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Golden Dream is a prequel? sequel? to H. Beam Piper's Fuzzy series nested in the greater terro-human empire future history.
It begins with the idea that the Fuzzies are actually aliens from an entirely different world and crash landed, were separated from their technology, and gradually devolved. Some of this was likely in an effort to explain some environmental oddities from the original books like the Fuzzies needing a compound to survive and breed that was almost entirely absent from the local food chain. It continues forward through the events of H. Beam Piper's books, however the entire book is written from the perspective of the Fuzzies themselves.
Even under the best of circumstances, I'm not often a fan of others posthumously show more expanding the universe of another writer in this way. It can be done well, and there are great 'tribute' volumes out there with writing by some really talented folks. This, is not one of those.
The idea of the fuzzies being from another world as an answer to the above question isn't in and of itself a terrible idea, except taken in the context of Piper's wider terro-human empire future history...which has essentially never encountered another spacefaring alien race even with FTL travel, and in this case the fuzzies themselves are also supposed to have FTL tech. Secondly, even crashlanding and being permanently separated from their ship isn't an adequate explanation for their gradual loss of tech and devolution, as they apparently made absolutely no attempt at bootstrapping their tech level back up, even though most of their technical crew survived.
The timeline is also very confusing. Given the loss of knowledge, skills, and actual evolutionary changes (its mentioned specifically that the fuzzy phenotype at a minimum has shifted over time) it seems as though it must be hundreds if not thousands of years between the crash and the arrival of humans. The lifespan of the fuzzies is also specifically referenced as being relatively short in this brutal world. Yet, based on parent names, fuzzies remembering prior generations, and similar things it would appear that its only been dozens of years, perhaps a decades, since the crash? Which doesn't seem to make much sense. The idea of a race memory that involves the shape of their home system? galaxy? but absolutely nothing else is also very strange.
The author also posits that despite human (or maybe higher than human) levels of intelligence the fuzzies also have an almost genetic need that is being fulfilled by being held, cared for, and treated like children by the humans which feels *very* strange.
All in all, even if you're a fan of Piper's original Fuzzy material, I'd say skip this. show less
It begins with the idea that the Fuzzies are actually aliens from an entirely different world and crash landed, were separated from their technology, and gradually devolved. Some of this was likely in an effort to explain some environmental oddities from the original books like the Fuzzies needing a compound to survive and breed that was almost entirely absent from the local food chain. It continues forward through the events of H. Beam Piper's books, however the entire book is written from the perspective of the Fuzzies themselves.
Even under the best of circumstances, I'm not often a fan of others posthumously show more expanding the universe of another writer in this way. It can be done well, and there are great 'tribute' volumes out there with writing by some really talented folks. This, is not one of those.
The idea of the fuzzies being from another world as an answer to the above question isn't in and of itself a terrible idea, except taken in the context of Piper's wider terro-human empire future history...which has essentially never encountered another spacefaring alien race even with FTL travel, and in this case the fuzzies themselves are also supposed to have FTL tech. Secondly, even crashlanding and being permanently separated from their ship isn't an adequate explanation for their gradual loss of tech and devolution, as they apparently made absolutely no attempt at bootstrapping their tech level back up, even though most of their technical crew survived.
The timeline is also very confusing. Given the loss of knowledge, skills, and actual evolutionary changes (its mentioned specifically that the fuzzy phenotype at a minimum has shifted over time) it seems as though it must be hundreds if not thousands of years between the crash and the arrival of humans. The lifespan of the fuzzies is also specifically referenced as being relatively short in this brutal world. Yet, based on parent names, fuzzies remembering prior generations, and similar things it would appear that its only been dozens of years, perhaps a decades, since the crash? Which doesn't seem to make much sense. The idea of a race memory that involves the shape of their home system? galaxy? but absolutely nothing else is also very strange.
The author also posits that despite human (or maybe higher than human) levels of intelligence the fuzzies also have an almost genetic need that is being fulfilled by being held, cared for, and treated like children by the humans which feels *very* strange.
All in all, even if you're a fan of Piper's original Fuzzy material, I'd say skip this. show less
It takes a little bit to catch on to what's happening - but this is that story that explains how a species native to a planet can be in an economic crises because there is only ONE creature that gives them an essential nutrient - and the entire race is dying out.
In Golden Dream we learn WHY the Fuzzies were facing these problems, what they thought of the Big Ones who came to them in their time of need - and just generally fun reading.
In Golden Dream we learn WHY the Fuzzies were facing these problems, what they thought of the Big Ones who came to them in their time of need - and just generally fun reading.
Mayhar did a great job of adding to the Fuzzy stories. Could hardly tell that it was not Piper. Gave a great story of where the Fuzzy's came from and what they were.
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115+ Works 1,358 Members
Ardath Mayhar was born in Timpson, Texas on February 20, 1930. She began her writing career as a poet when she was 19 and began publishing science fiction in 1979. During her lifetime, she wrote more than 60 books in almost every fiction genre. She also wrote under the pseudonyms Frank Cannon, Frances Hurst and John Killdeer. She won the Balrog show more Award for a horror narrative poem in Masques I and was honored by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America as an Author Emeritus in 2008. She died on February 1, 2012 at the age of 81. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Is a (non-series) prequel to
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Golden Dream
- Original title
- Golden Dream - A Fuzzy Odyssey
- Original publication date
- 1982-10
- People/Characters
- Jack Holloway; Little Fuzzy
- Epigraph
- Round and round
run the Gashta
Small ones,
Big ones,
Golden ones,
and the pale-furred ones.
We laugh and push,
Tripping and scrambling.
When we play hide-and-find
we are happy.
But we must b... (show all)e cautions
or we may die... - Dedication
- To H. Beam Piper and William Tuning without whom this book would have been nonexistent.
- First words
- Breaks-Twigs (Etza-T'ra in his own Gashta tongue) clibed into the feather tree, found a comfortable spot, and settled himself to his task of watching the young ones.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)So I will end with the observation that though the Hagga have named us strange things, and we have accepted those names at their hands for the sake of affection, we still cling to our original ones, among ourselves.
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