Sime~Gen

Fandom
Name:	Sime~Gen
Abbreviation(s):	S~G
Creator:	Jean Lorrah and Jacqueline Lichtenberg, under the umbrella, Sime~Gen Inc.
Date(s):
Medium:	books
Country of Origin:
External Links:	http://www.simegen.com/
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

Sime~Gen aka Sime/Gen and Sime-Gen is a Science Fiction shared universe originally created by Jacqueline Lichtenberg and further developed professionally with Jean Lorrah and, eventually, Mary Lou Mendum.

some Sime~Gen biology, illo by Beth Ann Wempe, detail from Post-Syndrome: Considerations on Sexuality in the Sime/Gen Universe

According to Lichtenberg, “The concept is about what God will do to teach us compassion.”

One way to look at Sime~Gen is as a reinvention of the vampire archetype, as the universe centers around an exchange of lifeforce.

from the Simegen.com page

from the Simegen.com page, see Sime~Gen Inc.

banner from the Sime~Gen Facebook page

Some of the "Sime~Gen's" appeal to fans is the exploration of gender, power, destiny, and sexual relations. It is, outwardly, presented as almost entirely het, though same sex relationships are explored in subtle ways.

Many fans find the non-sexual but emotionally and physically intimate relationships between Sime and Gen characters, including those of the same sex, to be particularly appealing.

Elements of this universe are very similar to the fan-created Alpha/Beta/Omega and more extreme elements of the Sentinel AU tropes.

The Canon

Sime-Gen, Sime/Gen, Sime~Gen

The terms: "Sime-Gen" and "Sime/Gen" were used in the print zines. "Sime~Gen" is used online.

There appears to be no meaning attached to whatever punctuation is used.

Regarding the use of "-" and "/": Lichtenberg certainly was aware of those terms' meaning in early fanfic, and while "/" did not originally refer to same sex fanworks, the virgule certainly took on the meaning in later creations. Slash made fans start discussing the confusion the use of "/" was causing. A long discussion of the old Boards and lists settled on the tilde. Jean Lorrah may have suggested the tilde as representing tentacles.

What Is Sime-Gen?

Official Descriptions

From a 2015 for-profit book of Sime~Gen fanfic:

Sime~Gen is a series of novels written by Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah. It is set in a future where humans have mutated into two subspecies. Simes, who go through a brief but dramatic change at puberty and Gens, whose change, while just as dramatic, is invisible to the naked eye.

The outward sign of the Simes' change is development of tentacles on their forearms, four strong and flexible "handling" tentacles and two smaller tentacles just for selyn transfer, called "laterals." Gens produce life energy called "selyn" which Simes require once a month to live. Unfortunately, the result in obtaining this energy is usually the death of the Gen.

This physical transformation happens just prior to puberty. There is no way of knowing, before that, if a person will be Sime or Gen.

At the chronological beginning of the published novels by Jacqueline, and Jean, a second mutation of Sime emerges. These "channels" are able to keep Simes from Killing Gens, thus saving mankind from self-annihilation. The stories that you find here, and the published books by Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah, explore the role of these new Simes, and the Gens who live side by side with them as humankind struggles to become one again.

From an 2012 interview with Jacqueline Lichtenberg

The Sime~Gen Universe is built on the concept of the Human as essentially Good. Given no restraints and no outside control, the Human tendency is to do GOOD. The Natural Human is constructive, not destructive, and we tend to Love not Hate.

This is an assumption about Human Nature most people need to view via a Science Fiction lens. It's bizarre. It doesn't match up with what we think we see in the real world around us. It's fiction. But as such, it makes a terrific cornerstone for a science fiction worldbuilding exercise.

Another bizarre assumption behind Sime~Gen worldbuilding is (as with Star Trek) that the universe is essentially benign, a comfortable and welcoming natural home for the basic Human.

[...]

Humans belong in Nature - so there can never be the classic fictional conflict source of "Man Against Nature" -- which is the basis for the biggest best sellers.

The worldbuilding assumption (never overtly stated) is that the physical Human body, the Human Soul, and Nature (the universe around us) is all of one piece, wholly and totally integrated, absolutely harmonious. This situation exists because God is constantly creating this universe. We are a song that God is singing -- all in perfect harmony. [...]

Another "rule" of general fiction that Sime~Gen violates is the ancient adage that "Everything changes except human nature." That adage became famous in the genre of Historical Fiction. One basic cornerstone postulate behind Sime~Gen is: The Sime~Gen Universe: where a mutation makes the evolutionary division into male and female pale by comparison.

From the Sime~Gen website:

Imagine a world, our world, in the far distant future. Humanity has mutated into two different races. There are the GENS or generators of SELYN the energy of life. Their bodies produce more selyn than they require to live. Then there are the SIMES. They require SELYN to live, but their bodies don't produce it. The only way they can obtain SELYN is from a GEN, which can kill the GEN. Can humanity survive under these conditions? This is the premise behind the Sime~Gen universe, created by Jacqueline Lichtenberg. For almost 30 years these novels have captured the imaginations of men and women of all ages. They have banded together, created beautiful art, written wonderful stories and novels, published fanzines, formed mini-clubs known as Householdings, and more recently have invaded the internet, to create what we lovingly call the Virtual Tecton.

Fan Descriptions

Summary from "The Secret Pens":

Set on a post-apocalyptic Earth, they tell the story of a humanity split into two separate races: the energy-producing Gens and the tentacled, energy-feeding Simes. At first, Simes kill Gens to get their selyn or life energy. The two halves of humanity live in separate nations in a state of perpetual war. But then it is discovered that some Simes, called channels, are able to take selyn safely from a Gen and give it to another Sime. Some Gens, called Companions or Donors, can learn to give selyn safely to any Sime. Eventually there comes to be peace. Together, the eight published novels and two published short stories span several centuries from horse-and-buggy era to spaceflight.

From A Companion in Zeor #11 (1994):

Sime~Gen, or S~G as it is often abbreviated, is an interesting universe created by Jacqueline Lichtenberg. It is set in Earth's far future after a cataclysmic disaster that brings about a mutation of the human race.

Not only do the people evolve into two distinct groups of beings, but strange new plants and food sources evolve at the same time.

One group of humans evolve to be generally tall, thin, graceful, tentacled and feared by the other group. These were the Simes. They look human until you see their forearms. Each arm has four handling tentacles which function like extra hands or fingers. Two of them are over the wrist and two are under the wrist. There are two additional tentacles on either side of the wrist. These are called Laterals.

More on the Simes in a moment.

Then there are the Gens. Gens look just like you or I do today. Gens are normally terrified of Simes in that some Simes are known to kill Gens. Up to a point in time where some Simes and Gens started working together to create peace between their two races.

Gens unknowingly produce an energy source called selyn [pronounced seh-line]. Simes require the Gen's selyn to have a continued existance. Here is where the fear of Simes in a Gen comes into play.

Gens could easily live without the Simes. But the Sime cannot live without the Gen. Early in their development Simes used to capture Gens strictly for their own survival. They would ultimately kill the hapless Gen of every ounce of selyn. It was no wonder that the Gens have come to learn to fear the Simes and pass this fear on down through many generations of Gens!

Eventually, some of the Simes learned how not to kill a Gen when taking their selyn thus preserving the said Gen's life. This presented a tremendous challenge to the Sime population as well as the Gens.

Householdings were established after a time where Sime and Gen could live peacefully together. Early on in their history the Householdings were criticized and ofttimes attacked by hostile Simes. Householders, as they were called, were often referred to as perverts because of their chosen way of life.

By this time, Simes and Gens had different levels of status.

For the Gens, there were the Out-Territory Gens. Often called Wild Gens. There were Gens who came to be called Companions because of their abilities to serve their Sime partners willingly and without fear. They were the more talented Gens! As they also had a knack for keeping most Simes from getting their internal systems royally turned upside down and kept hostile nagers (the identifying feature of a Gen as well as Simes though Simes were not as brilliant and easy to see in the dark as Gens were) from interfering with a Channel's work. There were also Out-Territory Gens who were general donors much later on in their history.

Simes, on the other hand, had developed into either Channels, renSimes, or junct (addicted to the kill) Simes. The Sime who was junct could either be a renSime or a Channel. He or she depended on pen Gens (captured Gens from Out-Territory or specifically bred in government pens) for their survival. The Gens they used always died. A renSime living in a Householding depended on the Channels for the selyn they needed to live. Channels got their selyn from their Companions and with their Companions help either collected selyn from the usually nervous O-T general donor or in the distribution of the selyn to the renSimes.

No matter which sort of Sime you were, you had to have selyn every twenty-eight days or run the risk of dying by attrition or lack of selyn. This was not a pleasant way to die!

Gens who captured Simes in their territory often locked up the Sime in a cage in a public square and watched the offending Sime suffer and die. That is, if he or she didn't get shot to death.

Which brings me to another point. The children. Parents of In and Out Territory children could never be sure WHAT their child would be. Gen parents feared their children if blisters broke out on their forearms and would shoot and kill any and all such children! Why? To keep their communities safe from the killer Sime! First Need is a thing to be feared unless the child changes from pre-Gen (what all children are called) to a full-fledged Sime! Unless a qualified Channel or Donor is available, the new Sime will kill the first Gen they get their tentacles on!

Sime children who fail to changeover (the process of becoming a Sime and often unpleasant to the child in question) have the problem of being taken to the Gen pens where they are kept in a drugged state for the junct Simes' use. Unless they can escape from In Territory to Out Territory through established secret routes. Even escape to Out Territory can be cut short if border guards or licensed or unlicensed Raiders catch them!

Gen children who manage to get to the border face the same risks Sime children face. Raiders or the Gen Border Guards!

Eventually, a Unity is worked out between the Simes and the Gens.

From Kathryn Andersen:

For those of you completely confused, a small explanation must be given. The Sime~Gen universe is a fictional creation of Jacqueline Lichtenberg in which humanity has mutated into two forms - the selyn-producing Gens, and the tentacled (on their arms) Simes which feed on selyn. Selyn is a kind of life-energy which Simes can detect. Unfortunately, for most Simes, taking the selyn from a Gen kills the Gen. A Channel is a Sime who can take selyn from a Gen without killing them, and channel it to other Simes. Some Gens also, with proper talent and training, are able to donate selyn to any sime (not just Channels) without being killed.

The sting in the tail is that nobody is born Sime or Gen - a child will either establish as a Gen or change over into a Sime during adolecence. In changeover, the Sime's tentacles burst out of their sheaths, and they are hit by their First Need for selyn, in which the Sime will either kill a Gen or be given selyn from a Channel. There is a one-in-three chance that the child of two parents of one kind, will turn into one of the other kind. Thus the oft-repeated tragedy of a child changing over into a Sime, and killing their Gen parents -- or of the child of Simes turning Gen and being killed.

Zelerod's Doom is the mathematical prediction that, if Simes keep on killing Gens instead of using Channels to take their selyn, since a Sime needs the selyn from one Gen every month, there will come a time when there are no more Gens, and then all the Simes will die out very soon after.

Sime-Gen Positive Civilization Rebuild vs."Post-Apocalyptic"

Jacqueline Lichtenberg explained in a 2012 interview:

Sime~Gen is not "Post Apocalyptic" though that's the only Category Label extant that it's generally tossed into.

However, the novels that wear that label "Post Apocalyptic" are often very downbeat, about the desperate struggle to survive in a destroyed and shattered world, about the horrors of not having modern technology, about looking backwards to an unattainable golden age instead of building a better, new golden age. It's a term that's come to be applied to stories about barely surviving in a hopeless world which is utterly hostile to the human spirit, and which breaks the human spirit.

[…]

The Sime~Gen characters I write about are of a different breed. While there is a Householding that specializes in archeology and digging up ancient technology (in House of Zeor they're exploring what a "camera" can do), most of the people in this new society think for themselves and invent things, never considering that they can't do something just because they don't know how.

Much of the Sime~Gen redevelopment follows the same course that Ancient humans followed -- for the same compelling reasons. But there are departures due to their physiological and psychological differences from Ancient Humans.

The PreHistoric event that generates the Sime~Gen situation is not an "apocalypse" as generally depicted in Science Fiction and Fantasy novels -- but its opposite, but I don't think there is an antonym.

[…]

At that time [I created Sime~Gen], the SF literature was dominated by Atomic Bomb apocalypses, and all of my favorites were about human mutants: Andre Norton's STARMAN'S SON etc. All of those were cautionary tales (like Silent Spring) or outright Horror Stories (humans are so evil at heart that left to themselves they will destroy themselves - stupid or evil humans in a hostile environment.) So, being a science fiction writer, I postulated the opposite.

Instead of God cursing humans with utter destruction for our essential shortcomings, WHAT IF .... The essence of science fiction is "What if....?" or "If only ....?" or "If this goes on ...." I learned from reading about how to write that the best SF combines all 3 of those speculations. So I did.

WHAT IF - humanity is good, but stubbornly refusing to learn compassion?

IF ONLY - humans would become sensitive to the pain of others

IF THIS GOES ON - God will Bless us with a very definitive lesson. A lack of compassion will become a capital offense.

So in Sime~Gen, because of God's love for us and his Universe, God blesses us. If you postulate that God is real (a terrible stretch for some people, but this is SF after all -- no pain, no gain) -- and that the Soul is real, then Death can be only temporary. Reincarnation could be real because God, being rather sensible, would recycle these complicated creations called people.

Redesigning the Universe so that a lack of compassion is a capital offense is just God's method of training us in a lesson we really do want to master. It's a lesson in how to make life easy, how to get along, how to live without destroying that which supports life (our ecology - Sime~Gen is an answer to the problem of using up all Earth's oil for energy and not being able to restart civilization after collapse of this one).

Sime~Gen and the Vampire Archetype

"All the work by Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah revolves around themes of an "exchange of lifeforce." Both of them have written "traditional" vampire novels and stories (not in the Dracula vein), but their major work has been reinventing the vampire archetype in the Sime~Gen series."

For discussion and reader/fan reactions, see the article Sime~Gen and the Vampire Archetype.

The Pro Book Series

from a 2018 discussion: "Shouts out to u/sistersin for alerting us to the existence of this weird beefcake masterpiece and u/logomaniac-reviews for tracking down the name of the actual book."

"I remember when we saw the cover of our book, Jacqueline and I cried. In those days authors had NO CONTROL over what publishers thought would attract readers. We wrote science fiction/intimate adventure/action, and they put horror covers on them. But we survived, and that publisher is long gone! The Sime~Gen series is now up to 14 books."

"Oh wow are you Jean Lorrah? Very cool to have an author drop by! Good on you for persisting with the series. As you will see if you peruse this subreddit very much at all, some classic SF authors were eternally cursed with embarrassing or bewildering covers. We are fans of the genre and don't hold it against the authors!"

By Jacqueline Lichtenberg: House of Zeor (#1); Unto Zeor, Forever (#2); Mahogany Trinrose (#4); RenSime (#6); Personal Recognizance (#9); The Farris Channel (#12)

By Jean Lorrah: Ambrov Keon (#7); The Story Untold and Other Sime~Gen Stories (#10); To Kiss or To Kill (#11)

By Jean Lorrah and Jacqueline Lichtenberg: First Channel (#3); Channel’s Destiny (#5)

By Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah: Zelerod’s Doom (#8)

By Mary Lou Mendum, Jacqueline Lichtenberg, and Jean Lorrah: Clear Springs Chronicles: A Change of Tactics (#14); A Shift of Means (#15); A Test of Courage (#16)

Anthology by Fan Writers: Fear and Courage (#13)

The author who wrote the first draft of each book is listed first in collaborative works.

Its Origins

In 1989, Lichtenberg wrote, "The Sime/Gen universe was wholly conceptualized by the time I was 16, but fiction was not written in it until I was about 26."

“Sime~Gen is one of many endless stories I used to tell myself on long walks around the neighborhood.”

Lichtenberg describes the beginnings of Sime~Gen:

The origin is in [post-] World War II news pre-empting "The Lone Ranger" on the radio. “The Lone Ranger” was my earliest encounter with the misbegotten attitudes of commercial fiction purveyors - and all the rest proceeds from the 3-5 year-old’s outraged indignation. It still prevails in my thinking.

After the Internet became useful, I found a fan page devoted to the Lone Ranger where they posted the official Creed of the Lone Ranger - and it explained what I was hearing underneath the story and plot. It is the theme that defines the behavior of a good person.

Now, decades later, I see that standard of Good in many other sources - and all of it sums up to how to become a person who can use power without abusing it. The kiddie show inspires, the adult shows like Star Trek and Stargate challenge viewers to identify use from abuse, and the Bible prescribes exercises to master the use of power.

WWII was a correct use of power in the world, but pre-empting the lessons in how to recognize Good was an abuse of programming power.

[…]

Sime~Gen is about the use and abuse of the power to take or give. …

The situation of a future after the fall of this civilization is in the SF of the 1950’s - which I saw as doing it all wrong. The interesting part of humanity’s story is on the next rebuild. What will that rebuild be? The answer lies in the cause of the destruction. So Sime~Gen postulates the cause will be abuse of power.

Humans are hard to teach, and this is a Soul level lesson. So I postulated reincarnation as foundation of the world building.

The characters have undergone lots of short lives ending in horrendous deaths until they have learned to handle power with compassion. Those who have learned that lesson prosper in the rebuild and live longer lives with gentler deaths. Those who haven’t learned keep on dying horribly.

Now put some real people in that world and see what happens.

From a 2003 chat with Jacqueline Lichtenberg:

I used the same research I had done for Star Trek Lives! based on fan reader responses to my Kraith Series to construct the first novel in the Sime~Gen Universe....The core of that novel, House of Zeor, is what I called in Star Trek Lives! The Spock Effect. I sold it to 60 Spock fans on a money back guarantee and never had one returned. In other words, it works. Today, many more than 50 fans are writing Sime~Gen fanfic, posting it to the web, and having a ball. They role-play online, and do all kinds of things. So Sime~Gen does indeed capture whatever quality it was that ST had that made people want to write ST fanfic. I'm very pleased with the way that has turned out. I was as far as I know, the first writer to allow people, to encourage and train people, to write in my universe.

Also see Marion Zimmer Bradley's Influence on the Sime~Gen Universe, an article by Jacqueline Lichtenberg.

Sharing the Sime~Gen Universe

In the "Worldbuilding" forward to the 2018 Sime~Gen Concordance (manuscipt), Lichtenberg explained, "Sime~Gen, from inception, was created to be a participatory world, a platform for multi-media creations by many authors."

Jean Lorrah

Jacqueline Lichtenberg: "After selling several Sime~Gen novels to hardcover, I was joined by Jean Lorrah (author of many Trek novels, as well as her own series of fantasy novels, Savage Empire). Jean's first novel was our Sime~Gen collaboration titled First Channel. We are now co-owners of Sime~Gen Inc. which owns simegen.com.

For details on Lorrah and Lichtenberg's professional and fan-related collaborative work, see Jean Lorrah and Jacqueline Lichtenberg Collaboration.

From a 2012 interview with Lichtenberg:

[Jean] and I have very different world-views, but Sime~Gen is not a series but a universe -- to tell its story you must have a lot of worldviews included. Hence the fanfiction is an integral part of the experience of reading Sime~Gen.

Read a Sime~Gen published novel, read some related fanfiction posted on simegen.com/sgfandom/ -- then re-read that published novel and you'll find you're reading a totally different novel. That effect makes the published novels worth their price -- even the price of the audiobook versions.

Mary Lou Mendum

After re-publishing the Sime~Gen series in book, e-book, and audiobook form, Wildside Press began to ask for new S~G fiction, including fiction written by fans. Several of the more accomplished writers of longer fanfic that had been printed in the S~G zines were invited to work with Lichtenberg and Lorrah on revising their stories, conforming them to canon and getting them ready for submission for publication. Some of these writers were Kerry Lindemann-Schaefer (The Only Good Sime), Andrea Alton (Icy Nager), and Mary Lou Mendum.

Mendum, a plant/food scientist at the University of California, Davis, and well-known fan-writer and RPG player, completed the process; her trilogy was published as volumes 14-16 in the series. For more information, see Clear Springs Chronicles.

Fan Anthology

After Wildside Press requested a fan anthology, fan writers were invited to submit their already zine-published work or new work. Two fans, Zoe Farris and Karen L. MacLeod, edited the anthology. Lichtenberg and Lorrah also assisted with bringing the works up to standards. In 2015, Fear and Courage: Fourteen Writers Explore Sime~Gen, a for-profit fanfic anthology, was professionally published as #13 in the series. It contains forewords by Lichtenberg and Lorrah, as well as 19 fanworks. See the Fear and Courage entry for more information.

Welcome to the first Sime~Gen Anthology written by the fans. This Anthology is a compilation of stories and poetry written by people who have been influenced by the published works of Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah, in such a powerful way that they felt compelled to explore this universe in their own writing.

In 2017, Lichtenberg and Lorrah were thinking of making series volume 18 or 19 another fan anthology with a few longer stories, possibly featuring Mary Lou Mendum's "Mystery" stories.

A similar endeavor was DAW Darkover Anthologies.

The Logo

P.S. Nim's logo design, the symbol of the House of Zeor, as printed in The Sime/Gen Concordance

The "Ambrov Zeor" logo was created by Signe Landon and used on issues #5-#12. In 1976, Lichtenberg wrote about the logo in Ambrov Zeor #5:

The Ambrov Zeor logo on the cover of each issue of AZ after #3, Signe Landon's design which won the logo contest, is not, repeat not, the House of Zeor symbol. And the House of Zeor symbol is not the starred-cross. P.S. Nim's logo design is the House of Zeor symbol. The starred-cross is something else. I invented the starred cross while writing House of Zeor, and although it is not described in HoZ, I did have aspecific design in mind. Much to my surprise, as I learned more of occult and esoteric theory, I found that the starred-cross symbol I had in mind is perfect for the Sime series.

Dominance Hierarchy, Genetics, Need, and Survival

"Sime~Gen" is a fandom focused on the genetic need. Simes need organic body elements of Gens, Gens need to give this to Simes, despite the danger to themselves. Puberty is the time when humans either become Gens or Simes.

It is similar to the Alpha/Beta/Omega trope in this way, though "Sime~Gen" is almost entirely het, rather than same sex.

Also see Dominance Hierarchy.

• 
  from A Companion in Zeor #6 (1980)
• 
  from A Companion in Zeor , a cartoon from issue #5, by Lori Tartaglio, Michael Tartaglio: Woman says: "Dirty, rotten, stinking, shoven @#!*?*, lousy, miserable #!*@! Rant! Rave!..." Man says: "Oh, well. It's "that" time of the month".... But do I get her a Midol or a Gen?!") (1980)
• 
  cartoon from "A Companion in Zeor" #10, artist is Donell Meadows: portrays two Simes, and a Gen with a chain around their neck, the captions: "Slina's Gen Pen. Guaranteed Good Kills. Prime Stock. Special Orders." And No, I Won't Gift Wrap It."

The Fandom

The Origins

From a 2012 interview with Lichtenberg:

How did Sime~Gen fandom form? I couldn't honestly say it ever FORMED. It's an amorphous sprawl of happy role players who just love bouncing ideas around and rewriting the established Sime~Gen Universe exactly as Star Trek fans (me, too, with Kraith) rewrote Star Trek.

The fans create all these alternate universes that I just totally adore, and another one just started bouncing some ideas around on the Sime~Gen Group on facebook.

Remember those 60 copies of HOUSE OF ZEOR that I sold on a money back guarantee? Well they were to Spock fans, who were mostly fans of my Kraith Series of Star Trek fanfic -- and the reason they knew me was from reading fanzines, in which many of them also wrote stories.

I drew a bead (aimed) directly at that nerve that Spock's character twanged in those writers, and they responded to Sime~Gen the same way they responded to Trek -- the reached out their hands, grabbed the wet clay of my universe, and remolded it.

And that's how Marion Zimmer Bradley taught me -- molding my words with her hands, running my words through her typewriter, kneading them as you knead bread.

The Star Trek fan writers sent me Sime~Gen stories they'd written.

When you've got a tiger by the tail, there's nothing to do but swarm aboard and ride it. So I sent the stories to the editor of Ambrov Zeor (which was various people at various times) and she published them.

OK, it wasn't quite that simple. Before I would allow anything to be published in Ambrov Zeor, I had to make sure it met the highest professional standards of craftsmanship I knew how to meet. So often a fan written Sime~Gen story would go through 3-5 rewrites before it went to the editor and copyediting (and more little tweaks and twiddles) -- the exact same process any professional publishing house uses.

By doing this, we trained a lot of writers in the craft, and several editors, two of whom are working professionally now on the basis of what they learned then. I can think of two of the writers who have sold professionally, also. But many fan writers just don't want to write professionally -- not that they don't want to turn out high precision craftsmanship, but that their subject matter isn't geared to the commercial markets.

That squeezes a lot of material into the fanfic market which is now online with all kinds of fanfic spun off from TV shows. Many of our writers still write in those venues.

Permissions and Contracts

From Zeor Forum #1 (1980):

First off, you probably noticed that Jacqueline Lichtenberg owns the legal copyright to AMBROV ZEOR. This means that she owns all material not previously copyrighted printed in these pages, even if it’s your own pet theory. We arranged things this way for all-around legal protection, as we don't want anyone to get sued. Jacqueline can’t sue you for writing about her Simes and Gens, and if she likes your ideas so much that they end up in a pro Sime story, you can’t sue her either. But the nice thing is that the Sime universe is a living one, subject to change, and through AZ you readers will be able to affect Jacqueline’s view of it and her writing.

Fan Promotion

[need content]

The Intended Sime~Gen Audience

Jacqueline Lichtenberg commented on a male fan's letter of comment in Ambrov Zeor #7 that he was not her specific intended audience:

I am delighted that you liked "House of Zeor" so much. I normally say that it is written only for the SF of over 15 years' standing whose palate is somewhat jaded. I am always shocked when I meet a fan of the book who does not fit my intended audience (women between the ages of 18 and 25 who have been reading nothing but SF since they learned to read). But I've concluded that if one does something well, it can be appreciated by those for whom it was not intended.

Sime~Gen and Star Trek

From Ambrov Zeor #7: "Since Jean Lorrah and Jacqueline Lichtenberg are collaborating on the same Sime novel, "First Channel," It is expected that a familiarity with both Jean's Star Trek stories... and Jacqueline's Star Trek stories, the Kraith series, will enrich the Sime fan's enjoyment of "First Channel" [a Sime~Gen pro book]."

Also, see the 1976 essay House of Zeor and Star Trek and the 2000 essay The IF MAGAZINE connection to STAR TREK.

From Ambrov Zeor #6 (1978):

SINCE JEAN LORRAH AND JACQUELINE LICTENBERG ARE COLLABORATING ON TIE SIME NOVEL, FIRST CHANNEL, IT IS EXPECTED THAT A FAMILIARITY WITH BOTH JEAN'S STAR TREK STORIES AND JACQUELINE'S STAR TREK STORIES, THE KRAITH SERIES, (for info. S.A.S.E. Carol Lynn [address redacted]) WILL ENRICH THE SIME FAN'S ENJOYMENT OF FIRST CHANNEL.

In 1978, a fan commented on the connections between the Sime~Gen universe and Star Trek in a letter of comment printed in Ambrov Zeor #7:

I'm certainly glad I read STL, and AZ #1 before I read HoZ; otherwise I would have thought the similarities between ST and HoZ which I spotted were due to an overdose of ST zines instead of due to your intended use of the "tailored effects". For me, (I don't know how it appeared to anyone else) the similarity seemed most profound in the scene where Klyd is in his cell in extreme need. When I saw his actions at that time, I said to myself, "Hey, wait a minute: that sounds like a Vulcan in Pon Farr, maybe going into linger death." Then I realized that this was one of the "tailored effects" — the "superhuman" species which is stronger, faster, more resistant than so called "ordinary" humans, but who has a need, which, if it is not met, can lead gradually to madness or finally death.

Another fan in 1978 speculated on Sime~Gen and Star Trek, specifically Kraith:

This is an LoC of sorts on AZ 5&6 which I received yesterday; I just sort of arbitrarily decided to send it to you. I got some more ideas on Simes, etc., and also on Vulcans — in this case, re-workings of ideas of comparisons that I have previously discussed with Jacqueline (when I first got HoZ, and read it and critiqued it for her — I found a whole bunch of direct and indirect parallels between HoZ and Kraith — there was even a whole scene sequence I think JL just rewrote for HoZ right out of Kraith.) Anyway, I thought you (and other AZ people, including other readers) might be interested in the notes I jotted to myself last night.

One of the first things I did was make an equivalency listing: Vulcans = Simes; pon farr = need; (mating) Blooming = selyn (Gens). Now, I am aware that these are not exact equivalencies. The first two fit rather well (and the Vulcans are of course Kraith Vulcans — I do think that both Kraith Vulcans and Simes have many similarities, including a consciously constructed culture/ society. Other little details of similarity, things like Vulcan timesense, and Sime placesense. Body-knowledge/awareness, etc.)

The second one seems to me to be more than obvious. Both species are compelled by a basic biology they cannot deny; with the Vulcans it is pon farr, with the Simes it is selyn need.

In 1981, a fan questioned, among other things, the Star Trek connection:

[Beth]: ... one thing bugged me [in Ambrov Zeor #11]: I am not, nor have I ever been, or do I indeed ever plan to be, a Star Trek fan. Therefore, I don't think Trek-related material has any place in a Sine zine. I know it sounds petty, but I find it annoying. Also, a question — what impels a fan to write material in another author's universe? I have myself at least five universes of my own in various stages of development, and I knew I would never be able to write things in a world of someone else's creation. And yet many people apparently can and do, very happily. I don't really understand it. Can you?

Answer from Anne Golar [editor of Ambrov Zeor]: Gee, a Sime fan who is not a Trek fan. I have not encountered very many of those. I guess one of the reasons that Trek is in our zine is because most of the people who are into the zine got into science fiction through Trek, like me, or got into Trek through science fiction. And, Jacqueline is one of the co-authors of Star Trek Lives! and has written her own Star Trek universe stories, the Kraith series. It would be very hard to separate Trek from Simes when even Jacqueline has written the Sime series in such a way that she states that if you like Star Trek, you'll like her books. But, you see, we are not only Star Trek and Sime/Gen fans. We are dragon fans and Darkover fans and Amber fans and I know I don't speak only for myself when I say that we are Heinlein fans and Asimov fans and Clement fans and on and on. Now as for what impels a fan to write material in another author's universe. Jacqueline and Marion Zimmer Bradley and even a lot of Trek fan writers have been asked this question and the answer came down to this. The writers are more the discoverers of the universes. The universes are not the personal property of the authors and when a fan has waited months upon months, and in the case of Trek, years, without any fresh material in that universe, they become desperate. In fact they become so desperate to visit more with Hugh and Klyd, or Regis Hastur or Spock that they have to make up more stories. I myself also carry a few universes in my head, but I think that I would be a lot poorer person if I could not make room for the universes of others.

In 1999, Lichtenberg credited Star Trek, Gene Roddenberry, Leonard Nimoy (and Marion Zimmer Bradley) for some writing lessons:

This is an attempt to find the UNIFIED FIELD THEORY for the Sime~Gen World. It exists only in my subconscious (I think Jean has access to that part of my mind more easily than I do!) and as explained below, if there are ever to be more Sime~Gen novels from me, that is where that theory is going to stay. In my subconscious -- not in my conscious.

It is a common error on the part of writers trying to write pastiche -- and I saw it in the ms of an experienced Sime~Gen writer yesterday too -- to ask their questions in this style.

[...]

I learned some of how to recognize this error from Gene Roddenberry. I learned some from Leonard Nimoy. I recorded some of those lessons in STAR TREK LIVES! -- I learned more from Marion Zimmer Bradley. I developed more on this topic for myself.

From a 2012 interview with Lichtenberg regarding Star Trek, and meeting Jean Lorrah:

I first encountered Jean's writing during the compilation of STAR TREK LIVES! Jean had co-authored a STAR TREK story which we wanted to include in a center section of STAR TREK LIVES featuring fan fiction -- no fan fiction devoted to any TV, film or book series had ever been professionally published, aired, or discussed in professional journalistic media of any kind at that time.

It turned out that the fanfiction section would make the book too long, (and yes, they were against the concept of fanfic, and there were nasty copyright issues with Paramount which owned Star Trek at that time). So it wasn't included.

However, to their utter astonishment STAR TREK LIVES! was a best seller and went 8 printings -- we blew the lid on Star Trek fandom! So Sondra Marshak took on another partner, Myrna Culbreth and did the anthology STAR TREK: THE NEW VOYAGES (and some sequels, plus some original Trek novels) while I went on developing Sime~Gen.

When HOUSE OF ZEOR first came out in Hardcover, I sold copies I had bought myself to Star Trek fans I knew via snailmail magazines and groups. I sold it on a money back guarantee (the hardcover was exorbitantly expensive). The guarantee was only to Spock fans. People who liked Trek for reasons other than Spock were not my target readership for HOUSE OF ZEOR (though McCoy fans were the target of UNTO ZEOR, FOREVER).

I sold over 60 copies of the hardcover on the guarantee and never had one returned.

Jean Lorrah, however, was not so much a Spock fan as a Surak fan.

So HOUSE OF ZEOR both worked and didn't work for her. She wrote a review in a fanzine titled Vampire In Muddy Boots calling House of Zeor a novel that was flawed in the way of typical first novels. She was a professional writer at that time, but hadn't sold a novel, and didn't know the "flaws" evident in first novels are there not because the author can't do any better, but because publishing houses would BUY a novel that was a first novel that did not have those "flaws." Catch-22.

Very soon after the publication of House of Zeor, my mailbox exploded with mail. I couldn't handle it all and found myself writing the same thing again and again. So I started making as many carbon copies as I could and putting them out in circulating lists (asking each person to forward it to another on the list).

That didn't work well, and before I knew it, Betty Herr had taken over creating a mimeographed fanzine Ambrov Zeor.

For the first issue, we wanted to publish Jean Lorrah's insightful review, so I wrote to her and asked permission. Within months she'd sent in several fanzine stories set in Sime~Gen -- and soon after that we met at a Star Trek/Media convention where she showed me the outline for a longer story.

The Movie That Never Happened

There is much discussion from Jacqueline Lichtenberg about a long-dreamed about film proposal, titled "The Need." Some late 1999 speculation:

This fellow is the kind of connection (his track record is a verified fact about him, not just Hollywood Hot Air) that we have been unable to make for this project. We have the animators aboard - (in writing) - we have production contacts and networking to Distribution to the top of the top, all in favor of this project. But all of them are waiting on serious FINANCING -- before they can commit to the project.

MAYBE -- oh, just maybe -- this might turn out to be the lead that will connect us to the connection that will eventually cause this Feature Film to make it into "development" -- which is a long, long, long way from "production" you understand.

There's a term in Hollywood, "turnaround" -- it means that a thing has been "in development" too long and its market is no longer hot or the people who wanted to do the project are gone, or it's just not going anywhere because the energy is gone, or someone else just released a better one of these and it flopped -- and they turn the script back around to the Agent with regrets.

In other words, you can be "in development" for years, on a shelf gathering dust with nothing happening, and then be axed for no reason that has anything to do with the content of your script.

Or you can be "in development" not because this company wants to make that film, but because they DON'T want anyone else to make it and compete with one they have in production that they like better.

This new connection is a connection to the connections who MIGHT start the "in development" process.

It's SMOKE AND MIRRORS again. Get a grip on that idea -- this isn't to get excited about.

On the other hand, it's been several weeks since we had ANY movement, and months since we had a new contact that could lead toward financing. My head knows not to get excited, "Been there; done that. Hohum, <yawn>" and there are many of these I haven't reported to this List -- but this time my gut has another opinion.

THIS one could become significant. It may not be THE one -- but it could lead there.

The next step is one of those Power Lunch type meetings in Manhattan -- Agents get involved. Money involves contracts, time tables, promises in writing -- and at this particular time, our OTHER two legs on this deal (animation and production/distribution) may not have time or capacity to pursue this project, so we might have only financing and NOTHING ELSE -- back to square one.

We're going into the holiday season, and business grinds to a halt.

When things start again, the people along this new connection tree may be too busy to involve themselves with this project. It all could come to naught for no reason to do with S~G at all.

We have some TIME to get our websites polished up before another bunch of Hollywood types come trolling through here again, but if this thing starts to happen, a good bit of my attention will be siphoned off to attend to the managing of this script marketing and development.

It's based on a story I wrote, so I'm involved in rewrite conferences even though I'm not the rewriter and have no real say-so about the final version -- and so is Jean Lorrah because she's the one we nominate to do the "novelization" of the script and her opinions count. She's fleshing out the script and adding genuine S~G DETAIL that will be missing from the film. Jean's half-owner of this franchise, you know.

Early Online Presence

A February 1996 flyer inviting fans to go "on line"

flyer

ARE YOU ON LINE?

Then come join us!!!

We have ListServe.

Ask Jacqueline Lichtenberg or Jean Lorrah plus many others your favorite questions.

You'll be glad you did! <g>

SIME/GEN on EMail and the WEB.

Homophobia

Gay characters and homosexuality in "Sime~Gen" was a big topic of discussion, both with fans, and Jacqueline Lichtenberg herself.

Many fans were very distressed at Lichtenberg's refusal to include any relationships in her work that were not heterosexual and this was perceived by some fans to be homophobic.

See some fan comments about homopbobia and homosexuality in Sime~Gen canon and fanon.

See Homophobia in Fandom.

FanQ Awards

Winner in 2005:

• A Matter of Necessity, story by D. DaBinett (gen)

Honorable Mentions in 2005:

• Sime-Gen Cooperative Fiction, edited by Beverly Erlebacher
• A Companion's Duty by Lexie Pakulak (slash)

Conventions

Specifically Sime~Gen

• Sime-Gen Con (in conjunction with Westercon, Sacramento, 1981)
• Earthcon #2 (Cleveland, Ohio) (1982)

As a Presence

• ConJose (2002)
• TorCon3 (2003)
• NorEasCon4 (2004)
• WriterCon (2004)
• InterSection(2005)
• MediaWest*Con (2005)
• LAConIV (2006)
• Darkover Grand Council
• ShoreLeave
• WesterCon

Filks and Original Music

There was also some interest in Sime~Gen filks and original music.

In 1981, these fanworks were to be sent to Lichtenberg:

INTERESTED in obtaining recording of Sime/Gen songs? Many have been written, but not recorded. Write some of them for us -- send to Jacqueline at [address redacted]. Tell us what you would pay for such a tape, and perhaps one can be made.

Also from 1981, a fan's letter to other fans, explaining that she had contacted Winston Howlett (creator of the Star Trek fanwork, Fanzine), and asked him about making a Sime~Gen music tape:

I have sent Winston Howlett the letter, a copy of which is enclosed for you. I really would like some music for the S/G universe and wanted you to know that we fen are responding to the information you gave in CZ#5. (Exerpts from the letter to Winston Howlett follows): Recently, I learned that you are considering making a tape of music for the Sime Universe of Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah. I wanted to write to tell you that I certainly hope you decided to make such a tape, and that I would surely buy one if it existed. I would be willing to pay between$5 and It 10 for such a tape, and based on tapes of filksongs I have in fact bought at conventions, would expect to pay about $7 for such a tape, especially if mailed. In addition, if music for the songs were reprinted and could be purchased (perhaps in a zine format), I would be happy to buy a set of this music, either for myself (arranged for piano) or for a friend of mine (arranged for guitar). Of course, I would expect to pay additionally for this, perhaps another fll to $5 or so, depending on the number of pages and mailing costs and printing requirements, etc. I really do hope you go ahead with the project, and I know there are other Simefen who feel the same way.

Fan Art

Some fanart has been posted here.

Marion Zimmer Bradley contributed fanart to an unknown Sime~Gen zine.

Sample Art

• 
  Comments from the artist, Pyracantha: "One of the oddest fan groups I was involved with was the "Sime-Gen" crew, which flourished in the 1980s and 1990s, with some membership persisting into the next decades. "Sime-Gen," short for "Sime-biotes" and "Gen-erators," was an imaginary Earth future in which the human race had diverged into two forms. One was the Simes, whose forearms sprouted small tentacles which could grip and manipulate as well as transmit an esoteric energy called "selyn." The "Gens" were outwardly indistinguishable from the original human form, without tentacles, but they could generate "selyn" energy. The Simes, rather like vampires, could only exist with regular feeding on selyn from Gens. And sometimes, especially in the earlier stories, the feeding resulted in death for the Gen. After a while the Simes and Gens found a way to live with each other without killing their hosts. Simes had special abilities that Gens didn't have, such as brief bursts of super-strength or super-speed, and some special ones had psychic powers as well. I did a lot of fan illustrations for Sime-Gen publications including this one, in which an impoverished Gen runaway is caught stealing ears of corn to eat, by the farmer's daughter, who is a Sime. Naturally they fall in love, but how can they have a life together when she might have to feed on his energy and kill him in the process? They work something out because the story ends with the grown-up Gen telling the story to his and her son. Ink on illustration board, 7" x 8", December 2000."
• 
  Comments from the artist, Pyracantha: "One of the more bizarre imaginary worlds I've illustrated is the "Sime-Gen" concept from the works of Jacqueline Lichtenberg.... Lichtenberg, who is still writing though advanced in years, maintains a little fan club for these works even after decades of obscurity. At Chessiecon I met a few of them who still remember and even cherish these tales of vampire-like tentacled mutants and psychic powers. This character, Ercy Farris, is a Sime - one of the tentacled morphology - who works with psychoactive flowers in the hope that the plants will contain essences which free the Simes and Gens from the difficulties of having to draw or provide energy from other sentient beings. She holds one of these magic flowers, a "Mahogany Trinrose," in her tentacles. "Mahogany Trinrose" is ink, colored pencil, and gouache on brown paper, 7" x 10", November 1996."
• 
  Illo for the story, Moonlight Sonata, comments by the artist: "During my association with Sime-Gen fandom I did a number of illustrations for fan-written stories. This is one of them and is also one of my rare attempts at an action scene. In the story the hero, who is homeless and hungry, is caught stealing an apple from one of the vendors at a marketplace. As he is alone and unprotected, a mob of children and teenagers attack him. Their only weapons are pieces of wood or rocks that they pick up. The leader of the children's' gang is a large red-headed girl, who you see in the center. In the Sime-Gen storyline, children are neither Sime nor Gen until they hit puberty and then they either sprout tentacles as a Sime, or become generators of the bioenergy that Simes live on. The young hero, who becomes a Gen, manages to escape. The Sime-Gen chronology is elaborate, though one group of fans has published a fairly detailed chart of it along with references to works by originator Jacqueline Lichtenberg and her collaborators and fans. As I am very fond of world-building I naturally want to know what happened in the first place to turn humanity into Simes and Gens. According to Lichtenberg, she will not provide an account of the originating events and no one else should, either. No matter what happened, it had to be an enormous catastrophe resulting in the deaths of billions. The world of the earlier chronology is a post-apocalyptic Earth population attempting to adapt into the new human forms, and using what they can salvage from a destroyed past. Interestingly, the later chronology becomes more science-fictional as well as introducing elements of psychic powers, which is one of my favorite fantasy/s.f. themes. This illustration as well as two others for a short story, were published in a Sime-Gen fan magazine. I still have it somewhere.... The author (not Lichtenberg, but a fan writer) bought the whole set for her collection. Black ink drawing, colored with watercolor on illustration board, 8 1/2" x 6 1/2", December 2000."

Role-Playing Games

a role-playing proposal, approved by Lichtenberg, printed in A Companion in Zeor #6, reprinted in #7 (1980/1981)

Lichtenberg and Lorrah were open supporters of role-playing games in this fandom and were, in fact, participants.

In May 1999, Lichtenberg posted a question from a fan on Writers-L, the Sime~Gen mailing list:

I’ve been having a discussion with a Sime~Gen fan related to shiltpron music and chocolate. The group of Simes and Gens in question are all on the exact same date for transfer, and they do not want to disrupt that schedule. There hasn’t been much written about the effects of shiltpron. Now in the role playing game on IRC, consuming chocolate gave added effects. Granted, the role playing game is not considered Canon, but it could add a nice touch. <smile> My answer was: Hey, here you're asking questions that have not been "established" (pardon the pun) in Canon. The only way to answer these would be to ask Jacqueline and Jean.

I'd throw this to the list to give us something to think about.

In 1999, Lichtenberg explained to fans that she wrote in an "open-texture" style which encouraged fanfiction:

How many RPG's based on A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM are on the web? As many as there are for STAR TREK? The difference in fan-response lies in the "open-texture" of STAR TREK that Leonard Nimoy taught us about.

In order to answer these very broad questions posed by this fan, I would have to invent things that would exclude stories I haven't yet thought of.

So I'm not going to answer the questions.

These comments got some push back and commentary from a fan who did not see this "open-texture" as a good thing for role-playing. See I (and others) am writing the role-playing game sourcebook for Sime~Gen.

From a 2003 chat with Jacqueline Lichtenberg:

Today, many more than 50 fans are writing Sime~Gen fanfic, posting it to the web, and having a ball. They role-play online, and do all kinds of things. So Sime~Gen does indeed capture whatever quality it was that ST had that made people want to write ST fanfic. I'm very pleased with the way that has turned out. I was as far as I know, the first writer to allow people, to encourage and train people, to write in my universe.

Role-Playing: Bender Cove Scenario

From a May 1999 discussion on WRITERS-L:

JL here again:

If you're curious about the Shiltpron/Chocolate item that is referred to above -- it was established in a free form RPG episode in the Bender Cove scenario in which Jean Lorrah and I participated as characters from the published books -- or in my case, from the published genealogy -- and you can read that one episode out of context here, or go read the whole scenario.

See Borderlands SG RPG Index, a role-playing cooperative.

See Sime~Gen Roleplaying on IRC.

See SECTUIB HILO AMBROV ZEOR VISITS BENDER COVE for an undated role-play chat.

The Sime~Gen Video Game Project

In 2012, Aharon Cagle, a fan of Jean Lorrah’s fiction. founded Loreful, a video game development studio in Cincinnati, Ohio. Cagle approached Lorrah about his company developing a cross-platform video game set in the Sime~Gen universe. After discussions with Jacqueline Lichtenberg, Lorrah announced news about the project, at first called Project Unity, on the Sime~Gen Facebook group in August 2012. After several months of contract negotiations, Sime~Gen Inc. and Loreful signed a five-year licensing agreement that granted Loreful the exclusive right to develop content in a 150-year period of the Sime~Gen timeline (space age).

[more content to be added]

The Wiki and the New Concordance

In February 2013, the Sime~Gen Facebook group discussed wanting a new Concordance, and Zoe Farris volunteered to begin the work. Multiple attempts at a Concordance had been made in the past, all either unfinished or containing errors. See The Sime/Gen Concordance.

The goal was to have some type of Concordance ready in a few months to support the pre-launch of the new video game being developed by Aharon Cagle at Loreful and its fundraising campaign and to provide background information for the game writers. It was decided to first develop a wiki, which could then be turned into a printed concordance.

See Sime~Gen Wiki and the New Concordance for details.

Zines

• a link to the Fanzine Fiction Publishing and Posting Agreement
• Ambrov Zeor! (1976-1996)

• A Companion in Zeor (1978-2006)
• First Transfer (1987-?)
• Householding Chanel Inquirer (1987-1988)
• My Life Is My Own (1996)
• Icy Nager (1982)
• Of Simes, Gens, Adepts, Kren... (1980)
• The Only Good Sime (1990s)
• Postsyndrome (1985)
• A Shift of Means (1996)
• The Sime/Gen Concordance (1991)
• Sime~Gen Cooperative Fiction (2005)
• The Sime~Gen Songbook (unknown date)
• The Tecton Star, an APA (1991-1999)
• Tecton Inquirer (1980s)
• Zeor Forum (1980s)
• The New York Simes (1990-1991)

Fanfiction

Lichtenberg leaned much more to calling fan writing, pastiche and "online tv pastiche ("fanfic")." rather than fanfiction. She also called fans who wrote in her universe, "Sime~Gen writers." This may be because, a) she was a bit of a social engineer when it came to fannish language b) she wanted to lean away from the perceived legalities of fanfiction, c) she wanted to distance fiction (and elevate) based on her and Lorrah's canon from media and literary fic.

Lichtenberg was both highly controlling of what was written in Sime~Gen (and even more so in Kraith), as well as purposely leaving things open-ended. In 1999, she explained to fans that the Sime~Gen chronology was purposely vague:

... note the sparsity of what is established -- and the total lack of DETAIL about each thing that is established -- this is what Leonard Nimoy calls "open texture" and is the Craft mechanism that allows fans to write stories in someone else's niverse ) -- in a story that has a specific theme, a particular point of view, and a place to fill in an overall episodic novel format. The answers to the laundry list of questions above would be substantially different at 20 year intervals all up and down that chronology.

NOTE: writers who want to PREVENT others from grabbing their universe and running with it into pastiche use the opposite method -- closed-texture -- choosing what, when and how to establish everything to deny entry to the imagination of others. This is also a kind of writing that academics tend to admire because it is "complete" - a complete novel with a real ending can't have a sequel, a prequel, or any other commercial exploitation. It just is what it is and will never be anything more. (how many sequels to AS YOU LIKE IT have you found posted to the web as pastiche? How many RPG's based on A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM are on the web? As many as there are for STAR TREK? The difference in fan-response lies in the "open-texture" of STAR TREK that Leonard Nimoy taught us about.

In order to answer these very broad questions posed by this fan, I would have to invent things that would exclude stories I haven't yet thought of.

So I'm not going to answer the questions.

In a post to the new Simegen-L mailing list discussion on how to handle fanfic submissions for online-only "publication", Lichtenberg commented, explaining why fanfic in the print zines tended to go through rounds of revisions before publication:

I'd prefer any posted S/G fiction work just as we've always worked the fanzine fiction - that it gets vetted for S/G background and writing craftsmanship before being inflicted on the unwary reader. I almost never reject anything, but I try to be sure the writer him/herself knows they've done their very best and will be proud of it for the rest of their lives - even after they've grown to be much better at writing. I don't demand rewrites - but I make sure the authors have a chance to decide if they want to fix up something that didn't seem to work well. The readers have appreciated this so much that I think we should continue that policy into the e-zines.

Fanfiction: Fan Comments

You know, except for S~G, I really don't read fanfic any more. I never really liked most of it because most of it warps the characters all out of recognition. There is so much original work available that I just don't bother. I love stories about gay guys, but I don't have to read slash any more (and most of it is really awful... I cannot imagine James T. Kirk as a homosexual), because there's real original stuff out there.

But I don't read much online. If I do, I print it out.

Fanfiction Examples

imagining Sime~Gen and The Avengers, from A Companion in Zeor #7 (1981), artist is Lori Tartaglio

Sime~Gen is occasionally used in crossovers.

• Orhuen Obbligato and Fighting for Duo are pass around novels (Starsky & Hutch/Sime~Gen, pre-1979)
• Unending Nightmare by Cami and Tasha (Blake's 7/Sime~Gen) (Liberator Dreams (1991)

Sime~Gen Fiction for Visually Impaired Fans

Around 1980, Karen Litman, with Lorrah and Lichtenberg's permission, spearheaded a project to have Sime~Gen material recorded for Talking Books, a US government project.

From a 1999 description:

I am in charge of the Recording Project for the Blind. Working with others, we are reading and recording all of Jacqueline's books and zines into the Library of Congress 4-track format for distribution to the visually handicapped. For further information, you can contact me at New Jersey address or the P.O. Box for those specifications. We are also including material by some authors other than Jacqueline, if we have written permission to distribute their works. Among these authors will be Betsy Curtis, Robert Heinlein, and Andrea Alton.

In the early 2000s, Litman wrote: "Much of the S/G fanzine material has been taped for the blind and handicapped readers. But the project head has retired. If anyone wants to take over, contact Karen Litman."

Householdings and Fan Clubs

Fan clubs for Sime~Gen are called "Householdings."

Elisabeth Waters (via Jacqueline Lichtenberg) advertised a club and zine in mid 1976. The club and letterzine is unknown: "First issue of the letterzine is due out the end of June."

Similar clubs are Weyrs (Dragonriders of Pern), Holts (Elfquest), Darkover Councils and Towers (Darkover), and Abbeys (Deryni).

See: Sime~Gen - Householding Registery, ^{Archived version}.

Welcommittee

The Sime~Gen Welcommittee is a welcommittee for fans of Sime~Gen and Jacqueline Lichtenberg.

Fans often referred to it as "Wel."

This community was formed as a way for fans to answer Lichtenberg's fan mail. Previous to "Sime~Gen Welcommittee," Lichtenberg's zine editors answered these queries.

Sometime around 1989, it morphed into "The Alternate Universes Welcommittee", and fans continued to refer to it as "Wel." This name change was made to promote all of Lichtenberg's professional endeavors, rather than just Sime~Gen.

Fan Gatherings and Costuming

See Faith Day Ceremony.

• 1987: the first Faith Day ceremony November 1987
• 1988: Faith Day: Darkover Grand Council
• 1998: Faith Day: Darkover Grand Council
• 1998: transcript of the IRC Chanel Pledge Party in the Ancient Tecton
• 1998: Faith Day at Bender Cove
• photos of Sime~Gen fans' costumes at the 13th Grand Council Darkove=r Meeting

Websites and Mailing Lists

a 1996 ad for the official website, printed in the zine, A Shift of Means

• Sime~Gen Wiki and here
• Sime~Gen Facebook Group
• Sime~Gen.com and Sime~Gen - Fandom, ^{Archived version}
• The Secret Pens (fiction, role-playing)
• Rimon Farris Memorial Library
• Borderlands SG RPG Index (role-playing cooperative)
• SIMEGEN-L (Virtual Selyn) (mailing list, focus is vampires, Sime~Gen, published novels, and more)
• Lifeforce-L (online newsletter)
• Vantage Point News (personal newsletter, sime~gen and more)
• WRITERS-L (discussion list for Sime~Gen writers)
• RATHOR-L (mysticism at Simegen.com)

Fan Comments

Fan discussions were carried out privately by letters and phone calls to each other, but also in more public areas, such as letters of comment to zines and in online forums.

A small number of comments are below. There are many more of them on individual zine pages as well.

Fan Comments: General

1986

Why do I react the way I do to the Sime books? That is a toughie. Here's my theory. Many people feel that their lives are rather dull and uneventful, or that their world is not as satisfying as it could be. They do not feel mentally, emotionally, or even physically stimulated enough in their own life. One the other hand, other people may be perfectly content with their lives (like me) but they love to add alternate realities to their life. For example, I love STAR TREK and its universe, but should I miraculously wake up in that time period, I doubt very much that I would join the crew of the Enterprise.

I love living, and though danger and intrigue are great to read about, I would never put myself in such perilous positions. (Do you realize that about three or four guys got knocked off per show?) So I guess you could divide fans into two groups. The real thrill-seekers who wish they were actually there, and the armchair thrill-seekers who are glad to be there for a time, but like to return to their own safe lives.

For both types it is absolute heaven to be able to open a book that will transport them to a different world where their intellect and emotions are constantly shifted into high gear. A person can become a character of the story and therefore feel every emotion, think every thought, and do everything that the character does. Not every person can totally immerse themselves in a book, but I think those of us who can are very lucky.

I have other thoughts. You may disagree, but I feel that women enjoy these stories, probably more than men, for two interrelated reasons. One, I mentioned in the last letter, that women are more emotional than men (ie: we feel things to a greater extent) (not always true, and not a bad thing!) and two, the thought of a complete and total commitment and companionship where one person really needs another, and sex is not a necessary or required part of it (but where it can be present) appeals to women. A major reason (although we may not admit it) that women try to make themselves pretty is to attract attention to themselves. There is so much of an emphasis today on physical beauty and sex. In the Sime world, beauty is not a prerequisite for compatibility and the very fulfilling commitment between a Sime and a Gen. And this type of attractiveness does not fade over the years, as does physical beauty and possibly physical attraction.

Strange, most people I've talked to tend to compare Simehood to maleness and Genhood to femaleness. But it's really the other way around, isn't it? I mean, in terms of polarity the male pole should have and give energy, where the female should need and take it. Female animals, with an instinct for motherhood and species preservation, have a need, and are given sperm cells by males, the "spark of life" to fill that need. Simes have an even more pressing, personal need which is filled in an even more direct manner, by donations of literal energy.

Further, it is the function of a female-polarity force to stabilize, as Binah with Chokmah. Simes, when their instincts are not perverted by junctness, are constantly obsessed with Gens' safety and well-being. The Tecton seems like a group of over-protective mothers sometimes, and so do the people who must have drafted Klairon's beloved Principles of Action.

I know I'll get a lot of flak from Companion-types who, although Gen, are professional cherishers and stabilizers. But it's the function of humans to be complicated, and wives require support from their husbands as well as vice versa. If a wife had a profession as arduous and draining as channelling, she'd require Companion-class support, as can be seen by looking at a woman suddenly left alone to try to raise a bunch of kids. What wouldn't that woman give for Im'ran?!

Jacqueline, you are to be congratulated. You have indeed made up a new kind of polarity relationship. Most of us, and me too up until yesterday, associate Simehood with maleness, as I said before. I think this is because you have so neatly abstracted incidental characteristics from essential ones in assigning them to Simes and Gens. You gave Simes the phallic- symbol tentacles, the greater physical strength and consequent tendency to do the heavy work, and, above all, the ability to force the issue of whether need should be filled. All these have long been seen as male traits, and the opposite as female, but they are irrelevant to polarity. It leads to a whole reexamination of polarity relationships, including those between human males and females.

I've thought a lot on why Ilike these S/G stories. There's a type of "love" found in them that is hard to find in other books (even in real life). It's really a combination of love, friendship, trust, and respect. The DO books have it; Anne McCaffrey's books have it; most of Andre Norton's have it; and Zenna Henderson's (hey, they're all women writers!) ((JL; Yes, with women fans in the majority. Why is that?)) plus SHANE, the Western, Alistair MacLean's books, and Louis L'Amour's Westerns. I could probably add more if I went through the list of books I've read...And of course STAR TREK has that quality, plus the other three movies Gene Roddenberry wrote and produced. (?) The Greek word "agape" comes closest to describing it. I don't think English has a word for it. Does Simelan?

Fan Comments: Homophobia

Gay characters and homosexuality in "Sime~Gen" was a big topic of discussion, both with fans, and Jacqueline Lichtenberg herself.

Many fans were very distressed at Lichtenberg's refusal to include any relationships in her work that were not heterosexual and this was perceived by some fans to be homophobic.

• Sime-Gen and Slashiness; archive link by by Victoria Janssen (March 2012)

1984

I ought to explain to Julia that my interpretation of Jacqueline's contention that there are no gay channels is that the Tecton doesn't recognize their right to exist any more than the Church of the Purity recognizes the right of any Simes to exist. [JL: Tecton has nothing to do with it. If they exist they die 3 months after changeover, maybe a year at the most.] It is based on the logic of homophobia that what you fear will go away if you ignore it or if that's impossible you use severe enough tactics so that the feared minority will live in fear. Oh, it works very well. You can see how effectively it destroyed Grant, Sart and even the bisexual Dev. I wanted to show the consequences of denying fundamental needs uh requirements. (I have to watch my terminology here.) [JL: It doesn't, so you do.] If the mainline Tecton doesn't adhere to this strategy, I have yet to understand Jacqueline's reasoning about her universe. [Because the discussion of homosexuality in the Sime/Gen universe has bothered some fans, we have decided to continue it only in a special zine Kerry Schaefer hopes to put out that will deal with all aspects of sexuality in the books and in the universe. If you have any interest in these matters, write Kerry Schaefer...]

1985

It basically goes back to the complaint that many fans have brought up (and it is many) that Jacqueline says there are no homosexual channels (or if there are, they would die in First Year), and that there is no such thing as a sexually-locked orhuen. There are a large number of homosexuals and bisexuals in S/G fandom, and this statement of JL's makes them feel locked out. I've found that, like most people captivated with the S/G universe, they like to picture themselves in it, like to pick out roles for themselves. Most seem to fancy themselves Companions or channels. The intense intimacy of the S/G relationship seems a dream, an ideal to them, because it allows a socially acceptable relationship between two people of the same sex. Of course, they would like to turn that physical intimacy into sexual intimacy, in their ideal. And then they find out that they can't, that this is not allowable in this fantasy world they thought was their ideal — because Jacqueline says so. They are very deeply, terribly, frustrated.

Katie presents very well the feelings of Jacqueline's gay fans. We are deeply frustrated indeed, to find ourselves excluded yet again, and by those we had reason to believe rejoiced in the diversity of the universe, rather than condemning certain forms of that diversity. Some of us have simply lost interest in S/G fandom as a result. Others continue to argue the issue. (For those interested in previous discussions of this topic, I refer you to the AZ#8 Letcol, correspondence between Linda Frankel and JL, and the AZ#9 Letcol, letters from Barbara Tennison, Jean Lorrah, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Linda Frankel, and JL.) What follows is the result of this ongoing dialog with Jacqueline.

1989

The message that I get from JL loud and dear is: All fans welcome! However, if you are not a heterosexual and you are disabled, please take your business elsewhere.

Yes, I can appreciate that not all of an author's "future histories" have biases, points of view which match my own. However, I do not wish to be in the position of seeming to support this author's racist views by continuing to buy and rave about this author's S/G books. The author has the right to dream up any stories she so wishes, I, as consumer, have the right to "vote with my wallet" and not buy her works.

1994

Well, the Sime/Gen series is pretty homophobic overall. [INSCRUTABLE SIME/GEN JARGON WARNING] I mean, if a donor gives a channel transfer and they are of opposite sexes, the sudden release of tension and flood of physiological good feeling just naturally and automatically expresses itself in a burst of sexuality, but if the donor and channel are of the same sex, they shake hands — "thanks, buddy," "right, mate" and that's it. Talk about unlikely! It's the same physiological process in both cases, and ought to have the same physiological result. [END JARGON]

According to some of Lichtenberg's commentary on the Sime/Gen books, donor/channel transfer between opposite sexes is followed by a burst of sexuality as you mention, but between same-sex donor and channel it is followed by corresponding physical repulsion, a sort of don't-touch imperative, as if static electricity were pushing them apart. This theory of magnetic-sounding physiology goes further to define the sexes as absolute opposites instead of roughly the same thing with variations; the former view seems to me dangerous as well as inaccurate, and very much at the root of exaggerated "romantic" thinking of all kinds.

2012

[N. K. Jemisin]:

I think what it all comes down to is that if something looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, an author shouldn’t be especially surprised if people assume it’s a duck. The Sime-Gen relationships in the books look like sexual tension, use the language of sexual tension, employ the same sexual-tension tropes as those used in romance. So…

Victoria Janssen: *QUACK*

[John Cowan]: That passage, or at least the homosexual as opposed to merely sadistic interpretation of it, has been effectively been written out of canon. The bit about channels always being heterosexual remains, however. It doesn’t make much sense to me (as a reader and a fanfic co-author) but there it is, part of the background most of the time. After all, the selyn economy is just as unrealistic, as is the whole idea of being able to raise humans as stock, but there it is: if you want to read (or write) about Superman, you just have to accept that there’s enough green kryptonite on Earth that Krypton would have to be bigger than the Sun to supply it all.

[Victoria Janssen]: Thanks, John! That’s really interesting to know. I assume a lot of the ideas in the first book were changed and refined over time?

Victoria Janssen: I found many, many points to ponder in House of Zeor, because in my view it mirrors and interacts with second-wave feminism, in particular with feminist thought on sexuality and power relations. At the same time, the text seems curiously blind to other ways that it represents sexuality.

In later novels of the series, I’m told, there is more exploration of what power the Gens hold, but in House of Zeor, the focus is on the predatory power of the simes, seen through the eyes of a gen named Hugh Valleroy. In his world, most simes live by killing a gen every few months. While searching for his gen girlfriend, who’s been taken captive by simes, Hugh must work with Klyd Ambrov Zeor, who is working to create a society in which simes do not kill. Klyd is one of a rare minority of simes, called channels, who can take energy from gens, store it within themselves, and then feed it to other simes. Klyd’s goals are made more complex by the rarity of his mutation. Hugh, beginning from a place of fear, comes to believe in Klyd’s goals.

I find it fascinating how the author explicitly excludes sexuality from the Sime-Gen feeding relationship. Klyd laughed…. “Channels are virtually incapable of anything but a vigorous, if intermittent, heterosexuality.” At the same time, the author used language that can easily be interpreted as sexual, some of it even closely akin to language I have seen in romance novels.

I was especially reminded of 1960s and 1970s romance novels that featured socially and sexually powerful male figures—often referred to as “Alpha Males”–paired with naïve, younger, less socially powerful women. These male figures generally take the lead in the sexual aspects of the relationship, and are often forceful about it due to the heroine’s lack of experience or her “secret desire” to be dominated. Given that these novels are contemporaneous with House of Zeor, I don’t think it’s farfetched to assume a connection, whether conscious or unconscious.

[N.K. Jemisin]: Yeah, I had the same issue with the Sime-Gen novels. I got the impression that the author was a typical second-wave feminist, with some unexamined issues wrt gender essentialism, sexual orientation, class, race, etc. Because the whole damn series was so slashy it required an active effort not to see it; I didn’t even have to take my slash goggles out of the case. :) If I recall, Lichtenberg wrote a series of articles on why same-sex friendships shouldn’t be seen as sexual, and she’s right. But when those same-sex friendships are literally dripping (as in Sime-Gen transfer, there’s all sorts of dripping fluids) with homosexual/bisexual subtext, I guess it becomes necessary to insist that they’re just friends at every turn or the subtext becomes the default.

Victoria Janssen: I am thinking of reading a few more of the novels, but am not sure when. I read (or possibly re-read) the second one, and WOW was it grim! Characters senselessly dying right and left. Reminded me of feminist dystopias I read in the 80s.

Meta/Further Reading

• see Category:Sime~Gen Meta

• See Introduction to the Sime Series; archive link; WebCite by Jacqueline Lichtenberg, printed in A Companion in Zeor #1 (1978)
• satirical zine, JACKIE! (1981)
• At first I decided not to write, but I felt so strongly about your book Channel's Destiny that I just had to write. (1987)
• Out of Death Was I Born... by Kathryn Andersen (late 1990s?)
• Sime~Gen and underage characters (1999)
• The IF MAGAZINE connection to STAR TREK (2000)
• The Sime~Gen Universe by Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Jean Lorrah by Jaye (2005)
• Sime-Gen and Romance Novels; archive link by Victoria Janssen (2012)
• The House of Zeor at Schlock Value (2013)
• Unto Zeor, Forever by Schlock Value (2013)
• REVIEW: House of Zeor by Steven Howell Wilson (2013)
• Mahogany Trinrose; archive link at Schlock Value (2016)
• RenSime at Schlock Value (2016)
• Now Touch Me, Babe by James Nicholls (2022)

Meta: Homophobia

• Three Letters on the Subject of Homosexuality in the Sime/Gen Universe, letter exchange between Linda Frankel and Jacqueline Lichtenberg (1979)
• Post-Syndrome: Considerations on Sexuality in the Sime/Gen Universe (1985) ("If anyone's interested, there's a zine debating the problems of sexuality in the Sime/Gen Universe (especially given Lichtenberg's homophobia) available...")
• Sime-Gen and Slashiness; archive link by by Victoria Janssen (March 2012)