Date: Mon, 06 Jun 2005 18:42:25 -0400 From: "Michael Walsh" <MJW at press.jhu.edu> To: <WSFAlist at WSFA.org> Subject: [WSFA] Waldropian news Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org> Awaiting me upon my retail from te Big Apple were copies of the latest = Waldrop collection: Heart of Whitenesse.=20 Two reviews: >From Publishers Weekly World Fantasy Award*winner Waldrop offers 10 quirky, sometimes outrageous = speculative stories in this wise and funny collection, each with a lively = and informative afterword. If J.D. Salinger had written SF, Holden = Caulfield would have been one of the gang in "The Other Real World," a = teenage view of the Cuban missile crisis with a more somber outcome than = the actual one. "The Dynasters" imagines an unusual scenario in which the = phony Piltdown Man (and Piltdown Woman) are real. A three-headed robot in = the offbeat "Our Mortal Span" runs into trouble in a theme park called = Story Book Land when he takes fairy tales too seriously. In the marvelous = title story, about playwright Christopher Marlowe, "Will Shaxper" is only = a bit player. "Us," a gripping tale of alternative history, explores the = possibilities had Charles Lindbergh Jr. lived. Waldrop is a razzle-dazzle = hoot. >From Booklist The inimitable Waldrop, an authentic master of gonzo sf and fantasy, = returns with some of his most recent short fiction, along with notes that = enlighten about the transformation in sf markets as they move from paper = to the Web, and imply that Waldrop has traveled extensively, at least if = the number of places he movingly portrays accurately suggests personal = knowledge. The collection-opening "Dynasters" takes its departure from the = idea that Piltdown Man really existed. The title story features Christopher= Marlowe and ice festivals on the Thames. "Winter Quarters" delves deeply = into the extinction of the mammoth. "The Other Real World" is such a rich = exploration of 1950s popular culture that it needs many pages of footnotes,= and "D=3DR X T" may be the only sf story about pedal cars. There is only = one Howard Waldrop, and he is quite as irresistible as ever, at least in = small doses (it is probably just as well for his reputation that he isn't = a novelist). 750 copies, all signed by author and jacket artist Doug Potter: $40.00. = 274 pages. For the well healed, there's the 26 copy lettered edtion in a traycase for = a paltry $150.00 Drop me a note OFFLIST if you want me to hold one for you for the next = WSFA meeting(s) mjw