Tag Archives: Clifford D. Simak

Book, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[June 24, 1966] Increments: World's Best Science Fiction: 1966, edited by Donald A. Wollheim and Terry Carr

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by John Boston

Donald A. Wollheim’s and Terry Carr’s World’s Best Science Fiction: 1966—second in this series—is here, so it’s time for the usual pontificating, hand-wringing, viewing with alarm, etc., as one prefers.  This one comes with not one but two blurbs from Judith Merril, their competitor, though the editors say nothing about her anthology series, the next volume of which is due at the end of the year.

The editors have regrettably pulled in their horns a little on the “World” front.  There are no translated stories in this volume, unlike the first; the editors claim that they read plenty of them, but them furriners just don’t cut the mustard.  More precisely, if not more plausibly, “what they have lacked is the advanced sophistication now to be found in the American and British s-f magazines.” Suffice it to say that there are virtues other than “advanced sophistication” and they may often be found outside one’s own culture. 


by Cosimo Scianna

Nor is there anything here from any of the non-specialist markets that have been publishing progressively more SF in recent years.  The only item here that did not originate in the US or UK SF magazines is Arthur C. Clarke’s Sunjammer, originally in Boys’ Life but quickly reprinted last year by New Worlds, and then by Amazing early this year.

So it’s a rather insular party.  But my main complaint last year was that too much of the material was too pedestrian, and the book excluded writers who are pushing the envelope of the genre, like Lafferty, Zelazny, Ellison, and Cordwainer Smith.  The editors seem to have been listening.  This year they’ve got Ellison and Lafferty, though they seem to have missed their chance at Smith, and Zelazny is still among the missing.  More importantly, the book as a whole is livelier than its predecessor.

This is not to say the pedestrian has been entirely banished.  Witness Christopher Anvil’s The Captive Djinn, the only selection from that rotten borough Analog, yet another story about the clever Earthman outwitting cartoonishly stupid aliens.  Anvil has written this story so often he could do it in his sleep, and most likely that is exactly what happened. 

There is a lot more of the standard used furniture of the genre here, but at least it’s mostly done more cleverly and skillfully than dreamed of by Anvil.  In Joseph Green’s The Decision Makers (from Galaxy), Terrestrials covet the watery world Capella G Eight, but it’s already occupied by seal-like amphibians with group intelligence though not much material culture.  Is this the sort of intelligence that should ordinarily bar colonization outright? The “Conscience”—a bureaucrat in charge of making these decisions—thinks so, but proposes to split the baby, allowing colonization but providing that the humans will alter the climate to provide more dry land for the amphibians.  Of course, behind the bien-pensant speechifying, a still small voice says, “We’re just now starting to get rid of colonialism here, and you want to start it up again?” And another: “Ask the American Indians about the promises of colonists.”

Less weighty thoughts are on offer in James H. Schmitz’s Planet of Forgetting (from Galaxy), involving a fairly standard space war scenario with chase on unknown planet, with the wrinkle that some of the local fauna seem to be able to make people briefly forget where they are and what they are doing.  At the end of this smoothly rendered entertainment, suddenly the wrinkle becomes a mountain range. 

Similar cleverness-as-usual is displayed in Fred Saberhagen’s Masque of the Red Shift (from If), one of his popular Berserker series, in which a disguised Berserker robot appears and wreaks havoc on a spaceship occupied by the Emperor of the galaxy and his celebrating sycophants.  But it is promptly outsmarted and done in by the Emperor’s brother, who is resurrected from suspended animation and lures the Berserker into the clutches of a “hypermass,” which seems to be what scientists are starting to call a “black hole.” (Though on second thought, I’m not sure that “cleverness” is quite le mot juste for a story that falls back on the dreary cliche that a galaxy-spanning human civilization will find no better way to govern itself than an Emperor.) Jonathan Brand’s Vanishing Point (If) is an alien semi-contact story, in which the functionaries of the Galactic Federation have created an artificial habitat, a sort of Earth-like theme park complete with human curator, for the human emissaries to wait in and wonder what is really going on.

Engineering fiction is represented by Clarke’s slightly pedantic Sunjammer (as noted, Boys’ Life by way of New Worlds), concerning a yacht race in space, and by Larry Niven’s livelier Becalmed in Hell (F&SF), whose characters—one of them a brain and spinal column in a box, with vehicle controlled by his nervous system—get stuck on the surface of Venus (updated with current science) and have to improvise a primitive solution to get home.

There are a couple of near-future satires representing very different styles and targets of the sardonic.  Ron Goulart’s Calling Dr. Clockwork (Amazing) is a lampoon of the medical system; protagonist visits someone in the hospital, faints at something he sees there, wakes up in a hospital bed himself attended by the eponymous robot doctor, and can’t get out as his diagnosis shifts and things seem to be falling apart in the institution.  Fritz Leiber’s The Good New Days (Galaxy) is a more densely populated slice-of-slapstick extrapolating the welfare state, with a family living in futuristic but cheaply made housing (“They don’t build slums like they used to,” complains one character), with the TV on every minute, and Ma trying to avoid the demands of the medical statistician who wants her vitals, and everyone struggling to get and keep multiple make-work jobs (the protagonist just lost his job as a street-smiler), and things are all falling apart here, too, and a lot of the sentences are almost as long as this one.  The two stories are about equally amusing, which means above standard for Goulart and a little below standard for Leiber.

So that’s the ordinary, and a higher quality of ordinary than last year. 

A few items are unusual if not extraordinary.  R.A. Lafferty’s In Our Block (If) is an amusing tall tale about various odd characters with unusual talents residing in the shacks on a neglected dead-end block, like the woman who will type your letters but doesn’t need a typewriter (she makes the sound effects orally), and the man who ships tons of merchandise out of a seven-foot shack without benefit of warehouse.  It has lots of slapstick but not much edge, unlike the best by this idiosyncratic writer.  Newish writer Lin Carter (two prior appearances in the SF magazines, a lot in the higher reaches of amateur publications), in Uncollected Works (F&SF), extrapolates the old saw about monkeys on typewriters reproducing the works of Shakespeare, in the direction of Clarke’s The Nine Billion Names of God, leading to an unexpected and subtle conclusion.

In Vernor Vinge’s Apartness, from the UK’s New Worlds, the Northern War has destroyed the Northern Hemisphere, and generations later, an expedition from Argentina discovers people encamped in Antarctica, living in primitive conditions, who prove to be the descendants of white South Africans who fled from the uprising that followed the war and eliminated whites from the continent.  (Interesting that this American writer didn’t find a market for it at home.) They are not pleased to be discovered by darker-skinned explorers and try to drive them off.  The well-sketched background makes this more than an exercise in irony or just revenge.

On to the extraordinary—three of them, not a bad showing.  Traveler’s Rest, by David I. Masson, also from New Worlds, depicts a world where time varies with latitude, passing slowly at the North Pole (though subjectively very fast), where a furious—and possibly futile—high-tech war is in progress with an unknown and unseeable enemy.  Life proceeds more mundanely in the southern latitudes.  Protagonist H is relieved from duty, travels south, reorients himself to current society, establishes a career, marries and procreates over the years. He's known now as Hadolarisondamo, since names are longer in the slower latitudes.  Then, middle-aged, he is called back to duty, and arrives 22 minutes after he left.  This world’s nightmarish quality is highlighted by the dense mundane detail of the normal life of the lower latitudes; the result is a tour de force of strangeness.

Harlan Ellison’s “Repent, Harlequin!” said the Ticktockman (from Galaxy) is a sort of dystopian unreduced fraction.  In outline, it’s a simple story of a future world where punctuality is all; if you’re late, your life can be docked.  One man can’t take it any more and dresses up in a clown suit and goes around disrupting things until he gets caught by the Master Timekeeper (the Ticktockman), brainwashed, and forced to recant publicly—though the end hints that his legacy lives on.  In substance, it’s business as usual; in style, it’s a sort of garrulous stand-up routine, and quite a good one.  It’s best read as a purposeful affront to the usual plain functional (or worse) prose of the genre (a reading consistent with the story’s theme) and a persuasive argument for opening up the field a bit stylistically.

The other outstanding item here—best in the book to my taste—is Clifford D. Simak’s Over the River and Through the Woods (Amazing), in which a couple of strange kids appear at a farmhouse in 1896 and address the older woman working in the kitchen as their grandma.  The gist: Ordinary decent person confronted with the extraordinary responds with ordinary decency.  It’s plainly written without a wasted word, deftly developed, asserting its homely credo with quiet restraint—a small masterpiece amounting to a summary of Simak’s career.  Simak is one writer who should ignore Ellison’s advice—and vice versa, no doubt.

The upshot: Not bad.  Better than not bad.  The field is taking small steps away from business as usual, and the usual seems to be getting a little better.  The kid may amount to something some day.

[Come join us at Portal 55, Galactic Journey's real-time lounge! Talk about your favorite SFF, chat with the Traveler and co., relax, sit a spell…]




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Magazine/Anthology, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[June 10, 1966] Summer Reruns (July 1966 Fantastic)

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by Victoria Silverwolf

Old Series Never Die, They Just Fade Away

Summertime is right around the corner, here in the Northern Hemisphere, and all patriotic Americans know what that means; reruns on television. Not only does this save the production companies money, it allows defunct programs to continue to appear on TV screens long after they're gone, like ghosts haunting a house. (Of course, they're easier to exorcise than traditional specters; just pull the plug.)

Two popular, critically acclaimed, and long-running series recently cast off this mortal coil, ready to enter the monochromatic afterlife of reruns.

Late last month, the courtroom drama Perry Mason slammed down the gavel for the last time with The Case of the Final Fade-Out. The story involved a television studio, so a large number of crew members made cameo appearances, pretty much as themselves. There was also a very special guest star.


That's executive producer Gail Patrick Jackson on the left and Hollywood columnist Norma Lee Browning on the right. The fellow in the middle? That's bestselling author Erle Stanley Gardner, creator of Perry Mason, dressed up for his role as a judge in the final episode.

At the start of this month, The Dick Van Dyke Show came to a conclusion with the appropriately titled episode The Last Chapter. Van Dyke's character, television writer Rob Petrie, finishes the book he's been working on for five years, and looks back on his life.


Because The Last Chapter was really just an excuse to reuse sequences from previous episodes, I'm offering you this scene from the penultimate episode, The Gunslinger. Surrounding Van Dyke in this Western parody are cast regulars Mary Tyler Moore and Richard Deacon.

I'm sure that both of these hit series will be reincarnated in American living rooms for quite a while.

Not all summer television programming consists of reruns, to be sure. There are so-called summer replacement series as well. In a week or so, we'll enjoy (or avoid) the first episode of The Dean Martin Summer Show (not to be confused with The Dean Martin Show, which has been going on since last year. Are you still with me?) It will be hosted by the comedy team of Dan Rowan and Dick Martin.


Rowan on the left and Martin on the right, in a scene from their 1958 Western spoof Once Upon a Horse. I wonder if they'll have any success as TV hosts.

A Home Run The First Time At Bat

Although it's not unknown for popular songs of yesteryear to return to the charts — auditory reruns, if you will — listeners are usually searching for something original. Newcomer Percy Sledge offers an notable example with his smash hit When a Man Loves a Woman. This passionate, soulful ballad, currently Number One in the USA, is not only the first song recorded by Sledge, it is the first song recorded in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, a city famous for its music studios, to reach that position.


Your fans mean it, Mister Sledge.

I've Seen This All Before

The reason I've been talking about reruns, before I get to the contents of the latest issue of Fantastic, isn't just the fact that they've been filling up the magazine with reprints for some time now. As we'll see, many of the old stories in this issue have reappeared several times before. Reruns of reruns, so to speak. Whether fans of imaginative literature will be willing to spend four bits for fiction they may have already read in collections or anthologies remains to be seen.


Cover art by Frank R. Paul.

Predictably, the front cover is also a rerun.


The back cover of the June 1943 issue of Amazing Stories. It looks better in the original version.

Before I get to the reruns, however, let's start with something new.

Just Like a Man, by Chad Oliver


Illustrations by Gray Morrow.

Three men are in an aircraft, flying over the surface of an Earth-like planet. A sudden storm forces them to abandon the vehicle, stranding the trio in an area resembling an African savannah. Because the place is full of leonine predators, they hightail it to the relative safety of a nearby rainforest.


Climbing one of the planet's gigantic trees in order to get away from the hungry cats.

They wind up far above the ground, among an unsuspected community of highly intelligent primates. These mysterious creatures help them survive, and even offer the possibility of reaching their home base, located five hundred miles away across uncharted wilderness.


Among the primates, who are not as hostile as shown here.

This is a decent tale of adventure, and the enigmatic primates are interesting. The planet is so similar to Earth — the feline predators are pretty much just lions — that you might forget you're reading a science fiction story. Overall, it's worth reading, if not outstanding in any way.

Three stars.

The Trouble With Ants, by Clifford D. Simak


Cover art by Robert Gibson Jones.

From the January 1951 issue of Fantastic Adventures comes this final story in the author's famous City series. (By the way, the title of this work was changed to The Simple Way when it appeared in book form.)


Illustration by Rod Ruth. From this point on, all the illustrations are reruns from the original appearances of the stories.

In the far future, people are gone from Earth, with the exception of one fellow in suspended animation. Long ago, humans increased the intelligence of dogs, gave them the power of speech, and built robots to serve their needs. The canines, in turn, taught other animals to speak.

Complicating matters is the fact that a man caused ants to develop technology of their own, including robots the size of fleas. Now the ants are constructing a building, for an unknown purpose, which threatens to take over the planet.

An ancient robot returns from humanity's new home in a mysterious fashion. It seeks out the man in suspended animation as part of its quest to understand the ants.

Brought together as a fix-up novel in 1952, the City series won the International Fantasy Award the next year. It is usually considered a classic of science fiction, and has been reprinted many times.


One of the many editions of this work. Cover art by Ed Valigursky.

Highly imaginative, and with a sweeping vision of the immensity of time, Simak's tales also have a gentleness and intimacy that touches the reader's heart. The mood is one of quiet melancholy, and the acceptance of the fact that all things will pass away.

Although SF fans are likely to have read this story before, its quality makes it a welcome repeat. (One can rarely say the same thing about television reruns, or else viewers would stay glued to their screens.)

Five stars.

Where Is Roger Davis?, by David V. Reed


Cover art by Robert Fuqua.

Let's take a break from stuff that has already been reprinted multiple times, and take a look at the first reappearance of this yarn, taken from the yellowing pages of the May 1939 issue of Amazing Stories. (The author is unknown to me, but I have discovered that he also writes for comics, particularly Batman. Apparently a couple of episodes of the new television series are based on his scripts for the comic book.)


Illustrations by Julian S. Krupa.

Two young men working for a New York City tour bus encounter an invisible, telepathic Martian. One of them is seduced by the alien's plot to take over the world, and soon becomes a megalomaniac.


The fact that the Martian makes robbing a bank as easy as pie is another factor in his decision.

The other fellow has to figure out a way to keep the Martians from conquering Earth.

The mood of the story changes drastically from light comedy at the start to grim tragedy by the conclusion. Given the year it was written, I wonder if the dictatorial intentions of the first man were influenced by the rise of Fascism.

The author claims that this story is a true account, sent to him by the second man. There are also bits of imaginary news articles scattered throughout, in an attempt at verisimilitude. These don't work very well, particularly the long one at the end. The only thing I found mildly intriguing, if implausible, was the way the hero manages to plot against beings who can read his mind.

Two stars.

Almost Human, by Tarleton Fiske


Cover art by Harold W. McCauley.

The introductory blurb makes it clear that the author of this story, reprinted from the June 1943 issue of Fantastic Adventures, is really Robert Bloch, using a rather absurd pseudonym. (As is common practice, this was done because he had another story in the same issue under his own name.)


Illustration by Rod Ruth.

A hoodlum makes his way into the secret laboratory of a brilliant scientist. His moll has been working for the guy, so the crook knows the genius has created a robot. The machine is being educated like a child. The gangster teaches it to be an invincible criminal, and to kill without mercy. As you'd expect, things don't work out very well.

This piece reads like hardboiled fiction from a crime pulp. The final scene is particularly gruesome, in typical Bloch style. The author shows a certain knack for the Hammett/Chandler mode, but that's about all I can say for it. Not that great a story, but somebody thought it was worth reviving for an anthology.


Cover art by Jack Gaughan.

Two stars.

Satisfaction Guaranteed, by Isaac Asimov


Cover art by Robert Gibson Jones.

Speaking of robots, here's one of several stories about the robopsychologist Susan Calvin by the Good Doctor, from the April 1951 issue of Amazing Stories.


Illustration by Enoch Sharp.

Calvin only plays a minor part in this story, which focuses on a rather mousy, insecure housewife. Her husband works for the same robotics firm as Calvin, so he brings home a test model of a new machine. It looks like a handsome young man, and is designed to be helpful around the house in many different ways. The husband goes off on a business trip, leaving his wife alone with the robot.

The housewife is frightened of it at first, but soon learns to accept it. It even helps her with home decorating, clothing, and makeup, so she learns self-confidence. A final, unexpected gesture on the part of the machine, seemingly out of character for a robot, wins her the envy of her snobbish acquaintances. Susan Calvin explains why the machine's action was a perfectly logical way of obeying the famous First Law of Robotics.


Anonymous cover art for a British edition.

The author must be fond of this tale, because he has already included it in two different collections of his work. The one shown above, as the title indicates, includes stories that take place on Earth rather than in space, despite the misleading illustration and blurb. The story also appears in an omnibus that brings together his two robot novels as well as several shorter works.


Cover art by Thomas Chibbaro.

Besides that, it is also included in the same Roger Elwood anthology as Bloch's story. My sources in the television industry tell me that it is being adapted for the British series Out of the Unknown, and should appear late this year. (Will there be American reruns? One can only hope.)

Is it worth all this attention? Well, it's not a bad yarn, if not the greatest robot story Asimov ever wrote. The housewife is something of a stereotype of an overly emotional female, dependent on a man for her happiness. (This is in sharp contrast to the highly intelligent and independent Doctor Susan Calvin.) At some point you may think that the author is violating his own rules about robot behavior, but it's all explained at the end.

Three stars.

A Portfolio – Virgil Finlay

I'm not sure if I should even discuss this tiny collection of illustrations by the great artist, but at least I can share them with you.


For The New Adam (1939) by Stanley G. Weinbaum. The magazine calls it The New Atom, which is an egregious error.


For Mirrors of the Queen (1948) by Richard S. Shaver.


For The Silver Medusa (1948) by Alexander Blade (pseudonym for H. Hickey.)

What can I say? His work is stunning.

Five stars.

Satan Sends Flowers, by Henry Kuttner


Cover art by Robert Frankenberg.

The January/February 1953 issue of Fantastic is the source of this variation on an old theme.


Illustrations by Tom Beecham.

A man sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for immortality. (The premise is similar to that of the Twilight Zone episode Escape Clause, but the twist ending is different.) He ensures that he will remain young, healthy, and all that, so Satan can't play any tricks on him. Obviously, he figures he'll never have to pay up.

The Devil demands surety in the form of certain subconscious memories the fellow possesses. After assuring him that he won't even know he's lost anything, the man agrees. Unafraid of either earthly punishment or damnation, he lives a life of total depravity.


His first crime is the murder of his mother.

Eventually, he persuades the Devil to give him back what he lost, even though Satan warns him that he won't like it. This turns out to be a bad idea.

Like most other stories in this issue, this one has already appeared in a book. (It acquired the new title By These Presents.)


Back and front cover art by Richard Powers.

I should mention that the husband-and-wife team of Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore almost always collaborated, even if the resulting story appeared under only one name. Whoever might have been responsible for whatever parts of this work, it's a reasonably engaging tale. I'm not sure I really accept the explanation for what the man's unconscious memories represent, but I was willing to go along with it.

Three stars.

The Way Home, by Theodore Sturgeon


Cover art by Barye Phillips.

This quiet story comes from the April/May 1953 issue of Amazing Stories.


Illustrations by David Stone.

A boy runs away from home. Along the way he meets a wealthy man and his glamourous female companion, in their fancy car; a man with an injured hand who has been all over the world; and a pilot in a beautiful airplane. Without giving too much away, it's clear from the start that these men represent possible future versions of himself.


Is this the road to the future, or to home?

Like Asimov's story, this piece has already appeared in two of the author's collections, but with a slight change in the title.


Cover art by Mel Hunter.

(I'm not sure if I should really count these as two different collections, because all the stories in Thunder and Roses already appeared, along with others, in A Way Home. Such are the vagaries of the publishing industry.)


Cover art by Peter Curl.

In any case, this is a beautifully written little story, subtle and evocative. To say much more would be to ruin the delicate mood it creates.

Five stars.

Worth Tuning In Again?


Cartoon by somebody called Frosty, from the same magazine as Satan Sends Flowers.

I wouldn't call this issue bad at all, although there were a couple of disappointing stories.  It's no big surprise that the Simak and the Sturgeon were excellent, and Finlay's art is always a delight.  It's enough to make you want to tear yourself away from all those reruns on television and turn to some literary reruns instead.


In the world of cuisine, reruns are known as leftovers.

Tune in to KGJ, our radio station!  Nothing but the newest and best hits!  Even the reruns are great!




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Magazine/Anthology, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[April 8, 1966] Search Parties (May 1966 Fantastic)

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by Victoria Silverwolf

Keep Watching the Skies!

The good citizens of Michigan were recently reminded of the warning I've quoted above, from 1951's The Thing from Another World (a loose cinematic adaptation of John W. Campbell's 1938 novella Who Goes There?).


Father and son describe what they saw.

Folks in Washtenaw County (just look for the city of Ann Arbor on the map, and you're smack dab in the middle of it) reported seeing strange lights in the sky last month. Supposedly, a UFO even landed in a swampy area near the tiny community of Dexter Township.


Looks like a classic flying saucer to me.

About one hundred people witnessed these phenomena. Naturally, the federal government got involved. They sent astronomer J. Allen Hynek to the area to check things out. Reportedly, he thinks at least some of the sightings can be explained as swamp gas. One politician isn't so sure.


Note that the article uses the phrase marsh gas. One person's swamp is another person's marsh, I suppose.

Gerald R. Ford is a United States Congressman from the Grand Rapids district of Michigan, so this situation strikes close to home for him. (He's a Republican, and the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives. Maybe this event will make him famous.)

Here's a picture of Representative Ford and wife Betty on a recent fishing trip, so you'll recognize him if his face shows up in the news in times to come.

It Makes a Fellow Proud to Be a Soldier

While some Americans are tracking down UFO's, others are searching for ways to justify their nation's involvement in the conflict in Vietnam. As a counterpoint to the many demonstrations against the war, a patriotic song celebrating the heroism of the Army Special Forces has been at the top of the charts for several weeks. The Ballad of the Green Berets, sung by Sergeant Barry Sadler, seems to have struck just the right note with many conservative music lovers.


Personally, I prefer the Tom Lehrer song I have alluded to above.

Hunting Through the Pages

Meanwhile, I've been searching for good reading. Take, for example, the latest issue of Fantastic. Fittingly, many of the stories feature characters who are on quests of one kind or another.


Art by Frank R. Paul.

(I might add that I had to search through piles of old pulp magazines to find the original source of the magazine's cover art. It turned out to be the back cover of the September 1944 issue of Amazing Stories.)


Confused? We'll get to an explanation of this weird scene later in the issue.

The Phoenix and the Mirror, by Avram Davidson

Let's begin our journey with a new novella from the former editor of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.


Illustrations by Gray Morrow.

The author's introductory note explains that the ancient Roman poet Virgil, author of the Aeneid, was depicted as a sorcerer in legends of the Middle Ages. (Davidson prefers the spelling Vergil, which I will use for the name of the fictional character in this story. He also prefers nigromancer to necromancer and Renascence to Renaissance, but that's typical erudite eccentricity on his part.) He also notes that this tale is the first part of a series to be called Vergil Magus.

Anyway, we begin in medias res, with Vergil trying to escape from an underground labyrinth full of malevolent manticores. (These are not the lion-scorpions of myth, but something more like large, clever weasels.) He manages to get out, winding up at the palace of an aristocrat with magical powers. She forces him to undertake the extremely difficult quest of creating a very special enchanted mirror, so she can see where in the world her daughter might be. He can't say no, because she steals one of his souls.

You read that right. People in this world have more than one soul, it seems. Losing one isn't fatal, but it seems to be so traumatic an event that Vergil feels compelled to undertake the nearly impossible task. He has to obtain unrefined tin and copper ore from the far ends of the known world, and then form the mirror through a long and laborious process. After many struggles, with the help of his alchemist sidekick, he manages to complete this onerous undertaking.


The mirror in use.

That isn't the end of his troubles, however. After instantly falling in love with the daughter after one glimpse in the mirror, he treks through desert wastelands, with an enigmatic Phoenician at his side, to rescue her from a Cyclops.


The lady and the cyclops.

This isn't the typical brutal, dimwitted Cyclops from mythology, but an intelligent, even sensitive creature. Multiple plot twists follow, and we find out why a phoenix is mentioned in the title.

Davidson keeps his baroque writing style under control here, and the plot is cleverly crafted. The background, which is kind of a mixture of the ancient world and the Middle Ages, with a strong dose of pure fantasy, is unique and interesting. Some readers may be impatient with several pages describing in great detail the exact method of creating the mirror, but I found it fascinating.

My one major complaint is that Vergil's lengthy and dangerous voyage to obtain copper ore is skipped over almost entirely, related in just a few sentences of flashback. I would like to learn more about his adventures there. Maybe Davidson plans to expand this novella into a novel, as authors of science fiction and fantasy often do. Otherwise, I greatly enjoyed this witty and imaginative excursion into a past that never existed.

Four stars.

Seven Came Back, by Clifford D. Simak


Cover art by Robert Gibson Jones.

As usual, the rest of the magazine is filled up with reprints. Let's start with a tale from the pages of the October 1950 issue of Amazing Stories.


Illustrations by Arthur Hutah.

The setting is Mars, the favorite world of SF writers. Like many fictional versions of the red planet, this is a place where humans can survive without spacesuits. It's still a very dangerous environment, however, with all sorts of deadly creatures living in the endless desert.

The protagonist is on a quest to find the fabled lost city of the nearly extinct Martians. He hires a couple of tough guys to guide him through the wasteland. As we'll see, this turns out to be a big mistake.

Six Martians show up at their camp. It seems that they're the last of their kind, and they think that the men can lead them to a seventh. The Martians have seven sexes, you see, and this is their last chance to reproduce. (That must certainly make things complicated.)

If the humans help them out, they'll take them to the city, which is supposed to be full of fabulous treasures. The two roughnecks take off on their own, leaving the protagonist alone in the deadly desert.

Things get a lot stranger after this, and I don't want to give too much away. Suffice to say that the main character manages to survive, wins an unexpected ally, and has a mystical experience at the city.


The lost Martian city.

At first, I thought this was more or less a science fiction Western, with the hero heading for a showdown with the no-good polecats who left him to die. I have to admit that the plot went in completely unexpected directions. I'm still pondering the meaning of the ending. The author mixes space adventure with his usual warmth and concern for all living things and a touch of Bradbury's magical Mars.

Four stars.

The Third Guest, by B. Traven

The mysterious author of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre offers a fable of life and death that appeared in the March-April 1953 issue of Fantastic.


Cover art by Richard Powers.

Like everything else about the author, the provenance of this story is puzzling. As far as I have been able to determine, it was written under the title The Healer, was first published in German in 1950 as Macario, and somehow wound up with its current title when it showed up in Fantastic.


Illustrations by Tom O'Sullivan.

One of the few facts known about the author is that he — or she? — lives in Mexico, the setting for most of his — or her? — fiction. This tale is no exception. It takes place when the region was still known as New Spain, during the colonial period.

Macario, a dirt-poor woodcutter, barely manages to feed himself, his wife, and their many children. For most of his life, his greatest dream has been to eat an entire roast turkey by himself. Over several years, his wife saves the tiny payments she receives for doing chores for slightly less poverty-stricken folks. She buys a turkey, prepares it exquisitely, and presents it to her husband, telling him to go into the woods and devour it alone.

Before he can enjoy the delicious feast, however, three strange visitors show up. The first is a sinister fellow, richly dressed. He offers Macario enormous wealth for a share of the turkey. Macario refuses.


The first guest.

The second one is poorly dressed, gentle, and saintly. Despite his kindly manner, Macario again refuses to share his meal. The visitor blesses him anyway.


The second guest.

The third guest, as the title suggests, is the one most vital to the plot. Macario knows he cannot refuse this cadaverous figure, so he at least manages to keep half of the turkey for himself. In exchange, the guest gives him an elixir that will cure all ills, but only if the visitor chooses who will live and who will die. The rest of the story follows Macario as he wins a reputation as a great healer. A summons from the Viceroy of New Spain, whose child is dying, leads to a final confrontation with the third guest.

This is a remarkable fantasy, with the simplicity of a folktale but the sophistication of great literature. It appeared in The Best American Short Stories 1954 (edited by Martha Foley), so I'm not alone in my opinion. It was even made into a Mexican movie in 1960, which you might be able to catch at your local arthouse cinema, if you don't mind subtitles.

Five stars.

The Tanner of Kiev, by Wallace West

The last time we met this author, it was with a reprint of the antifeminist dystopia The Last Man, to which my esteemed colleague John Boston awarded one star. Even if we ignore that story's political stance, it's poorly written. Will this tale, from the October 1944 issue of Fantastic Adventures, be any better? It could hardly be worse.


Cover art by J. Allen St. John.

The first thing to keep in mind is that this is a story about World War Two, written and published during the height of the conflict. You have to expect Our Side to be heroic Good Guys, and Their Side to be sadistic Bad Guys. In particular, the Soviets are definitely on the side of the angels here.


Illustrations by Malcolm Smith.

The hero parachutes behind enemy lines in Nazi-occupied Ukraine. His mission is to deliver a radio transmitter to the underground resistance. Things get weird pretty quickly, as he runs into an immortal magician from Russian folklore.


The wizard and his pets.

Next thing you know, he's at the chicken-legged hut of the legendary old witch Baba Yaga. None of this supernatural stuff seems to bother him, and soon he's on his way into Kiev. He contacts the Russian guerillas, including the pretty female one with whom he falls in love. With the help of the warlock and witch, as well as a talking squirrel and a were-rat, the brave Soviets overcome the craven Germans.

Given the fact that, inevitably, a wartime story is going to paint things in black and white, this isn't a bad yarn at all. It's pretty well written, and the wild and wooly plot held my interest. The changes in mood from whimsical to romantic to horrific are disconcerting, and the love story is a little sappy, but's it worth a read.

Three stars.

Wolf Pack, by Walter M. Miller, Jr.


Cover art by Leo Summers.

The Second World War is also the background for this story, from the September-October 1953 issue of Fantastic, but this time the battle rages in Italy instead of the Soviet Union.


Illustrations by Bernard Krigstein.

The main character is the pilot of an American bomber who has already flown nearly fifty missions, raining destruction from the skies. He has recurring dreams about a alluring woman he thinks of as La Femme, or just La. It would be easy to dismiss this as a predictable fantasy for a young man deprived of female company for an extended period of time, or as an idealized image of his girlfriend back home. Yet she seems very real, and he appears to be in some kind of telepathic communication with her, even while awake.


The woman known as La.

During his latest bombing run, he nearly aborts the mission, terrified that he might destroy her. The other members of the crew have to physically restrain him to complete their gruesome task.


A bomber's world.

The author was a radio operator and tail gunner during World War Two, participating in as many bombing missions over Italy as the story's protagonist. It's no surprise, then, that the details of life as a bomber pilot are extremely realistic and convincing.   Miller took part in the bombing of the Benedictine Abbey at Monte Cassino in 1944, which certainly had an influence on the writing of his award-winning novel A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959), already considered a modern classic.

Unlike the previous story, which, understandably, was full of gung-ho patriotic glory (much like Sergeant Sadler's hit song, come to think of it) this is a somber, emotionally powerful account of the way that war turns men into machines, and how the innocent suffer as much as the guilty.

Five stars.

Betelgeuse, in Orion: The Walking Cities of Frank R. Paul, by Anonymous

I wasn't sure if I should even bother discussing this little article, but what the heck. It originally appeared under the slightly different title Stories of the Stars: Betelgeuse in Orion, supposedly by a Sergeant Morris J. Steele in the September 1944 issue of Amazing Stories. This is probably a pseudonym for the magazine's editor, Raymond A. Palmer, but I can't prove that.


Cover art by Julian S. Krupa.

Anyway, after some facts about the giant star, we get wild speculation about the beings who might live there. It's pretty much just a way to fill up some space.

Two stars.

The End of the Search

Well, my search for enjoyable fiction certainly paid off! This was an outstanding issue. Even the worst story was pretty good, and the best were excellent. It makes me ponder my skepticism about reprinting old stuff. After all, I don't complain when an movie from yesteryear shows up on television, as long as it's a good one.


Check your local listings to see if this decade-old classic will be showing in your area any time soon.




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Magazine/Anthology, Serial

[September 14, 1965] The Face is Familiar (October 1965 Galaxy)

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by Gideon Marcus

In all the old familiar places…

All summer long, the Traveler family's television tradition has included the game show, Password.  Though it may seem odd that such a program should rival in importance to us such stand-outs as Secret Agent and Burke's Law, if you read my recent round-up of the excellent TV of the 64-65 season, you'll understand why we like the show.

Sadly, the September 9 episode marked the beginning of a hiatus and, perhaps, an outright cancellation of the show.  No more primetime Password, nor the daily afternoon editions either.  Whither host extraordinaire Allen Ludden?

Apparently, What's my Line!  Both Ludden and his wife, Betty White, were the mystery guests last week; I guess they had the free time.  They were absolutely charming together, and it's clear they are still very much in love two years into their marriage.

Speaking of anniversaries, Galaxy, one of the genre's most esteemed monthly digests, is celebrating its 15th.  To mark the occasion, editor Fred Pohl has assembled a table of contents contributed by some of the magazine's biggest names (though I note with sadness that neither Evelyn Smith nor Katherine MacLean are represented among them).  These "all-star" issues (as Fantasy and Science Fiction calls them) often fail to impress as much as ones larded with newer writers, but one never knows until one reads, does one?

So, without further ado, let's get stuck in and see how Galaxy is doing, fifteen years on:

The issue at hand


by John Pederson, Jr.

The Age of the Pussyfoot (Part 1 of 3), by Frederik Pohl

The editor of Galaxy has a penchant for providing a great deal of his own material to his magazines.  Normally, I'd be worried about this.  It could be a sign of an editor taking advantage of position to guarantee sale of work that might not cut the mustard.  And even if the work is worthy, there is the real danger of overcommitment when one takes on the double role of boss and employee.

That said, some editors just find creation too fun to give up (yours truly included) and in the case of Pohl, he usually turns in a good tale, as he has for decades, so I won't begrudge him the practice.

Indeed, Pussyfoot is a welcome addition to the mag.  A variation on the classic The Sleeper Awakes theme, in this case, the time traveling is done via the rather new technology of cryogenics.  Indeed, protagonist Charles Forester, 37-year old erstwhile fireman, is one of the very first corpses to be frozen circa 1969, and wakes up in the overcrowded but utopian world of 2527 A.D.


by Wallace Wood

Feeling immortal (with some justification – no one really dies anymore; they just get put on ice until they can be brought back, often within minutes) and also wealthy (but $250,000 doesn't stretch as far as it used to) Forester takes a while to really come to grips with his new situation, always just a touch too clueless for his own good, and perhaps plausibility.

Very quickly, he learns that things are not perfect in the future: being immortal means one can be murdered on a lark and the culprits go unpunished.  Inflation has rendered Forester's fortune valueless.  He must get a job, any job.  But the one he finds that will employ an unskilled applicant turns out to be the one no one wants: personal assistant to a disgusting alien!

There's some really good worldbuilding stuff in this story, particularly the little rod-shaped "joymakers" everyone carries that are telephone, computer terminal, personal assistant, drug dispenser, and more.  I also liked the inclusion of inflation, which is usually neglected in stories of the future.  It all reads a bit like a Sheckley story writ long, something Sheckley's always had trouble with.  It's not perfect, but it is fun and just serious enough to avoid being farce.

Four stars for now,

Inside Man, by H. L. Gold

The first editor of Galaxy started out as a writer, but even though he turned over the helm of his magazine four years ago (officially – it was probably earlier), he hasn't published in a long time, so it's exciting to see his byline again.  Inside Man is a nice, if nor particularly momentous, story about a fellow with a telepathy for machines.  And since machines are usually in some state of disrepair, it's not a very pleasant gift.

Three stars.

The Machines, Beyond Shylock, by Ray Bradbury

Judith Merril sums up Bradbury beautifully in this month's F&SF, describing him as the avatar of science fiction to the lay population, but deemed a mixed bag by the genre community.  His short poem, about how the human spirit will always have something robots do not, is typically oversentimental and not a little opaque.  And it's not just the font Pohl used.

Two stars.

Fifteen Years of Galaxy — Thirteen Years of F.Y.I., by Willy Ley

The science columns of Willy Ley comprised one of main draws for Galaxy back when I first got my subscription.  In this article, Ley goes over the various topics of moment he's covered over the last decade and a half, providing updates where appropriate.  It's a neat little tour of his tenure with the magazine.

Four stars.

A Better Mousehole, by Edgar Pangborn

Pangborn, like Bradbury, is another of the genre's sentimentalists.  When he does it well, he does it better than anyone.  This weird story, told in hard-to-read first person, said protagonist being a bartender who finds alien, thought-controlling blue bugs in his shop, is a slog.

Two stars.

Three to a Given Star, by Cordwainer Smith

Oh frabjous day!  A new Instrumentality story!  This one tells the tale of three unique humans sent off to pacify the gabbling, cackling cannibals of Linschoten XV: "Folly", once a beautiful woman and now a 11-meter spaceship; "SAMM" a quarter-mile long bronze statue possessing a frightening armory; and "Finsternis", a giant cube as dark as night, and with the ability to extinguish suns.


by Gray Morrow

Guest appearances are made by Casher O' Neill and Lady Ceralta, two of humanity's most powerful telepaths whom we met in previous stories.

I've made no secret of my admiration for the Instrumentality stories, which together create a sweeping and beautiful epic of humanity's far future.  Three has a bit of a perfunctory character, somehow, and thus misses being a classic.

Still, even feeble Smith earns three stars.

Small Deer, by Clifford D. Simak

In Deer, a fellow makes a time machine, goes back to see the death of the dinosaurs, and discovers that aliens were rounding them up for meat… and that they might come back again now that humanity has teemed over the Earth.

A throwback of a story and definitely not up to Simak's standard.  A high two (or a low three if you're feeling generous and/or missed the last thirty years of science fiction).

The Good New Days, by Fritz Leiber

On an overcrowded Earth, steady work is a thing of the past.  Folks get multiple part time gigs to fill the time, including frivolous occupations like smiling at people on the way to work.  Satirical but overindulgent, I had trouble getting through it.  Two stars.

Founding Father, by Isaac Asimov

Dr. A was lured back into the world of fiction after an eight-year almost complete hiatus; apparently he can be cajoled into almost anything.  In Father, based on this month's cover, five marooned space travelers try to cleanse a planet of its poisonous ammonia content before their dwindling oxygen supplies run out.

It's a fair story, but I had real issues with the blitheness with which the astronauts plan to destroy an entire ecosystem that requires ammonia to survive.  In the end, when terrestrial plants manage to take root on the planet, spelling doom for the native life, it's heralded as a victory.

Two stars.

Shall We Have a Little Talk?, by Robert Sheckley


by Jack Gaughan

Bob Sheckley was a Galaxy staple (under his own name and several pseudonyms) for most of the 1950s.  His short stories are posssibly the best of anyone's, but he eschewed them for novels that just didn't have the same brilliance.

Well, he's back, and his first short story in Galaxy in ages is simply marvelous.  It involves a representative of a rapacious Terra who travels to a distant world to establish relations, said contact a prelude to its ultimate subjugation.  But first, he has to establish meaningful communications.

Fiercely satirical and hysterical to boot, Talk is Sheckley in full form.

Mun, er, five stars.

Summing up

In the end, this all-star issue was, as usual, something of a mixed bag.  Still, there's enough gold here to show that the river Gold established is still well worth panning.  Here's to another fifteen years!

[Journey Press now has three excellent titles for your reading pleasure! Why not pick up a copy or three? Not only will you enjoy them all — you'll be helping out the Journey!]




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Magazine/Anthology, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[August 10, 1965] Binary Arithmetic (September 1965 Fantastic)

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by Victoria Silverwolf

Yin and Yang


An ancient Chinese representation of the topic I will discuss.

Up and down. Left and right. Hot and cold. Female and male. Good and evil.

There's a natural tendency for human beings to think in pairs of contrasting concepts, sometimes in opposition, sometimes complementing each other. Such dualities are useful, but are often greatly oversimplified, painting everything as black or white, and ignoring the many shades of gray between.

I thought about this, oddly enough, when I heard the news just yesterday that Singapore is no longer part of the nation of Malaysia, as it had been since winning full independence from the United Kingdom in 1963. Instead, it is now a sovereign nation.


Lee Kuan Yew, Prime Minister of Singapore, announces the city-state's new status at a press conference.

Political differences between the central Malaysian government and Singapore led to the split, as well as strife between persons of Malay ethnicity and the mostly ethic Chinese population of Singapore. It's not yet clear whether Malaysia kicked Singapore out, or if the city left of its own free will.

This division of one nation into two made me think about the way our minds see things as dyads. I even perceived recent hit songs as a pair of opposites.

For most of July, (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones was at the top of the American music charts. It's a hard-driving tune, sure to grab your attention the first time you hear it.


And it's now my favorite rock 'n' roll song.

As if the gods of record stores and jukeboxes wanted to help me prove my theory of duality, the song that reached Number One in the USA this month could not be more different. Herman's Hermits have a smash on their hands with I'm Henry VIII, I Am, a comic music hall ditty that goes all the way back to 1910.


The success of this very silly song may foretell the end of the world.

New and old. Serious and funny. Good and bad. (OK, that last one is a matter of opinion.) Even when it comes to entertainment, things seem to exist as opposites, at least in our heads. The latest issue of Fantastic is no exception.

It's Two — Two — Two Magazines In One!

I trust the makers of Certs will forgive me for making fun of the well-known slogan from their TV commercials. It's appropriate for the revised version of Fantastic, which combines one new story with a quartet of reprints.


Art by the late Frank R. Paul.

That cover looks pretty old-fashioned, doesn't it? That's because it first appeared more than a quarter of a century ago, as the back cover of the very first issue of Fantastic Adventures, May 1939.


Look familiar?

The new publisher of Fantastic obviously intends to reuse as much material from the past as possible. Also dating back to the innocent days before World War Two is the following now-dated scientific explanation for why a Martian might look something like the being on the right. (The one on the left is a human, in case you were wondering.)


The redundancy in Item F makes me giggle.

Before this place becomes, as Tom Lehrer put it in Bright College Days, soggy with nostalgia, let's take a look at something hot off the presses.

Stardock, by Fritz Leiber

Starting off the issue is a new adventure of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, whom we've met many times before.


Illustrations by Gray Morrow. You can already tell that a lot is going to happen.

This time we're in Fafhrd's homeland, a place of snow and ice. A cryptic bit of doggerel leads our heroes to a chain of mountains. In search of a fabulous treasure, the ill-matched pair make their way, slowly and painfully, up a gigantic peak. Along for the fun is a large white feline, who becomes as important a member of the team as the giant Northerner and the diminutive Southerner.


They've already made a long, hard climb before they even begin to scale the highest mountain.

All kinds of challenges and mysteries stand in their way. The Gray Mouser has visions of a green, mask-like face, and Fafhrd experiences dreams of touching a woman he can't see. Two rivals are after the same treasure, and they have a pair of unusual companions. Most bizarre of all, gigantic invisible beasts, something like flying mantas, carry equally unseen enemies.


And what would a sword-and-sorcery yarn be without a monster to fight?

Eventually, the bold duo reach the top of the mountain, encounter the beings who live inside, and find out who led them there, and why.


A naked Gray Mouser and a dwarf who isn't naked.

Lieber's imagination runs wild here, and his writing is simply gorgeous. A lecture by Fafhrd, in which he describes each mountain in poetic language, is a thing of beauty. The trek up the ice-covered peak is described in exquisite, vivid detail. (I suggest reading this story while wrapped in a blanket and sipping hot cocoa.) There are enough fantasy elements for a full-length novel, and the plot has plenty of twists and turns to keep the reader's attention.

Five stars.

Sally, by Isaac Asimov

The rest of the magazine consists entirely of reprints. The first comes from the pen of the Good Doctor.  It first appeared in the May/June 1953 issue of the same publication.


Art by W. T. Mars. At least Ike got his name on the cover.

As you might expect, the story deals with robots, of a sort. In this case, we're talking about self-driving automobiles, with positronic motors that are also their brains. The narrator runs a sort of retirement home for these intelligent vehicles, once their owners have passed on. The cars have personalities, as far as their caretaker is concerned. The sedans are boys, and the convertibles are girls, including the title character.

An unscrupulous fellow, one of Asimov's few villains, tries to purchase the retired cars, so he can put their brains into different bodies. The idea is that he can then make a profit, selling old autos for new. The narrator, as horrified as he would be if the man was suggesting vivisection on people, refuses. The Bad Guy returns, using force this time to get his way. Let's just say that things don't work out for him.

There aren't a lot of surprises in the plot, unless you count the fact that the author's famous Three Laws of Robotics don't apply here. As usual for Doctor A, he writes clearly and efficiently.


Illustration by Emsh. All the illustrations for previously published stories are also reprints.

Automobile enthusiasts, among whom I cannot count myself, will probably get an extra kick out of this story. I thought it was worth reading, while waiting to have your vehicle fixed at the car shop.

Three stars.

"You'll Never Go Home Again", by Clifford D. Simak

This story first appeared in the July 1951 issue of Fantastic Adventures (not to be confused with Fantastic.) Flipping through the pages of the older magazine, I note that it still had the quotation marks around the title, but also had an exclamation point. (I worry about these things.)


Art by Robert Gibson Jones. The cover story has an exclamation mark also, as do several other pieces in the table of contents. I guess it was an exciting magazine.

A team of space explorers lands on a distant planet. It's made very clear, right from the start, that these folks are extremely careful when it comes to investigating a new world. The many scientists aboard the spaceship check out everything to make sure the place is safe, and there are soldiers to keep the peace.

A seemingly primitive humanoid alien shows up. A gizmo allows the alien and the humans to communicate, which is definitely a convenient plot device. The extraterrestrial offers the statement quoted in the title (without exclamation mark) not as a threat, but simply as a statement of fact.


Illustrations by Leo Summers.

The rest of the story deals with the explorers trying to figure out what the alien meant. It turns out to be something about the planet they hadn't considered.


A broken watch provides a clue.

In essence, this is an Astounding-style puzzle story, and not a very interesting example of one. Somebody like Hal Clement would have come up with a better solution to the mystery. By 1951, Simak was already an experienced pro, so it's written decently. However, there is none of the appreciation for the outdoors, or the affection for all living things, that we expect from him.

Two stars.

The Dark Room, by Theodore Sturgeon

We go back to Fantastic (not to be confused with Fantastic Adventures, or, for that matter, Fantastic Universe) and dig out a copy of the July-August 1953 issue for our next blast from the past.


Art by Rupert Conrad. The great Theodore Sturgeon is reduced to being one of others.

We begin with a married couple leaving a party. They're both devastated by what has just happened. You have to read between the lines a bit, but it becomes clear that the woman, for no reason she can explain, had sex with another man there.


Illustrations by Emsh.

After the couple breaks up, the man, still an emotional wreck, finds out that other people have done equally inexplicable things at parties held by the same wealthy host.


Looks like a nice party, doesn't it?

Some of these incidents are minor, as when a sweet, grandmotherly woman who writes innocent books for children comes up with an extremely dirty story. Some seem good, as when a man who knows nothing at all about music creates a hit song. Others are much more serious, even including murder. In each case, somebody did something completely out of character.


Maybe not so nice after all.

Launching his own investigation into the mystery, the betrayed husband sneaks into the rich man's home; in particular, to the dark room of the title. (This is itself an anomaly, as the room is decorated in an ultra-modern fashion, while the rest of the house is very conservative.) He discovers something strange and frightening, and learns an uncomfortable fact about himself.


The lady and the spider have more in common than first meets the eye.

This unique psychological fantasy, with more than a touch of horror, demonstrates Sturgeon's gift for creating memorable, three-dimensional characters. The premise is much more subtle than just the typical monster story you might expect when the giant spider shows up. It might even make you ponder your own personality, and what you would never do.

Four stars.

The Worm, by David H. Keller, M. D.

As Mister Peabody might have said to Sherman, it's time to jump into the WayBack machine, and visit the remote past. Come with me now to the year 1929, and the March issue of Amazing Stories.


Art by Frank R. Paul, of course.

An old guy lives alone, except for his dog, in a mill that hasn't been used in a long time. He hears an odd noise, similar to what the mill's grinding stones used to sound like, coming from beneath the basement. Pretty soon the source of the noise is obvious.


Illustration by Frank R. Paul, naturally.

The man makes a desperate effort to stop the bizarre creature from destroying his home and everything in it. Does he succeed? You'll have to read the story to find out.

I have to admit that I wasn't expecting much from a Gernsbackian, pre-Campbellian, bit of scientifiction from three-and-one-half decades ago. To my surprise, this chiller was pretty well written. There's even some sophisticated characterization, as when the man recites random bits of poetry to himself. It's a simple yarn, executed with some talent.

Three stars.

Half a Loaf is Better Than None

With extra pages, and the contrast between original fiction and reprints, I felt like I was getting two magazines for the price of one. The first part, with Leiber's fine new story, was worth four bits all by itself. The second part was a mixed bag. Sturgeon's story was very good, Simak's was a disappointment, and the others were OK, if nothing special. If you pick up a copy, I'd suggest taking a break and enjoying a cup of coffee after you read Stardock, so you'll be ready for some lesser works.


It would seem fitting to add some of this stuff to your java.

[Come join us at Portal 55, Galactic Journey's real-time lounge! Talk about your favorite SFF, chat with the Traveler and co., relax, sit a spell…]




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Magazine/Anthology, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[April 12, 1965] Not Long Before the End (May 1965 Amazing)

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by John Boston

Still Bleeding

Another month, another civil rights murder.  Viola Liuzzo lived in Detroit and participated in civil rights activities there.  Horrified by the carnage of the “Bloody Sunday” attack on civil rights marchers on March 7, she went to Alabama, where the Southern Christian Leadership Conference put her to work on administrative and logistical tasks, including driving volunteers and marchers from place to place as needed.

On March 25, Liuzzo drove some marchers and volunteers from Montgomery back to Selma.  On her way back to Montgomery, with a Negro associate in the car, she was passed by a car full of Ku Klux Klansmen, who fatally shot her in the head.

This murder was well publicized, even in remote places like my small town in Kentucky, where it was briefly a major subject of conversation.  The consensus: “She should have stayed home with her kids.” The notion that Americans should be able to travel safely in America and that people shouldn't murder other people seems somehow to have been forgotten.

Of course she was not the only one killed by the anti-civil rights forces, though her killing received more publicity than most.  The Rev. James Reeb, a Unitarian minister from Boston, was beaten with clubs by segregationists on March 9 and died of his injuries in a hospital.  In February, Jimmie Lee Jackson was beaten and shot by state troopers who attacked civil rights marchers and then pursued marchers who took refuge from the violence in a cafe.  His death prompted the Selma-Montgomery march.

Looks like there’s a long way to go.

The Issue at Hand


by Gray Morrow

The end is much nearer for the departing regime at Amazing.  This next to last Ziff-Davis issue is fronted by one of the more ill-considered covers to appear on the magazine.  It features what looks like a theatrical mask, with several items of disconnected clockwork behind it, against a sort of green starscape.  Well, the colors are nice.  It illustrates or represents in some fashion Poul Anderson’s two-part serial The Corridors of Time, which begins in this issue (though there’s no corridor to be seen on the cover; probably just as well).

The Corridors of Time (Part 1 of 2), by Poul Anderson


by Gray Morrow

I will await the end of the Anderson serial before commenting, as is my practice.  A quick look indicates that it is a time war or time policing story, in the general territory of Asimov’s The End of Eternity and Leiber’s The Big Time, not to mention Anderson’s own Time Patrol stories, and the protagonist is dispatched to Northern Europe around 1200 B.C.  More next month.

The Survivor, by Walter F. Moudy


by Virgil Finlay

Walter F. Moudy, who has published a novel but whose first magazine story appeared only last month, contributes the novelet The Survivor, another in the growing genre of future violence-as-entertainment.  That roster includes last month’s lampoon by John Jakes, There’s No Vinism Like Chau-Vinism, a couple of Robert Sheckley stories, Charles V. De Vet’s energetic Special Feature from Astounding in 1958, and no doubt others.  In the future, Moudy proposes, the US and Russia are still antagonists, but now they channel their rivalry into the Olympic War Games: each side puts 100 armed soldiers into an arena 3000 meters long and 1000 meters wide, and they fight it out until one side is eliminated, and the viewers out in TV-land see every drop of blood.

The author alternates between a fairly naturalistic account of the thoughts and experiences of the clueless Private Richard Starbuck as he fights, wonders why he is doing it, is grievously wounded, and nearly dies, and the performances of the commentators and their special guests, which treat the event just like the sporting matches we are all familiar with.  This is 99% of a pretty good story, with the TV commentary close to pitch-perfect, and the effects on the protagonist of immersion in pointless and terrifying violence are well rendered. 

Unfortunately Moudy trips over his feet in the last paragraph with a gross departure from Show Don’t Tell, beating the reader over the head with his message rather than letting events speak (or scream) for themselves. This is the sort of rookie mistake that editors are there to save writers from, and they didn’t.  This provides at least a scintilla of support for the charge by Science Fiction Times that the editors seemed to have lost interest.  Three stars, unfortunately; it was on its way to four.

The Man from Party Ten, by Robert Rohrer

Robert Rohrer embraces cynicism unreservedly in The Man from Party Ten, a characteristically well-turned, quite short story about factional warfare in the ruins of an extraterrestrial Earth colony, as brutal within its shorter compass as Moudy’s longer story, though also more obviously contrived.  Nonetheless, well done.  Three stars.

Over the River and Through the Woods, by Clifford D. Simak

Relief from brutality arrives in the issue’s last story, Clifford D. Simak’s Over the River and Through the Woods, an unassuming small masterpiece.  A couple of strange kids appear at a farmhouse in 1896 and address the older woman working in the kitchen as their grandma.  It is quintessential Simak: Ordinary decent person confronted with the extraordinary responds with ordinary decency.  It’s plainly written without a wasted word, deftly developed, asserting its homely credo with quiet restraint, all in eight pages.  Wish I could do that.  Wish more writers would do that.  Five stars.

Yardsticks in Space, by Ben Bova

This month’s nonfiction piece is Ben Bova’s Yardsticks in Space, about the measurement of stellar distances. It's typical fare from this writer: reasonably interesting material rendered in a fairly humdrum style under a humdrum title.  Perfectly readable but a far cry from the better efforts of Isaac Asimov and Willy Ley.  Two stars.

Summing Up

So, not bad: one excellent story, one that’s quite good until the very end, and one capable story, plus a reasonably promising-looking serial by a prominent if uneven author, and no Robert F. Young or Ensign De Ruyter!  Maybe Goldsmith and Lobsenz will go out on a relatively high note.

We had so much success with our first episode of The Journey Show (you can watch the kinescope rerun; check local listings for details) that we're going to have another one on April 11 at 1PM PDT with The Young Traveler as the special musical guest.  As the kids say, be there or be square!




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Magazine/Anthology

[July 10, 1963] (August 1963 Galaxy)

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by Gideon Marcus

Last week, we marked the 187th birthday of the United States in traditional fashion.  We launched fireworks, marched in parades, read the Declaration of Independence, and otherwise honored the creation of the world's oldest extant constitutional democracy.  There is a lot to be proud of in the last two centuries of progress, which has seen our nation elevated to the status of first among equals.

At the same time, we still have a long way to go, as evidenced by the numerous Civil Rights protests that have occurred and are occurring around the country every day.  In them, one can see echoes of the original revolution, the one sparked by the land-holding, enfranchised WASPs of the colonies.  Let us hope that the benefits secured by that small group will one day extend to everyone.


Protesters of segregation at Gwynn Oak Park, just outside Baltimore, including Allison Turaj, who had a rock thrown at her.

Speaking of revolutions, every two months, we get to take the pulse of the one started by H.L. Gold, who threw down the gauntlet at the feet of pulp sci-fi in 1950 when he started his scientifiction magazine, Galaxy.  It was once a monthly magazine, but since 1959 it has been a half-again-sized bi-monthly.  This was a cost-saving measure, as was the reduction of writers' rates.  The latter caused a tangible (if not fatal) drop in quality, and it is my understanding that it either has recently been or will soon be reversed.

Thus, the August 1963 Galaxy is a mixed bag, with standout stories by lesser authors and lesser stories by standout authors.  Take a look:

Hot Planet, by Hal Clement

The once great Hugo-winner, Hal Clement, again brings us a scientifically rigorous but largely unreadable tale of an alien planet.  Last time, it was The Green World, about a young planet with paradoxically old features.  This time, the subject is closer to home.  Mercury, as we have described previously, orbits closest to the sun of all the planets, and the sun's gravity likely has frozen the planet's rotation such that it always presents one face to its parent. 

Clement posits that Mercury is so close to the sun, in fact, that the tides (the differential of gravity between the near and far sides of the planet) are strong enough to melt the planet's insides.  This, in turn, causes tremendous vulcanism such that giant cones belch forth internal gasses and give the little world an atmosphere (albeit a scalding and unbreathable one).  This is the Mercury portrayed in The Hot Planet.

It's a fascinating idea, one I've not seen advanced in any of the scientific literature.  It's also highly plausible, and I suspect similar tidal heating is underway in some of the close-in moons of the giant planets. 

Unfortunately, the characters are cardboard, the plot is threadbare, and the writing soporific.  Perhaps Analog can pick Clement up to be their regular science writer, a role for which he is likely better suited.  Two stars.

The Great Nebraska Sea, by Allan Danzig

I've got a friend whose bag is disaster stories.  The bigger, the better.  Climatological events, nuclear wars, flashy alien invasions — he imagines them in the backdrop of his daily life to make it more exciting.  He'd really dig this new "history" written by newcomer, Allan Danzig. 

It's a simple, straightforward recounting of the great crustal shift of '73 that caused the Great Plains to sink dozens of feet and a great rift at the Gulf Coast to form, causing the ocean to permanently flood the central United States.  The event that caused the deaths of 14 million Americans is spun positively, seen through the lens of a far future that has used the Great Nebraska sea to great economic advantage.  Lyric in its matter-of-factness, it's a fun read.  Four stars.

Earthbound, by Lester del Rey

A tiny vignette which asks the question, "At one point does a prison the size of the world become intolerable confinement?"  It punches.  Four stars.

The Problem Makers, by Robert Hoskins

A covert agency of the Terran Empire is tasked with "advancing" the other planets of the galaxy.  Their philosophy is essentially Utilitarianism — if it benefits the most people, it is worthy…no matter how many people must suffer along the way.  Decently written, but it's a smug story, the kind I'd expect in Analog.  If Hoskins meant it as satire, it was too subtle for me.  It offended.  Two stars.

The Pain Peddlers, by Robert Silverberg

This is one of those truly unpleasant tales that I can't help admiring.  In the future, the medical credo has evolved to, "First, do no harm — unless you can make a buck by televising it."  And future television lets you feel as well as watch.  So a nation of sado-masochists gets to viscerally participate from the viewpoint of the patient, who undergoes surgery without anesthesia!  The Pain Peddlers is a dark tale of the production of such hospital shows.

It's good, feeling like it might have come from the pen of Robert Sheckley (where are you these days, Bob?) Four stars…but skip it if you're squeamish.

Here Gather the Stars (Part 2 of 2), by Clifford D. Simak

Last month, Cliff Simak introduced us to Enoch Wallace, a Civil War soldier who retired to rural Wisconsin, ultimately to become the immortal operator of a cosmic way-station.  There, he facilitates the teleportation of aliens across the galaxy.  This issue concludes Wallace's tale.

I mentioned in the first article that the work seemed strangely unpolished.  It meandered, and there was much duplication, as if the novel had not been strongly edited.  That feeling is even stronger in this second half, in which new concepts are introduced in an ad hoc matter. 

There are many several-page sequences which are cul-de-sacs, adding little to the story, and not particularly engaging in and of themselves (for instance, when Wallace goes into his virtual shooting gallery and fights a sequence of imaginary beasts).  We get a parade of alien visitors and gifts and Wallace's somber musing upon them, and sprinkled among them are plot points quickly introduced and resolved:

One of Wallace's actions, done at the request of an alien visitor, nearly causes Earth to be barred from admission to the interstellar group.  There is a Talisman that ties the universe together, but its keeper is unworthy, and so the galactic community is falling apart.  Then it turns out the Talisman has been stolen, and its thief chooses Earth to hide out on.  He is thwarted in his plans by Wallace as well as Lucy, the psychic healer, who it turns out is perfectly suited to be the new keeper.  All of this happens in Part 2 — none of it is hinted at in Part 1!

This all could have made for an interesting story, but the pacing is jagged.  In the end, Simak presents a dozen components but fails to unify or develop them in a satisfying manner.  It saddens me, for Simak is a great author, and there is the germ of a great story here.  As is, it's a three star novel badly in need of a complete rewrite. 

The Birds of Lorrane, by Bill Doede

Last up, Doede brings us the story of an Earther who plunges far beyond the pale of humanity to a desert world on which (it has been told) live a pair of sentient, talking birds.  He finds them, but at such cost that he is left at death's door.  Are the birds his salvation or his ruin?  Interesting, if a bit underdeveloped.  Three stars.

All in all, the revolution seems to have hit a rough patch.  Perhaps Galaxy's new editor, Fred Pohl, can weather this literary Valley Forge such that his ragtag army of new recruits can yet prevail…

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Magazine/Anthology

[June 30, 1963] Calm from the Storm (July 1963 Analog)

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by Gideon Marcus

We live in increasingly tumultuous times (or maybe we are just better informed about them).  A war is heating up in Vietnam, an even significant enough to have produced fictional characters who have experienced it (e.g. Linc, the veteran in Route 66; Oscar from Heinlein's new serial, Glory Road). 

There's a war waging in our country, too, as Blacks fight for the rights they are due as humans.  They march, they protest, they are attacked, and sometimes they are killed.  The President recently sent a Civil Rights Bill to Congress, but its future is far from certain.

When the news gets unbearable (or if you are a soldier on either of these front lines and need a break) science fiction and fantasy provide welcome respites.  They offer completely new worlds to explore that may have their own problems, but at least they're different ones.  Or the stories posit futures/alternaties where vexing issues have been solved. 

I find myself increasingly seeking out this refuge as the world gets scarier.  This month's last science fiction digest, the July 1963 Analog, afforded me several hours of peace when I needed it.  Perhaps it will do the same for you.

The Big Fuel Feud (Part 2 of 2), by Harry B. Porter

Even as a rocket scientist, I found Porter's increasingly dry comparison of solid vs. liquid fuels to be interminable.  Campbell needs contributors who will be less textbook, more Asimov (or Ley).  Two stars.

The Ethical Engineer (Part 1 of 2), by Harry Harrison

When we last saw Jason dinAlt, the psychic gambler with a galactic range, he had brought a tepid peace between the city-dwellers and the country folk on the lethal world of Pyrrus.  The latter had managed to live with the increasingly hostile life forms on that death world rather than wage an increasingly futile arms race against it. 

Pyrrus barely figures in this new serial, as dinAlt is kidnapped in Chapter One by a religious fanatic bent on taking Jason back to galactic civilization to face crimes against decency.  On the way, their ship is crippled, and the two must become unlikely allies to survive on yet another harsh world.

It's not as good as Deathworld, and it could have just as easily starred another character.  That said, it picks up as it goes, and I found myself wanting more at the half-way break.  I appreciate that Jason dinAlt, like Laumer's Retief, appears to be Black.  Three stars trending upwards.

New Apples in the Garden, by Kris Neville

In an increasingly technological world, the engineer becomes increasingly essential.  So what happens when people stop seeing slip-stick pusher as a desirable career?  Kris Neville describes a dark future of slow but inexorable decay (with the unspoken subtext made overt in the final illustration).  I don't know that I buy this premise given how heavily the sciences are boosted these days, but it is evocatively drawn.  Three stars.

A Knyght Ther Was, by Robert F. Young

Robert Young has written a lot of great stuff, but these days, his work tends to be really bad, usually some sort of in-joke based on an obvious literary reference (usually something obscure like the Book of Genesis).  This time, his story features a fellow named Thomas Mallory who goes back to England in 542 A.D.  Can you guess what he finds?  I'll give you a clue — it's not a decaying Romano-British/Welsh society under attack by colonizing Saxons.

Worse yet, and you'll see this a mile away, Mallory is THE Mallory.  Yes, bootstraps galore in a tediously predictable tale that doesn't even have the virtue of being funny.  Two stars, and that's being generous.  Read the original, or the ur-document penned by Geoffrey of Monmouth.

New Folks' Home, by Clifford D. Simak

Cliff Simak, master of bucolic SF, has got a serial running in Galaxy right now called Here gather the stars, in which aliens set up a galactic way station in a rural part of America.  New Folk's Home is very similar, thematically, in which an old man, making his last vacation to the backwoods of his youth, discovers a beautiful new house in the middle of nowhere.  Why is it there, and how could it be tied to him?  Is it an intrusive eyesore, or just the retirement spot he was looking for? 

I especially enjoy Simak because his stuff tends to have happy endings, and his aliens are benevolent.  Good stuff, as always.  Four stars.

Thanks to the Harrison and the Simak, I have a more positive feeling toward this issue (and the world) than the issue's 2.6 star rating would normally command.  It's not the best magazine of the month, or even near the top — that prize goes to Fantastic (3.3), followed by Worlds of Tomorrow and Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.1).  Even IF got a higher score (2.8), and it had one of the best stories (Down to the Worlds of Men, by Alexei Panshin).  New Worlds was slightly better, too (2.7).  Only Amazing was worse, and it was a LOT worse (2.1).  So there was lots to enjoy this month to take you out of the miseries of the world.

On the other hand, one misery continues to intrude.  Women wrote just two out of the thirty-seven contributions.  I've been told women aren't just interested, and the editors print the best things they can find.  Why should editors bother to especially solicit women when their jobs are busy enough as it is? 

In reply, I present Exhibit A: Jack Sharkey, whose work fills half of two magazines this month, garnering a whopping two stars between them.  Surely, we can do better than that if we bring in some new blood. We literally can't do worse.

Speaking of Alexei Panshin, the great young author, himself, has answered my letter and offered up an article describing the birth of his first (and most excellent story).  Look forward to it in just a couple of days!

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Magazine/Anthology

[May 6, 1963] The more things change… (June 1963 Galaxy)

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by Gideon Marcus

Around the world, events herald a heightened rate of change.  Civil Rights marchers and boycotters in Birmingham, Alabama have been met with fire hoses, attack dogs, and mass incarceration.  Casualty reports for servicemen killed in Vietnam are becoming a weekly occurrence.  In a more hopeful vein, the nuclear test ban group at the United Nations appears to be making good progress, and it has been reported that the White House and Kremlin will soon be bridged by a "Hot Line:" a secure teletype link for instant communications.

And yet, within the latest pages of Galaxy, a magazine that established the vanguard of new-type science fiction when it came out in October 1950, it appears that time has stood still.  The proud progressive flagship appears to be faltering, following in the footsteps of Campbell's reactionary Analog.  It's not all bad, exactly.  It's just nothing new…and some of it is really bad.  Is it a momentary blip?  Or is Editor Pohl saving the avante-garde stuff for his other two magazines?

In any event, here it is, the June 1963 Galaxy:

Here Gather the Stars (Part 1 of 2), by Clifford Simak

A century after the American Civil War, Union soldier Enoch Wallace is found to still be alive on his Wisconsin family homestead.  Amazingly, he has retained his youth, as has his home, despite the age-decay of the nearby farmhouses.  The government puts the solider under 24-hour surveillance.  Yet, all they are able to learn of the reclusive man is that he no longer farms, goes for a walk for an hour a day, potters in his garden for short periods, and his only "friends" are the mailman and a deaf-mute young woman, a sort of local witch.

We soon learn, however, that Wallace's home is actually a galactic way station, a transfer point for teleporting aliens.  Both the home and Wallace (when he is inside) are freed from the ravages of time.  Day-in and day-out, members of an incredibly diverse collection of extra-terrestrials are translated across the light years into the station's holding tanks.  These are essentially copies of originals — great energies create new beings at each station, killing the earlier copies.  The corpses are then discarded.  It's a grisly kind of travel, when one thinks about it, and it certainly leaves little room for an eternal soul that clings to a physical form. 

Simak is one of the great veterans of our field, and he has been a staple of Galaxy since its inception.  He is unmatched when it comes to evoking a bucolic charm, and he has a sensitive touch when conveying people (human or otherwise).  This particular tale begins promisingly, but it meanders a bit, and it frequently repeats itself.  Either over-padded or under-edited, it could do with about 15% fewer words.  Three stars so far, but I have a feeling the next half will be better.

The Cool War, by Andrew Fetler

In contrast to Simak, Fetler is a newish author and a decidedly minor one.  He's finally made the jump from IF to Galaxy (a step up in pay and prestige), but I don't know how he earned it with this piece, a satire in which robots are used to replace political notables.  It's not very coherent, and it's not at all fun.  One star. 

For Your Information, by Willy Ley

This month's science article is surprisingly good.  The surprise isn't that Willy wrote a good piece — he's the reason I became a Galaxy subscriber in the first place, 13 years ago.  No, it's because I hadn't expected to be interested in the subject matter.

The topic is sounding rockets, those missiles that carry scientific packages into space but not into orbit.  They tend to get little press compared to their bigger cousins, and I've been as guilty of neglecting them as everyone else.  Yet hundreds of these little guys are launched each year by more than a dozen countries, and the scientific return they offer is staggering, particularly in consideration of their low cost.  Plus, the development of these small boosters has direct application to the creation of big ones.

Four stars.  Worth reading.

End as a Hero, by Keith Laumer

Kayle, a space-traveling psychologist is captured by the mind-controlling Gool and implanted with a mission to destroy the Terran Federation at its source: Earth.  But the aliens have picked the wrong subject for this treasonous task.  For Kayle has erected barriers to suggestion while giving himself access to the Gool mind-trust, thus turning the tides.  Now the race is on — can he make it back to Earth and give humanity the secret to instantaneous teleportation before his military colleagues kill him out of an abundance of caution?  And is Kayle really the one calling the shots, or is it just part of a many-layered Gool plot?

It's a strange Rube Goldberg of a tale, and if you stop to think about it, it falls apart.  Yet Laumer is quite a good writer., and sort of makes it work.  Think of it as a straight Retief story.  Three stars.

The Faithful Wilf, by Gordon Dickson

The interstellar Nick and Nora are back in their third diplomatic mystery adventure.  Unfortunately, unlike the last one (which appeared in a truly excellent issue of Galaxy), Wilf is wretched.  The female half of the pair is ignobly reduced to whining and simpering, and the story is told so elliptically that I'm still not quite sure what happened.  It's a shame because Dickson, when he wants to, is one of the genre's better writers.  But he only wants to about a third of the time…  One star.

The Sellers of the Dream, by John Jakes

Last up is an "if this goes on tale," taking the trend of planned obsolescence to its ludicrous end.  Not only are clothes, furniture, and cars all disposed of on an annual basis, but even personalities and bodies are swapped.  Not by stodgy males, of course, but that will come soon enough.  Sellers is the story of an industrial spy who discovers that this year's body model is, in fact, a tragically altered ex-fiancee. 

Thus begins a most improbable scheme to save the captive woman that leads our hero to the wastes of Manhattan, a decrepit penal colony for reactionaries who cling to the notion that things have permanent value.  Along the way, the spy learns the awful secret behind the 21st Century economy. 

Author John Jakes has flitted across the various SF magazines for more than a decade.  He occasionally produces a work of art.  More frequently, he write mediocre space-filler.  Sellers is neither.  While the story doesn't make a lot of sense, the satire is worthy, and I found myself interested the whole way.  Call it an idea piece.  Three stars.

In the end, this month's Galaxy probably won't make you cancel your subscription, but it will leave you pining for change.  Well, every month brings new opportunities (or in the case of this bimonthly magazine, every other month.).  Until then…

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Magazine/Anthology

[February 24, 1963] Something Old, Something New (March 1963 Fantastic)

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[While you're reading this article, why not tune in to KGJ, Radio Galactic Journey, playing all the current hits: pop, rock, soul, folk, jazz, country — it's the tops, pops…]


by Victoria Silverwolf

The pace at which innovations are arriving in these modern times is dizzying.  This month alone, a remarkable array of novel products appeared:

A new commercial aircraft, the Boeing 727, made its first flight.  It differs from the earlier 707 in having three jet engines rather than four.  Intended for short and medium-length flights, it can use shorter runways at smaller airports than the older model requires.

The Coca-Cola Company introduced Tab, a new diet soft drink, in competition with Royal Crown Cola's Diet Rite.  An IBM 1401 computer generated more than 185,000 four-letter words containing one vowel as possible names for the product.  The winning name, shortened from "tabb,"sometimes appears as "TaB," with the first and last letters capitalized.

The Feminine Mystique is a recently published book by Betty Friedan that may lead to a new women's movement, similar to the fight for voting rights in the early years of this century.  It challenges the idea that the most fulfilling roles for American women are as housewives and mothers.

While we welcome all these new things, we should also remember the old.  Telstar 1, which now seems like a part of history, although it launched only seven months ago, has ceased operating.  Radiation in the Van Allen belt destroyed its delicate circuitry.

Popular music also featured a mixture of old and new in recent weeks.  Earlier this month, Walk Right In by the Rooftop Singers reached the top of the charts.  Many listeners may not have realized that this catchy folk song is a remake of a tune first recorded by Cannon's Jug Stompers way back in 1929.  This revision of an old song yielded the Number One position later in the month to something brand new, Hey Paula, as sung by a duo calling themselves Paul & Paula.  In my opinion, this is a case where newer isn't better.

Fittingly, half the stories in the latest issue of Fantastic appear in print for the first time, while the other half date back to the previous century.

Physician to the Universe, by Clifford D. Simak

One of the biggest names in science fiction begins his most recent story in a mysterious fashion.  A man awakes in a dark place with little memory of his past.  Little by little, he remembers what happened to him.  This is a future world where robots enforce strict health regulations.  The man's crime is failing to take care of himself.  His punishment is exile to an island in the middle of a vast swamp.  With two fellow prisoners, he undertakes the long and dangerous journey across the wilderness to freedom.  Slowly, he recalls the extraordinary thing that happened to him as a child, and the important reason he must return to his home.  This is a complex story, told with multiple flashbacks.  Some scenes are full of lyrical beauty.  One might quibble that the ending is sudden, and that the author makes use of too many speculative themes for a story of this length, but overall it's compelling.  Four stars.

A Question of Re-Entry, by J. G. Ballard

A major British author offers a science fiction version of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness in his latest story.  A United Nations official travels deep into the South American jungle in search of a spacecraft that crashed there five years ago.  He finds a tribe of Indians ruled by a white man who knows more about the missing vehicle than he admits.  Ballard has a gift for vivid description, and the jungle setting truly comes to life.  The plot is less effective, but adequate.  Three stars.

An Apparition, by Guy de Maupassant

We begin a trio of reprints with this 1883 story, translated from French.  An elderly man recounts the ghostly encounter he experienced as a young soldier.  There's not much else to this tale of the supernatural, which is really just an anecdote.  Two stars.

The Wet Dungeon Straw, by Jean Richepin

Also from 1883, and also translated from French, this macabre little story involves a man held prisoner for decades.  He becomes obsessed with drying out the wet straw on which he lies, exposing each piece to the tiny bit of sunlight he receives each day.  This project takes many years, and leads to an ironic conclusion.  Three stars.

His Natal Star, by Austyn Granville

This bagatelle from 1891 features an astronomer as its protagonist.  The star under which he was born draws near the solar system, and its gravity causes him to be drawn toward it.  The only purpose of this bit of absurd science is to show the fellow floating upside down in his home.  One star.

Nine Starships Waiting, by Roger Zelazny

We return to new fiction with the longest story yet from this prolific young writer.  It's difficult to offer a synopsis of this confusing tale.  Suffice to say that a super-assassin is sent to prevent a fleet of spaceships from conquering a planet.  The story is told from multiple viewpoints, and the assassin undergoes a strange change of identity, so the plot is difficult to follow.  The story is overwritten at times, with many literary allusions.  Two stars.

This disappointing issue, with a few bright spots, proves that both the old and the new contain good and bad.

[P.S. If you registered for WorldCon this year, please consider nominating Galactic Journey for the "Best Fanzine" Hugo.  Your ballot should have arrived by now…]




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