BIMBOS OF THE DEATH SUN won the 1988 Edgar for best original paperback mystery. It was a satirical look at SF cons and their conventions with a murder thrown in.
Dr, James O. Mega, an electrical engineer teacher, has taken a booth at Rubicon, an SF con, to publicize his first novel, a hard science fiction tale published under the name Jay Omega. It concerns a space station and the radiation effects, lowered intellect on the female crew members, of a nearby sun. The publisher, much to his embarrassment, retitled it the lurid Bimbos of The Death Sun. He’s a guest of honor at the con.
The other guest of honor is Appin Dungannon, author of a popular fantasy series. He’s a tyrannical despot who looks down on the fans and customarily insults almost everyone with which he comes into contact.
He is murdered, promptly causing a run on all his merchandise available at the dealer tables. The police are in a quandary. Suspects? How about almost everybody in attendance at the con. But no one seemed to have the opportunity.
Omega becomes the impromptu detective on the case and uses a device familiar to old time mystery fans. Gathering all the suspects together, this time in a role-playing game, to get the confession.
A few years later, McCrumb wrote a sequel, ZOMBIES OF THE GENE POOL, that has Omega attending an important media event. Back in the fifties, a young group of fanboys had buried a time capsule filled with their amateur SF stories. It’s thirty years later and some of the group have become quite famous, others are dead. The capsule is being dug up.
One of the supposedly “dead” ones shows up at the unearthing.
This book is less of a traditional mystery. The murder doesn’t show up until more than halfway through the book and isn’t defined as murder until near the end.
Both are fun books and seem to be readily available at Amazon and the used book sites.
JERRY HOUSE said:
Several years ago I asked McCrumb if there would be any more Omega books. Alas, she told me he was dead.
randy Johnson said:
Jerry,
I expected that, though one more might have been nice. You know, at maybe a crime con or something.
David Cranmer said:
This sounds like a lot of fun and being a fan that’s been to a few of these conventions, I probably could relate to these characters… Except maybe the tyrannical despot.
patti abbott said:
I’ve only read her more traditional mysteries. Have to try this.
Charles Gramlich said:
I have both of these. I read Bimbos years ago and enjoyed it, but for some reason never started reading the second one.
randy Johnson said:
If you’re like me, Charles, you get caught up in something and want everything. But I don’t like to read to much by one author at a time.
Then things sort of get put on the back burner as new stuff is acquired. Too much to read and not enough time.
PK the Bookeemonster said:
Loved this book and the sequel when they came out. Too bad the author apparently doesn’t respect them herself.
Jeremy said:
During college, I was VP of RPSG (Role-playing and strategy Game) org. I was a casual gamer that got talked into since I regularly bathed and had public speaking skills.
I was reading this during a meeting and found myself slowly examining the 40 or so folks in the room and thinking “Good God, she is talking about every damn one of these folk!”
I quit shortly after that.
Damn fun book.
Sharyn wrote some very fun mysteries, it is a pity that she has taken such great pains to remove herself from the mystery genre.
Iren said:
He’s dead? That’s the plot for the last one… what ever happened to Jay Omega…