I’ve been taking advantage of the sunshine and the reduced work schedule to lounge around in the garden reading, and since I’ve gotten back into Red Dwarf in a big way, I’m rereading Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers.
One thing that struck me is the part of the book that’s taken from Future Echoes. You know the part where Lister thinks he’s going to die while fixing the navicomp? Rimmer’s been gloating and celebrating for several pages, sending condolence memos and quoting Lister’s “death isn’t the handicap it used to be” line back at him, all very much the same as in the series, then there’s one bit that I love, that didn’t happen in the show.
Lister jumped down to to floor. “This is it, then.” Rimmer looked at him. “Don’t go.” “What d’you mean ‘Don’t go’? You said yourself I can’t avoid it. Let’s get it over with. What was I wearing?”
Rimmer, for all his pretence of being happy that Lister is going to die and his insistence that there is nothing that can be done to change future events, when it comes to time for it to happen, tries to stop it. Series Rimmer is lurking around with his fingers in his ears and a big stupid grin on his face, waiting for Lister to go boom. Book Rimmer stays behind in their quarters, and wishes that Lister had done the same.
