September will be a slow month, my apologies in advance. The review backlog grows and grows–reviews of Poul Anderson’s Tau Zero (1970) and The Best SF Stories from New Worlds #2 (1968) should be appearing soon. Although, there are many unreviewed volumes less fresh on my memory…
At least I have a massive review INDEX to keep you all busy.
I am diligently posting all the KWG volumes I snagged from a local Half Price Books—this shadowy person had a spectacular collection.
I am rarely interested in SF series, but, I’ll make an exception as Suzy McKee Charnas’ Walk to the End of the World (1974) was so darn amazing!
More Sheckley!
More Tucker! Fresh off the very satisfying The Long Loud Silence (1952)…
And finally, a novel from an author I’ve never read before—Alfred Coppel.
As always, thoughts/comments are welcome.
1. Motherlines, Suzy McKee Charnas (1978)
(Doug Beekman’s very bland cover for the 1979 edition)
From the back cover: “Alldera had risked her life to escape the Holdfast, where men ruled fems in a bestial society based on fear. She had followed a whisper: the legend of the free fems who lived without masters.
Instead, she had found the Motherline Tribes. The proud Riding Women who bred without men, the dark-laughing warriors who dared her to be free!”
2. Dark December, Alfred Coppel (1960)
(Uncredited cover for the 1960 edition)
From the back cover of the 1970 edition: “After World War III WHEN IT WAS TOO LATE…
Major Kenneth Gavin—one of the few anguished souls left to contemplate the end of biological existence, the silent spring, the dying of love, desire, and hope—was one who had pushed the button that ended everything. One who had nothing left but perception and remorse. One who had killed millions by remote control could kill no more–not even to save himself.”
3. The Lincoln Hunters, Wilson Tucker (1958)
(Davis Meltzer’s cover for the 1977 edition)
From the inside flap: “Ben Steward, man of the 26th century, was a “Character” for Time Researchers: he was an adventurer, an actor, a student of history… a man trained to blend into any era of man’s long past. In the overpopulated, stultifying world of 2578, his was an exciting job.
He had, for example, been standing on the shore with the Indians when the Pilgrims rowed ashore from the Mayflower. And now he had been sent back 700 years into his past, to the political furore just before the Civil War… and he was facing certain death.
For the engineers who operated the time machine had made a mistake, and Steward was stuck in the time which would overlap the time-segment he had already scouted. No person could twice exist in the same time; it was an impossibility. And so Steward, in a few moments, would simply disappear…”
4. The Robot Who Looked Like Me, Robert Sheckley (1978)
(Thompson’s cover for the 1982 edition)
From the back cover: “DOUBLE TROUBLE. What could you accomplish if you could be in two places at once? Charles Watson found out when he had a robot duplicate of himself built, perfect in every detail. But when it took over his love life, things really got interesting.
THE ROBOT WHO LOOKED LIKE ME brings a dozen of Robert Sheckley’s most outrageous flights of fancy together for the first time in paperback. Inside you’ll find a time traveller who multiplied himself into the millions, a beauty who outfoxed a computerized singles service, a man who was loved by inanimate objects, a pair of incredible binoculars, an actor who got caught in a never-ending western movie, and more marvelous madness from science fiction’s wittiest writer. In short, it’s pure, uncut Sheckley, guaranteed to blow you away with laughter.”