A novel by Jack L Chalker, George Alec Effinger and Mike Resnick
Publisher's Weekly
In designing their book as a
round robin, Chalker ( The Return of Nathan Brazil ), Resnick ( Second
Contact ) and Effinger ( When Gravity Fails ) seem to have been more
interested in presenting the next author with a challenge (''Write your
way out of this!'') than they were in continuity, plot or character.
Millard Fillmore Pierce (most names are pseudo-significant, such as the
battleship Mahatma Gandhi, captain Nathan Bolivia) appears in five
different guises, each a member of a different species from a different
parallel universe; all of them speak English and most of them intend to
take over the human Pierce's galaxy. That none succeeds is largely due
to red tape: so many forms must be filled out in order even to fire a
shot that battleships carry hundreds of bureaucrats to support each
soldier. What could have been light entertainment is defeated by the
authors' arch, feckless comments to one another--with discussions on
writing the book included as part of the book. Only a blindly dedicated
fan will be pleased with this collaboration.