Click on a title to jump down to a specific review, or just scroll down the page.

1. The Art Of Stephen Youll: Paradox.
2. Farscape: The Illustrated Season 2 Companion
3. The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered The World
4. Man Over Mind by Dean Warren
5. The Dreaming Jewels by Theodore Sturgeon.
6. The MacPherson Criticality: Engineers and Assassins by J.D. Isaacs.
7. The Man In The High Castle by Philip Dick.
8. The Night's Dawn Trilogy by Peter F Hamilton

1. The Art Of Stephen Youll: Paradox.
Foreward: Kevin J. Anderson. Main text: Stephen Youll. (Pub: Paper Tiger. 128 page hardback. Price: £20 (UK), $29.95 (US), $44.95 (Can.) ISBN: 1-85585-916-5.) Published: 27 September 2001.
check out website: www.papertiger.co.uk.

I saw some pictures of Stephen Youll's work some months ago in a sampler Paper Tiger distributed and thought this book would be occupying my time when it arrived. I wasn't too far wrong with that assessment.

Youll's scope ranges from fantasy and SF to film tie-in book covers. The main problem is that unless you pick up American editions, I'm not entirely sure you'd have seen much of his coverwork in the UK. A rather odd statement to say about an English artist who has taken up US residency.

I have a suspicion that UK publishers seeing his work will want to commission him on this side of the Atlantic. Youll belongs to the Jim Burns class of reading the story before preparing the cover to ensure the flavour of what you read can be seen visually.

He shows a flair for detail and colour with a remarkable realism in his characters' faces. I might pick fault with his depiction of hands being slightly wooden but artists' have some flaw and I just picked up on that one. Too much detail sometimes allows too much focus on areas that would otherwise not been picked up on.

He's also rather unusual in not relying on the airbrush and preferring to work in oils. Youll states he has air-brushed and used acrylics in the past but it would have been nice to have seen such work here as a comparison. Likewise, his early work involved painting a cutout of Durham Cathedral would have shown his verstality.

Showing is believing and seeing such work beyond his covers or indeed a sample of work when he worked with his twin brother is worth more than a few words on the subject. It might also have been interesting to see more of his non-commissioned work that he must do purely for his own interest. Any of these ideas will no doubt contribute to a second volume.

The text between sections indicates Youll's love of SF although little time is spent there going into much detail about each painting beyond special moments. At the back of the book, Youll has a sketchbook section showing his pencil sketches of details and alternative versions of some of his completed work.

If you're a Star Wars fan, you'll be buying this book purely for the 6 pages of tie-in covers unblemished with the written word. For the rest of us, there is plenty to choose from to sit back and admire.

GF Willmetts August 2001

2. Farscape: The Illustrated Season 2 Companion
by Paul Simpson and Ruth Thomas. (Pub: Titan Books. 160 page medium-sized paperback. Price: £9.99. ISBN: 1-84023-308-7.)

Don't forget to put in the 'Season 2' in the name if you're ordering this book up or you could end up with a 'Season 1' in your hands. I didn't but short of having the ISBN, I can see a mistake such as that happening.

This is obviously a follow-up to last year's book - which I also reviewed - with pretty much the same sort of contents. An episode guide with comments from cast and crew, together with sections on production and special effects. It's all still in black and white but there's a few pictures that I haven't seen elsewhere.

My criticism of last year's volume is still pretty valid, even more so that there are continuing episodes here. What's the point of a plot synoposis if it isn't complete? The entire season has been shown around the world so its unlikely to surprise anyone about the contents.

The book is informative about a lot of the various decisions that went on throughout the production year. Other than a picture of Jonathan Hardy - Rygel's voice - there are still no pictures of the rest of the cast sans make-up. No excuses this year as most of them have now been revealed - Ben Browder has even taken the top of his skull off! Beyond that, the book will sell simply cos it's 'Farscape' and there still isn't much in the way of book material out on the series yet.

It's about time there was a coffeetable colour book on the series. It's also very hard to get hold of outside of media bookshops. It's certainly not available in the High Street bookshops in my area. Bearing in mind that last year's edition went to a fourth edition, you really ought to move fast if you want an early edition.

GF Willmetts August 2001

3. The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered The World
by Thomas M. Disch (pub: Touchstone/Simon and Schuster, NY. 256 page medium-sized paperback. Price: £8.99 (UK). ISBN: 0-684-85978-5.)

Where there's an interest in Science Fiction, there tends to follow an interest in reading about SF. More so, as there aren't that many books on the subject.

This particular book was written in 1998 and the Touchstone edition released last year. Other than his Prisoner tie-in book, I haven't really read much of Disch the SF author so can't draw any comparisons to other work. This book is a subjective study of the American influence on SF beginning with Harlen Ellison's unacknowledged comment that all writers are liars.

Disch doesn't hold back on any of his comments. If you're a Star Trek fan then expect your ears to be thoroughly burnt both sides. Can't see the Scientologists being that happy either come to that. If nothing else, this should point out a rather critical self-look at our own genre and a lot of the quirky things surrounding it.

This book hits everything from political influence to feminism to the alien metaphor for foreigners. There is also a rather unflattering look at a wide selection of authors displaying warts and all. Although this writer has no overall objection to seeing behind the hype, it does raise an odd question why Disch sees himself purer than snow.

A lot of the time when I read books such as these, I often examine the books noted as potential reads somewhere down the line. In this particular instance, there are only a couple surprise reads as the majority I've read.

Saying that, for all the coverage, Disch doesn't pick that many examples and like any university graduate, depends far too much on the examples of other people's work than spend longer on his own opinions. That probably doesn't sound too fair cos Disch does actually dish (ouch!) out his opinions and its probably the cynic in me that thinks he could have said a lot more himself than depend on such padding.

At the price noted, it won't be a book that's too expensive to add to your collection.

GF Willmetts August 2001

4. Man Over Mind by Dean Warren
(pub: Xlibris Corporation. 244 page medium-sized paperback. Price: $16.00. $25 (hardback) ebook: $8.00. ISBN: 1-888-7-XLBRIS.)
check out website: www.xlbris.com

The Bosian computer rules the Galaxy through its human linked Star Minds. It is up to Tol, twenty-year-old heir of the deposed Plastowich bloodline, to overthrow the oppressive regime.

He does this by using an ancient Plastowich chromosome fingerprint that was placed in the system by Emperor Alcer, his long dead genetic parent. By posing as a potential Star Mind, Tol infiltrates the Bosian programming and manages to kill three Star Minds by turning their emotions on themselves.

On the way to Galaxy Central, Earth, he rescues the noblewoman Trury from marriage to the wicked Star Mind pretender to the throne, Fafir. It is ironical that the plot is based on the survival of a human royal bloodline that once held powerful sway over the Galaxy while, in the present day, these ancestors of robber barons are having a hard time justifying their existence.

Also, it is worrying when authors, especially ones who apparently have such well informed scientific knowledge, casually mention the 'galaxy' as though it were a mere shuttle ride across. It is difficult to visualise the human species, who are unable to discover an effective substitute for the combustion engine, going on to overrun and dominate something as incomprehensibly huge as the Galaxy.

Initially the plot of 'Man Over Mind' is bogged down by explanation. The skill of knowing what you are talking about is to not mention the fact too often.

We learn that the Minds are vulnerable to surges of testosterone that trigger bouts of rage and other roaring emotions. As there is a strange dearth of female characters, this is hardly seems surprising.

The only woman of note is the obedient, beautiful Trury - what else? - who becomes the young Tol's loyal paramour. There can be no doubt about the amount of effort the author put into crafting his novel and that he is committed to his characters, though Fafir is a rather too Ming the Merciless baddie.

Some way in, the story does become more fluid and strangely compelling, notwithstanding that its plot follows Tol through his tedious self-analysis of emotions and motivation. Perhaps a little more two dimensionality, Flash Gordon style, might have driven the story along.

A sub plot would have certainly helped. The dialogue has a pseudo archaic emphasis but, rarely, there appear nice fleeting touches, as in flowers using harmonics to attract pollinators. Mostly there are missed opportunities to lighten the tone of what should have been a gripping story line.

Without any humour to excuse the basic premise that this is a Galaxy filled with no intelligent species other than human beings, it is a leaden read. This is a read I would find it difficult to recommend, however someone out there might vigorously disagree.

Jane Palmer August 2001

5. The Dreaming Jewels by Theodore Sturgeon.
(pub: Vintage Books, USA. 217 page medium-sized paperback. Price: $12(US). £12 (UK import special order. Blame the distributors. You can get it cheaper through Amazon than ordering through a bookshop.) ISBN: 0-375-70373-X.)
Check out website: www.vintagebooks.com

You'd really hate to see the list of books I've yet to need, for various reasons, to read. Even more frightening is how much easier it is to locate books and have to ration mad impulses to get them all at once.

'The Dreaming Jewels' pre-dates Ted Sturgeon's more famous 'More Than Human' by three years being published originally in 1950. This is the tale of Horty Bluett, an abused orphan with the ability to regenerate damaged parts of his body.

Although this is part of the key to this story, the essential focus are the jewels that can reproduce anything they are wont to. It is also the tale of certain aspects of a freakshow that adopts Horty as one of their own. The villains of the piece - Maneater and Judge Bluett - are certainly people you'd prefer to avoid - but finely realised.

Sturgeon treats this as more of a character piece than providing too much detail of the situation. It's only when you think about the story afterwards, there is any realisation he uses this to avoid giving too much detail away of what life was like in such a situation. Even the three members of the freakshow we become acquainted with - Zena, Bunny and Havana - aren't that firmly established to realise they are midgets and a dwarf.

Seeing them as real people is one thing but not properly acknowledging their physical differences, to me at least, seems a little odd even for 40 years ago. In many respects, 'Dreaming Jewels' isn't as fully realised at the aforementioned 'More Than Human' or his later books. It's almost as if Sturgeon was groping to get certain aspects of his storytelling sorted out.

This is an extra-ordinary display of characterisation but largely at the expense of background detail that loses aspects of the plot along the way. Key areas of action are almost lost in the rush and this reviewer suspects Sturgeon hadn't fully realised how to stage them at the time.

There are certain lapses of logic that look odd in continuity but more a problem of a writer learning the ropes at that time. 'Dreaming Jewels' is worth investigating if you're a Sturgeon fan but I'm not entirely convinced that it's one of his better stories.

GF Willmetts August 2001

6. The MacPherson Criticality: Engineers and Assassins by J.D. Isaacs.
(pub: Warenville IL: D3 Press, 2000. 333 pages paperback. Price, $7.95 (US) currency equivalent. ISBN: 1-931008-00-0.)
Check out: www.d3press.com

Those who long for the space warfare and scientific reflections of science fiction's heyday in the 1950s will enjoy J.D. Isaacs' 'The MacPherson Criticality'. This novel offers a fresh look at those themes, bringing them up to date with computer technology and a believable female protagonist.

Isaacs is an aerospace engineer in real life and her fiction offers interesting ideas about the military and political possibilities of a speculative post-Einstein physics. The story also keeps us in suspense over the question of whether the hero and heroine will ever get to act on their attraction for each other.

A sub-plot which gives added depth to the characters without spoiling the story for macho readers who like to read about combat. 'MacPherson' opens when naval cadet Eileen Reagan crashes her spacecraft in a flight school final exam, throwing her future into jeopardy.

Her career as a flyer ruined, Reagan transfers to the marines and uses her martial arts training to develop a speciality in close assault. As she copes with the rigors of basic training, life as a woman in a male-dominated branch of the armed forces and her first combat posting, she begins to discover unexpected things about her childhood and, indeed, her identity.

Her past brings her into contact with higher-ranking officers, who draw her into an assortment of potentially lethal intrigues. Meanwhile Reagan strikes up a friendship with the handsome lieutenant who served as her examiner on her fateful flight test. Their initial relationship is largely intellectual, partially due to the fact that they are separated by light-years of space.

Both of them are students of advanced physics. Gradually, their studies lead them to conclusions that may have cataclysmic consequences for their society. Equally ominous is the spread of a neurological virus that seems equally capable of corrupting the software of electronic computers and the human brain.

This novel's chief weakness is that having attempted so much, the author cannot develop all her themes in as much detail as the reader might like. Those who are interested in scientific speculation may want more discussion of technical issues and those who are interested in the origins of Isaacs interstellar war may feel that politics has gotten short shrift.

Fans of character development may feel that the book's slightly cinematic take on reality has given the heroine unrealistically easy answers to serious questions. This is, however, the first novel in a series, so future works may cover all these topics in more detail. Those looking for an excellent story based on traditional themes will find 'The MacPherson Criticality' refreshing.

Thomas M. Kane August 2001

7. The Man In The High Castle by Philip Dick.
(Pub: Penguin. 249 page medium-sized paperback. Price: £ 5.99. ISBN: 014017172X.)

I've heard about this book long before getting around to reading it. Remember my creed: 'So many books, only one lifetime.' I'm still catching up when I came across a reference again and realised this one's been idle in my backlog of books for far too long.

Actually, I don't keep my books to read in a backlog, just a few big boxes. I do have a little bit of tidiness in my chaos. Essentially, this is an alternative reality where we see different results when World War Two ended differenly. The Japanese now dominate America and the Nazis conquer Europe and later nuke Africa. They're hatred of the black community being on par with their hatred of the Jews.

Things then settle down pretty much into occupied territory where everyone tries to get on with each other except maybe if you're Jewish and can be exradicted to Europe for internment and death, although this only gets a passing mention.

The title of this book is a bit of a misnomer as all the chap in the high castle has done is written a speculative novel where things in WW2 went a little different. Where Germany and Japan were beaten by the British and the Americans - nice to know we Brits weren't forgotten her!!!.

Still, I guess any reality can dream and allows Dick to explain what's different. The novel within the novel doesn't quite parallel our own reality, showing a rather different change after the war. Such thoughts indicate an imagination working throughout than taking any short corners.

The actual plot of the story centres on life in the antique business, an exchange of information about leadership deals and an attempted assassination. Much of the story is extremely riveting although I think Dick runs out of ideas towards the end and it peters out than leads to any sort of satisfactory conclusion.

The reality and the majority of the characters are very well realised. Although we don't visit Nazis Europe, the echoes of its fanatical regime permeats throughout. An America driven by the Japanese appears to just ramble on with both sets of nationals just wanting to get on with their lives. This is not a racist book. It just illustrates the kind of life things would be like in an alternative reality. It should be requiired reading by all SF readers.

GF Willmetts August 2001

8. The Night's Dawn Trilogy
Reviewed by C S Barlow
The NIGHT'S DAWN trilogy by Peter F. Hamilton.
THE REALITY DYSFUNCTION (pub: Pan. ISBN 0-330-34032-8. 1221 page paperback. Price: £8.99).
THE NEUTRONIUM ALCHEMIST (pub: Pan. 1259 page paperback. ISBN 0-330-35143-5. Price: £7.99)
THE NAKED GOD (pub: Macmillan. 1161 page hardback. ISBN 0-333-68791-4. Price: £20.99).

Do you want to be thoroughly entertained?

Do you want living spaceships? Alien artifacts? Aliens? Spectacular interplanetary battles? SUPER-super-weapons? The undead? Satanism? Believable science? Science beyond understanding? Sex? Han Solo without Luke Skywalker? Floating cities? Extra-galactic travel? Alternate dimensions?

And do you want all that wrapped up in breathless plotting, good characterisation, and wide-ranging imagination? Don't want much from your SF, do you? No matter, because you get it all on reading the massive NIGHT'S DAWN trilogy and, make no mistake, I mean 'massive' literally.

This, then, is the background: Mankind has discovered how to open wormholes enabling fast interstellar travel. He has colonised and continues to colonise numerous worlds. His social and political structure is complex but can be simplified by saying that he has split into two main factions: Adamists and Edenists.

The Adamists are similar to contemporary Man, albeit with religious beliefs and political structures writ on a stellar scale. They have vast fleets of starships and powerful technology but are somehow stagnant. They spread through the stars, improve their sciences but haven't really evolve as a race.

However, the Edenists are an evolution of Man. They have developed Affinity - a method of thought/emotion sharing condemned by the various Adamist religions. Because of this group mind (never a hive mind, as with say, the Borg - individuals remain just that), their technology is superior to the Adamists' and has much more potential.

They have developed bi-tech, a melding of organic, grown structures and intelligences with advanced electronics. This has produced the vast conscious orbitals the Edenists live in and their principle mode of transportation, the voidhawks. Related technologies have also allowed the downloading of character and awareness of any Edenist into their collective consciousness at death, enabling a kind of immortality.

This, the Adamists consider almost blasphemous. Though the two factions never actually come to blows, they exist uneasily together, seemingly more content to reiterate the other's failings than admit that as one they could offer much to the common good of Man. However, the only way Man can combat the threat it is about to face will be as a unified race...

On the remote colony planet, Lalonde, a chance amalgamation of events has opened up a hole into the beyond - the non-place where it would seem, our unhappy souls are doomed to wander when our bodies die.

Through this hole pour the desperate dead, willing to do anything to escape the mind-numbing ennui that is the beyond. They begin slowly, at first, to possess the living, employing the incredible energistic powers they have on tap from their former mode of existence.

Soon they have taken over most of Lalonde and seek transport to other worlds… What follows as Mankind attempts to combat this threat and come to terms with it in a stupendous amalgamation of chase scenes, battle scenes, breath-taking scenery, unexpected outcomes and not a few laughs. Margaret Thatcher makes an appearance as does Ellen Ripley. Possessed voidhawks appropriately called hellhawks, style themselves after Dan Dare rocket ships and the USS Enterprise.

The organised faction of the possessed is ruled by Al Capone with a future -and considerably more intelligent- equivalent of Brittany Spears as his moll. It's all done with a definite and refreshing English flavour seldom experienced in this sort of SF. We have an M6 motorway. People say 'bugger' and 'shagging.'

We have a world called Norfolk that has deliberately held back on technological advancement to give us England's 'Green and Pleasant Land' on a planetary scale. There is even mention of a Welsh-ethnic world. Further, the most powerful faction of the Adamist side of things, the Kulu Empire, is ruled by a distinctly European royal family.

Americans rarely get a look in, and - nothing against them, please understand - this makes a very pleasant change. Characterisation is well done. Everyone has good reason to be doing what they do.

They react to their vastly varied situations believably; though thankfully not always predictably. The male lead, Joshua Calvert and captain of the Lady Macbeth, is at first glance a simple Han Solo clone but is developed into something richer as the books progress.

The three female leads, Syrinx - Edenist captain of the voidship Oenone, Ione Saldana - director of the habitat Tranquility and Louise Kavanagh - daughter of a wealthy land-owner on the British-ethnic world, Norfolk, are engaging.

They are written without resorting too much to stereotype though in the case of Louise, bodice-ripping and Jane Austin spring too readily to mind. The main bad guy is Quinn Dexter who starts off as an arrested small-time criminal, gets possessed then overcomes his possessor to explore the potential of the energistic powers he has managed to keep hold of.

His audacious mission of revenge against the woman who originally had him caught and imprisoned on Lalonde would impress not a few horror aficionados. As the above hints, the plot has many, many strands, countless sub-strands and moves at an extreme rate that makes boredom simply impossible even at this kind of word-count. Yet there are faults. It's to Hamilton's credit that, considering his work's sheer size, none seriously detract from your overall enjoyment.

The weakest plot elements relate to the possessed themselves, especially concerning their mechanics of existence and energistic powers. Consider: the act of possession. Usually quite random, has an unexplained built-in convenience that keeps possessing souls to their own gender. A missed opportunity there, I think.

The possessed are more powerful in groups and, when many of them do get together, a red rain cloud is wont to form above them. Why is this? Simple. It is an almost unconscious desire to remove the open sky from sight. Why are they afraid of the sky? Because it reminds them of the beyond. This wouldn't be too bad but, from what we learn of the beyond, it doesn't come across as that terrible.

Boring but not terrifying. Still, the red cloud does help to give an idea of the number of possessed that are about. In the last book, the sudden dissolution of a large cloud makes for spectacular flooding. The possessed's energistic abilities also seem a bit ad hoc.

As the plot demands, they go from a simple weapon and method of re-shaping matter to offering a passport to a ghost-realm - which is NOT the beyond, bestowing invisibility and providing a means of walking through walls. I'm not arguing that these things would not be possible to one wielding such powers, simply that the way they were presented had just a hint of after-thought about it.

What is more, only Quinn Dexter out of all the billions of possessed discovers these capabilities. Moving away from the possessed, a more general fault is that the plotting can be almost too breathless. The cast of characters is huge, the situations exceedingly varied yet Hamilton does a wonderful job of keeping everything moving but sometimes to excess.

On more than one occasion, I got the feeling that I was simply swapping one chase scene for another - albeit the scales might change vastly, especially in the last book. I kept wanting Hamilton to slow things down a little, give the characters a rest, give ME a rest. This leads to my last niggle I'll mention before returning to the almost sickening praise.

Perhaps because of the sheer speed of events and in spite of the various glorious set-pieces, there was little good old fashioned 'Sense of Wonder' to be had from these books. For all the references to the vastness of space, the various alien races and artifacts were offered in such an exacting, cold manner I barely registered what wonders they were.

Though it goes against tradition for this type of thing, the characters are actually more interesting than the rather amazing world they live in. Compare David Zindell's 'Neverness' books where both character and setting are beautifully balanced and we have Sense of Wonder in bucket-loads.

For God's Sake though, don't let the above put you off. You'll be missing out on what could arguably be called a genre ride of a lifetime. From the opening chapter of the first book, the enjoyment doesn't fade until the wildly unlikely but very satisfying ending.

I am happy to have read these books. You should read them too. They are STAR WARS for adults.