Here are two different signed, limited edition anthologies from different publishers that, spine-out, look a whole lot like each other because they were printed using the same printing and binding technology. Chalker/Ownings called it the “Newcomer-Dikty process,” which turned out to be an early example of what became “Print On Demand” publishing, though both books below are true first editions with defined print runs.
Science Fiction writer Ben Bova has died at age 88. He was an important writer and editor, with a stint at Analog before becoming the first fiction editor of Omni.
Bova had been writing science fiction for longer than I’ve been alive. I read a fair amount of his work in my youth, with Millennium, City of Darkness and The Dueling Machine being particular favorites, Indeed, I remember checking out City in Darkness from the middle school library before first period, and read the whole thing by the end of the school day.
Ben was a friendly acquaintance, and we chatted at various conventions and signings over the years. This photo is from the 2014 London Worldcon.
He will be missed.
And here’s Part 2 of those London Worldcon pics.
Note that some pictures are labeled “…and company.” This is code for “I’m slightly less embarrassed about not remembering your name a year later than I would be about getting it wrong.”
The lovely and talented Gail Garriger contemplates her next cup of tea.
It’s only a matter of time until leopard-skin gloves are all the rage…
Tobias Buckell, straight from his performance in Hipsters of the Caribbean.
I’m 99% sure this is Martin Hoare with David Langford. After all, it’s Worldcon. How many bearded, gray-haired men with glasses could there be?
Apropos of nothing in particular, here’s Mike Walsh.
John Kessel.
John Kessel in jacket.
John Kessel in jacket and the shoes he stole from Lew Shiner.
Michael Bulmlein.
Jo Walton contemplates the five kilometer hike to her next panel.
Your Humble Narrator and Ian McDonald.
Stephen Baxter, taking a short break from 100,000 words of galaxy smashing.
The ageless Ben Yalow. He stays the same while the original painting for Confessions of a Crap Artist gets older.
Signs of the horrific mental degeneration that comes from being a science fiction bookseller…
Just ask George Locke!
Charlie Stross, caught in the middle of a very geeky plan for world domination.
Ben Bova.
Ben Bova and Your Humble Narrator.
Lawrence Watt-Evans.
Lawrence Watt-Evans and company.
Lawrence and Lawrence, coming this fall to Fox!
Matthew Hughes
Ann VanderMeer
Jeff and Ann VanderMeer.
Stephen Jones.
Joe Haldeman, Gay Haldeman and Jim Burns.
John Douglas.
Michael Swanwick, yet again.
“Come, Mrs. Peel, we’re needed!”
Henry Wessels, rocking the seersucker.
John Clute and company.
Teddy Harvia fooling around with a married woman known only as “Mrs. Thayer.”
Robert Jackson Bennett, who I somehow had to travel 5,000 miles to see.
Andrew Porter.
Scott Edelman.
Jeff Orth, one of the three chairs of the 2016 Kansas City Worldcon. Expect him to look approximately 30 years older 380 days from now.
James Patrick Kelly, of the Gets-photographed-a-lot-at-Worldcons Patrick Kellys.
Has anyone seen Jack Dann and Russell Blackford in the same room at the same time?
Janeen Webb.
Betsy Mitchell.
Just another random roundup of signed books, three from L.W. Currey’s $10 sale (more about which Real Soon), and one from eBay.
Why both De Camp and Leiber seem thoroughly out of fashion these days is an essay for another day…