he John Varley Reader is a collection of 18 stories, most of which are science fiction, first published in the 1970s and 1980s. Many take place in a future history called the Eight Worlds, in the centuries after enigmatic aliens take over the Earth and destroy all human civilization on the planet, leaving mankind to continue unimpeded elsewhere in the solar system. Most of these stories take place on the moon, where human society continues to thrive and evolve in various domed cities and ecological parks called Disneylands, and people can easily change gender. One of the stories in this collection is being published for the first time, and all are preceded by introductions by the author that put them in historical context.
"Picnic on Nearside" is the touching tale of two preteens who run away from their parents for an adventure on the nearly deserted side of the moon facing Earth, where they discover an old hermit living among the ruins. In "Overdrawn at the Memory Bank," a man who mentally inhabits a lion in the Kenya Disneyland must live temporarily within the virtual reality of his memory storage cube while his misplaced body is located. "The Phantom of Kansas" involves using weather as an art form in a Kansas Disneyland. "Beatnik Bayou" is another touching coming-of-age story involving children who are assigned to teachers who inhabit young bodies and serve as companions. "Tango Charlie and Foxtrot Romeo" is about a young girl who is the only human survivor in a degenerating orbital space station quarantined for centuries due to a fatal alien infection. "Options" is set in the early days of the Eight Worlds and involves the emotional trauma and joy faced by those considering gender changes.
"In the Hall of the Martian Kings" is a story of transcendental discovery as a group of explorers on Mars are stranded and must survive on their own for years. "Gotta Sing, Gotta Dance" involves a symbiotic team of humans and entities that help them survive working in the outer reaches of the solar system, with a side effect being the ability to create symphonies of extraordinary beauty. "Air Raid" is about time travelers who rescue doomed airline crash victims to save a degenerating future humanity. "The Persistence of Vision" involves a commune of deaf and blind people who develop a unique culture and lifestyle. "The Pusher" is the tale of a long-haul spacer who befriends unattended young girls at playgrounds for his own surprising and affecting reasons.
"Press Enter" is a murder mystery involving computer networks and artificial intelligence. "The Barbie Murders" is a murder mystery where both killer and victims are a cult of identical, androgynous humans, and "The Bellman," published here for the first time, is a murder mystery where the victims are all pregnant women. Both take place on the moon and share the same protagonist, Anna-Louise Bach.
Four other more recent stories are included. "Just Another Perfect Day" involved a character who loses his recent memories each night but still manages to play an important role in his future world. "In Fading and Dying Moons" involves enigmatic aliens that seem benign, at least at first. "The Flying Dutchman" is a supernatural horror story with a unique vision of hell. "Good Intentions" is an offbeat political deal-with-the-devil story.
Unique and memorable visions
From the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, John Varley wrote some of the best science-fiction stories ever to appear in the genre. The milieus and characters he created, particularly those involving the Eight Worlds, continue to be memorable for anyone who was reading SF during that seminal period in his writing career. This volume collects all of his most memorable short fiction (with at least one exception, the 1981 novella "Blue Champagne," which is inexplicably missing) and also includes insightful story introductions by Varley that provide new insights into the life and works of one of the field's most distinctive minds. (Among the least of these surprising insights is that the Anna-Louise Bach stories are not actually set in the Eight Worlds future.)
Varley's characters are also among the most memorable in science fiction, usually because of their inter-relationships. His child protagonists are especially unforgettable. Detective Anna-Louise Bach, in "The Barbie Murders" and "Bellman," is one of the better SF protagonists ever created. The male protagonist and young deaf and blind girl in "The Persistence of Vision" are hauntingly memorable. Cleo and her conservative husband in "Options" are equally unforgettable, as are Victor Apfel and Lisa Foo in "Press Enter." (Interestingly, most of Varley's best characters are female, which makes him almost unique among male SF authors—in the only other comparable situation in the SF field, James Tiptree Jr. turned out to be a pseudonym for Alice Sheldon.)
But despite the strong characters and unpredictable storylines common to Varley's best stories, the real stars are the startlingly original milieus and the philosophical debates these stories implant in the minds of the reader about what it means to be human. Reading John Varley's fiction leads one to question many of our most basic assumptions. Varley's fiction is "mind-expanding" in a way found only in truly superior science fiction. Despite all of the tragedy, fear and traumas involved in his stories, Varley's characters and societies feel interesting and right in ways that make one want to get to know them better, and maybe even visit them.
What more can you ask for in your entertainment?
