Conference noted::sf

    Re .0:
    
    Two of his Chtorr novels came out a few years ago, and we are waiting
    for the third.
    
    
    				-- edp

    	He's also writing scripts for the new STAR TREK TV series,
    tentatively called STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION.  See STAR TREK
    Conference Topic 107 for more details.
    
    	Press either the KP7 or SELECT key to add THEBAY::STAR_TREK
    to your Notebook.
                                                
    	Larry
    

    He's done a *lot* since "The Trouble with Tribbles" and WHEN
    HARLIE WAS ONE.
    
    Novels & Collections:
    
    THE FLYING SORCERERS [with Larry Niven]
    YESTERDAY'S CHILDREN
    WITH A FINGER IN MY I
    SPACE SKIMMER
    THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF
    BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES  [movie novelization]
    MOONSTAR ODYSSEY
    DEATHBEAST
    THE GALACTIC WHIRLPOOL  [Star Trek]
    A MATTER FOR MEN  [War Aginst the Chtorr #1]
    A DAY FOR DAMNATION  [War Aginst the Chtorr #2]
    ENEMY MINE  [movie novelization, with Barry Longyear]
    
    Anthologies:
    
    PROTOSTARS  [with Stephen Goldin]
    GENERATION
    SCIENCE FICTION EMPHASIS 1
    ALTERNATIES
    ASCENTS OF WONDER
    
    Non-fiction [all related to Star Trek]:
    
    THE TROUBLE WITH TRIBBLES
    THE WORLD OF STAR TREK  [plus revised edition]
    
    And, as Larry said, he's involved heavily in the new STAR TREK
    series.
    
    --- jerry

    slightly off the subject....
    I've been looking for a copy of The Flying Sorcerers for
    several years now - it is no longer in print. Does anybody
    have a copy they would be willing to sell/give away?

    If you are truly desparate, I would consider loaning my copy to
    you.
    
    By the way, it is by Niven & Gerrod.  I suspect that this may be
    why you have not found it as this book is very common in used paperback
    racks.
    
    --  Barry

        By the way, Gerrold isn't just "writing scripts for" the new
        Star Trek series... he's part of the permanent staff, along with
        Roddenberry, Fontana, et al (in some sort of consulting position
        which, as of his talk at Boskone, had no defined title). 
        
        	/dave

    He was interviewed on Entertainment Tonight, last evening. He had
    the copy of the first script on his desk, and would only say that
    there were not going to be a big three and little four as in the
    original, but a big eight. Some hint......
    
    r
    

        Oh, he said lots more at Boskone... not really appropriate
        to this topic, but...
        
        1. At least one (but apparently only one) of the main 8 is
           a woman (the doctor, I believe).  "Just by accident",
           he explained (this, mind you, is pre-casting).
        2. At least one is an alien... but not Vulcan (nor whatever
           species what's her name in ST I was).
        3. The captain will *not* participate in landing parties
           (I assume there would be exceptions for diplomatic type
           landings). He's middle-aged, and experienced.
        4. The first officer is officially in charge of landing
           parties.  He's in training for Captain.
        5. They are designing equipment for non-shirtsleeve planetary
           environments (no details), so there will be non-Earthlike
           landings.
        
        	/dave

  Re: .5

  Bonnie, last night at B. Dalton's in the Mall of NH, I saw many copies
  of "The Flying Sorcerers."  It's been re-released as a Del Rey paperback.

  JP

    re .10 I thank you and my 17 year old son (who has been beatinup
    on me for two years for losing our copy) thank you....I will at
    least be able to order it now.
    
    Bonnie
    
    who lives in rural Mass where used paper back book stores do not
    exist.

    What's "rural"?
    
    							Don

    rural is living on a dirt road, a town population of about
    1000 and about an hour's drive to any shopping mall.

    Don't mean to pry.  We travel all over Mass., lower Vt. & N.H. &
    Me., upper Ct. and was just wondering where 'cause there are new
    & used stores all over the place.  Thought maybe I/we could point
    some out.  Can there possibly be a DEC facility not within 15 min.
    of a bookstore?  Out-rageous!  (Where's that jobs-book?)

    
    				The ICEMAN

    re .14 Nope - there are several of them within 12 miles of
    our house! :-)

    Good.  An untreated Big Mac Attack could be serious.

    							Don

    So does this ST connection for Mr. Gerrold (let's hope he puts his
    money where he put his mouth in THE WORLD OF STAR TREK -- if he
    does it could be a hell of a show) mean that we have to wait even
    _longer_ for the next #$@&! Chtorr book?
    
    Matt
    

    re:.17
    
    Even *longer*. Gerrold has left his post with STAR TREK: THE
    NEW GENERATION, now that it's off the ground, and is now at
    work creating a four-hour sf mini-series for one of the major
    networks, with the option of its becoming a regular series .
    
    --- jerry

    Gerrold wrote two VERY entertaining books in what was supposed to
    be a trilogy about "The War with the Ch'Tor" (sp?). I've been waiting
    for the third a final book for several years, but nothing has appeared.
    
    Could Gerrold have written himself into such a corner that a suitable
    conclusion has escaped him?
    
    
    KBS
    

    
    I too am waiting for book three ("A Rage for Revenge" ?).  But I
    don't think Gerrold has cornered himself, on the contrary, how do
    you wrap up a trilogy when the first two books really haven't done
    anything to reach a solution.  
    
	If you haven't read them, <SPOILER ALERT>

    
    If you look at what's happened so far:  
    
    	We know that the worms and other strange life forms have invaded
    (been placed on) Earth.  Human technology hasn't come up with any
    answer yet.  Sure they're studying the things, but there hasn't
    been any answer and every time somebody turns around there's some
    new organism to worry about: first worms and giant millipedes, then
    meeps, pink fluff, and bunny dogs.  What's next, one would hope
    it would be the intelligence that started the whole thing (if there
    is one).
    
    	But at this point I don't have a whole lot of hope for a decent
    ending in one book.  Either the world ends or some wonder weapon
    is going to be pulled out of the air in the last twenty pages. 
    
    	Well, so much for my forecasts of doom.
    
    	Then of course there are the side tracks that appear when Gerrold
    doesn't seem to know what to do next.  The reappearance of the man-made
    telepath, the flashbacks to the classes in high school, how he'll
    use the bounty money for killing worms, etc.  If the story has an
    ending, it could have happened in the second book (maybe even the
    first) if some of the padding had been left out.
    
    <End Spoiler>

        They aren't the best things I've read by a good deal, but I
    hate it when I don't know the ending. But I've been known to buy whole
    sets of awful books just because I want to know what happens.

    	Am I waiting for number three?  Of course, but another one after
    that wouldn't surprise me.
    
    	Klaes
    

    This is one of those $64K questions. One reason for the delay
    is a problem with the contracts Gerrold had with Simon & Schuster,
    the publisher of the first two. Another reason is that he's
    just too damn busy with other things. He was story consultant
    or somesuch for the new STAR TREK tv show, and now he's working
    on an original sf mini-series for (I believe) NBC, with the
    possibility of turning it into a regular series.
    	I think it was the contract problems that initially delayed
    the third Chtorr book, and he started on the other things to
    keep himself busy (and fed and housed). Now *they* are keeping
    him from working on the book.
    
    --- jerry

    I recently stumbled-over Gerrold on the CompuServe SFSIG. He said
    that he'd publish the third Chtorr book when he was 'good and bleepin'
    ready,' and then elaborated by saying he's 4-5 chapters from the
    end, and that it will probably be published in 1988.
    
    
    KBS
    

    I was watching "Land of the Lost" last Saturday and noticed that
    the episode was written by none other than our own David Gerrold!
    The episode title was "The Possession".  Does anyone know if he 
    wrote any other episodes?
    
    Wook

    re:.23
    
    Yes, I believe he wrote more than one, but how many, I don't
    know. A few other sf authors wrote scripts for the show, but the
    only one that comes immediately to mind is Larry Niven.
    
    --- jerry

    
    Gerrold was story editor/consultant or something on LAND OF THE
    LOST, wasn't he?
    
    Well, while we're waiting for D.G. to be bleepin' ready, has anybody
    out there read YESTERDAY'S CHILDREN?  I thought it was superb, my
    favorite Gerrold work to date.  It's a slightly unusual spacecraft
    chase/battle, fast-paced and written in the present tense.  The
    feel is the clausterphobic "he's out there somewhere" feel of a
    WWII submarine/destroyer battle (a la DAS BOOT) heightened by the
    fact that the _Rodger_Burlingame_ and her crew are falling apart
    from within.  Also has a good deal of humor in "interlude" chapters:
    memos between Fleet HQ's talking about what a joke the Burlingame
    is, overheard chatter on Intercom Channel 'B', the All-Talk Channel,
    and continuing asides of good 'ol Solomon Short and a couple of
    professors arguing about warp drive.  It's an excellent combination
    of tension and humor, recommended to anybody.  Read it before you
    hit something like, oh, I don't know, SPACE SKIMMER.
    
    Matt
    

Path: muscat!decwrl!decvax!ucbvax!ucbcad!pasteur!ames!oliveb!sun!plaid!chuq
From: [email protected] (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf-lovers
Subject: CHTORR
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 12 Jan 88 04:45:12 GMT
Sender: [email protected]
Lines: 12
 
    For the fans of the CHTORR series, I checked with author David
Gerrold on CompuServe to see what was going on with them.  The good
news is that the first two books will come back in print in 1988.  The
better news is that the long-delayed third book is also on its way,
either late in 1988 or early 1989.  The bad news is that I forgot to
ask him who his publisher is now.  Oh, well, when I figure that out, I
will let you know. 
 
chuq
Chuq "Fixed in 4.0" Von Rospach		[email protected]		Delphi: CHUQ
 
                       What do you mean 'You don't really want to hurt her?'
                                    I'm a Super-Villain! That's my Schtick!

The new publisher of the Chtorr books is Bantam.  I don't know whether
the new books will come out first in hardcover, trade paperback, or 
mass market paperback.  (The first two volumes, from the long-defunct
Timescape line, were hardcover and trade paperback before they were
mass market.)

				Andrew

Article: 541
From: [email protected] (Rob Slade, Ed. DECrypt & ComNet, VARUG rep, 
      604-984-4067)
Newsgroups: alt.books.reviews,alt.books.technical,biz.books.technical
Subject: "When HARLIE Was One" by Gerrold
Date: Wed, 23 Mar 1994 22:36:35 GMT
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
 
BKHARLIE.RVW  931222
 
Ballantine Books
101 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10003
or
Bantam Doubleday Dell
666 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY  10103
"When H.A.R.L.I.E. Was One", Gerrold, 1972/1988
 
HARLIE is not a virus.  He/it is an experiment in artificial
intelligence.  For the purposes of the book the experiment is a
success and HARLIE is alive:  is a person.  The plot revolves (slowly)
around the efforts of corporate management to kill the project (and
HARLIE) and the efforts of the computer (program) and its creators to
stave this off.  As in most of Gerrold's books, the plot is primarily
there to set up dialogues in which he can expound his philosophies.
(The most blatant example of this is in "A Rage for Revenge" most of
which takes place in a seminar, the largest chunk of which is devoted
to an illustration of the standard five-stage model of grieving.) 
 
In both versions, the "virus" is a mere diversion.  It has nothing to
do with the story at all, and is a discussion point between two
characters, never referred to again.  Indeed, in the first version it
is introduced as a science fiction story, "but the thing had been
around a long time before that."  Make of this latter statement what
you will.  My resident science fiction expert can't think of what the
prior story might be and ventures that this might be Asimovian
self-citation. 
 
Statements have been made that the virus aspect was downplayed in the
second version.  This is rather ironic.  The virus story gets roughly
the same amount of ink in both versions, but the early one is
definitely superior.  HARLIE72 gives a fairly simple and
straightforward account of a self-propagating program.  In fact, aside
from the dependence upon dial-up links, the parallels between the
HARLIE72 virus and the actual CHRISTMA infestation fifteen years later
are uncanny.  Specifics include the use of an information source for
valid contacts, and a mutation which loses the self-deletion characteristic. 
 
The HARLIE88 discussion is much more convoluted, bringing in malaria,
spores, phages and parasites.  The are even two separate invocations
of the worm, one lower case and one capitalized, both with different
definitions.  (One refers to a logic bomb, and the other to a virus
directed at a specific target. Neither definition is so used by anyone
else.)  The end result is a completely iconoclastic set of terminology
bearing almost no relation to anything seen in real life. 
 
To further the irony, HARLIE88 could have been viral.  HARLIE72 could
not: part of the system was advanced hardware which did not exist in
other computers.  Therefore, while HARLIE72 had the ability to program
other computers, such programming could never have resulted in a
reproduction without the additional hardware.  HARLIE88, however, was
software only.  To be sure, the environment included "2k channel,
multi-gated, soft-lased, hyper-state" processors, roughly a million
times more powerful than the home user's "Mac- 9000", but still, as
one character has it, just chips.  HARLIE88 *could* survive, albeit
running more slowly, on other computers.  However, while one character
realizes that HARLIE could be "infectious" the discussion dies out
without realizing that the primary tension of the story has just been
eliminated. 
 
copyright Robert M. Slade, 1993   BKHARLIE.RVW  931222
 
==============
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%T When H.A.R.L.I.E. Was One
%A Gerrold
%I Ballantine Books
%C New York, NY 10003
%D 1972/1988
%G SBN 345-02855-6-125 (Note: pre-ISBN numbering)