Let’s start with your characterization of Van Vogt’s world as a “cash cow.” Apparently you have no idea what the term “cash cow” means. Nobody reads Van Vogt any more. Most of Van Vogt’s works are out of print. If I walk into my local Barnes and Noble, there’s NO Van Vogt in it! But you actually think that somebody had the bright idea that the way to get rich is by writing a novel in Van Vogt’s universe. Amazing.

As for your implication that Wright is some hack who’s writing in Van Vogt’s world because he can’t or is unwilling to make his own, you are apparently unaware of Wright’s other work. He does create his own worlds. The only books of his that I’ve read are his “Golden Age” trilogy, and it’s wildly imaginative and written by a man with serious talent.

Regarding your comments about not knowing whether he had permission from anyone to do this, or whether he even was a Van Vogt fan, it would only take a tiny amount of research to clear that up. But since that’s too much for you, I’ve done it for you. From an interview in Locus:

“I’ve spoken with Lydia van Vogt and I’ve signed the contract to write a sequel to the Null-A books, to be called Null-A Continuum. Talk about a childhood daydream come true! Worlds of Null-A was the first science fiction book I ever read, one of my favorites when I was a kid, a book that was influential to my thinking, and the one I wrote my college entrance exam essay on. And in all modesty, I think I can write a van Vogt book. I think I have the skills and the talent to capture his particular flavor of madness.”

Next, for your statement that Wright’s book is crowding out some young author who’s created his own world. First of all, that writer would be just as crowded out if Wright had written a book in a universe of his own creation. Secondly, you skewer Wright for writing one book in Van Vogt’s world, while completely neglecting the myriad authors writing in the worlds of Roddenberry and George Lucas. With such a tendency towards selective focusing, how do you cross a street without getting hit by a car? Third, if our concern is only for the livelihood of new writers with new worlds, and not for the quality of the literature itself, then we should not only rid the shelves of Wright’s book, along with all the Star Wars and Star Trek novels, but we should also clear the shelves of all of Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke, and everyone else whose books people buy instead of buying books by authors set in new worlds.

Finally, to condemn a book on economic grounds with no consideration whatsoever of whether it might actually be any good or not betrays an obsession with money that’s unseemly, to put it kindly. While clearly writing is a business and money is important, you seem completely out of touch with the fact that there may be other considerations in writing besides money.

Seldom have I encountered so much ignorance crammed into such a small amount of time.

All these works will ultimately live or die by their quality, and they’re not all necessarily done as a big money-making scheme. The example of the Null-A sequel by John C. Wright is an interesting one. In a recent interview for the SCiFi DImensions podcasts, he talks about its being more of a labour of love and that he won’t be doing any more books of this type because ‘he’s got to eat’!

Cheers,
EWB