Adzel:
sings Fafner for the San Francisco Opera Company around the Solar Commonwealth;
wins unlimited meals at the Silver Dragon Chinese Food and Chop Suey Palace by parading as the dragon during the newly revived Lunar New Year celebrations;
uses connections gained through his League scholarship to persuade a Master Merchant to accept Jim Ching as an apprentice.
The Earth Book presents an Adzel trilogy:
in "How To Be Ethnic...," Adzel is a student on Earth;
in "Day of Burning," he is in the trade pioneer crew with David Falkayn and Chee Lan as they spearhead the League intervention to protect Merseia from the radioactivity caused by the nearby supernova, Valenderay;
in "Lodestar," he is with the team when they are confronted by Nicholas van Rijn at Mirkheim.
In American future historical writing, a main line of development begins with Robert Heinlein's Future History time chart and culminates, in my opinion, with Poul Anderson's The Earth Book Of Stormgate. In passing from time chart to Earth Book, we have switched authors and future histories and have not even reached the end of Anderson's Technic History. However, I think the Earth Book embodies what Heinlein had intended in his chart, a detailed fictional future.
4 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I can't help but sometimes think you place too much stress on THE EARTH BOOK. It only collects some of the Technic stories, after all.
Merry Christmas! Sean
Sean,
THE EARTH BOOK:
collects twelve stories, including the first van Rijn story and his solo novel;
covers the period from first contact with Ythri to the colonization of Corona;
thus, is a future history in its own right;
brings back the League;
combines Ythrians and League;
presents a lot of new background info through Hloch's introductions.
Paul.
Also, THE EARTH BOOK:
because its introductions are sequels to THE PEOPLE OF THE WIND, refers to the pre-Flandry Terran Empire;
introduces Ythrians, the Ythrian New Faith, Avalon, Adzel and Merseia and refers to Aeneas;
completes the story of the Polesotechnic League and almost completes the story of human-Ythrian interactions;
includes Anderson's Christmas story.
Kaor, Paul!
All of these are good and true points, and helps to bridge the long gaps in the Technic timeline. Such as the Time of Troubles and the first three or four centuries of the Empire before ENSIGN FLANDRY.
Merry Christmas! Sean
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