Tag Archives: Howard L. Myers

Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[June 30, 1969] Anywhere but here (July 1969 Analog)

5 Comments

photo of a man with glasses and curly, long, brown hair, and a beard and mustache
by Gideon Marcus

Scenes from abroad

And so, our longest Japan trip to date has wrapped up.  We're still developing the many rolls of film we took, but here are some highlights from our vacation that included the cities Fukuoka, Amagi, Kobe, Osaka, Nagoya, and Tokyo:


Nanami and The Young Traveler zoom down a slide in an eastern suburb of Nagoya


Nanami and her husband perform at a Nagoya jazz club


This is Nanami's baby, Wataru, and her mother-in-law, Haruko!


Lorelei poses in front of Ultraman, one of Japan's newest superheros


Lorelei has become smitten with kimono and yukata.  We had to buy a new suitcase to fit them all (and the model trains Elijah bought)

The trouble back home

On the doorstep to my house was a big pile of mail that my neighbor has kept for me.  In addition to sundry bills, the latest FAPA packet, and a handful of independent 'zines (including the latest from the James Doohan International Fan Club), there was the latest issue of Analog.  Interest piqued by the lovely (as always) Freas cover, I tore into the mag before unpacking.  Sadly, it was all downhill from there…


by Kelly Freas

… And Comfort to the Enemy, by Stanley Schmidt

When an exploration ship lands on a seemingly uninhabited planet, its rapacious, by-the-book commander rubs his hands with glee at the prospect of colonizing plunder.  But it turns out there are intelligent natives—it's just that their "technology" is actually the fine control of all of their fellow creatures creating a sort of artificial Deathworld.  When the invaders refuse to leave, they take a hostage, who they use as a communications go-between.  And then they unleash a deadly plague which ravages first the explorer ship and then their entire race.  How the colonizers get out of the predicament is somewhat clever.


by Kelly Freas

This one starts a bit slowly, and the explorers are all too human, even though they're supposed to be aliens.  However, once it gets moving, it's pretty good, and you can sympathize with both the planet dwellers and the decimated invaders.

Three stars.

The Great Intellect Boom, by Christopher Anvil


by Kelly Freas

A pharmaceutical company stumbles upon a brain-booster pill.  Unfortunately, it promotes eggheaded learning, but not application of this learning.  As a result, the nation's economy stumbles as more and more citizens would rather discuss than do.

This is a pretty thinly veiled attack on academia and the intelligentsia, which surely must have tickled editor Campbell's reactionary heart.

One star.

The Mind-Changer, by Verge Foray


by Kelly Freas

Boy this one was a disappointment.  We last saw Verge Foray in a nice little piece called Ingenuity, which featured a post-atomic world where humanity was divided into psionically adept but primitive and regressing "Novos" and scientific, but conservative, "Olsaperns."  Starn was the hero of that story—a Novo with a rare gift of insight and intuition who managed to get in good with the technical Olsaperns.

This sequel story involves Starn's attempts to develop technology that will augment psionic powers such that they can rival or exceed the technology of the Olsaperns.  Fine and well, but really, this is just one of Campbell's "scientific" articles on psionics with a fictional coating.  I already find psi to be a pseudoscientific bore, but to try to add a veneer of respectability to it by invoking scientific trappings is distasteful in the extreme.

It's also a really boring tale.  One star.

The Choice, by Keith Laumer


by Kelly Freas

A three-astronaut explorer team from Earth is abducted by mysterious aliens who offer each of them a choice of fates—all of them some form of execution.  The two military members of the crew meet their fate boldly; the third is a far out civilian cat who doesn't cotton to his own extinction.  As a result, the story has a happy ending.

There is serious Laumer and there is funny Laumer.  Funny Laumer is usually the more trivial, and this is trivial funny Laumer.

Two stars.

The Man from R.O.B.O.T., by Harry Harrison


by Peter Skirka

A couple of years back, Harrison brought out the droll The Man from P.I.G., about a secret agent who goes undercover as a pig farmer.  The twist was that the pigs weren't his livestock but his accomplices.  In a similar vein, here we have the story of an agent who goes undercover as a robot salesman, but the robots are his accomplices.  Of course, given that the robots are intelligent, and one of them is even designed to look like the agent, one wonders why there needs to be human involvement at all in this case.

Anyway, the agent is dispatched to a rancher planet whose women folk all seem to be locked up, and whose men folk are all paranoid violence freaks.  Is it genetic?  Or is it in the cattle?

I always get "funny" Harrison (frex "The Stainless Steel Rat") and "funny" Laumer (e.g. "Retief") mixed up.  And here they're back to back!  Now I'll never disentangle them.

Two stars.

The Empty Balloon, by Jack Wodhams


by Peter Skirka

Last up, a throwaway story about a diplomat who thwarts a telepathic interrogation machine.  There's no real explanation as to how he does it, really, and most of the story exists to set up the lame ending.

Two stars.

Wow.  What a wretched month for magazine fiction!  With the exception of the atypically superlative New Worlds (3.6 stars), everything else was mediocre at best.  IF managed to break the three star barrier, but just barely (3.1), same as Fantasy and Science Fiction.  Amazing scored 2.6—which is a good month for that mag, while Galaxy got the same score, which constituted a bad month. 

Indeed, all of the better-than-average fiction would fill just one decently sized digest.  Incidentally, we had exactly one (1) short story produced by a woman, and the one woman-penned nonfiction this month was a biography…of a man.

It just goes to show that all the good stuff seems to be happening overseas these days.  I hope the next month of mags reinforces my decision to come home!




5 Comments Leave A Comment
Magazine, Science / Space Race, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[October 28, 1968] Impressive at first glance… (November 1968 Analog)

4 Comments


by Gideon Marcus

Up and over

Just as America returned to space in a big way with this month's flight of Apollo 7, the Soviets have also recovered from their 1967 tragedy (Soyuz 1) with an impressive feat.  Georgy Beregovoi, a rookie cosmonaut (ironically also the oldest man in space thus far, surpassing 45 year-old Wally Schirra by two years) has taken Soyuz 3 into orbit for a series of rendezvous and perhaps dockings (TASS is being vague on the issue) with the unmanned Soyuz 2.


Comrade Beregovoi in training

We've seen flights like this before, but this is the first time there has been a person involved.  Many are calling this a harbinger of an impending lunar flight, though NASA is adamant that this particular flight won't go to the moon.  Indeed, Dr. Ed Welsh, Secretary of the National Aeronautics and Space Council says Soyuz and September's Zond 5, which went around the moon, are completely different craft and the Russians aren't even close to fielding a lunar mission.

We'll have more on this flight in a few days.  Stay tuned.

On the ground

Like the flights of Soyuz 2 and 3, this month's Analog is outwardly impressive, but once you dig in, it's not so great.


by Kelly Freas

The Infinity Sense, by Verge Foray


by Kelly Freas

Centuries from now, after the fall of the Age of Science, humanity is divided into two camps: the "Olsaparns", who dwell in isolated technological camps and retain a semblance of the original technology and society, and the Novos—psionically adept savages who live in conservative Packs.  One of the Pack members is Starn, who possesses a brand new ability that allows him to best even the telepathically and premonitionally blessed.  He runs afoul of Nagister Nont, a highly adept, highly disagreeable trader, who kidnaps his wife.

After a raid on the Olsaparns leaves Starn close to death, the technologists remake him into something more machine than man, like Ted White's Android Avenger.  The Olsaparns want Nont out of the picture, so they help Starn in his quest to defeat the mutant and get back his wife.

I have no fault with the writing, which is brisk and engaging.  I take some issue with the pages of discussion on whether or not psi powers be linked with primitiveness, or the concept that humanity could regress to Pithecanthropy in a scant few generations (or the idea that evolution must be a road that one goes forward and backward on; I thought we gave up teleology last century).  But I blazed through the novella in short order, so… four stars.

The Ultimate Danger, by W. Macfarlane


by Kelly Freas

In which Captain Lew Frizel takes a shipload of eggheads to a hallucinogenic planet.  He is the only one who, more or less, keeps his head.  The message appears to be that LSD can be employed by aliens to judge our character.  Or something.

Three stars?

The Shots Felt 'Round the World, by Edward C. Walterscheid

This piece, on atomic tests, was much easier reading than Walterscheid's last article.  Do you realize that we have detonated half a billion TNT tons worth of nuclear explosives since 1945?  It's a wonder there's anything left of Nevada.

Four stars.

The Rites of Man, by John T. Phillifent


by Rudolph Palais

A scientist is working on rationalizing the art of interpersonal relations (because in Phillifent's universe, no one has invented sociology).  About twenty pages into that effort, humanoid (really, human) aliens show up and ask to be allowed to compete in the Olympics.  They do, but they lose on purpose so we won't hate them.  Then we interbreed.

Possibly the dullest, most pointless story I've ever read in this magazine.  One star.

The Alien Enemy, by Michael Karageorge


by Leo Summers

Humanity is a resilient creature, tough enough to tame any world.  Except that planet Sibylla, with its poisonous soil, extreme axial tilt, thin atmosphere, temperature extremes, high gravity, and violent weather may actually be more than Terrans can handle.  What does one do when a world is too minimal to sustain a colony?  And what is the value of 10,000 settler lives against the teeming, impoverished billions of Earth?

This is a vividly written piece with some excellent astronomy.  If I didn't know better, I'd say Poul Anderson is writing under a pseudonym.  I felt the solution to the colonists' problem, though reasonable, was not sufficiently set up to be deduced.  Also, I felt Karageorge missed the opportunity to make a more profound statement at the end than "well, humanity can lick almost all comers."  I'd have preferred something on the point of colonization or the shifting of priorities on a racial scale.

Still, a high three stars.

Split Personality, by Jack Wodhams


by Kelly Freas

Mauger, a homicidal brute, agrees to be split in two for science instead of getting the chair.  Instead of this resulting in two new individuals, it turns out that the two halves remain connected, the gestalt whole.  Thus, Maugam can literally be in two places at once.

This is timely as the first interstellar drive has had teething troubles.  Two test ships have gotten lost, unable to communicate with Earth.  Now, half of Maugam can fly on the ship while the other stays home and reports, since telepathy, for some reason, is instant.

It's actually not a bad story, though it's really just a bunch of magic and coincidence.  It works because Wodhams has set it up to work a certain way, not because this is any kind of realistic scientific extrapolation.  Also, it's hard to work up any sympathy for a homicidal brute.

Three stars.

Doing the math

When everything is crunched together, we end up with Analog clocking in at exactly 3 stars—again, adequate, but vaguely disappointing.  On the other hand, it's been something of a banner month in SF (provided you're not looking for female writers; they wrote less than 7% of the new fiction pieces published).  Except for IF (2.6), every other outlet scored higher than 3.  To wit:

New Worlds (3.1), Amazing (3.2), New Writings 13 (3.3), Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.4), and Galaxy (3.9).

The stuff worth reading (4/5 stars) would fill a whopping three magazines.  Who says the science fiction magazine age is over?




4 Comments Leave A Comment
Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[May 31, 1968] Euler's Issue (June 1968 Analog)

3 Comments


by Gideon Marcus

Constants

The universe is based on a host of magic numbers.  Without them, the cosmos would be entirely different and probably uninhabitable.  Some of these "constants" are familiar to the layman, Pi perhaps being the most so.  Engineers are familiar with electron-Volts and atomic masses.  Chemists know Avogadro's number, the relationship between atomic mass and metric mass.  Mathematicians know e.

e is a truly fascinating number.  Roughly equal to 2.71828, it is the fundament of exponential growth. For example, if you have a $1 compounded annually at 100% interest, at the end of a year you'll have $2. If you have $1 compounded monthly at 100% interest, at the end of the year you'll have $2.62. If you have $1 compounded continuously (i.e. over an infinite number of instants), you will have $2.71828 at the end of the year.

In calculus, if you integrate the function e to the x power, you get… e to the x power!  Conversely, of course, the derivative of e to the x is e to the x.  That means that e to the x is the one function whose rate of change is the same as its position is the same as its acceleration.

What does this have to do with Analog Science Fiction, particularly this latest issue?


by Kelly Freas

Well, when you have the same editor for 30 years, and he hires the same writers every issue, and he has a rigid editorial policy that eschews innovation and prioritizes certain pseudo-scientific fetishes, you end up with a certain kind of consistency.  Not necessarily a desirable consistency, but consistency nevertheless.  Read on, and you'll see what I mean.

e gad

The Royal Road, by Christopher Anvil


by Kelly Freas

You know you're in trouble when Chris Anvil gets the cover.  Actually, this continuan of the saga of Captain Roberts and his crew of two isn't so bad.  Previous installments had the trio serendipitously developing a mind-control ray and using it to wrest a planet from a despotic computer.  Then the three posed as nobility to sway said planet further.  It was all very glib and distasteful, and I didn't like it.

This story spends two thirds of its length rehashing the events of those stories for new readers and then bringing the trio back, making it a quartet (with Bergen from a story in the December 1967 issue), and unleashing them on a new problem.  A somewhat primitive planet is fractured into more than a dozen petty kingdoms, and the Interstellar Patrol needs a majority of them to agree in order to establish a base.  In the last third of Royal Road, we get the solution to this conundrum. It mostly involves creating an economic catastrophe that only kingdoms favorable to the Imperial Patrol are equipped to address, thus putting these kingdoms on top.  Anvil does note that the gambit could have killed millions, so at least things aren't quite so glib as before.

At least now the quartet of Captain Roberts has been transformed into a sort of Retief series.  Anything's an improvement.  Anyway, I didn't hate it.  A low three stars, I guess. 

No Shoulder to Cry On, by Hank Davis


by Leo Summers

After the vastly superior alien federation shows up on Earth, a sociologist is brought back to see what he assumes will be their advanced technology.  Instead, it turns out that humans have been quite a bit more successful than the ee-tees, at least in one vital field.

A Twilight Zone episode writ small, but inoffensive.  Three stars.

Duplex, by Howard L. Myers


by Kelly Freas

Kent is a person with a literal split personality.  His left half is under the control of a silent partner, dubbed "Pard", while Kent, nominally the "dominant" personality, runs the right half.  Together, they lead a pleasant life as an extremely successful concert pianist.  That is until Pard gets them both tangled up in a spy conspiracy that threatens not just the world…but themselves!

I liked the story's handling of mental handicaps, and it's a pleasant piece overall.  Three stars, but the highest three stars in the issue.

It's RIGHT Over Your Nose!, by Ben Bova


by Kelly Freas

In this science-ish article, Bova suggests that quasars, highly red-shifted quasi-stellar radio sources, may in fact be Bussard ramjets run by aliens.  Thus, rather than being natural phenomena of tremendous power far outside the galaxy, they are artificial phenomena of middlin' power within.

I tend to prefer natural over artificial solutions to problems.  Plus, why is every star-drive in the galaxy going away from us?

Still, it's readable, if breathless.  Three stars.

The Mind Reader, by Rob Chilson


by Leo Summers

Robot mini-planes prove to be decisive in the next Southeast Asian war.  This story is told mostly in dialogue between two people in a sort of "As you know, Bob…" fashion.

The concept is interesting and unique.  The story is not compellingly told.  Two stars.

Satan's World (Part 2 of 4), by Poul Anderson


by Kelly Freas

Finally, we have the next installment in Satan's World, which started last month.  The crew of Muddlin' Through was split up when David Falkayn was abducted by Serendpity Inc., a galactic information clearing house.  This provoked Polesotechnic League magnate Nicholas Van Rijn to take a personal hand in things, sending Adzel the saurian centaur to retrieve the poor lad. 

Turns out Falkayn (predictably) had been brainwashed.  It also turns out that Serendipity is working with, perhaps in the thrall of, a race of mysterious aliens known as the Elders.  The ulterior motive of this ostensibly neutral organization suggests some new power may be planning some kind of galactic conquest.

Meanwhile, Chee Lan the foul-mouthed Cynthian and Falkayn head to the world Serendipity told him about in part one–the frozen world in a cometary orbit that is closing in on its star, Beta Crucis.  This will cause its cryosphere to melt, revealing a mother-lode of precious metals.  But Van Rijn's team isn't the only one interested in the world, aptly dubbed "Satan".  Twenty UFOs have just dropped out of hyperspace in the vicinity, and they don't look friendly…

Anderson has a lot of tics I don't like, particularly his drawing of characters as…well, assemblages of tics.  Adzel is a placid Buddhist, Falkayn is a cipher, Chee Lan is a salty Little Old Lady from Pasadena, and Van Rijn is a lustier, more Dutch version of Raymond Burr's Ironside.

The author also devotes lots of ink to the physical descriptions of his astronomical creations, which I'm sure are fascinating to some, but perhaps are most gratifying for the three cents a word they earn him.

That said, just as I start to get bored, I find myself turning the page and reading on.  So, another three star segment.

Less than Three

So, just like the constant "e", Analog clocks in at just under three.  Indeed, that's how I feel about the magazine as a whole lately.  Sure, there are better issues than others, and sure, there are some standout pieces, but for the most part, I find myself doing anything–cleaning the bathroom ceilings, cataloging my 45s, sorting stamps–rather than read Analog.  Not that I hate the experience when I get to it.  It simply doesn't give the thrill of anticipation that Galaxy still gives me after all of these years.  Even F&SF, which hasn't been terrific since 1962, retains residual goodwill.

Of course, this month's Analog clocks in at 2.9 (rounding up 2.85), which is better than Fantasy and Science Fiction (2.6).  But it's worse than Galaxy (3.1) and IF (3.3).

It was a really thin month for magazines, and out of the four that were published, the better-than-three-star stories would barely fill one of them.  At least women wrote 11% of new fiction pieces, which is on the higher end lately.

Well, here's hoping that next month's Analog picks a different constant to ape, if it can.  And let's hope it's not Planck's Constant!




</small

3 Comments Leave A Comment
Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[April 30, 1968] (Partial) success stories (May 1968 Analog)

7 Comments


by Gideon Marcus

Chertona Dyuzhina (Baker's Dozen)

Luna 14 is the Soviet Union's latest space success story.  Launched April 7, it slipped into lunar orbit a couple of days later and began relaying data.  Per TASS, the spacecraft is still working fine, returning space weather reports and mapping the moon's hidden contours through the wobbling of its path due to lunar gravity.

No pictures have been returned, nor has there been any mention of an onboard camera.  However, since Luna 12 (launched October '66) did have one, it is generally believed that Luna 14 has one too–and it broke.  We'll probably never know.

Campbell's Seven

The latest issue of Analog is also not an unmixed bag.  However, it's still the best issue of the mag by a long shot since January.  That's something worth celebrating!


by Chesley Bonestell

Satan's World (Part 1 of 4), by Poul Anderson

David Falkayn is back!  The fair-haired protoge of Polesotechnic League magnate Nicholas van Rijn has been sent to Earth to find untold fortune.  More specifically, to inquire at Serendipity Inc., storehouse of all the universe's lore, for the quickest route between Point A (Falkayn) and Point B (wealth).  It's amazing what can be done with computers in the Mumblethieth Century!


by Kelly Freas

To do so, he puts himself at the mercy of the board of Serendipity, becoming a guest on their lunar estate.  His crewmates, Adzel the monastic saurian who talks like Beast from The X-Men, and Chee, who talks like Nick Fury from Sgt. Fury, stay behind…and worry.

With good reason, for Falkayn has been shanghaied, purportedly in love with one of the Serendipity board, but probably brainwashed or something.  Van Rijn gives Adzel and Chee the green light to investigate.

Falkayn stories are always somewhere in the lower middle for Anderson–serviceable but unexciting.  Once again, the author utilizes some cheap tricks to move things along, even calling them out in text in an attempt to excuse them (the long explanation of Serendipity's modus operandi; the sudden coincidence of a call by a critical character, etc.) None of the characters is particularly interesting, perhaps because of the extremely broad brush with which they're described, particularly Van Rijn.

Nevertheless, mediocre is pretty good for a Falkayn story, and I'm kind of interested.  Plus, Anderson's astronomy is always pretty good.

Three stars so far.

Exile to Hell, by Isaac Asimov


by Kelly Freas

This story is remarkable for being the first time Isaac has appeared in Analog (the magazine was Astounding when wrote for Campbell).  It is otherwise unremarkable–this vignette is written in '40s style, with a hoary "twist" ending, which was already incorporated as one of many elements in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.

Two stars.

Conquest by Default, by Vernor Vinge


by Kelly Freas

This one surprised me: alien anarchists, who by their law are forbidden to have polities larger than 10,000 people, take over a recovering post-nuclear Earth.  The Terrans are worried that they will suffer a fate similar to that of the Cherokees–annihilation, assimilation, relocation, or a combination of all three. 

Told from the point of view of one the conquerers, it very much seems like this will be one of those fatuous Campbellian tales where it turns out that free enterprise and libertarianism are the superior forces, and that the solution to "the aboriginal problem" has a neat and obvious solution.

But the story has a sting in its tail.

I had not expected to find an anti-capitalist, anti-libertarian screed in the pages of Analog, much less an acknowledgement of the American genocide…yet there it is!  And because the viewpoint character is an alien (and a comparatively sympathetic one, at that), the full impact of the story is saved for the end.

Four stars.

His Master's Vice, by Verge Foray


by Kelly Freas

Prox(y)ad(miral) Elmo Ixton lands his patrol ship, the sentient craft, Rollo, on the planet of Roseate on the trail of a rebel proxad who has gone to ground and recruited a network of criminal accomplices.  The agoraphobic and irritable Ixton ingratiates himself with very few people, but he does get his man…in time for the tables to be turned when the renegade takes over his ship.

Luckily, Rollo is not about to become an unwitting accomplice.

Not bad.  I didn't much like the Gestapo methods with which the "good guys" extracted the truth from suspects, though.

Three stars.

Fear Hound, by Katherine MacLean


by Kelly Freas

In late 20th Century New York, the city seethes with a despair so palpable, it almost seems the echoes of one person's broadcast pain.  Indeed, that is exactly what it is.  And the Rescue Squad, a corps of intellectual empaths, are on the case to find the source before s/he perishes in anguish, and in the process, telepathically pushes hundreds, maybe thousands more, to the brink of insanity or even death.

There's a lot of neat stuff in this one.  Obviously, you have to buy telepathy as plausible (something Campbell obviously does).  Given that, the idea of a group of people tracking down injured folk by their subtle telepathic emanations, and the unconscious mass effects these have on others, is pretty innovative. MacLean writes in the deft, immediate style that has made her one of SF's leading lights for two decades; the dreamy, choppy execution fits the circumstances of the story.

On the other hand, the bits about smart people essentially providing the brain for dozens of sub-average IQ types through unconscious telepathic links was something I found distasteful. There are also a few, lengthy explainy bits that could have been better worked in, I think.

A high three stars.

Project Island Bounce, by Lawrence A. Perkins


by Kelly Freas

The alien Ysterii arrive on an Earth not unlike that depicted in Conquest by Default.  Here, the crisis is that the blobby amphibians prefer the archipelagos of Asianesia to the dry expanses of Eurica.  This is causing a trade imbalance that will ultimately not only destabilize the world, but potentially lead to a cut-off of peaceful relations with the galaxy altogether.

Perkins doesn't tell the story very well, especially compared to Vinge's writing, and the "solution" is dumb. Two stars.

Skysign, by James Blish


by Leo Summers

Carl Wade, a Berkeley radical type finds himself trapped on an alien vessel floating above San Francisco.  As memory returns to his headachey brain, he recalls the he was the one "lay volunteer" among dozens of men and women chosen as ambassadors for their various technical expertise.

Now, Carl and a hundred-odd humans are prisoners in the gilded cage of the ship, offered all manner of food and a fair bit of recreation.  But they are nevertheless under the control of the alien crew, humanoids in skintight suits, with the ability to teleport and put the human captives to sleep at any time.

That is, until Carl, with the help of the Jeanette Hilbert, a brilliant meteorologist, figure out how to wrest control of the whole system from the aliens.  That's only half the story, since Carl and Jeanette have differing ideas on what to do with absolute power.

I liked this story, and Blish does a good job of putting us in the boots of a not-entirely savory character.  I find it particularly interesting that our radical protagonist is something of a jerk; I originally thought that this might be a subtle, anti-leftist dig, but Blish is an outspoken peacenik, so I think he just wanted to create a nuanced character.

Four stars.

Batting Average

Analog thus ends up at a reasonable 3.1 stars–not stellar, but certainly worth the 60 cents you pay for it (less if you have the subscription, of course).  That puts it at the bottom of the new mags (vs. IF and Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.5), but better than the reprints (Fantastic (2.7) and Amazing (2.0)).  The magazine average for the month was 3.1.

All told, if you took the four and five star stories of this month and squished them into one mag…well, you'd need one and a half. That amounts to about 40% of all new fiction this month. Again, not bad.

The sad news is only one story this month was woman-penned, making up for 4.3% of the newly published works.  And that one was MacLean's, meaning Analog wins this month's pink ribbon in a mass forfeit.

Well, I suppose you take your victories where you find them.  At least we ended up on the positive side of the ledger this month…




</small

7 Comments Leave A Comment
Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[April 2, 1968] Asking the big questions (May 1968 IF)

1 Comment


by David Levinson

A spring thaw?

Change appears to be coming to Czechoslovakia. Faced with growing dissatisfaction last year, First Secretary of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party Antonín Novatný invited Leonid Brezhnev to visit Prague last December in the hope of shoring up his position. Instead, Brezhnev was shocked by Novatný’s unpopularity and pushed him to resign as Party Secretary (he remained President).

Alexander Dubček was elected as the new First Secretary on January 5th and soon began on a course of reforms. On February 22nd, in the presence of Brezhnev, Dubček announced that steps would be taken to bring about “the widest possible democratization of the entire socio-political system.” A few days later, the Party adopted the first draft of an action program which allows greater freedom of speech (much of the resistance to Novatný came from the Writer’s Union) and more autonomy for Slovakia (the Czech Novatný had tried to curb Slovakian culture and language; Dubček is Slovakian). February ended with the release of the first uncensored magazine by the Writer’s Union.

Alexander Dubček addresses the nation after taking office.

On March 4th, the Party Presidium voted to dismantle press censorship, and by the end of the week the papers were calling for Novatný to step down as President. On the 14th, the Party voted to politically rehabilitate party members who had been purged in the 1950s. By the 22nd, the pressure was too much for Novatný and he reluctantly resigned as President. He will be replaced by Ludvík Svoboda, who had been purged, but rehabilitated at the request of Khrushchev.

The reaction in the East Bloc has been as might be expected. A Warsaw Pact meeting was hastily called for the 23rd in Dresden. The Poles, in particular, seemed unhappy with Dubček’s reforms. They may be nervous due to the student protests in Warsaw and elsewhere in the country. The word “counterrevolution” was mentioned and the specter of Hungary was raised. Dubček seems to have calmed fears for now.

Can Dubček keep the Soviets at arm’s length and bring about his reforms? Tito managed it, but Yugoslavia isn’t in the Warsaw Pact and doesn’t have a border with the Soviet Union. Only time will tell.

Seeking answers

The stories in this month’s IF grapple with deep questions. Some are big, such as expedience versus morality or the meaning of bravery and sacrifice; others are more personal. And Poul Anderson calls everything we think about the future into question.

Supposedly for Dismal Light, which doesn’t even have two male characters. Generic art by Pederson

Limiting Factor, by Poul Anderson

In a guest editorial, Anderson starts off looking at the limits of extrapolation as a tool for science fiction and winds up warning us about the limits of growth. Not population growth, as you might expect, but rather technological growth. A conservative estimate says that industry in North America alone will raise the average temperature of the Earth by 3°C. He warns, “You needn’t extrapolate far before you see the polar icecaps melting and the continental shores flooded. A little farther, and the entire planet swelters… A little farther, and life is threatened.”

Three stars.

Where the Subbs Go, by C. C. MacApp

When humanity discovered a faster-than-light drive, the Eje appeared with the Beam, allowing even faster travel across the galaxy, and established an outpost on Pluto. They also offer medical care for those injured in space. Those injured seriously enough are given substitute bodies, all identical with tremendous healing ability. These people are known as Subbs and are generally looked down on. Ralse Bukanan is one of the richest men in the galaxy; unknown to all but his closest business partners, he is also a Subb.

When Ralse’s son is kidnapped, he has to push his company to the brink of collapse and take some huge risks to rescue the young man. Add in some stolen Eje weapons, and the stakes get even higher.

Ralse questions one of the last people to see his son. Art by Jeff Jones

This is pretty good. MacApp can write good adventure when puts his mind to it, and he handles the more philosophical parts with equal skill. What we learn about the motives of the Eje turns everything upside-down and forces Ralse to change a lot of his priorities. The story is a little long, though. It’s right on the line between three and four stars, but probably good enough to go high.

A low four stars.

New Currents in Fandom, by Lin Carter

Our Man in Fandom takes a look at some new trends among fans. He starts off with the giving of fan awards at the latest Worldcon. He does try slightly to defend calling the awards Pongs, but I do share his hope that fan awards will continue to be given. After a quick look at some adjacent fandoms—which he’s covered before—Carter tells about an effort to print a portfolio of the late Hannes Bok’s work. Finally, he mentions a group of medieval reenactors known as The Society for Contemporary Anachronisms (sic; it’s Creative Anachronism). They’ll be holding a tournament at the Worldcon in Oakland on the afternoon of Labor Day.

Three stars.

Dismal Light, by Roger Zelazny

At the behest of Earth, Francis Sandow turned a bare hunk of rock orbiting Betelgeuse into the barely livable world Dismal, which Earth turned into a prison. The unnamed narrator stuck around after his sentence was up to keep working on a project to figure out the secret of a strain of extremely fast-growing rice. When an evacuation is announced because Betelgeuse is about to go nova, he drags his feet, saying he hopes to answer the question plaguing him. It may be more personal than rice.

One of the dangers faced by the narrator. Art by Brock

Zelazny gives us another of his smart-mouthed narrators. It’s starting to become a key feature of his work that he ought to use a little less frequently. The story is told with all the usual skill we expect from this author, but it fell a little short for me. That may be because the deeply personal question the narrator is struggling with didn’t resonate with me.

A very high three stars, but others may well give it a fourth.

Past Touch-the-Sky Mountain, by Barry Alan Weissman

Sommerfield, John is a merchant in the Chinese empire. On his way from his home base on the west coast of the New World (discovered by Marco Polo) to the British territory of Standish, his trip is interrupted by a police officer who has never heard of such nonsense.

Weissman is this month’s first-time author. Although forgettable, the story is well-written and has enough of a twist at the end to make it enjoyable.

Three stars.

Cenotaph, by D. M. Melton

As the shuttle bringing passengers down to Mora II swings past the Cenotaph Satellite, Steve Mendes reflects on the events that took the lives of the three people memorialized there, saving the lives of a full ship of colonists. Deservedly or not, he carries a lot of guilt.

Passing the Cenotaph when possible is tradition. Art by Eddie Jones

Melton’s output thus far has been a consistent low three stars. He’s taken a big step forward here. The events that took the lives of some of the forward team may not be terribly believable, but the characterization and internal monologue of the narrator are very well done.

A very low four stars.

The Creatures of Man, by Verge Foray

Hard-shelled, metal-spitting creatures have come to the world. After discussing things with a spider, a butterfly decides it is time to summon Man.

The butterfly and spider discuss the new creatures. Art by Wehrle

There’s a dreamlike quality to the narrative that, I suppose, reflects the different thought processes of the insect characters. However, the story was painfully obvious, too long, and the butterfly’s knowing of the “now-moment” didn’t really make any sense to me.

A low three stars, others may like this better.

The Man in the Maze (Part 2 of 2), by Robert Silverberg

Richard Muller was one of Earth’s top diplomats when he was sent to make contact with the first aliens humanity had discovered. On his return, he discovered that no one could stand to be around him for more than a few minutes, because the emotions of his deep subconscious radiate from him. In disgust, he retreated to the desolate planet Lemnos and the heart of a million-year-old city surrounded by deadly traps. Now his services are needed again. Charles Boardman, the man who sent Muller on the mission that gave him his affliction, and Ned Rawlins, the son of Muller’s late best friend, have come to recruit him.

Ned gradually gains Muller’s trust, feeding him the lies carefully constructed by Boardman. Eventually, he is overcome with guilt at the deception and reveals all to Muller. This was definitely not in Boardman’s plans. Is it possible to convince Muller to undertake this vital mission? If he goes, will he be healed? Can he rejoin humanity?

Ned may have gone too far to gain Muller’s trust. Art by Gaughan

Silverberg wraps up his retelling of Philoctetes strongly, though not as strongly as I had hoped. The final chapter, which focuses on Ned, is very, very good; it’s just that getting there wasn’t entirely satisfying. The whole thing is still excellent, and I’ll be putting it on my shelves when the novel comes out.

A high four stars for this segment and a very high four for the novel as a whole.

Summing up

At the beginning of the year, editor Fred Pohl promised a number of new features would be coming. So far, all we’ve seen is the introduction of the SF Calendar. Now for the first time since the October 1965 issue brought us the end of Skylark DuQuesne and the beginning of Retief’s War, the end of one serial hasn’t shared the issue with the start of a new. I’m not sure I’d call that a positive innovation, but I suppose Galaxy going monthly means Fred now has two vehicles for serials.

In any case, this is another strong issue for IF. Fred’s probably worked through the dross he’d already bought before the demise of Worlds of Tomorrow and now doesn’t need to buy filler. I hope having more pages to fill every month with 50% more Galaxy doesn’t change that.

Oh, dear. Are we going back to The Reefs of Space? Well, new Delany and Chandler is good.




1 Comment Leave A Comment
Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[February 26, 1968] Stormy Weather (March 1968 Analog)

3 Comments


by Gideon Marcus

There's no sun up in the sky

Out in the vastness of space, a constellation of man-made moons keeps watch on the Earth below.  Unlike their brethren, the military sentinels that look out for rocket plumes and atomic blasts, these benign probes monitor the planet's weather with a vantage and a vigilance that would make a 19th Century meteorologist green with envy.

In addition to the wealth of daily data we get from TIROS, ESSA, and Nimbus, the West is now getting aid from an unlikely, but no less welcome, source: behind the Iron Curtain.

Two years ago, the Soviets rebuffed the idea of exchanging weather satellite imagery.  "No need," was what they said; "no sats," was probably the real story.  For in August of 1966, all of a sudden, the USSR activated the "Cold Line" link between Moscow and Washington for the exchange of meteorological data.  This action coincided with the recent launch of Cosmos 122, revealed to be a weather satellite.

This constituted a late start in the weather race–after all, TIROS had been broadcasting since 1960.  Nevertheless, better late than never.  Unfortunately, the Soviets first sent only basic weather charts with limited cloud analysis.  Not much good without the raw picture data.  When we finally got the pictures, starting September 11, 1966, the quality was lousy–the communications link is just too long and lossy.  Our ESSA photos probably didn't look any better to them.

By March 1967, however, the lines had been improved, and Kosmos 122 was returning photos with excellent clarity.

We also got infrared data.  The resolution was much worse, but the Soviets maintained they did first discover a pair of typhoons bearing down on Japan.

Since then, the USSR has orbited at least two more weather satellites, Kosmos 144 and Kosmos 184, both returning the same useful data, often from different orbital perspectives than we can easily reach.  For instance, the Soviet pictures offer particularly good views of the poles and northern Eurasia.

It's a little thing, perhaps, this trading of weather data between the superpowers.  But anything that promotes peaceful exchange and keeps the connections between East and West ready and friendly is something to appreciate.  Sometimes the Space Race is more of a torch relay!

Raining all the time


by Kelly Freas

In sharp contrast, Analog remains an island unto itself, and like all inbred families, often produces challenged offspring.  Such is the case with the March 1968 issue, which ranges from middlin' to awful.

The Alien Rulers, by Piers Anthony


by Kelly Freas

We start with the awful.

Fifteen years ago, the blue-skinned Kaozo engaged our space fleet, destroyed it utterly, and became the benevolent masters of Earth.  They created a working socialist society, implementing tremendous public works projects, and humanity proved remarkably complacent under their rule.  Nevertheless, a revolution of sorts has been hatched, and Richard Henrys is tasked with the stickiest assignment–assassinate the Kazo leader, Bitool.

Henrys is quickly captured, but instead of facing execution, Bitool offers him a deal: protect Seren, the first female Kazo on Earth, during the next three days of the revolution, and he can go free.

Sounds like a decent setup.  It's actually a terrible story.  For one thing, the author of Chthon has all of his off-putting tics on display.  Seren is a straw woman, whose vocabulary is largely limited to "Yes, Richard," and "No, Richard."  The social attitudes of this far future world seem rooted in the Victorian times, with passages like this:

"You'll pose as my wife.  Hang on to my arm and–"

"Pose?" she inquired.  "I do not comprehend this, Richard."

Damn the forthright Kazo manner!  He had five minutes to explain human ethics, or lack of them, to a person who had been born to another manner.  Pretense was not a concept in the alien repertoire, it seemed.

He chose another approach.  "For the time being, you are my wife, then.  Call it a marriage of convenience."  She began to speak, but he cut her off.  "My companion, my female.  On Earth we pair off two by two.  This means you must defer to my wishes, expressed and implied, and avoid bringing shame upon me.  Only in this manner are you permitted to accompany me in public places.  Is this clear?"

And this one:

"I promised to explain why this subterfuge was necessary.  I didn't mean to place you in a compromising situation, but–"

"Compromising, Richard?"

"Ordinarily a man and a woman do not share a room unless they are married."

And then, there's the scene where the feminine disguise Richard puts together for Seren falls apart because her body lacks mammalian contours.  Why doesn't he then dress her in male clothes?  And when her stockings start to fall off her legs, I couldn't help wondering how they'd somehow uninvented Panty Hose in the 21st Century.

But then, I'm not sure if Piers Anthony has actually ever talked to a woman, much less seen her in her underthings.

On top of that, the final revelation that the Earth fleet was never destroyed, but instead went on to conquer Kazo, and the two planets have swapped overlords (both governments populated only by the very best technocrats) is so ridiculous as to beggar belief.  That Henrys is invited to become one of the ruling class largely for his novel ideas on how to cut a cake fairly, well, takes the cake.

One star.

Uplift the Savage, by Christopher Anvil


by Kelly Freas

Members of an interstellar agency learn that the best way to increase the technological sophistication of a primitive race is not to give them expertise, but allow them to steal it.  The two-page point is hammered in using fourteen pages of digs at women, higher education, and educated women.

One star.

The Inevitable Weapon, by Poul Anderson


by Harry Bennett

A scientist discovers teleportation.  Useless for interstellar travel, at least for a while, it's great for beaming in concentrated starlight–as a weapon at first, but potentially, to provide energy.

This would be a decent, one-page Theodore L. Thomas piece in F&SF.  Instead, it's fourteen pages of bog-standard detective/secret agent thriller.

Two stars.

Birth of a Salesman, by James Tiptree, Jr.


by Kelly Freas

Jim Tiptee's freshman story is an Anvilesque tale of breakneck pace and nonstop patter.  T. Benedict of the Xeno-Cultural Gestalt Clearance (XCGC) has got a tough job: making sure the trade goods of the galaxy not only take into account the taboos or allergies of alien customers, but also the transhipment longshorebeings. 

Tedium sets in by page two, which, coincidentally, is how many stars I rate it.

The Horse Barbarians (Part 2 of 3), by Harry Harrison


by Kelly Freas

A lot and very little happen in this installment of Jason dinAlt's latest adventure.  Last time on Deathworld III, Jason offered up his fellow Pyrrans as mercenaries to wipe out the horse barbarians on the planet Felicity.  It's fair play, after all, since these barbarians (absolutely not the Mongols, because they have red hair!) slaughtered the last attempt at a mining camp on their frozen plateau.

So, Jason accompanies "Temuchin", the warlord, on an expedition down a cliffside to the technologically advanced civilization on the plains below.  There, they steal some gunpowder, kill a lot of innocent people, and come back–in time to link up with the rest of the Pyrrans for a raid on the Weasel clan.  More slaughter ensues.

Jason feels kind of bad about his part in the killing, but it's all a part of a master plan to someday, eventually, pacify the warriors with by opening up a trade route with the south (as opposed to setting up off-world trade, since the barbarians hate off-worlders).  So whaddaya gonna do?

Well, personally?  Pick a different career path.  Even if the nomads are the biggest savages since the Whimsies, Growleywogs, and Phantasms, what right do the Pyrrans have to kill…anyone? 

Setting aside the moral concerns, Harrison is still an effective writer.  I wasn't bored, just a bit disgusted.

Three stars.

Practice!, by Verge Foray


by Kelly Freas

A shabby little private school for problem children is suddenly the subject of a set of accreditation inspectors.  There's nothing wrong with the kids or the staff–the problem is that the snoops might discover it's really a training ground for junior ESPers!  Luckily, the tykes are on the side of management, and the inspectors are snowed.

I went back and forth on whether this very Analogian tale deserved two or three stars.  On the one hand, I'm getting a little tired of psi stories (the headmaster in the story even says there's no such thing as something for nothing–and that's what psi is), and I resented the smug digs at public school.

But what swayed me toward the positive end of the ledger (aside from the unique and lovely art) was the bit at the end whereby it's suggested that the reason for the school, and the reason psi is so unreliable, is because, like music or language, it's something that needs to be practiced from an early age.  It's a new angle, and pretty neat.

So, three stars.

Can't go on…

Wow.  2.1 stars is bottom-of-Amazing territory, and it easily makes this month's Analog the worst magazine of the month.  Compare it to Fantastic (2.2), IF (3), New Worlds (3.3), and the excellent Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.6), and the contrast is even stronger.

Because of the paucity of magazines, you could fit all the really good stuff into, say, one issue of Galaxy.  On the other hand, women wrote 12% of new fiction this month, which is decent for the times (not to mention the episodes of Star Trek D. C. Fontana has been penning).

It's 1968, an election year.  Maybe this is the year Campbell hands the reins over to someone else.  It certainly couldn't hurt the tarnished old mag.

And then, maybe the sun will come out again!

Speaking of election news, there's plenty of it and more on today's KGJ Weekly report.  You give us four minutes, and we'll give you the world:



3 Comments Leave A Comment
Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[August 31, 1967] I wouldn't send a knight out on a dog like this… (September 1967 Analog)

5 Comments


by Gideon Marcus

Reversed metaphors

As we speak, I am packing for my trip to this year's Worldcon.  I'm not sure what to expect other than I understand I'll be on a lot of panels.  I'm mostly looking forward to seeing friends like Tom Purdom, Larry Niven, Ted White, and more.

My excitement is somewhat alloyed by the most recent magazine I've just finished.  After reading this month's Analog, I find myself asking, "Is this the state of science fiction?"


by Kelly Freas

The King's Legions, by Christopher Anvil

This month in Science Fiction Times, Norm Spinrad talked about how every editor has their pet authors.  Chris Anvil is the one who panders the most to Campbell's sensibilities, producing story after story of farcical garbage.  Legions continues the tale in which three planetary exploiters, who dealt with a planet controlled by robotic overlords by developing a emotional control nerve agent. 


by Kelly Freas

Last installment, said trio dealt with the collapse of society that ensued by assuming the roles of agents of competing feudal overlords, creating the illusion of a threat too big to contest by the planet's ragged revolutionaries.

This time around, a cadre of pirates, lured by the treasure said planet might offer (as well as the representatives' ships) have arrived bent on conquest. 

I'll be honest.  I got about four pages into this, flipped through to see that the damned thing is nearly 70 pages, and decided for once I would abrogate my responsibilities.  To quote Buck Coulson in this month's Yandro, "I can't read all this crap, and this seemed to be a good one to miss."

Two stars.

The Pearly Gates of Hell, by Jack Wodhams


by Rudolph Palais

Lurid account of a man's endless attempts at suicide, thwarted by a society that really wants its members to stay alive–forever.

Of course, even if one is successful, that doesn't mean surcease…

Bit of a tired one-note, this one.  Two stars.

The Usefulness of Nicotine, by Professor J. Harold Burn, FRS

This month's science article is a reprint, cacklingly presented by John W. Campbell, inveterate smoker.  Oh sure, the article writer concedes, smoking might kill you, but look how happy and productive you'll be before cancer does you in!  And here are all the gruesome details of the cats and rats vivisected to prove our point.

No thanks.  One star.

Fiesta Brava, by Mack Reynolds


by Kelly Freas

The misadventures of Section G, whose task is to ensure none of the United Planets gets too backwards lest they be easy prey for the (yet unmet) alien menace, continue.  This time, the agents sent by Director Sid Jakes are a botanist from a heavy gee planet, a cordon bleu chef with a talent for object throwing, a colorless matron with a photographic memory, and a diminutive 25 year-old who looks like she's eight.

This quartet is sent off to Falange, a colony of Spanish emigrants who have elected to preserve the police state of Francisco Franco long after his passing.  High jinks ensue.

Fiesta reads like Heinlein writing a Retief story, with Reynolds' patented history lessons thrown in.  To wit, this time we learn about bullfights (which Mack presumably saw when he was in Spain), the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, and why slaves really are happier than we give them credit for. After all–it's not as if there were ever any slave revolts.

I guess Reynolds' travels never took him to Haiti.

Anyway, it's not very good, but if you go for this sort of thing, it is readable.  I guess I'll give it a three.  I'm trying to be nicer these days.

Important Difference, by E. G. Von Wald


by Kelly Freas

Humanity has been at peace for 500 years, but this tranquility is disturbed when (putatively) bug-eyed aliens appear and start shooting.  One three-man scout becomes the first recon ship to successfully engage the enemy…and discover their true shape.

The "twist" is telegraphed as loudly as "What hath God wrought?" but I did appreciate how our race might evolve to the point that, even if our enemy looks like us, we could find a warlike nature so repellent as to mark a drastically different species.

Another low three star.

Lost Calling, by Verge Foray


by Leo Summers

Ingenuous young Dalton Mirni is picked up by a tramp freighter after being (so he says) in the captivity of aliens for 16 years of his life.  The problem is there are no aliens, at least that humanity knows of.  Not only that, but there is a big blank in his memory.  He knows he was being trained for a singular profession, but he has no idea what it was.

Still, he looks on the bright side.  After all, he is universally liked, by the crew that picks him up, the planet of Fingal (enemy of Earth), and the Earth people themselves.  And Mirni has the uncanny ability to solve people's interpersonal problems.

Of course, there can't be any connection between this skill and his lost memories…

I appreciated the tone of this story, and it's also pretty well done.  Definitely the best thing in the magazine, though I don't think I'd give it a fourth star.

Bad data

All in all, pretty grim.  Even being generous with my ratings, Analog clocks in at a dismal 2.3 stars, beaten by every other magazine and short story collection this month.  In order of decreasing badness, we have Fantasy and Science Fiction (2.8), IF (2.9), Orbit 2 (3), Fantastic (3), New Worlds (3.2), and The Devil His Due (3.2).

You could take all the four and five star stories and fill two digests (or thin books), which is pretty bad given we had seven to choose from.  It was a bright spot for women, though, as they contributed nearly 16% of the new stories published.

So is all hope lost?  Not necessarily.  I've already started on next month's Galaxy, and Budrys' book column discusses how the New Wave of authors (Aldiss, Ballard, Zelazny, Delany, et. al.) are revolutionizing the field.

They just aren't doing it in the pages of Analog.  So long as Campbell remains in the editorial chair, I suppose the revolution will remain untelevised.

We'll see how long that lasts.  Even Alabama integrated…




</small

5 Comments Leave A Comment