Newspaper Page Text
November, /V79
Ampersand
awesome pressures the pop musi< industry
has plopped on its media-made superstars
like Springsteen. I hat late Seventies caus
ticity. in turn, pales next to the anes
thetized. robotized decadence of the
cocaine, Qaalude and spray-on Spandcx
disco world.
Steven X. Rea
Murder: Fact @
Fiction
Perhaps that eminent sleuth Sherlock
Holmes said it best: “life is infinitely
stranger than am thing that the mind of
man could invent.. .the things whit h are
really mere commonplaces of existence,
make all fiction with its conventionalities
and foreseen conclusions most stale and
unpieditable.” The |x>int is, w hen it conies
to murder, verifiable atrocities are irrep
ressibly repulsive and intriguing when
compared to the casual wanderings nl die
imagination.
I'he recent release of two lx ><>ks devoted
to this same curiosity in homicide offers a
choice example. In Hest Detective Stones of
the Year - /979 (F. I* Dutton, $9.95). we
have an idiosyncratic selection of lb short-
story mysteries by editor K.dward Hoch,
whose own story, written from the crimi
nals viewpoint, is one of the more charm
ing. Published atmn.illy for the past .'fit
years, the anthology picks from mystery
magazines and is designed for the hard
core buffs who thirst for young, award-
winning talent in the field of fiction.
On the other hand we have The Mur
derer's Who’s Who (Methuen, Inc.,$17.95),a
work td substantial!) more import from
J.H.H. (iaute and Robin Odell. (Yes. it's
unfair to compare fiction w ith conipen-
diums cd fact, but mic h are their fates on
( WOULP ybo OEAfcfVe
y—
NovemlieTs Ampersand cd the Month is a
turkey (no smart remarks) from Kami (I.
Copeland of Hillsborough, NC, who w ill
rec eive $25.
a valuable tend lot the morbid soul and a
fine- addition to the literature of inurdet.
(»aute and Odell are not li ving to Ik* com
prehensive; they deal with over 650
notorious ot law-c hanging cases in a wav
whic h presumes a sen in-psychologic al bias.
Apparently the authors are infatuated
(like Mi. Holmes) w ith the philnsophv of
tnurdet. and in the Whit s Who we reap the
In'iiefits ol their sc holarly ardor.
Hest Detective Stones is neither inappro-
priate nor uninspiring; w riters like Brian
Carfield, Frank Sisk and Barbara Owens
have contributed tales of cunning and
worth, and Mi. Hex It's comments relieve us
d historic al ignorance. But the intellectual
.diure cd tnurdet. whic h is as old as the first
murderer, seems more accessible and sig
nificant as a sc ience than as a hobby.
William Witt Bloomstein
Science Fiction @
The Not-So-Bizarre
Regular readers of sc ience fic tion proba
bly already know .ilxmi Hest Science Fiction
Stones of the )ear, edited by (•ardner Dozois
(Dutton. $9.95), but even the occasional
dabbler m SF should definitely look into
this Ixxik; it lives up to its title.
I he eighth annual collection of this
Best SF” series has the c ream of the crop
for 1978; among the eleven stories are
John Vatlev’s "Flic- Persistence of Vision.'
Christopher Priest’s "Whores,” Joan 1)
Vinge’s "View from a Height” and (.cue
Wolfe’s prophetic short novel "Seven
American Nights," along with lesser
though still rewarding, efforts by Isaac
Asimov, rhomas M Disch. Cregory Ben
ford and several others. I he Val ley story
alone is an instant c lassic , w inning a
Nebula award and appearing already in
/979 Annual World's Hest SF from DAW
Books, as well as headlining a collec tion cd
Valley’s stories.
F.ditor Dozios not only selects the best SF
stories lot us. lie also gives a detailed over
view of the field in an excellent introduc
lion, giving« ut rent information about the
top w riters, editors and magazines. There
are also brief biogt aphic al intmduc lions tc
ae h of the slot ies, as is common in SF an
thologies. and a list of 90 honorable
mentions — stories that might have been
lie best if Varlcy and company hat
bombed.
Since many SF leaders are also fans of
the bizarre, they should lx*ware Harold F
Priestley’s Truly Hiinrtr (Sterling, $8.95),
rambling collection of *‘l>elieve-it-or-not
trivia that is rarely bizarre and usuallv not
even interesting. Truly Hnorre is a lead
balloon — pul vout nionev into the SF col
Met oil and you’re way ahead.
Neal Wilgus
this occasion.) While the Who’s Who is not
the first of its kind (Colin Wilson's F.ncyc
Iofhdoi of Murder, still the definitive refer
elite tool, and Jay Nalsh'x Hloodletters and
Hodmen come to mind), the work entails a
new dimension in recording the history of
murder: across reference system bv whit h
a listing of sources is (dieted for eat h c ase
One doesn’t have to sc ramble to locate sev
eral references on, say, Albert Fish, win
acknowledged at least 100 c rimes involving
dismemberment and cannibalism lief ore
Ixing electick uled at Sing Sing. < >i Amch.
Dyer, executed in 1896 for strangling 7 (if
not more) children with tape and then tos
sing their Ixxlics in a river. Or..
With a further innovation, a classified
index of cases, the Who’s Who is undeniably
Many Elements, Not
That Much Style
When F.. B. While published his famous
New Yorker essav on his former professor's
w riting textbcxik in 1957, it provoked so
much excitement that White revised the
hook for contemporary use. The Elements of
Style,by William Strunk Jr. and F. B. White,
is now in its third edition (Macmillan,
$1.95), and this one promises to be as
popular as the first two. One reason for
the hook’s immediate success was the im
plicit promise White's essay — now the
(Continued next pone)
Break into the
In the last two years Ampersand has paid out
some $25 ,500 to freelance contributors —
writers, artists, and photographers—and this
year wads of bucks are just waiting for ace
Ampersand contributors. (Lucky devils!) This is
real money, not Monopoly paper; we pay 10* per
published word, $25 per black id white photo,
more for color. Think of it, your name in print.
Viur mother will be so pleased.
Here’s how:
1. Send us a sample of your work, published
or unpublished.
2. Submit a list of story ideas that you are
ready and able to do. Be practical; don't offer
to interview Farrah if only we'd pick up the
plane fare. We're most likely to use book, con
cert. record and film reviews. We’re also in the
market for qualified textbook reviews, pithy
assessments of guest lecturers on the college
circuit, off-beat features, and cartoons (but no
comic strips, please). Ybu may prefer to submit
a finished "on spec" article rather than a
query; fine, but if you want it back — if you
want anything back — you must enclose a
stamped, self-addressed envelope.
3. Tell us your telephone number(s). in case we
become so excited by your brilliance we just
can't wait for the mail.
4. Be brief.
5. Be neat.
6. Be literate.
If you've already been published in Ampersand,
you needn't go through all this again — just
tell us of any change of address. And soon.
Send your stuff to Break into the Big Time,
Ampersand Magazine, 1680 N. Vine Street,
Suite 201, Hollywood, CA 00028.