Conference noted::sf

    
>>    	Has anyone come across Christopher Priest's writings? I'd be 
>>    interested to hear from anyone who can explain "Inverted World"!
    

	I've been a Priest fan ever since I read that novel serialized
in Galaxy magazine years back. As far as explanations go, I recall a lot
of attempts at the time, some (pseudo) scientific and some psychological,
but that was long ago and I can't much more.

I can however recommend a few other books you may enjoy:
	"A Perfect Lover"  (British title > "A Dream of Sussex", I believe)
		- probably my next favorite to Inverted, but nothing like it.
	"The Glamour"
	        - which I'm reading now and is very psychological in nature.
	I also have two more novels at home whose titles I can't recall.
And a short story collection with "Summer" in the title ( great memory, huh?)
that I highly recommend. Some of these appeared in New Worlds and F&SF.

	I too would be interested in hearing from CP fans, especially from
Europe, where his books are much more available than in the US. What new
titles? Any complete bibliographies?	
	
						Brent

    I don't think this counts as a spoiler.  It's what I gleaned
    from what is now a long-ago reading:
    
    _Inverted_World_ is about the subjective replacement of spheres
    by pseudo-spheres (those things that look like two trumpet horns
    kissing).  This is a side effect of a machine on the people who
    tend it.  The machine is being moved from somewhere in Europe 
    along a path, going into central Asia, and the book is written
    from the point of view of one of the city of machine-tenders.
    
    From the existence of "natives" we would conclude that the effect
    is subjective rather than real, but the point-of-view characters
    feels the distortions and time-skews as real, and some evidence
    exists that they are real. Perhaps the machine twists its tenders
    in time as well as psychologically.
    
    I remember how disappointed I was that there was no appendix
    explaining what was going on.
    
    				-John Bishop

    
    	"The Glamour" notwithstanding, I haven't come seen anything by CP
    since about 1980. Up 'til then he'd written;
    
    	Fugue For A Darkening Island - Brilliant, but very "British". It may
    				       not travel well.
    	A Dream Of Wessex	     - A look at "reality". 	
    	Indoctrinaire		     - Probably his best known book in the
    				       UK. Very, good but I can't remember
    				       what it's about.
    	Iverted World		     - Another look at "reality"
    	An Infinite Summer	     - A collection of shorts.
    	The Space Machine	     - Unashamedly written in the style of
    				       H G Wells
    
    	WRT "Inverted World", I felt that as the book progressed the
    evidence of the machine's effects being "real" became very strong.
    How, why etc I'd love to know!
    
    		Ian G.

    The only book missing from your previous list is "The Affirmation",
    which preceded "The Glamour".  This is the biography of a bloke
    who is probably going mad.  It alternates between England, where
    he is having serious trouble with family, money and girlfriend and
    "The Dream Archipelego" (a setting for some of Priest's short stories).
    In the Dream Archipelego he undergoes a treatment that will make
    him immortal, with the unfortunate side effect of amnesia.  So he
    writes an account of his life, which later he discovers to contain
    references to fictional cities called "London" and "Manchester"....
    The most admirable part of the book is the vivid depiction of the
    alternate reality.  It leaves you surreptitiously touching the
    table-top to make sure it's really there!
    
    As you can see the underlying theme of this book is very similar
    to that of Inverted World.  I believe Priest intended the ending
    of Inverted World to be ambiguous.  The problem most readers have
    with the book is that it appears at first to be a traditional "big
    world" book like Misssion of Gravity or Ringworld, where everything
    is worked out down to the last differential equation.  When this
    expectation is not fulfilled, there is a feeling that you have been
    cheated.
    
    On Priest's future plans, I have read that there is a new novel
    in the pipeline, but I know no more than that.
    
    
    John
    
                                              

    
    	There are two more books available in the UK;
    
    	Realtime World, a collection of shorts and one other. I've left my
    notes at home so I can't remember the other title!
    
    
    		Ian G.

As I was reading _Perfect Lover_ (aka. _A Dream of Wessex_ in the UK.), I 
thought it was a pretty run-of-the-mill psych-thriller, until the last few
chapters that is.  Then it pretty much blew me away with its implications.
I mean downright frightening.

Wook (Is is live or is it projection?)