The Silence of the Langford: Essays (And Some Stories) [Paperback]

Dave Langford (Author), Ben Yalow (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1996

Collection of humorous reviews, anecdotes and stories from the multi-Hugo winning author.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Fourfold expansion of NESFA's previous chapbook Let's Hear It for the Deaf Man.

Product Details

• Paperback: 278 pages
• Publisher: Nesfa Pr (September 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0915368625
• ISBN-13: 978-0915368624
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,571,110 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious essays about our creaky, beloved SF genre, September 19, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Silence of the Langford: Essays (And Some Stories) (Paperback)

I was amazed at how witty these essays are. How did Langford manage to be so creative? I laughed a lot. Langford makes fun of SF as only someone with a clear and through understanding of SF can. Despite his savage wit--boy, can he tear people apart-- he doesn't seem mean-spirited (not that there's anything wrong with a good muck-racking mean-spirited book). He makes fun of Stephen Donaldson, for example, but he doesn't make me personally feel stupid for liking Donaldson and in fact makes me want to go re-read Donaldson so I can re-enjoy the good parts and laugh at the silly parts that Langford pointed out-- silly aspects that in retrospect were there all the time but which I somehow completely failed to notice. I liked that Langford uses a mixture of big SF names (Asimov, McCaffrey, L. Ron Hubbard, etc) and lesser known names to illustrate his points about SF mechanisms and contrivances. He is clear enough that when he talks about authors I don't know then I still understand the points he's making and find him amusing, and I do like hearing about new authors, but I think I would have lost interest if he never spoke about books that I know. His comments have added interest when I can fit them in with my own knowledge of SF.