response 3 of 41:

Apr 23 22:16 UTC 1999

You've never read Asimov?  Well, not that I can go around saying stuff like
that, I haven't read anything on the list either...  It's not my fault, I've
been reading classics.  All the newer novels and stories seem so overwhelming,
and my favorite sf book is Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card).  I think I've been
spending too much time writing my own stories.  Actually, I'm working on a
novel!

response 5 of 41:

Apr 24 13:31 UTC 1999

        Way to go, Howard DeVore; local first fandomer.

response 7 of 41:

Apr 24 15:54 UTC 1999

Uh, Capek invented the word "robot" in his novel "R. U. R.", according 
to Asimov, writing in a lot of his books.  The concept of robots 
as we know them was invented by Eando Binder (Edgar(?) and Otto 
Binder, a pair of brothers who wrote about Adam Link).  

Asimov invented the 3 Laws of Robotics, and his robots were a lot more 
realistic than the Frankenstein-like robots other authors had in their 
stories.  He probably wrote the best robot stories in science fiction, 
but he didn't invent the concept or the word.

He was, as you said, he was very knowledgeable about science, a god 
among science fiction writers, and a pioneer of science fiction.

response 9 of 41:

Apr 24 22:45 UTC 1999

Really?  I though Asimov invented the word.  Learn something everyday :)

response 11 of 41:

Apr 28 19:22 UTC 1999

I should get out more... (it wouldn't very hard to get out "more", though,
in my case)

response 13 of 41:

Apr 29 23:55 UTC 1999

Oh, Insurrection was up there?  I didn't see that.  That's one point for
Chimera, then.  I have see Babylon 5, if they're talking about the movie.

response 15 of 41:

May 3 17:13 UTC 1999

Yep, her short story collection "Fire Watch" blew me away when I
read it a few years ago.  I think she's one of the best SF writers
of this era, and it's a damn shame that so few people have read her
works.

response 17 of 41:

May 29 04:50 UTC 1999

I've read "Factoring Humanity" and "To Say Nothing of the Dog".

Robert Sawyer, is an author to watch.  I think one of his previous
novels, "The Terminal Experiment" was nominated or won a Hugo or Nebula.
His first three novels (Fossil Hunter, Far-Seer, and Foreigner) were a
trilogy set on a dinosaur planet.  They looked so hokey that I initially
passed them by.  After "The Terminal Experiment" won some kind of award,
I picked it up and found that it was a very solid and thought provoking
piece of hard science fiction.  Since then I've been reading all his
books, which come out frequently - it seems like he is cranking out
three or four novels a year.  They all have very solid scientific
foundations, and lots of very interesting ideas.  The one nominated
here, "Factoring Humanity," starts out sounding a bit too much like the
movie "Contact" (female scientist decodes mysterious alien transmissions
by non-planar thinking and finds instructions for building a device that
takes her on a weird metaphysical journey), except that the weird
metaphysical journey is actually weirder, more original, and more has
much more profound implications than the one in Contact.  I don't think
it's a great book - not all that well built; some subplots that don't
really tie in well - but it is definately worth reading.  I'm kind of
worried that at the breakneck pace this guy is turning out books, that
he is going to burn out fast.  So many writers seem only to have a few
good books in them.  He still seems to be doing OK.  Maybe he's been
saving up books for years.  He claims to be "Canada's only full-time
science fiction writer".  Big deal.

response 19 of 41:

Sep 7 15:28 UTC 1999

Hot off the press from the World Science Fiction Convention in Australia:
the Hugo Award winners!    The nominees are listed in resp:0.

From: Gary Farber <gfarber@panix.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written,rec.arts.sf.tv
Subject: Hugos
Date: 4 Sep 1999 18:55:33 GMT
Organization: fwa pp

No one seems to have posted them here yet.  Tsk.

     * Best Novel of 1998
       To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis
     * Best Novella of 1998
       "Oceanic" by Greg Egan
     * Best Novelette of 1998
       "Taklamakan" by Bruce Sterling
     * Best Short Story of 1998
       "The Very Pulse of the Machine" by Michael Swanwick
     * Best Related Book of 1998
       The Dreams Our Stuff is Made Of by Thomas M. Disch
     * Best Dramatic Presentation of 1998
       The Truman Show (Paramount)
     * Best Professional Editor of 1998
       Gardner Dozois (Asimov's)
     * Best Professional Artist of 1998
       Bob Eggleton
     * Best Semiprozine of 1998
       Locus edited by Charles N. Brown
     * Best Fanzine of 1998
       Ansible edited By Dave Langford
     * Best Fan Writer of 1998
       Dave Langford
     * Best Fan Artist of 1998
       Ian Gunn
     * John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer of 1997 or 1998
       (Sponsored by Dell Magazines)
       Nalo Hopkinson

[. . . .]       

-- 
Copyright 1999 by Gary Farber; For Hire as: Web Researcher; Nonfiction
Writer, Fiction and Nonfiction Editor; gfarber@panix.com; Northeast US

response 21 of 41:

Sep 8 22:23 UTC 1999

Pleasant, but fluffy.  On the other hand, comedy suits her: Willis's 
characters are consistently extraordinarily mentally dim.  In a comedy, 
at least, this is appropriate and amusing; in her more serious works, 
it's somewhere between annoying and distressing.

Bruce Sterling's novelette is in his new collection, _A Good 
Old-Fashioned Future_, which I just bought: I'm looking forward to 
reading it.

Disch's non-fiction book was very thoughtful, but so provocative and 
iconoclastic that I'm not sure which surprises me more: that it won a 
Hugo, or that the author (presumably) was willing to accept one.

"The Truman Show" was a fine movie (especially for Jim Carrey, who 
manages to play a nice guy without being sappy), much better than 
"Pleasantville", which had tedious spots and was never really thought 
through.  I wonder if "Babylon 5" lost because everyone agrees the last 
season was a dog, or because the con was held in Australia where 
presumably fewer people saw the show?

response 23 of 41:

Sep 10 21:50 UTC 1999

Hmph.  (Scott enters some pointlessly sarcastic remark)

response 25 of 41:

Sep 14 21:27 UTC 1999

Who does?  (Read science fiction like they used to, I mean.)

If you like Stephenson and Powers, Mike, then you might just find 
Willis too, well, fluffy.  Try _Doomsday Book_, which is her grittiest 
novel: time-traveling grad student lands in the middle of the 14th 
Century Black Plague without realizing it.  Or some of her short 
stories: "Fire Watch" (middle of the Blitz) or "A Letter from the 
Clearys" (her most successful attempt at the kind of gut-wrenching 
story that the 1950s sf authors did so well).

response 27 of 41:

Sep 15 01:20 UTC 1999

  re #25:  thanks for the suggestion, perhaps I'll try those..

  re #26:  care to go into further detail about the writers you like --
  what sort of stuff they write, what would be a good starting point, etc..?