Amazon.co.uk Review
Norman Spinrad made his biggest SF splash with Bug Jack Barron, whose 1967--68 New Worlds serialisation brought raging controversy which Michael Moorcock discusses in an afterword. It's a quintessential 1960s novel, prophetically highlighting the irresponsible power of mass media and corporations.
TV megastar Jack Barron hosts the wildly popular Bug Jack Barron, a phone-in show that listens to public gripes and puts politicians and bosses on the spot--live. Naturally Barron pulls his punches for safety's sake...until he tangles with paranoid billionaire Benedict Howards, peddler of cryonic immortality, and walks into a minefield of deadly cover-ups. Violence erupts. Howards believes he can buy anyone, even Barron's estranged wife, even Barron. Barron doesn't mind selling out if the coin is immortality. On TV, the power remains all his:
As they rolled the final commercial Barron felt a weird manic exhilaration, knowing that he had set up a focus of forces that could squash the five-hundred-billion-dollar Foundation for Human Immortality like a bug if Bennie proved dumb enough to not holler "Uncle".The Foundation's medical secret--poor science but still packing a vicious gut-punch--is more appalling than Barron's nastiest guesses; by the time he learns the truth he's ensnared in complicity. Worse things follow. At the climax, with nothing left to lose, our man goes for broke in a desperate effort to crack Howards open in Barron's own glowing TV arena, in front of 100,000,000 viewers....Slightly dated and occasionally crude, but still hyper-intense, memorable stuff. --David Langford
Product Description
GET SET FOR THE BEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED TO YOU! The banned book is back! You've heard of it, now you can read it!
Lover and hero, Jack Barron, the sold-out media god of the Bug Jack Barron Show, has one last chance to hit it big when he meets Benedict Howards, the power-mad man with the secret to immortality.
A Hugo and Nebula Award finalist -- with an Afterword by Michael Moorcock -- start reading now so you too can BUG JACK BARRON!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Norman Spinrad is the author of over twenty novels and some 60 short stories collected in half a dozen volumes, including the notable THE LAST HURRAH OF THE GOLDEN HORDE. The novels and stories have been published in 15 languages.
He's written teleplays, including the classic Star Trek episode, "The Doomsday Machine," and two produced feature films DRUIDS and LA SIRENE ROUGE. He is a long time literary critic, sometime film critic, perpetual political analyst, and sometime songwriter.
He's also briefly been a radio phone show host, has appeared as a vocal artist on three albums, and occassionally performs live. He's been a literary agent, and President of the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) and World SF. He's posted 21 YouTube videos to date.
He grew up in New York, has lived in Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, and Paris, and travelled widely in Europe and rather less so in Latin America, Asia, and Oceania.
Lover and hero, Jack Barron, the sold-out media god of the Bug Jack Barron Show, has one last chance to hit it big when he meets Benedict Howards, the power-mad man with the secret to immortality.
A Hugo and Nebula Award finalist -- with an Afterword by Michael Moorcock -- start reading now so you too can BUG JACK BARRON!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Norman Spinrad is the author of over twenty novels and some 60 short stories collected in half a dozen volumes, including the notable THE LAST HURRAH OF THE GOLDEN HORDE. The novels and stories have been published in 15 languages.
He's written teleplays, including the classic Star Trek episode, "The Doomsday Machine," and two produced feature films DRUIDS and LA SIRENE ROUGE. He is a long time literary critic, sometime film critic, perpetual political analyst, and sometime songwriter.
He's also briefly been a radio phone show host, has appeared as a vocal artist on three albums, and occassionally performs live. He's been a literary agent, and President of the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) and World SF. He's posted 21 YouTube videos to date.
He grew up in New York, has lived in Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, and Paris, and travelled widely in Europe and rather less so in Latin America, Asia, and Oceania.
