What pre-1985 science fiction adventures have you started this summer? Any great reads? Disappointing ones? Intriguing discoveries? Here’s the April installment of this column.
A selection of read volumes from my shelves
In a conversation on Blueksy, someone asked for my history of science fiction recommendations (including a few general surveys). I scoured my shelves and came up with an all-too-large pile (with some notable volumes I wanted to include but could not find) of favorite histories of science fiction. See photo below. I tried to include monographs that were not studies of single authors.
As I am a historian by training and trade who holds on to some of my disciplinary ticks and hangups, I also included works by trained academics with two major exceptions 1) Mike Ashley’s multi-volume study of science fiction magazines (but no other recent works exist and they’re really good for the nuts and bolts of genre magazines) and 2) Alec Nevala-Lee’s approachable and well-researched group biography Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, and the Golden Age of Science Fiction (2018). Both should be read.
A photo of a few of my history of science fiction recommendations
I deliberately avoided works by science fiction authors like Damon Knight, Brian W. Aldiss, and Frederik Pohl. They’re great sources and I own and have read many of them but…. they are not histories by trained scholars. I do not mean for this to come off as elitist. Rather, my personal remit for my list—I needed to winnow down the hundreds and hundreds I own–was deliberately narrow! I read and use sources widely. Remember, these are my favorites — they might not be the best but they got me thinking and reading and writing. And that’s what we all should be doing, reading what makes us happy.
Before we get to the the curated birthdays and brief thoughts on the science fiction volumes above, let me know what pre-1985 SF you’re currently reading or planning to read! You’re also welcome to list your favorite histories of the genre.
The Photograph (with links to reviews and brief thoughts)
- Samuel R. Delany and Howard V. Chaykin’s Empire (1978). I love the art! The story? One of Delany’s weakest outings. It’s a shame.
- Robert Holdstock’s Eye Among the Blind (1976). His anthropologically inclined first novel contains “kerns of his later genius” according to my 2014. Most details have faded. That can’t be said to his far superior Where Time Winds Blow (1981). If you only know Holdstock for Mythago Wood (1984), definitely check out his earlier more overt science fictional works. That said, I really need to read Mythago Wood!
- Kate Wilhelm’s Abyss (1971) is a underrated outing (two novellas) by a master near the top of her game. I particularly enjoyed “The Plastic Abyss” (1971): As the human drama (the entrenched patterns and fritctions of society’s expected social roles) swirls at the forefront, the SF premise generates the unease—in this case an attempt to secure funding for an experimental absorptive material onto which life-like images can be projected.
- Philip K. Dick’s Our Friends From Frolix 8 (1970). One of many PKD novels that have clumped together into a terrifying indistinguishable distillation of his unease and what makes him great. This is too say, I read a lot of PKD early in my SF reading career and can’t remember which details relate to which books!
What am I writing about?
The merciful appearance of summer break early this month — and a summer with little planned travel — has allowed me to get back into the flow of writing reviews and working on larger projects. Since the April installment of this series, I’ve read reviewed and written about the following: Exploration Log 14: Anti-Racism in Chandler Davis’ “Stereotypes Are Dangerous” (1950), two posts on Clifford D. Simak: “Madness from Mars” (1939) and “Hermit of Mars” (1939) and his collection The Worlds of Clifford Simak (1960), Polly Toynbee’s Leftovers (1966) and Lewis Gibbs’ Late Final (1951), Richard Wilson’s “Strike” (1953), and Knut Faldbakken’s Sweetwater (1976, trans. Joan Tate, 1994), which appeared originally in the first issue of Rachel S. Cordasco’s magazine Small Planet: The SF in Translation Magazine.
The summer has allowed me to return to my article (and accompanying historical research) on Edward A. Johnson’s Light Ahead for the Negro (1904). First major summer step? I finished Richard A. Paschal’s Jim Crow in North Carolina: The Legislative Program from 1865-1920 (2021) to integrate into my article! I will spend as much as the afternoon as possible at my favorite coffee shop trying to eek out a few more pages or to reacquaint myself with my 200+ electronic newspaper clippings I’ve collected.
I’m also working on my review of SF in translation for the second issue of Small Planet: The SF in Translation Magazine. I’ll keep the author and book secret until it appears in the first few weeks of August. As for non fiction for the site, I’m working on a few early Clifford D. Simak fanzine articles for my Exploration Log series.
What am I reading?
This is a rare moment for reasons connected to my before-mentioned article that I do not have a science fiction work already lined up to read. It’s a radically attempt to FINISH writing projects that have acted as anchors to other writing and reading. That said, no worries blog friends — I have plenty of half-finished reviews waiting in the wings. Stay tuned.
Photo of Steve Batterson’s The Prosecution of Professor Chandler Davis: McCarthyism, Communism, and the Myth of Academic Freedom (2023) on my history shelf with other books
On the non-fiction front: I have been eying Steve Batterson’s The Prosecution of Professor Chandler Davis: McCarthyism, Communism, and the Myth of Academic Freedom (2023) after writing about Chandler Davis’ amazing fanzine article “Stereotypes Are Dangerous” (1950) for my Exploration Log series.
A Curated List of SF Birthdays from the Last Two Weeks [names link to The Internet Speculative Fiction Database for bibliographical info]
June 10th: Artist Don Maitz (1953-).
June 11th: Josephine Saxton (1935-2023). I recommend The Hieros Gamos of Sam and An Smith (1969). She was a unique and underrated voice of the New Wave. I also covered her first three published short stories.
June 12th: Frank K. Kelly (1914-2010). I wrote about an example of his dark 30s pulp here: “Famine on Mars” (1934).
June 12th: Henry Slesar (1927-2002).
June 13th: Artist Ralph McQuarrie (1929-2012). Best known for his Star Wars art. He also created SF covers.
James Gurney’s cover for William Greenleaf’s The Tartarus Incident (1983)
June 14th: Artist James Gurney (1958-). Best known for Dinotopia (1992) (and the sequels). Another very influential book in my childhood. He also created a SF covers.
June 14th: Stephen Tall (1908-1981).
June 14th: Ruthven Todd (1914-1978). I recently acquired his marginally SF work The Lost Traveller (1943). I’ll feature it in a purchase post eventually.
June 14th: Laurence Yep (1948-). A complete unknown to me. I acquired one of his novels recently: Seademons (1977) .
June 14th: Artist Peter Goodfellow (1950-2022). One of my favorite British SF artists.
Mitchell Hooks’ cover for the 1962 1st edition
June 15th: J. F. Bone (1916-2006). Best known for his novel The Lani People (1962). One of many novels with humanoid cat women. Blargh.
June 15th: Artist Neal Adams (1941-2022). Best known for his Tarzan covers.
June 15th: Brian Jacques (1939-2011). I’ve mentioned my love his Jacques’ Redwall sequence in previous year installments of the birthday list. If there’s a single author responsible for my adoration for reading and maps, it’s him.
June 17th: Wallace Wood (1927-1981).
June 17th: John Hersey (1914-1993). Best known for his non-fiction work Hiroshima (1946), Hersey also wrote three SFF volumes. I read and enjoyed his overpopulation themed novel My Petition for More Space (1974). I acquired his satire of the National Defense Education Act (1968) novel The Child Buyer (1960).
June 17th: Garen Drussaï (1916-2009). She wrote five science fiction stories in the mid-50s, including her “consumer hell” story “Woman’s Work” (1956) that I must finally get around to reading.
June 17th: Dean Ing (1931-2020).
The Brothers Quay cover for the 1st edition of Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly (1977)
June 17th: Tim and Steve Quay (1947-) (The Brothers Quay). Before their brilliant short films, they created a handful of covers early in their career! I found their 1st edition cover of PKD’s A Scanner Darkly (1977) the best.
June 18th: Artist Jody A. Lee (1958-).
June 18th: Roger Ebert (1942-2013). Ebert, a famous film-reviewer, also published two science fiction short stories in 1972.
June 19th: Mark Adlard (1932-). I reviewed the first volume–Interface (1971)–in his Tcity trilogy back in 2015.
June 19th: Brian Ball (1932-2020). A slick pulp-SF author, if that is your thing. I reviewed Singularity Station (1973) in 2013.
Peter Goodfellow’s cover for the 1977 UK edition of Grimus (1975)
June 19th: Salman Rushdie (1947-). I have my eyes on his first SF novel Grimus (1975) (above).
June 20th: Pamela Zoline (1941-). I love the rightly celebrated “The Heat Death of the Universe” (1967) and wish she wrote more than the handful of short stories.
June 21st: Cleve Cartmill (1908-1964). Best known for the controversy over “Deadline” (1944) “which described an atomic bomb a year before one was ever dropped, which the government attempted to suppress.” Should I read it? I imagine it is historically important but a poor story. Did he write anything else worth reading?
June 21st: David J. Skal (1952-2024). I’ve only read Skal’s short story “Chains” (1971).
June 22nd: Lima de Freitas (1927-1998). One of my top 5 science fiction artists — I love his line work. For a few examples I gathered, see this thread on Bluesky. I also posted about his work on my site: The Futuristic Cities of Lima de Freitas.
June 22nd: Octavia E. Butler (1947-2006). I’ve reviewed Clay’s Ark (1984), Dawn (1987) and Mind of My Mind (1977). Clay’s Ark (1984) is really really good. Covered it last year.
June 23rd: Michael Shaara (1928-1988). His collection Soldier Boy (1982) judges me from the shelf. I’ve been meaning to read it since 2015!
Paul Orban’s interior art for A. J. Deutsch’s “A Subway Named Mobius” (1950) in Astounding Science Fiction, ed. John W. Campbell, Jr. (December 1950)
June 23rd: Artist Paul Orban (1896-1974). I enjoy his style of interior art — the variety of lines and shading.
June 23rd: Artist Alan Craddock (1956-). I do not enjoy his style of cover art!
Alan Craddock’s cover art for the 1985 Orbit edition of David Gerrold’s A Day for Damnation (1984)
For book reviews consult the INDEX
For cover art posts consult the INDEX
For TV and film reviews consult the INDEX
Science Fiction and Other Suspect Ruminations 
Interesting you should ask! Back in 1960, I read a story in an anthology that I’ve never forgotten — it is so profound and actually timely in a way. Last month, with the help of Chat GPT, I tracked it down online, and made a pdf of the whole story, “The Survivor.”
I’m attaching the pdf of the story to this reply to your email. If you have any feedback or can add anything to what I know about it, would you please let me know?
Best, Ellen Azorin
Thanks for stopping by. I assume you mean Walter F. Moudy’s “The Survivor” (1965)? There’s no need to send anything to me. The PDF is available for all to read online here. The magazine has been digitized. I link it in my review. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2022/06/28/future-media-short-story-review-walter-f-moudys-the-survivor-1965/
In the middle of the Library of America edition of Ursula Le Guin’s Hainish Cycle, an overall concept which she somewhat took issue with. Currently on the 2nd novel: Planet of Exile.
Hello,
What did she take issue with?
I read them before I started my site. I posted my review of Planet of Exile in 2010! It was originally up on Amazon.
In short, she didn’t see her ideas / imaginations to be constrained by a comprehensive structured plan because there wasn’t one. As she says in the November 2016 introduction of this edition, “But I flinch when they’re called ‘The Hainish Cycle’ or any such term that implies they are set in a coherent fictional universe with a well-planned history, because they aren’t, it isn’t, it hasn’t” (xi). Adding, she was “free to wander” (xii), allowing “my ideas to change and develop. I wasn’t stuck in a universe full of notions I’d outgrown, self-instituted rules limiting my imagination” (xii).
To be honest, I don’t place a ton on what authors think far far far far after the fact. Haha. I wonder what she said about it closer to when it was published. Seems to be a rather minimal complaint!
Are you enjoying them?
Absolutely – this is actually my fourth overall of this universe, having previously completed Rocannon’s World, The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossesed. They’re all great, but as you may have seen over on Bluesky, The Dispossessed is my favorite so far. Ursula’s ability to create a world, characters and have those characters react/interact to the environment and stresses of that particular world / society created is brilliantly done, especially in that last novel.
The only one I do not remember is Rocannon’s World. I certainly read it (and the others you list). I am partial to The Left Hand of Darkness.
Also, don’t miss her short fiction….
Stuff like “The New Atlantis” (1975) is not to be missed: https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2017/01/22/book-review-the-new-atlantis-and-other-novellas-of-science-fiction-ed-robert-silverberg-1975-le-guin-wolfe-tiptree-jr/
And also her generation ship story “Paradises Lost” (2002). Wait, Boaz reads SF after 1985? At one point I did — and this story stays with me.
Leigh Brackett’s The Ginger Star. I’ve loved what I’ve read of her earlier work, and thought this would make a fine read for sunny days in the garden. Ho hum, sadly. Most of the book was just John Stark getting moved up the map, regularly captured by various peoples who proceed to transport him in exactly the direction he was going anyway. Picked up in the final chapters, so I’ll try the next in the trilogy sometime, but this wasn’t the planetary romance I was expecting.
Hello, thanks for stopping by. While I have not read that one, I did enjoy the stories in The Coming of the Terrans. It contains one Stark story. For whatever reason didn’t manage to review it.
My single favorite Brackett remains her novel The Long Tomorrow. My review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2020/07/04/book-review-the-long-tomorrow-leigh-brackett-1955/
I am going to read the novel version of “Flowers for Algernon”
There’s a short story version (the original) as well. I have memories of reading one of the two in school but I don’t remember which.
I’ve been meaning, for years, to read Keyes’ early short fiction before “Flowers.” He’s definitely a bit of a one-hit wonder and I’m curious about his other early SF.
Re Philip K. Dick. So much of Dick’s stuff is about undermining our sense of reality and there’s often one cool scene in each book that does precisely that. So I guess it might be easy to mix them up? (Am now imagining a story in which a reader goes back to check out a favourite work by Philip K. Dick only to discover it doesn’t exist etc etc).
Re Mythago Wood vs Where the Timewinds Blow. The two books share a lot of similarities – in both cases the mc is trying to find his missing brother in a strange, liminal space that’s in a constant state of flux.
I read ‘Emphyrio’ by Jack Vance. Definitely one of his better works. Also ‘Carve the Sky’ by Alexander Jablokov which was an enjoyable read but maybe suffered from a certain unevenness of tone.
I quite enjoyed Emphyrio as well. Did you see my review? I’m not always the biggest Vance fan but I thought he was doing some interesting things with this one. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2018/12/16/book-review-emphyrio-jack-vance-1969/
Yeah, reading most of my PKD when I was an older teenager also contributed to the mixing them up!
I expect to enjoy Mythago Wood.
I don’t know Alexander Jablokov. And now I know why! All but two of his short stories are after my 1985 cut-off date and I didn’t discover him as a teenager when I read SF more widely.
I’m surprised I’d never come across ‘Emphyrio’ until recently as I think it shows Vance at pretty much the top of his game. I guess it’s also one of his more political novels? You mention the story-telling aspect in your review, but I particularly liked the backstory – especially in regard to the antecedents of the planet’s ruling elite. It struck me as very ingenious. And yes, ‘Carve the Sky’ was published a good deal later than I thought!
Unless I mentioned it in my review, you’re going to need to refresh my memory on the backstory. I always gravitate towards commentary on the nature of narrative. Perhaps as I wrote a PhD on corralling diverse sources into coherent narratives.
I was reluctant because it’s a big plot twist ( even the wiki entry is suitably coy). So – for anybody yet to read ‘Emphyrio’ – this is a spoiler alert.
Tarvoke attends the equivalent of a puppet play at the start of the book – which is how he learns about the legend of ‘Emphyrio’. However the puppets are sentient and were genetically engineered by the alien Damarans specifically to entertain. At the end of the book we discover that Halma’s ruling elite were created by the Damarans in the same fashion, the irony being that these supposed ‘aristocrats’ have little or no real power. They are, in essence, ‘puppets’, a proxy elite put in place by the aliens to maintain control over the planet and its citizens.
Thanks! I don’t really remember that element. As I mentioned, how the narrative works often trumps the details of said narrative in my eyes.
Where Time Winds Blow is one of my favourite sf novels.
I just finished Who? by Algis Budrys. Review to appear next week. Not especially impressed, Also finished a James Tiptree Jr collection, Byte Beautiful from 1985. Had read all of the contents previously but it’s still good stuff. Was definitely not impressed with Silverberg’s Up the Line – contains unapologetic paedophilia. Currently reading Farah Mendlesohn’s book about Russ’s The Female Man.
Yes, it’s very good. I gave it a 5/5 in my short review. Have you read Jones’ monograph on Russ? ‘Twas quite good: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/?id=p084478
Let me know how the Mendlesohn shapes up.
Yes, I’ve read Jones’s book Russ – Jones is, after all, my favourite sf writer. And I like Russ’s fiction a lot.
By the way, I created an index of all the reviews I’ve written in the last few years (on both my blogs). It’s here. I’m going to add links to my SF Mistressworks reviews as well.
It’s always good to have a general index!
Just read “Who?” last year (and I’ve been meaning to read that one since the 80s). I thought it held up pretty well.
I didn’t think so: https://iansales.com/2026/06/30/who-algis-budrys/
Still haven’t read it!
I read The Ballad of Beta-2 by Samuel Delany about 8 weeks ago.
I enjoyed it as comfort reading (I was slightly sick with a cold) but it didn’t hit like Nova & Empire Star last year.
It reminded me a lot of Babel-17 which I read decades ago.
p.s.
I also agree that Alec Nevala-Lee’s Astounding should be read. Great book 🙂
As I think I said before, I read most of my Delany before I started my site. I did review The Ballad of Beta-2 as that one had escaped my grasp. I found it an interesting if not entirely successful take on the generation ship story. There’s a short review on the site.
I definitely remember enjoying Nova far far far far more. I think I’ve read that one 3 times (again, before my site).
Of the bunch you list, I plan on returning to Babel-17 first.
What do you plan on reading next? (hopefully something cool I’ve covered in the last few years! jk, but but but….)
Slow river by Nicola Griffith. First published in 1995 though
Yeah, I read that back in the early 2000s when I read more broadly. I remember little. I’ve heard it’s really really good.
I have been consumed with the brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky… recently completed One Billion Years to the End of the World, a quick read that was entirely captivating. I have found the translations of their works to be exceptional and the range of their books––in subject matter and genre (or mock-genre) and style––refreshing. Yes, they have that stamp of writing under an authoritarian regime (something American Sci-Fi Authors may experience very soon…); however, like Stanislaw Lem, they maintain a sense of graceful rhythm, a little humor and characters that is refreshing!
Of the bunch you’ve read, what is your favorite so far?
Finished Faldbakken’s “Sweetwater” yeaterday. Wasn’t able to find a copy of the preceding novel but that wasn’t really a problem in terms of understanding the plot or narrative. Pretty good, even if the nihilism was really unrelenting up until the very last couple pages, just all that day-to-day drudgery of scrabbling for survival eventually devolving to cannibalism etc. I did like the implication at the very end that the very psychology and skills that Allan had relied on to survive would make him unsuitable for the new cycle on the horizon (in particular, his inability to plant/grow anything – he was a scavenger, not a farmer!)
Also reading the Jack Vance compendium “Tales of the Dying Earth”, after initially dipping into it earlier. Very much enjoying it at first but midway through the second novel the repetitive nature of every character always betraying every other character, and some rather gross mysogyny/sexism, have died my enthusiasm a bit.
And I finally got around to the original “Dangerous Visions” anthology, which contains several things I’ve never read before. Ellison himself I usually find to be a tiresome blowhard but that didnt detract from his critical or editorial skills (or at least, not always). Obviously the book is historically significant and so far, three stories in, I have not been disappointed by the actual selections. In fact I was surprised I had not previously come across Silverberg’s unusually grim “Flies” before.
Recently acquired Casare’s “The Invention of Morel”, Josephine Saxton’s “The Travails of Jane Saint”, Joanna Russ’s “Souls” and Philip Wylie’s “The Disappearance” so those are next.
Still keep a lookout for the first volume! How Faldbakken renders Allan’s shift away from the city and his first moves in the dump — and the community he makes — made the first volume really effective. Glad you enjoyed volume two!
I’ve never sat down and read the Dangerous Visions anthology cover-to-cover. I’ve ended up reading shorts that appeared elsewhere. Thus I’ve been spared Ellison’s comments. I’d probably skip them anyway if I read the entire anthology!
“Burning Chrome” – The Winter Market.
I’ll do a video review. I took on the task of writing a short story a week for a year. Finally got that done. That workload had killed reading for the past year. I’m happy to be getting back into reading.
I also just started in on the novel, “Floating Worlds” by Cecilia Holland
Hello,
I read Gibson’s collection soon after I read Neuromancer. I remember enjoying it immensely. I now realize that “The Winter Market” would fit my short story review sequence on the manifestations of future media. Thanks!
I have a copy but know little about the Holland novel. Let me know your thoughts when you finish it.
The last SF books that I read – though more than a month ago – was Aldiss’ Enemies of the System and PKDs UBIK (a reread).
The former is one of the weaker Aldiss books, a rush job loaded with klichés and hacky short cuts. There’s a truly great idea in there, with a lot of potential, but Aldiss never gets around to develop it.
UBIK, on the other hand, is of course one of PKDs best, one that is so overwhelming that you don’t really confuse it with his others (or at least I didn’t – despite reading it maybe 20 years ago I still had remebered it very clearly). Perhaps the quintessential PKD novel.
I also have some SF lined up for the summer: Kate Wilhelms Infinity Box and Christopher Priests The Glamour. Perhaps a reread of Ballards The Drowned World, it unfortunately seems like it would fit the weather.
Hello Jannik,
Yeah, I’ve not hear good things about Enemies of the System. I have a copy somewhere. I remember really enjoying Ubik. Those are three great books you have lined up!
The best book I’ve read recently was Knut Faldbakken’s Sweetwater (1976, trans. Joan Tate, 1994). Highly recommended. It’s the second volume in his two-volume Sweetwater sequence. The first was Twilight Country (1974, trans. Joan Tate, 1993).
Yes, I’m on the lookout for Sweetwater and Twilight Country. Both have been translated to danish, and Sweetwater is pretty easy to find, but I haven’t encountered Twilight Country yet, and I would like to begin there.
Good good!
Right now I’m rereading Gene Wolfe’s classic The Fifth Head of Cerberus. As always, I learn something new every reread. (So far, it’s the notion — that I should have seen before! — that if the natives of Sainte Anne are shapeshifters, to so are the Terran colonists on Saint Croix.)
For what it’s worth, Cartmill’s “Deadline” is a pretty bad story. The stupidity is signalled by the names he gives to the rival polities : “Sixa” va. “Seilla”.
Hello Rich,
I haven’t heard good things about the Carmill. I don’t doubt it. The Fifth Head of Cerberus is yet another novel I’ve been meaning to read. I just can’t get into Wolfe at longer lengths… albeit, I haven’t really tried.
I got a bunch of reprints of “classic” science fiction from Armchair fiction a couple of years ago when they were running a sale and I’ve been working through them. Some of the novels are surprisingly good and others are, well, the novel equivalent of a science fiction B movie. I recently finished Jack Sharkey’s The Programmed People. It’s one of those novellas that could have been helped by an editor — about 2/3 of the way through, the reader gets an explanation of how the residents of the hive got into the hive and then there’s a quick resolution. It’s far from the worst science fiction novella I’ve read (I’ve read novellas from Victor Rousseau and Rog Phillips so that’s a high bar), but it’s not great and it was one of those novellas where it took a long time to read even though it wasn’t one of those high literary novels like The Seventh Function of Language (which I loved) where you have to read carefully and slowly.
I recently read Chan Davis’s “The Nightmare” which I think you recently reviewed. It really is chilling. After I’d finished, I realized I was very glad I read it now rather than right after 9/11 when people were worried that Al Qaida was going to get a nuclear weapon (possibly from secular Iraq), smuggle it into the US and detonate it in one of our cities. That said “The Nightmare” is a very good story that is still relevant today.
I also read EC Tubb’s “Project One” which is very good. It’s about a mysterious satellite orbiting the Earth and killing off the old and unhealthy. The US and the Soviets have to team up to blow up the satellite before too many people are killed.
Thanks for stopping by. I can’t say I understand the point of the Armchair editions. The books they reprint are available online — and they aren’t adding any extra materials, are they? That said, I am glad that they are spreading awareness of older SF. I’ve not read any of Jack Sharkey’s SF.
Re-Chan Davis: I assume you saw my post on his early anti-racism in SF article? I should return to his work. I found “The Nightmare” an interesting artifact of a particular moment where spreading out industry and people was viewed as a potential avenue for survival in a nuclear exchange.
I’ve only read a few of Tubb’s short fictions (all relentlessly bleak) and one short novel. All functional with moments of interest.