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by Henry Leon Lazarus

I flew to Florida over Thanksgiving and had a three hour layover in Atlanta (ugh). While wandering about the terminal, I looked into one of the larger Airport book stores and found a man searching the small science fiction section for something to read. What would you recommend? It would almost certainly have to provide a good read. The answer is at the bottom of the column and (hint) it isn't either a Robert Jordan or Star Trek novel.

Had he been looking for hard covers, and if they stocked it (they didn't), I might have suggested the best Poul Anderson in a decade, Starfarers (hard from Tor) about a trip to investigate a star traveling culture that takes two ship years each direction and a round trip in Earth time of 10,000 years. Mr. Anderson shows the changes time brings to Earth and humanity, and also has fun inventing the alien cultures the small crew meets. My only complain is that I would have expected more scientific progress over the 10,000 year span.

Bruce Sterling looks only fifty years into the future in Distraction (hard from Bantam Spectra) and finds more biological change than Poul Anderson considered. Mr. Sterling takes us to a United States gone to economic hell, but with plenty of cheap food available; and a biological lab under siege from Governor Huey of Louisiana, who has already conquered an air force base in his own state, and who isn't averse to using illegal brain modifying technology to grab the lab too. Our heroes, a Nobel Prize winning biochemist and a political spin master from Massachusetts have to mix love and politics to save the lab, and in doing so, reform America. Fun and exciting, it's sure to be on award lists.

Dean Koontz returns with another tale of a small town with an abandoned Army Fort filled with experiments gone wrong in Seize the Night (hard from Bantam). This time Chistopher Snow, the hero who because of his medical condition fears daylight, faces a time travel experiment gone badly awry. Mr. Koontz manages to use every time travel paradox I know of, without leaving the present, letting events proceed in his usual pulse-pounding manner.

I missed the hard cover of Lawrence Watt-Evan's tale of an appointed hero who would rather avoid notice, Touched by the Gods (paper from Tor). His empire is being attacked by a magician who can raise the dead and who is being backed by one of the Gods. I thought it would be long enough to get me through the two flights and layover, but I couldn't put it down and it just flowed. Oh well, I'm saving it for a reread. I also enjoyed Joanne Bertin's romance and fantasy novel, The Last Dragon Lord (hard from Tor) in which a ship's captain from a large merchant trading family and the last were-dragon found in six hundred years (they stop aging after they turn for the first time), must work together to foil the evil plans of a magician who uses blood magic, and is trying to kill these near-immortal beings.

Michael A. Stackpole mixes a lot of elements together with his tale of a blind man with Eyes of Silver (paper from Bantam Spectra) who helps in the rebirth of a lost emperor, and fights his enemy, the soldier who got him blinded years before. Fun. I also enjoyed Neil Gaiman's Stardust (hard from Spike books), a delightful fairytale about a young man raised in a small English village with a magical wall to fairyland, who goes on a quest to find a fallen star in Fairyland to prove his love to one of the village girls. Hans Christian Anderson would have been happy to include this lovely tale in one of his collections. C. J. Cherryh's second book in the sequel trilogy to Fortress in Eye of Time (paper from HarperPrism). Fortress of Owls (hard) continues the tale of Tristen, wizard's construct and king's friend, as he prepares his dukedom for invasion from an enemy kingdom. It might be a perfect book for flying, because it kept putting me to sleep. I only persevered because the first was so good and that final one might be worth waiting for.

Finally there are three books for those who like action and blood. The evil profiteers who start the war for which truth is The First Casualty (Paper from Ace) might have simplistic motives, but Mike Moscoe creates believable fighters on both sides and has exciting war scenes the keep the book moving well. Jane Jensen does such a good job converting her second Gabriel Knight game, The Beast Within (paper from Roc) about a fight with werewolves in Germany, that I am seriously considering buying the third game rather than waiting for its novelization. The seventh of William R. Forstchen's Lost Regiment, A Band of Brothers (paper from Roc) has the civil war troopers and their human allies fighting with near WW I weapons against the human eating Bantag invasion that reaches Roum. While it's beginning to feel like a never-ending series, Mr. Forstchen keeps it moving so fast that it's had to care.

Before he started writing NASA tales, Stephen Baxter had a five million year future history. Vacuum Diagrams (trade from HarperPrism) collects all of them with a frame story in an attempt to make them into a novel. Peter F. Hamilton's A Second Chance at Eden (paper from Aspect) has new and reprinted stories that precede his massive Reality Dysfunction series. Ben Bova's Sam Gun Forever (paper from Avon Eos) has new Sam Gun stories (lots of fun). The Invisible Country (trade from Avon Eos) is a collection of Paul J. McAuley stories. Margaret Weis has collected new stories in Legends (paper from DAW) and Denise Little has collected new tales of Alien Pets (paper from DAW).

Everything you didn't know about David and Leigh Edding's tales is available in The Riven Codex (hard from Del Rey). The fourth volume of the Official Guide to the X-files, Resist or Serve (trade from HarperPrism) is out – I guess the other three must have sold well. Finally for those Star Trek collectors the novelization of Star Trek Insurrection (hard from Pocket) is by J. M. Dillard and The Secrets of Star Trek Insurrection (trade from Pocket) is everything they would ever want from the movie.

Dean Koontz's first Christopher Snow adventure (see above), Fear Nothing (Bantam) is out in paper. Also available are Connie Willis's award nominated, funny, Victorian time travel tale, To Say Nothing of the Dog (Bantam); Diana Wynne Jones hillarious send up of bad fantasy, The Tough Guide to Fantasyland (DAW) that I quoted last year from the English edition I got a hold of. Marion Zimmer Bradley's current Darkover novel, The Shadow Matrix (DAW); Robert J. Sawyer's mystery SF, Illegal Alien (Ace); the second part of Chris Bunch's epic fantasy trilogy, The Demon King (Aspect), which is just as raunchy as the first and as much fun, and Michael Kanaly's odd Thoughts of God (Ace). Finally there's Tanya Huff's duology (that I've read a couple of times over the years) together at last in Wizard of the Grove (DAW).

The introduction and first chapter of the sequel is worth getting the 25th anniversary edition of William Goldman's The Princess Bride (hard from Ballantine Books), but alas he makes it obvious why there will only be that one chapter.

The answer to the question at the top of the column turns out to be simpler than I would have thought. David Brin's novels have all been reprinted recently and his award winning, Startide Rising (paper from Bantam Spectra) luckily was available. What would you have selected?

The Philadelphia Science Fiction Society will have its January meeting on Friday the 15th at 8:00 p.m. at International House. This is the annual election meeting – more for members only, than outsiders. Guests are welcome to attend this, the second oldest science fiction club in the country. Set your calendars to August 30 to September 3, 2001 when the World Science Fiction comes to Philadelphia for the first time in fifty years. It was invented here in 1936.