Sounds like a book that Gus could have written.

Well sounds like something Gus should have read.

Too sad about Olivia Goldsmith. "First Wives Club" was a much better book than the movie. Yes, the irony .. also sad.

Exactly what kinds of examples are you talking about, when you say "idea in metaphor" vs. character-based stories?

Yes, please. This question.

The part that horrifies me is that one of the obits said she was gearing up for two book releases this spring. Which makes me think she was getting the face-lift as a tune-up for her book tour.

A friend of a friend took Phen-Fen (say that three times fast) before going on a book tour to promote her first book. She got the fatal side effect. Pfeh.

And just think, all I do is shoot myself up with human interferon once a week.

One of goldsmith's books was about someone who underwnet massive amounts of body 'improvement ' surgery -- it may beo one I couldn't finish...

Here it i s flavor of the month . I still don't remember if I finished it.

But, Deb, you're balancing one risk against another. Nobody's going to be saying "Oh, how ironic, she was just taking the interferon to make her collarbones shinier."

No.

Betsy, I was being ironic. I was just amazed that anyone would risk death to look younger just to go on a book tour. Too bizarre.

edit: risk death if they don't have to, I mean. Shiny collarbones? Not worth it. Wear a turtleneck, yo.

And if it was somebody close? My mom or someone? They'd be lucky to be dead as when I heard that was how, I'd want to kill them again.

OK, a quick-and-dirty "what I'm thinking of."

Idea/Metaphor books: Left Hand of Darkness, The Dispossessed, Ringworld, Stranger in a Strange Land, Gateway, Rendezvous with Rama, The Forever War, Ender's Game.

Character books: Red/Green/Blue Mars, Barrayar et al, (Dune? Haven't decided), The Number of the Beast, Friday.

More to come - but hopefully this helps define my terms.