science

The Bones of Zora

The Bones of Zora is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand The Bones of Zora rather than just read about it. In short: The Bones of Zora is a science fiction novel by American writers L. Sprague de Camp and Catherine Crook de Camp, the ninth book of the former's Viagens Interplanetarias series and the seventh of its subseries of stories set on the fictional planet Krishna.

Key takeaways

The Bones of Zora belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect The Bones of Zora to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of The Bones of Zora from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Bones of Zora is a science fiction novel by American writers L. Sprague de Camp and Catherine Crook de Camp, the ninth book of the former's Viagens Interplanetarias series and the seventh of its subseries of stories set on the fictional planet Krishna. Chronologically it is the sixth Krishna novel. It was first published in hardcover by Phantasia Press in 1983, and in paperback by Ace Books in August, 1984 as part of the standard edition of the Krishna novels. An E-book edition was published by Gollancz's SF Gateway imprint on September 29, 2011 as part of a general release of de Camp's works in electronic form. The novel has also been translated into German. As with all of the "Krishna" novels, the title of The Bones of Zora has a "Z" in it, a practice de Camp claimed to have devised to keep track of them. Short stories in the series do not follow the practice, nor do Viagens Interplanetarias works not set on Krishna.

Plot summary Fergus Reith, prime Terran tour guide on the planet Krishna, finds himself between tours and on a somewhat different job, working with Aristide Marot, a French paleontologist out to unravel the mysteries of Krishnan vertebrate evolution. Marot is particularly interested in the era when life first emerged from the seas; as Krishna's surface is mostly land and its bodies of water are separated from each other, he theorizes the planet's animal species could have multiple origins.

Fergus guides Marot to the most promising fossil-bearing site, near the town of Kubyab on the banks of the upper Zora River in the Dashtate of Chilihagh. There they find a rival, Marot's competitor Warren Foltz, who is fanatically attached to a rival theory and is not averse to destroying contrary evidence. Moreover, Foltz is being assisted by xenologist Alicia Dyckman, to whom Fergus had formerly been wed in a stormy marriage culminating in divorce. The cause was Alicia's contentious and overbearing personality; convinced she always knew best, she had interfered with Fergus's tours to the point that he had finally barred her from participating. Miserable, at an emotional low ebb, and exploited by Foltz, Alicia now regrets having left Fergus, but their jobs keep them in continued opposition. Reith's scientific adventure is thus beset by skullduggery, violence, and tempestuous personal relations. Blessed with beginner's luck, he actually discovers a fossil supporting Marot's theory, which Foltz endeavors to hijack and break up. Various complications ensue; Fergus and Alicia are brought back together by their mutual passion for each other and enmity with Foltz, only to be alienated again due to Alicia's extreme behavior. Ultimately Fergus decides with regret it would be disastrous to take her back, and she leaves Krishna heartbroken, hoping to find treatment for her personality disorders on Earth. The Bones of Zora is unique among the later Krishna novels in its inclusion of a non-Krishnan extraterrestrial, a reptilian native of the planet Osiris. While such aliens were fairly common in the earliest of de Camp's Krishna books, his later works usually focus on Terrans and Krishnans only.

Setting The planet Krishna is de Camp's premier creation in the Sword and Planet genre, representing both a tribute to the Barsoom novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs and an attempt to "get it right", reconstructing the concept logically, without what he regarded as Burroughs' biological and technological absurdities. De Camp intended the stories as "pure entertainment in the form of light, humorous, swashbuckling, interplanetary adventure-romances - a sort of sophisticated Burroughs-type story, more carefully thought out than their prototypes." As dated in James Cambias's GURPS Planet Krishna (a 1997 gaming guide to the Viagens series authorized by de Camp), the action of The Bones of Zora takes place in the year 2151 AD., falling between The Virgin of Zesh and The Tower of Zanid, and making it the tenth story set on Krishna in terms of chronology. Internal evidence in The Bones of Zora confirms the relative sequence of Virgin and Zora.

Reception According to Publishers Weekly, "[t]his ... first collaboration in the long-running Krishna series [is] very much in the same lighthearted adventure vein as de Camp's solo efforts ... There's plenty of amusing action ... plus some wry, wise observations on relationships. After 46 years, the de Camp imprimatur still guarantees a good time. Tom Easton, writing in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, took a different view, calling the book "less good than its predecessors, partly because it is too much of a reprise. Too often, the pages ask (and answer), "Whatever happened to so and so?" and the story suffers for its lack of original novelty." He cautioned that "anyone who first visits Krishna through Bones is going to wonder what all the fuss is about," noting that "though the complications lend pace and fury to the action, they seem arbitrary, staged, like a tornado in a wind tunnel." But he concluded "[n]evertheless, I am sure there are enough Krishna fans to buy out the Phantasia edition. They will enjoy the book enough to justify the expense." In Issue 29 of Abyss, Eric Olson called this "both an enjoyable and an edifying read. This may not be a great or world shaking work, but it is a model of how to create an alien society which is believable, detailed and fun."" Robert Coulson, in Amazing Science Fiction Stories, agreed that "[i]t's not the best book in the Krishnan series, but it's entertaining and well worth your time." He characterized the story as "[a]n amusing trek through the pre-industrial societies of Krishna." Regarding the characters, he called "Reith's wimpish attitude toward Alicia ... believable if infuriating; the rest of the cast, plot, and background are good." Don D'Ammassa, addressing this and other late entries in the Viagens series, wrote "[t]he quality of the series remains undiminished in [these] volumes, which combine good-natured mayhem and a crisp, exciting narrative style.

Relation to other works The main plot device of bickering male and female protagonists not destined for a happy ending together is featured in several late de Camp novels, notably The Prisoner of Zhamanak (1982), The Incorporated Knight (1987), and The Pixilated Peeress (1991).

Notes

Illustrations

The Bones of Zora: Standard Ace edition of The Bones of Zora by L. Sprague de Camp and Catherine Crook de Camp, Ace Books, 1984 — Standard Ace edition of The Bones of Zora by L. Sprague de Camp and Catherine Crook de Camp, Ace Books, 1984

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with The Bones of Zora

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what The Bones of Zora claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to The Bones of Zora before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about The Bones of Zora ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of The Bones of Zora

In research: The Bones of Zora appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses The Bones of Zora in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: The Bones of Zora is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1983 American novels, 1983 English-language novels, 1983 science fiction novels, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for The Bones of Zora outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study The Bones of Zora in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what The Bones of Zora means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain The Bones of Zora out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is The Bones of Zora in simple terms?

Why does The Bones of Zora matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study The Bones of Zora?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on The Bones of Zora.