DALMAS, John

   Pseudonym for all his fiction of US writer John R(obert) Jones (1926-), whose first career was as a research ecologist for the US Forest Service. He began publishing with The Yngling (1969 ASF; fixup 1971; rev 1984), which, with its prequel, Homecoming (1984) - both assembled as The Orc Wars (omni 1992) - depicts a barbarian future whose history echoes that of the eponymous Norse kings of legend; eventually the hero of the saga leads his neo-Vikings south from the encroaching ice, though their ideal community is soon under threat; The Yngling and the Circle of Power (1992) is a prequel. In the Fanglith series - Fanglith (1985) and Return to Fanglith (1987) - the planet to which criminals are exiled turns out to be Earth; much of JD's work similarly transforms SPACE-OPERA venues into arenas where ironies (or the gods) have free play. In both The Reality Matrix (1986) and, with Rod Martin (1928-), The Playmasters (1986) this drift of implication becomes explicit. The Regiment sequence - comprisingThe Regiment (1987), The White Regiment (1990) and The Regiment's War (1993) - tells, a group of mercenaries from a military planet sent off to fight until they all die - characters, once again, who are players in others' games. The General's President (1988) interestingly assumes that a US civilian puppet-leader might convincingly fox his military backers. Though his work is teasingly close to routine, JD is too various and lively to dismiss.Other works: The Varkaus Conspiracy (1983); Touch the Stars: Emergence (1983) with Carl Martin (1950-); The Scroll of Man (1985); The Walkaway Clause (1986); The Lantern of God (1989); The Lizard War (1989); The Khalif's War (1991).