A Shift of Means
| Zine | |
|---|---|
| Title: | A Shift of Means |
| Publisher: | |
| Editor: | |
| Author(s): | Mary Lou Mendum |
| Cover Artist(s): | Janice St. Clair |
| Illustrator(s): | Gail Barton, Donell Meadows, and Mary Lou Mendum |
| Date(s): | October 1996 |
| Medium: | |
| Size: | |
| Genre: | |
| Fandom: | Sime~Gen |
| Language: | English |
| External Links: | |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
A Shift of Means is a gen and het Sime~Gen 123-page novel by Mary Lou Mendum.
It is the fourth A Companion in Zeor Special Edition.
The first printing was 100 copies. The art is by Janice St. Clair (cover), Gail Barton, Donell Meadows, and Mary Lou Mendum.
From the Introduction
Jacqueline Lichtenberg wrote the introduction, and she addressed both this novel and My Life Is My Own.
You hold in your hands the product of several years work by two of the most dedicated and talented writers in Sime/Gen fandom and you won't know the extent of their accomplishments until you read what they turn out after these novels.
"A Shift of Means" is a novel connected to Mary Lou Mendum's novellas previously published in Ambrov Zeor. "A Change of Mind and Heart" in AZ #19 and "A Legacy of Trust" in AZ #22.
[snipped]
SHIFT is set in one small Gen-Territory town where the Tecton has just begun to penetrate. LIFE is set in another very similar Gen-Territory town with a brand new Sime Center and Sime presence in town. SHIFT is set in a town with a university surrounded by farms and other very tiny towns. LIFE is set farther from intellectual centers and peopled with workaday folks who just want to be left alone to raise their families in peace—and murder their Sime children in peace—until the Mayor of the town defies the town council to contract with the Tecton for a Sime Center (for economic reasons more than for idealistic ones).
These two towns, invented independently by these two writers are so similar that when they began discussing it they realized the towns couldn't be very far from each other. They are even set at about the same point in history—and the main characters are contemporaries.
In future books, it turns out, these characters will cross paths and interact in such a way as to affect their lives and possibly S/G history.
Both of these novels are written by and for fans—that is for those who have read a couple of the professionally published novels and have an idea of what the world background is. The authors have taken pains to remind readers of some of the more obscure points of background but not to over-burden the story with explanations of things you already know.
The joy of reading such fiction free of laborious explanations is—to me—incomparable and I'm proud and delighted to be able to share this with you all.
The result is two totally unrelated novels, each about different aspects of life in the Sime/Gen universe, which have the same delicious feel to them. Genuine Sime/Gen; Genuine s/f; Genuine Art.
SHIFT has a more s/f feel to it because it has a scientific thesis at the core of the novel concept. It will teach you about social dynamics in a painless and even humorous way. And I think you'll come away from reading this novel with the feeling that you've made two new friends from in-Territory.
"My Life is My Own" stands more on the fantasy side of the formula, telling a totally character-generated and character/relationship driven story. It is great art because it delves into the life-stage process of growing up, and does it with unfailing honesty and warmth. It is great science fiction because it tells the story of an out-Territory born Gen youth grabbing control of his own life in a universe where that simple act is fraught with complex, alien, significance and hampered by unfair laws and restrictions upon which the entire, fragile new social order depends. No Sime may step over the line and interfere between an out-Territory Gen parent and his/her Gen child—not even when that child will be crippled for life by the parent's ignorance and prejudice.
Each of these novels focuses on ordinary people in this universe—people whose acts, lives, and destinies won't be recorded in the history books, people who won't make World News Headlines regularly, people like you and me, people who don't seem to "count" in the scheme of things, but for the sake of whom the "scheme of things" exists.
Both of these unique and independent books give us the full range and intensity of Sime/Gen drama the way I had originally intended to write it—before I learned some very harsh lessons about "the world out there."
The professional s/f field will not publish novels such as these, even if the backgrounding were fully realized, because they are not action-adventure and don't fit the sf formula. Yet as far as I personally am concerned, these two novels (and the previous two novels Ambrov ZeorlCompanion in Zeor brought to you—Icy Nager by Andrea Alton and Jacqueline Lichtenberg and The Only Good Sime by Kerry Lindemann-Schaefer and Jacqueline Lichtenberg—are far better than most of what's available on the stands today.