enthusiasm. If he hadn’t been enthusiastic, he would have said no and hung up.
By this time it’s Minicon. Jim Odbert passes me a set of maps. Then he, Gordy,
Joe, Lynn, and I sit around half the night discussing the history of the city
and the surrounding continent. A set of house rules is devised and agreed upon:
(1) Each contributor is to send me a brief description of the main character of
his/her story. (2) These descriptions will be copied and distributed to the
other contributors. (3) Any author can use these characters in his/her story,
providing they’re not killed off or noticeably reformed.
I run all this through a typewriter and mail it out to all the contributors. It
occurs to me that this isn’t nearly as difficult as I had feared. My only worry
is that the mails might slow communication with John Brunner in England, causing
him to be late with his submission. Except for that everything was going fine.
Then the fun began …
Andy, Poul, and John all send me notes in varying degrees of gentleness
correcting my grammar and/or word usage in the flier. They are willing to accept
without confirmation that my spelling was intended as a joke. These are the
people I’m supposed to be editing! Riiiiight!
Poul sends me a copy of his essay, ‘On Thud and Blunder’, to ensure the realism
of the setting, particularly the economic structure of the town. He also wants
to know about the judicial system in Sanctuary.
Andy wants to know about the deities worshipped, preferably broken down by
nationality and economic class of worshippers. Fortunately, he includes a