SFL Archives Vol 11 readthrough update 03

 SFL Archives Vol 11: 25% completion, 78 bookmarks (more than a few bookmarks were redundant and got cleaned up)

-The reason why Alexei Panshin had a decades long break getting stories published becomes clearer. (Panshin apparently signed a multi-book contract for the advance money, Panshin then tried to weasel out of the book contract commitment by submitting stories *co-authored* with his wife...publishers did not react well to shenanigans they normally pulled on authors happening to them)

-One shot SF&F authors of the 1980's get discussed and a few of them/their stories sound interesting (Hilbert Schenck, Barrington Bayley, Denis Johnson, John Sladek, etc)

-COSMOS, a 17 chapter SF round-robin "write your way out of this" serial written almost exclusively by future SF editors/authors inside the 1933 fanzine SCIENCE FICTION DIGEST 

-Some SFLers have devolved into posting lists of books and author bibliographies in response to other SFLers making 1000+ word essay-posts

-SFLers start asking what deeper meaning Ridley Scott intended by costuming Tim Curry in gallons of red paint, a foam bodybuilder suit and fake horns in the 1985 movie LEGEND. (2020 take: Ridley Scott putting 97% of his effort on the visuals of a film & 1% effort on the movie script never gets hypothesized by 1986 SFLers)

-Vernor Vinge's PEACE WAR comes up, and how the bobbles (aka stasis field technology) in PEACE WAR could be used IRL across multiple fields like construction, civilian, military, space exploration, etc.

-Philip Jose Farmer's unauthorized vulturing of other SF&F authors work gets mentioned multiple times, re the PJF authored VENUS ON A HALF-SHELL and the PJF authored Necronomicon

-SFLers note that Jack Chalker's stories all seeming to have involuntary species + gender swaps for main characters and the subsequent kinky sex that happens due to species/gender changes makes me very happy I have only read one of Jack Chalker's stories (it was notable for the extreme speed of the plot movement vs modern fantasy books) and nothing more. 

-Diane Duane's STAR TREK novels get brought up and fans of Diane Duane/fans of STAR TREK fiction might find things of note being discussed that I haven't 

-More SFLer's discover Michael Moorcock and the ETERNAL CHAMPION stories, which [sarcasm mode]Robert Heinlein definitely did not rip off for his Number of the Beast book[/sarcasm mode].

-The SF-LOVERS t-shirt project gets relaunched with a cluttered seeming graphic design (two interstellar aliens reading SF-LOVERS on a terminal with a scarier interstellar alien creeping up behind the reader aliens)

-An SFLer on the hunt for unique for PhD thesis material asks "What is the etymology behind "filksongs/fens/fen?" (2020: I will 110% be skipping all further posts regarding this subject)

-Steven Brust regains ARPANET acess and happily continues posting to the SF-LOVERS mailing list, to my utter non-delight as a avid non-fan of SKZB

-Lots and lots of LORD OF THE RINGS/Tolkien lore chat: Is Gandalf one of the Maia, why didn't Gandalf instantly ace the door-lock "say friend" test trying to get into Moria, was Legolas a backwoods (giggle) uneducated elf-hick or was Legolas just not willing to embarrass Gandalf about elf-language in front of the mortals? (2020 note: I can't remember how many supplemental LoTR books Christopher Tolkien had published up to this point in 1986. Also, RIP Christopher Tolkien)

-Funny SF stories requests. Henry Kuttner gets recommended a bunch, especially Kuttner's "drunk inventor-genius" stories. Spider Robinson's work gets recommended too (2020 take: Spider Robinson is a trap. Do Not Read. DO NOT READ.) BILL THE GALACTIC HERO gets recommended (2020 take: Bill the Galactic Hero IS NOT a trap read.)

- HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy's Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster fan recipes and anecdotes of drinking those fan recipes.

-The 1980's reboot of the TWILIGHT ZONE series viability is in doubt, and a doomed Save the Twilight Zone fan-campaign gets started.

-Locus Magazine mentions that Robert Aspirin has signed a multi-book deal for more MYTH stories (2020 take: Aspirin would pull a Panshin 2.0 move, only in Aspirin's case it was (mostly) IRS back-taxes related).

-A SFLer pitches a survey dedicated to filksong *cannonical collections of 'whimsically' regular words* and I promise to skip over any future posts on this just as much as posts about etymology of filksongs/fen/fens

-An PLAYBOY short story article called "TIME IS MONEY" gets brought up and discussed. (2020 take: doing a moderate reworking of that idea circa 2020 might win you the 2020/2021 PROMETHEUS AWARD aka the Hugo Award for Libertarians)

-1985 movie THE STUFF gets brought up again and from a 2020 standpoint it sounds more surrealistic than 1983 movie LIQUID SKY.

-CODEX SERAPHINIANUS gets brought up a few times. Knowing nothing about it  and refusing to google it, the CODEX SERAPHINIANUS sounds alot like the VOYNICH MANUSCRIPT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript

-Harlan Ellison and Ben Bova suing broadcast television networks & the producers of TERMINATOR 1 over stolen pitched-to-Hollywood ideas to get some sweet sweet settlement money comes up again. 

-A few SFLer's get around to watching Akira Kurosawa's HIDDEN FORTRESS and start noticing similarities/homages/outright scene reenactments of it that George Lucas did in STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE

-the AYES OF TEXAS get reviewed by Mark Leeper, and *even Mark Leeper, master of surface level oblivious reviews* picks up on the TEXAS slant in it.

SFL Archives Vol 10 readthrough update 01

-The Kindle I use to read the SFL Archives decided to suicide itself during yet another blowjob hagiography review of Spider Robinson at the 2% mark in SFL Vol 10, and I didn't blame it.

(sidenote 2020:  In my free time waiting for a replacement Kindle device, gave Spider Robinson's work a re-read after dissing him hard last in my previous SFL Archives read-through posts, because maybe I'd been too harsh towards Spider Robinson previously?)

 -Lots of David Eddings BELEGARIAD discussion, lots of Piers Anthony story discussion, and lots of Spider Robinson story discussion

2020 joke: <Jeopardy buzzer: Alex, what is "Authors whose work aged beyond hyper-badly for $800?" 

Alex Trebek: "CORRECT." >

2020 Joke Explainer: Giving Spider Robinson's work a re-read was a big mistake. Repeated instances of outright sexual assault, jailbait, underaged date rape, non-consentual bdsm, date rape, rape, etc in all of Spider Robinson's short stories & novels.

-Frank Herbert's Dune series continues to be discussed, not so much the DUNE 1984 movie. Much SFL internal amusement comes from reposting an old interview excerpt where Frank Herbert says: "I'm still against the idea of sequels in principle, because it's like watering down your wine all the time until you're left with just water." This is extremely funny given how many Dune sequels/prequels have come out since 1999.

-Piers Anthony had only released 8 XANTH books up to this point in 1985...<shakes head in 2020>...and most of the 1985 SFL readers demand more Piers Anthony stories. More discerning SFL posters noticed that each new Xanth book has upped the perv-factor with female characters in them getting dumber, and younger. 

-someone posts about the 1985 convention BOSKONE 22 being terrible on multiple levels (massively overcharging one-day pass people, overcrowded, terrible panels, worse film schedule, actively hostile venue, etc) with other SFL posters chiming in agreeing. One of the Boskone 22 organizers posts a big-ass "how fucking dare you" crocodile tears effort post that fails to address any of the complaints many SFL people posted about re: Boskone 22.

-Robert Forward's ROCHEWORLD gets held up as a model of good hard science fiction writing, which uh as a first time reader of Rocheworld and it's sequel 2 weeks ago in 2020, I can firmly say; HELL NO. Rocheworld was not good or hard science fiction beyond the light-sail setup.

-book publisher f**kery pt 47: Diane Duane's (who I had never heard of before or totally forgotten about (I really didn't read YA fiction growing up)) book 2 of a existing series comes out, which leads into a digression about book publishers (Dell) cancelling entire print runs, Ballantine Books dying, books being stuff in publishing limbo, Bluejay Press taking up the copyrights, and Bluejay Press as usual utterly f**king up the release dates of books.

-BLUEJAY PRESS is or rather was the anti-matter version of BAEN BOOKS. Bluejay Press  seemed to have good talent scouts and signed lots of amazing in retrospect fantasy & SciFi authors but could never release a book on time, usually missing their own publishing dates by 4 months or more. Meanwhile, Baen Books was the complete opposite in every way.

-pt 57 of me realizing how f**king old/how long certain authors have been around for. Example: George RR Martin & Stephen Donaldson were mentioned as promising up-coming talented authors when the SF-LOVERS mailing list started up in late 1979....this time circa 1984 it's Mary Gentle and Somtow Sucharitkul.

-Theodore Sturgeon death notice (RIP)

-20th century fox (rip, lol disney buyout) tries to get a rocky horror picture show subculture going for it's 1984 movie BUCKAROO BANZAI repeated times in the SFL mailing list.

-1985 marks the first time that April 1st jokes/pranks become the THING to post on April 1st.

-The doxxing of Richard Bachman being Stephen King is completed, and some SFLer's make some extremely notMad posts about it.

-Steven Brust starts posting prolifically in the SFL mailing list about many many things.
Direct quote: "If you really want mainstream quality writing in fantasy, I recommend the Gor books of John Norman." Steven Brust, SFL Archives Volume 10

(sidenote 2020: Have and will continue to re-quote 'Steven Brust recommending GOR' anywhere Steven Brust gets discussed online. The Steven Brust recommending GOR quote also lead to to my working hypothesis of:

If Heinlein inspired a never ending series of libertarian writers, well then John Norman's GOR books inspired and showed that skeevy sex sells in fantasy and scifi. 

originally posted August 11th - August 23th in the SomethingAwful forums Science Fiction Fantasy Megathread 3