured pouch he had swallowed to conceal. Crowder gets involved in the investigation but is warned off when Joey is kidnapped. But clever Joey gets a message through. "Friday on Saturday." And only Uncle George knows what that means. The whole community is drawn into the search, from the starchiest of faculty members to the coolest of jazz sidemen, but the denouement is as startling as it is logical. ISBN 0-88184-519-1 Cloth 128 pages $14.95 QUARTET by Jean Rhys This powerful psychological novel set in Paris between the wars is Jean Rhys' most compelling work. Stranded and alone after her Polish husband is mistakenly jailed, Marya Zelli is befriended by an English couple who take her home with them. Slowly they overwhelm her; the man by his uncontrollable passions, the woman by using her as a foil against the husband. QUARTET was made into a motion picture starring Alan Bates and Maggie Smith. ISBN 0-88184-538-8 Trade Paper 186 pages $7.95 DEATH OF MY AUNT by C.H.B. Kitchin In DEATH OF MY AUNT the erudite novelist C.H.B. Kitchin turns for the first time to detective fiction, producing a witty and charming gem of a story--with a leavening dose of the sardonic. One of the most beautifully developed and quietly amusing characters in detective fiction, Malcolm Warren is a fastidious, even eccentric, young stockbroker, summoned by his very rich and very autocratic aunt. Her sudden and horrible death by poison--at Malcolm's inadvertent hand--plunges our hero into a fevered search for the real killer. Selected by H.R.F. Keating as one of the "100 Best" crime and mystery novels. ISBN 0-88184-549-3 Mass Market 159 pages $3.50 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: THE FIVE BEST MYSTERIES according to Dilys Winn 1) THE DAUGHTER OF TIME by Josephine Tey 2) THE THIRTY-FIRST OF FEBRUARY by Julian Symons 3) TIME AND AGAIN by Jack Finney 4) WHO IS LEWIS PINDAR? by L.P. Davies 5) THE GLASS KEY by Dashiell Hammett (from MURDER INK by Dilys Winn; Workman, 1977) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: WARNING TO PASSENGERS The environment aboard a hyperspace craft is quite safe as long as you are careful. Very careful. The management reminds you that THE SPEED OF LIGHT ON BOARD THIS CRAFT IS TEN METERS PER SECOND. Be ready for relativistic effects and optical illusions. *NEVER* TAMPER WITH YOUR LIFE BELT. THE FIELD IT GENERATES ALLOWS YOUR NEURAL TRANSMISSIONS TO OPERATE AT NORMAL SPEEDS, AND IT IS ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL TO YOUR HEALTH. 1. Use only the ship's master clock displays. Do not rely on your personal timepiece; it will accurately record your personal subjective time, but it will never agree with other timepieces until you reset it when you leave the ship. 2. Remember that everything you see and hear is at least slightly in the past, due to the time it takes sound and light to travel. The closest things to you are the most current. 3. Trust what your hands tell you rather than believing your eyes. Bending light can make you think a convex floor is concave. Colors may shift, and shapes may distort. 4. Go slow. Limit your speed to a fast walk until you are familiar with the environment. Please heed the traffic rules. By running fast, it is possible to exceed the speed of sound, which is only 6.7 meters per second. 5. Never assume anything. 6. Have a nice trip. REDSHIFT RENDEZVOUS by John E. Stith author of DEEP QUARRY Ace Books, June 1990 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: MEMORY BLANK by John E. Stith (Ace, 1986) This is an earlier novel by the author of DEEP QUARRY (see RFP #3) and the upcoming REDSHIFT RENDEZVOUS, and is well worth digging up. It's another of the suspense/sf/mystery amalgams that Stith is so good at, and, as usual, with a heavy focus on character development. Cal Donley wakes up with total amnesia and some pressing problems. He seems to have been seriously beaten, suggesting that he's not beloved by all, but on the other hand he is also covered with someone else's blood, indicating that he might have given even better than he got. When he hears that a construction worker was recently killed, Cal fears that he is a murderer. But why? And why are the people around him suddenly having "accidents"? Cal, along with his impertinent wrist computer Vincent, must solve the mystery before his enemies, or the police, get him. All of this takes place on an orbital colony called Daedalus, and the futuristic details are very nicely worked out. But this is not hard science fiction and will not bother those readers who are interested only in the mystery. As I mentioned before, Stith's concentration on character ultimately surpasses all genres, making MEMORY BLANK a fine novel of suspense for all. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: BIRTHS AND OTHER IMPORTANT DATES IN FEBRUARY 01 1874 Hugo von Hofmannsthal; Austrian dramatist, poet, essayist 01 1902 Langston Hughes; American writer and poet 01 1904 S.J. Perelman; American humorist 01 1918 Muriel Spark; Scottish writer, poet, critic 02 1859 Havelock Ellis; English psychologist and essayist 02 1882 James Joyce; Irish writer and poet 02 1905 Ayn Rand; Russian-born American novelist 03 1468 Johannes Gutenberg; German printer and inventor, died 03 1811 Horace Greeley; American journalist 03 1874 Gertrude Stein; American poet, novelist, critic 03 1907 James Albert Michener; American novelist 04 1688 Pierre Marivaux; French playwright and novelist 04 1900 Jacques Prevert; French poet and screenwriter 04 1921 Betty Friedan (Betty Naomi Goldstein); author of THE FEMININE MYSTIQUE 05 1626 Madame de Sevigne; French letter writer 05 1848 Joris-Karl Huysmans; French novelist 05 1914 William Burroughs; American writer 06 1564 Christopher Marlowe; Elizabethan dramatist 06 1778 Ugo Foscolo; Italian writer and poet 07 1612 Samuel Butler; English poet 07 1812 Charles Dickens; English writer 07 1867 Laura Ingalls Wilder; American writer 07 1885 Sinclair Lewis; American novelist 08 1577 Robert Burton; English writer 08 1819 John Ruskin; English writer and critic 08 1828 Jules Verne; French writer 08 1906 Chester F. Carlson; who invented xerography (AKA photocopying, AKA Xeroxing) 09 1866 George Ade; American humorist and playwright 09 1874 Amy Lowell; American poet, critic, biographer 09 1914 Gypsy Rose Lee; "author" of THE G-STRING MURDERS that was actually ghostwritten by Craig Rice 09 1923 Brendan Behan; Irish humorist and playwright 09 1944 Alice Walker; American writer and poet 10 1775 Charles Lamb; English essayist 10 1868 William Allen White; U.S. newspaper editor 10 1890 Boris Leonidovich Pasternak; Russian poet and writer 10 1898 Bertolt Brecht; German poet and playwright 11 1657 Bernard Fontenelle; French writer 11 1917 Sidney Sheldon; American novelist 12 1567 Thomas Campion; English poet and musician 12 1828 George Meredith; English writer, poet, critic 13 1886 Ricardo Gueiraldes; Argentinian writer and poet 13 1903 Georges Simenon; French writer 13 1914 American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) established at Hotel Claridge, New York City 14 1864 Israel Zangwill; English writer 14 1882 George Jean Nathan; American drama critic and editor 14 1944 Carl Bernstein; American journalist 15 1883 Sax Rohmer; English writer Arthur Henry Sarsfield Ward, who created arch villain Dr. Fu Manchu 16 1838 Henry Adams; American historian and writer 16 1886 Van Wyck Brooks; American critic and biographer 16 1893 I.A. Richards; English critic, linguist, poet 17 1879 Dorothy Canfield Fisher; American novelist 17 1929 Chaim Potok; American novelist 18 1859 Sholem Aleichem; Yiddish humorist Solomon J. Rabinowitz 18 1896 Andre Breton; French artist, writer and poet 18 1909 Wallace Stegner; American writer 18 1930 Gahan Wilson; American cartoonist and writer 18 1931 Johnny Hart; American cartoonist 18 1931 Toni Morrison; American novelist and editor 19 1917 Carson McCullers; American writer 20 1888 Georges Bernanos; French novelist and essayist 21 1801 Cardinal John Henry Newman; English writer 21 1907 W.H. Auden; English poet and playwright 22 1819 James Russell Lowell; American poet, critic, editor 22 1892 Edna St. Vincent Millay; American poet 22 1900 Sean O'Faolain; Irish writer and biographer 23 1633 Samuel Pepys; English diarist 23 1821 John Keats died at 25 23 1868 W.E.B. Du Bois; American writer and historian 23 1904 William L. Shirer; American journalist and historian 24 1786 Wilhelm Carl Grimm; German folklorist (a Brother Grimm) 24 1852 George Moore; Irish writer, poet, critic 25 1707 Carlo Goldoni; Italian playwright 25 1908 Frank Slaughter; American writer 25 1917 Anthony Burgess; English writer, critic, and composer 26 1802 Victor Hugo; French writer and poet 27 1807 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow; American poet, translator 27 1902 John Steinbeck; American writer 27 1912 Lawrence George Durrell; English writer and poet 27 1913 Irwin Shaw; American writer and dramatist 28 1533 Michel de Montaigne; French essayist 28 1909 Stephen Spender; English poet :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: WILD CARDS #6: Ace In The Hole edited by George R.R. Martin & Melinda Snodgrass (Bantam Spectra, February 1990, ISBN 0-553-28253-0, $4.50, 385 pages, cover art by Tim Truman). Hope you didn't miss this one. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: TOP FICTION BESTSELLERS OF THE '80s 1) CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER by Tom Clancy (1,607,715) 2) THE DARK HALF by Stephen King (1,550,000) 3) THE TOMMYKNOCKERS by Stephen King (1,429,929) 4) THE MAMMOTH HUNTERS by Jean M. Auel (1,350,000) 5) DADDY by Danielle Steel (1,321,235) 6) LAKE WOBEGON DAYS by Garrison Keillor (1,300,000) 7) THE CARDINAL OF THE KREMLIN by Tom Clancy (1,287,067) 8) TEXAS by James A. Michener (1,176,758) 9) RED STORM RISING by Tom Clancy (1,126,782) 10) IT by Stephen King (1,115,000) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: RANDOM REVIEWS: THE EIGHT by Katherine Neville (Ballantine, 1988) Have I got a book for you! Here's what Susan Isaacs said about THE EIGHT: "This is a Quest with something for everyone: ancient curses from the Fertile Crescent; Russian chess masters; sexy, savvy American computer whizzes; Napoleon and Robespierre; brave nuns; valiant Jewish diamond merchants; magic numbers; secret hiding places; the music of the spheres. In other words, Katherine Neville's big adventure novel is great fun!" From the moment the mysterious Gypsy fortune-teller says, "You are in great danger", Catherine Velis tumbles down the rabbit hole into The Game. The Gypsy says, "On the fourth day of the fourth month, then will come the Eight." Deciphering that message is just one of the many puzzles in this delightful novel: there are poems with hidden messages, symbolic diagrams, and many chess positions to work out. The whole story is a chess game, though you don't need to understand chess to enjoy THE EIGHT. But let's back up a minute. You see, ancient Moors crafted a very special chess set and gave it to Charlemagne. He realized that there was something very wrong about the set and had it hidden in an abbey at Montglane, where it lay in rest until 1792. THE EIGHT is told on two time lines: the 1790s when political unrest causes the Montglane Service (as the chess set is called) to be scattered around the world, and the 1970s when Catherine Velis and the other players in the game are tracking the pieces in an attempt to reassemble the set. On another level, THE EIGHT is a fascinating historical drama, complete with real-live people. The following are some of the characters who pass through the story of the Montglane Service: Jacques-Louis David Voltaire Maximilien Robespierre William Wordsworth Andre Philidor Marat Charlotte Corday Casanova Cardinal Richelieu Napoleone Buonaparte Talleyrand Leonhard Euler Muammar Khaddafi Charlemagne Sir Isaac Newton Benedict Arnold Rousseau James Boswell William Blake Diderot Madame de Stael Johann Sebastian Bach Casanova Catherine the Great What is so special about the Montglane Service that people will kill (and die) for it? Who is the mysterious Russian chess player Solarin and why is he following Catherine? And just who is the Black Queen? If you like games, puzzles, or high adventure, you'll thoroughly enjoy THE EIGHT. Don't blame me if you miss out on The Game. GRUMBLES FROM THE GRAVE Robert A. Heinlein edited by Virginia Heinlein (Ballantine Del Rey, 1990, ISBN 0-345-36246-2, $19.95) review by Darryl Kenning As a general rule I do not buy hardback books. In fact, it is a rare treat for me to get a large format softbound book. I just couldn't resist getting this one though. GRUMBLES offers a number of fascinating insights into Robert A. Heinlein, his life, his writings, and most of all, a lot of the frustrations of writing Science Fiction, especially in the early years when his material was sold mainly to librarians. The book is divided into sections, each one starting from the 1940s and proceeding chronologically through the 1980s. Ranging from juveniles to fan mail, and from travel to building several homes, the text is letters to editors and agents culled and edited by his wife and partner. For those of you into originality, the appendix includes the text cut from RED PLANET and the original postlude to PODKAYNE OF MARS. For us bookaphiles, a bibliography in order of production is also included. I felt I knew RAH just a bit after reading this book, and wished I could have known him and Virginia together. If you are a fan of SF generally and/or a fan of his you will want to have this book. It is a must for the serious student of SF and writing SF. I recommend it highly. Thanks Virginia and Thanks Bob, for all the GREAT stories Rating 5 ***** RULES OF PREY by John Sandford (Putnam, 1989) Here's yet another game, this one more of the Cat And Mouse variety. The players are instantly recognizable: the brilliant, eccentric, maverick Cop and the Psycho Killer with an inability to relate to women. After the first 50 pages you'll probably feel that you not only could write the last 250 pages yourself, but that you could do so with almost any number of plot variations. Luckily for the reader of RULES OF PREY, John Sandford (a pseudonym for a "Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist") has some variations for you that you probably wouldn't have thought of. The trouble is, the characters didn't work as well for me as the plot did. For instance: because of the sudden and repeated underlining of certain points in the last 50 pages I assume that The Point of the novel is that good guys can often be as bad, if not worse, than bad guys. I don't think I've spoiled anything for you, because this "point" is perfectly obvious from the beginning of the story. The Cop character is defined from the start as being without morals, ethics, or scruples of any kind. The ONLY admirable quality he possesses is that he's a very cunning game-player. The Psycho Killer, on the other hand, surprises at several points, and always by his objectivity and rationality. On this level, the ending is a disappointment. The major character revelations are NOT major revelations at all, merely more evidence of what we've known all along. The saving grace for RULES OF PREY is that when you take away the character development that misfires, you're still left with a breathtaking suspense story, an intricate game between two men, neither of whom feels bound by any principles of fair play. It makes for an exciting read, and should not be missed by fans of Psycho Killer stories. The Thomas Harris Problem: Having read the Thomas Harris novels RED DRAGON and THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, I found it impossible not to compare RULES OF PREY to them at every juncture. This really isn't entirely fair, but the two Harris novels are widely regarded as the standard of excellence in Psycho Killer stories, a position I agree with. So let this commentary be put in perspective, and let me state again that the level of suspense and the appealing gamelike qualities of RULES OF PREY put it several ranks above most stories of this kind. A good read. DEEP TIME by David Darling (Delacourt Press, 1989, ISBN 0-385-29757-2, $17.95) Review by Fred L. Drake, Jr. Dr. Darling, who has written science books for children and many articles for ASTRONOMY magazine, has now published his first book on cosmogony for the adult lay reader. DEEP TIME is an entertaining and thoughtful look at how the universe came into being and how it operates. The vehicle for the story of creation is a fictional saga of the journey of a single proton through time beginning some time after genesis. After a short while spent observing our particle "hero", as the proton is described by Darling, we are swept dramatically backward through time to find the origin of what we are watching, seeking to understand the how's and why's of it all. Darling provides a dramatic narrative of all that befalls his selected subatomic particle all through this portion of the book; his descriptions are filled with vital energy in which the reader is swept up with great abandon. Yet, Darling does not take us all the way back to "Time Zero" at this time. Science has not yet discovered all there is to know about about the origins of the universe, and Darling is, gracefully, not ashamed to admit the limits of current knowledge and accepted theory. We, as readers, are then whisked back to the point at which our watchful vigil began. As the foundations for the "conventional" universe are laid before our eyes, Darling brings forth new understandings of the nature of the physical universe in straight-forward, though sometimes energetic, terms. We see the great cosmic strings of primal matter organize and, in fact, spawn the creation of galaxy clusters. Great feats of atomic bonding then change the simple proton we started with to an atom of gold flying forth from a forming star, hurled into a nearby cloud mass, which eventually forms a most familiar planet, our motherworld, the Earth. We watch closely as the molecules on this planet grow in complexity and learn to control each other, and even to replicate themselves. Evolution is a theatrical production at which we, for a moment, are spectators. Then the nature of our journey changes. Less is left to simple chance; indeed, chance itself becomes a very complex matter. Our gold atom is mined from the bowels of the Earth and formed into a part of a disk made all of gold, and attached to the outside of a spaceship: Voyager II, which left Earth in 1977. Our journey slows at this point, though the gold atom is now travelling as fast as it was prior to being imbedded in the dust cloud which was to become the Earth and its home for a few billion years. Darling has been measuring time not by the conventional increments which we are familiar with and use in our daily lives, but as a function of how much happens. The greater the distance of a moment from the moment of genesis, Time Zero, the smaller the number of things that happen in a given length of time, and the less meaning that length has. So we are given a new way to look at time itself, and are brought to perceive a new meaning in time. Yet our journey does continue. As Voyager II travels through our solar system, we are given glimpses of the asteroid belt and outer planets, and then the journey to the far end of Deep Time begins. During the first of Voyager II's orbits through our galaxy, we watch the human race burgeon forth from our home planet and move into the galaxy, meeting other races of beings and growing in many other ways as well. Technology changes in wondrous ways, until the fabric of space itself becomes raw material to work with and machines the size of complete star systems are the products of human toil. But eventually, the human race dies out. The universe continues to expand as it has since the beginning, and energy becomes more and more valuable. The space between particles grows to vast distances. Single atoms take the space that the entire universe does now. Atoms of positronium; a bond of a single positron (a part of a proton) and a single electron. A rudimentary atom analogous to hydrogen. And so the universe has moved through many states during our journey. We began with a high energy universe smaller than the point of a pin where no particle could retain its identity--for the succession of collisions with other particles was so rapid--a universe where there was only one form of energy; to a universe with a great atomic complexity and a moderate level of energy, where a great level of differentiation could take place and have meaning, that our mortal minds call home. Ending with a universe so sparse that we would not recognize that such could be called a universe. Thus we are brought through Deep Time to witness the future of our universe: desolate, but highly intricate, for each and every change has great meaning, for there will not be another for many millennia. Such is the story of a subatomic particle in the "open" universe. This universe which never ceases to expand. Darling, however, does propose another possibility of what may happen should the universe prove "closed", if it will at some point cease to expand and eventually even begin to compress once more toward its original state. This is a scenario often proposed and which some consider to hold more hope; the universe, once compressed into the ultra-dense pin-prick of matter and energy, can burst forth once more, and go through its paces in all their glory. Yet Darling is still not satisfied, though the reader will likely be amazed at his telling of the story. Darling reminds us then of several things, and brings forth a rather fantastic hypothesis on the event of genesis. He lets us know that we are not separate from the cosmos, as our analytical left brain would have us believe, but that we are very much a part of the universe; that when we think, a part of the universe is thinking. We are reminded of the relationship of the observed and the observer; that the universe could not exist without some measure of observation, even if we know nothing of the observer. Darling points out throughout the book how contrived the universe can seem, and that perhaps it seems contrived because it IS, since it is, by nature, a product of observation, and no observer can avoid imposing patterns upon the observed. The most stupendous event described in the book is very simple and, yet, more complex than any other. To describe it simply, the universe begins to think. Not parts of it, embodied matter in the shapes of humans or other beings, but the whole of the thing itself, grown from smaller organisms, such as people. The universe acquires, BECOMES, a single mind. Yes, this is Darling's hypothesis; his grand revelation. A theory which no Western religion will willingly accept. That the universe perceived the necessity of watching, of observing. Of seeing its own creation and, by observing that event, creating itself. DEEP TIME is a truly fantastic work, both scientific in manner and content, and prophetic at a truly amazing scale. Darling leads us through great events which are truly difficult for the now-emerging human intellect to comprehend, showing us all the amazing facets of existence. ASIMOV ON SCIENCE FICTION (1981) and ASIMOV'S GALAXY: Reflections on Science Fiction (1989) by Isaac Asimov Here you have two of Asimov's essay collections (there are more), both more or less limited to discussions of the world of science fiction. The earlier volume collects essays from all over, and GALAXY is limited to his essays from Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine. The first thing you'll probably notice about Isaac Asimov's writing is its artlessness; he is the patron saint of no-frills clarity. It's the kind of writing liable to make you say, "Why, even I could do that." Soon afterwards you will discover that, most likely, you CAN'T do that, because clarity isn't easy. To begin with, clear writing requires clear thinking, which is itself alarmingly rare. I grew up with Victorian novels; long, leisurely books of culture and delicacy. They often took 600 pages to make one social statement -- Asimov, by contrast, would express the same idea with a paragraph. The next paragraph will continue on, making another point. So when you read these two books of essays (over 600 pages), you're getting more than your money's worth of ideas. Use Asimov's essays as I do, as a breath of fresh air in between more convoluted volumes. I always feel encouraged and revived after reading Isaac Asimov, and these two collections are nice to have on the shelf when needed. MRS, PRESUMED DEAD by Simon Brett (Scribner's, 1988) Best known for his Charles Paris series of mysteries, Simon Brett here presents the second outing of amateur sleuth Melita Pargeter, a modern incarnation of Christie's Miss Marple. But whereas Miss Marple's knowledge of the seamier side of life came from watching people in her small village, Melita's education came from her late husband, who operated on the wrong side of the law and made many, many friends. Mr. Pargeter left Melita very well off, and she buys a home in the tiny 6-house community of Smithy's Loam, a standard yuppie preserve. The other inhabitants prove to be pretty odd, but the oddest of all are Rod and Theresa Cotton, the former owners of Melita's house. Did Rod really get transferred up north? If so, why did Theresa give a fake address? What is the Church of Utter Simplicity and what does it have to do with anything? The comparison with Miss Marple is apt, and this mystery falls well within the "cozy" classification. A typically fine effort by Simon Brett--I am definitely going to be looking up the first Melita Pargeter novel, A NICE CLASS OF CORPSE. MRS, PRESUMED DEAD is now a mass market paperback from Dell ($3.95, ISBN 0-440-20552-2). "F" IS FOR FUGITIVE by Sue Grafton (1989) If you haven't tried one of Sue Grafton's alphabet mysteries ("A" Is For Alibi, "B" Is For Burglar, "C" Is For Corpse, "D" Is For Deadbeat, "E" Is For Evidence), now would be a good time to catch up. Grafton's detective is Kinsey Millhone, a tough private investigator working out of Santa Teresa, California. Each mystery seems better than the last, and most plots seem to center on the modern incarnation of The Family. As foil, Kinsey has no family. She was orphaned early, has been married and divorced twice, and now lives alone. Her only real friend seems to be her landlord Henry, who's in his eighties. She has little time to regret her lack of family, though, since she spends her working hours prowling around in the dirty laundry of the families of others. And mighty dirty it is, too. This mystery series reminds me just a bit of Ross Macdonald's Lew Archer mysteries--the lifestyles (and mores) of California's rich and famous. In my opinion Sue Grafton has improved on the premise, though: Kinsey is emotionally tougher than Lew was, and spends less time whining about the lack of morality and justice in the world. Not that it matters, but Sue Grafton also gives great interviews; she seems as smart and charming as Kinsey. Pick up any Sue Grafton mystery and you won't be sorry. THE STARSHIP AND THE CANOE by Kenneth Brower review by Marsha Via The Starship and The Canoe is a delightful double-biography of two fascinating people; Freeman Dyson, a renowned and respected physicist and mathmetician, and his son, George Dyson, a rather eccentric, virtually reclusive young man. Although the two men are not close, and are in many ways very different, each is seeking to escape the madness of modern society/civilization in his own peculiar manner. Freeman dreamed of space colonization in the the 1950s, when such an idea was quite futuristic. He worked on the Orion project for several years, until the limited-test-ban treaty of 1963, which put a stop to nuclear explosions in the atmosphere. The treaty made it impossible for further research, as the Orion was to be a spaceship propelled by nuclear explosions. George also sought to escape the conventions of society, but unlike Freeman wanted to remain on this planet. He accomplished his goal by living in the wilderness of British Columbia, ninety-five feet above the ground to be exact, in a Douglas fir. His mode of transportation was a kayak, in which he travelled the coastline of British Columbia north to Alaska and back. Later, George designed and constructed a 50-foot kayak. The book describes a number of intriguing and humorous adventures which each man experiences in their respective "projects", culminating in a reunion of the two after many years. I found The Starship and The Canoe to be well worth reading. Marsha Via can be contacted at the Blacksburg Information Service BBS (703) 951-2920 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: BOX SCORES by Darryl Kenning Subterraneann Gallery, R.P. Russo.......2 The Lizard War, J. Dalmas...............3 The 97th Step, S. Perry.................3 Orbital Decay, A Steele.................2 Emerald Eyes, D Moran...................5 The War Machine, Drake and Allen........4 (scale is 0 to 5, with 5 highest) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: If you can't annoy somebody, there's little point in writing. --Kingsley Amis :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: NEW FROM MEADOWBROOK: STRANGE BUT TRUE FACTS ABOUT SEX The Illustrated Book of Sexual Trivia by David Smith & Mike Gordon Finally, a book about sex that even Doctor Ruth can learn from. It's a humorous guide for trivia buffs and anyone fascinated by sexual facts. The book contains strange but true and often hilarious facts from history, anthropology, medicine, literature, and Hollywood gossip. It includes naughty quotes and lascivious anecdotes, such as: * Until the 20th century, Egyptian men preferred not to deflower their brides, instead they paid a servant to do it for them. * All of the members of the "20,000 Club" have had sex in an airplane at more than 20,000 feet above ground. * In Victorian times, some women would bathe in fresh strawberries to shrink flabby breasts. * The women of northern Siberia are reputed to show their affection toward men by throwing slugs at them. * Gandhi slept with naked women in order to test his celibacy. Although authors David Smith and Mike Gordon know everything there is to know about sex, they still have trouble getting dates. Smith is a freelance writer and Gordon is a popular British cartoonist. They both live in London, England. ISBN 0-671-70080-4 64 pages $6.95 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: TOM CLANCY SPEAKS (The author of CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER, THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER, etc.) Why were my books popular? With all due modesty, because they were pretty good books! When I write, I do not think "market", I think book. I write the kind of book I want to read and if other people want to buy it, fine. Success for any writer is as much accident as it is art. The trick to being successful is being noticed, and there are a whole lot of good writers out there who haven't been noticed. I will not be writing for awhile; I am presently unemployed. But in terms of what is going on in Eastern Europe, I believe espionage activity between the East and West is going to increase, not decrease. As the Soviets decrease the offensive power of their military, they will increase their intelligence-gathering abilities just to hedge their bets. It's the intelligent thing to do. (From Publishers Weekly, January 5, 1990.) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: THE TURNER TOMORROW AWARDS The Turner Broadcasting System's new division, Turner Publishing Inc. (see What's News), is sponsoring a contest for SF writers with a $500,000 first prize and four merit prizes of $50,000 each. Winning entries will be published in hardcover by Turner Publishing, and TBS will make movies and/or TV series of as many winners as possible. It has been stated that the first prize winner will receive $500,000, plus hardcover publication, plus the royalties from the hardcover, so apparently the $500,000 is not an advance but is in addition to any and all royalty payments. THE BASICS: The contest runs from January 15 to November 20, 1990. All contestants must be 21 or older. Each entry must be between 50,000 and 100,000 words in length. All stories are to be set in the near future, 1991-2021, and depict a practical, positive solution to some world problem that ensures the survival and prosperity of all life on the planet. Any work that has been previously published in any form, or even previously submitted, is not eligible (they don't even want any simultaneous submissions). Obviously they are after material written specifically for this contest. Each entry will be acknowledged by postcard, but manuscripts will NOT be returned. THE FINE PRINT: All entries must be accompanied by a signed official entry form where the author accepts that Turner Publications "shall own outright, without further compensation, and Author hereby grants unlimited motion picture, TV and all other audio visual rights in the Work or any part of the Work, in any and all modes of distribution including, without limitation, theatrical and TV motion picture, home video, radio, merchandising, dramatic stage and phonograph record purposes, and the right to produce, exploit, publish and perform prequels, sequels, and remakes of the Work in any media now existing or hereafter created, throughout the world, for the life of the copyright and all renewals thereof. 'Work' as used herein includes, without limitation, the title of the work and the themes, ideas, formats, characters, interplay of characters, characterizations, locales, [and] storyline..." Whew! For any winning manuscript that is deemed not suitable for film adaptation, the movie rights will revert to the author after two years. The current plan is for an editorial group to weed the entries down to the best 150 manuscripts by February 20, 1991, and then to the top 40 by March 20, 1991. At that point the judges will show up (May 10-15, 1991) and the winners will be announced May 20, 1991. The judges will be: Ian and Betty Ballantine, Ray Bradbury, Peter Matthiessen, William Styron, Wallace Stegner, and others still to be named. For the complete rules and your official entry form, write to: The Turner Tomorrow Awards One CNN Center Box 105366 Atlanta, GA 30329 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: Thank you for sending me a copy of your book. I'll waste no time reading it. --Moses Hadas :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: ROC BOOKS New American Library (NAL) and Penguin USA have started a new SF/Fantasy imprint--ROC BOOKS. The roc, as of course we all remember from our reading, was a legendary bird encountered by Sinbad and Marco Polo; a bird so huge that it supposedly feeds elephants to its young. This choice of name allows it to fit with the other international imprints of Penguin Books (Penguin, Puffin, Pelican, etc.). For those of you who can't wait to find out what ROC BOOKS has in store for you, here is the entire 1990 lineup: April 1990 ---------- Robot Visions by Isaac Asimov The Warrior Lives by Joel Rosenberg Project Solar Sail edited by Arthur C. Clarke Among Madmen by Jim Starlin & Daina Graziunas Barrow by John Deakins May 1990 -------- The Hawk's Gray Feather by Patricia Kennealy The Lost Regiment #1: Rally Cry by William R. Forstchen Dread Brass Shadows by Glen Cook The Abraxas Marvel Circus by Stephen Leigh Pshrinks Anonymous: The Mysterious Cure and Other Stories by Janet Asimov June 1990 --------- Ancient Light by Mary Gentle Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett Royal Chaos by Dan McGirt The Best of Trek #15 edited by Walter Irwin & G.B. Love July 1990 --------- The Best of the Best of Trek edited by Walter Irwin & G.B. Love The Chronicles of Galen Sword #1: Shifter by Garfield & Judith Reeves-Stevens The War Years #1: The Far Stars War featuring David Drake, edited by Bill Fawcett Night of Dragon by R.A.V. Salsitz Jade Darcy and the Zen Pirates by Stephen Goldin & Mary Mason August 1990 ----------- Threshold by Janet Morris & Chris Morris Starcruiser Shenandoah #2: Division of the Spoils by Roland J. Green Gossamer Axe by Gael Baudino The Varayan Memoir #1: Son of the Hero by Rick Shelley Isaac Asimov's Wonderful Worlds of Science Fiction #10: Invasions edited by Isaac Asimov, Martin H. Greenberg & Charles G. Waugh September 1990 -------------- Hero by Joel Rosenberg Echoes of the Fourth Magic by R.A. Salvatore Fire on the Border by Kevin O'Donnell, Jr. Game's End by Kevin J. Anderson Dreams of Life and Death by W.T. Quick October 1990 ------------ Buffalo Gals and Other Animal Presences by Ursula K. LeGuin Chicago Red by R.M. Meluch Everything But Honor by George Alec Effinger The Boy From the Burren: The First Book of the Painter by Sheila Gilluly November 1990 ------------- Mountain Made of Light by Edward Meyers Vampires by John Steakley Time Warrior #1: The Hour of the Fox by Matthew J. Costello King of the Scepter'd Isle by Michael Greatrex Coney Seti by Fred Fichman December 1990 ------------- Pyramids by Terry Pratchett Blue Moon Rising by Simon Green Newer York edited by Lawrence Watt-Evans Sunder, Eclipse & Seed by Elyse Guttenberg The Best of Trek #16 edited by Walter Irwin & G.B. Love :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: TIME PASSES FOR BABY BOOMERS Those of us born in the exuberant decade following World War II are (to our surprise) getting older. Luckily we live in a capitalistic country, which means that the growing ranks of the Rapidly Decaying will NOT be ignored. In addition to an ever- increasing supply of old-age aids and panaceas, we can look forward to an array of books to help us cope with the inevitable. We at RFP thought you might like a look at a couple of early volumes that mix horror and humor to cover a very important subject. THE OVER-THE-HILL SURVIVAL GUIDE How to keep young people in their place, get back at your kids, and go out with a bang. by Bob Feigel & Malcolm Walker (Meadowbrook Press, 1989) The GUIDE covers all of the major disadvantages of being among the elderly, and suggests methods of dealing with them--some silly, some comically (and frighteningly) practical. The humor here is broad and very definitely black (one chapter is called "Creative Cooking With Pet Foods"). As is so often true of comedy, there's a great deal of truth hidden among the jokes, but the tone maintained throughout is high-spirited, with a great zest for living. I admit to being a fan of black humor, and my favorite chapter was "The Last Laugh", a cornucopia of suggestions on how to make your inevitable death more meaningful for you. My favorite funeral hint was: "For the last word in burials, have a tape player hidden in your casket. Get a friend to set the remote control to activate your voice just as the casket goes down." An accompanying illustration shows the horror on the faces of minister and mourners as screams come from the hole in the ground. Now THERE'S a funeral they'll be talking about for the rest of their lives. There are also some suggestions for getting revenge on your family. Feigel and Walker realize that there's nothing like your near-and-dear for driving you over the edge. There are many ways to annoy them now as well as after you're gone, and I believe all are covered in this GUIDE. You'll probably recognize a few tactics that your parents and grandparents have used on you. Now you're going to get your chance to have some fun. THE OVER-THE-HILL SURVIVAL GUIDE is a monument to the feisty, a hymn to the unquenchable human spirit. May we all have as much gusto at eighty as the elderly in this GUIDE. Happy reading. TIME FLIES by Bill Cosby (Doubleday, 1987; Bantam, 1988) This was my first Bill Cosby book (I missed FATHERHOOD), and I was very surprised. Most importantly, I didn't find TIME FLIES to be very funny. I'm a long-time fan of Bill Cosby The Comedian and was prepared for him to be as devastatingly funny about the elderly as he always has been about the very young. Not here. The problem seems to be that Bill Cosby isn't very comfortable about aging himself. Over and over again we are told about his inability to run the hundred as fast as he used to, and his supposedly comical inability to deal with this fact emotionally. It would be funnier if it was obvious that he HAS finally come to terms with his aging--but it's not obvious at all. I don't know Bill Cosby, so I have no idea how he really feels about old age, but in TIME FLIES the tone is wistful and resigned. Personally, I found TIME FLIES to be faintly depressing. What is the audience for this book? I'm not sure. If you're expecting Cosby The Comedian, as I was, you're in for a disappointment. This might be considered a serious book of commiseration and solace for the aging, but there are other books that cover that ground better. In the final analysis, I'd tell Bill Cosby fans to skip this book and rent a videotape of one of his stand-up concerts. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: This book fills a much-needed gap. --Moses Hadas :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: NEW FROM SIMON & SCHUSTER: EMPEROR OF AMERICA by Richard Condon An incisive and uproarious satire on American politics by the author of THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE and PRIZZI'S HONOR. In his new novel, Richard Condon turns his wicked eye on the "Imperial Presidency"--with a REAL emperor ruling America in the not too distant future. When a nuclear accident (or WAS it an accident?) destroys Washington, D.C., an army colonel named Caesare Appleton assumes command of the nation--or at least he THINKS he's in command. While battling the Evil Empire of Nicaragua and plotting to convert Nantucket into a landing field for CIA planes carrying Colombian cocaine, Caesare becomes both the master and the pawn of the omnipresent media. And the higher he rises, the more he falls prey to his own uncontrollable urges for unavailable women, to his avaricious advisers, to his scheming siblings--and his manipulative mother. With the keen wit that has made him a best-selling author for 30 years, Condon spins a political fable that is both hilariously fantastic and bitingly real. ISBN 0-671-68643-7 320 pages $19.95 THE FULL CATASTROPHE by David Carkeet A highly entertaining satiric novel about marriage and language. Jeremy Cook--the bemused academic linguist first introduced in Carkeet's DOUBLE NEGATIVE--has just taken a new job with The Pillow Agency, an unusual marriage counseling firm. His assignment: to move in with a troubled couple, Dan and Beth Wilson, analyze their verbal interactions, and save the marriage. As Dan and Beth become hyperaware of both Jeremy's presence and the hidden innuendoes in their everyday speech, a series of increasingly hilarious complications ensues. The result is a howling sendup of marriage in all its catastrophic permutations. ISBN 0-671-64319-3 288 pages $18.95 LUNCHEON AT THE CAFE RIDICULOUS by Alice Kahn From the syndicated columnist Vogue has called "the best pulse- taker in the business" comes a veritable smorgasbord of stylish satirical pieces about the generation who worships at "The Temple of Lifestyle". Like a saucy anthropologist with old-fashioned, down-home wit and wisdom, Alice Kahn has visited some of the most absurd outposts of nouvelle American culture. At once witness to and participant in the trendy new fashions in food, fitness, art, and relationships, she always manages to find the funny bone, tweak the sensibilities, and leave us filled with laughter and recognition. From "The Valley of Art Psychosis" to "Channeling for Dollars", Alice Kahn explains her "Life as a Piece of Data", her near miss with "Biff, a Celebrity Drug Abuser", and how she became "The Number at the Top of Dustin Hoffman's Dashboard". She provides a scintillating guide to "Love in the Time of Diet Cola", while also offering poignant reflections on "The Family that Shabooms Together". Whoopi Goldberg calls her "The Empirin with Codeine for the menstrual cramps of life". The San Francisco Chronicle dubs her "The voice of our generation..." Born in the Midwest, schooled in New York, and living in the West, Kahn is a self-proclaimed "broad with a broad perspective". Poseidon Press ISBN 0-671-69150-3 224 pages $17.95 THREE-FISTED TALES OF "BOB" Short Stories in the SubGenius Mythos edited by Reverend Ivan Stang Outrageous tales by some of today's hippest writers, SF storytellers, and underground heroes--all based on the bizarre creed of the Church of the SubGenius, America's most popular (and hilarious) counter-religion. Farcical, sardonic, and wickedly funny, the Church of the SubGenius has attracted national media attention and a growing grassroots following since the publication of the cult's first two works, THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS and HIGH WEIRDNESS BY MAIL (both highly recommended by RFP). This original anthology, featuring stories by William S. Burroughs, Robert Anton Wilson, John Shirley ("Max Headroom") and DEVO's Mark Mothersbaugh, among other celebrated apostles of weirdness, is sure to thrill loyal followers and win over new believers. Background on the birth of the church makes this book accessible to the uninitiated, and each tale gives insight into the heretofore elusive personality of J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, legendary SubGenius holy man. For SubGenius cultists, cyberpunk aficionados, SF fans, and anyone who enjoys humor at its most biting and irreverent, here is a masterpiece of all-American weirdness. A Fireside Original ISBN 0-671-67190-1 352 pages $10.95 Also: THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS (ISBN 0-671-63810-6 $10.95) HIGH WEIRDNESS BY MAIL (ISBN 0-671-64260-X $10.95) PARALLEL UNIVERSES The Search for Other Worlds by Fred Alan Wolf The author of the American Book Award-winning TAKING THE QUANTUM LEAP explains the mind-boggling theory of parallel universes--a lively book for scientists, science fiction fans, students, and anyone interested in our world and beyond. IS science fact stranger than science fiction? In an "outrageous ride along the frontiers of science" (New Age Journal), physicist Fred Alan Wolf explores the startling concept of parallel universes--worlds that resemble and perhaps even duplicate our own--and puts a refreshing and illuminating spin on the complex theories challenging our perceptions of the universe. Through such lively examples as a superspace theater and zero-time ghosts, Wolf deftly guides the reader through the paradoxes of today's physics to explore a realm of scientific speculation in which black holes are gateways of information between universes, and alter egos spring into existence at the flip of a coin. Wolf explores a future when time travelers will make history--and alter the past--while testing Earth's first time machine; when lucid dreaming and schizophrenia may mark the overlap of parallel universes; when quantum computers may predict the stock market. Touchstone ISBN 0-671-69601-7 320 pages $9.95 :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: DVORAK'S GUIDE TO PC TELECOMMUNICATIONS by John C. Dvorak & Nick Anis foreword by Peter Norton (Osborne McGraw-Hill, $49.95) two disks, one book Telecommunications just got simple---- Plug into the world of electronic databases, bulletin boards, and on-line services. All you need is your computer, a modem, and this outstanding book and disk package by internationally acclaimed columnist John C. Dvorak and programming wiz Nick Anis. With this book and software package you can: * Send and receive electronic mail, memos, and reports to and from your office, hotel room, beach resort, or home. * Set up an efficient home-office. * Schedule airline reservations electronically. * Download over 10,000 software programs right into your computer over regular phone lines. * Get instantaneous stock quotes. * Tap into most major newspapers and newsletters electronically. For your $49.95 you get a comprehensive, easy-to-read guide on everything you ever wanted to know about telecommunications plus two diskettes loaded with outstanding free programs. This book is written for experts and novices alike. Includes: * Two 5-1/4" disks (3-1/2" disks available through a coupon offer) * A modem tutor * TELIX/SE--the complete Telecommunications Software * Over $1500 in discounts and services * 13 important utilities for your computer See your local bookstore or order by calling 1-800-262-4729. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: NUMBER ONE FAN by Annie Wilkes Why is there so little coverage of the written word on television? The two media are not mutually exclusive--I read AND watch TV, and so do all my friends. As my final proof, I point to all the books about television, a healthy section of the bookstore. So why aren't there TV shows about books? I'm not talking about some small local PBS show, or a 5-minute segment of a daytime news show. I mean a full half hour of prime or semi-prime time devoted to the world of books. And what about TV drama? For a country that's just discovering the hazards of illiteracy, television still acts like reading doesn't exist. How are we supposed to convince our kids that being able to read is a valuable life tool if NOBODY on TV reads? Every once in a while we get an illiterate character worked into the plotline of a TV drama, and we get to see how pathetic the illiterate's life really is. That's OK as far as it goes, but it's so negative. Being able to read is not just the avoidance of the problems of illiteracy, it's a positive joy. How about an occasional teenage character that says, "No, I don't think I want to go cruisin' with the guys tonight, get drunk, and puke in the back seat--as attractive as that sounds. I think I'll relax in my room with a bottle of sugar-water, a bag of high-sodium crunchies and a good book." How come that never happens? The point here is: reading is a part of life. A fun part. I'll admit that driving around Oahu in a red Ferrari is also a fun part, and needs to be shown, but let's have a little equal time, you know? You network guys don't even have to show someone actually reading, just mention it from time to time, have a character carrying a book around, maybe sit with a book open in his lap, that kind of thing. Is it so much to ask that the definition of "cool", "rad", or whatever the appropriate terminology is today, be expanded to include the concept Literate? And would it hurt TV to occasionally acknowledge that? :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: BACK ISSUES ELECTRONIC EDITION: Check the BBSs in the Directory first. If what you want isn't available, send $5 to us for a disk containing ALL available issues. Disk will be formatted using PC/MS-DOS (for IBM clones). Specify 3-1/2" or 5-1/4" floppy. PRINT EDITION: Send $1.50 for each issue requested. Checks: Make checks payable to Cindy Bartorillo. Address: See masthead on Table of Contents page. ISSUES AVAILABLE: #1: Premier issue: 1988 World Fantasy Awards; Books I'm Supposed to Like, But Don't; Pronunciation Guide to Author's Names; Christie Characters on Film; Featured Author: Richard Matheson; Baseball & Cricket Mysteries; Stephen King Checklist; Time Travel Books #2: Summer Reading Issue: Award Winners & Nominees; Beach Bag Books; Featured Author: Stanley Ellin; Splatterpunk; Murderous Vacations; The Psychology of Everyday Things; The Shining; SF Fan-Lingo; Pseudonyms #3: Books About Books Issue: Two-Bit Culture; Christopher Morley; 84 Charing Cross Road; Assorted References; Bibliomysteries; Deep Quarry; Featured Author: Harlan Ellison #4: Hollywood Issue: Recent Awards; About Hollywood; Silver Scream; Death of a Salesman; Joe Bob Briggs; The Hollywood Mystery; Featured Author: Fredric Brown; The Dark Fantastic; Darryl Kenning Reviews #5: Halloween Issue: Hugo Awards; Year's Best Horror Stories XVII; Tracy Kidder; Supernatural Mysteries; Thomas Harris; Falling Angel Heart; Ray Garton; New From Underwood-Miller; Featured Author: Robert R. McCammon; The Modern Halloween Shelf; Darryl Kenning Reviews; The Ultimate Stephen King Character Quiz #6: Computers & Robots Issue: 1989 World Fantasy Award Nominations; Donald M. Grant, Publisher; Cyberpunk & Neuromancer; Computer Books; Digital Delights; Nightmare On Elm Street, The Comic; Banned Books; Featured Author: Josephine Tey; Mystery Terminology; Darryl Kenning Reviews; Books On A Chip; New From Carroll & Graf; Computer Cowboy Reading; and the usual #7: Happy Holidays Issue: New From Carroll & Graf; Featured Author: Charles Dickens; A Christmas Carol; Religious Reading; An Incomplete Education; Great Endings; New From Simon & Schuster; New From Underwood-Miller; Christmas Mysteries and Other Yuletide Reading; On Line With Steve Gerber; The Last Christmas Trivia Quiz; and the usual #8: True Crime Issue: New Age Books; Amazing Stories; True Crime in Paperback; Steve Gerber; Bluffers Guides; The Onion Field; Mysterious Press; Lizzie Borden; John E. Stith; Darryl Kenning; Bestselling Children's Books; Awards; Carroll & Graf; and more :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: BESTSELLERS TRIVIA QUIZ ANSWERS A. 1) Daddy by Danielle Steel 2) Clear and Present Danger by Tom Clancy 3) The Dark Half by Stephen King 4) Caribbean by James A. Michener 5) Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco 6) Tales from Margaritaville: Fictional Facts and Factual Fictions by Jimmy Buffett 7) Straight by Dick Francis 8) The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett 9) Jimmy Stewart and His Poems by Jimmy Stewart 10) California Gold by John Jakes 11) The Eleventh Hour: A Curious Mystery by Graeme Base 12) The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan 13) Spy Line by Len Deighton 14) The Sorceress of Darshiva by David Eddings 15) Mystery by Peter Straub B. The "real" A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z thing Code 1 f q l a p h e x b y n r u g m t j w d k z o c s v i Code 2 s n v f r g h j o k l a z m p q w t d y i b e c u x Code 3 w h f r c t y u z i o p k j x l n v e b m g q d a s 1) All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten (Robert Fulghum) 2) The Sands of Time (Sidney Sheldon) 3) The Dark Tower: The Drawing of the Three (Stephen King) 4) Stolen Blessings (Lawrence Sanders) 5) A Thief of Time (Tony Hillerman) 6) The Shell Seekers (Rosamunde Pilcher) 7) The Blooding (Joseph Wambaugh) 8) Breathing Lessons (Anne Tyler) 9) A Twist in the Tale (Jeffrey Archer) 10) Cat's Eye (Margaret Atwood) 11) Thornyhold (Mary Stewart) 12) Savage Thunder (Johanna Lindsey) 13) A Season in Hell (Jack Higgins) 14) Peachtree Road (Anne Rivers Siddons) 15) Spy Hook (Len Deighton) :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: If you were a member of Jesse James's band and people asked you what you were, you wouldn't say, "Well, I'm a desperado." You'd say something like, "I work in banks," or "I've done some railroad work." It took me a long time just to say "I'm a writer." It's really embarrassing. --Roy Blount, Jr. :=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=:=: