The Complete LaNague
Page 108
“Lipidleggin’”
Gurney is Repairman Jack’s Uncle and the ancestor Peter LaNague is trying to trace in Chapter Eight of An Enemy of the State. (Rebelliousness can be genetic, I guess.) Back in 1978, with tongue planted firmly in cheek, I wrote this cautionary tale about a day when saturated fats would be banned. I saw how it could happen, but never for a moment did I believe it would happen. Not in a free country like our U.S. of A. But trans fats and 32-ounce soft drinks have been banned. What next? Butter?
“The Man with the Anteater” and “Higher Centers”
I could have included these in my first story collection, Soft and Others, but decided against it for a simple reason.
I’m not crazy about them.
Yes, they follow my continuing theme of the individual versus the system, but they’re preachy, didactic, pedantic… I could go on, but you’ll see for yourself. Back in those days we were learning our craft in public. These stories were written in 1970 (equivalent to the late Jurassic Period for some of you) and occupy the lower-left end of my learning curve.
I still like what I said, just not how I said it.
“Higher Centers” (Analog, April 1971) is a parable of Big Brother versus local/market control. (Guess which side I come down on.) It has a clever maguffin, but it’s as subtle as a dropped anvil.
“The Man with the Anteater” (Analog, July 1971) is even less subtle and, in many ways… ridiculous. It starts off with a few paragraphs directed straight at the reader – something I’d consider verboten only a few years later. In the finale I pull a Melville: I stop the narrative to give a short lecture on antbears. Oy. But the story belongs here because its protagonist is Josephine Finch’s grandfather and Peter Paxton has a cameo. (See Wheels Within Wheels.)
"To Fill the Sea and Air"
Dalt and Pard (Healer) wandered a lot. One of their stops (mentioned in the novel) was a planet named Gelk where he worked as a chispen fisherman. Here's the story about the man he crewed with. It takes place after Dalt’s visit, but will give you an idea of what he was doing when he was aboard.
DYDEETOWN WORLD
Baen published Dydeetown World (a melding of the novellas "Dydeetown World," "Wires," and "Kids,") with a marvelous cover by Gary Ruddell in the summer of 1989. It had started in 1984 as an idea for a short story – five, maybe six thousand words, tops. A quiet little SF tribute to Raymond Chandler whose work has given me such pleasure over the years. I was going to use all the clichés – the down‑and‑out private eye, his seedy friends, the tired, seamy city, the bar hang‑out, the ruthless mobster, the whore with the heart of gold. And I was going to set it in the far future, in a future I had developed for the LaNague Federation science fiction stories.
But "Dydeetown" was going to be different. Rather than bright and full of hope like its predecessors, this story was going to be set on the grimy, disillusioned underbelly of that future. I wanted to move through the LaNague future at ground level, take a hard look at the social fall‑out of the food shortages, the population‑control measures, the wires into the pleasure centers of the brain – things I'd glossed over or mentioned only in passing before. But despite the downbeat milieu, the story would be about freedom, friendship, and self‑esteem.
Beneath its hardboiled voice, its seamy settings, and violent events (Cyber/p-i/sci‑fi, as Forry Ackerman might have called it) were characters trying to maintain – or reestablish – a human connection. The intended short story stretched to novella length by the time it was done, but I think it worked.
Apparently, a few other folks agreed. After the "Dydeetown Girl" novella snagged a finalist spot for the Nebula Award in 1987, Betsy Mitchell prodded me into writing the sequel novellas "Wires" and "Kids" (oh, those plural nouns) and splicing them together into a single story.
Although written for adults, the Dydeetown World novel wound up on the American Library Association's list of "Best Books for Young Adults" and on the New York Public Library's recommended list of "Books for the Teen Age."
One scene in "Dydeetown Girl" involves a tyrannosaurus rex used as a guard animal. That's right: in a story written in 1985 I used a dinosaur cloned from reconstituted fossil DNA, but I tossed it off as background color.
If only I'd thought to stick a bunch of them in a park…
THE TERY
The Tery has had a long strange trip. My science fiction beauty-and-the-beast tale had its start in 1971 as a novelette called "He Shall Be Jon." I'd intended it for John W. Campbell Jr. and Analog, but he died just as I was finishing it. His replacement, Ben Bova, passed on it so I sold it the following year to Vincent McCaffrey at Fiction; it appeared in the fourth issue.
A few years later Jim Frenkel, then science fiction editor for Dell, approached me at Lunacon about a series of books he was putting together called Binary Stars. Each volume would consist of two novellas, much like the venerable Ace Doubles; the books would have interior illustrations and each novella would be introduced by the author of the companion piece.
At that time I was breaking ground on a new house and needed all the cash I could lay my hands on. I signed on and went to work. "He Shall Be Jon" became the basis of the first ten chapters of the novella and I continued the story of Jon the tery from there. I added a new character named Tlad who linked the story to my LaNague Federation future history. I also tried my hand at overt horror for the first time.
I called the resultant novella The Tery. It was twice the length of the novelette and ended with a satisfying catharsis. A bit thin in spots, I thought, but I'd reached the word limit and the submission deadline was upon me, so I had to let it go as was.
The Tery appeared in Binary Stars #2 in 1978 and was graced with five wonderful Steve Fabian illustrations. Unfortunately, only those who have seen the originals know how wonderful they are. Everyone else was subjected to the muddied, almost indecipherable reproductions on the cheap paper Dell used. Fabian's delicate half tones were lost, reducing his illos to elaborate smudges.
In 1989 I went back to the story. I fleshed out the characters and fine-tuned the choices facing them until I finally was satisfied. The Tery was now novel length – a short novel, to be sure, but I couldn't see padding the story just to bring it up to a certain word count. Some writers are putter-inners. I tend to be a taker-outer. In 1990 Baen published the novel-length version in paperback. The completed The Tery was finally before the public, although it was the only one of my novels without a hardcover edition.
Dave Hinchberger of Overlook Connection Press said he could rectify that. I jumped at the chance.
But in reviewing the scans I realized that the prose needed work – a lot of work. I was in the middle of three other projects at the time but could not let the book go back into print as it was. So I made time and did an extensive edit. It’s still not perfect, but it’s as good as it’s going to get.
You now have the definitive edition of The Tery – the same text as revised for Overlook Connection Press edition.
This is it. No more changes.
I swear.
Copyrights
“Lipidleggin’” Copyright © 1978, 2001 by F. Paul Wilson
(first appeared in Asimov’s SF Magazine, May-June 1978
An Enemy of the State © 1980, 2001 by F. Paul Wilson
(first published by Doubleday & Company in 1980)
Dydeetown World © 1989 by F. Paul Wilson
(first published by Baen Books in 1990)
The Tery © 2005 by F. Paul Wilson
(this revised version first published by Overlook Connection Press)
Healer © 1976, 2001 by F. Paul Wilson
(first published by Doubleday & Company in 1976;
a version of the opening section "Pard," first appeared in
Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, December 1972)
“To Fill the Sea and Air” © 1979, 2001 by F. Paul Wilson
(first appeared in Asimov’s SF Magazine, February 1979)
“The Man
with the Anteater” © 1972, 2005 by F. Paul Wilson
(first appeared in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, December 1972.)
“Higher Centers” © 1971, 2005 by F. Paul Wilson
(first appeared in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, April 1971.)
Wheels within Wheels © 1978, 2005 by F. Paul Wilson
(first published by Doubleday & Company in 1978;
a novelette version first appeared in
Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, April 1971.)
“Ratman” © 1971, 2000 by F. Paul Wilson
(first appeared in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, August 1971.)
also by F. Paul Wilson
The LaNague Federation Series
An Enemy of the State
Dydeetown World
The Tery
Wheels Within Wheels
Healer
Repairman Jack
The Tomb
Legacies
Conspiracies
All the Rage
Hosts
The Haunted Air
Gateways
Crisscross
Infernal
Harbingers
Bloodline
By the Sword
Ground Zero
Fatal Error
The Dark at the End
Nightworld
Repairman Jack: The Teen Trilogy
Jack: Secret Histories
Jack: Secret Circles
Jack: Secret Vengeance
Repairman Jack: The Early Years Trilogy
Cold City
Dark City
Fear City
The Adversary Cycle
The Keep
The Tomb
The Touch
Reborn
Reprisal
Nightworld
The LaNague Federation Series
Healer
Wheels Within Wheels
An Enemy of the State
Dydeetown World
The Tery
Other Novels
Black Wind
Sibs
The Select
Virgin
Implant
Deep As the Marrow
Mirage (with Matthew J. Costello)
Nightkill (with Steven Spruill)
Masque (with Matthew J. Costello)
The Christmas Thingy
Sims
The Fifth Harmonic
Midnight Mass
Short Fiction
Soft & Others
The Barrens & Others
Aftershocks & Others
The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emproium
Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack
Sex Slaves of the Dragon Tong
Omnibus Editions
The Complete LaNague
Calling Dr. Death
Repairman Jack: The Teen Trilogy
Editor
Freak Show
Diagnosis: Terminal
Table of Contents
THE COMPLEAT LaNAGUE
AN ENEMY OF THE STATE
PROLOGUE
PART ONE
The Nihilist
The Year of the Tortoise
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
IX
PART TWO
The Anarchist
The Year of the Tiller
X
XI
XII
XIII
The Year of the Malak
XIV
XV
PART THREE
“Above All Else: KYFHO”
The Year of the Sickle
XVI
XVII
The Year of the Dragon
XVIII
EPILOGUE
THE TERY
HEALER – I
WHEELS WITHIN WHEELS