Which books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?
1. The Sundial, Shirley Jackson (1958)
From the back cover: “THE SUNDIAL is a chilling, suspenseful, bloodcurdlingly macabre novel of twelve strange people awaiting the end of the world in a fantastical house like no other on earth.” SF Encyclopedia describes The Sundial as “the closet to SF she came.”
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4.5/5 (Very Good)
English author Angela Carter (1940-1992) spun postmodern fabulations of decadent futures and decaying urban expanses replete with incisive deconstruction of genre conventions [1]. Her dark, Freudian, and erotic masterpiece The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman (1972) ranks amongst my favorite SF 70s visions. From a young age Carter read John Wyndham and, like so many others in the 60s, felt the relentless pull of Michael Moorcock’s New Worlds magazine and the larger New Wave movement: “this lode, this seam of intensely imaginative and exciting fiction” [2]. And, as with her contemporary Emma Tennant, the work of J. G. Ballard–and/or his ability to fill the air with his entropic sadness–spurred her to write post-apocalyptic SF [3]. Heroes & Villains (1969) is the product of her inspiration and “her first tale to engage in a recognizably sf displacement of reality” [4].
Continue readingWhich books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?
1. 6 Great Short Novels of Science Fiction, ed. Groff Conklin (1954)
From the back cover: “THE BLAST: STUART CLOETE envisions New York City under atomic attack, and tells the story of the lone survivor.
COVENTRY: ROBERT HEINLEIN shows what happens to one of the last individualists, who request a sentence to purgatory.
THE OTHER WORLD: MURRAY LEINSTER reveals a savage, feudal civilization which lives off the sweat of slaves kidnapped from our world.
BARRIER: ANTHONY BOUCHER writers of a time traveler, and his strange encounters with the people who will come after us.
SURFACE TENSION: JAMES BLISH traces a race of microscopic men that works out its destiny under water on a planet somewhere far out of the galaxy.
MATURITY: THEODORE STURGEON depicts the agonizing plight of a super man born in our midst.
Continue readingToday I’ve selected two post-apocalyptic visions by female authors. I needed an antidote to the creepy last man/woman stories I’ve been reading recently. Alice Eleanor Jones spins a masterpiece about a housewife attempting to keep the entropy of a crumbling world and an abusive husband at bay. Katherine MacLean imagines a moment where the last representative of the American Empire, after all the rhetoric of progress and exceptionalism came crashing down in a nuclear war, interacts with a persistent and well-meaning native girl.
The links to the stories can be found in the reviews. Both are recommended reads for fans of 50s and 60s science fiction.
5/5 (Masterpiece)
Alice Eleanor Jones’ “Created He Them” first appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, ed. Anthony Boucher (June 1955). You can read it online here.
Sometimes there are stories that transcend their short length with lasting power. This story has resided within me as if freshly read for weeks. Like some corrosive lozenge of love and hate, “Created He Them” eats you up from the inside.
Continue readingRob Latham in his article “Sextrapolation in New Wave Science Fiction” (2008) argues that in the early 1950s “a handful of stories were published in the magazines that dealt explicitly with sexual topics” long absent from genre. Latham suggests that some of the notable New Wave takes on science fictional sex read as reconceptualized versions of these stories [2]. With few exceptions, the 50s trailblazing tales were ignored by the major digests of the day and instead appeared in the failing pulps–Startling Stories and Thrilling Wonder Stories–or in “second- and third-tier digests just struggling to establish themselves” such as Howard Browne’s Fantastic Adventures. For example, my two previous posts in this series covered Sherwood Springer’s “No Land of Nod” (1952), which appeared in Thrilling Wonder Stories, and Philip José Farmer’s “The Lovers” (1952) in Startling Stories. The later was rejected by H. L. Gold, according to John Brunner, at Galaxy with the note: “I’ll publish this if you can get rid of the sex–I run a family magazine” [3].
Let’s get to the stories! Both Fritz Leiber’s “The Ship Sails at Midnight” (1950) and Theodore Sturgeon’s “The Sex Opposite” (1952) explore polyamorous relationships between humans and aliens. In Leiber’s case, a group of bohemians fall in love with a bisexual alien. In Sturgeon’s tale, a heterosexual couple both fall for a parthenogenetically female “alien” symbiote that appears male to women and female to men.
Previously: Sherwood Springer’s “No Land of Nod” (1952) and Wallace West’s “Eddie For Short” (1953)
Up next: Ward Moore’s “Lot” (1953) and Langdon Jones’ “I Remember, Anita…” (1964)
3/5 (Average)
Fritz Leiber’s “The Ship Sails at Midnight” first appeared in Fantastic Adventures, ed. Howard Browne (September 1950). You can read it online here.
Four self-proclaimed “‘wild’-young people, bohemians” (61), fresh out of college but still “sponging” off their parents “doing academic odd-jobs” (57), encounter the enigmatic and stunningly gorgeous Helen serving food at Benny’s, an all-night diner. Soon after meeting Helen, Es, “something of an artist,” starts to push the boundaries of her previously staid art (56). The narrator, Larry, who calls himself a writer but spends more time “reading magazines and detective stories, lazing around, getting drunk, and conducting […] endless intellectual palavers” (58) suddenly has something to actually write about–a carnal and intellectual love for Helen that they keep hidden from the rest. Louis, a philosopher, slowly encounters new avenues to explore rather than “merely cultivat[ing] a series of intellectual enthusiasms [..] and fruitless-excitement over the thoughts of other men” (57). And the gruff exterior of Gene, an atomic scientist, begins to mellow. All four view Helen as a “Great Books discussion leader” who serves as an intellectual midwife–who fosters, encourages, and inspires the expansion of their minds.
Continue readingWhich books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?
I planned to have a review up today. Unfortunately, August is always my least productive month writing as it marks the return to work after a much needed summer break. It’s been a rough few weeks! Stay tuned.
1. The Squares of the City, John Brunner (1965)
From the back cover: CHECHMATE IN PARADISE. Ciudad de Vados was a Latin-American showplace, a paradise…a flourishing supercity designed and run nearly to perfection.
But not quite. They had a traffic problem.
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In the March 1955 issue of John Brunner’s fanzine Noise Level, the young author listed a handful of “thematically edgy stories”–including Sherwood Springer’s “No Land of Nod” (1952), Theodore Sturgeon’s “The World Well Lost” (1953), and Lester del Rey’s “For I am A Jealous People (1954)–that he considered a “step forward” in the field [1]. The previous year he had praised elements of Philip José Farmer’s “The Lovers” (1952) in a fan letter to Startling Stories. According to Jad Smith, the stories feature “lived-in, morally ambiguous backgrounds much noisier and dynamic than the two-dimensional backdrops of more conventional fare” that appealed to Brunner’s embryonic views on genre [2]. Brunner viewed social change as a “messy and unpredictable process riddled with moral complexities” [3].
Continue readingWhich books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?
1. 5 Tales From Tomorrow, ed. T. E. Dikty (1957)
From the back cover: “THE TIME: TOMORROW… when
…space travel is as simple as suburban commuting
…robots do everything from washing dishes to waging wars
…do-it-yourself surgery kits are as common as Band-aids
…giant electronic brains mastermind all human activity
THE PLACE: SPACE SPACE SPACE
where the cold, dark islands of abandoned planets drift in a fabulous universe flooded with blazing energy, the dust of old suns and the heat of smoldering new stars.
Space–the promise of new life to a crowded earth–the new frontier–the hope of tomorrow!”
Contents: Bud Foote’s “Push-Button Passion” (1954), Tom Godwin’s “The Cold Equations” (1954), Clifford D. Simak’s “How-2” (1954), Robert Abernathy’s “Deep Space” (1954), Everett B. Cole’s “Exile” (1954)
Continue readingToday I’ve reviewed the seventeenth story in my series on the science fictional media landscape of the future. John Brunner explores how total immersion media, one organ in a vast futuristic fair designed to satiate the masses, can transform fear within the broken.
Previously: John D. MacDonald’s “Spectator Sport” (February 1950).
Up Next: C. M. Kornbluth’s “The Advent on Channel Twelve” (1958) and Alice Eleanor Jones’ “The Happy Clown” (December 1955).
4.5/5 (Very Good)
John Brunner’s “Fair” first appeared in New Worlds Science Fiction, ed. John Carnell (March 1956) under the pseudonym Keith Woodcott. You can read it online here. It also appeared in his first collection No Future In It (1962).
I recently devoured Jad Smith’s short monograph John Brunner (2012) in the Modern Masters of Science Fiction series for Illinois University Press. Not only did the book rekindle my desire to tackle more of Brunner’s short fiction but I also bought copies of The Squares of the City (1965) and Quicksand (1967). I might even reread The Shockwave Rider (1975) in the near future. If you are at all interested in John Brunner’s science fiction I recommend acquiring a copy.
Smith identifies “Fair” (1956) as Brunner’s “finest achievement during this [early] period” (Smith 28). I’d rank it right under his spectacular generation ship short story “Lungfish” (1957). As with many of Brunner’s best works, “Fair” had a contested publication history–in this instance John Carnell only accepted it under the pseudonym “Keith Woodcott” to “fill out an issue” (Smith 29). The identity of the consummate wordsmith didn’t last long as Carnell accidentally revealed his identity in next issue when the story came in second in the reader’s poll!
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Science Fiction and Other Suspect Ruminations 