John DeChancie:The Kruton Interface

I didn't care much for DeChancie's Castle Perilous when I first read it. It had some neat ideas, but on the whole I thought the writing could have been much better. And since I had so much else to read, I left DeChancie alone for a while.

Well, getting to know an author, even on the Net(Fidonet SF, to be precise) makes one inclined to give him a second chance. The Kruton Interface was the first that presented itself. I can only hope it's not representative.

It has problems. Okay, I know, or can guess, why it has most of them. It was originally a play--I presume also written by DeChancie. It's humour, which is also tricky to try--and the kind of humour that works well on stage does not necessarily work well in book form. I kept reading it and saying, "If I saw this on stage, I'd be laughing my ass off." But I was not, at the time, laughing my ass off reading it on the page. Perhaps someone with a more vivid imagination would.

I'd love to see the play someday. And I will continue to try DeChancie's other stuff--I've heard his Starrigger books are good, and Magicnet(from those with advance copies)...but this one just kept missing.

%A DeChancie, John
%T The Kruton Interface
%I Ace
%C New York
%D September 1993
%G ISBN 0-441-14227-3
%P 185 pp.
%O Paperback, US$5.99, Can$4.50

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The Den of Ubiquity / Aaron V. Humphrey / alfvaen@gmail.com