Blue Champagne [Paperback]

John Varley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1986

Berkley mass paperback, 1st printing Nov. 1986, ISBN 0425093360, 290 pages, cover art by Todd Cameron Hamilton. 8vo (6.75" x 4.25") 1987 Locus Poll Award, Best Collection (Place: 1). 8 stories, 2 original; 4 of them (incl. 2 longest novellas) belong to the Eight Worlds universe. Paperback reprint of Jan. 1986 Dark Harvest hardcover original. Stories include: The Pusher [1982 Hugo Award, 1982 SF Chronicle Award, 1982 Locus Poll Award. Nominated, 1981 Nebula Award]; Blue Champagne [nominated, 1982 Hugo Award; winner 1982 Locus Poll Award]; Tango Charlie and Foxtrot Romeo [ 1987 Locus Poll Award, Best Novella (Place: 3)]; Options [nominated, 1979 Nebula Award, 1980 Hugo Award; 1980 Locus Poll Award, Best Novelette (Place: 2)]; Lollipop and the Tar Baby; The Manhattan Phone Book (Abridged); The Unprocessed Word; Press Enter [] [winner, 1984 Nebula Award, 1985 Hugo Award, 1985 Locus Poll Award, 1985 SF Chronicle Award].

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Although the promise of Varley's early work has petered out, he retains a remarkable storyteller's voice that supersedes his lack of good stories to tell. The reader is thus drawn into these tales examining the way technology complicates human relationships. From the computer and space flight to future prosthetics, the author asserts, greater options lead both to increased possibilities and to problems. While a few of the selections are affecting, the heavy streak of sentimentality leaves the reader feeling manipulated. Best of the lot are "The Pusher," about one solution to the loneliness of the space traveler; "Tango Charlie and Foxtrot Romeo," featuring a little girl alone on a satellite who has adapted to life with only a computer and a mob of dogs as companions; and the award-winning romantic whodunit "Press Enter."stet
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 292 pages
• Publisher: Berkley (November 1, 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0425093360
• ISBN-13: 978-0425093368
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,787,938 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Sip Carefully, September 15, 2003

By 

Patrick Shepherd "hyperpat" (San Jose, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Blue Champagne (Paperback)

Like most short story collections, this is something of a mixed bag. But as it contains some examples of Varley at his best, and his best is at the top of the field, it is an important collection for any serious fan of his, and good reading for everyone.

"The Pusher" is a very quiet story that will bring to the fore some unconscious assumptions most people have when hearing about an adult male interacting with an pre-adolescent female. In this case, those assumptions are exploded by the story's middle, and there is a serious investigation of just what types of emotional stress a near-light speed traveler would be subjected to, and what he can do about it. A unique look at a problem that just might be somewhere in humanity's future.

The title story, "Blue Champagne", didn't do very much for me, though it shows a remarkable imagination in its construction of a very unique champagne 'glass' and a very different approach to help for nerve damage that the medical profession is only now beginning to attempt. But it should be read before the next story "Tango Charlie and Foxtrot Romeo" both for some common background elements and a shared character. "Tango" is the best story here, an achingly emotional story about a girl raised in isolation by a computer on a space station that had been decimated by a plague so virulent that it was projected to wipe out all human life if it ever escaped from the station. Now the station's orbit is deteriorating and it must be destroyed, and the girl can't be rescued. Finely written, with some twists that are not expectable, and not overplayed.

"Press Enter " is the Hugo and Nebula Award winning story that will make all the believers in world-wide conspiracies, mystery fans, and the computer nerds very happy. This is a more plot driven story than some of the others here, but with more than enough character to engage your heart as well as your mind.

The only truly insignificant story here is "The Manhattan Phone Book (Abridged)", which is a compilation of very short vignettes of representative people from that book, who no longer exist. Happily it's a really short story. The rest of the stories are what I call average; quite readable and enjoyable, but not ones that will make you sit up and take notice or remember for very long.

There is something of a theme that runs through many of the stories here, that of the alienated, isolated individual trying to cope with the world, which gives these stories a feeling of darkness, a somberness tempered by Varley's resolutions to his character's problems.

A good introduction to Varley for those who haven't read any of his other work, with enough excellent stories to make you want to come back for more, and will repay your time spent reading with an expanded view of both the world and the human condition.

--- Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars All his short stories are must-reads; novels are optional, July 1, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Blue Champagne (Mass Market Paperback)

I've read almost all John Varley's books and give my highest recommendation to ALL his collections of short stories: this one, Tango Charlie, Barbie Murders, etc. I loved the world he created and the way he continued it throughout all his short story collections. Read together, they present such regular features as symbs, an alien lifeforce that enters its human, after which the two coexist symbiotically in a most tender and intimate manner; their thus-transformed biochemistry is how both can work around Saturn's moons, where there's a continuing subplot of eco-monkey-wrenchers who are painting the rocks. Characters in the culture change their sex, not without soul searching, and experience their surroundings and relationships in enlightening new ways, and sometimes change back. I read everything I could get my hands on in one stream, and recommend your doing the same with all his short stories. They are wonderful read collectively. A couple of stand outs: Blue Champagne, about a gold cybernetic prostetis body for a paraplegic; Press Enter, about a unrelentingly evil computer; Tango Charlie, about a child who for years, with her pets, is the sole survivor on a space ship. (And it's been a decade since I read them). Enjoy!

Conversely, I found his trilogy to be mediocre, tolerable, okay sci fi fare. Fun if you need something to read.

Steel Beach gave me an ache. Without knowing a thing about the author's personal life, my immediate hit on it was that he's had too much psychotherapy, or something. I missed the brilliant voice of the short stories and could sense it there throughout Steel Beach, but it was as if the creative metaphors had been analyzed too much, taking most of the life out of them, or the talking cure was still going on but now in writing. The remaining glimmers and my respect for his past work kept me reading.

Still and all, a great sci fi writer. Don't miss the short stories, one more time!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Varley's best collection., February 5, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Blue Champagne (Mass Market Paperback)

If you're tired of namby-pamby upbeat SF in "future perfect" tense, this book is for you. I can't believe it is out of print! It should be required reading for any true fan of science fiction. The stories are enthralling; the characters' lives are compelling. You'll lose yourself in Varley's vision.