Which books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?

1. Arkady and Boris Strugatsky’s Roadside Picnic (1972, trans. Olena Bormashenko, 2012)

From the back cover: “Red Schuhart is a stalker, one of those misfits who are compelled, in spite of the extreme danger, to venture illegally into the Zone to collect the mysterious artefacts that the alien visitors left scattered around. His life is dominated by the place and the thriving black market in the the alien products. Even the nature of his mutant daughter has been determined by the Zone. And it is for her that he makes his last, tragic foray into the hazardous and hostile territory.”

Initial Thoughts: One of those obvious holes in my SF knowledge… I certainly have read about the writing pair but I’ve only read a story here and there–for example “Wanderers and Travellers” (1963, trans. 1966)–and one novel that I never managed to review. My father has been pushing me to read more of their work. And yes, Andrei Tarkovsky’s adaptation Stalker (1979) remains one of my favorite movies. I took a History of Russian Film class in college and wrote my term paper on Tarkovsky’s use of color.

2. Philip K. Dick’s The Unteleported Man (1964) and Howard L. Cory’s The Mind Monsters (1966)

From the inside page for The Unteleported Man (1964): “Nobody would go to the stars the long way when you could travel to your new planetary Utopia the instant-teleportation way. That is, nobody reasonable would want to spend eighteen years in a spaceship just to be stubborn about electronic transit.

Which is what made Rachmael ben Applebaum such a thorn in the side of the giant industrial combines that had made the Telpor what it was. Because Rachmael was all set to head for Newcolonizedland by his own starship-alone.

But just being eccentric and a doubter would hardly justify the incredible concentration of effort to prevent his trip THE UNTELEPORTED MAN suspect he was on the track of a secret too dangerous to get out–even after an eighteen year journey.

Yet even he did not guess how terrifyingly right he was!”

From the inside page for The Mind Monsters (1966): NIGHTMARE PLANET. When Terence O’Corcoran, solo operator of an exploratory Terran Planetary Survey Corps spaceship, crash-landed on an alien world, he awoke with no obvious injuries and a forever-useless ship.

The redheaded young Irishman grabbed his blaster and proceeded down the icy mountain slope. Once on level ground, Terence felt hostile eyes watching him from behind the forest’s dense growth. And then one came into a view: a bug-eyed monster! One after another, Terence shot them down, the most vile creatures imaginable.

But these were nothing compared to the things he would face once he got to the carnival capital of Mahtog…”

Initial Thoughts: I do not plan on reading the Corey’s The Mind Monsters (1966). It sounds absolutely atrocious. With that out of the way, the bit about the publication history of Dick’s The Unteleported Man (1964). Dick wrote 30k extra words for the novel version of his 1964 novella that first appeared in Fantastic Stories of Imagination (December 1964). However, the publisher rejected his additions and published the original novella version instead. That’s the version I own. In 1983, after PKD’s death, a novel version with the 30k words hit shelves. I do not own that version. This appears to be a Dick novel/novella that escaped my early pre-site obsession with his work.

3. War Moore and Avram Davidson’s Joyleg (1962)

From the back cover: “Who was JOYLEG? The U.S. Government was paying him a veteran’s pension of $11.00 a month… and that’s all anyone knew.

Congressman Tully Weathernox thought it was a disgracefully small reward for one of Our Nation’s Defenders. Congresswoman Lucinda Habersham figured Joylef was a probably fraud. So–they checked.

Joyleg wasn’t a veteran of World War II-or World War I. Nor the Spanish American caper. Nor the Indian wars. Was it possible that he was a last survivor of the Boys in Blue? Not according to the records, he wasn’t.

There was an incredible speculation about what Joyleg might be… so Lucinda and Tully journeyed to the hills of Tennessee to investigate. They found out the secret of Joyleg, all right…

…a secret that changed the history of the world!”

Initial Thoughts: I’ve never got my head around Davidson’s SF. I’ve enjoyed some of the Moore I’ve read, for example, “Lot” (1953). We shall see about this one! I’ve not heard it is close to either authors’ best.

4. Muriel Jaeger’s The Question Mark (1926)

From the back cover: “In 1926 Muriel Jaeger, dissatisfied with the unrealistic utopian stories of H. G. Wells and Edward Bellamy, set out to explore “The Question Mark” of what a future society might look like if human nature were truthfully represented.

Her hero, disgruntled office worker Guy, is pitched 200 years into a future London where each citizen is offered free education and a personal “power-box” granting access to communication, transportation and entertainment. To Guy, the great challenges facing society seem solved, but its inhabitants tell a different story of fractured life in this supposed utopia.

Preceding the publication of Huxley’s Brave New World by 5 years, The Question Mark is a significant cornerstone in the foundation of the dystopia genre, and an impressive work of literary science fiction.

MURIEL JAEGER (1892-1969) was a prolific writer of history books, essays and science fiction, and was amongst the first women to receive degrees at Somerville College, Oxford. She later became associated with Leonard and Virginia Woolf, who published her pioneering science fiction novels The Question Mark (1926) and The Man with Six Senses (1927).”

Initial Thoughts: I’ve been reading more early 20th century SF as of late, and I can’t pass up an early dystopia.

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