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Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
Club Notice - 11/13/92 -- Vol. 11, No. 20
MEETINGS UPCOMING:
Unless otherwise stated, all meetings are on Wednesdays at noon.
_D_A_T_E _T_O_P_I_C
11/18 HO: DOOMSDAY BOOK by Connie Willis (Plagues) (HO 4N-509)
12/09 HO: A FIRE ON THE DEEP by Vernor Vinge (HO 4N-509)
_D_A_T_E _E_X_T_E_R_N_A_L _M_E_E_T_I_N_G_S/_C_O_N_V_E_N_T_I_O_N_S/_E_T_C.
11/14 SFABC: Science Fiction Association of Bergen County: TBA
(phone 201-933-2724 for details) (Saturday)
11/21 NJSFS: New Jersey Science Fiction Society: TBA
(phone 201-432-5965 for details) (Saturday)
HO Chair: John Jetzt HO 1E-525 908-834-1563 hocpb!jetzt
LZ Chair: Rob Mitchell HO 1D-505A 908-834-1267 hocpb!jrrt
MT Chair: Mark Leeper MT 3D-441 908-957-5619 mtgzfs3!leeper
HO Librarian: Nick Sauer HO 4F-427 908-949-7076 homxc!11366ns
LZ Librarian: Lance Larsen LZ 3L-312 908-576-3346 mtfme!lfl
MT Librarian: Mark Leeper MT 3D-441 908-957-5619 mtgzfs3!leeper
Factotum: Evelyn Leeper MT 1F-329 908-957-2070 mtgzy!ecl
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
1. The next discussion book in Holmdel is _D_o_o_m_s_d_a_y _B_o_o_k by Connie
Willis. Of this, Evelyn Leeper says:
The gist of _D_o_o_m_s_d_a_y _B_o_o_k can be summed up in two sentences: "It's
no fun to come down with an unknown disease in 14th Century
England. It's not much better in the 20th Century." One of the
main things Willis does is show us that our comfortable notions
about how we're protected by technology and medical advances are
based as much, if not more, on wishful thinking as on hard facts.
Willis does this be telling two stories in parallel: one of Kirvin,
who has traveled back to 14th Century England to study it first-
hand, and one of the rest of her research team left behind (ahead?)
in the early 21st Century. Kirvin was sent back to 1320, well
before the Black Plague burst into Europe, but falls ill almost
immediately upon arriving. In addition, immediately after sending
Kirvin back in time, the technician collapses with an unknown flu-
THE MT VOID Page 2
like illness, and cannot report the exactly when Kirvin landed.
This is a book about sickness and plagues and dying, and how people
react to it. Though Willis does an excellent job on the 14th
Century details, it is the parallelism that is unique here. For
all our progress, Willis says, a new disease can easily bring us
back to the problems of 600 years ago.
And for one final recommendation, I am nominating _D_o_o_m_s_d_a_y _B_o_o_k for
the Hugo next year. But even if you haven't read it, join us for
the discussion, which will undoubtedly extend to the topics of
plagues in science fiction and plagues in real life. [-ecl]
2. I recently spent some time in Puerto Rico. There are good
aspects and bad aspects of Puerto Rico but in one way the traveler
or foreigner has a real disadvantage there. That is, in figuring
out the money. You always have to spend a few minutes figuring out
the money when you go overseas, but the currency in Puerto Rico is
the worst and most difficult to figure out of any country we have
visited. Usually a country will have two units of currency, and
usually they will have a ratio of 100 to 1. The coins will have a
numeral and the units of currency. Well, they start out okay with
the big unit being something called a "dollar" and with the bills
at least having numerals to show how many dollars they represent.
I am pretty sure a dollar is the figure they show with an S and a
bar through it, but I just don't see that figure on the bill
anywhere. Oh, and of course, the bills are all the same size, so
it is really tough to tell them apart by feel. I pity a blind
Puerto Rican.
The coins have denominations spelled out in words that are not even
in the local language. They say things like "one cent" or "five
cents"; "1 cent" and "5 cents" might be better. Now we get into
fractions as well as words. The big coin says "quarter dollar."
If I have my ratio right, and I am not sure I do, this is 25 cents.
I also got in my change something from what must be a foreign
currency. It is labeled "one dime." None of the other coins or
bills say how many dimes they are, so I at first assumed it came
from some previous system of currency or some other country. It is
smaller than a cent but it is silver like a five-cent piece. It
probably is something like a half a cent. A five-cent piece is the
next larger silver coin and I can't think what else would divide
into five cents. That would make 200 dimes to a dollar. I guess
it does say "United States" like the others, but no other coin
measures its value in dimes. Also I asked a man where I could find
someone who would give me 200 dimes for my dollar and he just
walked away. I think what I'd have to do is ask someone to break a
five-cent piece and give me my change all in dimes and I'd see how
many I get. I can easily see how this weird currency could drive
the Puerto Ricans to the bughouse.
Mark Leeper
MT 3D-441 908-957-5619
...mtgzfs3!leeper
THE MULTIPLEX MAN by James P. Hogan
Bantam, 1992, ISBN 0-553-08999-4, $20.
A book review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper
_T_h_e _M_u_l_t_i_p_l_e_x _M_a_n is the kind of novel Robert Sheckley would
have written in the 1950s and 1960s if he had been able to get his
tongue out of his cheek long enough to write it. He used to write
satiric novels set in the next century with trends of this century
taken a step too far. Also, body switching was a favorite theme of
Sheckley novels. Of course, Sheckley was no scientist, so he
explained body switch technology with hocus-pocus and smoke and
mirrors. James Hogan was an aeronautical engineer before he turned
to science fiction, so he is able to write a convincing explanation
about how body-switching or, more accurately, personality-switching
might be done. This is a story told from several points of view,
but always from the point of view of whomever it is who currently
has the body in question. We start with Jarrow, a school teacher
who one day wakes up in a body he does not recognize.
As with a Sheckley story, the foreground is really just
distraction. The real point of the story is to show you a world in
which something has gone very wrong. In this setting there are
conflicts between the people still living on Earth and people who
live off-world: the moon, Mars, maybe O'Neill colonies. Off-
worlders are in favor of technology and expansion. However, on
Earth the repressive governments are forcing caution and
conservation down everyone's throat. The most repressive government
is the United States. Asia and the former Soviet Union ended up
being where people were able and willing to use technology and they
now lead the world. In the United States the Green Party seems to
have accomplished getting us only brave new warning labels.
Unhealthy foods are disappearing as living becomes safer, but the
society is stagnating.
But in this world the repressive government is willing to try
new technology if it helps its own ends. And one new method allows
the mind to be treated as a computer personality--to be treated as
programs. It can be stored and downloaded to different brains. And
in explaining how this can be done in reasonably scientific terms,
Hogan gives a hard science edge where Sheckley was always treading
in fantasy.
The body is owned by characters on each side of the
controversy, but it is clear where Hogan's sympathies lie. As an
adventure, it is decent, but not great. But, of course, the
adventure story is not really the point.
THE HOLLOW MAN by Dan Simmons
Bantam, 1992, ISBN 0-553-08252-3, $20.
A book review by Evelyn C. Leeper
Copyright 1992 Evelyn C. Leeper
Sometimes the short story is better.
For _T_h_e _H_o_l_l_o_w _M_a_n, Simmons took his short story "Eyes I Dare
Not Meet in Dreams" (which I liked very much in his collection
_P_r_a_y_e_r_s _t_o _B_r_o_k_e_n _S_t_o_n_e_s), threw in the Vanni Fucci character from
"Vanni Fucci Is Alive and Well and Living in Hell" (also in _P_r_a_y_e_r_s
_t_o _B_r_o_k_e_n _S_t_o_n_e_s), added a little background for the main character
and a lot of gratuitous horror in a whole new section stuffed in the
middle (shades of Richard Kiel's character from the James Bond
films), and produced a novel significantly worse than any of its
sources (except maybe the Bond films). As an example of how so much
is misdirected in the novel, I will merely say that when a member of
the Mafia dumps a body in a deserted swamp and looks up to see a
witness, he does _n_o_t take that witness to Disneyland.
Read the short story instead.
NIGHT AND THE CITY
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: DeNiro plays an incorrigible,
sleazy promoter trying to arrange a night of boxing
in this remake of the British 1951 film by Jules
Dassin. The main character is not likable but the
story is told with energy and style. Rating: high +1
(-4 to +4).
About the best thing you can say about Harry Fabian (as played
by Robert DeNiro) is that he has a lot of energy and ambition.
Harry is a high-powered promoter of sleazy schemes. In spite of
Harry's surface likability and ever-endearing demeanor, even Harry's
closest friends cannot or should not trust Harry anywhere near
money. Harry is a lawyer who has become so well known for his
ambulance -chasing that he has to supplement his income by any other
scheme he can put together. His latest scheme is to promote a night
of local boxers fighting each other, but the scheme is elaborate and
the financing shady. And Fabian will use whomever he has to in
order to make himself a big fight promoter for one night and at the
same time gall "Boom Boom" Grossman (played by Alan King), a well
known local fight promoter.
Jessica Lange stars as Helen, who owns a bar with her husband
Phil(played by Cliff Gorman), but who is also fooling around with
Fabian. The supporting cast includes Jack Warden and Eli Wallach.
But the main show is the frenetic Harry Fabian, who is almost never
off-camera and seems to live at 10% greater speed than the rest of
us. He has to so that in the middle of one scheme he can get
involved with another one, like selling probably-stolen VCRs. "Sell
these for $400, keep $200," his friend Gupta tells him, and Harry is
off on a second scheme.
The dialogue in Richard Price's screenplay is fast and often
funny in a bitter, ironic way. Harry's various inter-connected
schemes build a sort of "Mission Impossible" house-of-cards plan
where the impossible mission is to make this cheap hustler into a
success. Irwin Winkler's direction and Tak Fujimoto's photography
pick up the grunginess and oppressiveness of the New York City
streets with the immediacy of hand-held Steadicam. Popular songs
from the 1950s and 1960s run a commentary on the action of the film,
as when Fabian runs a scam to the tune of "The Great Pretender."
In spite of a lack of likable characters, _N_i_g_h_t _a_n_d _t_h_e _C_i_t_y
shows us the life of the underbelly and a few interesting
machinations. I gave it a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
ZEBRAHEAD
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: This is a realistic but far too
open-ended story of racial tensions that may or may
not have led to violence. Story of a white Jewish
boy dating a black girl and its eventual outcome by
neophyte writer-director Anthony Drazen avoids being
too obviously a Romeo-and-Juliet story, but ends up
muddling whatever point it was trying to make.
Rating: low +1 (-4 to +4).
The setting is Detroit in what was once a middle-class
neighborhood. Now it is run-down, bombed-out, and polluted over.
One guy in the neighborhood likes to set fire to his lawn and see it
burn in jets of flame from some flammable pollutant in the soil.
These days the people who live in this neighborhood are people who
have no other choice. The area is dominated by blacks, with some
Asians, Hispanics, and Jews mixed in. Zack Glass (played by Michael
Rapaport) is a Jew, but his culture and friends are black. Zack's
father Richard (played by Ray Sharkey) runs a record store. Richard
has two interests in life: making sure he and his son are getting
enough sex, and listening to black music from the 1950s and 1960s.
Zack's best friend Dee (played by DeShonn Castle) is black.
Through him Zack meets Dee's beautiful cousin Nikki (played by
N'Bushe Wright). When Zack starts dating Nikki, their friends and
family are not sure what to make of the situation. There seems to
be a suspicion that a white-black relationship will not work out,
but this is not "Romeo and Juliet" or "West Side Story." This is
not a story of whites and blacks at war, but there are tensions that
set events in motion that do lead to violence.
_Z_e_b_r_a_h_e_a_d is not a simplistic story. Even when violence does
occur it is left open to the viewer's interpretation whether or not
the violence even can be termed a racial incident. Anthony Drazen
has shown us the background for an incident without tying it up and
making it simple. As a first-time writer and director he has told a
story that is probably near his own experience and his characters
both talk and act realistically. Most are also acting for the first
time and probably playing characters much like themselves. The only
familiar face is, in fact, Ray Sharkey, a rather good actor who
takes James Woods sorts of roles. The dialogue and acting are both
quite acceptable considering the overall lack of experience. Only
the ambiguity of the events of the story works against the film.
However, one does get to the end of this film expecting some point
to have been made a little more strongly than Drazen has. The
"Okay, so what?" dissatisfied feeling does not serve this film well.
As a result, I give it a low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Hugo Recommendations from NESFA
(provided by Jim Mann)
[I am providing this as is off Usenet. Needless to say, I have
my own opinions on what is missing from this list. We will probably
schedule a meeting in late december or early January to dicuss what
_w_e think the "Good Stuff" is. -Evelyn Leeper]
Every year, NESFA (the New England SF Association) has a series
of discussion groups on the Hugos. We sit around and tell one
another what we think is good, what is worth reading and worth at
least considering at Hugo time, etc. This year, we decided to take
notes, to try to pass our recommendations along to others who might
be looking for something good to read. Besides, it's always a good
way to start a discussion.
The purpose of this list is to provide tips on Good Stuff to
read. (The number in the last column is the number of people who
recommended the books listed, out of eighteen participants.)
Novels
_C_o_u_n_t _G_e_i_g_e_r'_s _B_l_u_e_s, Michael Bishop (1)
_A_n_v_i_l _o_f _S_t_a_r_s, Greg Bear (1)
_H_a_r_d _L_a_n_d_i_n_g, Algis Budrys (1)
_S_e_r_v_a_n_t _o_f _t_h_e _E_m_p_i_r_e, Raymond Feist (1)
_J_u_m_p_e_r, Steve Gould (3)
_W_o_r_l_d_s _E_n_o_u_g_h _a_n_d _T_i_m_e, Joe Haldeman (1)
_F_a_t_h_e_r_l_a_n_d, Robert Harris (4)
_R_e_s_u_r_r_e_c_t_i_o_n (_n_o_v_e_l_l_a?), Katherine Kerr (1)
_J_a_c_k _t_h_e _B_o_d_i_l_e_s_s, Julian May (1)
_G_l_a_s_s _H_o_u_s_e_s , Laura Mixon (4)
_F_l_y_i_n_g _i_n _P_l_a_c_e , Susan Palwick (3)
_L_a_s_t _C_a_l_l, Tim Powers (2)
_D_r_e_a_m_s_h_i_p_s, Melissa Scott (1)
_C_o_l_d _a_s _I_c_e, Charles Sheffield (1)
_T_h_e _G_r_a_i_l _o_f _H_e_a_r_t_s, Susan Shwartz (2)
_G_u_n_s _o_f _t_h_e _S_o_u_t_h, Harry Turtledove (1)
_A _F_i_r_e _U_p_o_n _t_h_e _D_e_e_p, Vernor Vinge (9)
_A_r_i_s_t_o_i, Walter Jon Williams (2)
_B_r_i_a_r _R_o_s_e, Jane Yolen (2)
Short Fiction
"Faith," Poul and Karen Anderson (_A_f_t_e_r _t_h_e _K_i_n_g) (1)
"Silver or Gold," Emma Bull (_A_f_t_e_r _t_h_e _K_i_n_g) (2)
"The Winterberry," Nicholas DiChario (_A_l_t. _K_e_n_n_e_d_y_s) (3)
"Stopping at Slowyear," Fred Pohl (1)
Hugo Recommendations November 6, 1992 Page 2
"A Long Night's Vigil at the Temple," Robert Silverberg
(_A_f_t_e_r _t_h_e _K_i_n_g) (1)
"The Seven Swans," Lois Tilton (1)
Non Fiction
_L_e_t'_s _H_e_a_r _I_t _f_o_r _t_h_e _D_e_a_f _M_a_n, Dave Langford (3)
_D_i_n_o_t_o_p_i_a (novella?), Jim Gurney (3)
_A _W_e_a_l_t_h _o_f _F_a_b_l_e, Harry Warner (3)
The following items have been noted as having received good
reviews, but have not yet been recommended by any NESFAn:
Novels
John Barnes: _A _M_i_l_l_i_o_n _O_p_e_n _D_o_o_r_s
Orson Scott Card: _T_h_e _M_e_m_o_r_y _o_f _E_a_r_t_h
Doris Egan: _Q_u_a_r_a_n_t_i_n_e
Guy Gaverial Kay: _A _S_o_n_g _f_o_r _A_r_d_o_n_n_a
Ian McDonald: _T_h_e _B_r_o_k_e_n _L_a_n_d
Michael Kube-McDowell: _E_x_i_l_e
Kim Stanley Robinson: _R_e_d _M_a_r_s
Dan Simmons: _T_h_e _H_o_l_l_o_w _M_a_n
Sheri Tepper: _S_i_d_e_s_h_o_w
John Varley: _S_t_e_e_l _B_e_a_c_h
Other
Jane Yolen: _S_t_o_r_y_t_e_l_l_e_r (contains substantial non-fiction)