Greasing the Pan: the "Best" of Paul T. Riddell

Science fiction essayist Paul T. Riddell isn't the first to compare magazine writing to public masturbation, but he's the first to practice what he preached and quite writing. Before he did, he and cohort Edgar Harris (former sports editor of Science Fiction Age) spent thirteen years covering such diverse subjects as assistance to beginning writers ("I want to hunt down the idiot who came up with that 'writers make $37.50 an hour' story and let Whitley Strieber's aliens make him/her squeal like a pig") to Harlan Ellison's cybernetic history and how Canada formally apologized to the UN for the TV series Lexx. Put down the Edmond Scientific catalog, grab a UNIT recruiting flyer, and find out why Ellen Datlow referred to Riddell as ". . .unfailingly incediary."