Rune With A View

Apologies in advance to those who receive this and future mails
more than once.


It is now August. Term restarts in 7 or 8 weeks. The time has come
for me to start bothering people for articles for Rune With A View.
I am toying with the idea of having it a Phantom free zone - unless I
receive something exceptional on the subject.

Possible subjects -

IFIS
What is IFIS,
why join etc.
What is Science Fiction
Book reviews, film reviews,
short stories

Gamesoc - What and why gamesoc,
what is roleplaying and why sit round a table pretending
to be someone else, Isn't life depressing enough as it is
without inventing more of it
Do you have to be a sad person to score 535 in Scrabble(like
I did last night)

You decide, and send me what you write.
In 3 weeks if I am not happy with the amount I have received, I
shall start writing my requests for articles to the tune of Rocky
Horror lyrics.

Chris Lyth
...................................................
The world won't end in darkness,
It'll end in family fun,
With Coca-cola clouds
behind a Big Mac sun.

One God by The Beautiful South

Boring Prachett... (spelling misaktes abound!)

OK, here's my formula for making a fortune,
first think of a cliche, anyone will do. Then
write down all the jokes about it you can.
If this is not your first time, you can cut and
paste the material from older versions. Have a few
old characters who will be used to string the jokes
together and then set the whole thing in an existing
world and give the book a pun as a title. It works
all you have to do is ask Terry Prachett.

After the first couple of books I spotted a pattern
in his writing, I also spotted some old material as
well. What I didn't spot was any new ideas. By the sixth
book I had lost interest in the genre completely and
can only think that he is writing the books for his
bank manager. (Why else it release in large hardback,
normal hardback, softback, comic, film and any other format
Prachett can think of.)

Prachett has failed to spot that many readers like to
be surprised or intigued by fanstany books, his later
books fail to do this. It's the same old ingrident,
maybe boiled, maybe fried; but the same old stuff.
He is not the first to fall into this trip - but
unlike Prachett, Asimov was honest about it. and
Douglas Adams did shop evenually.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed reading his first
couple of books, they were very refreshing and
funny. Like lifting a stone and watching all the
insects scurrying around. But the fun stops after
you lifted the umpteen stone and it just not worth
the efford any more.

To continuely re-using the same 3 or 4 characters is
not new; to have the same world is also not new, or
the same background. But something else is needed, not
just a series of cheap (in the sense that they are
not clever or new) jokes about one well worn out
cliche.

Daniel

Daniel Celano wrote:
[snip]
I think you'll find that Pratchett and other successful
fantasy authors sales figures will prove you wrong.

People like the same old stuff in their fantasy. Just
look at David Eddings.

Laters,

Adam

To Mr Admin: Since my e-mail has changed (now
celano@), I am receiving two
copies of every thing... why...

Daniel

Daniel Celano said:
Is it really 2 copies of EVERYTHING, or just 2 copies of CLyth's rune
With A View post, which he SENT twice, once to chat and once to
announce, despite the fact that I've told him several times that chat
is a subset of announce so it's pointless mailing both.

If you recieve 2 copies of THIS post, let me know, and I'll fix it,
otherwise it's Mt Lyth that's at fault, not you or me.

---

Nick Waterman. Network Consultant / Sysadmin - LEOnet.
nick-sig@ Team *AMIGA*! http://www.leonet.co.uk/~nick
There's an exception to every rule, except this one.

Consider yourself lucky - I got 3 copies of it (Announce, Chat and Gamesoc)

Chris - if I send you something this time do you promise not to loose it
like last time ?

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Philip Ayres
E-Mail: payres@
Web Site: www.netcomuk.co.uk/~payres
ICQ: 40853612
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