FREE/BARGAIN — Science Fiction & Fantasy

[ZodWallop]

Two Samuel Delaney sci-fi classics are on sale for $2 a piece at Amazon US. (Elsewhere they're full price.)

Babel-17

The Nebula Award Winner: “By looking at a typical space opera adventure from a different angle, Delany . . . give[s] us a weird, welcoming book” (Tor.com).

At twenty-six, Rydra Wong is the most popular poet in the five settled galaxies. Almost telepathically perceptive, she has written poems that capture the mood of mankind after two decades of savage war. Since the invasion, Earth has endured famine, plague, and cannibalism—but its greatest catastrophe will be Babel-17.

Sabotage threatens to undermine the war effort, and the military calls in Rydra. Random attacks lay waste to warships, weapons factories, and munitions dumps, and all are tied together by strings of sound, broadcast over the radio before and after each accident. In that gibberish Rydra recognizes a coherent message, with all of the beauty, persuasive power, and order that only language possesses. To save humanity, she will master this strange tongue. But the more she learns, the more she is tempted to join the other side...

Nova

A quest for a priceless element—and revenge—fuels this far-future interstellar adventure that “reads like Moby-Dick at a strobe-light show” (Time).

In 3172, the universe is divided between three political units: the stars and worlds of Draco, with Earth as its power center; the Pleiades Federation, on whose capital world, New Ark, lives the incredibly wealthy Von Ray family, descended from well-heeled merchants whose ancestors made their fortune as pirates; and the Outer Colonies, where, in their underwater mines, tiny quantities of the fabulously valuable Illyrion have been discovered. Lorq Von Ray was a playboy and young space-yacht-racing captain who, at a party at Earth’s Paris, clashed with Draco’s Prince Red. This sets Lorq on a demonic quest, through which he hopes to find vengeance.

When a star goes nova and implodes, in the seething stellar wreckage for a few days—even hours—lie tons of Illyrion, the element that makes interstellar travel possible. To help him secure the priceless fuel, Lorq recruits a gypsy musician, a would-be novelist, and some other ragtag misfits. But an even more dangerous fuel than Illyrion is revenge...

[maddz]

Originally Posted by Aleron Ives

I read the Modern Library version of 'Trouble With Lichen', and I didn't notice anything amiss with it. 'The Midwich Cuckoos' is only $2, so I bought it. Here's a word count breakdown by chapter:

Chapter 01: 1987
Chapter 02: 2644
Chapter 03: 1004
Chapter 04: 4226
Chapter 05: 944
Chapter 06: 2963
Chapter 07: 1759
Chapter 08: 1598
Chapter 09: 2443
Chapter 10: 3138
Chapter 11: 2208
Chapter 12: 1212
Chapter 13: 2690
Chapter 14: 4056
Chapter 15: 3493
Chapter 16: 8212
Chapter 17: 2932
Chapter 18: 7479
Chapter 19: 5560
Chapter 20: 2867
Chapter 21: 3167
Total: 66582

Perhaps some brave soul will compare with the UK EPUB?

For the UK Penguin Modern Classics edition, the counts are (using the Calibre Book Editor report):

Chapter 1: 1998 (header 6 words)
Chapter 2: 2660 (header 6 words)
Chapter 3: 1010 (header 4 words)
Chapter 4: 4250 (header 4 words)
Chapter 5: 945 (header 4 words)
Chapter 6: 2990 (header 5 words)
Chapter 7: 1783 (header 4 words)
Chapter 8: 1629 (header 4 words)
Chapter 9: 2458 (header 5 words)
Chapter 10: 3168 (header 6 words)
Chapter 11: 2232 (header 5 words)
Chapter 12: 1221 (header 4 words)
Chapter 13: 2722 (header 4 words)
Chapter 14: 4112 (header 4 words)
Chapter 15: 3531 (header 5 words)
Chapter 16: 8285 (header 6 words)
Chapter 17: 2966 (header 4 words)
Chapter 18: 7542 (header 6 words)
Chapter 19: 5601 (header 3 words)
Chapter 20: 2897 (header 3 words)
Chapter 21: 3189 (header 5 words)
Total: 67189

That's a difference of 607 words or 0.90%. Were you including the chapter headers in your count? If you weren't, the chapter headers count for 97 words which makes the difference 510 words or 0.76%.

So I would say that the difference is almost certainly down to localisation between the UK and the US markets. By all accounts, Wyndham's novels were edited for the US market - at the time, Americans would have been less familiar with British English and cultural references than they are now, and US publishers tended to change manuscripts heavily to make them more accessible for US readers. Quite apart from anything, the presence of untranslated Latin (and other languages) quotes would necessitate that - even I can't translate them now and I did Latin at school until I was 15.

It's possible that the original US paper releases suffered more, and many cuts may have been restored for the ebooks. The only way to know for sure is to find a copy of an original US paper release and compare it to the ebook.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Two Samuel Delaney sci-fi classics are on sale for $2 a piece at Amazon US. (Elsewhere they're full price.)

Babel-17


Nova

Delany , my good friend.

[salty-horse]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Two Samuel Delaney sci-fi classics are on sale for $2 a piece at Amazon US. (Elsewhere they're full price.)

These are on sale all the time, so I don't bother posting them.
Note that it's a better deal to get the omnibus that includes them along with Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand. It's frequently priced at $4.

BTW, I noticed that Open Road just published US e-book editions of Robert Silverberg's Majipoor novels. I'm tracking the omnibus edition of the first trilogy, so I'll let you know when it goes on sale.

[JSWolf]

Delaney wrote the most unreadable SF book ever.

[Manabi]

Originally Posted by maddz

So I would say that the difference is almost certainly down to localisation between the UK and the US markets. By all accounts, Wyndham's novels were edited for the US market - at the time, Americans would have been less familiar with British English and cultural references than they are now, and US publishers tended to change manuscripts heavily to make them more accessible for US readers. Quite apart from anything, the presence of untranslated Latin (and other languages) quotes would necessitate that - even I can't translate them now and I did Latin at school until I was 15.

I used to hate localization, but then I reread the Harry Potter books using the UK edition and realized that a lot of stuff that was changed wasn't consequential, but helped readers understand what was being talked about. (Things like names of common candies in the UK vs the US.) I will say that even though I had to look up some stuff to find out what it was, it did make the books feel even more "British," but there's not shortage of that in the localized ones.

That said, sometimes localization goes berserk and ruins things. I can't think of any books that's happened with, but several anime got utterly butchered when someone decided they had to be localized to hell and back for the US market. (The poster child being the dub of Cardcaptor Sakura, where the US studio heavily edited and rearranged the order of episodes, only airing 39 of 70, in large part to try and make the male appear to be the main character.)

If you can still read any Latin you're doing better than me with Spanish (two years in high school) and German (two years in college), both of which I've forgotten almost entirely.

[andyh2000]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Delaney wrote the most unreadable SF book ever.

Dhalgren? Started it, and very quickly stopped again.

Andrew

[maddz]

Originally Posted by Manabi

If you can still read any Latin you're doing better than me with Spanish (two years in high school) and German (two years in college), both of which I've forgotten almost entirely.

Amo, amas, amat, amamis, amatis, amant. That and mensa, mensa, mensam is about the only Latin I retain from nearly 60 years ago (apart from common Latin quotes). I certainly couldn't read any Virgil in the Latin now - and The Aeneid was one of our set texts. The more, ahem, interesting texts were not studied until university, although the Greek Literature in Translation course did include Aristophanes (which was rather glossed over at my convent school).

[Aleron Ives]

Originally Posted by maddz

Were you including the chapter headers in your count?

If you mean the chapter titles, then yes. If you mean some kind of quotation at the beginning of each chapter, the Modern Library version doesn't have those at all.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by andyh2000

Dhalgren? Started it, and very quickly stopped again.

Andrew

That's the one. I think Dhalgren was in a drug fueled state when he wrote that.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

Delany , my good friend.

Yeah, sorry. I posted that on a tablet using swipe on a keyboard that has Delaney but not Delany built in.

Originally Posted by salty-horse

These are on sale all the time, so I don't bother posting them.

I had just read a review of Nova and looked it up and hey, it was on sale. The next day-17 went on sale.

[Dr. Drib]

I've read about one-half of his works, most of them when they came out.

I still have a First Edition [paper, mint] of Dhalgren.

A masterpiece, one that transcends the term 'genre' fiction.

I'm going to go back and re-read most of his fiction, since it's been so many years since I've read him.

[ratinox]

Originally Posted by Manabi

That said, sometimes localization goes berserk and ruins things. I can't think of any books that's happened with, but several anime got utterly butchered when someone decided they had to be localized to hell and back for the US market. (The poster child being the dub of Cardcaptor Sakura, where the US studio heavily edited and rearranged the order of episodes, only airing 39 of 70, in large part to try and make the male appear to be the main character.)

Yes, well, that's not localization. What it is... is not polite to print.