Old Tea Leaf Reviews 6: 1986 Locus Poll Best First Novel

[james_davis_nicoll]

Does anyone know why the number of Best First Novels varies so much from
year to year?



Best First Novel

1 Contact Carl Sagan

A female scientist finds herself caught up in what appears to
be the first genuine contact with aliens.

I thought this was stunningly mediocre.

As far as I know, this was Sagan's only attempt to write deliberate
fiction but I believe he had a certain amount of success in other fields to
comfort himself with.


2 Emprise Michael P. Kube-McDowell

This is the first book in the Trigon Disunity, which begins just after
a group of plucky scientists save humanity by inventing a Fission-B-Gone
device just before the oil runs out. Whoops. Civilization survives and goes
on to make contact with extraterrestrials of an unexpected nature.

I think the later books in the series are more interesting than this
one but this was interesting enough to get me to buy those later novels.

I believe his most recent book was 2002's VECTORS. His website
says that there's another book in the pipeline, THE EYES OF REASON.



3 In the Drift Michael Swanwick

This is set in a universe where Three Mile Island was a lot
more serious than it was in our world. A significant chunk of the US
got covered in radioactive debris, with both political and economic
consequences.

As it turns out, the Soviets seemingly took this as inspiration
for the next few years and unhappily for them, reactors built out of
shoddy and flammable materials are easier to make go boom than American
light water reactors.

This was competently written. I am not sure why the premise
didn't annoy me more.

Swanwick is still writing fantasy and SF and wins awards with
monotonous regularity.

This was a Ace Special.


4 The Summer Tree Guy Gavriel Kay

I've never been able to finish this.

Guy Kay is as far as I can tell fairly successful.


5 Tailchaser's Song Tad Williams

This involved a cat and is thick enough to stun a nun if thrown.

Williams is also still with us.


6 Cats Have No Lord Will Shetterly

As I recall, the reason cats have no lord in the universe is tied
into the continued existance of the universe in question. I don't remember
much about the book except that there's an amusing reference to the duel
at the Cliffs of Madness from the PRINCESS BRIDE.

Shetterly is still active as a writer, among other things.
Apparently he had a book out as recently as 2007 but not only did I
manage to miss reading it, I missed its existence until now.


7 Masters of Glass M. Coleman Easton

I did not read this.

I believe that Easton had about a half a dozen novels, all
published in the 1980s.


8 Saraband of Lost Time Richard Grant

I also did not read this.

Grant was reasonably prolific but I am unaware of any books
more recent than 1999's KASPIAN LOST.


9 Walk the Moon's Road Jim Aikin
I did not see this.

As far as I know, Aikin only had two books published, the
most recent one in 1993.


10 Infinity's Web Sheila Finch

I did not read this.

Finch is a Nebula-awarding winning author. Her most recent
novel was published in 2004.


11 The Isle of Glass Judith Tarr

Another one that I did not pick up.

Tarr is fairly prolific to this day.


12 Saturnalia Grant Callin
I missed this. I've been looking for a copy for years without
uccess. Note that for reasons I find sufficient, I don't buy books on-
ine.

As far as I know, he only had two SF novels published, plus
handful of short stories.


13 The Torch of Honor Roger MacBride Allen

I''m sure that I've read this. Stupid non-functional
memory.

I believe that he has been reasonably prolific since this
was published. His most recent series is the BSI: Starside, a
procedural series about cops working the interstellar beat.


14 Children of the Light Susan B. Weston

I did not see this.

I believe that this was her only book.


15 The Warrior Who Carried Life Geoff Ryman

I also missed this, although I own a copy of it. Someday
I will get to it.

Infamous in my brain as the man that inflicted the purile
and unnecessary Mundane SF movement on a long suffering world, Ryman
has achieved both longevity and critical acclaim.


16 Song of Kali Dan Simmons

Suprisingly for a book with the word "Kali" in the title, one
white man's encounter with India does not go entirely well.

I remember liking it as the time but I know that there are
some people that thought its depiction of India was racist. Those
people will be happy to know that Simmons has since been distracted
by the shadowy menace of Eurabia.

Simmons has had a fairly long career to date. His more recent
book, THE TERROR, has been getting positive reviews.


17 The Secret Country Pamela Dean

I am very embarassed to admit that although I've owned this
fo over decade, I have not yet read it.

I believe that she had six novels published between 1985 and
1998 and that a seventh is in the works.


18 Skirmish Melisa C. Michaels

Another one that I missed.

I believe that she had about a dozen books published before
2000 but nothing since.


19 The Long Forgetting Edward A. Byers

Another one that I missed (I cut way back on buying SF in
the mid-1980s).

I believe he only had two novels, published in consecutive

years.


20 The Sorcery Within Dave Smeds

I also missed this.

Smeds appears to have had ten novels to date, all of which I
have missed. The standard disclaimer about books that I have missed
(as opposed to actively avoided) applies: all it means is that I did
not read those books, nothing more.


21 The Princess of Flames Ru Emerson

I also missed this.

Emerson appears to have been reasonably prolific in the
1980s and 1990s but I don't see anything more recent than 2001.


22 Pandora's Genes Kathryn Lance

I didn't even hear about this one.

As far as I can tell, she had this book and a sequel and nothing
since.


23 Down Town Vildo Polikarpus and Tappan King

I am quite embarrassed. I know that I've read this and I think
I liked it but I have no memory of it at all.

As far as I can tell, this was the only SF novel either of
them wrote.


24 Ibis Linda Steele

Yet another book that I missed. It seems to have been Ms. Steele's
only book.


25 Staroamer's Fate Chuck Rothman

And to close things out, a book other people liked that I missed
entirely.

This appears to have been his only novel, although he was writing
short fiction at least until the late 1990s.

Comments

[mrbankies.livejournal.com]

re: 5 (Tad Williams)

If you think Tailchaser's Song is thick enough to injure, you've obviously never picked up some of his later works. William's first work qualifies short for him, excepting Caliban's Hour (very short) and his graphic novels.

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Yes, apparently my memory of it as a bus crusher is wrong. I remember spending days trying to get through it.

[mrbankies.livejournal.com]

Tailchaser's Song is long enough in it's own right. I was merely comparing it's length to William's later output (most of which I've read), which could kill large livestock with minimal effort. He even admitted in the afterwards to his Outland quadrology (set mostly in a virtual reality environment) that he overwrote those books.

[ross-teneyck.livejournal.com]

I remember Tailchaser's Song as a somewhat bizarre mixture of Watership Down-with-cats and Lord of the Rings-with-cats. I wasn't impressed.

I liked his later fantasy "trilogy" (it was a trilogy in hardcover, but the last book exceeded the limits of paperback technology so they split it in two for MMPB) Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn well enough. It needed an editor to ruthlessly cut out about a third of the total wordcount, but that aside it wasn't bad.

GGK's Fionavar Tapestry (The Summer Tree is the first book) was a bit of an odd experience for me. There is a bit fairly early in the first book that I really adored, and even though it was later subverted the memory of that bit carried me through the remainder of the very uneven trilogy. Parts of it were nearly as good as that one bit, others parts were... less good... and overall I thought he should have saved out about half the things he threw into that trilogy and used them in a different story.

I remember a poster on r.a.sf.w saying that someone needed to firmly take away GGK's copies of The Golden Bough and The White Goddess before he did himself an injury. I suspect they were mostly thinking of the Fionavar books, if that gives you any further clues about the series.

[apis-mellifera.livejournal.com]

And I don't think the Fionavar books are uneven at all--I love them to bits and wouldn't change a word. His other books, though? Meh meh meh. (Except for Ysabel, which I also love--in part because it's linked to the Fionavar books. I may have squealed like a teenaged girl going to see NKOTB back in 1987 when I realized who the protagonist's Aunt Kim was.)

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

I'm the other way around. Fionavar moved me in parts, but I've never felt a need to reread it. I adore his other books, but haven't read Ysabel yet.

[martinl-00.livejournal.com]

Word.

[snickelish.livejournal.com]

I read The Summer Tree and underwhelmed, so I never finished the series. It had all the things I hate about bad alternate worlds stories: a bunch of incompetent people from our world go to another world, Have Epiphanies, and Fix Things that the inhabitants of the world are incapable of fixing, even though our heroes are completely ignorant of the new world and how it functions.

But I've heard such good things about his later books that I may try him again. Tigana seems to especially well regarded.

[kgbooklog.livejournal.com]

Tigana seems to especially well regarded.

I read this and have avoided him since. The premise is that the worst possible thing you can do to a nation is magically erase its name.

[ross-teneyck.livejournal.com]

I wasn't terribly taken with Tigana either, although I didn't hate it. I mentally filed it under (mild spoiler) obbxf jurer gur ivyynva ynhapurf infg naq rynobengr cynaf sbe qrfgehpgvba orpnhfr bapr hcba n gvzr uvf srryvatf jrer uheg.

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

I had a discussion about this in my lj once. Tigana readers seem to divided into those who feel this is a truly horrific act (I'm one of them) and those who don't feel it's that significant compared to all the other things you can do to a country.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm definitely in the latter group. My favorite of Kay's novels is A Song for Arbonnne. I felt as though I could understand better the motivations of the characters.

I wonder if one's reaction to Tigana depends one whether one has deep roots and identifies closely with one's nation. I'm an immigrant whose loyalties have changed over my lifetime, so that might affect my view of the book.

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

If you like Italian grand opera, you'll love Tigana. This is a compliment.

[mrbankies.livejournal.com]

William's Otherland series was much the same as Memory, Sorrow and Thorn. When you worked around the cruft and distilled the plot out, the story could have been told in a third to possibly even a half of the word count he used.

[almeda.livejournal.com]

It's also the only one of his books I can make it past Chapter 1 of -- and in fact I adore Tailchaser's Song. I recommend it to friends with the tagline, "It's like Watership Down, only with a cat instead of rabbits. And he's on a quest."

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

If Tailchaser is anything like my cats, any quests lasting longer than about five minutes are doomed to failure due to distraction.

[(Anonymous)]

Rabbits on a quest would have the same problem, although the upper bound (based on the four data points currently nibbling my socks) would be more like ten seconds. [i]Watership Down[/i] works, despite this inaccuracy, so Tailchaser might, too.

- Ken

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

"Must set out on quest to save all of felinity!...ooh, string. Okay, I'm tired now." *thud*

[tsm-in-toronto.livejournal.com]

But ... doesn't the world need to Be Made Safe for attention deficit?