Scott French (1948–2009)

The degree of your enjoyment in reading Just This Once will depend entirely upon the perspective and expectations that you yourself bring to the reading. Because, you see, the book was written by a computer, and you might well wonder just how much talent a computer can possibly have for writing an enjoyable story. The author (and programmer), Scott French, explains:

"I spent nearly eight years and $50,000 of my own money studying computational linguistics, natural language programming, show more Artificial Intelligence to program the best Expert System on the market to think and write like Jacqueline Susann."

And, according to the front flap, he also input two Jacqueline Susann novels for a data base. In a highly sophisticated form, elegant pastiche might be words that come to mind for the result. However, French claims:

"'Just this Once' is not a rehash of another book. It is the novel Jacqueline Susann would write if she were alive today" [1993].

Warming to its task, the computer begins the first chapter, "The Doll House", by telling us:

"Silent vibrations of power emanated from the four men who occupied the plush velvet chairs surrounding the antique cherry wood table supposed to have once been owned by Napoleon.
Actually, the chances were good that this meeting was more than the result of an idle rumor. Nick Salerio was a man with a flair for class."

In the next section of the book, "In the Beginning," we meet Carol:

"It was a normal summer day. The mercury was stuck at 106 degrees in the non-existent shade. The sudden air-conditioned atmosphere inside the building struck her like a small hurricane, almost knocking her off her feet with the unexpected man-made wind, both the artificial coldness and the indoor acres of of brilliant gold and black furnishings grabbing her senses unexpectedly.
Somehow she made her way to the cage. The girl inside smiled and said 'Can I help you?' "

Later, in the "Hollywood" section:

"Lisa glanced at the brightly lit "recording" sign in the hall of S&L Records, kicked the soundproof wall and threw the door to the control room open. A surge of raw 110-decibel sound struck her with the force of a breaking wave.
'Hey!' The sound engineer leapt to his feet and started across the room to intercept her. 'You can't come in --' He stopped in his tracks as recognition set in. 'Oh, uh, oh, it's you, uh, Miss ...' The man was stuttering.

Finally, for a technical flourish 300 pages later, the story closes with a cliff-hanger ending that leads to the title for the book,

"I deserve it. I deserve some enjoyment in my life. I deserve feeling like this."

The story is set in show business, behind the scenes in a casino in Las Vegas, and in a Hollywood recording studio, It has a plot, and events, and characters, and they interact. There are love, and death, and suspense, all described in a style which, naturally, is quite reminiscent of Jacqueline Susann. What more can one want from a computer? Even with some coaching from its programmer?

It would be unfair of course to expect the computer to surpass the genuine Jacqueline Susann, writing Valley of the Dolls. On the other hand, when one imagines a computer starting up and facing a blank sheet of paper, I think it is fair to call the book a quite creditable job, and in a first attempt at that! I enjoyed the story and was left quite bemused by the fact of its having come out of a computer. It's a strange feeling!

So, if you see a copy of the book at a price comparable to your own level of expectation, then I suspect that you too may be as pleasantly surprised as I was. If, however, you want the genuine article, then of course you should simply read Valley of the Dolls. I enjoyed that too. show less

The information in this book is now completely outdated. However, when it was published, it was state-of-the-art information being made available to the general public for the first time. I found my first bugs using this book.
‘Scott French’ is a pseudonym of Lee Lapin, who published many useful books until his death in 2009. Thanks, Lee.