Year's Best Science Fiction 02 # 1985 Read online

  It’s also worth noting that once again this year many of the year’s best short-story collections came from “small press” publishers. Many of these books would have been brought out by “mainline” publishers a few years ago, but these days most mainline publishers, ruled as they are by the short-sighted “bottom-line” dictates of corporate publishing, refuse to print short-story collections or anthologies … thus cutting much of the SF audience off from easy access to that most quintessential form of SF, the short story (and at a time when much evolutionary new work is being done at shorter lengths). There are exceptions (or partial exceptions) to this, but for the most part the rule still holds; let’s hope the situation loosens up some in years to come. Also note that once again many of these collections (all four of the Laffertys, both Pohls, the Vance, the Russ, the Wagner, the Leiber, the Lee, the Harrison, the Etchison, the Yarbro) contain heretofore unpublished stories, stories for which—presumably—no first magazine publication could be obtained … in spite of the fact that again this year I heard more than one magazine editor complaining about a dearth of good material. I can understand that some of this material—the Russ or the Harrison stories, for instance—might be too experimental for timid genre editors, but how to explain why the Pohl stories (good stuff smack-dab in the center of the field) went begging, or why there were good unpublished stories around by giants of fantasy such as Vance, Leiber, Donaldson, and Lee at a time when a couple of fantasy-oriented magazines are floundering because of their inability to attract the huge fantasy audience that buys millions of fantasy books per year … many of them by people like Vance, Leiber, Donaldson, and Lee. Someone is just not thinking here, that’s plain.

  The reprint anthology market was weak again this year, perhaps even weaker than last year. The best reprint anthologies of 1984 (counting Bishop’s Light Years and Dark as an original anthology for these purposes) probably were: The Best of Universe (Doubleday), edited by Terry Carr; Sherlock Holmes Through Time and Space (Bluejay Books), edited by Isaac Asimov, Martin H. Greenberg, and Charles Waugh; The First Omni Book of Science Fiction and The Second Omni Book of Science Fiction (Zebra), edited by Ellen Datlow; and 100 Great Fantasy Short Short Stories (Doubleday), edited by Asimov, Carr and Greenberg. Noted without comment is Magicats! (Ace), edited by Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois. Also interesting was Burning With A Vision (Owlswick Press), edited by Robert Frazier, a collection of SF poetry.

  The SF-oriented nonfiction/SF reference book field produced some varied and interestingly offbeat material in 1984. The Faces of Science Fiction (Bluejay), by Patti Perret, is a fascinating rogue’s gallery of photographs of major SF writers. Wonder’s Child (Bluejay), by Jack Williamson, is the autobiography of one of the longest-practicing of all SF writers, and Age of Wonders (Walker), by David Hartwell, is an intriguing, idiosyncratic, and often controversial look at SF by the premier SF book editor of the ‘70s. I also enjoyed Yesterday’s Tomorrows (Simon & Schuster), by Corn and Horrigan, a nostalgic look at The Future as seen from the perspective of (mostly) the ’20s, ’30s, and ’40s. The best reference book of the year was undoubtedly the updated Index to the Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections, 1977—1983 (G.K. Hall), compiled by William Contento. Like the movie, The Dune Encyclopedia (Berkley), compiled by Willis E. McNelly, was disappointing, and Omni’s ScreenflightslScreen Fantasies (Doubleday), edited by Danny Peary, told me a lot more than I wanted to know about a large number of mostly mediocre SF movies; this may be personal bias, though. There were several new critical books about Philip K. Dick, with more yet to come: Philip K. Dick: In His Own Words (Fragments West), by Gregg Rickman, and The Novels of Philip K. Dick (University Microfilms Research Press), by Kim Stanley Robinson. Castles (Bantam Hardcover) was an interesting book of fantasy-related art by British painter Alan Lee.

  1984 was another year of Big Blockbuster SF Movies, many of which turned out to be disappointing. SF fans have been whining for years now about how wonderful it would be if Hollywood would make a faithful adaption of a major SF novel, instead of ruining it by the intrusion of anomalous aesthetic material. Well, 1984 saw the release of two extremely faithful film adaptations of famous SF novels—Frank Herbert’s Dune and Arthur C. Clarke’s 2010—and in both cases the movies probably would have been a lot better as movies if they’d been a little less faithful to the original books. The movie version of Dune makes this particularly clear—Herbert gets away with stuff on the printed page which does not play at all well on the screen. The film’s portrayal of Baron Harkonnen, for instance, is quite faithful to Herbert’s characterization, but when we can see the Baron, the pitiless eye of the camera makes it quite plain how ludicrous that characterization is, and the Baron’s every appearance elicited fits of giggling from the audience. The device of having the audience “hear” the character’s thoughts at key points, a favorite narrative trick of Herbert’s, also plays very poorly on-screen. The major problem with Dune, though, is its director. Arty director David Lynch seemed an odd choice for Dune anyway, like having Alain Resnais direct Spartacus. The film he’s created, although visually interesting, is pretentious, stuffy, and dull—poorly paced and edited, filled with stilted dialogue (right out of Herbert’s novel, for the most part), wooden performances, and expository lumps so poorly digested that voiceover narration is required to explain what it is we’re seeing. 2010 is a much better movie, but it also pays a certain price for its fidelity to its model—most of the faults and disappointments of the movie are also the faults of Clarke’s novel, from which they have been slavishly copied. Neither the book nor the movie function as really satisfactory sequels to Kubrick’s 2001, both failing rather cravenly to actually come to grips with the ultimate philosophical implications of the earlier film. In fact, 2010 the movie is more successful as a movie than Clarke’s book is as a novel—the film version, for instance, puts into the storyline a good deal of humor and suspense that are missing from the novel, and Roy Scheider’s Heywood Floyd is considerably more complex, interesting, and human than Clarke’s. Turning elsewhere, the anxiously-awaited Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom turned out to be a dumb and ham-handed movie vastly inferior to Raiders of the Lost Ark, Gremlins was distasteful and shamelessly manipulative, and Star Trek III: The Search For Spock was okay but lackluster. Starman was a cross between ET and Mork and Mindy, totally familiar, but redeemed by good performances by Jeff Bridges and Karen Allen. The Last Starfighter was silly, but had a few good moments. The Philadelphia Experiment wasn’t bad as long as you ignored the goofy plot-logic, the absurd “science,” and the lousy special effects. A strange little film called Repo Man became an underground cult classic, something a bigger-budgeted production called Buckaroo Banzai set out rather self-consciously to do but couldn’t quite accomplish. The best fantasy movies of the year were comedies: Ghostbusters and Splash, both funny, stylish, and surprisingly intelligent (particularly Ghostbusters). About the year’s other SF/fantasy movies—Streets of Fire, The Terminator, Firestarter, Conan the Destroyer, Supergirl, Runaway, and a horde of slasher movies—the less said the better.

  The 42nd World Science Fiction Convention, L.A. Con II, was held in Anaheim, California over the Labor Day weekend, and drew an estimated attendance of 9,280, making it the largest Worldcon in history. The consensus from most attendees I talked to was that L.A.con, while well-run, was somewhat dull … on the other hand, it did succeed in making a considerable profit, unlike last year’s Worldcon, ConStellation, which disastrously ended up more than $44,000 in debt. The 1984 Hugo Awards, presented at L.A. Con II, were: Best Novel, Startide Rising, by David Brin; Best Novella, “Cascade Point,” by Timothy Zahn; Best Novelette, “Blood Music,” by Greg Bear; Best Short Story, “Speech Sounds,” by Octavia E. Butler; Best Non-Fiction, The Encyclopedia of SF & Fantasy, Vol. III, by Donald H. Tuck; Best Professional Editor, Shawna McCarthy; Best Professional Artist, Michael Whelan; Best Dramatic Presentation, Return of the Jedi; Best Semi-Prozine, Locus; Best Fanzine, File 770; Best Fan Writ
er, Mike Glyer; Best Fan Artist, Alexis Gilliland; plus the John W. Campbell Award to R.A. MacAvoy.

  The 1983 Nebula Awards, presented at a banquet aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California on April 28th, were: Best Novel, Startide Rising, by David Brin; Best Novella, “Hardfought,” by Greg Bear; Best Novelette, “Blood Music,” by Greg Bear; Best Short Story, “The Peacemaker,” by Gardner Dozois; plus a Grand Master Award to Andre Norton.

  The 1984 World Fantasy Awards, presented at the Tenth Annual World Fantasy Convention in Ottawa, Canada on October 14th, were: Best Novel, The Dragon Waiting, John M. Ford; Best Novella, “Black Air,” by Kim Stanley Robinson; Best Short Story, “Elle Est Trois (La Mort),” by Tanith Lee; Best Anthology/Collection, High Spirits, by Robertson Davies; Best Artist, Stephen Gervais; Special Award (Professional), Ian & Betty Ballantine, Joy Chant, and George Sharp for The High Kings; Special Award (Non-Professional), Stephen Jones and David A. Sutton for Fantasy Tales; Special Convention Award, Donald M. Grant; plus (in a somewhat unusual move) five (shamefully overdue) Life Achievement Awards to L. Sprague De Camp, Jack Vance, Richard Matheson, E. Hoffman Price, and Donald A. Wandrei.

  The 1983 John W. Campbell Memorial Award winner was The Citadel of the Autarch, by Gene Wolfe.

  The second Philip K. Dick Memorial Award was won by The Anubis Gates, by Tim Powers.

  Dead in 1984 were: A. BERTRAM CHANDLER, 72, author of the well-known story “Giant Killer,” as well as a large number of SF novels, many of them in the popular “Rim Worlds” series; CHARLES G. FINNEY, 78, author of the classic novel The Circus of Dr. Lao; WALTER TEVIS, 56, well-known novelist, author of The Hustler, The Man Who Fell to Earth, and Mockingbird; RICHARD BRAUTIGAN, 49, author and poet, whose Trout Fishing in America and other works often straddled the borderland between fantasy and surrealism; J.B. PRIESTLEY, internationally-known author and playwright, many of whose plays and novels contained SF elements; TRUMAN CAPOTE, 59, famous and controversial author of In Cold Blood; EDWARD LLEWELLYN-THOMAS, 66, who wrote five SF novels under the name “Edward LLewellyn,” the most recent of which was Search And Destroy; JOHN NEWTON CHANCE, 72, who wrote SF as “John Lymington”; PAUL DARCY BOLES, 68, novelist and short-story writer who occasionally wrote fantasy; MANUEL MUJICA LAINEZ, 73, Argentinean writer, author of The Wandering Unicorn; JANE ROBERTS BUTT, 55, as “Jane Roberts” a well-known occult writer, author of the “Seth” books, as well as a few SF novels; KAREN EMDEN, 40, literary agent with the Virginia Kidd Agency, and daughter of agent Virginia Kidd; TOM RAINBOW, 30, science columnist for Issac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine; JOHNNY WEISSMULLER, 79, an actor best known for his screen portrayals of Tarzan and Jungle Jim; FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT, director and filmmaker, best known by the SF audience for his directing of Fahrenheit 451, and for his starring role in Close Encounters of the Third Kind; BYRON HASKIN, 85, special effects pioneer and director of the SF movies War of the Worlds and The Conquest of Space; WALTER PIDGEON, 87, actor, best known to SF fans for his role as Dr. Morbius in Forbidden Planet; OSKAR WERNER, actor, star of Fahrenheit 451; RICHARD BASEHART, 70, best known for his starring role in the TV series “Voyage To The Bottom of the Sea;” ROLLY BESTER, 66, actress and advertising executive, wife of SF writer Alfred Bester; BEVERLY ANN HERBERT, wife of SF writer Frank Herbert; SALLY S. GREENBERG, wife of SF anthologist Martin H. Greenberg; CYLVIA MARGULIES, 75, wife of the late editor Leo Margulies; WILLIAM L. CRAWFORD, 73, SF small press pioneer; DAN McPHAIL, 68, publisher of the first SF newszine, Science Fiction News; CHARLES HANSEN, 69, longtime Denver fan; BERESFORD SMITH, 51, longtime convention fan; BILL FESSELMEYER, 36, & SHERRY FESSELMEYER, 34, active Kansas City fans; TIM DANIELS, 29, fan and founder of the Amber Society; and JACK McKNIGHT, longtime Philadelphia fan and member of the Philadelphia Science Fiction Society, designer and manufacturer of the first Hugo Awards, a personal friend.

  LUCIUS SHEPARD

  Salvador

  I had heard of Lucius Shepard before 1984—he had previously published two stories in 1983, one in Universe and one in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction—but as 1984 progressed, it became difficult to avoid hearing about him. Suddenly, Shepard was appearing all over the genre magazine and anthology market, bringing out one memorable story after another, in one of those sudden explosive outbursts of talent so characteristic of SF. Partway through the year, his powerful first novel Green Eyes (a very strange mixture of SF, voodoo/zombie horror fantasy, and Southern Gothic) appeared, to good critical response, throwing more fuel on the fire. By the end of 1984, Shepard had become one of the three or four most talked-about young writers of the year, and had received Nebula nominations for nine different works of fiction (five of them in the same award category!). Not bad for one year’s work …

  Shepard was born in Lynchburg, Virginia, “raised hell in high school and hallucinated for a year and a half at the University of North Carolina,” then dropped out to travel widely in the Middle East, Europe, Latin America, and the Caribbean, living for some time abroad. He “beat his brains out” for a long time as a rock musician for several rock’n’roll bands that “nearly made it,” but has given that up, claiming that “the resultant brain damage has left me handicapped to the extent that I am only fit now for writing science fiction.” He has become a frequent contributor to Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and has also sold to Omni, Universe, and The Clarion Awards. His story “Solitario’s Eyes” was a finalist for last year’s World Fantasy Award. Upcoming are two new novels: The Weeping Woman, from Berkley, and Foreign Devils, from Tor Books. He is currently working on a new novel, tentatively entitled Psiderweb. He lives—for the moment, at least—in Nantucket, Massachusetts.

  In the harrowing story that follows, he shows us that we do learn even from the experience of war—the only question is, learn what?

  Three weeks before they wasted Tecolutla, Dantzler had his baptism of fire. The platoon was crossing a meadow at the foot of an emerald-green volcano, and being a dreamy sort, he was idling along, swatting tall grasses with his rifle barrel and thinking how it might have been a first-grader with crayons who had devised this elementary landscape of a perfect cone rising into a cloudless sky, when cap-pistol noises sounded on the slope. Someone screamed for the medic, and Dantzler dove into the grass, fumbling for his ampules. He slipped one from the dispenser and popped it under his nose, inhaling frantically; then, to be on the safe side, he popped another—“A double helpin’ of martial arts,” as DT would say—and lay with his head down until the drugs had worked their magic. There was dirt in his mouth, and he was very afraid.

  Gradually his arms and legs lost their heaviness, and his heart rate slowed. His vision sharpened to the point that he could see not only the pinpricks of fire blooming on the slope, but also the figures behind them, half-obscured by brush. A bubble of grim anger welled up in his brain, hardened to a fierce resolve, and he started moving toward the volcano. By the time he reached the base of the cone, he was all rage and reflexes. He spent the next forty minutes spinning acrobatically through the thickets, spraying shadows with bursts of his M-18; yet part of his mind remained distant from the action, marveling at his efficiency, at the comic-strip enthusiasm he felt for the task of killing. He shouted at the men he shot, and he shot them many more times than was necessary, like a child playing soldier.

  “Playin’ my ass!” DT would say. “You just actin’ natural.”

  DT was a firm believer in the ampules; though the official line was that they contained tailored RNA compounds and pseudoendorphins modified to an inhalant form, he held the opinion that they opened a man up to his inner nature. He was big, black, with heavily muscled arms and crudely stamped features, and he had come to the Special Forces direct from prison, where he had done a stretch for attempted murder; the palms of his hands were covered by jail tattoos—a pentagram and a horned monster. The words DIE HIGH were painted on his helmet. This was his second tour in Salvador, and Moody—who was Dantz
ler’s buddy—said the drugs had addled DT’s brains, that he was crazy and gone to hell.

  “He collects trophies,” Moody had said. “And not just ears like they done in ’Nam.”

  When Dantzler had finally gotten a glimpse of the trophies, he had been appalled. They were kept in a tin box in DT’s pack and were nearly unrecognizable; they looked like withered brown orchids. But despite his revulsion, despite the fact that he was afraid of DT, he admired the man’s capacity for survival and had taken to heart his advice to rely on the drugs.

  On the way back down the slope, they discovered a live casualty, an Indian kid about Dantzler’s age, nineteen or twenty. Black hair, adobe skin, and heavy-lidded brown eyes. Dantzler, whose father was an anthropologist and had done field work in Salvador, figured him for a Santa Ana tribesman; before leaving the States, Dantzler had pored over his father’s notes, hoping this would give him an edge, and had learned to identify the various regional types. The kid had a minor leg wound and was wearing fatigue pants and a faded COKE ADDS LIFE T-shirt. This T-shirt irritated DT no end.

  “What the hell you know ‘bout Coke?” he asked the kid as they headed for the chopper that was to carry them deeper into Morazan Province. “You think it’s funny or somethin’?” He whacked the kid in the back with his rifle butt, and when they reached the chopper, he slung him inside and had him sit by the door. He sat beside him, tapped out a joint from a pack of Kools, and asked, “Where’s Infante?”