We Learn Only To Ask More Questions.

The Reader Has Certain Rights. He Bought Your Story. Think Of This As An Implicit Contract. He's Entitled To Be Entertained, Instructed, Amused; Maybe All Three. If He Quits In The Middle, Or Puts The Book Down Feeling His Time Has Been Wasted, You're In Violation.

For Each Human Being There Is An Optimum Ratio Between Change And Stasis. Too Little Change, He Grows Bored. Too Little Stability, He Panics And Loses His Ability To Adapt. One Who Marries Six Times In Ten Years Won't Change Jobs. One Who Moves Often To Serve His Company Will Maintain A Stable Marriage. A Woman Chained To One Home And Family May Redecorate Frantically Or Take A Lover Or Go To Many Costume Parties.

One Mark Of A Good Officer, He Remembered, Was The Ability To Make Quick Decisions. If They Happen To Be Right, So Much The Better.

Spray A Book With Insect Spray, Drop It In A Bag, Add Some Mothballs And Seal It. Put It In Another Bag And Seal It. Another. The Packages Piled Up On The Floor, Each A Book Sealed In Four Plastic Envelopes.

Sf Isn't A Genre; Sf Is The Matrix In Which Genres Are Embedded, And Because The Sf Field Is Never Going In Any One Direction At Any One Time, There Is Hardly A Way To Cut It Off.