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 ...
More details »Looking Back
We meet Ronald Reagan
We needed a break, and saw that the USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) was paying a call at Santa Barbara this weekend. The RR is the newest of the Nimitz-class nucular aircraft carriers. (Sorry, we have to call them nucular until that asshole in the White House is gone.) And Sunday is the day they set up Arlington West on the beach. So I ...
More details »Novels
Millennium
In the skies over Oakland, California, a DC-10 and a 747 are about to collide. And in the far distant future, a time-travel team is preparing to snatch the passengers, leaving prefabricated smoking bodies behind for the rescue teams to find. And an air disaster investigator gets a phone call that changes his life … and the world as we know it.
This novel was based on John’s ...
More details »Movie Reviews
Far From the Madding Crowd
“Madding” at this time meant “frenzied.” I’ve always wondered about that. This is one of those I missed when new, and I seem to be catching up on a lot of missed big movies lately. So be it. I enjoyed it, but more for the widescreen spectacle than for the story, which I found to be frequently frustrating. But I get that way when I see people making stupid choices, particularly beautiful ...
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 ...
More details »Short Fiction
Blue Champagne
No matter the technological wonders that come to pass, it is still a story of human needs and desires that effervesce.
More details »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.
More details »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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