Book Review: Margaret and I, Kate Wilhelm (1971)

/ Joachim Boaz / 24 Comments

(Uncredited cover for the 1978 edition)

3.5/5 (Good)

Nominated for the 1972 Nebula Award for Best Novel

The grayness swirled and became solid, a plain that was featureless at first, then with grotesque shapes emerging from it, obviously things growing, but things that shouldn’t have been.  They looked like monstrous scabs, like leprous fingers curled obscenely in an attitude of prayer, like parts of bodies covered with a fungus or mold, misshapen and horrible” (73).

Margaret and I (1971) is a profoundly unsettling and hallucinatory exploration of a woman’s sexual and emotional self-realization.  Or, to use the Jungian terms deployed by Wilhelm in her preliminary quotation, the novel charts the process of individuation where the conscious and unconscious “learn to know, respect and accommodate Continue reading →

Adventures in Science Fiction Art: Visualizing Time, Part II (time travel + sundials + the decay of eternity + time portals)

/ Joachim Boaz / 14 Comments

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(Walter Popp’s cover for the 1953 issue of Fantastic Story Magazine, ed. Samuel Mines)

It has been along time since I cobbled together a cover art post…

…but it’s a good one!

This is Part II of my Visualizing Time sequence—if you haven’t seen it already check out Part I.  And in Part II we have a standoff across time with your primitive ancestors, decay and the hourglass, rewriting America’s racist past, the sundial as an arena for an epic showdown with an alien, jumping through cave paintings (a metaphor Continue reading →

Updates: Recent Science Fiction Acquisitions No. XCIV (Simak + Farmer + Harness + Van Scyoc)

/ Joachim Boaz / 20 Comments

More Simak! More Philip José Farmer Farmer! And two unknown qualities, Harness’ collection The Rose (1955) and Sydney van Scyoc’s Saltflower (1971)…

And three of the the covers for this collection are top-notch—two Powers’ gems and a wonderful Lehr “cityscape.”

Thoughts?

1. Saltflower, Sydney Van Scyoc (1971)

(Paul Lehr’s cover for the 1971 edition) Continue reading →

Book Review: Citizen in Space, Robert Sheckley (1955)

/ Joachim Boaz / 17 Comments

(Richard Powers’ cover for the 1955 edition

4/5 (collated rating: Good)

Robert Sheckley’s easily one of the best SF satirists in the short story form.  The collection Citizen in Space (1955), although not as uniformly brilliant as the collection Store of Infinity (1960), is chock full of gems including “The Luckiest Man in the World” (1955), “Something for Nothing” (1954), “Ask a Foolish Question” (1953), and “Skulking Permit” (1954).  Sheckley exposes in all their glory the vast variety of humankind’s follies and utopic delusions.

Later in the 50s and in the span of 6os his visions would become increasingly searing and metafictional.  This early collection Continue reading →

Updates: Immortality Themed SF Novels/Short Stories Resource Posted

/ Joachim Boaz / 9 Comments

  

I while back I put out a call for SF novels/short works on immortality to add to a preliminary list I put together.  Due to my lack of knowledge of newer SF and uncanny ability to forget relevant previously read works I eagerly added your suggestions.  And Marta Randall’s Islands (1976) motivated me to finally post  it…

Here’s the LIST!

If you can think of any that I might be missing be sure to Continue reading →

Updates: Recent Science Fiction Acquisitions No. XCIII (McCaffrey + Gunn + Spinrad + Sellings)

/ Joachim Boaz / 5 Comments

My first collection (and a big one at that) of Norman Spinrad short stories!  I loved The Iron Dream (1972).  I’ve also wanted to give Anne McCaffrey’s non-Pern SF a shot (loved Pern as a kid).  Although, it does look rather silly, catlike aliens are generally not my idea of fun.  Another novel by James Gunn, one he claims is his best…. And, one of those impulsive type acquisitions of unknown quality, The Power of X (1968) by Arthur Sellings.

Thoughts?

1. Kampus, James E. Gunn (1977)

(Bob Larkin’s cover for the 1977 edition) Continue reading →

Book Review: Islands, Marta Randall (1976)

/ Joachim Boaz / 13 Comments

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(Vincent Di Fate’s cover for the 1976 edition)

3.5/5 (Good)

Nominated for the 1977 Nebula Award for Best Novel

*Note: I read the 1980 Pocket edition which, according to Locus, was modified (to what extent I do not know) from the original 1976 first edition.

Marta Randall, the first female president of SFWA, is one of numerous female science fiction writers from the 70s that are seldom read today.  A while back Ian Sales alerted me to Randall’s work in his very positive review of A City in the North (1976) on SF Mistressworks.  Recently, while looking for unread works on my immortality-themed SF list (here), I came across the Nebula-nominated Islands (1976).

One of the more effective ways to write about the ennui Continue reading →

Updates: Recent Science Fiction Acquisitions No. XCII (Ellison + Ballard + Davidson + St. Clair)

/ Joachim Boaz / 26 Comments

First, a painful example of early 60s marketing for a SF novel written by a women: “WOMEN ARE WRITING SCIENCE-FICTION!  ORIGINAL! BRILLIANT!! DAZZLING!!! Women are closer to the primitive than men.  They are conscious of the moon-pulls, the earth-tides.  They posses a buried memory of humankind’s obscure and ancient past which can emerge to unique color and flavor a novel.”

Uh huh.

I wish I possessed a buried memory of humankind’s obscure and ancient past…

A wonderful batch.  My first Avram Davidson collection although the blurb and cover are utterly unappealing.  More Ballard, my first Margaret St. Clair novel, more Ellison…

Thoughts?

1. Vermillion Sands, J. G. Ballard (1971)

(Richard Powers’ cover for the 1971 edition) Continue reading →

Book Review: Double, Double, John Brunner (1969)

/ Joachim Boaz / 20 Comments

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(Murray Tinkleman’s cover for the 1979 edition)

2/5 (Bad)

John Brunner has long been one of my favorite SF authors and it almost pains me to review dismal disasters like Double, Double (1969).  I find it mind-boggling that an author who produced the otherworldly Stand on Zanzibar (1968) can turn around and release Double, Double the very next year.  Yes, yes I know, even brilliant SF authors such as Robert Silverberg churned out a vast and bizarre variety of sex/smut books to make ends meet (and buy a mansion) under such names as L.T. Woodward MD (Virgin Wives, Sex in our Schools, etc) and Don Elliot (Cousin Lover, Gang Girl, Gay Girl, The Instructor, etc) so I really should not complain….

Double, Double contains the most rudimentary clichéd premise and a plot used in countless 50s B-movies.  At moments it feels like Brunner wanted to transform the plot into a vehicle for social commentary.  However, at these crucial junctures where Brunner could have used his profusion of strange disparate characters gathered together in the English countryside to comment on the state of English society Continue reading →