The Changed Man (27 page)

Authors: Orson Scott Card

“MEMORIES OF MY HEAD”

This story began very recently when Lee Zacharias, my writing teacher at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, mentioned that suicide stories were common enough among young writers that she despaired of ever seeing a good one. I remembered that when I was teaching at Elon College the semester before I had gotten enough of those suicide endings to make the pronouncement to my students that I hereby
forbade
them to end a story with suicide. It was a cop-out, said
Iâit was a confession that the writer had no idea how the story
really
ought to end.

Now, though, I was feeling a bit defiant. I had said that suicide stories were dumb, and now Lee was saying the same thing. Why not see if I could write one that was any good? And why not make it even more impossible by making it first person present tense, just because I detest present tense and have declared that first person is usually a bad choice?

The result is one of the strangest stories I've ever written. But I
like
it. I enjoyed using this epistolary form to tell the tale of a hideously malformed relationship between a couple who had lived together far longer than they had any reason to.

“LOST BOYS”

This story came with its own afterword. Let me only add that since its publication, it has been criticized somewhat for its supposed cheatingâI promise at the beginning to tell the truth, and then I lie. I can only say that it is a long tradition in ghost stories to pretend to be telling the truth; part of the pleasure in the tale is to keep the reader wondering whether
this
time the story might not be real. The ghost stories
I've
enjoyed most and remember the best have been the ones told as if they were true and had really happened to the teller. I tip my hat to Jack McLaughlin, a wonderful grad student in the theatre department at BYU, who spooked a whole bunch of us undergrad acting students with a really hair-raising poltergeist story that Actually Happened To Him.

I also enjoy the fact that criticisms of my story for violating expectations have all come from the more
literary, “experimental” wing of the science fiction community. It seems that they love experimentation and literary flamboyanceâbut only if it follows the correct line. If somebody dares to do something that is
surprisingly
shocking instead of
predictably
shocking, well, fie on them. Thus do the radicals reveal their orthodoxy.

The fact remains that “Lost Boys” is the most autobiographical, personal, and painful story I've ever written. I wrote it in the absolutely only way
I
could have written it. So even if the manner of its writing is a literary crime, as these critics say, I can only answer, “So shoot me.” I'm in the business of telling true stories as well as I possibly can. I've never yet found any of their rules that helped me tell a story better; and if I had followed their rules on this story, I never could have told it at all.

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

THE CHANGED MAN

Previously published as book one of
Maps In Mirror
by Orson Scott Card (Tor, 1990)

A Tor Book

Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

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New York, N.Y. 10010

TORÂ® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

Cover art by Paul Scanlan

eISBN 978-1-4299-2219-7

First eBook Edition : May 2011

First edition: April 1992

Tor Books by Orson Scott Card

Note: Within series, books are best read in listed order.

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ENDER UNIVERSE

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Ender Wiggin: The finest general the world could hope to find or breed.

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Danny North is different from his magical family. And when he discovers his gift, it is greater than he ever imaginedâwhich could earn him a death sentence.

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Visit the magical America that might have been, marvel as the tale of Alvin Maker unfolds.

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Earth has been rendered uninhabitable. But it is still vital.