DUNE 7 BLOG

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Slan Hunter Delivered

After delivering the final manuscript of HUNTERS, and while Rebecca finishes her final rewrite of CRYSTAL DOORS: OCEAN REALM, I turned to the next project on the stack, giving my final read, edit, and polish of the manuscript for SLAN HUNTER (described in the December 23 blog). I finally delivered the manuscript yesterday, and now I want to take a break for a couple of days to catch up on hundreds of small things before I turn to the next revision of SANDWORMS.

This novel is much thinner (290 pages, 73,000 words) than a DUNE book, and the flavor is much more golden-age Science Fiction, heavily influenced by the pulp magazines and A.E. Van Vogt's original style. I believe Van Vogt's "big ideas" and complex machinations were a clear precursor to the work of Frank Herbert.

A.E. Van Vogt's widow Lydia has written a very touching introduction to how SLAN HUNTER came about, how her husband worked so hard to get this book started before Alzheimer's robbed him of his creativity and concentration. The novel won't be out for about a year, but Lydia has given me permission to post her introduction here.

The loss of Frank Herbert was a great blow to us all, but he continued writing up until his last day, finishing a brief article on advice to writers. A.E. Van Vogt also struggled to keep writing for as long as his mind functioned.

--KJA

== INTRODUCTION ==

It is wonderful to be asked to tell the story of the evolution of SLAN HUNTER -- or SLAN II as our family knew it for years.

Since its original publication in 1940, SLAN has continued to be Van's most popular novel. There have been fan clubs, discussion groups, countless articles and dissertations, and even a commune inspired by SLAN. The novel remains in print to this day, half a century after its original publication.

Van and others discussed possibility of a sequel over the years, but nothing was ever seriously considered until my son, Greg, began pursuing the idea with Van in late 1988. Moved by his enthusiasm and his view that SLAN and its fans deserved a conclusion to the story, Van told Greg to put together his ideas, and they would go from there. By mid 1989 a working outline had been completed, and Van began writing the actual novel.

Prior to this, neither Greg nor I had actually been involved in the creation of one of Van's works. Though we knew, to an extent, how he wrote notes of ideas and dialogue, we did not know how he put it all together. Van usually took a year to get to the final draft of a novel, so we gave him his space to create.

As he continued to add pages of work to the working files of SLAN II, the project seemed to be moving along quite well. At the beginning of 1990, however, an unexpected conversation regarding the choice of endings for the novel raised concerns with us that things were not as they seemed. We had offered different possible endings in the outline, depending on whether Van and the publishers wanted to do a third SLAN novel and/or a prequel. In this conversation, though, Van seemed completely unaware of the issue that had already been discussed many times, and further conversations revealed a very troubling picture. His work on the new novel had progressed, but not nearly as far as we had been led to believe.

We had known for a few years that Van's memory was diminishing, and while we consulted doctors, they attributed the problems to "just getting older" and did not express a great deal of concern. This was now, however, much more serious than a touch of old age senility.

Van was a remarkably intelligent man. None of us realized how effectively he had used that intelligence to mask the grip Alzheimer's was beginning to have on his mind. It is so painful to think back now, knowing how frightened, confused, and frustrated he must have been. He would have realized something terrible was happening to his brain's ability to remember and cohesively tie thoughts together; try as he might, he could not stop it from progressing. All Van could do was use his brilliance and wit to conceal those months of total bewilderment.

With the sad reality now exposed, we began in earnest to find out all we could about what was actually happening to him and what we could do about it. At that time, information on the disease was sketchy, and doctors actually seemed reluctant to commit to a specific diagnosis. It wasn't until late 1990 that doctors stopped referring to Van's condition as senility or dementia, and recognized that he was suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

What had begun as an exciting new project for Van and the beginning of a new era of family involvement, was now tragically a realization of what the family's focus would be from that point forward. Van endured and struggled with this progressively debilitating disease until it took his life and last brilliant thought on January 26, 2000.

As you can imagine, the completion of this novel means a great deal to me and our family. Not only does SLAN HUNTER complete Van's last great project, incorporating his ideas, characters, and dialogue; it is a fun, grand adventure reminding us of the inventiveness and forward thinking of one of the grand masters of the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

I must express my deepest and most sincere thanks to Kevin J. Anderson. Without his interest, dedication, and tremendous talent, the dream of a sequel to SLAN would not have come true, and this book would not be in your hands today. Seldom is an author given the opportunity to be re-born in the public eye. Kevin's inspiration and determination have brought that opportunity to my beloved husband A.E. van Vogt. From the bottom of my heart and Van's, "Thank you," Kevin.

Throughout his life, almost everything A.E. van Vogt studied had to do with people: how they thought, felt, loved, or pursued their dreams. A review of his works, fiction or non-fiction, shows us how devoted he was to the idea of helping us see ourselves more clearly, helping us find better ways to achieve our goals, helping us become better than we already were -- helping us, if you will, become like slans.

Ultimately, I believe, this is what people saw in him and his work, and why to this day he has so many wonderful fans. The outpouring of letters and internet discussions from all of you after his death was so overwhelming to me that, to this day, I am overcome with emotion thinking about it. Thank you all so very much for all of your kind and heart-warming thoughts about my wonderful husband, A.E. van Vogt.

Lydia van Vogt