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                         Introduction to Mariner
                           by Jason A. Miller

Hi there! and welcome to _Mariner_, a "Swans Crossing"-related
novel which I wrote during a slow semester in 1994.

The story focusses on the five SC characters who, while not
necessarily my five favorites, are the five that I thought
would be the most interesting to write for:  Callie and Jimmy
(whose constant fighting, interrupted only by moments of pure
"Why can't he/she see how I feel?" longing, mirrors the best 
and worst of my epic high school relationships), J.T. and
Glory (my other favorite couple from the show), and Saja (who
is just too intensely freaking cool for words).

I also focus heavily on Captain Walker, who always got the
best dialogue of the show's adults.  My favorite ever SC scene
involved Captain Walker reading passages from Samuel Coleridge's
"Rime of the Ancient Mariner" (and if you've not yet read
that, I suggest you do so at once!), accompanied by images of
Jimmy and Callie staring longingly into space, wondering about
each other.

So basically, Mariner takes place (in part) during "Ancient
Mariner" as that poem's events unfold, while back in Swans
Crossing a strange ghost story develops...

This is not, however, purely a "Swans Crossing" novel.  It also
crosses over into the universe of my favorite science fiction
television show, "Doctor Who", a British program which aired from 1963
to 1989 (with a 2-hour made-for-TV movie on FOX back in '96).
Mariner takes place in the universe of the New Adventures, a still-
published line of Doctor Who books.

DW's main character is the Doctor, a thousand-year old time
traveller whose ship is called the TARDIS.  It's bigger on
the inside than on the out -- on the outside, it resembles
an old-fashioned phone booth; on the inside, it's impossibly
huge.  The Doctor is an old friend of Captain Walker, who
for my purposes, used to be a Time Lord as well before losing
his powers and being exiled to Earth.  "Doctor Who" was
always very tongue-in-cheek so don't be scared off by some
of the alien (so to speak) concepts!

The Doctor has two travelling companions when Mariner is set.
Ace was born in London in 1970, but spent some time fighting
in the Earth army of the 26th century and is consequently
tough and cynical.  Bernice ("Benny") is also from the 26th
century, an orphaned archaeologist who has a very cynical
world view and doesn't entirely trust the Doctor or Ace.
The three travellers argue a lot -- not unlike our SC friends
in that regard.

Each of the sci-fi characters finds something worthwhile,
noble, and human, in the kids from "Swans Crossing", who are
very much the heroes of the piece.  Mariner at its best is
a celebration of everything I loved about SC -- the characters,
the exotic plots, the witty dialogue, the extravagant literary
references shoehorned into a show produced for 12 year olds
(I was an English major at the time, so pardon my enthusiasm :> ).

Mariner is hard to read in spots -- there are lots of typos and
grammatical errors in the archived version you're about to read,
and the better-edited version I wrote a year later is not available
on the Internet.  I also didn't include Garrett and Sydney and Mila,
or Nancy, or Sandy or Owen, or Neil.  There are some pretentious
science fiction concepts lurking in the book (the whole conceit
of making Captain Walker a space alien, for one thing, with
Callie his half-human daughter, and the submarine really a
disguised time machine).  But it was the most fun writing
experience I've ever had, and I hope that you have fun
reading it!  Though the book is old, I'd still love to hear
comments from everyone out there, so please e-mail me!

-Jason