[FRIAM] Double Master Function (was Re: bad covid story)

[Steve Smith]

On 2/3/22 12:31 PM, glen wrote:
> Well, I'm not sure what Martin is on to next. But his participation in 
> the upcoming Elden Ring lore seemed to exhibit he had some ambitions 
> left. Since he names Zelazny as inspiration, maybe there's a sliver of 
> possibility there. If we could only get Peter Jackson, that'd push it 
> through. 8^D
>
> I'll check out The Moon and the Sun. I don't remember you mentioning 
> it before.

tM&S might not be your cup of tea, I don't know.  I probably mentioned 
Vonda to you when I looked you up in Portland 6 years ago... I was on my 
way (among other things) to visit with her in Seattle.  Her Starfarers' 
trilogy (from the 1980s) might be the most apt for a harder SF 
preference.   She got a big shot in the publishing arm when she was 
contracted to do the novelization of the Trekkie "Wrath of Khan"... upon 
release, her publisher then had the numbers to republish and repromote 
her backlist at that point.

Vonda who had a degree in (molecular?) biology or genetics or both, 
diverged somewhat from her more typical hard SF with this one which is 
nominally a period historical fiction with the twist that "what if Louis 
XIV's explorers encountered mer-persons?"  and the rest somewhat 
follows.  The movie follows the same theme but more tritely.   In the 
book, the protaganist is a young woman whose brother is the court 
Natural Scientist who herself aspires to "do science".  Her brother's 
duties in court (hanging out with the King and playing intrigue with the 
other courtiers) left room for his sister to use his facilities and 
influence to do her own work.   When the explorers brought back a 
handful of specimens of Mer-Creatures she studied them with a different 
eye than the King and others who simply wanted to tap into their 
(mythologized) immortality.     So it was also a story of female agency, 
capability and empowerment.   Most of Vonda's work had strong elements 
of that.  She also wrote a number of books that worked well for both 
Young and Older Adults, of which tM&S could be included.

Vonda was *highly* conflicted herself over the attention given to her by 
Robert Heinlein who claims his titular character Friday was inspired by 
her.   She whispered to me during the Nebulas when that was mentioned: 
"He may have been a fucking Chauvanist Pig but who can resist being 
promoted by 'the Dean of Science Fiction'?" or some such.   She never 
married nor had any long-term romantic partnerships that I knew of but 
her writing contained a lot of same-gender and polyamorous (group 
family) relationships.

The as-yet-released novel she was working on when she was diagnosed is 
supposedly now (her last push) finished and ready for publication 
(according to her, literally 2 weeks before her death).  She described 
it to me as nominally *also* a historical fiction of a similar ilk, but 
more of an epic perhaps, describing the long-slow-slide of the Minoan 
civilization.    As per the definition of former SFWA president (and ABQ 
resident) Stephen C Gould, the difference between SF and Fantasy is that 
in SF, one singular known fact is changed (faster than light travel, 
time travel, wormhole, infinite cheap energy, etc.) and everything else 
ensues from that, while in Fantasy, *everything* is up for grabs (e.g. 
Magic) and everything ensues from that!

Zelazny's Amber-schtick seems to follow *somewhat* from that idea...  in 
some sense, it seems as if everything Magical he invoked was somehow a 
natural consequence of the schmear of physical laws across the schmear 
of parallel worlds suspended between the antipodes of Logos and Chaos 
(my interpretation of his deal)...




>
> On 2/3/22 10:57, Steve Smith wrote:
>> Regarding the Amber series and Zelazny. They were very influential on 
>> me... really the first/only "Fantasy" I ever cared much for.  If 
>> Zelazny's writing could be credited properly it would be to call it 
>> *Hard* Fantasy which seems somewhat a contradiction in terms.    When 
>> I moved to the area, I was surprised to discover that Roger Z had 
>> moved to Santa Fe himself not long before.   One of his later Amber 
>> novels included Santa Fe and Berkeley locations, so I might have 
>> guessed.   In any case, I discovered that he gave (twice-annual?) 
>> one-day workshops on fiction writing in Taos and Los Alamos.  I 
>> attended a few of them over the years and really enjoyed his personal 
>> style and writing tips.
>>
>> Regarding a serialization/adaptation of Amber...  I would not expect 
>> it to be an easy one to adapt well... just as I've been very 
>> disappointed in the treatment of the Foundation Series on AppleTV...  
>> The one redeeming opportunity *might* be Zelazny's "hard boiled" 
>> style which I do find renders well onto the screen with both dialog 
>> and imagery.
>>
>> My cousin's (Vonda McIntyre) 1997 novel The Moon and the Sun (beat 
>> out Martin's Game of Thrones for the Nebula that year) and went on to 
>> be made into a "Hollywood Blockbuster" starring Pierce Brosnan as 
>> Louis XIV.   The project had lots of starts and stops but was finally 
>> *completed* in 2014.  It was finally released in theaters last month.
>>
>> I went to see it as my first visit to a cinema since COVID out of 
>> loyalty.  It was a fine Disney-style PG movie for pre/teenage girls,  
>> it didn't begin to do justice to the novel (as often happens).
>>
>> Vonda died fairly abruptly of Pancreatic Cancer 3 years ago (April 1, 
>> following her quirky nature) but had enough time to polish of her 
>> last and final Novel which may eventually be published.  Her literary 
>> agent has been coy.   She was never forthcoming about why the movie 
>> itself was so slow in release. I now suspect *she* may have been 
>> holding it up somewhat as it was such a weak adaptation, despite a 
>> huge budget and a star leading man.
>