Bimbos of the Death Sun

Rating:
Summary: I couldn't put this book down!
Review: I thought that Highland Laddie Gone, in Ms. McCrumb's "Elizabeth MacPherson" series was one of the funniest mysteries I'd ever read. That was until I picked up this book and spent one side-splitting night reading it.

As a person who has attended various science fiction conventions, I recognized many of the characters in the book. The characterizations are too funny and very realistic.

Dr. James Owen Mega (aka Jay Omega) is an engineering professor at the local college, and the author of "Bimbos of the Death Sun", a new science fiction novel. He is attending his first science fiction convention as a guest author, and is bewildered to discover that he has literally entered another world. Guiding Dr. Mega through the world of sci fi fandom is english professor, Dr. Marion Farley, Emma Peel fan and Dr. Mega's significant other.

The entire convention is thrown into a tailspin when the main guest of honor, author Appin Dungannon, is found murdered in his hotel room. Jay and Marion decide to help the police discover who would kill him.

A must for anyone who has ever attended a science fiction convention.

Rating:
Summary: Good SF conventionhandbook, but nothing else.
Review: The blurb for this book... and the reviews here... correctly state that this book is a good handbook for the overall "feel" of a science fiction fan convention.

Beyond that, however, the reviews depart from reality. I was expecting a good murder mystery wrapped in tightly written, funny sci-fi insider jokes. I got a grammatically correct novel with weak, unengaging characterizations, unworkable murder plot & plot resolution, and only a very, very thin scattering of humor aimed at things only sci-fi insiders would understand.
This book was written for the sci-fi OUTSIDER, laughing WITH the outsider, not embracing the insider fans & trade.

So, if you're a sci-fi fan, or looking for an engaging murder mystery, then look elsewhere.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best in the sci-fi-con murder subgenre
Review: The sci-fi-con murder subgenre, you ask? Well, yes, there is a whole subgenre of murder mysteries where the murder takes place at a science fiction convention. (There are similar subgenres of murders that take place at romance writers' conventions, and at mystery writers' conventions...) The worst - and therefore funniest - stereotypes about the bad habits of science fiction geeks are brought out. The costumed wackos, the people who can't stand real life and escape into Star Trek, the dedicated gamers... the slightly lost, slightly underweight guys who sometimes forget to eat...

I'd say this book is tied for my favorite in the subgenre; my other top favorite is _Sci-Fi_ by William Marshall, which takes place at a science fiction convention in Hong Kong. (It's out of print, but as of this moment, there may be a used copy available...) If you read both books back to back, your stomach muscles will hurt from laughing.

One of the things that annoyed me about the title of the book, funny as it is, is that when the book first came out, bookstores kept classifying it under science fiction instead of mystery; luckily I read both, so I found it.

Other than that confusion about the title, nothing whatsoever was wrong with this book. It was funny all the way through. So what if the nasty little author who got murdered was a stereotype of nasty, demanding, little authors? He was funny!! Our hero is a bit of a stereotype of the absentminded young professor, too, but he's funny also! Only the pickiest reader would mind a little bit of stereotyping in order to move the plot along at its hysterically funny pace.

One of my favorite bit characters in the book was the Scottish folksinger. As he's thinking about heading home to Scotland from his American gig, he's contemplating what he's going to tell his friends when they ask what he did in America: "I fed candy to the Martians." There's also a great cop, who delivers a very funny "I love this job!" There's not a bad line in the book.