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I was home sick yesterday, so I had a chance to sit on the couch and read [i]To Everything That Was [/i]in its entirety.
First, it was long — on the order of 300 pages, I’d estimate (it’s not paginated.)
Second, the stories varied in quality from so-so to pretty darn good. John Byrne was an excellent artist even very early in his career, with an unmistakeable style. I really enjoyed his work in “Demonstar”, “Flotsam” and “Survival”. The art from the [i]Look-In [/i]issues is great (even if Archaia had to “squeeze” it a little to fit it to the modern page format, making some panels look like uncorrected CinemaScope…) but the stories are kinda confusing, That may be an artifact of the “Remastering” process, in which new narrative arcs have been grafted onto the original material (not unlike the process Powys used when putting together the Year Two omnibus, but less convincingly.)
Third, I enjoyed reading this enough to go on an E-Bay hunt for as many of the original Charlton comics and magazines as I could afford. I look forward to reading the original versions of these stories. Anyone know an easy way to get the [i]Look-In [/i]stories? I’m reluctant to pay E-Bay prices for a couple years worth of weekly magazines with only 2 pages of [i]Space: 1999 [/i]content in each issue. Were these stories ever collected anywhere?
Finally, despite some deviations from Powysverse assumptions (Koenig and Russell are married earlier, and Helena is pregnant with a daughter by the end of the book, for example) I would unreservedly recommend this collection. It and its predecessor, [i]Aftershock and Awe[/i], are solid additions to the [i]Space: 1999 [/i]”canon.”
I’m feeling better today, thanks for asking!
Space: 1999: To Everything that Was, arrived today courtesy of Amazon.
It’s a thick trade paperback (it was solicited as a hardcover, but I guess that would’ve been too costly) very much along the lines of “Aftershock and Awe”
Interestingly, they include a couple Powysverse books in their timeline at the end ([i]The Forsaken [/i]and [i]The Whispering Sea[/i])
I’ll try and read it soon and post what I think.
It worked for me, too.
I took the opportunity of ordering the [i]Compendium[/i] (2 copies — 1 to read, one for the “collection) and ordered another copy of [i]Resurrection[/i], since I only have 1 copy.
The Lulu coupon code NOVBOOKS12 got me 20% off my order, which was nice — essentially, I got one book free.
Looking forward to reading [i]Phoenix [/i]– I already have one of the “convention” copies, so the Lulu copy will be for reading.
Finally got around to buying & reading [i]Android Planet [/i](I was planning to wait and order it the same time as [i]Phoenix of Megaron [/i]to save some shipping costs, but finally bit the bullet and ordered around the beginning of December.)
It was a pleasant read. There was nothing that jumped out as being rewritten, so I salute you for a job well done in making the changes mesh perfectly with the pre-existing text.
The typos were a bit out of control, however. I marked a good dozen in the first half of the book. The second half was considerably cleaner, with only a single typo catching my eye.
I have to say again that the font used is far too small and not at all reader-friendly. Serif fonts are a lot easier to read, at least for me. I understand you’re aiming for a consistent look to your releases, but please PLEASE consider a different, bigger font for future titles.([i]Eternity Unbound [/i]is a far more pleasant reading experience because of the choice of font.) My ideal preference would be for e-book versions, which would allow me to make the text as large and serif-y as I want, but as that’s not in the cards, the next best alternative would be to acknowledge that some of your readers are on the wrong side of 50, and take pity on us with a bigger, easier-reading font.
I’ve seriously considered OCR-ing the books and making e-books out of them for my own use. I want to read them, but don’t want to have to lay a magnifying glass across the pages…
I got Muir’s book the other day for my Kindle. I was terribly disappointed. Not only is it riddled with embarrassing errors, it also displays a chip on Muir’s shoulder the size of the Starship [i]Enterprise[/i].
The fact that [i]Space: 1999[/i] isn’t [i]Star Trek[/i] is NOT the only reason some people don’t get into [i]1999[/i], as Muir seems to be trying to prove. I’d even venture that it’s not the primary reason. [i]Space: 1999[/i] succeeds or fails on its merits (or lack thereof) without reference to [i]Star Trek[/i]. Some people just don’t respond to [i]Space: 1999[/i]’s acting and writing style, no matter how much they may admire the production values and special effects.
In fact, it’s OK to like BOTH properties. I do. Muir needs to work through his Trek Envy if & when he does a second edition, and just write about [i]Space: 1999[/i].
I also tended to disagree with him on the relative merits of certain Year Two episodes. That’s OK. I tended to line up pretty much 100% with Wood’s assessments of episodes, so on that alone I tend to think Wood is the “better” critic. I mean, if he agrees with me, he MUST be right. 🙂
In my estimation, Wood’s book supplants Muir’s for most purposes I can think of. But, of course, YMMV and all the other usual disclaimers are in effect.
It’s really terrific. I’ve been using it as a supplement to my recent first-ever run through the Year Two episodes, and it’s added a lot to the experience.
Maybe that’s because I generally agree with Woods’s ratings of the individual episodes (even if I generally rate them a bit lower than he does, we agree on which are good and which are bad.)
Much better — more detailed and more accurate — than any other “1999” episode guide I’ve read.
Wow. What a weird prohibition.
I imagine ITV’ll figure it out in another decade or so, when physical books are only printed as Limited Edition Collectibles, and everybody reads from some kind of e-reader. 😉
My copy came yesterday and I was reading it last night and this morning (Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it!)
One purely logistical issue: the font you use in the book is kind of hard to read. Now that I’m on the wrong side of 50, I appreciate the readability of a serif font. I also love reading on my iPad, because I can customize the font to suit my eyesight.
Has there been any consideration made to releasing Powys books as e-books? I’d go back and re-buy them all, if I could get them in a version I could read on my iPad. I’d continue to buy the hardcopies, because I like having the “artifact” around, especially when it’s packaged as nicely as Powys books are. So essentially you’d be selling me two copies of each title. That’s got to help out the bottom line, right?
Plus, e-books need never go out of print.
