{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/sflovers/83",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "sflovers",
  "thread": {
    "id": 83,
    "subject": "Anyone read Gene Wolfe: Free Live Fr",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1990-06-25T20:37:43+00:00",
    "last": "1990-06-25T20:37:43+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<sflovers-v15-240-12@digest.sf-lovers>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Eric M. VAn",
        "address": "72717.3247 at compuserve.com"
      },
      "date": "1990-06-25T20:37:43+00:00",
      "subject": "Re: Anyone read Gene Wolfe: Free Live Fr",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Ahh, Free Live Free.  Give it a 3 for Wolfe, a 4.5 for the world at large.\nBy way of comparison, I'd give There are Doors a 2.5 and 4, respectively.\nIt's worth noting that Free Live Free is the Wolfe novel that There Are\nDoors is most like, easily, but Free Live Free is much sunnier.\n \nI thought it was a ton of fun.  I agree with the critical consensus that\nthe plot machinations, especially at the end, don't really add up/work.\nThe Tor editions contain an appendix, a chronology to help explicate the\ntime-travel stuff, that Wolfe put together reluctantly at the request of\nhis editors.  Which is where I might point out that there's *two* versions\nof the book: the original (and by Wolfe, preferred) from Mark V. Ziesing -\na handsome, oversize, illustrated hardcover (still in print), and the later\ntext in hardcover and paperback from Tor. The later version, rewritten a\nbit by Wolfe at the request of editor David Hartwell, omits a chapter and\ncondenses the early action so as to get the mystery-novel plot moving\nquicker.\n \nI found neither point to be a problem in my first reading, by the way, but\nthat's probably because I knew and loved Wolfe and trusted him to take me\nwhere he wanted to take me.  I think Hartwell was editing with the\nnew-to-Wolfe reader in mind, and was hoping that this could be a breakout\nbook for him.  (Ironically, it's his latest and weakest in years -\nCastleview, which offers a gripping read, some typically amusing Wolfe\nconundrums (and their concomitant loose ends and lacks of explanations) and\nnot much else, that was an alternate choice of the BOMC).\n \nAs far as some of the other comments re Wolfe in this thread, I just have\nto differ about Peace: I think it's one of Wolfe's three masterpieces, and\narguably the finest fantasy novel ever written (adjective chosen with care:\nThe Lord of the Rings remains the *greatest* fantasy novel ever written, I\nthink).  Last time I asked him, it was his own favorite of his books.\n \nAnd we ought to mention the short story collections, all of which are\nsuperb.  It's hard to imagine now, but back before The Book of The New Sun\nthere were those who wondered if Wolfe was another Bradbury or Ellison,\nbasically a short story writer (since Operation Ares was weak, The Fifth\nHead of Cerberus actually three linked novellas, and Peace, by most,\nunread)!\n \n[In defense of Operation Ares, we do have to mention that the MS. as\npublished was about half of what Wolfe wrote, and that the editing was done\nrather rapidly by Gene, if I recall correctly, that is.]\n \nWe should also mention Pringle's potato chips, since Gene, back long ago in\nthe real world, headed the team that designed the machine that makes them!\n \nBy the way, David Hartwell tells me that Gene is at work on a science\nfiction novel that he (uncharacteristically, I might add) refuses to say\nmore about.  Might this be the major Wolfe work we've waited for since\nThe Book of the New Sun? (There's another novel, a straight mystery he\nwrote some years ago, that should be out within the next year.)\n \nEric M. Van"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}