Echoes of All Our Conversations

[SamusekTDS]

so any working coupons?

[KoshN]

so any working coupons?

Ordered mine the first day of notice, but the 25 percent off coupon for Liking on Facebook would NOT work on THAT order. The instant button wouldn't "take." So, I'll use it on my next order, before July 4th.

[JasonDavis]

There's now a video of Claudia Christian opening her copy of Echoes of All Our Conversations, Volume 1 available at B5Books.com.

[nottenst]

It has arrived and I just popped the CD in....

It is great to hear their voices again.

.....

Edit: And now I just finished listening to it. It was a great fun interview. I took a quick glance through the book and like usual it looks fascinating ...

[beerguy101]

Received my copy of the book today. I think I know how I will spend part of this raining doing...

[Jan]

(Thought it was time to change the thread title to the name of the series)

Jan

[DaveNarn]

Just got my copy of Echoes Of All Our Conversations Vol. 1 and am working my way through.
What an amazing collection of interviews - good work Joe!

I'm sold now, hook, line, and sinker sign me up for the next 5 volumes.

[SamusekTDS]

I just got mine today, looked it over... and... hm.

I think it's too expensive for what it is - I've gotten every book so far since this started - but I think here is where I will have to draw the line.

When the original 15 volume series was announced, I never expected the editors to turn it into a cottage industry, and I feel like the whole thing has now officially been milked a bit too dry. It was expected the Crusade books would be out by now, and they're not. Instead, while nicely edited, we have expensive vanity book after book of compiled, largely already published material.

I will say that the only volumes I got before this that disappointed were "asked and answered".

Not to mention the regular book price has gone up by 20$ (CD is nice, but not worth that 20) is significantly shorter and coming out too quickly (60$ a month for 6 months? perhaps on a slower schedule I may still have even considered it.)

Hm.

Add to that that cafepress STILL has not corrected their shipping cost to Canada, and now I can't even offset that with coupons anymore. Bugger this.

Honestly, (IMHO) to avoid potentially abusing the B5 fan community goodwill, at this point you probably should: finish the Crusade series, and then get together, call it a day, thank all the fans for their years of loyal patronage and move on to other pursuits.

I'm sure its at least partially a labour of love for most of the scripts team, but it is also possible to smother with love. Good work has been done over these years, but please follow B5's lead and end things on a high and not drag it out.

Anyway - of course its your right to put out whatever you'd like and JMS approves of, and my right to buy or not to buy, but it would also be nice to able to say: "Yup! this shelf has every book they put out, not a bad one among the bunch, and worth every penny."
---
Sam.

[Joe Nazzaro]

Sam, I wouldn't even begin to argue with you about the relative worth of the project, but the one thing I would correct is that you claim this is 'largely already published material.' As I've explained before, there are bits and pieces that may have appeared in various genre magazines many years ago, but the bulk of material has never been printed in its entirety before, and I am probably the one person in the entire world that can tell you that with any authority. If you think there was any magazine out there that would run interviews of that size (even if they did have the photos to run with them, which they didn't), that is most definitely not so. Other than that, you are most certainly entitled to your opinions. I think terms like 'worth' and 'value' are very subjective and I would never want to argue them with anybody.

[Jan]

Sam,

If you haven't already sent your thoughts to Captain Jaclyn at [email protected], I urge you to do so. While Jason and I are part of the team, it's she who can handle any shipping issues and who should be aware of how you feel in general. Include your order number, too.

Jan

[DaveNarn]

I agree - value is very subjective thing.
Yes these books are expensive anyway you slice it and you have to be bitten pretty hard by the B5 bug to shell out this kind of cash.

If so, this a rare opportunity (not shared by most other Sci-Fi fans) to geek out on how B5 was made as told from the cast and crew as advertised - and I'm not disappointed.

I've enjoyed these actors in other rolls and get a kick out of the complete and chronological referenced interviews.
Peter Jurasik talking about his days on Hill Street Blues or Jerry Doyle's carefully gauged comments on about his co-star Michael O'Hare.
(If you have ever heard Jerry's current radio show, you've heard a more critical version of Michael.)

I'm thinking the transcripts are unedited because as I read I hear the familiar phrasing each of these guys have that I have come to know.

Looking forward to the next volume

[Joe Nazzaro]

Dave, you're mostly correct about them being unedited. There are a rare few comments that were off the record and obviously couldn't be printed, but surprisingly, the off-the-record comments were few and far between over the years. Most people weren't afraid to express their opinion even if it risked getting on the bad side about production and perhaps I was circumspect about running them at the time only because I didn't want to cause them any trouble, but as you can see, that material has now been fully restored. For example, Larry Ditillio was always very outspoken about what constituted a 'Joe story' and what was a 'Larry story,' but since he was still working on the show at the time a lot of those comments were made, but I didn't want to cause him grief by putting something out that was deliberately inflammatory just for the sake of putting it out there. But I did quiz Larry about all of Joe's episodes, just as I quizzed Joe about Larry's episodes.

[Jan]

Not to argue perceived value at all but one note about:

Good work has been done over these years, but please follow B5's lead and end things on a high and not drag it out.

I think it's worth noting that the Black Series and the A&A books were all from JMS' point of view. Now it hasn't been from anybody in these threads, but a fair point has been made elsewhere that virtually all of the material out and available has been JMS-centric. My original thought when hearing about these interview books is that it would give a voice to lots of the other folks who were involved with the show. Even though there were spotlights about them in the B5 magazine, many (most?) folks don't have access to that sort of thing anymore.

To me, preserving the unique history of the show is what it's all about. Whether that's valuable to individuals is something everybody has to decide for themselves.

Jan

[JoeD80]

For example, Larry Ditillio was always very outspoken about what constituted a 'Joe story' and what was a 'Larry story,' but since he was still working on the show at the time a lot of those comments were made, but I didn't want to cause him grief by putting something out that was deliberately inflammatory just for the sake of putting it out there. But I did quiz Larry about all of Joe's episodes, just as I quizzed Joe about Larry's episodes.

It was interesting meeting Larry & Joe at the same time recently. They are like old war buddies, joking around but also not afraid to say the worst things to each other.

[Jonas]

My one complaint is that making these books limited editions and not putting them out as eBooks means that it is not, in fact, helping to preserve the history of B5. It is only making them available to a small group of people with relatively high incomes.

I, for example, am someone who takes this show very seriously, has been heavily influenced by it as an artist, and would very much like to spend some time at some point writing some work of an academic nature about it. Beyond that, I find that many of the books, especially the script books, contain invaluable information about running a show and organizing a production, information that would be extremely useful to future generations of storytellers.

But it is simply impossible for someone of my background to buy all of this in the available timeframe. Impossible. I have to struggle to pay the rent, to make sure we've got something to eat. And surely I am not the only person in such a situation, especially in this age of crisis. I managed to get a bunch of the books, mostly as Christmas presents, but there are a lot of them that I'll never read. I'm pretty sure a lot of others are in the same position. Some of them are only just finding out about B5.

I know all of this has been said before, and I appreciate all the hard work that's been put into these books. But I cannot help but think that it's a shame that the history of such a monumental show, which will continue to affect people around the globe (we're not all in the US, remember?) for many years to come, will remain the exclusive property of a few people who were lucky enough to be there and to have the money. Especially given that we do have the technology now to make such information available on something other than dead wood.