L. Neil Smith Withdraws Novels from Prometheus Consideration

While I'm grateful to members of the Libertarian Futurist Society for nominating my books, Contact and Commune and Converse and Conflict for the 1991 Prometheus award, I request that they be withdrawn from consideration.

As you know, they would have been part of the FORGE OF THE ELDERS trilogy (the third volume is finished) and, as such, represent about two-thirds of a story. Publication of the third volume was cancelled under circumstances I've already written to you about. I don't want them to compete with one another, nor do I wish to reward a publisher for having treated them SO shabbily, especially when I'm considering alternatives still in a matter I regard as far from closed.

More than any other reason, however, I'm choosing this path because I'm proud of these books, which take the most enthusiastic slap at the bland face of "political correctness" I could manage. (I believe this is why the first two volumes were never competently promoted and the publisher threw the third volume away.) I anticipate their future publication in complete form under their correct titles, and perhaps even between a single pair of covers. At that time, if your members are kind enough to desire it, theyll be available for reconsideration.

Sincerely,
L. Neil Smith