SHIVA (was: Re: "While I'm sitting here drinking coffee...")

Damien Broderick (damien@ariel.ucs.unimelb.edu.au)
Wed, 30 Jul 1997 12:24:59 +0000

> >Reference : SHIVA a science fiction book of some years ago which postulated
> >drawing power from the Ionospher by "shorting' it to ground using laser
>beams
> >to ionize a path.

Forrest asked:

> I haven't seen this. Is it good hard SF?

I assume the reference is to SHIVA DESCENDING, one of the first of the
current flood of `hammeroid' novels and made-for-TVs and Spielbergs...
It's a 1980 `the asteroid is coming!' collaboration between Prof Gregory
Benford (and you can't get harder than *that*) and sf fan artist and genial
porno film maker Bill Rotsler (and you can't get harder than *that*,
either). There are plenty of doubts, though, over whether it's any good.

Damien Broderick