Sunday, March 02, 2008

Uhura's last song - for Janet

From Susan Casper, on SFF Net:
"Sorry to have to report the news that Janet Kagan died today [Saturday in US] of acute chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). She was on hospice care toward the end, but ending came fairly quickly. A small memorial service will be held at the Kagan home, next week. Please don't send flowers. I will let you know if and where charitable donations are in order."

I feel like I've lost a very good friend. I knew author Janet Kagan only through her 1985 "Star Trek" novel, "Uhura's Song", and a series of wonderfully warm and friendly emails (which I was only discussing earlier today on TrekBBS.) I know another Trek friend who'll be devastated. "Uhura's Song" was very special to many fans.

RIP, Janet.

2 comments:

Therin of Andor said...

While researching Janet Kagan's SF backlist recently, I found a reference to a supposedly hard-to-locate 1998 revised trade paperback edition of her SF novel, "Hellspark" (1987), and a brief mention that it contained new Afterwords by Janet for both "Hellspark" and "Star Trek: Uhura's Song".

Thanks to Amazon's links to the second hand market, I located superb-condition copies of "Mirabile" (Tor hardcover, 1991) and the revised "Hellspark" (MeishaMerlin, 1998). They arrived last week - and yes, the Afterword to "Uhura's Song" is so cool - five new pages of classic Janet talking Star Trek!

Therin of Andor said...

The latest "Star Trek" magazine (Titan US #11) is out. It contains the obituary I wrote for Janet Kagan. It was such an honour to be asked to do it. Thanks Paul!