Spider Legs Read online

  After some hesitation on Piers's part, it seemed like I soon hooked him on the idea of a collaboration, and what you see is the result. Collaborating turned out to be quite easy, and, oddly enough, choosing a title was one of our more difficult jobs. I had originally called the book Phantom, a title which we abandoned fairly quickly because the title had been used too many times before. Before we finally arrived at Spider Legs, we considered other titles: PycnoPhantom, Legs, Killer Legs, Sea Legs, Pycnophobia, Fractal Phantoms, Spider Eating, Spider Hunter, and even 20,000 Legs Under the Sea.

  Some of you may be interested in how I got the idea for Martha and Elmo's long teeth. It came from various children's stories I had read involving humans with large teeth. In fact these kinds of stories have had a long history. The scary story “The Teeth” in the children's book In a Dark, Dark Room by A. Schwartz (Harper-Trophy, 1985) is one good example. “The Teeth” is based on a story from Surinam (Dutch Guiana) collected in the 1920s by Melville and Frances Herskovitz. In the story, a boy continues to meet men on the street with large teeth. Each man he encounters seems to have bigger teeth than the previous. . . .

  There is some precedent in the medical literature for a disease known as “vampire disease” which gives the impression of longer teeth because the gums recede. Other effects of this blood disorder disease include pale skin, sensitivity to sunlight, and partial relief by drinking blood. There's also a disease which causes long fingers: Marian's syndrome. President Abe Lincoln is a suspected case, presently awaiting positive identification of the gene from his remains. People with Marfan's are also taller than average.

  By now you have probably noticed that I love to collect quotations of all sorts. In Spider Legs you'll see a number of quotations by Robert Ingersoll. I found these in an old, tattered book at a local library book sale. The book was published in 1881 and is falling apart now, but hopefully I have preserved some of its wisdom here. For those of you who collect quotations, here are two favorites:

  You are so part of the world that your slightest action contributes to its reality. Your breath changes the atmosphere. Your encounters with others alter the fabrics of their lives and the lives of those who come in contact with them.—Jane Roberts

  If we wish to understand the nature of the Universe we have an inner hidden advantage: we are ourselves little portions of the universe and so carry the answer within us.—Jacques Boivin

  You probably know all about Piers from his previous novels and Author's Note, but if you're interested in some of my hobbies, they include the practice of Ch'ang-Shih Tai-Chi Ch'uan and Shaolin Kung Fu, raising golden and green severums (large tropical fish found in the central Amazon basin), producing computer art, collecting prehistoric mammal skulls and carved African masks, playing piano, and working with the SETI League, a worldwide group of radioastronomers who scientifically search the heavens to detect evidence of extraterrestrial life.

  My professional interest is finding new ways to continually expand creativity by melding art, science, mathematics, and other seemingly disparate areas of human endeavor; and some of my older books include such titles as The Alien IQ Test, The Loom of God, Keys to Infinity, Black Holes—A Traveler's Guide, and Chaos in Wonderland. I also wrote the brain-boggier columns for Discover magazine, hold several U.S. patents, and am associate editor for various scientific journals. If you'd like to learn more about pycnogonids, see images of fossil pycnogonids, or learn more about Newfoundland, please feel free to visit my Internet web site, which has received millions of visits: http://www.pickover.com.

  Enough about me. I'd like to hear from you readers. If you would like to send me your comments on this Anthony/Pickover collaboration, or obtain a photo of a real pycnogonid, or obtain more information and a complete list of my other popular science books, or send me your own favorite quotations, I can be reached at www.pickover.com.

  P.S. Although this Author's Note is finished, by now my lobster is cold. Shall I put it in the microwave to reheat it, or would the claws explode under the pressure of the warming fluid? Let's try the microwave. While we wait: Did you know this decapod (yes, that's its scientific order) has 19 pairs of legs. The eyes consist of a few elongated segments. The number of unfused ganglia (nerve tissue masses) posterior to the esophagael ganglion is five thoracic and six abdominal. I'm rambling. I know. I have a tendency to do that.

  The microwave is beeping. The lobster is now warm, but I seem to have lost my appetite after thinking so much about its anatomy. I also keep thinking of the scene in the resturant where Martha Samules probes at the lobster to make it move. Perhaps if Martha were here, we could give her a chunk to devour.

  All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 1998 by Piers Anthony Jacob and Clifford A. Pickover

  ISBN: 978-1-4976-5829-5

  This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

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