VANTAGE POINT NEWS

JUNE/JULY 1992

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Permanent Address:

PO Box 290

Monsey, NY 10952

Sime/Gen Fandom Addresses:

Endorsed Books, PO Box 290, Monsey, NY 10952

Katie Filipowicz: (street address removed), Spring Valley, NY 10977

CHANGE! Donell Meadows: Registrar of Householdings, c/o Kerry L-Schaefer

Kerry Lindemann-Schaefer: A/Z (street address removed), Morehead City, NC 28557

CHANGE! Karen Litman: Companion In Zeor, (streed address removed), McKee City, NJ 08232 (she didn't move, the PO changed her address).

Jean Lorrah: Empire Books, PO Box 625, Murray, KY 42071

CHANGE! Kraith Collected: Pat Kennedy and Bill Hupe, (street address removed), East Lansing, MI 48823.

NEW! S/G APA Karen S. Boyer (street address removed), New Lenox IL 60451

CHANGE! S/G Alt. Univ. Welcommittee, Linda Whitten, (street address removed), Colorado Springs, CO 80904.

Kerry Lindemann-Schaefer may have some address updates that I don't have. There has been a lot going on in S/G fandom this last year, but I've been distracted. I'm back in New York now, resettled and going back to work on new projects.

My agent got me a 2 book contract to start a new byline in a new field, but the publisher has sworn us to secrecy about it. Some years from now, it may be possible to reveal the details, so those completist collectors who want all my work may file long-term SASES with me labeled "New Byline" and you'll be notified when that's possible. Figure 5 or 6 years.

File SASE now with Endorsed Books for the next VANTAGE POINT NEWS which will be available for a Self Addressed Stamped Envelope labeled VPN.

As many of you know, I've been working on a number of projects that haven't crystallized yet, though I've mentioned them in these VPN addenda. The latest addition to the list is a script project for a feature film, a real long-shot, but worth a try. Keep a SASE on file for Vantage Point News and if/when anything comes of that, you'll be notified in time to go see the movie. Again, consider 5 years or so.

I've also placed some of the articles I'd written for SF&F Forum with a new magazine called MIDNIGHT ZOO - which does horror, sf, and fantasy shorts up to 15,000 wds. Info: SASE Midnight Zoo, (street address removed), PO Box 8040, Walnut Creek, CA 94596, 415 942-5116. That is the article on identifying the new genre I have seen (and written in mostly) which I call INTIMATE ADVENTURE. That article was in the September issue, '92. November issue carried a reprint of RECOMPENSE. December special issue will have a new, never before published story of mine called MOTHER'S CURSE. Kerry Lindemann-Schaefer and Donell Meadows are also both selling to MIDNIGHT ZOO.

When I got back to CA in October, I wrote a very short nonfiction booklet on Tarot. There's commercial interest but it has to be revised. This is part of my NOT SO MINOR ARCANA project, and info on it can be had for SASE, as usual.

When I finished that, I wrote half of another (new universe) space adventure novel about a pilot and a damsel in distress, but I didn't finish it before the new book contract came through. Maybe I will some day. I also have an idea (as yet not even outlined) for another sort of vampire - more romantic and dashing than usual - for a category romance.

Also a Sime/Gen Concordance was finally produced and published fannishly. It was masterminded by John Shimwell, who died suddenly just a few months later. He was a young man, personable, charming, enthusiastic, and brilliant in the offbeat way common among sf writers. Karen S. Boyer is attempting to carry on his work with a new edition, and there has been some tentative interest in the Concordance as a professional publication when/if the S/G series is revived.

Karen Boyer has also started a Sime/Gen APA - Amateur Press Alliance. This is a small group of people who each contribute 10 or 20 copies of a one page NONFICTION contribution which Karen then binds into fanzine format and sends out to each of the 10 or 20 people involved, creating a collaborative fanzine discussing Sime/Gen and related topics. Such an APA can grow to be as large as 30 or 50 members. You can not, however, get a copy of this publication without contributing regularly to it. For further details SASE Karen S. Boyer address above.

Karen Boyer has also begun writing S/G fiction and you may see her name in Ambrov Zeor or CZ someday soon.

Both THOSE OF MY BLOOD and DREAMSPY are officially out-of-print at St. Martin's (in hardcover.) From time to time has been a tentative stirring of interest in doing a paperback of BLOOD which is now available in Spain in Quality Paperback format. But so far there is no paperback in sight. Therefore I will proceed with plans to put out a computer printout in reduced type because we are totally out of stock on THOSE OF MY BLOOD. DREAMSPY however went into a second printing and I was able to pick up enough copies to last for years.

A smashing, rave review of THOSE OF MY BLOOD has been printed in a new Vampire fanclub review publication called ONYX, which is published by a S/G fan: Mark Williams, (street address reviewed), N. Canton, OH 44720. A later issue carries an article from me about why I write vampire stories.

My nonfiction STAR TREK book, STAR TREK LIVES! may be reprinted. We've finally got the rights from Bantam.

Mary Lou Mendum has just completed a novel length S/G story destined for an upcoming Ambrov Zeor about the characters she introduced in her first story for us. I absolutely love this novel.

Meanwhile, S/G fans are producing S/G novels themselves, it seems there will be more issues of Ambrov Zeor. And there will be 2 Special Editions of novels by fans that I wanted to sell before the market collapsed. Both are good enough to publish professionally. For info or to submit, SASE Kerry Lindemann-Schaefer, (street address removed), Morehead City, NC 28557.

The writing-workshop circle of S/G writers is growing and thriving and welcoming new members who are seriously interested in mastering the craft. If you're interested, SASE Kerry and enclose a S/G short story of your own. Collaborations also welcome. We got a wondrously imaginative piece from two collaborators who blended BLAKES' SEVEN into S/G. That has been sent back for rewrite but I don't know if it will succeed. Someone recently volunteered to take over circulating manuscripts among our writer's circle, but I've forgotten who or I'd have put the address on our masthead. (Please write me again whoever you are!)

KRAITH COLLECTED, my fanzine STAR TREK universe stories created jointly by as many as 50 people back in the 1970's has been taken over by the largest active ST 'zine press currently publishing non-K/S stories, and Kraith has experienced a surge of orders and a new popularity in England, too. Kraith, as some of you may recall, won me the first Memory Alpha Surak award voted by ST fans some years ago. See above for the new address.

Though Katie Filipowicz is no longer publishing a S/G 'zine, she has worked herself to a frazzle covering the Endorsed Books desk while I was gone. A lot of my titles are out of print now, but with the help of a small army of S/G fen with compatible computers, we are in the process of putting the books I wrote on typer onto disk. Once that is done, we should be able to produce printouts (not fanzines or bound books, but very tiny print printouts) for those who are missing certain titles and can't find them. These will be expensive since we are not interested in "publishing" the books - i.e. make a lot of copies and then try to sell them - but personally, I can't stand the thought of someone wanting one of my books and being unable to get them. Katie has been helping with this and urging me to do a new VPN.

People involved in S/G activities who want their departments covered in the next VPN should send me the text of what you want printed (no more than 4 or 5 sentences, please) and any Change of Addresses.

Live Long and Prosper,

Jacqueline Lichtenberg