Conference noted::sf

  I think it was a bit of "Mote" in reverse.  But it was also "War of the
Worlds", and as such was not all that interesting.  It seems like the book
went; "Detection, invasion, we throw everything at them - nothing works,
then we come up with yankee inginuity and spirit to blow them away."

  The most interesting concepts weren't developed enough (the Elephants' society
and dependance on their sole information source).  Far too much glossing over
of interesting information and TOO DARN MANY FAILURES.  We couldn't do squat
against those Elephants in the book.  I seem to recall a story where a space
ship lands on a planet (or earth back in time), where body armor, horses
and swords were the current trend.  They may not be laser-rifles, but the
way the author presented the battle, the charging knights could do a heck
of a lot of damage to the men and machines from the spaceship.

  Another problem was Niven and Pournelle's seeming attempt to make the science
fiction portion fairly mundane.  Things were mentioned in passing as if they
assumed their readers had read Pournelle's "High Frontier" and most of their
other SF books. 

  All in all, I expected more for such a long wait.

John

    I suspect the knight-vs-aliens fight was in "The High Crusade" by
    Poul Anderson.  It's a good read.
    
    Earl Wajenberg

RE: .2

I thought that .1 (armoured people with swords vs aliens) was the first chapter
of Deathworld III, by Harry Harrison.  In this case barbarians wipe out 90+%
of hi-tech mining group who lands on their planet for exploitation.  The miners
were stated to be really tough and ready for trouble, and were armed with the
standard laser rifles, hi-tech detection gear, etc.  The barbarians won by
simply coming in hard and fast, and killing everyone before the miners could
get their (clearly superior) firepower into action.

-- Ken Moreau

    The book with the knights in armour against a space ship was "the
    High Crusade" by Poul Anderson. A good - and rather funny - book.

    I read 'Footfall' a while back and basically enjoyed it, although
    it suffers from the same ailment the other Niven/Pournelle
    collaborations do; namely, Jerry Pournelle.
    
    I've read all the collaborations, virtually all Niven's solo stuff
    and a few (possibly all, who knows) of Pournelle's and have come
    to the following conclusion: if you find a passage in one of the
    N/P collaborations that is pedantic, lacking in detail or resolution,
    or just plain boring, it's probably Pournelle's.
    
    I've always enjoyed reading Larry Niven; his characters are
    consistantly three-dimensional, his plots well developed and there's
    enough technical hocus-pocus and action to satisfy nicely.
    
    Pournelle, on the other hand, is just plain tedious both in fiction
    as well as the self-aggrandizing gushers that are published in 'Byte'
    and 'InfoWorld.'
    
    Hmm... I seem to have gotten somewhat off the track here.  Anyway,
    I kind of enjoyed 'Footfall.'  Not as much as some of the earlier
    collaborations nor as much as Niven's 'Known Space' stories, but
    pretty good.  Besides, it gives a new slant on 'elephant gun.'
    
    -- Tony

    I wish I had something original to add.  I foolishly picked up Footfall
    when it first came out in hardcover.  Good but not great.  Well,
    really just OK.
    
    C'mon, hasn't anybody else read Greg Bear's Eon or Gregory Benford's
    Artifact yet?
    
    len.
     

    re: FOOTFALL's similarity to LUCIFER'S HAMMER
    
    Ten years back, Niven & Pournelle came up with the idea of the
    "ultimate alien invasion novel" and worked out the outline. The
    proposed publisher thought that there was just too much going
    on and suggested that they take the idea of the aliens use of a
    large space body as a projectile against the Earth, and make it
    into a separate disaster novel. The result was LUCIFER'S HAMMER.
    Obviously, they ended up writing the invasion novel anyway.
    
    re: Apparent differences in Niven's and Pournelle's writing
    
    Don't be too cocksure. I know a number of people who were convinced
    that they could tell which parts of MOTE were written by Pournelle
    and which by Niven. They were often wrong. Each author has said that
    he purposely wrote scenes that were more like the other's style
    just for the learning experience.
    
    --- jerry

    I've read as many of Larry Niven's books as I can lay my hands on,
    and have enjoyed them all (and that is a fair few books !) I also
    read another Niven collabration a year or so ago. It was called
    'Dream Park' and the co-author was Stephen Barnes. I thought the
    book was pretty good reading myself.

    I have read some of Niven and Pournelle's joint efforts, namely
    'Lucifer's Hammer' and 'Mote in God's Eye'. They were pretty
    good too as far as I was concerned, esp. 'Hammer'. I have read a
    few of Jerry Pournelle's solo works and have always found them to
    be very similiar (maybe I haven't read enough of his books) and
    rather "long-winded". The bottom line is, I much prefer Niven's
    stories and tend to avoid Pournelle's, even to the extent that I
    am wary of reading Niven+Pournelle productions.
    
	Mr Magoo    

  RE: Pounelle vs Niven

  I've read everything either author wrote (except for some of Niven's recent
"Magic..." books and Pournelle's "War..." series), and I have to agree with
the basic statement that Pournelle's stuff is rather dry after you've read
a couple of them.  He has placed lots of emphasis on technology, and uses
the same basic plot and character arrangement over and over.  Janissaries
was quite good reading, though.

  Niven seems to be experimenting, moving from good SF (too numerous to
cover all, but Ringworld definitely stands out), to combinations of SF and
fantasy (e.g. Dream Park) to downright fantasy (his "Magic..." stuff). 
I think this experimentation has kept Niven in good form, whereas Pournelle
is probably so into SF, that he's "too close to the problem."  Maybe he
should try some poetry...

John

    While I would have to agree that in a strict comparison between
    the two, Niven is the better writer--although, in Pournelle's defense
    I will point out that Larry set out to be a writer from the first,
    while Pournelle worked at 'real jobs'--NASA, among others--and picked
    up the writing stuff later.
    But I don't think it's fair to pick one man's work out of a
    collaborative effort and blame it for the failure of the work. 
    I have no idea how Niven and Pournelle work together--I assume they
    must to some extent divide up the scenes to write individually and
    then somehow fuse them together.  But as Niven always replies when
    asked how he and Pournelle work together, the answer is "perfectly."
    I have read most of both men's works, and rarely can I isolate scenes
    in collaborations as having been written by one or the other.
    I have the feeling that the two just work mentally very well together,
    developing the ideas and probably even 'talking out' most of the
    scenes together.  So if the book fails, it is evenly both men's
    faults.
    
    As for 'Footfall' itself--I didn't think it was that bad at all.
    Certainly not on a par with their best stuff (i.e. THE MOTE IN GOD'S
    EYE) but fun and innovative in its own way.
    My greatest glee, after last year's TV season, was thinking of it
    as "'V' With a Brain."
    
    --Matt
    

We may not be able to identify each author's writing, but the fundamental
contribution of each is easier to identify.  Pournelle is the historian,
military scientist, and survivalist;  Niven is more the hard scientist,
plot developer, and a better character developer.  Of course, these 
bounds aren't absolute, but they are consistent with the work of each
that I have read, and are consistent with the earlier observation 
of how each came to be an SF author.

- tom]

    re .6 - I've started Eon three times and can't get into it - is
    it really worth trying again?
    Does anyone out there have a copy of Niven's Misspelled Magicians
    (aka Flying sorcerers?) it was one of my eldest son's and my favorite
    books and betwen us we've lost it. (it is no longer in print). If
    noone has a copy to spare coul you tell me which notes in this file
    give the addresses of used book publishers? Thankyou.

    p.s. oops - I meant salesmen not publishers.

    re:.12
    
    I'd be very surprised that THE FLYING SORCERORS is out of print.
    I didn't think Del Rey let any Niven book out of print. At any
    rate, there are *scads* of used book stores in the Greater Maynard
    area (I assume that's where you're located). To find one near you,
    just look up "Books, Rare and Used" in your Yellow Pages.
    
    --- jerry

    re .12 - well, I've read it (all the way through) twice now.  It
    does start slow but if you haven't made it past the first 50 pages
    I'd suggest you keep slogging away.  Maybe we just like different
    stuff.  I thought it was incredibly imaginative, almost too much
    so (there are lots of ideas that get dropped and never fully explored).
    
    len.
    

    re .14
    
    I don't live anywhere near Maynard - we are way out in the woods
    west of Westminster. I do know that there are mail order houses
    for used books - I remember seeing some addresses in an earlier
    note but don't remember which one. As to TFS being out of print
    - I tried to order it but it wasn't listed in books in print as
    of last fall.

   To add my 2 cents worth, I was REAL disappointed in Footfall. I have
    always looked forward to Niven and Pornelle's epics like
    Hammer and Mote, and up to now, their stuff has been reasonably
    plausible, but elephants from another solar system who inherited 
    their intersteller technology and decided that they would conquer 
    the earth by dropping rocks (shades of Hammer) is too tacky for me. I was 
    disappointed I spent the money on the paperback!
    
    Dave

    
    I picked up Footfall in paperback recently.  I thought it was pretty
    interesting, but not strictly from the point of view of "good story,
    well written".  I go to lots of SF Cons, and have spent time speaking
    with a number of authors.  The entire book seemed to be (to me,
    anyway) contrived as an "in-joke" about science fiction writers
    and science fiction conventions.  I thought I could recognize a
    number of authors I have spoken with among the "SF-Writer team that
    saves the world".  A number of themes in the book reinforced my
    conclusions:
    
    ***** mild spoiler *****
    
    o science fiction writers save the world when the military fails
    o the last guest-of-honor at the last SF Con in the world
    o the world's last fan
    o angry SF writer (Pournelle?) drowns Washington press representative
      in a toilet to save the world
    
    (There are probably other examples, too, but these are the ones
    that immediately come to mind when I ponder on why I thought it
    was a "hack".)
    
    Although jayeembee is probably right (he usually is!) when he says
    that Niven/Pournelle write in each other's styles for practice,
    my guess would be that Niven wrote all the "life with the aliens"
    chapters, and Pournelle wrote the chapters about the survivalists
    and the military.
    
    And now for the speculations ( and these are ONLY speculations and
    rumours):  based on things that I and other CON-goers have overheard
    at SF Conventions, I think the whole book was a game.  I think Niven
    and Pournelle were challenged to write something containing some
    number of truly ludicrous scenes that other people suggested to
    them; ie; elephants in platform shoes parachuting to the earth.
    
    Since I read the book from the perspective of it being something
    of a joke on a grand scale, I had a lot more fun with it than I
    might have otherwise.
    
    YOUR wild rumours and speculations welcome...
    
    Rita
    
    

    Get on the stick, it was BABY elephants in platform shoes parachuting
    to earth...
    	
    Yeah, I think I met couple of the Threat Team.  
    	
    Possibly, the book can be considered a fantasy- in the sense that
    it's what N&P wish would happen... :-)
    
    Ah, for the old days of Carlos Wu and Gil Hamilton.

    After receiving a recommendation from a friend for FOOTFALL I decided
    to go through this note again.  Seems like it should be read with
    the tongue planted firmly in the cheek.
    
    Anyway, I have an unFOOTFALL question:  Was the ARTIFACT mentioned
    the ARTIFACT which appeared in Analog in the '60s?  Whoever wrote
    it, I liked it.  (I'd try to look it up but all ref. mat'l is at
    home, and I'd probably forget about it by the then anyway.)
                                                             
    						Don

    If the ARTIFACT you're asking about is the ARTIFACT I think I
    mentioned, then it's not likely to have been in Analog in the '60s,
    unless Benford put the idea aside for a looooong time.  The ARTIFACT
    I had in mind is a recent largish novel about a cube found in a
    Mycenaean dig.  The cube contains a "matched pair" of quantum
    discontinuities (black holes?) which become separated and try real
    hard to get back together;  the problem is when they get back together,
    if they do so in an uncontrolled way, they will release a "lot of
    energy".  The story involves modern Greek politics, MIT and Cambridge MA,
    Atlantis, etc..
    
    len.
    

    Guess not.  This was the cover story & I believe it was about a
    derelict is space.
    
    						Don

    re:.22 re:.20
    
    a-HA! I just figured out what story you're referring to! It's
    "Artifact" by J. B. Clarke, sometime circa 1968. Pardon me whilst
    I zip off to the other room...
    
    Back again. Only a year off --- it was the June 1969 issue.
    
    --- jerry

    Footfall reminds me of the endings of Batman TV episodes and James Bond
    films wherein the villain comes up with the most indirect way of
    liquidating the hero.
    
    The flaw in all too many of these invasion novels is the hesitancy
    the aliens have in eliminating the human race.  Yeah, it doesn't
    make for much of a novel. But Footfall, for me, lacked a plot
    complication that would justify not wiping out the humans without
    a moment's hesitation.
    
    Semantic confusion over "surrender" is an absurd reason for those
    baby elephants not to wipe us out.

    re: .23  Thanks; saves me the trouble of digging out and rooting 
    thru 2 boxes.
    
    re: .24  Sounds like the climax was dangling simulated tails in
    front of 'em & then leading 'em off somewhere to drown.
                                 
    							Don

Just finished this book.  Though it was not as good as other N&P stuff I have 
read, it was fun.  I always take SF with a grain of salt anyway.  What I found
annoying was all of the politics thrown in, like "Gee, if we had only built
more nuclear power plants".  There was a LOT of this liberally sprinkled
around this book, and the trend indicates that we will see more in the future.
I doesn't ruin the book, but it keeps it from being a class act.

/e

re: propaganda in "Footfall"

That's Pournelle for you.  In "Lucifer's Hammer" he had a nuclear
power station still running for years after the breakdown of
civilization.  The noble engineers (well, I'll go along with that)
keep it running in spite of not having any outside parts or outside
power. If they ever take it down for maintenance, they won't have any
power to bring it up again.  Hmmm. For some reason it becomes a
target for bands of drug-crazed cannibals, probably the remnants of
today's environmental movement.

I sure wish Niven would dump him.  In fact, I wish Niven would dump 
all of his collaborators and start writing books by himself again.  
"Dream Park", "The Descent of Anansi", and the Magic books have all 
been fairly weak.  Better still, he should stop padding his stuff out 
to novel length and go back to short stories.  I can still remember 
the thrill I got when I first picked up "Neutron Star".  Well, I 
suppose all the greats grow old.

/jlr

Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Path: decwrl!decvax!ucbvax!ucbcad!nike!sri-spam!rutgers!caip!daemon
Subject: Niven, Pournelle & waves
Posted: 6 Oct 86 05:17:21 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
Posted: Mon Oct  6 01:17:21 1986
 
From: "James B. VanBokkelen" <JBVB%MX.LCS.MIT.EDU@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU>
 
I just finished reading _Footfall_ (hardcover purchased remaindered
@ local Waldenbooks), and was struck by what appears to be an error
in its physics (which was also present in _Lucifer's Hammer_).  I
have lived near the ocean all my life, and I fail to see how meteor-
produced seismic waves can behave as they do in the books.
 
***** Spoiler Warning *****
 
"...India would be covered north to the mountains.  The Bay of Bengal
would focus the wave again: it might cross Burma as far as China."
 
First, waves *must* break when they reach shoaling water; for waves of
this magnitude, this would occur far out on the continental shelf.
Once a wave has broken, it is no longer an impulse moving through
water, it is actual moving water flowing shoreward.  Lots of energy
gets dissipated in the break, and quickly thereafter in the turbulent
flow conditions.  I would guess at least 25% of the remaining energy gets
reflected back out to sea.
 
Second, I recall from various reading that larger waves travel faster.
The top would get blown off anything big in shoaling water, where its
crest steepens.
 
Third, since the impact was a point, the waves would decay by inverse
square.  I suspect some of the more destructive earthquake waves of
the past were generated by fault slippages which acted more like a
line source, at least for a few hundred miles around.
 
Fourth, should a wave 1000 feet high, and 4000 feet along its base
come ashore on flat ground, its flow would be very turbulent.  If it
leaves 20 feet of standing (or at least decelerated) water behind it
as it goes, it runs out of water 20 miles inland, regardless of any
other effect.
 
Anyone with specific knowlege care to comment?
 
Another thing that bothered me was the unannounced arrival of the "foot".
The ship itself had been spotted by astronomical telescopes.  The ship
had a fusion drive, and was pushing the asteroid, and was a mile long all
by itself.  Maybe the aliens had tried to take out the big telescopes,
but there are thousands of 8-inch and smaller instruments out there.
Why didn't the authorities (or even independent-minded, forward-thinking
amateurs, given Pournelle) put a watch on the ship when it left Earth
orbit?  Sure, it hid behind the moon, but it couldn't continue to hide once
it set out to meet the asteroid.  Postulating that it somehow got clear
without being observed (drive off once out of the shadow, long unpowered
coast), you'd see it coming back, driving the asteroid.  Even at 7 miles
per second, it would take 10 hours falling from the moon's distance.
 
This makes three stories by Niven (one short, and the two collaborations)
where some mighty catastrophe is used to remove Asia from the picture.
I wonder...  Of course, stories in which *we* were removed from the picture
might not sell well...
 
jbvb@ai.ai.mit.edu
 
(flames to me - I can't keep up with the current rate of postings)

    Wouldn't a wave from a point impact decay as the inverse of distance,
    not the inverse square?  It's expanding as a circle after all, not
    as a sphere.  The other points are well taken, though - tidal waves
    just wouldn't wash hundreds of miles inland.
    /jlr

    	I just finished reading FOOTFALL, and most of what I have to
    say would be a spoiler, so:
    
    	**SPOILER WARNING TIME**
    
    	I must admit I did enjoy reading FOOTFALL, but I was so let
    down by the ending, primarily because it left so much hanging (to
    me, anyway).  We go through almost 600 pages getting into dozens
    of characters, and then the book just ends; you presume humans have
    stopped the snouts, but what a terrible mess is still left on Earth.
    This is no clear-cut happy ending.  The novel could have done with
    another 600 pages telling us what happened afterwards, which reminds
    me:  Do Niven and Pournelle plan a sequel?  It has been almost four
    years since FOOTFALL first came out.
                                        
    	I know we were being preached to most of the time by the authors
    (I suspect Pournelle did most of it), but it didn't bother me too
    much, as I tend to agree with most of the messages (Orion spaceships,
    nuclear power, etc.).  Also, the bit about science fiction writers
    being consulted by the military on the aliens is not just an SF
    writer's fantasy:  There was a meeting several years ago discussing
    the future of military weaponry and hardware, and several major
    SF writers were invited for their opinions.
    
    	I liked the snouts - no, I don't mean I like what they did,
    but the ideas of a race of intelligent elephants was interesting.
    It is a shame that more wasn't done with their reactions to our
    Earth elephants, though.  Also, it was a bit disappointing to run
    into another alien race which cannot have its individual beings
    function independently like only humans seem to do, but then again
    that is essentially how elephant herds behave.
          
    	Overall, it was an entertaining read, but the characters could
    have been fleshed out more, and I really want to know what happens
    to the human race and the snouts next.
    
    	Larry
    

    Elephants are no more "herd" animals than humans.  Their primary
    social organization is the family group, where family means a mother,
    her daughters, their daughters and any non-adult male children.
    
    Humans in the "wild" live in equally small, family-oriented bands.
    
    Humans in technological societies look much more like a herd animal
    (or even a ant-like colony) than elephants do.
        
    It's a mistake to believe that intelligent aliens will be dominated
    by their evolutionary biology to a greater extend that we are. 
    It's also an easy way out of doing real work on the alien spieces
    for a book.
    
    But then _Footfall_ is not a well-plotted or well-written book, it
    is an attempt to write a book which will be optioned by a movie studio
    (as was _Lucifer's_Hammer_), and so make big bucks for the authors.
    
    			-John Bishop

Re:< Note 350.31 by MINAR::BISHOP >

>    Elephants are no more "herd" animals than humans.  Their primary
>    social organization is the family group, where family means a mother,
>    her daughters, their daughters and any non-adult male children.

Just because they looked like elephants doesn't mean they were 
elephants!  The snouts actually evolved almost 5 light years away from 
any other elephants!  I think the gene pools were rather isolated :-)
    
>    It's a mistake to believe that intelligent aliens will be dominated
>    by their evolutionary biology to a greater extend that we are. 

I don't get this at all.  It may be stretching things, but it is 
definately not a "mistake" as when you make something up you cannot make 
a mistake.  Seriously I think Niven and Pournelle gave a part answer to 
this issue by explaining that the snouts really got their technology 
from the junk that an earlier civilization left, essentially they were 
savages with interstellar spacecraft!
 
Tony

    RE: .31
    
    >But then _Footfall_ is not a well-plotted or well-written book, it
    >is an attempt to write a book which will be optioned by a movie studio
    >(as was _Lucifer's_Hammer_), and so make big bucks for the authors. 
    
    Unless you happen to be privy to either Niven's or Pournelle's
    thoughts, you might consider prefacing such arbitrary and insulting
    statements with an "imho."
    
    Fred

    Ok, ok, it was my opinion, not revealed truth.
    
    The idea of "inheriting" technology is interesting, and is my
    favorite explanation of the history underlying the Star Wars
    movies.
    
    I personally have a fondness for the idea of intelligent elephants
    or elephant-like beings.  Trunks are a neat way to have manipulative
    organs and avoid the balance problems (and back problems and so
    on) of bipedalism.

    			-John Bishop

    Actually, I thought "Lucifer's Hammer" and "Footfall" had
    mini-series written all over them.  They have all the signs:
    multiple plot threads, large casts of characters, and constant
    changes of locale. They have lots of good visuals too.  They would
    look great on TV, although I didn't like either one.  There's
    something about Pournelle's characters that grates on my nerves.
    There's an air of intolerance about them, an air of contempt for
    anyone who disagrees with them.  They know they're smart, and have
    little patience for the bureaucrats and bleeding hearts who stand
    in their way. Maybe I'm just projecting my personal impression of
    Pournelle, who struck me as arrogant and bullying.   I've enjoyed
    some of Niven and Pournelle's collaborations (particularly "The
    Mote in God's Eye"), but like to think that the good parts are
    Niven's work. 
    
    /jlr
    

    Since it's a given with most noters that they are not intimately
    involved with whoever they are talking about (be it authors, etc),
    wouldn't it also be a given that anything written by a noter *would*
    in their opinion, humble or not, without having to attach a disclaimer
    to it?  It follows the rule of essays that states you shouldn't
    put "I think", since it's obvious that you are writing what *you*
    think....
    
    Just my opinion.  ;)                               ---kim

    re .32 and other elephant matters - if you're into elephants, I
    heartily recommend you check out Elephant Memories, published last
    year some time.  If you're not into elephants, look at it anyway,
    you'll probably become an elephant freak.  This book was written
    by a woman (whose name escapes me just now) who lived in the wild
    with elephants for a dozen or so years.  If a real citation is desired,
    I'll provide one tomorrow.
    
    len.
    

    Len.
        
    	No way you can find her name?
    
    Charlie

    re .38:
    
    Elephant Memories, by Cynthia Moss; published by Wm. Morrow.
    ISBN 0-688-05348-3.
    
    Very highly recommended.
    
    len.
     

   Could someone post the "real" identities of the members of the threat
team?  The Heinlein character was obvious, but I'm unsure of most of the
others.  (Never having met or heard any authors, I can't match the
personality to the person very well.)

   With appropriate spoiler warnings, of course.

   Thanks in advance!


					-mjg

    re:  .35:
    
    As I was reading...
    
>        something about Pournelle's characters that grates on my nerves.
>    There's an air of intolerance about them, an air of contempt for
>    anyone who disagrees with them.  They know they're smart, and have
>    little patience for the bureaucrats and bleeding hearts who stand
>    in their way.
 
    I was wondering if you had ever met him in person...  :+)
    
    Willie_who_bought_him_an_Irish_Coffee_for_breakfast_once.
       

	A friend of mine who is friends with Larry Niven tells the following 
	joke:

		Q: How many Jerry Pournelle's does it take to change a 
		   light bulb?

		A: None.  He'd rather curse the darkness.

	Beverly

    Pournelle himself admits he has "little ability to 'suffer fools
    gladly'".
    				- hbm

    Re .43:
    
>    Pournelle himself admits he has "little ability to 'suffer fools
>    gladly'".

    Which raises the question of how he can stand to live with himself.

    
    
      RE .19
    
       Carlos Woo?.  =8^]   
    
         Louis Woo. My favorite Niven character.  
    
                         
    RC

    It's Louis Wu -- I know, a nit, but if it weren't for nits,
    they wouldn't have invented finetooth combs...
    
    					andrew

   Carlos Wu was Louis's father - a good friend of Beowulf Shaeffer.  (It's
never actually said, but I believe that Beowulf's wife was Louis's mother,
as she (Sharla?) wouldn't leave Earth, and Beo, being an albino, couldn't get
rights to have a child on Earth, so Carlos, with a super-IQ and thus unlimited
birthrights fathered a few children for Sharla and Beo and then got out of
the picture.

   I believe that you can trace the entire main-line of Known Space through
a few interconnected people:

   Jim Garner (isn't he an actor?), who was Gil Hamilton's supervisor/boss,
Gil Hamilton met up with one of the Wus at some point in a story (I doubt it
was Carlos, about a generation or two too early), then Carlos Wu, through
Beowulf Shaeffer and then Louis Wu.


					-mjg

    Louis Wu - so famous we had a birthday party for him at Worldcon in
    August 1989.
    
    -Jody
    

    I tried to get into that party and gave up too soon (one drawback of
    having a 9:30 bedtime). I heard Larry Himself was there! I'm sorry I
    missed him. The closest I ever came was a Wordsworth signing -- two
    hours earlier. I DID get a signed copy of "Integral Trees" though.
    
    - Hoyt

>   Carlos Wu was Louis's father - a good friend of Beowulf Shaeffer.  (It's
>never actually said, but I believe that Beowulf's wife was Louis's mother,
>as she (Sharla?) wouldn't leave Earth, and Beo, being an albino, couldn't get
>rights to have a child on Earth, so Carlos, with a super-IQ and thus unlimited
>birthrights fathered a few children for Sharla and Beo and then got out of
>the picture.

    It is stated clearly, though I forget which story.

    - mikeK

   In the story Borderland of Sol, Carlos Wu related to Beo how little Louis
is doing, but I'm not positive that this Louis Wu is the one we know and
love, or perhaps a father or grandfather.  Louis Wu never talks about his
father...


						-mjg

    re:.51
    
    But the timing is right, as Louis is 200 years old at the time of
    RINGWORLD, and that novel takes place about 200 years after the
    Bey Schaeffer stories.
    
    While it's true that there is quite possibly more than one person
    in Known Space named Louis Wu at any given moment, it would be
    absurd for Niven to plant this reference without it being his
    intention that we deduce it to be a reference to "our" Louis.
    
    --- jerry

   Of course!  The time-wise thing was making me doubt it, but I had forgotten
how old Louis actually was!

   I'm confident now.

					-mjg