Gary Hoppenstand is a professor teaching in the Depatment of American Thought and Language at Michigan State University. Mr. Hoppenstand is writing a book for State University of New York Press entitled Tech-Noir: The Story of Postmodern Adventure Fiction. The book is scheduled for publication in the fall of 2002, and it will contain a chapter on George C. Chesbro's The Beasts of Valhalla.

Here is an excerpt from one of the messages Mr. Hoppenstand sent to Mr. Chesbro:

I plan to write the chapter featuring Beasts sometime in late December 2001. With your permission, between now and then I will develop about six or seven questions about the novel that will center on your representations of science and technology in the story, as well as additional information about the history of your novel and how you came to write it. As I mentioned to you, I also plan on using Beasts in my summer "Science and Technology" humanities class here at Michigan State. I am most pleased that you have brought it back into print, and I know that my students will thoroughly enjoy it.

One of my main arguments that I will be advancing about your work in my book is your expression of a fundamental humanism in your series and non-series fiction. Mongo, Garth, Veil, Chant and your other protagonists are representations of the triumph of the human spirit in a contemporary world of self-inflicted pain. Your fiction tackles oppression in a variety of areas: government oppression, the oppression of religious fundamentalism, and the oppression of political fascism, among others. Your stories break traditional genre boundaries, crossing science fiction, crime fiction, horror fiction, and detective fiction, presenting narratives that are both highly entertaining and profoundly moving. Not many contemporary writers have attempted this feat, let alone done it as well as you have.

I look forward to sending you a draft of my chapter in early January.

Thank you again.

Gary Hoppenstand

Click here to view the Table of Contents for Tech-Noir.

More information about Tech-Noir will be available here on Dangerous Dwarf when the book has been published.