perelgut@utcsrgv.UUCP (Stephen Perelgut) (06/12/83)
After a long break, here is more LOCUS news. We have been having
many problems due to our external links. I have not seen
net.sf-lovers in weeks, and I have not received any mail about my
previous book reviews. Anyone who sent mail to me and did not
receive a response, I probably didn't get your original letter.
Try getting to me by any route other than
decvax!utzoo!utcsrgv!perelgut.
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Isaac Asimov has turned in the manuscript for THE ROBOTS OF DAWN,
a sequel to THE CAVES OF STEEL and THE NAKED SUN. He got a
$150,000 advance (more than for FOUNDATION'S EDGE). He refused
to leak details.
Michael Bishop is writing strong. Expect ONE WINTER IN EDEN (a
collection of short stories) this fall, and WHO MADE STEVIE CRYE?
(a novel) in 1984.
Avon is publishing REFUGEE by Piers Anthony in September.
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Also, a mini-review for Varley's latest effort.
MILLENIUM.
John Varley
Berkley, June 1983 $6.95/ $7.95 in Canada
The basis of the plot is that humanity in the very distant future
is dying of genetic diseases, radiation poisoning and everything
else we might expect along those lines. There are some sketchy
explanations of how things all come about but they aren't too im-
portant. The people of the future use a time-machine (which they
think was built 50-75 centuries before) to travel back in time
and pick up victims of disasters before they die and replace them
with artificial bodies. That sounds very familiar if anyone
wants to dig up an obscure reference.
The new people are to be used to help re-populate the Earth. For
some reason, the time machine cannot send back to the same moment
twice. This leads to blacked-out areas of time which you have
either been to or which you will be going to or which someone
else might be going to. It is all very confusing and there are
lots of even more confusing explanations.
For those who like literature, there are references to H. G.
Wells' and stuff. All in all, a mediocre book which makes one
pine for the less explanation-ridden days of the early 40's and
50's. (I wasn't there, but I read the stories.) However, what
really makes the book stand out in my mind, the second to last
chapter is not very good. It confuses things but suddenly we are
hot in the middle of a Harlequin romance. Then, the last
chapter. By the time I got here, I thought I had read it all but
nooooooo, there are more twists to come. We find thousands of
Christian myths alive and well (there are earlier hints), a very
soft ending (depressingly bad I thought), and then...
GOD
Yup, we get to meet him and find out he is a sneaky bugger indeed.
I have rarely disliked an ending as much. In fact, I wasn't too
crazy about the book but it was entertaining in parts but when I
got to the very end, I decided I hated the entire book.
Varley has written lots of good stuff (read THE BARBIE MURDERS
for an example), and he has some average stuff (WIZARD, TITAN).
But in this book he makes me long for NUMBER OF THE BEAST.
Overall rating (1-10) is 3, but the ending gets a 1 (I would give
it lower, but there isn't any).
--- Stephen Perelgut ---
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