Serial Killer
Words: © 1990, 1993 by Tom Smith, with thanks
to Murray Porath
A commentary of the preponderance
in today's SF/Fantasy market of trilogies, tetragies, pentagies, perigees, apogees,
zerogees, holyjeez. A certain small crew of authors (who were all apparently
struck in the head by thesauri at a young age, not only because of their tropisms
for big ornate words but also because of their tendency to say the same things
in as many different ways as possible), have been basically re-writing the same
few stories, over, and over, and over, and will likely continue doing so until
the sun dies, or the rain forests are paved over, or until we stop buying the
damn things.
The Original Trilogy of Trilogies,
or Ninety-Four Percent of Everything is Shit
Book 1: Everything turns to shit
Book 2: Everything is shit
Book 3: We install plumbing
Book 4: The toilet backs up
Book 5: The house overflows
Book 6: We save the house, but the plumber dies
Book 7: The plumbing explodes
Book 8: We resurrect the plumber
Book 9: We discover the true meaning of shit
The David Eddings Variations,
or What Is This Shit?
Book 1: Everything turns to shit
Book 2: Everything is shit
Book 3: Everyone starts shovelling
Book 4: The shit dries around everyone's ankles
Book 5: We call in the plumber and a back-hoe
Book 6: The toilet backs up
Book 7: The house overflows
Book 8: The back-hoe's out of gas and the plumber's phone is in the shop
Book 9: We fill the tank and fix the phone
Book 10: The plumber saves the house, but is killed by the back-hoe
Book 11: The plumbing explodes, taking the back-hoe
with it
Book 12: We search for a repairman, who must resurrect the plumber
Book 13: We discover the true meaning of shit
Book 14: We become one with the shit
Book 15: The shit is destroyed by sending the plumbing to a nether dimension,
but from now on everyone is kind of uncomfortable
The Piers Anthony Variations,
or Enough of This Shit
Book 1: Everything turns to candy-coated shit
Book 2: Candy-coated shit turns out to be intelligent and can talk
Books 3-Infinity: Sounds like candy-coated shit to me
|