Page:Weird Tales Volume 5 Number 5 (1925-05).djvu/136

Rh stories, but such pseudo-scientific stories of the planets as Invaders From Outside and Draconda."

This is a small part of the letters received. There are a few letters—a very few—that are not so high in their praise: letters that point out what (in the opinion of the letter-writers) are faults; and these letters receive the most careful attention; for is not this magazine yours? You are the readers; it is you who have made the success of Weird Tales possible; it is you, therefore, who should determine what stories we print. If anything displeases you in, write the editor about it, and your criticism will be very carefully studied.

One letter from Moscow, Idaho (the writer asks that his name be withheld), criticizes what he terms "impossibilities": "Just one instance: Teoquitta the Golden was very clever and entertaining, but the permutation of sex described is a biological impossibility. Let me qualify that. Sex has apparently been changed experimentally in certain lower animals; varying degrees of change from female to male are known to take place in cattle (the freemartin phenomenon), and possibly may also occur in other mammals. But the important point is this: such changes can only take place during the embryonic stage of development. After that, they are impossible. Any biologist will tell you that. Of course, fiction of the weird sort is not intended to stick to scientific facts, although realism in any story will be enhanced if the scientific basis is properly regarded. Still, Teoquitla the Golden was clever.

"Your authors ought to familiarize themselves very carefully with the environment in which they place their stories, in order to emphasize the realism. Some minor point might spoil the story for the readers. An instance comes to mind: in Whispering Tunnels, reference is made to a telegram, on yellow paper. But in France telegrams are blue—the so-called petits bleus. A criticism of microscopic importance, you will say, and I admit it; still, that one point shattered all the realism for me and just spoiled the rest of the story.

" has given me many a pleasant hour."

Another reader points out an inaccuracy in The House of Dust, where one of the characters says: "The Senecas hev took to the warpath and skelped the whole winter colony out to the lake." But the Senecas (the reader points out) were never within hundreds of miles of Louisiana, where the scene of the story is laid. Now if the author had said Choctaws, instead of Senecas, the story would have gained in realism for one reader, at least.

Dennis G. Cooper, of Detroit, writes: "I must congratulate you on your selection of stories used in . Everyone with a leaning toward this fascinating kind of fiction can surely find what he likes in the magazine. There is food for all tastes."

"Keep the shivery tales going, say I," writes Eli Colter, of Portland, Oregon. "Poe has plenty of disciples, and Will Shakespeare knew a thing or two. Let me say thank the gods for a magazine that steers clear of sex rot and its ramifications, yet produces stories that hold the reader seeking thrills. More power to you!"

H. E. Fuller, of Loxley, Alabama, in voting for A Gaddaan Alaad, by George Ballard Bowers, as the best story in the March issue, writes: "Mr. Bowers has been eminently successful in catching the elusive superstitious atmosphere of aboriginal Luzon, and his is a sweet sad story of the triumph of father-love over the sodden instincts of a primitive race."