Analog SFF, March 2008
Page 26
As usual, Pratchett does not disappoint. Enjoy!
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I haven't seen much from Michael Moorcock in quite awhile, but he's still writing, and he's still working with his conception of the Eternal Champion incarnated as Beggs and von Beks and others again and again across the multiverse to fight the war of Law and Chaos with and against each other. Nor has he forgotten Elric the albino hero with the soul-eating sword, whom I understand is based on a Monsieur Zenith from Anthony Skene's Sexton Blake tales of the 1920s and 1930s.
We see it all in The Metatemporal Detective, which gathers eleven tales featuring a master detective, Seaton Begg (whose exploits are fictionalized as those of Sexton Blake), and his sidekick, pathologist Taffy Sinclair, who wander the multiverse fighting on the side of Law. There is an explicit affinity between Begg and Holmes. Sometimes Begg allies with Monsieur Zenith, sometimes he opposes. In some adventures he encounters Hitler as a wannabe politician, or a cop, or a terrorist, but never as the Hitler of our own world. Indeed, the worlds of the tales are very different from our own. Time is rubbery, so that tales can be set everywhen from the 1930s to the twenty-first century. Air transport is by zeppelin, engines are powered by electricity instead of gasoline, and the United States is broken into several different countries. Indeed, in “The Mystery of the Texas Twister” Texas is its own country, ruled by “King” George Washington Putz, who wants to steal the secrets of the internal combustion engine, powered by Texas oil, and the gyrocopter, engineer a war with the nation of California, and annex the neighbors, beginning with the idyllic democracy of Navajonia, all to enrich himself and his cronies. Somehow, Begg and his allies must put paid to the scheme.
The style is that of the old pulps, which is not surprising considering that they are dedicated to Moorcock's “boyhood hero ... Anthony Skene.” Interest is added by the strong links to Moorcock's body of previous work, as well as by the sly references to current events, both political ("King” Putz) and environmental (oil is bad, electricity is good).
Science fiction and fantasy are sometimes said to be engaged in the business of myth making. This is clearest when a work (such as Tolkien's Lord of the Rings) strikes a chord with the public, but it is also clear when a writer such as Moorcock builds a career—or at least a prolonged series—by elaborating on a vision. Others who have done this include Gordon Dickson, Kage Baker, Isaac Asimov, and many more. And it is interesting to note that some version of the Eternal Champion is often involved in such efforts.
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It's been almost twenty years since I reviewed Bruce McAllister's Dream Baby (in August 1990), but he's kept writing excellent stuff for the magazines. Much of it deals with issues connected to the Viet Nam War (as did Dream Baby, both the novel and the short version included here). Others, like the title story of The Girl Who Loved Animals and Other Stories, consider an all-too-likely future in which animals are going extinct and young street women can be offered employment as incubators for gorilla embryos.
No cybernetic heavens here. No dazzling military pyrotechnics. No wondrous aliens. McAllister's imagination stays close to home and focuses on the human element. There is warmth here, love for the human condition, and impressive literary polish.
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Steven Silver of ISFiC Press in Illinois just sent along a copy of Tanya Huff's Finding Magic, published to coincide with the 2007 Windycon in Chicago, at which Huff was the guest of honor.
Huff is primarily a fantasy writer, in which role she has committed a couple of dozen novels for DAW and a slew of short stories. She is praised for her imagination, her realistic dialog, and her ability to get things right. I'm not that familiar with her work, so I started reading “I Knew a Guy Once,” which is one of her few SF tales. The basic idea is fairly simple: a psychologist arrives on a space station to do something about rising stress levels, misbehavior, and general psychological bad vibes. The same ship brings a bartender, and Huff focuses all her attention on her efforts to clean up a bad bar and improve morale (since happy people drink more). The psychologist we don't see again till the very end, when he reveals that the problem he was supposed to solve has been solved, only he didn't do it. Ba-da-bum. Not exactly major, but very nicely, deftly done.
Huff is worthy of your attention. Enjoy.
Copyright (c) 2007 by Tom Easton
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Reader's Department: BRASS TACKS
Dr. Schmidt,
Normally I wouldn't write to complain about a story I didn't like. A story in your November 2007 issue raised my eyebrow, though. “Yearning for the White Avenger,” by Carl Frederick is a nice work of fiction. I just fail to see how it qualifies as science fiction, no matter how broad your definition. In your June 2007 editorial you set out two guidelines for Analog's definition of science fiction. The first was that a story “should incorporate some element of scientific or technical speculation in way that is integral to the story.” The only science that I can find in “White Avenger” (training a parrot) is neither speculative nor even particularly integral to the story. So, while I enjoyed the piece, I am left wondering how it made it into my monthly fix of science fiction.
Thanks for a great publication!
Chaim Schramm
Philadelphia, PA
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The speculation is that an unprecedented level of communication with a member of a different species might be achieved by using a member of a third species as a “go-between.” It's absolutely integral to the story because the way the plot plays out depends completely on that three-way communication.
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Dr. Schmidt,
In “Adapting” (September 2007) and “Double Standard Required” (November 2007) you lay the blame for global warming on population growth. Given, we are discussing that part of global warming caused by human activity. If that is the null set, then the discussion is moot.
Like you, I doubt if global warming is a major tool in the toolbox of extinction. Reduced land and resources could trigger the Armageddon scenario, but I think there are far greater threats.
It is in the reaction to global warming that I perceive the greatest threat to the survival of the human race.
In your last editorial, you mentioned deforestation as a principal cause of global warming. I doubt that, because it has happened in the past without notable effect. The dying oceans are another matter.
By and large, it seems to me that the dominant factor in emissions is stored biocarbon. The stores of millions—no, hundreds of millions of years are spewing forth into the atmosphere. This is not the result of population, but of industry. Your math on resource utilization ignores the bucker paradigm. A bucket can only hold so much no matter what the rate of fill.
The first human population explosion was caused by agricultural technology. Not technology as we perceive it today, but technology nevertheless. It took humanity thousands of generations of time to reach that level of technology. The second human population explosion was the result of industrial technology. In blaming population for industry, we are putting the horse in front of the cart.
With current resources we can meet need, but there is no amount of resources that will meet appetite.
Human biology has not changed much in fifty thousand years. However, human culture has, and man is his culture. Biology determines the response to culture, and while man is not evolving, social orders are. This explains the Flynn Effect, which the Bell Curve could not.
Evolution is not concerned with the wellbeing of a species, either individually or collectively. Survival is the only relevant factor. Predacious human social orders tend to glamorize the process in favor of predators, but the top of the food chain is dependant on the bottom. Wolves are facing extinction while rabbits multiply to the point of nuisance.
So social orders compete and the survivors replace the failures, War is the ultimate arbitrator of this competition. It may not be used, but it sits in the judgment box w
aiting to be unleashed. It matters not how well a social order provides for the well being of its members: if it fails the test of war, it fails the evolutionary process.
As the technological acceleration increments, social orders become more and more dependant on the machine in the contest of survival. Those social orders that embrace the machine flourish, while those that do not are swept aside.
Eventually, social orders become social economic machines, mechanisms in which human judgment is replaced by mechanical response. If this seems a stretch, consider the present arguments over social economic policy. “Let the marketplace decide, because the marketplace is superior to human planning.” No, those are not the exact words, but stripped of propaganda, that is what they mean.
As humanity advances in political skill in at best a linear rate, the machine advances at an exponential rate. The dominant social orders serve the machine, and this service is called progress. Few question the destination.
Soon only computers will be able to program computers, and soon thereafter, the machine will be self-sustaining.
Today it is the machine, not population, which generates industrial emissions. It seems clear to me that the machine can continue without population. Not only that, the machine can endure far greater environmental stress than humanity. What may be malignant to man might be benign to the machine. If I am correct, then why is population the dominant factor in industrial emissions?
I fail to concur as to the certain permanence of the Earth. Mass is fuel. If the machine decides to leave, it may not leave a planet behind. Even if it remains, is a machine a planet?
Respectfully,
Daniel Dempkey
El Centro, CA
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Reader's Department: UPCOMING EVENTS by Anthony Lewis
16-18 November 2007
ORYCON 29 (Oregon SF conference) at Portland Marriott Waterfront, Portland, OR. Writer Guest of Honor: Robert Charles Wilson; Editor Guest of Honor: Liz Scheier; Artist Guest of Honor: Molly Harrison; Media Guests of Honor: Vic and Kelly Bonilla; Fan Guest of Honor: Jonas Saunders. Registration: $45 until 31 October, more later. Info: http:// www.orycon.org/orycon29; orycon29@ gmail.com;.OryCon 29, P.O. Box 5464, Portland, OR 97228-5464.
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16-18 November 2007
PHILCON (Philadelphia SF conference) at Sheraton Philadelphia City Center, Philadelphia, PA. Principal Speaker: Eric Flint; Artist Guest of Honor: Sue Dawe; Costuming Special Guests: Kevin Roche & Andrew Trembly. Registration: $45 until 31 October, $50 thereafter and at the door. Info: www.philcon.org; info2007@philcon.org; Philcon, Box 8303, 30th Street Station, Philadelphia PA 19101.
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23-25 November 2007
LOSCON 34 (Los Angeles area SF conference) at LAX Marriott, Los Angeles, CA. Writer Guest of Honor: Robert J. Sawyer; Artist Guest of Honor: Theresa Mathe; Fan Guest of Honor: Capt. David West Reynolds; Music Guest of Honor: Dr. James Robinson. Registration: $40 until 31 August, $45 until 31 October, $50 at the door. Info: loscon.org/34/index. html; info@loscon.org; Loscon 34, 11513 Burbank Blvd, North Hollywood CA 91601.
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6-10 August 2008
DENVENTION III (66th World Science Fiction Convention) at Colorado Convention Center, Denver, CO. Hotels include Adam's Mark (party hotel), Hyatt Regency.Guest of Honor: Lois McMaster Bujold; Artist Guest of Honor: Rick Sternbach; Fan Guest of Honor: Tom Whitmore; TM: Wil McCarthy. Registration (until further notice; see website): USD 175; supporting membership USD 40; child (until 12 as of6 August 2008) USD45. This is the SF universe's annual get-together. Professionals and readers from all over the world will be in attendance. Talks, panels, films, fancy dress competition—the works. Nominate and vote for the Hugos. Info: www.denvention3.org; president@denvention.org. Denvention 3, Post Office Box 1349, Denver, CO 80201 USA.
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30 October-3 November 2008
WORLD FANTASY CONVENTION at Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Guests: TBA. Registration: Attending US $100 until 30 September 2007 (limit of 850), Supporting: US $35; additional for Awards Banquet US $50. Info: www.worldfantasy. org; info@worldfantasy2008.org; World Fantasy 2008, c/o The Story Box, 1835-10 Avenue SW, Calgary, Alberta T3C 0K2 Canada.
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