Customer Reviews

Alternate Skiffy

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Science Fiction may be the only literary genre where this type of work would be acceptible. In most others, it might be regarded as navel-gazing or self-congratulatory piffle. SF, though, is a bit of an in-group thing, and folks who really love SF are only too happy to set up endless in-jokes about their favorite writers, series, etc.

Mike Resnick has created yet one more first rate collection of alternate history stories, but in this case it is stories about SF writers and trops turned slightly on their heads. What if Fritz Leiber became an actor instead of a great SF writer? What if a slightly funnier and intelligent SF writer had "developed" Dianetics? WARNING: if you're new to SF or not a deep and heavy fan, some of these stories will run right over your head so often, you'll develop athlete's foot of the scalp. If you worship the genre, though, this is your book.

Oh, and the title? Hard-core SF fans hate the current fashion of referring to their favorite genre as "sci-fi", preferring instead the initials "SF". Thus, that awful and hated phrase is prounced "skiffy".