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VarleyLog

We Bought a Tesla!

Here’s what happened. Lee came across what looked like a tiny, yellowing IOU at the bottom of some ancient records. It was from the Tooth Fairy, and she said she was a little short of cash and would pay me a dime the next night. It was dated May 8, 1954. I was seven! She’s still in business, you know, the Tooth Fairy, so Lee tracked her down and demanded payment. The old biddy was not ...

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Looking Back

Forest Whitaker Gets a STAR

When: Monday, April 16, 2007 at 11:30 a.m.

Location: 6801 Hollywood Blvd, near Highland.

I remember as a kid coming to the Walk of Fame. It was like a field trip and very exciting to us…. [The star represents] where I came from, and where I am going and hopefully where I am at right now. ~Forest Whitaker

Angela Bassett ...

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Novels

The Ophiuchi Hotline

Varley’s first novel. Cover by Boris Vallejo.

After the effortless capture of Earth by vastly superior aliens, humanity is forced to fight for existence on the Moon and other lumps of airless rock. The invention of the Hotline–a constant stream of data from a star in the constellation Ophiuchus–facilitates survival and enables the ...

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Movie Reviews

Johnny English

Rowan Atkinson is one of the funniest men alive, with his British television shows Mr Bean, The Thin Blue Line and, best of all, the Blackadder series, all of them 10 times as funny as anything that has ever been on American TV. So why are his movies so disastrous? Maybe that’s too harsh for More details »

Collections

Picnic on Nearside

Varley’s second story collection, originally published as The Barbie Murders and Other Stories in 1980.

Picnic on Nearside won the 1980 Locus Award for Best Single-Author Collection.

The title story, “Picnic ...

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Short Fiction

The Phantom of Kansas

Art can take many forms, some more obvious than others…

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Titan: An Overview

A Short Overview of Titan

Here's a very short but quite impressive video made by Jean-Paul Verne, a fly-through of Gaea from my trilogy. M. Verne wants to be involved if a movie ever gets made. Over the years many, many people have written to me wishing these books would be made into a movie. Naturally, I'd like that, too. Let's hope this is not as close as we'll ever get.

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Accidental Hippies

Accidental Hippies

Sometime not long after my high school graduation I was studying at Michigan State University when my long-time girlfriend dumped me. I entered such a state of depression that I could not continue in college. So I dropped out and decided to hit the road with Chris Kingsley, my best friend in the world. Chris had much more experience of life on the road than I did, had actually hitched to ...

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