Truth to Tell (Professionals zine)

Zine
Title:	Truth to Tell
Publisher:	Deathless Pros Press
Editor(s):	Alexfandra
Date(s):	August 1995
Series?:
Medium:	print
Size:
Genre:
Fandom:	Professionals
Language:	English
External Links:
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Truth to Tell is a slash 155-page (81,000 words, Palatino 12 point type) Professionals anthology. It contains B&W drawings by Joey Rodrigues.

Summaries below from the flyer:

• The Art of Love by Alexfandra ("A little melodrama. Bodie goes undercover in the art world, seeking the connection between two dead models and a KGB blackmail ring. Could Ray Doyle, an artist Bodie becomes quite attached to, be involved?")
• Memoirs of a Merc by Alexfandra ("A little fluff. The new Acting Controller of CI5 hires a "technical consultant" for a special job--William Bodie, celebrity author of "Memoirs of a Merc." Doyle is none too pleased about working with him, especially when he finds out Bodie is a fraud. Or is he?")
• Private Lives by Alexfandra ("A lot of romance. Doyle has been annoying everyone during his recovery from his shooting, so CI5 psychiatrist Kate Ross packs him off to a private beach house for a relaxing holiday, with Bodie as his minder. And she instructs them each to keep a journal during the stay. What they wind up writing about, and thinking about, and dreaming about, leads to a momentous discovery.")
• Careful What You Wish For by Gwyneth Rhys ("A lot of angst. Doyle wants Bodie and he gets him...but that's where the trouble begins. Now he stands to lose everything he cares about, including Bodie and CI5, in this story of guilt, loss, and the responsibilities that come with love.")

Sample Interior

interior by Joey Rodrigues

interior by Joey Rodrigues

Reactions and Reviews

See reactions and reviews for The Art of Love.

See reactions and reviews for Memoirs of a Merc.

See reactions and reviews for Private Lives.

See reactions and reviews for Careful What You Wish For.

[zine]: Disclaimer: In case anyone should doubt it, the opinions expressed in this review are 100% mine (not even tainted by Charlotte Hill, who's chained to the laptop writing Pros for NNWW4). Also, I'll admit(for those of you who don't know me so well) that I do have strong editing opinions, and things that niggle me often don't bother other readers. You have been warned!

Overall: This is a good no frills zine. Enjoyable but not outstanding. Grade: B

Presentation: I said no-frills, and I meant it. The cover is plain, the two column format is easy to read.

I would have rather had a few hyphens to break up some of the lines and a lighter font. It also could have been packed a little tighter on the page, but I recognize these as very minor complaints. I was not too fond of the interior artwork (2 pen & ink pieces). Grade: B

Value: 81,000 words of well-written Pros fiction for $13 is a very good price. Grade: A

Content: I'll go into each story individually below; these are overall comments. I enjoyed this zine. The writing was well done, with good description, handle of POV, sentence structure and word choice. I felt like I was reading an "old-time" Pros zine. I would have liked to see the editing go differently.

As I read the stories, a couple of them reminded me of old circuit favorites, and these did not fare well in the comparison. Given that, I wanted to see these stories tweaked a little, shifted from the "cliched" in to new arenas. What I saw of the writing leads me to believe that the authors were capable of doing a little more to make these stories stand out from the crowd. I wish they had been pushed a little farther. Writing quality: B. Editing: C.

The stories: (WARNING: Plot spoilers follow)

[See this fan's comments on the four stories on their individual pages.]

Conclusion: I enjoyed the zine, but not as much as I would have liked to . It motivated me to pull out old favorites, and enjoy them again. Absolutely worth the price and the read, but Truth to Tell left me feeling something missing.

There were two different editors on the zine, as well as feedback from others, and I wonder if that had an effect, good or bad. I'm wondering if a sort of "consensus" style of getting feedback is not as useful as finding one person who can bring out the best in a writer, and sticking solely with that person's editing comments. This is how Manacles operates, yes? The problem, I suppose, is finding that one person -- how do you know when you've got a really good writer/editor relationship going, how can you tell when someone has found a way to "push" you in the right direction? And how can you tell when to ignore group opinions?

Sometimes I worry that because there are so many writers & other creative types in our local gang, and because we "talk shop" a lot of the time, that we are subconsciously influencing each other's ideas and writing styles in subtle ways, ways that might not always be for the best. I *love* our writing get-togethers, but sometimes I worry that I'm writing for *them*, and not for me. A fine line to walk.

Thanks again for your comments--they've definitely given me something to think about.