> > I disagree. First of all, both "Nightfall" and "The Positronic Man" (the novel based on
> > Bicentennial Man) were co-authored by Asimov and Silverburg.

> To be honest, I've never read any of those novels with an open mind. I'm prejudiced against them because I feel that in each case the original story was just the right length and said everything that needed to be said. In my mind, regardless of the reality, a novel length version is just pointless padding.
>

>
> Pa"don't try changing my mind -- reality is irrelevant"ul

I have to agree with Paul here. I read __The Ugly Little Boy__, yet another Asimov & Silverburg novelization and was disappointed, probably doubly so because I was expecting it to be the same caliber as the short it was derived from. Oh silly me. The additonal 300 pages didn't deepen the original philosophical point of the story (and/or my understanding of it). One just gets the feeling that the publishers want to milk the Asimov cash cow one more time.

Ditto for the sequels to Arthur C. Clarke's _Rendezvous With Rama__ Loved the original! Hated the sequels! (done with "contributor" Gentry Lee). The interesting question posed in the first book was thrashed and clouded with a soap opera of relationships in the sequels. (I had to read the third, of course, just to see if the second was just an unfortunate fluke or what. I repeat, Oh silly me). Again, one imagines the publishers handing an outline to Gentry Lee and saying, see what you can do with this, we ought to be able to get a few more dimes out of the old boy somehow.

koala"favorite SF author is Sheri S. Tepper"mom