A lot of genzine for your money, with stories, poetry and various pieces of artwork. The contents, following the example set by Gambit zines, are helpfully arranged in series order and comprise one series A, two B, three C, one D and two PGP. All the stories are short to medium length except Neil Faulkner's "Hunter" (series C). This is an ambitious and ultimately successful tale involving another ship and a particularly unpleasant alien; to say much more would be to give away an artfully constructed plot. The portrayal of the Liberator crew is pretty good, especially Cally's attitude to Avon, though I wouldn't have thought Vila was quite as feeble as he is towards the end. This is one story where the character interaction and the action sequences are given equal weight.
Equally good is "Trial" by Judith Proctor, which centres on Avon's trial for fraud and is told in the first person by Blake. It is set in the early days on Liberator and brings out Blake's uncertainties about Avon both as a friend and as a fellow-rebel; how can Blake reconcile his cause and personal loyalties? There's a typically Avonish twist at the end. The second story by Ms Proctor is "Shane", Avon as a gunslinger. It has an utterly delicious drawing on page 118, but shouldn't he have an authentic big black hat? If you haven't read the novel by Jack Schaefer or seen the film you won't get all the resonances, but this is still a very enjoyable read. Perhaps you should get the novel too?
My favourite story was the haunting "A step between" by Jean Graham. It's a brief description of the conversation between Tarrant and Vila following Terminal, and it is exquisite. Nobody writes this type of simple yet telling prose as well as Ms Graham, or if they do, I'd love to find examples. I would have bought the zine at twice the price just to get these four pages. It also contains another of her stories "The ultimate slash story", but this one is comic.
Fans of Travis, and of episode links, will enjoy Andrew Kearnley's "Fugitives", an ingenious tale involving Travis and Docholi. The remaining stories, all short, are "Ambitions" by Louise Rutter about Anna/Chesku, Andrew Down's amusing "Gauda Prime - an alternative ending" , and "Slip to back" by David R Sanderson, a bleak PGP which features Servalan.
Last updated on 29th of September 1996.