posted
A great loss. Very sad day. His stories brilliant. His ‘how to’ techniques, second to none. “Writing to the Point” is a short book but will forever change your view of the craft, opening your eyes to things that would take a lifetime to learn. A man so full of character you know how deeply his personal friends and family will miss him.
posted
I liked the way Budrys' stories worked familiar SF themes, but provided much more depth to the characters and backgrounds. And all this back in the 1950s, mostly, where SF was just breaking free of certain pulp-writing and science-fact-writing conventions. (There was a writeup in Locus just last month, I think, discussing his three major novels.)
(A tangental anecdote---I never met the man, but I had a couple of books with his picture in them. My mother happened across one of 'em and said Budrys resembled an old boyfriend of hers. She had an old picture of the boyfriend, and the resemblance was startling. I mean, they weren't the same guy, but I found this resemblance extremely amusing. As well as the notion that, if a few facts in this story were changed, I might've been the son of a famous SF writer...)
Printer-friendly view of this topic
