Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[April 8, 1967] Swan Songs (May 1967 Worlds of Tomorrow)

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by Victoria Silverwolf

After the Ball is Over

According to my sources in the publishing world, the latest issue of Worlds of Tomorrow is the last one that will be published. I can't say I'm completely surprised, given Frederik Pohl's juggling act of editing three magazines at once. Worlds of Tomorrow is the youngest of the literary siblings, and seems to have received the least attention. (The fact that it went from bimonthly to quarterly is a strong clue.)

While the band plays Goodnight, Ladies and my corsage begins to wilt, let's take one last waltz around the ballroom.

Save the Last Dance For Me


Cover art by Douglas Chaffee.

Stone Man, by Fred Saberhagan


Illustrations by Hector Castellon.

Here's the latest story in the author's Berserker series, featuring ancient machines bent on destroying all organic life. This yarn features a peculiar kind of time travel, which requires some explanation.

Humans settled a planet where some kind of weird space/time warp sent them into the remote past. It also wiped out their memories, so they pretty much started from scratch as cave dwellers. Many generations later, society evolved into one with advanced technology. Then the Berserkers showed up.

The planet's surface became a war-scarred wasteland, and the remaining population went underground. Making use of the same space/time warp, the Berserkers try to completely eliminate the human population by sending war machines to the past.


Our hero, a young cave dweller, and a Berserker device.

The main character sends his consciousness into an armored suit that goes back in time, in order to intercept the machines. (I will refrain from making a head 'em off at the past joke.)


A closer look at the enemy. The cave folk call it a stone-lion, and call their rescuer a stone-man.

It won't surprise you that our hero saves the day, after a very tough battle. (Let's ignore the fact that his body remains in the future while his mind inhabits the armor, so his life isn't really in danger. Anyway, if the Berserkers had won, he and the rest of the people on the planet would never have existed. Time travel is confusing, isn't it?)


He deserves to celebrate his victory.

What most impresses me about the Berserker series is that the author avoids repeating himself. (I wish I could say the same for the Gree and Esks series, or even Retief.) This is a pretty good story, but I have some quibbles.

There's a character I haven't mentioned yet, a young woman who suffers amnesia during one of the Berserker's attacks on the underground dwellers. (In the future, not the past. Are you still with me?) Her only role in the story seems to be to listen to the hero's expository dialogue. The premise is a complicated one, so I understand why the author needs to explain things to the reader via this character. However, like the plot itself, this strikes me as contrived.

I'd say a solid three stars for this one.

The Negro in Science Fiction, by Sam Moskowitz

Another article from the walking encyclopedia of fantastic fiction. As usual, this essay wanders all over the place, from dime novels of the Nineteenth Century to the present day. A lot of time is spent on obscure old stuff. The author seems to have his heart in the right place, decrying science fiction's failure to deal with modern issues of civil rights, but he also makes excuses for grotesque stereotypes from the last century. (As long as characters are on the side of the good guys, it doesn't seem to matter how they look, talk, or act.)

Two stars for a dull look at a very important topic.

Squared Out with Poplars, by Douglas R. Mason


Illustrations by Dan Adkins.

On behalf of the museum where he works, the protagonist journeys to the remote home of an eccentric fellow who intends to sell his collection of valuable artifacts. Along the way he runs into the elderly guy's beautiful granddaughter, who is headed the same way. After a difficult struggle to even reach the place, they discover the old man's bizarre secret project.


Dragging away one of the fellow's minions.

This is an odd story. I don't want to give away too much, but the premise involves truly weird technology that includes computers, human consciousness, and the trees that give us the title. In essence, it's a Mad Scientist yarn, with maybe a touch of James Bond. It's also written in an eccentric, affected style. The author doesn't seem to intend it as a comedy, but there are snide remarks from the hero all the way through it. At least it didn't bore me.

A wobbling three stars for originality, if nothing else.

The Uncommunicative Venusians, by David H. Harris


Illustrations by Jack Gaughan.

Forget the title. This is an article on symbolic logic, using syllogisms with science fiction elements that could have easily been replaced with something more mundane. The author seems to know what he's talking about, but his attempt to sugarcoat a math lecture with aliens and UFOs doesn't liven things up much.


The best thing about this piece is the above illustration, which adds a futuristic touch to Sir John Tenniel's original portrait of the Caterpillar from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Two logically derived stars for this homework assignment.

Base Ten, by David A. Kyle


Illustrations by Vaughn Bode.

A man in a spaceship comes across a derelict rocket on an asteroid. The relic is way out of date, so he knows it's been there quite a while. Surprisingly, there's still someone alive inside the thing, in very bad shape.


Studying the castaway's notes.

The survivor tells him an incredible story about running into small aliens on the asteroid. They were friendly enough, but didn't want Earthlings to know about their existence.


Examining the old rocket's complex operating system, which is an important part of the plot.

The older fellow, who is half-insane from many years of isolation, offers vague hints of why he wasn't able to leave the asteroid, although the rocket had plenty of fuel. Meanwhile, the younger man tries to figure things out from the survivor's records.


Including drawings of the so-called Redheads, who resemble potato/mushroom combinations with limbs.

Try as he might, the young fellow isn't able to keep the older man from suffering a tragic fate.


Giving in to despair.

At the end, he figures out why the survivor was unable to return to Earth.


Saying goodbye.

The beginning intrigued me, but the aliens are silly and the solution to the mystery is disappointing and implausible. I'm not sure why this minor puzzle story needed so many drawings, but I'm sure the artist was glad for the work.

Two heavily illustrated stars.

Syracuse University's Science-Fiction Collections, by Richard Wilson

There's not much to say about this article. It talks about the archive of books, magazines, manuscripts, and such mentioned in the title. It's good to know that scholars will have access to all this stuff, anyway.


A nifty example of the university's collection.

Two carefully indexed stars.

Whose Brother Is My Sister?, by Simon Tully


Illustrations by Jack Gaughan.

Some time after aliens arrived on Earth, the two species intermingled to such a degree that there are more extraterrestrials on the planet than humans. (The situation is said to be similar on the alien home world, but that's not really part of the plot.) The aliens are able to travel across the cosmos because they figured out that the current universe is absorbed by a new universe every instant.

(Don't worry if that doesn't make much sense to you. I felt the same way. And don't get me started on the debate as to whether the new universe is a lot smaller or a lot bigger than the old universe.)

The aliens have a chance to enclose the current universe inside some kind of so-called box, which will stop the passage of time. For some reason, they assume this will lead to an eternal paradise for everyone. Hardly anybody, human or alien, disagrees with this nutty scheme, except for a few religious folks.

Can you guess that things don't go as planned?


The arrow is a clue.

The best things in this story are the aliens. The author shows a great deal of creativity and imagination in describing their physical appearance, culture, and biology. (They have three sexes!) I would gladly read about their lives instead of all the nonsense about universes instantaneously eating up other universes, putting a box around the universe, and freezing time.

An ambiguous three stars.

The Throwaway Age, by Mack Reynolds


Illustrations by Gray Morrow. Notice the fine choice of reading material.

At some time in the near future, both the capitalist West and the communist East have expanded their territories, but the Cold War has cooled down considerably. So much so, in fact, that the best undercover agent for the West is reassigned from covert action behind the Iron Curtain to domestic snooping.


Sing along with me! There's a man who lives a life of danger . . .

The superspy, a fervent anti-communist (understandable, given his background) is bitter about what seems like a severe demotion. However, he accepts what he thinks will be a trivial assignment to infiltrate a very small and loose group of folks who want to change the economic system. They don't even have an organization, really, or a name for their movement. Harmless enough, but he runs into trouble along the way.


. . .With every move he makes/another chance he takes . . .

The members of this loose-knit bunch range from a gung-ho activist to a statistician to a ex-CIA agent. The one thing they have in common is the belief that both the West and the East are wasting resources and preventing humanity from reaching a higher level of civilization.

Did I mention that one of them is a pretty young woman, the daughter of the group's de facto leader, with whom the spy interacts in true Bondian fashion?


. . .Swingin' on the Riviera one day . . .

This is a manifesto disguised as a spy story, which in turn is disguised as science fiction. The futuristic elements, such as personal hovercars, are irrelevant. The espionage plot is just an excuse for lectures about socioeconomic issues.

I wish I liked this story more than I do. Reynolds is one of the few authors willing to deal with such topics, and he does so in a sophisticated way. He also has the rare virtue, for an American writer, of being cosmopolitan. His foreign settings and characters are authentic and vividly portrayed. Too bad this isn't really a work of fiction.

Two disappointed stars.

We'll Meet Again

I may have to take back what I said at the start of this article. Editor Pohl plans to continue the magazine for a while, or so he says.

That contradicts everything I've heard about the impending demise of the publication. We'll see which one of us is the better prophet.

Looking back on the magazine's history, it's a very mixed bag. There were a few excellent works of fiction, along with a lot of lesser pieces. Among the very best were All We Marsmen by Philip K. Dick (now available in book form as Martian Time-Slip; To See the Invisible Man by Robert Silverberg; The Totally Rich by John Brunner; The Worlds That Were by Keith Roberts; and The Star-Pit by Samuel R. Delany. I may have forgotten other outstanding stories. The frequent nonfiction articles were not as noteworthy.

Whether Worlds of Tomorrow shows up again in a few months or not, I am grateful that the Noble Editor gave me the opportunity to trip the light fantastic with it.


Let's tango!



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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[April 6, 1967] But what of Star Trek? ("The Alternative Factor")

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by Janice L. Newman

Star Trek has given us some of the best science fiction on television. It’s also, like any weekly show with scripts written by different authors, had some mediocre episodes. But watching with a large group every week, we’ve found that even episodes that had many detractors still had at least a few fans among us.

Until now.

“The Alternative Factor” started strong, with an unexplained phenomenon causing everything in the universe to briefly ‘wink out’. There are several tense exchanges between Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock, and then one between the captain and “Starfleet Command” (though without the delay which one would expect at such a distance). These exchanges set the stage for a fascinating mystery.


"We've got word that this episode is a stinker, Captain.  You're on your own."

Unfortunately, from that point on, the episode degenerates into an inconsistent, near-nonsensical mess.

During the phenomenon, a person appears on the previously barren planet below. The captain orders the being beamed aboard the ship. The being is unsubtly named “Lazarus”, though we never actually see him give his name, only hear Captain Kirk call him by it later in the episode. Lazarus behaves strangely, begging for help in destroying ‘a monster’. He’s then apparently given the run of the ship, despite the fact that they are at battlestations.


"Say, the coffee's pretty good in this place!"

What follows feels more like a French bedroom farce than an episode of Star Trek. When the phenomenon occurs, we see two inverse silhouettes fighting, and Lazarus is replaced by a different Lazarus, though this is so poorly conveyed that eventually Kirk and Spock must have a conversation heavy with explanation (that lasts five minutes!) in order to tell the audience what’s supposed to be going on. One of the versions of Lazarus is supposedly mild and calm, but the vast majority of the time Lazarus has interacted with the crew he’s been an eye-rolling, scene-chewing maniac. The differentiation of ‘good Kirk’ and ‘evil Kirk’ in “The Enemy Within” was so well done that the clumsily handling here is doubly offensive.


"Bad" Lazarus choking on a piece of scenery

The fact that Lazarus is allowed to roam free to wreak havoc is consistent with previous episodes of Star Trek (see: “Charlie X”, for example) but even after he’s under suspicion of having stolen critical dilithium crystals, he still easily slips through security’s incompetent fingers (when they bother to put a security guard on him at all).

Eventually, Kirk ends up going through a ‘corridor’ between universes and encounters the rational version of Lazarus, who explains that everything the other Lazarus has said—the claims that his civilization was destroyed, that he’s a time traveler, that the rational Lazarus is a monster in human form—are all nothing more than the ravings of a madman. The insane Lazarus is prepared to meet and fight his antimatter counterpart even if it means destroying both universes.

The rational Lazarus outlines a plan where he will trap the other Lazarus in the corridor between their universes and, with Captain Kirk’s help, destroy the ships which act as the doors at either end of the corridor. Though he himself will be trapped for eternity fighting himself, the universes will survive. Captain Kirk helps him implement the plan, mournfully says, “But what of Lazarus…and what of Lazarus?” (a line they liked so much they used it twice) and the episode is, thankfully, over.


"But what of…" "Yes, Jim.  We get it."

What was particularly frustrating about this episode is that there were plenty of ways to make it more coherent and less nonsensical. Instead of having the ship’s crew behave utterly incompetently, Lazarus could have changed locations whenever the phenomenon occurred, allowing him to slip through their fingers without making them seem like buffoons incapable of basic reasoning. Instead of Kirk going along with the plan outlined by the rational Lazarus, he could have attempted to stun the insane Lazarus, and had him escape anyway. Throughout the story ideas are thrown in that seem to come from nowhere, for example, when the sane Lazarus states that destroying the other ship will also destroy his own, it’s the first the audience has heard of such a connection. The ending is poignant, but could have been so much more so if the story had made more sense. The worst thing a show can do is make you ask, “But why didn’t he…? Why didn’t they…?” and I found myself continually plagued by this damming question throughout the episode.

Better editing, more careful writing, and thoughtful direction could have made this story one of the classics. Instead, it’s the worst episode of Star Trek we’ve seen thus far.

One Star.

Bad Comedy


by Joe Reid

Dear Reader, I’d like to preface my thoughts on this weeks’ episode of Star Trek with a number of more pleasurable thoughts.  First being that the month of March just ended and almost everywhere in this wonderful country we live in the weather is beautiful.  Nature is on full display.  Jack MacMahon was just appointed the General Manager of the San Diego Rockets.  That’s good news to local basketball fans.  Lastly April Fools Day came a couple days early courtesy of Mr. Gene Roddenbury. 

My first exclamation of disbelief was provoked very early in the show.  The crew was going about what appeared to be routine business.  They were exploring a mundane new world, with no life, and no civilization; then the makers of the show boldly went to a place of utter confusion.  I said “you have got to be kidding me”, as a red space cloud was layered over the screen in a strange thrusting motion.  It had to be the most meaningless moment of television that I have witnessed in a long time.  The cheesy effect lacked meaning until characters explained to the audience what it was.  At that point it went from being meaningless to ridiculous, but let’s continue.


Trek optical team's finest hour

The second time this airing caused me to question my TV set was not much later in the episode.  It just so happened that the red space cloud effect caused life to appear on the dead new world the crew was in the process of scanning.  The captain decided that it would be a smart idea to visit the planet HIMSELF and say hi to the new life form.  This life form turned out to be a severely accident-prone, waif-bearded swooner named Lazarus, played by Robert Brown.  The first thing this biblically named beatnik does is jump off a rock to apparent death.  If only we were so lucky as to have lost this troublesome character at his first “death” we could have been spared witnessing the unfocused, angry, conniving, and as I previously mentioned swooning performance that Brown brought to us.  The rest of the mainstays were no better.  Kirk, Spock, and McCoy took every opportunity to provide Lazarus with unguarded access to anything that he wanted.  Which forced me to say, “you have got to be kidding me. They can’t be that dumb”.


"Good thing they didn't think to keep me locked up!"

It would be my earnest desire to say that there was only one more instance of low points of the bad joke that this episode was for me.  But like his namesake in the Good Book, Lazarus kept coming back to Life and causing more trouble for the crew of the Enterprise, and they deserved every bit of it for all of the dumb choices the characters in the episode make.  Even up until the last scene, with an unsatisfying twist ending, this episode was a painful stinker of a show.

This episode deserves to receive the lowest rating that I can give, and I would if not for a standout performance by the lovely Janet McLachlan, who played Lt. Charlene Masters.  Her performance was real and grounded, making up for the abysmal performances that surrounded her in this episode.

2 stars


by Gideon Marcus

I think I understand what happened last week. There are obviously two "Alternative Factors" – one matter, one…doesn't matter.

We didn't get the good one.

In another universe, Roddenberry produced a coherent episode, one in which we actually saw the sane Lazarus on the Enterprise and could distinguish him from "crazy Lazarus with Band-Aid", one in which "engineering" actually looked like the engineering sets we've seen before, one in which a better special effect was employed than superimposing the Triffid Nebula over the screen followed by the "EXTRA! EXTRA!" newspaper effect.

In the alternate Alternative Factor, the bugaboo wasn't antimatter, which every Starship in Starfleet utilizes safely in its warp engines. In that episode, there was an explanation for why Lazarus needed dilithium crystals (after all, it's not as if they were necessary to swap universes).  In another reality, there was an explanation why destroying one of the Lazarus ships destroyed the other.

In that alter-episode, it is addressed that one can't actually wrestle another person, even an identical person, for an eternity.  Someone is going to get hungry.

On the other hand, perhaps in this posited installment ("The Other Element", perhaps it's called?) we might not have gotten Lieutenant Charlene Masters, who was a welcome addition to the crew, very Cicely Tyson-esque.


Even the redoubtable Lieutenant Masters couldn't save our version of the episode.

Nevertheless, she's still not enough to pull the episode above a dismal 1.5 stars.

(credit to Tam Phan for the idea for this piece)

Next week's episode promises to be better.  Come join us tonight at 8:00 PM (Eastern and Pacific). We'll be reading a fanzine, too.

Here's the invitation!



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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[April 4, 1967] Transitions (May 1967 IF)

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by David Levinson

A fumbled hand-off

Americans are taught that the true importance of the inauguration of Thomas Jefferson in 1801 is that this was the first peaceful transfer of power between rival politcal parties in history. Whether or not that’s the case, such a transfer is seen in the modern era as an indicator of a successful democracy. Apart from in the white colonial governments in Rhodesia and South Africa, this has yet to occur in sub-Saharan Africa, but for a brief moment it looked as though it was going to happen.

On March 17th in Sierra Leone, the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party lost a close election to the All People’s Congress under Siaka Stevens. Four days later, Governor-General Henry Josiah Lightfoot Boston swore Stevens in as the country’s new Prime Minister. Later the same day, Brigadier David Lansana staged a coup, ordering the arrest of Stevens and Boston and declaring martial law. In the wee hours of the 23rd, a counter-coup arrested Lansana and announced that the country would now be ruled by an eight-man National Reformation Council. Initially, they said that the new head of state would be Lt. Colonel Ambrose Genda, who was part of the Sierra Leonean mission to the U. N. He was quite surprised by the news, but as he boarded a plane in London on the 27th, it was announced that the head of the council would be Lt. Colonel Andrew Juxon-Smith, who was on the same flight. Had Stevens taken power and ruled within the constitution, Sierra Leone could have been an example to the rest of post-colonial Africa. Alas, it was not to be.


Siaka Stevens (top left), Governor-General Henry Josiah Lightfoot Boston (top right), Brigadier David Lansana (bottom left), Lt. Colonel Andrew Juxon-Smith (bottom right)

Steady state

There's not much variation in the quality of the stories in this month’s IF. It's more of a smooth plane with one small ding in it. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but neither is it really good.

What are these robots up to? Art by Gaughan

Spaceman!, by Keith Laumer

Down on his luck and freezing to death, Billy Danger seeks shelter in what he thinks is a grain silo. To his surprise, he has inadvertently stowed away on a spaceship. The obnoxious Lord Desroy would like to shove him out an airlock, but Hunter Sir Orfeo thinks Billy can be trained as a replacement gunbearer. Also aboard is the exotically beautiful Lady Raire. When Desroy gets both himself and Orfeo killed on the planet Gar, Billy and Raire are locked out of the ship. Struggling to survive, they settle in with a tribe of collie-sized house cats. Eventually, they find a way to send a distress signal. The first group to respond kidnaps Raire and leaves Billy for dead. Billy convinces the second group to take him and his favorite cat by showing them Desroy’s ship. To be continued.


Billy wakes to find himself in strange company. Art by Castellon

Last month, I predicted this would be Laumer in semi-comic mode (based on that exclamation point). Instead, it’s more straight adventure, just not as grim as something like The Hounds of Hell.  So far, Billy is not one of Laumer’s usual extremely competent heroes, though he’s not completely hopeless either. My only complaint is that I’m going to be stuck with The Byrds in my head for the next couple of months.

A solid three stars.

The Robots Are Here, by Terry Carr

After wrapping up a major defense project, Charles Barrow discovers a phone number in his handwriting in his wallet. In an attempt to figure out what it’s for, he calls and is rudely informed he has an appointment that evening. Curious, he goes and finds himself in the offices of R.O.B.O.T., where there are no human staff. He eventually reaches the office of the head robot and learns what the robots are up to. If only he can remember.


The head robot interviews Charles Barrow. Art by Gaughan

Carr is a well-known fan who turned out several very promising stories (the Traveler is a big fan), but hasn’t put out much lately. His focus in the last couple of years seems to be more on editing, putting out one or two “Best of” anthologies. This is another strong story, though not his best. The verbal tics of the robots really shone for me, but I wonder if a high-ranking executive in the defense industry could experience what Barrow does without attracting some attention from the FBI.

A high three stars.

SF Superclubs, by Lin Carter

Carter looks at efforts to create fan clubs on the national and international scale. One of the very first was the Scienceers in 1930, whose first president was Black. Alas, Carter doesn’t dig into this interesting fact. Instead, he runs through a large number of failed attempts, the most successful of which was Gernsback’s Science Fiction League. Next month, another failure and a successful attempt.

Three stars

The Youth Addicts, by Charles W. Runyon

Just returned from his third deep-space tour, Bork Craighen learns that he has Silver Syncope. He’s going to lose all sensation and will be dead within two months. Clay, the one friend he’s made over the last seven years, finds him drowning his sorrows and desperately needs his help. Clay’s wife became addicted to memorigraf and has lapsed into a coma. He wants Bork to enter her memories and bring her out. Bork might even find a way to solve his own problem, too.


Bork has received some bad news from his doctor. Art by Bodé

I honestly can’t tell if I liked this better than it deserves or less. It limps badly in places and parts don’t make much sense, and yet I found it a compelling read. Runyon is better known for mysteries and under-the-counter books, but he also has a science fiction background. More from him would not be amiss.

Three stars.

The Long, Slow Orbits, by H. H. Hollis

Gallegher relates how he came by some interesting scars. Cyborgs are illegal on Earth and Mars, but in the asteroids they become chattel slaves. Galleg (as the narrator refers to himself) falls in with Harriet, a young woman dedicated to freeing the cyborgs and leading them in a revolution against “The Sheik”. Before they succeed, they’re trapped, and Gallegher sacrifices himself to help her get away. He’s thrown into a Klein bottle prison with no hope of escape.


Klein bottles are weird. Art by Virgil Finlay

When I saw a Gallegher story, I groaned, but this surpassed all expectations. Apart from the framing story and a weak pun at the end, this is nothing like its predecessors. Gallegher is, dare I say it, noble. He gets involved because of a pretty face, but soon believes in the cause. His escape from the Klein bottle doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but the rest is actually good.

Three very surprised stars.

The Hole, by B. K. Filer

A meteor strike has made it possible to dig over 20 miles into the Earth’s crust, exposing eons of evolutionary history. But someone keeps destroying the brain cases of the many well-preserved fossils going down to the earliest forms of life. Russ figures out who is doing it, but the why isn’t clear.

Here’s our first time author. The geology seems very suspect to me, the paleontology is dead wrong in a few places, and I’m not convinced by the motivation for the destruction. But somehow the whole is a little better than the sum of its parts. The writing itself shows some skill, so there may be hope for Filer if he tries again.

Two stars.

The Road to the Rim (Part 2 of 2), by A. Bertram Chandler

Fresh out of the Academy and on his way to his first posting, Ensign John Grimes has convinced himself to throw in with a merchant captain who’s decided to hunt pirates. A lucky find allows them to learn how the pirates are finding their prey and to set a trap. Grimes’ skills as a gunner destroy one ship, and they set out on a desperate chase to kill a second. We know Grimes will live. The real question is what will happen to his career.


An accident near a running Mannschen drive can be a terrible thing. Art by Gray Morrow

This installment shows off most of Chandler’s strengths. The action is well done, and the character moments are strong. It could have been a few pages longer to do more with the mad engineer’s prophecies and especially for Grimes to better deal with having caused the death of someone for the first time. (Also, I have no desire to spit on the mat or insult the cat’s parentage, no matter how many times I’m told this is Liberty Hall–as the character, Grimes, habitually encourages his guests.) We’ve seen Grimes as both an experienced officer reluctantly retiring and a callow youth. I look forward to seeing him as a mature adult at the peak of his strengths.

A solid three parts for this part and the novel as a whole.

Summing up

Well, that was a pretty middle-of-the-road issue. Only one story below average, and that was more weak than bad, but there’s also no stand-out story. The two novels will ultimately stand or fall on their own, and the rest will probably fade into obscurity. Is it worth your 50 cents? If you’ve got four bits burning a hole in your pocket, it’s a fair way to spend a couple of hours. Otherwise, you’re probably better off saving up for one of the novels if they appeal to you. (I still can’t believe I actually liked a Gallegher story, though.)


A new Delany. That’s more like it.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[April 2, 1967] On The Immortality Of The Crab (Doctor Who: The Macra Terror)

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By Jessica Holmes

In Spanish, there’s a rather delightful way to say you’re daydreaming: ‘Pensando en la inmortalidad del cangrejo’. It literally means ‘thinking about the immortality of the crab’.

The Macra Terror by Ian Stuart Black is a serial that I think will quite often have you pondering on crab immortality, and I don’t mean that it’s thought-provoking.

The first thing you’ll notice about this serial is that there are BIG CHANGES AFOOT. Not in anything trifling like the main cast, but they’ve gone and changed the style of the opening titles. Now they flash up a great big picture of Patrick Troughton’s mug on the screen, in case we forget what the main character looks like.

EPISODE ONE

The Doctor and company arrive in a colony that I can only describe as Butlins IN SPACE. For those of you who aren’t from my neck of the woods, Butlins operates holiday camps where they put on lots of group activities and shows and stuff. Not my cup of tea, but they’re inexpensive and very popular.

An unfortunate soul called Medok (Terence Lodge) has run afoul of the law, however. His crime? Not being deliriously happy, and for very good reason. He’s been seeing monsters.

The gang run into him (literally) outside the TARDIS, and the authorities soon arrive to take him for brainwashing, and take the gang for a makeover.

Yeah, haircuts and beauty treatments take up a surprising amount of the episode. The Doctor smartens up for all of ten seconds before promptly turning back into a complete scruffball. It’s mildly amusing, I suppose. I got bored.

It’s also clear quite early on (though it takes the characters a while to notice) that there’s something deeply weird about this place. Is it the singing shift-change announcements with lyrics like ‘we’re happy to work!’? Could it be the fact that they apparently have a ‘beauty president’? Or perhaps it's the omnipresent giant screens broadcasting the face of their beloved Controller (whose FACE is Graham Leaman, but whose VOICE is Denis Goacher, a fact that will make more sense later)?

Can’t quite put my finger on it.

Curious about what Medok has been claiming to see, however, the Doctor visits him in his cell and sets him free, meeting up with him later at a construction site. There, Medok tells him about the Macra: huge beasts, like giant insects with great claws, moving about in the dark. A few people have seen them, but those who fail to keep their mouths shut soon find themselves in the hospital for ‘correction’.

Oh, and there’s one just outside the building site at this very moment…

This is not a strong start. I get what the writer is trying to do here. It’s all a bit ‘Brave New World’ with a side order of creature-feature, but it’s just falling flat for me. The dialogue is very blandly written and quite wooden. It serves its basic function, but not much else. Let’s see if things improve from here.

EPISODE TWO

The encounter with the Macra gets Medok and the Doctor hauled in front of the colony's Pilot (Peter Jeffrey). Medok covers for the Doctor, telling the Pilot that the Doctor was only trying to apprehend him. The authorities send Medok back to the hospital, and the Doctor returns to his quarters.

The Pilot, meanwhile, decides his guests would benefit from some brainwashing. The Doctor wakes Polly up before the voices in the walls have too much of an effect on her, and Jamie manages to resist, but Ben’s completely under the Pilot’s spell, and even runs off to snitch when the Doctor rips the brainwashing equipment out of the wall.

A little later, Ben and Polly have their own run-in with the Macra, briefly snapping Ben back to his usual self as he comes to Polly’s rescue. However, by the time they get back to the Doctor, Ben’s once again mind-controlled. I can tell because for some reason his accent changes. Apparently you get free elocution lessons with your brainwashing.

Finding brainwashing equipment in the Pilot's quarters, the Doctor realises that somebody is brainwashing the Pilot himself. The group (sans Ben) start to question the very existence of the yet-to-appear-in-person Controller. There’s something fishy about the place, and it all seems to stem from him.

The group demand to see him in person, and surprisingly he acquiesces. But the Controller is no longer a young man with a jawline you could use to cut glass. He’s old. Very old. And it doesn’t appear that he’s the man in charge any longer, if he ever was. It's been his face on the screen… but not his voice.

And it appears that he has outlived his usefulness.

The Macra aren’t a new threat to the colony after all. They’ve been running it all this time.

This episode’s a bit more interesting, and the reveal with the Controller is quite well done, even if it is a bit ‘Wizard Of Oz’. PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE CRAB BEHIND THE CURTAIN.

EPISODE THREE

Now that they know the truth, the real Controllers send the gang down to the pits to mine for gas, where they reunite with Medok. The Doctor remains on the surface to supervise and meddle, and manages to reverse-engineer the formula for the poisonous gas that the colonists are mining, but can’t work out what it’s for.

Down in the tunnels, Jamie steals the keys to an access door from an overseer, and sneaks into an abandoned mineshaft. Medok goes after him, but almost immediately runs afoul of a giant claw.

Jamie finds him dead and runs into the beasts that killed him, but that’s not the end of his problems. Learning that Jamie has gone out of bounds, Control vents gas into the old shaft. If this gas is so valuable, the Doctor is puzzled that they’d waste it on killing Jamie. It must have another use. Bear in mind he doesn't have any way of knowing what exactly is going on inside the shaft. He can't see the Macra, or communicate with Jamie. He just knows that Jamie is in there. And yet he manages to come to the conclusion that there must be Macra in the mineshaft, and they must need the gas to live. He’s right, but that’s a leap of logic bordering on omniscience. It’s not very satisfying to watch the invisible hand of the writer blatantly hand a character information.

The Doctor and Polly scramble to stop the flow of gas, but the Macra are encroaching on Jamie…

EPISODE FOUR

The Doctor manages to pump fresh air into the mineshaft just as the Macra begin to drag Jamie from his hiding spot, and then there’s a convenient rockslide just to make doubly sure they’re dead.

With that problem dealt with, Jamie escapes the tunnel and runs into something much worse: cheerleaders.

To escape them, he dances the Highland Fling. It’s… quite something. Unfortunately, Ben catches him, and reveals him to the authorities. It seems the brainwashing is starting to wear off however, as Ben clearly struggles with himself as he betrays his friend.

On the run from the authorities, the Doctor and Polly end up finding their way to the control room, and spot the Macra within. They’re like parasites that have completely hijacked the colony. The Pilot needs to see this.

It’s a struggle to get him to come with them, but the Pilot manages to resist Control’s command, and he’s horrified to find out that they’re telling the truth. Apparently a lifetime of brainwashing doesn’t come with any cognitive dissonance. However, the group are apprehended, and forced into a room which begins to fill with toxic gas.

Ben chooses this moment to finally shake off his brainwashing and come to the rescue, messing around with the gas inflow and outflow to create an explosion. Somehow. And it only blows up the Macra in the control room. This bit is not very well explained at all.

All’s well that ends well, and the colonists try to elect the Doctor as their next pilot. That won’t do at all, so the gang heads off on their merry way, dancing through the celebration as they go.

Final Thoughts

So, that was The Macra Terror. Was it terrifying? Uh, no. Perhaps to younger children, but I’m not scared of crabs so there’s nothing about making a crab BIGGER that makes it any scarier to me. The Macra model itself is quite impressive in terms of scale, I’ll give it that much.

Character-wise, nobody’s interesting enough to comment on, and the plot doesn’t have much going for it either. It’s just a bit dull. On paper the idea of a colony being secretly controlled for an ulterior purpose sounds quite interesting, but the execution just feels flat. Rather than ‘oh my goodness!’ my reaction is more ‘Oh, and?’ because it ultimately doesn’t seem to matter that much.

Everyone finds out they’ve been under the control of a bunch of evil crabs for the past few decades and they just go right back to business as usual once the crabs get blown up. I think there was a missed opportunity to examine how the colony might adjust once the influence of the Macra was lifted. Their entire culture revolves around working and keeping the masses mindlessly happy and obedient. What happens to them when their entire reason to be here is suddenly removed? I’m not asking for half a dozen episodes of political fallout, but maybe a single conversation isn’t too much to ask?

All in all, it’s a pretty forgettable story. Not dreadful, but if you didn’t get to see it, don’t worry. You’re not missing much.

2.5 out of 5 for The Macra Terror




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 30, 1967] The Peacekeepers (Star Trek: "Errand of Mercy")

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by Gideon Marcus

Star Trek offered a mirror to our present day world of Cold War tensions with its latest episode, "Errand of Mercy".

The episode begins with two mighty star nations, the United Federation of Planets ("a democracy") and the Klingon Empire ("brutal, savage") about to go to war.  And not a border skirmish, but a full on, fleet vs. fleet conflict that may see one of the parties laid to heel.

In between them, strategically located, is the planet of Organia.  Its inhabitants are humanoid, seemingly primitive.  As chance would have it, the Enterprise gets there before the Klingons, and Kirk (accompanied by Spock) attempts to persuade the Organians to accept a Federation protectorate, in exchange for defense, technology, education, and other benefits of enlightened society.

The Organians rebuff a bemused Kirk, assuring him that there is no danger.  Whereupon the Klingons arrive, quickly establishing a military governorship.  Unable to convince the Organians to fight for their freedom, Kirk and Spock attempt a two-man resistance effort.  They are quickly sold out by the Organians, but then rescued from prison by the self-same natives. The Klingon Commander, Kor, orders the slaughter of 200 Organians every hour until they are returned. Again, the Organians assure our heroes that nothing amiss is occurring.

Ultimately, two mighty battle fleets square off in the vicinity of Organia.  This proves to be the last straw.  The people of Organia demonstrate heretofore unseen power, their spokesman, Ayelborne, appearing in person on the Klingon and Federation homeworlds, announcing the immobilization of all combatants.


The Organians reveal their true power

In a nice moment, Kirk and Kor express their outrage at not being allowed to settle their differences through war.  They quickly come around when it is clear they have no choice.  In the final act, Kirk broods over his belligerence, feeling much chagrined.  Spock explains that they have many millennia to go before they, too, can become Gods.

We've seen many episodes where the Enterprise meets much more advanced races: "Charlie X", The Squire of Gothos", "The Corbomite Maneuver", "Arena", "Shore Leave".  Some might even be tired of the theme (I am not–we should expect half of the beings we encounter to be far beyond us; cosmic timescales favor this).  But "Errand of Mercy" is the best of this type of show we've seen so far, illuminating our frailties as a species beautifully.

"Errand" is aided by some of the best casting we've seen in the show.  John Abbott imbues Ayelborne with dignity and strength, suffused with a penetrating mildness.  And John Colicos, who I've seen before on Mission: Impossible, is affably delightful as Commander Kor.  By turns irritated and almost entreating, Kor comes across as, if anything, a lonely man.  He is isolated by his rank, by his position as an obvious intellectual and aesthete in an Empire of thugs.  Kor seems to want nothing more than to have a friend, and the only person who might qualify is his mortal enemy, Captain Kirk.  To echo Mr. Spock, "fascinating."

I appreciated the justifications for war laid out by both sides, as they appealed to Ayleborne to allow them to continue their fight.  The Klingons, Kirk says, raided planets.  The Federation, Kor insists, was hemming the Klingons in, cutting them off from territory that had always been theirs.  Yes, the American/Soviet parallels are strong (to the point that Kor boasts that the Klingons will win due to their unswerving dedication to their state, and their positions as cogs in its system).  Juanita Coulson, in the latest Yandro, praised the show for its economy of writing, how much they back into almost throwaway lines.  This episode does a lot with a little.  In this, they are aided by director John Newland, who did most of this year's excellent (but abortive) spy show, The Man Who Never Was.


And Sulu took the center seat again!

There were some complaints voiced about the show during our viewing.  Two observed that Kirk was too quick to take the Organians at face value, asking the wrong questions (when he asked any) as to why they felt so secure.  To that, I note that 1) Kirk is, as he says in the episode, "a soldier, not a diplomat"; his behavior is entirely consistent with what we've seen in prior episodes (viz. "The Squire of Gothos" and "Arena").  2) A war had just been declared, with shots already fired.  Kirk's focus was, shall we say, narrow.  This also may explain why Spock was unusually accommodating in his impromptu guerrilla role.

Indeed, that's what I love about this episode.  The Organians put themselves into a form humans can understand, and yet it's still not enough.  Both Kirk and Kor (an intentional similarity of names?) are irritated with these beings who do not behave as they "should".  The only beings with whom they share any common ground are each other!


"In another life, I could have called you 'friend'.  Wait.  Wrong episode.

Another viewer noted that the Federation, as American analogs, would have simply taken Organia, as the Klingons ultimately did (or tried).  And perhaps they would have.  I like to think the humans (and Vulcans) are better than that.  At the very least, Kirk tried to persuade them peacefully.  But given the deliberate portrayal of the Klingons as the Federation through a glass darkly, I think the viewer may have had a point.  And probably one intended to be gotten by the writer.

Speaking of which, Gene L. Coon is a name that has popped up several times recently.  Between writers Coon and D.C. (Dorothy) Fontana, it does seem that Star Trek is reaching a consistent maturity.  Gone are references to "Earth" (though the "Federation" has a single homeworld, per Ayelborne the Organian).  The show seems to have settled on "Vulcan" over "Vulcanian".  The characters are firmly established.

With the arrival of the Organians, one wonders if the character of the show will change drastically.  Are the Organians a galactic phenomenon, or do they only care about their sector of space?  That they didn't intervene in the war with the Romulans suggests the latter.  If the Organians are strictly local, will the Federation and Klingons find other frontiers to fight about?

I can't wait to find out!  Five stars.

A Peaceful Fantasy


by Jessica Dickinson Goodman

I've written before about alien cultures reacting to Federation colonialism – from the Horta last week to the Gorn a few weeks before. In this episode, we got to see what Captain Kirk hoped was the beginning of if not colonization, then as Gideon puts it, "protectorate status."

And we saw the Organians gently reject this and all such overtures. Over and over again, we hear varions of of, "Captain, I can see that you do not understand us. Perhaps…" and "We are in no danger."


"Mellow out, man.  Everything's cool!"

At first, like Captain Kirk, I thought the Organians unbearably naive. But it turns out that Captain Kirk, and I, were arrogant. They were in no danger; capable of unilaterally ending a war that promised galaxy-wide devastation with a thought. They were ably prepared to defend themselves and the two societies who so wished to do violence around them.

Of all of the god-like aliens we have seen, I liked these the best. No capricious squires or whiny, cruel children; the Organians had a philosophy, the discipline to live by it, and the power to ensure they remained unbothered by outside forces while on their paths. I can imagine the Horta or the Gorn would have envied those powers, though as Commander Spock pointed out, "it took millions of years for the Organians to evolve into what they are. Even the gods did not spring into being overnight."


Spock comforts Jim for being a primitive.

I find these forms of power fantasies deeply satisfying. Every day, we see the power of violence, of guns, of bombs, of war. To see, if only for a few, technicolor minutes, a power to stop war? To prevent violence? To ensure cultural continuity and security in the face of attempts to colonize? That is a fantasy I enjoy a great deal. Lest I sound too star-struck, I will note that I would have preferred to see any Organian women, any evidence of many cultures mixing together, of creativity, of growth, rather than the mild stasis that seemed to characterize their society. But for what it was, it was good to see.

Just don't ask me to live there.

Four stars.

An Actually Superior Superiority


by Elijah Sauder

In this episode of Star Trek, we saw not just the most powerful god-like-beings we have seen, but also the most compelling. In our previous encounters, the god-like-beings' powers were potent, but only in a localized region of space. In this episode the Organians immobilized the entire Space Force and Klingon Empire’s armies. To quote (approximately) Kirk, “We never had a chance; the Organians raided the game.”


"Mooom!  He started it!"

As humans we want to feel in control and to exert such control through whatever means necessary; we meddle, we fight. But the Organians did not exhibit the same behavior. They expressed disgust at the thought of meddling, and when they meddled, it was in the most pacifist of ways. This gave them a suggestion of superiority far greater than that of the previous powerful beings, who flaunted their power in a way that was nothing more than human.

I very much enjoyed this episode through and through–not just as a show, but as a writer’s vision of what we should strive to be. Looking around at the violence and overreach of global superpowers we see today, what would it look like if we could transcend our primal nature to something better?

I give this episode 5/5.

The Dittoverse


by Lorelei Marcus

A crucial part of the science fiction genre is aliens, and Star Trek gives them to us in great variety.  We have the completely unfamiliar aliens like the salt-monster from "The Man Trap" or the silicon-based carpet monster from "The Devil in the Dark".  Then there's the God-like beings, which display evolution well beyond the people of the Enterprise.  My favorite aliens, though, are the humanoid ones, because their existence suggests a great deal about the Star Trek universe.

The Klingons are the third race of aliens we've seen that seem to be technologically and evolutionarily similar to the humans of the Federation.  First were the Vulcan(ians), and then the Romulans, though there is strong evidence that the Romulans are distant relatives of the Vulcans, and thus constitute one species.  The Klingons seem to have a similar relationship to humans based on their appearance, customs, and technology.  Perhaps the Klingon Empire is the result of a colony ship like Khan's, launched during Earth's warring period.  Yet I suggest there is a larger mystery afoot.

Minor differences aside, there is also a distinct resemblance between humans and Vulcans [and apparently an ability to interbreed (ed.)].  Initially, one could attribute this to the limitations of Star Trek's make-up department, but I propose there is an explanation for not just the connection between humans and Vulcans, but every humanoid alien seen and to be seen on the show.


Amazing fashion sense aside, the Klingons are remarkably humanoid.

This answer lies in "Miri" (the episode, not the character).  "Miri" introduces that 'mirror Earths' exist, worlds that appear exactly like the Federation's homeworld, yet with distinct populations and even timelines.  While we've yet to see another identical Earth like the one in "Miri", we have seen many habitable worlds and humanoid aliens.  What if a common ancestor of the humans, the Klingons, the Vulcans, all started from the same place, on the same world, at a certain early point in its evolution?  Then, this proto-Earth was progressed countless times in separate timelines, each evolving into the cultures and creatures we know.  Each of these separate Earths were somehow folded into one space, perhaps with some space-time affecting technology like a Starship's warp drive.  We already know time travel is possible using the Enterprise.  Why not an accidental collapse of the fourth dimension as well?

There is a simpler solution, of course.  All of these identical worlds could be deliberate constructs for some higher being's experiment.  Personally, I think this explanation is less interesting, but with the number of God-like aliens we've seen, probably the more likely.

Either way, I love science fiction that makes me speculate on the very fabric of the universe.  This episode is definitely a great additional piece to the puzzle that is Star Trek.

Four stars.

I have no idea what to make of this next episode of Star Trek.  Come join us tonight at 8:30 PM (Eastern and Pacific) and help us figure it out.

Here's the invitation!



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[March 28, 1967] At last, a drop to drink (April 1967 Analog)

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by Gideon Marcus

Back to Basics

Our family recently went to the movies to see the latest war epic, Tobruk.  It's the story of a British commando unit teamed with a company of German Jews charading as a unit of the Afrika Korps.  Their goal: to destroy the supply depot at Tobruk and stop Rommel in his tracks.

The first half was decent, but the second devolved into Hollywood schlock.  Particularly when one knows one's history: there was such a raid, but it ended in abject failure.  Tobruk is not so mind-numbingly mediocre as TV's Rat Patrol, but they are in the same genus.

How to get the taste out of my mouth?  As it turned out, local channel 9 was airing the old Bogart movie, Sahara, filmed in 1943 as the war was going on.  I'd seen it when it first premiered, and so I knew to circle the listing and bake the popcorn so my family and friends could enjoy it with me.  If you haven't had the pleasure of this amazing saga of a lone M3 tank in the African desert, and its ragtag crew it collects from nearly a dozen different nations, well, give it a watch next time it airs.

Old Standby

Just as I found the antidote to modern bloat in a classic production of the '40s, this month, the answer to the rather lackluster science fiction being turned out of late was found not in a magazine of the '40s, but in one that, for many, peaked in that "Golden Age."  Indeed, the April 1967 Analog was one of the finest examples of Campbell's editorial output in a long time.


by John Schoenherr

To Love Another, by James Blish and Norman L. Knight

First, a case of eating words.  Please pass the mustard.

James Blish and Norman L. Knight have composed a number of novellas in a particular setting.  A few centuries from now, humanity is bursting at the seams, shoulder to shoulder on a severely overcrowded planet.  The science of tectogenetics has created a new race of humans, the Tritons, one perfectly at home in the oceans.  Against this backdrop, the asteroid "Flavia" is on a collision course with Earth, threatening tremendous damage when it hits.  Efforts are being made to minimize its impact (pardon the pun).

Two stories have been set in this timeline: The Shipwrecked Hotel and The Piper of Dis.  I rated both of them two stars.  They were dull, plodding tales, and after the last one, I stated, "I hope this is the last piece in the series."

I take it back.


by Kelly Freas

To Love Another is a vivid tale of love between Dorthy Sumter, head of Submarine Products Corporation, and her lieutenant, the Triton Tioru.  It's hard to describe it as having a plot, in the strictest sense of the word.  Rather, it is a pair of viewpoints at a particular juncture in humanity's history, one of its most momentous.  It is a gentle adventure that runs from the depths of the ocean, to the hive of a Habitat '67-type city, to… well, to the place In-Between.


Habitat '67 in Montreal

Not quite five stars, but excellent stuff.

The Enemy Within, by Mack Reynolds


by Leo Summers

What's a mother to do when her eager little boy winds up locked inside a psuedo-intelligent spacecraft, and all her efforts seem only to make the problem worse?

This is an effective, well-drawn tale by Mr. Reynolds, though if there is anything to be taken away from it, it's that spanking is an outdated punishment that ultimately does more harm than good.

Three stars.

The Feckless Conqueror, by Carl A. Larson

If humans are to settle other planets, they will either have to adapt to new environments or adapt their enivronments.  Larson examines the adaptibility of the human species, noting our tolerance to oxygen pressure, heat, cold, gravity, and magnetic fields.

It's pretty good.  Three stars.

To Change Their Ways, by Joseph P. Martino

On the planet of New Eden, where the men grow wheat and the women…turn it into bread and noodles…famine threatens.  Seems the hardheaded farmers refuse to give up their tailored grain, which cannot tolerate the seasonal cooling that is gradually chilling the planet (seasons last decades on this long-orbit world).  A sector administrator is sent to help out the planetary coordinator, mostly to harangue him about being tougher with the recalcitrants.

If ever there was a story with no drama, no plot beats, no there, it's this one.  Two stars.

The Time-Machined Saga (Part 2 of 3), by Harry Harrison


by John Schoenherr

Last month, I was a little hard on Harrison's newest serial, in which a time machine is put to work for cheap on location shooting in the 11th Century.  It's better this time around, as the production of the film goes underway.  The beefcake hack of a star gets a broken leg and refuses to work.  Luckily, Ottar, the native Viking, is more than willing to work for a bottle of whiskey a day and a silver mark a month.  And he's a natural for the part!

But while the scenes filmed in Norway and the Orkneys go well enough, a wrinkle is introduced when it is discovered that there are no colonies in Vinland–not in the 11th Century or ever.  Only one solution for that: found Vinland (with cameras rolling, of course).

It's rollicking fun with a lot of good encyclopaedic data.  My only quibble is that the timeline of Harrison's book is clearly all of a piece; the first installment had the film crew seeing themselves from a "later" time trip in the past.  But if the timeline exists with all travels baked in, why didn't they find themselves filming the landing at Vinland?  Perhaps this will be explained next chapter.

Either way, it's still worth four stars.

Ambassador to Verdammt, by Colin Kapp


by Kelly Freas

Imagine a race of aliens so bizarre that the human mind can barely register their existence, let alone make meaningful contact.  The science team on Verdammt knows the Unbekannt are intelligent beings, but prolonged interchange leads to a psychotic break.  It will take a very special kind of ambassador to bridge the species gap.

This is a story that would have fared better in the hands of a true master, a Delany or a Cordwainer Smith.  As it is, there's a bit too much artificial delaying of shoe-drops to heighten drama.  The scenes from the perspective of the character meeting the Unbekannt lack the lyricism to really make them shine. 

That said, it is a neat idea, it is at least competently rendered, and it made me think. That's what an stf story's supposed to do, right?

So, a solid three stars.

Compare and Contrast

For the second time this year, Analog has topped the pack of magazine (and magazine-ish) offerings, clocking in at 3.2 stars.  Thus, it beats out New Worlds (3.1), IF (3), Path into the Unknown (2.6), Fantasy and Science Fiction (2.5), Galaxy (2.3), New Writings #10 (2.2), and Amazing (2.1).

It was a pretty peaked month, in general, with the best thing outside this issue probably a fourteen-year old reprint by Judith Merril (which was, in fact, the only piece published by a woman this entire month).

Still, it's nice to know that oases can still sometimes be found, even this often bleak desert of a modern magazine era.  Here's hoping it the hot spring doesn't turn into a mirage next month…



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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[March 26, 1967] Changes Coming New Worlds and SF Impulse, April 1967

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by Mark Yon

Scenes from England

Hello again!

So I’m now having to get used to receiving just one issue of the British magazines a month. The deal made with the Arts Council last month means that I was guaranteed this issue, which I understand will be the last in this paperback format. It is less but is it a case of "less means more"? Let’s go to the issue!

Editor Mike Moorcock is clearly busy this month, and as a result we have a Guest Editorial from the much-plaudit-ed Samuel R. Delany, who I know is making quite an impact in the US with his novels (Babel 17, amongst others).

Though it is well written, it’s another editorial discussing the future of science fiction. Editors Moorcock, Harrison and Bonfiglioli have all covered this in various issues in the past few years, and this isn’t really anything new. It may, however, be for new readers. It is unsurprisingly positive and embraces the change that we’ve seen in recent years.

To the New Worlds/SF Impulse stories.


Illustration by James Cawthorn

Daughters of Earth by Judith Merril

Judith Merril is currently writing reviews for the Magazine of Fantasy & SF and editing The Year’s Best SF anthology. In between her work on those, she also found the time to revise one of her pieces from December, 1952.

Allowing for the fact that it's a reprint, Daughters of Earth is a cracker in that it takes a lot of old-fashioned science fiction ideas but gives them a modern, different twist. It is the story of future human space exploration but instead of the usual future being determined by men, this is told through successions of generations of women in one family. It is a deliberate subversion of the usual science fiction cliches.

To emphasise this, the story begins in an almost-Old Testament style: “Martha begat Joan, and Joan begat Ariadne. Ariadne lived and died at home on Pluto, but her daughter, Emma, took the long trip out to a distant planet of an alien sun. Emma begat Leah, and Leah begat Carla, who was the first to make her bridal voyage through sub-space, a long journey faster than the speed of light itself”. We go from the Earth to the Moon with Joan, from the Moon to Pluto with Ariadne and from Pluto with Emma to Ullern, a planet reached on the spaceship Newhope through FTL travel. There the colonists meet aliens.

It is an epistolary story, initially told through letters written for Carla, a future descendant, and for future generations on Ullern.

This may sound like a typical space-exploration story as humans expand their influence to the stars. However, it is different in that although it is clearly writing a history, it shows the female of the species in a more positive and pro-active light than usual, even when at times it regresses to soap-opera. With that in mind, the story is perhaps proto-feminist and shows that the future is not just male heroism and gung-ho histrionics, but also about love, family, and personal sacrifice, as well as coming to grips with the fear created by travel into the unknown.

Pleasingly refreshing, this makes me think that this is the sort of story that Heinlein would like to write, but can’t quite reach. It is an example of how traditional science fiction can be given a modern update. 4 out of 5.

Aid to Nothing by P. F. Woods

And then a step down, from the author also known as Barrington J. Bayley. A story of conflict when a Martian tribe, the Sussorr, meets colonising humans. The Sussorr are receiving telepathic vibes from their neighbours the Tuaranth. The beginning reminds me of A. E. van Vogt’s The Black Destroyer, but it soon degenerates into a story where other parts read like a cut-rate Edgar Rice Burroughs. The sympathy is clearly with the peaceful Martians, emphasised by the cartoonish war-loving humans, led by a man annoyingly named Bungleton. 2 out of 5.

Three Short Stories by Thomas M. Disch

The return of Mr Disch, who recently exploded into the British magazines (and was perhaps most recently noted by our Noble Editor for his expletive-laden story in this month’s Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction), started well and yet recently has had stories published that to me felt like his writing is running out of steam.

The title tells it all – there are three stories. The first is a story told by a man to another about a girl he knew before she committed suicide. The storyteller is shot by a secret agent once he has told the story. In the second part, Thadeus and Diane are looking to move into a dilapidated New York apartment, where they discuss life and love before leaving. In the third piece, Mrs. Neary is on a ship that is sinking.

Lots of metaphor and clearly sentences that are meant to mean something, but the point of the stories seem to have passed me by. I’m sure that the stories means something to somebody, and that the three stories are connected in some way, but if they are it is all a bit beyond me. Disch can write – but this is still a bemusingly metaphorical disappointment.3 out of 5.

Illustration by James Cawthorn

The Key of the Door by Arthur Sellings

Arthur is an author much liked by Moorcock, so the return of this writer to New Worlds is not entirely a surprise. His last story was That Evening Sun Go Down in the September 1966 issue of New Worlds.

I had better just check, though. Are you aware in the US what the phrase “Key in the Door” means to us Brits? Just in case you’re not (and apologies if you are!) here it’s a turn of phrase to describe the rite of passage, reached at the mighty age of twenty-one, when according to the adage, the person is symbolically given the key of the door to a property. It really means that they are now an adult, with the freedom to do what they want in their future. Here such matters are turned into a light-hearted time-travel story that’s moderately humorous and not to be taken too seriously.

Victorian Godfrey is discovered to be using his father’s time machine, travelling to 1985 and 2035. There he saw his father dancing with a young lady, but is reluctant to tell his father this. To his father’s horror, Godfrey’s travelling has changed things in the future. As you may know, humour is very divisive and usually for me doesn’t do too well. This one is… fair. It provides a bit of lighter counterbalance to the rest of the issue. 3 out of 5.

Book Reviews

I’m pleased to see the return of a book review column, even if it is for only one book! Guest reviewer Brian Aldiss reviews I. F. Clarke’s (no, not that one!) book, Voices Prophesying War 1763 – 1984. Brian goes through the book in some detail, pointing out the (mostly) positives and negatives of the book. It rather sounds like the sort of thing Olaf Stapledon was doing with First and Last Men – quite dry, but full of science-fictional ideas. Might be worth a look.

Summing up New Worlds / SF Impulse

Really this is a holding issue, in that it is the last before we get the new New Worlds in its new form, whatever that is. Whilst it is not quite the same as the “What do we have left?” issue of last month, it is still a little underwhelming. As you might expect, the Merril short novel dominates the issue at about 70 pages and is as good as I had hoped for, but it is a (revised?) reprint. The rest of the issue is lesser material. Even the Disch felt like sub-standard work.

And as is clearly explained in the beginning, that’s that.  Goodbye SF Impulse, hello New New Worlds!

It looks like Mr. Disch may be important. I’m hoping that this new material may be better than his recent efforts, good though they can be.

Until the next – whenever that is!



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Fashion, music, politics, sports

[March 24, 1967] One Door Closes As Another Opens (Death and Renewal with a VW Bus)

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by Victoria Lucas

A Door Closes


Ruth Clark Lucas, 1897-1966

Except inside me, the door to my mother is forever closed. If anyone should wonder where I’ve been these past few months, the answer is grieving. In November my mother died and my partner Mel and I drove to Tucson to sell my house (the one I paid the mortgage on while going to Stanford), pick up whatever seemed right, deal with legal and funeral home details, and then drive back to SF again, and our little place at 29 Hodges Alley.

While we were in Tucson the funeral home had a memorial service, and I attended after some consultation (coffin closed). She had so few friends, only from where she worked. When I got home I finally looked at a copy of the death certificate I had acquired. It gave me a shock. It said she died from alcoholism.

Actually, I think it slammed


My pal Joe Bfstplk

I was completely clueless, but my man Mel claims to still be a recovering alcoholic after many years of being sober, admitting that he is still on the road to recovery rather than having accomplished a “cure.” He said he had recognized the signs when we were in the house–a random liquor cabinet full of bottles, all open and most with very little in them, and other things. The house gave me the creeps so bad I insisted we sleep in our van in the driveway rather than in a bed in the house. It was as if the cloud over Joe Bfstplk in Li’l Abner cartoons had escaped and was looming over my old home.

A door hanging open


Why, that looks like our bus

The vehicle we slept in, though, is a door to the future, and I must leave my grief before I get these pages wet. Mel and I had begun to talk about taking the transfer and raise he has been repeatedly offered at his place of work, Hartford Steam Boiler, to go to New York City, as Phase I of our overall plan to visit Europe. In preparation for driving there we bought a VW van from some friends, a Lesbian couple who have settled down and have no further need for a vehicle they can sleep in. Mel and I sold our individual cars. Now we are planning the trip across country.

Magazine in a box in my future?


Aspen Magazine No. 4

Partly to get a taste of New York, and partly because of the contents, I bought a “magazine” produced in New York City that makes me want to look up the publisher when we get to that city of publishers. This one, though, is a bit odd. It’s a “magazine in a box” called Aspen.

The spring issue is just out, and I am really fascinated with the concept and the content of this issue, which includes John Cage and a tiny record with electronic music.


The contents of Aspen Magazine No. 4

The move will mean leaving the publications we’re used to buying, or in my case, writing for, here. (Fortunately, I'll still be able to write for the Journey!)

Goodbye, Barb


The first Barb of the year

The Berkeley Barb has been my paddle in strange waters, sometimes my sounding board.

Goodbye, Oracle


A recent Oracle

And the San Francisco Oracle has been a predictor in uncertain times, a wad of possible futures, many of them hopeful. I don’t know if we will be able to get it in New York. We shall see.

Oh, wait, I forgot that I've already written for The East Village Other, and I've been reading that paper for awhile. And there is so much music, so much in NYC! I'm looking forward to John Cage concerts and St. Mark's Church events, and so on I've seen in the Other, and oh, the museums!


The Guggenheim

Museums and Concerts and Protests, Oh, My!

I especially want to see the Guggenheim both for the art and the architect. And the 59th Street Bridge, just so I can feel groovy! And we'll want to visit friends at The Bead Game (an old pharmacy building with drawers of beads). I've never been to New York before.

In fact, when I think about it, I've never been east of Arizona. Just crossing the country will be, yes, OK, a "trip," a learning experience. We aren't doing a lot of fitting out of our bus, because travel expenses are included in Mel's deal, and so there's money for motels and meals out. We're also taking camping stuff so we can stop at nice places to camp and put up a tent. I was taking a course of allergy shots in SF, so there's a spot in our new Coleman ice chest for my vaccine, and Mel will administer them. We will join protests in New York City as we have here. So much to do, tee do dee, please excuse me. I'm just bursting into song. I'll be happy to report from time to time.

I hope you'll keep tuning in!




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 22, 1967] The Lurking Fear (Star Trek: "The Devil in the Dark")

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The Devil’s Advocate


by Andrea Castaneda

There appears to be a recurring theme in Star Trek that showcases how a planet's native species respond to human interaction. In “Arena”, “Galileo Seven”, and “Man Trap”, we’re presented with an outright hostile response that thwarts the possibility of a sustainable settlement. “Devil in the Dark " appeared, at first glance, to go in this direction. However, it is the way this week’s “monster” is framed in an empathetic light that sets this episode apart.

The episode proceeds predictably…at first. On planet Janus VI, a mysterious thing is killing man after man deep in the Pergium mines. Enter the Starship Enterprise, who are called to investigate the matter. After getting briefed by colony chief mining engineer Vanderberg, Kirk and his crew set out to track down and kill whatever this creature is. But not before Spock examines a perfectly spherical rock, describing it as a “geological oddity”. Vanderberg refers to it as a silicon nodule, saying his team found thousands of them after they opened a new level.

It didn’t take a lot of brain power for me to deduce that the nodules were probably the creature’s eggs. The mining operation threatened its nest, so the creature began to defend it. The Gorn in “Arena” and primitive species in “Galileo Seven” responded with a similar hostility to the perceived “invaders”. Why would this creature be any different?


"This egg-like thing? No idea what it is."

Suddenly, alarms blare, the crew rushes outside, and to their horror they see there’s been another attack. Not only is another man left dead, but the creature has taken a vital piece of equipment, one necessary to sustain human life. And while Scotty’s ingenuity buys them time, they now have a race against the clock. Perhaps that’s why Kirk takes on a more militant approach, ordering his men to shoot the creature on sight.

Eventually, Kirk and Spock come face to face with the creature at last. Looking like a blob made out of a shag rug and Chef Boy-ar-dee, it approaches them, and the men fire their phasers. Wounded, a piece breaks off, and it retreats back into the rock. Examining the piece, the men conclude that it is a silicon based lifeform–explaining why it didn’t appear on their carbon-based lifeform scans. As the men speculate about what the creature is, a fear dawns in Spock that it may be the last of its kind.

We are given a similar situation in "Man Trap", in which a lone shapeshifting salt-sucking creature kills many members of the Starship Enterprise to survive. But as the conflict hinges more on McCoy's personal affection for the creature–who looks like his old flame–its death is more symbolic of McCoy choosing duty over love. We get one mournful moment when Kirk reflects on the now extinct species, but it is framed as something that had to be done.

But this is where “Devil in the Dark” makes the most significant deviation from the format. When confronted with the creature again, Kirk has a change of heart when he sees it recoil from the sight of the phaser. Realizing it may be more than just a mere animal, he asks Spock–who now wants the creature dead to save Kirk–to touch minds with it.


Heart to…heart?

This was the moment that made this episode stand out for me. Speaking through the Vulcan, the creature identifies itself as a Horta and explains how she only started the attacks after the miners destroyed her eggs. Because the rest of her species died out, something that happened every 50,000 years, she was left as the lone protector of the eggs.

We are given a similar exchange in "Arena", when the Gorn tells Kirk his kind "destroyed invaders" of his planet, but it isn't nearly as emotionally charged as the Horta’s. Through Spock, the creature sobs, lamenting the impending doom of her kind and calling the humans “murderers” and “devils”. Kirk now realizes the misunderstanding and calls McCoy to heal and save the creature.

Unbeknownst to them, the angry mob of miners overwhelm the Enterprise’s security team, and rush to claim… whatever the Horta has for a head. But Spock, having learned her species’s history, convinces them that she is benevolent by nature. As proof, he explains that she had known about the human colony for the last 50 years, only attacking in recent months as a last resort to protect her species. And by some miracle, the men’s anger is suddenly quelled, having seen the error of their ways. It is, perhaps, an over-generous portrayal of human forgiveness. But maybe the agreement of letting Horta hatchlings help in their mining operations–thus giving them more profit–is what helped let bygones be bygones.

“Devil in the Dark” isn’t a flawless episode. But the moving portrayal of the Horta lamenting her lost future is what made this episode one of my favorites. It offers a new perspective for what the native species of a planet may feel when confronted with the “alien” humans. Still, I can't help but spare a thought for the salt-creature of "Man Trap", and even the Gorn in "Arena", who also may have felt the same sense of existential anguish.

Five stars.

FUTURE IMPERFECT


by Joe Reid

I love and enjoy a good sci-fi story. I am a lover of the works of Mr. Robert Heinlein and other masters like him. In the pages of a good sci-fi book you have fantastical worlds and brave people that are navigating those worlds for the adventure, to save those they care for, and to just plain do what is right and honest. Good sci-fi is so unlike our present world, where the strong, by hook or by crook, take what doesn't belong to them for the benefit of some high and mighty master who already got more scratch than a dog with fleas. Scratch stands for money, for those of you unfamiliar with street lingo.

So this episode comes along and reminds me a little too much of the world we live in. It starts off underground on a planet with the cleanest looking miners I ever laid my eyes on. They have a problem. Something is stopping the means of production of whatever it is that these miners in their all too clean jumpsuits need to mine. That problem is these workers are dying for some reason. Notice that it takes 50 of these men dying before the corporate bosses do something about it.


"You'll be just fine… Bob, was it? Ah, who cares?"

What do their bosses do about it? They do what all big money types do. They send in a fixer to make the problem go away. In comes the crew of the spaceship Enterprise. Their leader Captain “Jim” Kirk shows up and it is pretty obvious early on that all he cares about is making sure that the miners get back to producing. It doesn't matter that there’s 50 men fewer to do the work they were doing before. Money is money!

For almost all of the episode, Kirk is single-mindedly focused. Getting those space rocks moving is more important than anything else. So much so that when we learn that the creature that is killing the miners is a new form of life never seen before, Kirk would rather eliminate it than try to communicate with it. Dr., or Mr. Spock (I get confused about which is right) tries to stop him from killing the creature, but it is to no avail, as the call of space dollars drowns out any call to “seek out new life and new civilizations”. Kirk cruelly dismisses the concerns of his friend and pulls rank on him to force compliance out of the creature. So much for friendship huh, Jim?


"I'm right behind you, Spock."

In the end, it appeared to the viewer that Kirk had a change of heart and started to care about something other than money. He then uses Mr. Spock to talk to the creature, putting Spock at personal risk. For what? So that Kirk can save the creature? Bring back the dead miners? Nope! Having discovered that the creature was smart and didn’t want its species to be killed off, Kirk understood that he could use that fear to make even more money for the corporate interests that he works for. Thinking just like the greedy men of our world, and crushing any hope that the future will be a better place for any of us.

[I'll also note a striking thing Joe said after the episode: "Everyone's happy. The natives work for free, and in return, they get to keep their lives." One wonders if the Horta would have been preserved had they not been such good miners… (ed.)]

Before ya’ll get too upset with me, I know, this is just a TV show. It isn’t real. I'll tell you what though. Things we see on TV and read in paperbacks might very well be real. Only, not just yet. It is the kind of real that we hope to see someday. The kind that we will make happen in time.

And that's why I didn’t care much for this episode of Star Trek. Instead of providing a hopeful vision of the future, I just got to see the same kind of motivations that leap up at me from the pages of newspapers. I hope that the creators of this show can offer me something more hopeful in other episodes. If Star Trek keeps looking like downtown Detroit, where big corporate bosses only care about profits and send their stooges to enforce their desires, I fear that there may not be much future for this picture of the future.


Friendly interaction in Kercheval, Detroit, last summer.

3 stars

A Vulcanian’s Best Friend


by Abigail Beaman

If you were to ask my opinion about Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek, I would of course start gushing over how much I love the cast and concept of the show. It has to be one of my favorite programs that I sit down and watch regularly. Each character has a unique personality that sets him and her apart from each other, so much so that I can remember their names.

While Captain James T Kirk is charismatic and headstrong, Doctor Leonard “Bones” McCoy is cantankerous and hot-headed; but no one stands out as much as Mister Lieutenant Commander Spock. The reason is simple: he is half-Vulcan(ian?), an alien race whose members either lack emotions or repress said emotions. Due to his half-Vulcan side, Mister Spock is best described as a logical, calm, and stoic computerized man. And while it seems he gets along with most of the crew, despite his emotionless stature, there seems to be just one person that Spock truly cares about on the Enterprise. That man of course is Captain Kirk.

How do I reach this conclusion? Well, simply the only time Spock seems to break his stoic behavior and disregard any morals he has (without the aid of a certain flower’s spores) is when Kirk is in trouble. This episode shows just how deep the relationship runs between the half-Vulcan scientist and the charismatic human captain.

At the start of the episode, Spock makes it clear that he doesn’t want to kill the Horta, as he believes it to be the last of the species, a reservation he expressed in "The Man Trap", too. Spock in other episodes also has demonstrated that he values life above all else. It seems that preserving life is a moral of his and to break it would be like him breaking his stoic, Vulcan behavior. Even when Kirk tells the security team that they are to kill the Horta on sight, Spock disregards this direct order and tells the team to try to keep it alive if possible.


"Spock, what did I just say? Kill, not capture."

That is, until Kirk is at the Horta’s mercy. Spock’s opinion of the situation changes entirely: he tells Kirk to shoot it, to kill it before it kills him. The fear that Spock displays not only in his voice but also his movements clearly paints a picture, that Kirk is someone Spock cherishes greatly. Spock runs down the cave to save his friend only to find out Kirk has had a change in heart. Spock was not only ready to kill the Horta, but to sacrifice his own morals for Kirk. I don’t know about you, but the only time I would consider betraying my morals is for someone I consider a true friend, not someone who I work with.


"I'm quickening my pace, Jim!"

Clearly, the relationship between Spock and Kirk goes beyond that of just co-workers. It's a revelation that has been a long time coming, and a welcome one. Which is why I felt compelled to discuss it over any other aspect of the episode. That Spock sees Kirk as someone he cares about, enough to break his “Vulcanian cool” and morals to save, leaves me reassured. Maybe Spock can't be "happy", as he stated last episode. Nevertheless, even if Spock is an emotionless alien, he still can find a kind of companionship in his best friend, Jim Kirk.

Four stars.

Fighting Fire with Empathy


by Jessica Dickinson Goodman

I loved the twistiness of this episode. First Kirk wants to kill the Horta, then he defends it with not only his own life, but his crew's bodies. First it's a monster, then a mother. First Spock is his usual cool, emotionless self, and then he is screaming in pain as he connects himself mentally to the Horta. First the silicon nodules have "no commercial value" and then they become the hope of a new golden age of mining on Janus 6.


"Oooo, that smarts!"

Just like in "Arena," in "The Devil in the Dark" we are confronted with the colonial shortsightedness of Starfleet. Janus 6 is a "long-established colony" whose longtime colonists have somehow managed to miss an entire species of rock-dwelling creatures. Now, their 50,000 year breeding cycle might explain this, but stepping away from the specifics, it does remind me of modern failures of imagination, particularly in cases of colonial governments failing to understand the places they seek to control.

For example, the refusal of the U.S. Forest Service to use the wildfire management strategies that the Tongva Nation, Chumash Bands, and other peoples have used since time immemorial in what is now called California. Last November, this led to the tragic death of 10 hotshot firefighters in the Loop Fire near Los Angeles. Like the Horta, that wildfire burned hot and seemingly without reason; but wildfires, like Hortas, often have a logic of their own. The canyons that burned in the Angeles National Forest had been left uncleared for decades of misguided fire-suppression policies. When all of that mass had built up, of course it burned too hot and too fast to stop. The failure of the Janus 6 geologic survey team to find local life built up another kind of conflagration, one that killed 50. One hopes they won't make that mistake again.


The Loop Fire

Though we can't use Spock's Vulcanian skills to read the minds of wildfires, one of the beauties of science fiction is the hope that we might one day communicate with someone as different from us as blood and stone, or fire and water. The tension between what is and what could be, the twistiness as we get from here to there, is the fun of the genre, and this episode did a great job of letting us enjoy the ride.

4 stars.

In the next episode, Kirk and Spock go to the California Renaissance Faire. Come join us tomorrow at 8:30 PM (Eastern and Pacific)!.

Here's the invitation!

 



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Magazine, Science / Space Race, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[March 20, 1967] Vistas near and far (April 1967 Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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by Gideon Marcus

I see you!

We have now entered a phase of the Space Race where there's enough stuff in orbit that other stuff in orbit can take pictures of it.  Not just deliberate rendeszvous' like dual missions of Gemini 6 and 7, but snapshots of opportunity, like Gemini 11's photo of the Soviet Proton 3.

Last week, NASA released perhaps the most extraordinary example of this nature: the first snapshot of a spacecraft sent to the Moon…by a spacecraft sent to the Moon!  Lunar Orbiter 3, launched early last month, has been busily mapping our celestial neighbor, searching for the choicest landing spots for Apollo (whose first manned mission, I've just learned, has been delayed until next year due to the Apollo 1 fire.) In the course of its surveying, Lunar Orbiter 3 caught a glimpse of Surveyor 1, the first American soft-lander.  It all makes the Moon feel that much closer.

While the newspaper brings us tales of science fiction-made-fact, the stf mags continue to provide the visions of science-to-be.  The latest edition of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction offers several visions of the future: some poetic, some bleak, and some not really worth reading.  Good thing I'm here to tell you which is which, huh?

A pail of tomorrows


by Gray Morrow

Dawn, by Roger Zelazny

Lord Siddhartha, the Buddha, arrives as the capital for a bit of revelry.  There, he is greeted with honors, for he is a prince of this land, redolent with the smells of spice, the bustle of medieval commerce, the prayers of the devoted.  At first glance, Dawn seems as if it will be a pure fantasy in a richly drawn world.  But there are signs that underneath the veneer of ancient India lies a strictly scientific core.

Indeed, we learn quite soon that Siddhartha is actually Sam, one of the original colonists on this world, a planet whose technology has been deliberately restrained by the cabal of the Firsts and their lackeys, the Masters.  Their firm grip lies in their stranglehold on immortality, facilitated by their ability to transmigrate souls from body to body at will.

Sam wants to bring progress to the world.  Can he and his band of rebels undo the work of centuries?

Zelazny's latest novella is reportedly the first part of a longer work, to be titled "Lord of Light".  If it is as expertly rendered as this fine start, then it'll be a good read, indeed!

Four stars.

The Two Lives of Ben Coulter, by Larry Eisenberg

"The greatest disappointment of Ben Coulter's life was his inability to play the violin well."

So begins the tale of a fellow who turned instead to engineering for the purpose, failing to find it there until he co-developed a technique for the remote control of a living being.  Perhaps, at last, he could program mastery into himself.

Most science fiction authors take inspiration from the science news of the day.  Some, like Doc Smith, are actually scientists.  Larry Eisenberg is perhaps unique in the SF community for extrapolating a scientifiction application of his own invention, the remote controlled pacemaker.

His story, if not quite as personally affecting as his crowning scientific achievement, is a pleasant little piece, nonetheless.

Three stars.

Cloud Seeding, by Theodore L. Thomas

In this fictionless vignette, Thomas suggests combining cloud seeding with chemical distribution.  After all, if you're putting stuff in the sky to make rain, why not use fertilizer or poison of what have you.

Thomas forgets that the seeds for the raindrops are necessarily uselessly tiny.  I almost feel as though these little exercises are not to present interesting ideas, but are puzzles for the reader: spot the fallacy and win a hundred dollars!

Two stars.


by Gahan Wilson

Problems of Creativeness, by Thomas M. Disch

The 21st Century is an overcrowded, socialist paradise.  Everyone is on the childless dole, unless they can prove themselves exceptional, finish college, or join the guerrila forces.  Birdie Ludd, the least exceptional of young men, doesn't want to do any of these things.  But for the love of Milly, pretty enough almost to be a movie star, he was willing to endure almost anything.

Less a story and more a slice-of-life from the perspective of an indolent youth, Problems relies mostly on a vivid stream-of-consciousness style and copious use of the first profanity I've read within F&SF's pages.

Three stars, I guess.

The Sword of Pell the Idiot, by Julian F. Grow

Farquhar Orpington-Pell, late a subaltern in Her Majesty's Own Midlothian Dragoons, falls in with a Western doctor on the late 19th Century range.  Their crooked path takes them to a subterranean complex inhabited by aliens.  Things Happen.  Supposed-to-be-funny-but-just-tedious things, capped off by the rather insulting punchline that the transpirings inspired a much better, well known set of books.

Feh.  One star.

"Virtue. 'Tis A Fugue!", by Patrick Meadows

An advanced world refuses the entreaties of humanity to join a terran federation.  Professor Thomas Gunn, a musicologist, provides the key to reaching the hearts of the aliens.  Their language is the culmination of tonality, you see, each sentence its own song.  Our hyper-efficient, sound-codified speak was too declassé to appeal.

It's all a lot of "mun, mun" to me, and in any event, the revelation came out of nowhere.  Indeed, Gunn's story and that of the contact team are completely unrelated until he suddenly appears on the planet in the story's last scenes.

Two stars.

A Matter of Scale, by Isaac Asimov

The Good Doctor goes way out with his latest article.  You know those "the sun is a beachball, and the planets are various small fruit several hundred feet away" models you read in all the science books for kids?  He's decided to go one better, substituting atomic analogs so the distances can be more relatable.

I'm sure it was a fun exercise for him.

Three stars.

Randy's Syndrome, by Brian W. Aldiss

Lastly, another tale of the next, shoulder-to-shoulder, anti-utopian 21st Century.  The foetuses of the world go on strike, refusing to be born into such an awful place.  But is it really a mass strike of the unborn, happy in their womb world of racial memory and distorted, second-hand sensory inputs?  Or is it some kind of planetary neurosis of the mothers?

Whatever it is, it's not science fiction, more a modern myth.  Some might find it clever.

Two stars.

Under the Moon

After such a bright beginning, the April 1967 F&SF stumbles to a finish.  I recognize that science fiction is cautionary as well as aspirational, but I feel one needs to say more than "this future we're heading toward is gonna stink..and by the way, the future is now." 

The Zelazny is worth your time, however.

And, hey, at least the newspaper brings us pretty pictures!



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55 years ago: Science Fact and Fiction