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Nightflyers / True Names
1st printing PBO, 1981 (Dell SF, not Ace). Unread copy is very lightly rubbed on edges.
239 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 1981
92 people want to read
About the author
George R.R. Martin
1,533 books117k followersGeorge Raymond Richard "R.R." Martin was born September 20, 1948, in Bayonne, New Jersey. His father was Raymond Collins Martin, a longshoreman, and his mother was Margaret Brady Martin. He has two sisters, Darleen Martin Lapinski and Janet Martin Patten.
Martin attended Mary Jane Donohoe School and Marist High School. He began writing very young, selling monster stories to other neighborhood children for pennies, dramatic readings included. Later he became a comic book fan and collector in high school, and began to write fiction for comic fanzines (amateur fan magazines). Martin's first professional sale was made in 1970 at age 21: The Hero, sold to Galaxy, published in February, 1971 issue. Other sales followed.
In 1970 Martin received a B.S. in Journalism from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, graduating summa cum laude. He went on to complete a M.S. in Journalism in 1971, also from Northwestern.
As a conscientious objector, Martin did alternative service 1972-1974 with VISTA, attached to Cook County Legal Assistance Foundation. He also directed chess tournaments for the Continental Chess Association from 1973-1976, and was a Journalism instructor at Clarke College, Dubuque, Iowa, from 1976-1978. He wrote part-time throughout the 1970s while working as a VISTA Volunteer, chess director, and teacher.
In 1975 he married Gale Burnick. They divorced in 1979, with no children. Martin became a full-time writer in 1979. He was writer-in-residence at Clarke College from 1978-79.
Moving on to Hollywood, Martin signed on as a story editor for Twilight Zone at CBS Television in 1986. In 1987 Martin became an Executive Story Consultant for Beauty and the Beast at CBS. In 1988 he became a Producer for Beauty and the Beast, then in 1989 moved up to Co-Supervising Producer. He was Executive Producer for Doorways, a pilot which he wrote for Columbia Pictures Television, which was filmed during 1992-93.
Martin's present home is Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is a member of Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (he was South-Central Regional Director 1977-1979, and Vice President 1996-1998), and of Writers' Guild of America, West.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/george...
Martin attended Mary Jane Donohoe School and Marist High School. He began writing very young, selling monster stories to other neighborhood children for pennies, dramatic readings included. Later he became a comic book fan and collector in high school, and began to write fiction for comic fanzines (amateur fan magazines). Martin's first professional sale was made in 1970 at age 21: The Hero, sold to Galaxy, published in February, 1971 issue. Other sales followed.
In 1970 Martin received a B.S. in Journalism from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, graduating summa cum laude. He went on to complete a M.S. in Journalism in 1971, also from Northwestern.
As a conscientious objector, Martin did alternative service 1972-1974 with VISTA, attached to Cook County Legal Assistance Foundation. He also directed chess tournaments for the Continental Chess Association from 1973-1976, and was a Journalism instructor at Clarke College, Dubuque, Iowa, from 1976-1978. He wrote part-time throughout the 1970s while working as a VISTA Volunteer, chess director, and teacher.
In 1975 he married Gale Burnick. They divorced in 1979, with no children. Martin became a full-time writer in 1979. He was writer-in-residence at Clarke College from 1978-79.
Moving on to Hollywood, Martin signed on as a story editor for Twilight Zone at CBS Television in 1986. In 1987 Martin became an Executive Story Consultant for Beauty and the Beast at CBS. In 1988 he became a Producer for Beauty and the Beast, then in 1989 moved up to Co-Supervising Producer. He was Executive Producer for Doorways, a pilot which he wrote for Columbia Pictures Television, which was filmed during 1992-93.
Martin's present home is Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is a member of Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (he was South-Central Regional Director 1977-1979, and Vice President 1996-1998), and of Writers' Guild of America, West.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/george...
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
December 23, 2009
3.0 to 3.5 stars. Two excellent novellas by two of the best writers around. Nightflyers is an early SF/horror tales by the master of modern epic fantasy. An excellent, well-written tale. True Names is a classic in the field of cyberpunk and was the first story to imagine the virtual world of cyber space. Worth reading.
True Names was named to the Prometheus Award's all time list.
True Names was named to the Prometheus Award's all time list.
June 15, 2019
I bought this book from AbeBooks because of the TV program. It was the first book by George R.R. martin I have read, and I was very impressed by not only his writing style, but the way his imagination works. The book was written in 1979, and to me it was ahead of it's time at the time it was published in 1980. There are many differences between the book and the 10 hour TV show, but for the most part the book is spot on. highly recommended.
October 23, 2020
This book contains two Hugo nominated novellas: Nightflyers and True Names. It also contains brief essays from both authors and the editor.
“Nightflyers” did not really grab me, it is primarily horror with a distinct proto-cyberpunk vibe. The characters didn’t really work for me and horror is not my thing. The plot and ideas were interesting however, especially the mystery surrounding the “Captain” of the Nightflyer. 2 Stars.
“True Names” is Vinge starting to come into his own. He went on to write several books that I adore, including two Hugo award winning works of genius. This novella is not as strong but certainly shows a lot of promise. The idea of the “Other Plane” / cyberspace which inspired Gibson, Stirling, Stephenson and Moran has clear origins here. The concept of conflict within the Cyber realm is also dealt with reasonably realistically here, and surely must have influenced similar scenes in “The Long Run” by DKM. 3 Stars
The essays from the authors were also interesting, particularly from GRRM, who invoked Clarke’s Law as well as performing an excellent comparison of the two stories.
These stories have aged: but for those interested in the origins of the internet as an immersive experience this is the place to start.
“Nightflyers” did not really grab me, it is primarily horror with a distinct proto-cyberpunk vibe. The characters didn’t really work for me and horror is not my thing. The plot and ideas were interesting however, especially the mystery surrounding the “Captain” of the Nightflyer. 2 Stars.
“True Names” is Vinge starting to come into his own. He went on to write several books that I adore, including two Hugo award winning works of genius. This novella is not as strong but certainly shows a lot of promise. The idea of the “Other Plane” / cyberspace which inspired Gibson, Stirling, Stephenson and Moran has clear origins here. The concept of conflict within the Cyber realm is also dealt with reasonably realistically here, and surely must have influenced similar scenes in “The Long Run” by DKM. 3 Stars
The essays from the authors were also interesting, particularly from GRRM, who invoked Clarke’s Law as well as performing an excellent comparison of the two stories.
These stories have aged: but for those interested in the origins of the internet as an immersive experience this is the place to start.
June 10, 2023
Sometimes I wish that I had a book-oriented YouTube channel or podcast where I could talk about science fiction with someone who's just as into it as me. I want someone to discuss the intermingling of genres and approaches with, someone who will debate the worth and historical significance of a text. I will probably never have that, but if I did, a conversation about this bindup of two novellas would be more intriguing than I first assumed. I have been excited to read this book ever since I got it at a library sale last May since I've never read anything from Martin bigger than a short story and I can't even remember the one Vinge story that my logs tell me I've read. I was pleased by both stories - more so the latter - but before I can quantify just how pleased I was, let's talk about them.
NIGHTFLYERS
This is the second version of Martin's TV-adapted novella; it features an academic who charters a ship called the *Nightflyer* which is captained by a man named Roy Eris in order to make contact with a mysterious and legendary group of starships which aliens say left the galactic core millions of years ago. Once they set sail, though, the crew grows suspicious of Eris - why won't he leave his cabin? And why is the crew's telepath suddenly screaming about a malevolent alien? And who really made . Kind of a weak ending, huh?
Despite its shrug-inducing ending and a kind of routine science-fiction-horror-action thing in the back-half, I enjoyed *Nightflyers*. Martin is very readable and he does a really good job of making this feel like it's a large world and drawing good enough characters for the story at hand. It wasn't really predictable. I do know that some people (one of my favorite book reviewers specifically) believe that this is too horny of a story, and while I get that if you only read the first ten pages, it cleans up and gets back to the plot pretty well. Good plot, solid characters, just slighty off execution. 7/10.
TRUE NAMES
Mr. Slippery is a "vandal" in the Other Plane, a fantastical virtual reality network where ordinary people can pretend to be warlocks and all these other cool things. The thing is, Mr. Slippery is part of a criminal coven, which makes him a good target for the government, who needs an inside man in the coven to discover who the strange Mailman (a terrorist) is. They know that Slippery's "true name" is Roger Pollack, which means they can make him do whatever they want. They send him in and he teams up with a woman named Erythrina to uncover who the Mailman is and why he's recruiting other hackers. Erythrina thinks he's some sort of alien from the asteroid; Slippery might not be convinced, but he can convince the feds to give them access to all their databanks. They do, and Roger and Erythrina.
If you know much about Vinge you'll know that he coined the word "Singularity," and this story is a good example of why he could. It's good in other aspects, too, like its readability and its sheer originality. I know it seems a bit routine now, but back in 1981, this was crazy. I'm sure was at least one person writing about cyberspace as we know it before Vinge, but finding out what those are goes beyond our scope today. Besides the originality, it really is just a fun story, and the big battle in it is everything that this particular battle should've been. It's still more or less unique, only distinctly reminding my of one story: "Understand" by Ted Chiang. 8/10.
There are some notable parallels between these stories; computers and artificial intelligence are just two of them, and they're awfully fitting since personal computers were just picking up steam in 1981. There's also the question of if these novellas are science fiction or horror/fantasy? I think they're both SF, and that Nightflyers is probably in that space-horror or whatever category, while True Names is just science fiction; a fantasy story does not qualify as a fantasy simply because of supernatural imagery. This is the kind of thing that I could go on about for hours, but for our purposes... these are time-appropriate and somewhat influential novellas that you should probably take the time to read.
This is a pretty easy book to rate: 7 + 8 / 2 = 7.5, so 7.5/10 it is. I'm definitely interested in other books from the Binary Star line, but none look as important or as good as this one. I do need to read actual Martin and a Vinge novel - probably *Rainbow's End* - because I already own that one. I guess you can all look at my Goodreads profile @ Darnoc Leadburger to see if I've gotten around to that yet. Man, I really am starting to sound like a YouTuber... may God help me. But for now, you can all help me by clicking my other reviews. Alright, YouTube wannabe impression is over; have a great day and wee and month and year, everybody, and I hope you'll be ready for the next one. Godspeed, friends.
NIGHTFLYERS
This is the second version of Martin's TV-adapted novella; it features an academic who charters a ship called the *Nightflyer* which is captained by a man named Roy Eris in order to make contact with a mysterious and legendary group of starships which aliens say left the galactic core millions of years ago. Once they set sail, though, the crew grows suspicious of Eris - why won't he leave his cabin? And why is the crew's telepath suddenly screaming about a malevolent alien? And who really made . Kind of a weak ending, huh?
Despite its shrug-inducing ending and a kind of routine science-fiction-horror-action thing in the back-half, I enjoyed *Nightflyers*. Martin is very readable and he does a really good job of making this feel like it's a large world and drawing good enough characters for the story at hand. It wasn't really predictable. I do know that some people (one of my favorite book reviewers specifically) believe that this is too horny of a story, and while I get that if you only read the first ten pages, it cleans up and gets back to the plot pretty well. Good plot, solid characters, just slighty off execution. 7/10.
TRUE NAMES
Mr. Slippery is a "vandal" in the Other Plane, a fantastical virtual reality network where ordinary people can pretend to be warlocks and all these other cool things. The thing is, Mr. Slippery is part of a criminal coven, which makes him a good target for the government, who needs an inside man in the coven to discover who the strange Mailman (a terrorist) is. They know that Slippery's "true name" is Roger Pollack, which means they can make him do whatever they want. They send him in and he teams up with a woman named Erythrina to uncover who the Mailman is and why he's recruiting other hackers. Erythrina thinks he's some sort of alien from the asteroid; Slippery might not be convinced, but he can convince the feds to give them access to all their databanks. They do, and Roger and Erythrina.
If you know much about Vinge you'll know that he coined the word "Singularity," and this story is a good example of why he could. It's good in other aspects, too, like its readability and its sheer originality. I know it seems a bit routine now, but back in 1981, this was crazy. I'm sure was at least one person writing about cyberspace as we know it before Vinge, but finding out what those are goes beyond our scope today. Besides the originality, it really is just a fun story, and the big battle in it is everything that this particular battle should've been. It's still more or less unique, only distinctly reminding my of one story: "Understand" by Ted Chiang. 8/10.
There are some notable parallels between these stories; computers and artificial intelligence are just two of them, and they're awfully fitting since personal computers were just picking up steam in 1981. There's also the question of if these novellas are science fiction or horror/fantasy? I think they're both SF, and that Nightflyers is probably in that space-horror or whatever category, while True Names is just science fiction; a fantasy story does not qualify as a fantasy simply because of supernatural imagery. This is the kind of thing that I could go on about for hours, but for our purposes... these are time-appropriate and somewhat influential novellas that you should probably take the time to read.
This is a pretty easy book to rate: 7 + 8 / 2 = 7.5, so 7.5/10 it is. I'm definitely interested in other books from the Binary Star line, but none look as important or as good as this one. I do need to read actual Martin and a Vinge novel - probably *Rainbow's End* - because I already own that one. I guess you can all look at my Goodreads profile @ Darnoc Leadburger to see if I've gotten around to that yet. Man, I really am starting to sound like a YouTuber... may God help me. But for now, you can all help me by clicking my other reviews. Alright, YouTube wannabe impression is over; have a great day and wee and month and year, everybody, and I hope you'll be ready for the next one. Godspeed, friends.
December 9, 2022
A visionary proto-Cyberpunk work that fleshed out the concept of cyberspace and influenced crypto anarchism.
Warning: spoiler alert!!
Published more than a decade before the internet started to have an impact on people’s lives, True Names is a truly visionary work that paved the way for the at the time nascent Cyberpunk movement, drawing up the battle lines between technocratic surveillance and individual freedom. Vinge’s work has had a lasting influence on Silicon Valley, not least among the more anarchic advocates of cryptography, cryptocurrency, and dark webs.
True Names traces the action of a group of hackers called warlocks, who busy themselves breaking into government and private computers around the world. All this take place in a virtual reality space called the Other Plane, where revealing one’s identity – one’s ‘true name’ – can lead to arrest or worse. When warlock Mr Slippery has his true name revealed, the government forces him to help track down a notorious warlock who goes by the name of Mailman, responsible for large-scale data breaches and subsuming large chunks of data processing power. A series of battles ensue in both the virtual and real world, bringing down the economy in the process, and from first suspecting that Mailman is of extraterrestrial origin – given its immense power and ability to replicate itself – it is only at the end of the story that Mr Slippery learns that the Mailman is a National Security Agency research project gone rogue.
In True Names Vinge envisions an Orwellian scenario where technology is used by the elites to control the masses, a dystopian trope adopted by the Cyberpunk movement. At the same time, Vinge’s warlocks – hacking into government departments, euphorically sifting through data at amazing speed – became a template for Cyberpunk’s console cowboy. It is this euphoric empowerment of the individual that came to influence the more anarchic elements of Silicon Valley. That Vinge’s Other Plane is clearly inspired by Dungeons and Dragons – fleshing out the idea that only the imagination stands in the way of how how data is visualised in a virtual world – has only added to his popular appeal. So it is perhaps no surprise that about a decade later activist Timothy C. May paid homage to Vinge in his influential Crypto Anarchist Manifesto (1988):
“A specter is haunting the modern world, the specter of crypto anarchy. Computer technology is on the verge of providing the ability for individuals and groups to communicate and interact with each other in a totally anonymous manner. Two persons may exchange messages, conduct business, and negotiate electronic contracts without ever knowing the True Name, or legal identity, of the other.”
In other words, cryptography empowers people and undermines state and corporate control. May’s manifesto introduced the basic principles of crypto-anarchism: encrypted exchanges ensuring anonymity, freedom of speech, and freedom of trade. In today’s world crypto anarchism is very much alive in crypto currency circles, the idea being that a currency generated and anonymously secured by peer-to-peer networked devices outside of the banking system unshackles the individual.
In 1993 Vinge delivered a speech at the Department of Mathematical Sciences, San Diego State University, titled The Coming Technological Singularity: How to Survive in the Post-Human. His opening words were:
“Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended.”
With the Mailman’s powers spiraling out of control, a theme Vinge further developed in Marooned in Realtime (1986), Vinge is generally credited with being the first to develop the concept of the AI-driven singularity. While the dangers of a technological singularity were to become major themes in much Cyberpunk literature as well as in Postmodern space opera, it is also integral to today’s public discourse on AI, as evidenced by Oxford University scholar Nick Bostrom’s hugely influential non-fiction book Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies (2014).
Warning: spoiler alert!!
Published more than a decade before the internet started to have an impact on people’s lives, True Names is a truly visionary work that paved the way for the at the time nascent Cyberpunk movement, drawing up the battle lines between technocratic surveillance and individual freedom. Vinge’s work has had a lasting influence on Silicon Valley, not least among the more anarchic advocates of cryptography, cryptocurrency, and dark webs.
True Names traces the action of a group of hackers called warlocks, who busy themselves breaking into government and private computers around the world. All this take place in a virtual reality space called the Other Plane, where revealing one’s identity – one’s ‘true name’ – can lead to arrest or worse. When warlock Mr Slippery has his true name revealed, the government forces him to help track down a notorious warlock who goes by the name of Mailman, responsible for large-scale data breaches and subsuming large chunks of data processing power. A series of battles ensue in both the virtual and real world, bringing down the economy in the process, and from first suspecting that Mailman is of extraterrestrial origin – given its immense power and ability to replicate itself – it is only at the end of the story that Mr Slippery learns that the Mailman is a National Security Agency research project gone rogue.
In True Names Vinge envisions an Orwellian scenario where technology is used by the elites to control the masses, a dystopian trope adopted by the Cyberpunk movement. At the same time, Vinge’s warlocks – hacking into government departments, euphorically sifting through data at amazing speed – became a template for Cyberpunk’s console cowboy. It is this euphoric empowerment of the individual that came to influence the more anarchic elements of Silicon Valley. That Vinge’s Other Plane is clearly inspired by Dungeons and Dragons – fleshing out the idea that only the imagination stands in the way of how how data is visualised in a virtual world – has only added to his popular appeal. So it is perhaps no surprise that about a decade later activist Timothy C. May paid homage to Vinge in his influential Crypto Anarchist Manifesto (1988):
“A specter is haunting the modern world, the specter of crypto anarchy. Computer technology is on the verge of providing the ability for individuals and groups to communicate and interact with each other in a totally anonymous manner. Two persons may exchange messages, conduct business, and negotiate electronic contracts without ever knowing the True Name, or legal identity, of the other.”
In other words, cryptography empowers people and undermines state and corporate control. May’s manifesto introduced the basic principles of crypto-anarchism: encrypted exchanges ensuring anonymity, freedom of speech, and freedom of trade. In today’s world crypto anarchism is very much alive in crypto currency circles, the idea being that a currency generated and anonymously secured by peer-to-peer networked devices outside of the banking system unshackles the individual.
In 1993 Vinge delivered a speech at the Department of Mathematical Sciences, San Diego State University, titled The Coming Technological Singularity: How to Survive in the Post-Human. His opening words were:
“Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended.”
With the Mailman’s powers spiraling out of control, a theme Vinge further developed in Marooned in Realtime (1986), Vinge is generally credited with being the first to develop the concept of the AI-driven singularity. While the dangers of a technological singularity were to become major themes in much Cyberpunk literature as well as in Postmodern space opera, it is also integral to today’s public discourse on AI, as evidenced by Oxford University scholar Nick Bostrom’s hugely influential non-fiction book Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies (2014).
June 10, 2019
Vernon Vinge's "True Names" is trendsetting. George R.R. Martin's "Nightflyers" is, like all his work, evocative.
May 5, 2020
I read Nightflyers. Very good psychological, first contact story.
May 18, 2015
I don't know enough SF history to say where this one sits in the cannon. But from what I have read elsewhere, everyone says that the Vinge story is the first imagining of a virtually embodied cyberspace, as seen not long thereafter in books written by William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, Neal Stephenson, and later Tad Williams (among others). It's an important idea, and a tip of the hat for setting the stage, but I struggled with the anachronistic view of technology that Vinge used to describe how the "Other Plane" would work. I'll probably read it again, though, because it's not really a fair criticism, particularly because he was trying to do something extremely difficult to do in the late seventies: situate a computationally interconnected world in a near-future that no one could have possibly yet understood.
Most SF authors from this era that I have read save themselves from the pitfalls of True Names by setting their stories so far in the future that they don't have to deal with bridging the short gap between modern and near-future technologies. Martin's story works this way. In contrast to Vinge's hard science story, Martin uses mysticism as a major device. One of the things I love about his stories is the way he situates magic as part of the fabric of the universe. It never feels out of place to me, perhaps because in the worlds he imagines magic never really does anyone any good. I suppose you could say he's a postmodern fantasist, and I've always enjoyed that about him. The one problem I had with Nightflyers was the amount of character development that Martin tried to cram into such a short novella. I found myself constantly flipping back to the page where he introduced the entire cast of characters in one massive dump of details. It felt like he just wanted to get us up to speed on who these people were so we could move forward with the story, but the names and faces are so unfamiliar that it was just too hard to differentiate them without more space and backstory between the introductions. Even still, the novella stuck with me and it was worth the read. But if you're just getting into old Martin sci-fi, and you're not interested in Vinge, you might want to check out Tuf Voyaging.
In short, I'm not fanatical about the two stories, but I enjoyed them, and they added to my understanding of how science fiction has grown over the years.
Most SF authors from this era that I have read save themselves from the pitfalls of True Names by setting their stories so far in the future that they don't have to deal with bridging the short gap between modern and near-future technologies. Martin's story works this way. In contrast to Vinge's hard science story, Martin uses mysticism as a major device. One of the things I love about his stories is the way he situates magic as part of the fabric of the universe. It never feels out of place to me, perhaps because in the worlds he imagines magic never really does anyone any good. I suppose you could say he's a postmodern fantasist, and I've always enjoyed that about him. The one problem I had with Nightflyers was the amount of character development that Martin tried to cram into such a short novella. I found myself constantly flipping back to the page where he introduced the entire cast of characters in one massive dump of details. It felt like he just wanted to get us up to speed on who these people were so we could move forward with the story, but the names and faces are so unfamiliar that it was just too hard to differentiate them without more space and backstory between the introductions. Even still, the novella stuck with me and it was worth the read. But if you're just getting into old Martin sci-fi, and you're not interested in Vinge, you might want to check out Tuf Voyaging.
In short, I'm not fanatical about the two stories, but I enjoyed them, and they added to my understanding of how science fiction has grown over the years.
July 14, 2009
These are two early short stories from two great writers. The impact of Vernor Vinges story "True Names" can be seen in William Gibson novels. He all but references it in "Neuromancer".
October 1, 2009
True Names is the book where Vinge predicts the online social environments of the internet. It's a life changing read!
November 16, 2017
"Nightflyers"; 3 stars! "True Names"; 1 star!
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews