John Varley - Science Fiction Writer
Welcome
to the website of John Varley, quality science fiction since 1974. This site is and always will be free. We accept no advertising and never will.
However, if you enjoy my books, the movie reviews, the essays, and Lee’s lovely photography, contributions are always appreciated, in amounts great or small. Or not. Up to you. Like I said, it’s free!
VarleyLog
We Bought a Tesla!
Here’s what happened. Lee came across what looked like a tiny, yellowing IOU at the bottom of some ancient records. It was from the Tooth Fairy, and she said she was a little short of cash and would pay me a dime the next night. It was dated May 8, 1954. I was seven! She’s still in business, you know, the Tooth Fairy, so Lee tracked her down and demanded payment. The old biddy was not ...
Looking Back
The Shrub That Ate a House
The sleepy little town of Sierra Madre is off the beaten trail, wedged as it is between Arcadia, Monrovia, and Pasadena, at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. But not so very long ago it was at the center of a struggle for the very survival of humanity. I detailed this story a while back in my review of the four movie versions of Jack Finney’s book The Body ...
Novels
Wizard
Wizard is the second book in the Gaean Trilogy.
Gaea is world and goddess, a dazzling pageant of wild mythology and chimerical creatures in a gargantuan, strange and beautiful world. Cirocco is now the Wizard of Gaea, powerful but troubled. And ready to lead the revolt against Gaea’s mad, capricious tyranny.
Movie Reviews
King Kong
First, it’s very, very good in most respects. The effects are stunning, the story is a bit deeper than the original, and Andy Serkis as Kong is so good that the Academy will almost certainly ignore him for his work again, as they did for his portrayal of Gollum, because they can’t imagine that there’s a real actor behind the CGI ...
Collections
The Persistence of Vision
This is Varley’s first story collection — a multiple award winner. It won the Locus Award and the Prix Apollo for Best Single Author Collection. The title story also won a Locus Award and a Hugo and a Nebula. Five other stories were near awards.
PBS turned “Overdrawn at the Memory Bank” into a 3-(out of ...
Short Fiction
Titan: An Overview
A Short Overview of Titan
Here's a very short but quite impressive video made by Jean-Paul Verne, a fly-through of Gaea from my trilogy. M. Verne wants to be involved if a movie ever gets made. Over the years many, many people have written to me wishing these books would be made into a movie. Naturally, I'd like that, too. Let's hope this is not as close as we'll ever get.
Accidental Hippies
Accidental Hippies
Sometime not long after my high school graduation I was studying at Michigan State University when my long-time girlfriend dumped me. I entered such a state of depression that I could not continue in college. So I dropped out and decided to hit the road with Chris Kingsley, my best friend in the world. Chris had much more experience of life on the road than I did, had actually hitched to ...