Written by Fred Patten, and published on the LASFS Rex Rotary, December 14, 1966. Intended for Apa L, 113th Distribution, LASFS Meeting no. 1531, December 15, 1966. Address: 1825 Greenfield Avenue, Los Angeles, California, 90025. Phone: GRanite 36321.

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Well, nuts. This is one of those days when I just don't feel like cutting stencils, so I think I'll just keep RR short & sweet this week. I feel more like reading s-f. I just finished reading Keith Laumer's newest pb, The Monitors, which is passable but one of the weakest novels Laumer's written so far -- too much froth, humor & satire without enough foundation. Not really worth 60¢, I don't think. On the other hand, Philip José Farmer's The Gates of Creation (Ace, 40¢) is a bargain at the price, being an excellent chase dimension-opera, with all the futuristic trappings handled to best effect. Speaking of Farmer, Ballantine has just re-released a whole slew of its best past titles, including his The Green Odyssey, which is described in its own blurb as "rollicking ... adventure", and after ten years is still one of the best I've ever read -- and I must've read it through 7 or 10 times now. Sort of like one of de Camp's Khrishna stories, with a liberal helping of Edmond Hamilton space-opera thrown in. I asked Farmer at the ChiCon (or was it the DisCon?) if he planned writing the hinted-at sequel, and he said that sales had been so bad on it that there wasn't much chance of it -- but if Ballantine feels it's worth the expense of bringing out a new printing of it now, maybe there's hope for a sequel yet. Anyhow, if you haven't read The Green Odyssey yet, you certainly should at this opportunity. Some other titles in this Ballantine re-release include Poul Anderson's Brain Wave, Kuttner's Ahead of Time, Pohl-Kornbluth's Gladiator-at-Law, del Rey's Nerves, and Vance's To Live Forever; all of them excellent books -- the sort you'll want to save to re-read, even if you don't have a regular library. (To Live Forever should be a must to anybody interested in Coventranianism, since the immortality/caste system is borrowed from this book.) Let's see, what else have I read recently that I can recommend? Philip Farmer's The Gate of Time, a fine parallel-world action story; don't let the usual lousy Belmont packaging put you off it. (Farmer is always good.) For the sword-&-sorcery fans, there's the Real Stuff in the first of the Conan volumes in pb, Conan the Adventurer, by Howard & de Camp (Lancer, 60¢). It's labeled as "Vol. I", but in his Introduction, de Camp says that it's chronologically the 4th in the 8-volume pb set that's planned. Oh, well. Theodore Sturgeon has a new collection out, Starshine (Pyramid, 60¢ -- say, that 60¢ price tag is coming to look awfully familiar), with some old stories and some new ones, but all good ones as usual. And I guess that's about all I've read in the past week except for an old volume of Wilhelm Hauff's fairy tales, and once again through Manning Coles' Green Hazard. (Old friends are so pleasant to go back to every so often.) And as soon as I get through putting out this fanzine, there's something here called Tarnsman of Gor, by John Norman, that looks as though it should be quite good (I trust Ballantine's taste implicitly, even at 75¢); and next to it is Ace's first "Agent of T.E.R.R.A." volume ...

-- BEING COMMENTS ON LAST WEEK'S DISTRIBUTION

Dian Pelz -- If you were drunk, that makes you the first drunk typist I ever heard of who makes nary a typo. Your third master, maybe, but from too many to none at all? Not that I'm complaining; merely quibbling. (I can't find any comment hooks, so I'll quib a small quibble to let you know your zine was read and enjoyed.)

Jane Lamont -- You'll probably have to keep hitting me over the head for the next six months or so, until I get the pronunciation of your name right. This is the first I've heard that it isn't pronounced LaMONT, and I've been saying LaMONT ever since Gil and Brandon got into fandom without anybody correcting me, so I've got an awful lot of habit to unlearn by now. Just keep reminding me, like I do to people who keep spelling my name Patton instead of Patten. ## Are you officially back to Jane from Jayn now?

Jim Schumacher -- Hello again, Jim. I hope you'll at least be able to make the next few Dist'ns, around Xmas Vacation, before school closes in on you again. ## I'm glad to see that you aren't one of the "Apa L is dying, ho! ho! ho!" crowd. Personally I'm quite satisfied with it as it is today. Admittedly, I could wish it were a little bigger -- say, about 50 pages or so -- and had contributions from such people as Bĵo and Don Fitch every week. But while we've lost some good contributors, we've also lost most of the bad ones, too; those whose zines boosted our pagecount but nothing else. (Like Terry Romine and Bob Konigsberg, to Name Names.) Where before I used to flip through Apa L when I got it, looking for the best stuff to read first, I now usually just start at the beginning and read straight through, because it's all at least acceptable. I would say that if we ever dropped below 20 pages, then Apa L would be in trouble, as such -- several of us would keep bringing our weekly zines to LASFS, but it wouldn't be worth the trouble of collating them into one unit and publishing a special cover & table of contents for them any m ore. But as long as we've got 25 to 50 pages, we're doing all right. (The "Apa L is dying, ho! ho! ho!" crowd consists, as far as I can tell, of Dwain Kaiser and Andy Porter (the latter of whom comprises a crowd all by himself), the self-appointed spokesmen of Valley Fandom and New York Fandom, respectively -- to hear them tell it.)

Fred Hollander -- This reminds me to prepare my usual semi-annual election editorial for Apa L next week. I've pretty well made up my mind by now who I'm supporting, but I'll take another week to see how the field firms up before coming out with any endorsements. (Other than "Lin Johnstone (or Joyce McDaniel, if you prefer) for Junior Committeewoman!") Is Dave Fox available for club office for the next six months?

Milt Stevens -- Who are you writing for, us or your shipmates? Your posting of the Animal Cunning Award is too scanty in detail t o do other than just make us curious about the people you're talking about; fill in more detail, please. (One page a week isn't much room in which to do this; any chance you can work your way back up to two pages per issue?)

Bruce Pelz -- What should be done about the Dues Situation is to allow leeway to handle individual cases, instead of trying to find one hard & fast Rule to vote into effect to cover all situations. Some people would but can't pay, others are deadbeats because they consider it "smart" to freeload -- Lichtman was the latter, and boasted about it, which didn't help his situation any.

Howard Thurlow -- Larry Niven reads Apa L fairly often, and I noticed him chuckling over your first issue (I was watching to see how he'd react to it), though I don't believe he's ever commented on it to anyone. Not within my hearing, at any rate. ## The Wertenbaker Soc'y is one of many LA fan sub-groups.