? a novel that I otter be able to find, but haven't....
Dates: 12/23/99,5:04 PM through 12/27/99,12:28 PM (4 postings)
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? a novel that I otter be able to find, but haven't....
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FROM: "Dennis K. Lien" <Dennis.K.Lien-1@tc.umn.edu>
REC'D: 12/23/99, 5:04 PM
I have someone looking for an sf/fantasy novel which rings a very vague
only with me. He describes it as a paperback, read in 1972, written in
the form of field notes/naturalist's diary involving a scientist who
(here on earth, in the present) is studying a colony of otters and who
slowly somehow becomes aware that the animals have mutated into
intelligence, are hostile, and (having learned that he knows this)
are out to do him harm. Only other clues are that (a) the narrator
generally refers to the otters by a Latinate/scientific name
(something like "muscilids") and (b) that the author of the book itself
probably has a last name from the latter half of the alphabet (from
memory of where said title was shelved in a collection).
The "novel as field notes" reminds me of DRAGONS: THE MODERN INFESTATION
by Pamela Blanpied (no otters in that, though); a circa 1972 sf book
dealing with intelligent otter-like creatures is Gordon Dickson's ALIEN
ART (but nothing else matches--the otters are aliens on an alien
planet in the future and are sympathetic characters; etc.); a horror
novel dealing with large, quasi-intelligent otter-like creatures is
DANCE OF THE DWARFS by Geoffrey Household--but again, nothing else
matches (for one thing, the narrator is a South American rancher,
and the story is not told in form of scientific notes). I've
checked our own catalog and WorldCat for fiction about otters; did
Web searches for "otter" mentions in the Contento/LOCUS science
fiction databases (it's not "The White Otters of Childhood" by
Michael Bishop either), and looked through Fred Patten's very useful
AN ANTHROPOMORPHIC BIBLIOGRAPHY (2d ed of 1996) which has plot
summaries of adult sf/f books featuring intelligent animals or
anthropomorphic Earth-animal-like aliens (used my personal copy,
as no US library other than Texas A&M seems to know this exists);
it doesn't seem to be in Lerner, but given his rules of inclusion/
exclusion I'm not sure if that's signifcant or not.
Perhaps someone here recognizes the book?
Dennis Lien / U of Minnesota Libraries // d-lien@tc.umn.edu
FROM: <jthomas@pcpls.lib.in.us>
REC'D: 12/23/99, 5:54 PM
"Dennis K. Lien" wrote:
> The following is being cross-posted to Stumpers and to Fiction-L;
> apologies for duplication to those like me who are members of
> both lists:
>
> I have someone looking for an sf/fantasy novel which rings a very vague
> only with me. He describes it as a paperback, read in 1972, written in
> the form of field notes/naturalist's diary involving a scientist who
> (here on earth, in the present) is studying a colony of otters and who
> slowly somehow becomes aware that the animals have mutated into
> intelligence, are hostile, and (having learned that he knows this)
> are out to do him harm. Only other clues are that (a) the narrator
> generally refers to the otters by a Latinate/scientific name
> (something like "muscilids") and (b) that the author of the book itself
> probably has a last name from the latter half of the alphabet (from
> memory of where said title was shelved in a collection).
>
> The "novel as field notes" reminds me of DRAGONS: THE MODERN INFESTATION
> by Pamela Blanpied (no otters in that, though); a circa 1972 sf book
> dealing with intelligent otter-like creatures is Gordon Dickson's ALIEN
> ART (but nothing else matches--the otters are aliens on an alien
> planet in the future and are sympathetic characters; etc.); a horror
> novel dealing with large, quasi-intelligent otter-like creatures is
> DANCE OF THE DWARFS by Geoffrey Household--but again, nothing else
> matches (for one thing, the narrator is a South American rancher,
> and the story is not told in form of scientific notes). I've
> checked our own catalog and WorldCat for fiction about otters; did
> Web searches for "otter" mentions in the Contento/LOCUS science
> fiction databases (it's not "The White Otters of Childhood" by
> Michael Bishop either), and looked through Fred Patten's very useful
> AN ANTHROPOMORPHIC BIBLIOGRAPHY (2d ed of 1996) which has plot
> summaries of adult sf/f books featuring intelligent animals or
> anthropomorphic Earth-animal-like aliens (used my personal copy,
> as no US library other than Texas A&M seems to know this exists);
> it doesn't seem to be in Lerner, but given his rules of inclusion/
> exclusion I'm not sure if that's signifcant or not.
>
> Perhaps someone here recognizes the book?
>
> Dennis Lien / U of Minnesota Libraries // d-lien@tc.umn.edu
FROM: "Fiction_L" <fictionl@nslsilus.ORG>
REC'D: 12/27/99, 9:23 AM
FROM: "Thelma Stone" <tstone@pub-lib.ci.fort-worth.tx.us>
REC'D: 12/27/99, 12:28 PM
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