Re: Smoking. Was: Clarke Award Finalists 2001

On 6/17/2025 10:27 AM, Scott Lurndal wrote:

Bobbie Sellers <bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> writes:

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On 6/16/25 22:45, Titus G wrote:

On 17/06/25 07:00, Michael F. Stemper wrote:
snip

but all that I can remember about them is: more smoking than in Doc Smith.
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I was surprised at characters spending more time smoking cigarettes than
sticking to the plot in some recent reads.
Meet the Tiger. Leslie Charteris.
The Ministry of Time. Kaliane Bradley.
Hardwired. Walter Jon Williams.
The worst was non SF, Vengeance by Benjamin Black.

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Books I read in the 1960s and thoughly enjoyed were recently
reopened and closed for the very same reason as I found the smoking
scenes too objectionable. And nearly every character just had to have
another cigarette to talk to friends or tell off the enemies.
I myself never seriously smoked tobacco at any time but most
was after i was 25 yoa.  The smoking did not offend me when i read
the books the first time. Now it disgusts me to read about it. The
result of anti-smoking propaganda or the thought of my former
room mate who had smoked since she was 14 yoa and died at
75 of brain cancer that had spread from a lung cancer.

 As a lifelong non-smoker, I recall having difficulty enjoying
a restaurant meal due to smokers at the next table, walking out
of a bar smelling like an ashtray, or trying to survive a six
hour flight in the last non-smoking row of an airplane.
 I'm happy that all three are no longer issues.

I was flying from South America to Miami on TACA Airlines about 35 years ago when the dude sitting next to me lit up a Churchill cigar.  The last hour+ of that flight was miserable.
Lynn