By Jessica Holmes
Here we are at the end of another serial and another series of Doctor Who. For sure, it’s had its ups and downs, but does the series end on a high note? Let’s look at the ending of Doctor Who: The Wheel In Space.
Continue reading [June 4, 1968] (Doctor Who: The Wheel In Space [Part Two])
by Gideon Marcus
Constants
The universe is based on a host of magic numbers. Without them, the cosmos would be entirely different and probably uninhabitable. Some of these "constants" are familiar to the layman, Pi perhaps being the most so. Engineers are familiar with electron-Volts and atomic masses. Chemists know Avogadro's number, the relationship between atomic mass and metric mass. Mathematicians know e.
e is a truly fascinating number. Roughly equal to 2.71828, it is the fundament of exponential growth. For example, if you have a $1 compounded annually at 100% interest, at the end of a year you'll have $2. If you have $1 compounded monthly at 100% interest, at the end of the year you'll have $2.62. If you have $1 compounded continuously (i.e. over an infinite number of instants), you will have $2.71828 at the end of the year.
In calculus, if you integrate the function e to the x power, you get… e to the x power! Conversely, of course, the derivative of e to the x is e to the x. That means that e to the x is the one function whose rate of change is the same as its position is the same as its acceleration.
What does this have to do with Analog Science Fiction, particularly this latest issue?
by Kelly Freas
Well, when you have the same editor for 30 years, and he hires the same writers every issue, and he has a rigid editorial policy that eschews innovation and prioritizes certain pseudo-scientific fetishes, you end up with a certain kind of consistency. Not necessarily a desirable consistency, but consistency nevertheless. Read on, and you'll see what I mean.
e gad
The Royal Road, by Christopher Anvil
by Kelly Freas
You know you're in trouble when Chris Anvil gets the cover. Actually, this continuan of the saga of Captain Roberts and his crew of two isn't so bad. Previous installments had the trio serendipitously developing a mind-control ray and using it to wrest a planet from a despotic computer. Then the three posed as nobility to sway said planet further. It was all very glib and distasteful, and I didn't like it.
This story spends two thirds of its length rehashing the events of those stories for new readers and then bringing the trio back, making it a quartet (with Bergen from a story in the December 1967 issue), and unleashing them on a new problem. A somewhat primitive planet is fractured into more than a dozen petty kingdoms, and the Interstellar Patrol needs a majority of them to agree in order to establish a base. In the last third of Royal Road, we get the solution to this conundrum. It mostly involves creating an economic catastrophe that only kingdoms favorable to the Imperial Patrol are equipped to address, thus putting these kingdoms on top. Anvil does note that the gambit could have killed millions, so at least things aren't quite so glib as before.
At least now the quartet of Captain Roberts has been transformed into a sort of Retief series. Anything's an improvement. Anyway, I didn't hate it. A low three stars, I guess.
No Shoulder to Cry On, by Hank Davis
by Leo Summers
After the vastly superior alien federation shows up on Earth, a sociologist is brought back to see what he assumes will be their advanced technology. Instead, it turns out that humans have been quite a bit more successful than the ee-tees, at least in one vital field.
A Twilight Zone episode writ small, but inoffensive. Three stars.
Duplex, by Howard L. Myers
by Kelly Freas
Kent is a person with a literal split personality. His left half is under the control of a silent partner, dubbed "Pard", while Kent, nominally the "dominant" personality, runs the right half. Together, they lead a pleasant life as an extremely successful concert pianist. That is until Pard gets them both tangled up in a spy conspiracy that threatens not just the world…but themselves!
I liked the story's handling of mental handicaps, and it's a pleasant piece overall. Three stars, but the highest three stars in the issue.
It's RIGHT Over Your Nose!, by Ben Bova
by Kelly Freas
In this science-ish article, Bova suggests that quasars, highly red-shifted quasi-stellar radio sources, may in fact be Bussard ramjets run by aliens. Thus, rather than being natural phenomena of tremendous power far outside the galaxy, they are artificial phenomena of middlin' power within.
I tend to prefer natural over artificial solutions to problems. Plus, why is every star-drive in the galaxy going away from us?
Still, it's readable, if breathless. Three stars.
The Mind Reader, by Rob Chilson
by Leo Summers
Robot mini-planes prove to be decisive in the next Southeast Asian war. This story is told mostly in dialogue between two people in a sort of "As you know, Bob…" fashion.
The concept is interesting and unique. The story is not compellingly told. Two stars.
Satan's World (Part 2 of 4), by Poul Anderson
by Kelly Freas
Finally, we have the next installment in Satan's World, which started last month. The crew of Muddlin' Through was split up when David Falkayn was abducted by Serendpity Inc., a galactic information clearing house. This provoked Polesotechnic League magnate Nicholas Van Rijn to take a personal hand in things, sending Adzel the saurian centaur to retrieve the poor lad.
Turns out Falkayn (predictably) had been brainwashed. It also turns out that Serendipity is working with, perhaps in the thrall of, a race of mysterious aliens known as the Elders. The ulterior motive of this ostensibly neutral organization suggests some new power may be planning some kind of galactic conquest.
Meanwhile, Chee Lan the foul-mouthed Cynthian and Falkayn head to the world Serendipity told him about in part one–the frozen world in a cometary orbit that is closing in on its star, Beta Crucis. This will cause its cryosphere to melt, revealing a mother-lode of precious metals. But Van Rijn's team isn't the only one interested in the world, aptly dubbed "Satan". Twenty UFOs have just dropped out of hyperspace in the vicinity, and they don't look friendly…
Anderson has a lot of tics I don't like, particularly his drawing of characters as…well, assemblages of tics. Adzel is a placid Buddhist, Falkayn is a cipher, Chee Lan is a salty Little Old Lady from Pasadena, and Van Rijn is a lustier, more Dutch version of Raymond Burr's Ironside.
The author also devotes lots of ink to the physical descriptions of his astronomical creations, which I'm sure are fascinating to some, but perhaps are most gratifying for the three cents a word they earn him.
That said, just as I start to get bored, I find myself turning the page and reading on. So, another three star segment.
Less than Three
So, just like the constant "e", Analog clocks in at just under three. Indeed, that's how I feel about the magazine as a whole lately. Sure, there are better issues than others, and sure, there are some standout pieces, but for the most part, I find myself doing anything–cleaning the bathroom ceilings, cataloging my 45s, sorting stamps–rather than read Analog. Not that I hate the experience when I get to it. It simply doesn't give the thrill of anticipation that Galaxy still gives me after all of these years. Even F&SF, which hasn't been terrific since 1962, retains residual goodwill.
Of course, this month's Analog clocks in at 2.9 (rounding up 2.85), which is better than Fantasy and Science Fiction (2.6). But it's worse than Galaxy (3.1) and IF (3.3).
It was a really thin month for magazines, and out of the four that were published, the better-than-three-star stories would barely fill one of them. At least women wrote 11% of new fiction pieces, which is on the higher end lately.
Well, here's hoping that next month's Analog picks a different constant to ape, if it can. And let's hope it's not Planck's Constant!
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by Gideon Marcus
Fading Echoes
It sometimes astounds me how long Galactic Journey has been around. Eight years ago, we covered the launch of Echo 1, a big balloon shot into orbit so that NASA eggheads could use it as a cosmic message relay. More importantly, it was an artificial beacon, proof at a time when the Americans were losing the Space Race, that we had established a visible presence in outer space.
In just a few days, Echo 1 will be no more. Though the air at Echo's altitude is, to terrestrial standards, a fine vacuum, there is enough there to pull at the satellite. For the past eight years, the tug has slowed down Echo, and this month, it will fall out of orbit, plunging into the atmosphere, where it will burn up.
All things must pass, and Echo had a good run, but still, it's a little sad.
Which brings us to this month's issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.
Last month, we lost Anthony Boucher, who helmed F&SF for much of the '50s. His term was excellent, and he also wrote some great stories, too, my favorite being The Quest for St. Aquin He was only 56.
Since Boucher's tenure, F&SF has been an inconsistent magazine. There have been good issues of F&SF, and there have been less than good ones. The latest is one of the latter kind, and its underwhelming quality serves only to make us pine all the more for what we've lost.
by Ronald Walotsky
The Consciousness Machine, by Josephine Saxton
Zona Gambier is a mental technician, proficient in the usage of WAWWAR, a device that has revolutionized psychotherapy. It dredges the animus of one's mental dysfunction, bares it to the possessor, and in doing so, cures the ailing person of any psychological malady. It is thus a matter of great consternation when she finds that her patient, Thurston Maxwell's, animus does not seem to correspond to his condition–namely a predilection for sexual assault.
The imagery WAWWAR produces is the story of a teenage boy living ferally, hiding from all of humanity, until he comes across a newborn, still attached to her just-dead mother. He raises the child, somehow providing for it, until she is old enough to be an adoptive sister. Later, as an adult, they become lovers. Finally, they have a child together, completing a kind of circle.
Ultimately, we find out what this story means, and whose animus it actually is. The writing is rather nice, but the explanation at the end is ad hoc, and I certainly wouldn't call the piece science fiction. Science-esque, perhaps.
Three stars.
Of Time and Us, by David R. Bunch
Better poetry than some, worse than others. I'm not sure I care for the sentiment, espousing the futility of humanity against the infinity of chronology.
Three stars.
by Gahan Wilson
The People Trap, by Robert Sheckley
Overpopulation stories have been de rigeur for more than a decade now, to the point where the genre is a bit overripe. Especially given that, according to articles I've been reading lately, the population growth rate has been steadily declining in the First World for most of the '60s. Now, will that continue? There are an awful lot of Baby Boomers coming of age, and perhaps the trend will reverse itself. But it does seem that large families, at least in the West and other developed areas, are falling out of fashion.
Which is why Sheckley's satire of overpopulation stories, in which a mild-mannered father, tired of sharing his one-room flat with five others (with five more on the way), enters a deadly competition, is a breath of fresh air. Along with 60 other participants, he must complete a foot-race through the wilds of New York City, populated by the lowest forms of humanity. His prize: one of the last free-standing acres of land on the continent.
Very quickly, you see that the thing is a lampoon, and as such, it's quite tolerable. Indeed, it's the closest thing to an old-style Sheckley story I've read in a long time, and old-style Sheckley is one of my favorites.
Four stars.
Settle, by Ann MacLeod
A couple buys a fixer-upper. Soon, the man of the house starts losing pieces of himself. First a toe, then a foot, onto his leg and torso, until he is just a head. Still, he goes on repairing elements of the home, determined to make it livable. Eventually, he is just a set of teeth and a bit of brain, mowing the lawn by mouth, until he is crushed under the knee of his toddler son. The end.
Per the editor's preface, this story is about how a money pit takes its toll in flesh from its owners. I'm glad that was explained to me, because otherwise, I'd have no idea.
One star.
Backtracked, by Burt Filer
Author Burt Filer is apparently married to Settle's author, Ann MacLeod. His tale is the superior of the two.
A man in his mid-30s wakes up to find his body ten years older. Apparently, he has "backtracked"–a decade from then, he swapped physical forms with his younger self (which apparently destroys the future incarnation so as to prevent paradoxes). He has no memory of the next ten years, nor why he chose this particular date to come back to.
All he knows is that his polio-crippled leg is now reasonably robust, and that his wife is not altogether happy with his new, somewhat weathered, appearance.
Eventually we do find out what would motivate a man to give up a decade of life, and it's a reasonable justification.
Three stars.
At the Heart of It, by Michael Harrison
This is both an old tale and an old-fashioned tale. It details the tragic story of a bookseller who discovers a profane book, one that teaches the reader the art of transferring one's soul into an inanimate object.
There are no surprises, and the kicker comes at the end, like all its Weird Tales brethren. I imagine this would have been humdrum in the 30s and it certainly doesn't cut the mustard now.
Two stars.
Counting Chromosomes, by Isaac Asimov
The Good Doctor explains the relatively new science of genetics and the role chromosomes, which are essentially punch cards that govern cell reproduction, have in them. He spends a good deal of time on sex chromosomes, and the effects that mutated sex chromosomes have on human beings.
Fascinating stuff, but there is an air of eugenics about his discussion, particularly in calling chromosomally abnormal human beings "defectives" and describing the recent exclusion of Ewa Klobukowska from women's sports on the basis of an extra Y chromosome as a positive development, ensuring competitions remain "sportsmanlike", rubbed me the wrong way.
Three stars.
The Secret of Stonehenge, by Harry Harrison
In this vignette, archaeologists armed with a time-traveling camera send it back to find out why and when Stonehenge was created. Turns out that the camera leaves chronological echoes, afterimages that last long after the camera has departed. Of course, it is these images, that, to primitive Britons, could only have been a sign of the gods, that spurred the creation of Stonehenge.
Harry should know better. We've known since 1963 that Stonehenge was an astronomical calculator, able to predict eclipses and solstices. It was built where it was because it needed to be to function properly.
In any event, the far more exciting (and dangerous) discovery is that long-range time travel can be used to communicate with the past, but this was not touched upon.
Two stars.
Sea Home, by William M. Lee
The first long-term permanent underwater residence has been completed. However, it quickly becomes apparent that Sea Home has a problem: its five long-term crew, already at depth, are undergoing physiological changes. It appears to be linked to the special air mixture they're breathing to alleviate pressure issues; their blend includes oxygen, helium, and sodium hexaflouride–the latter two ingredients serving as a kind of buffer, one very light, and one very heavy.
There's a lot wrong with this story. For one, it's a novelette for a one-gimmick story. Lee tries to add color and reasonably competent writing to hide the fact, but there are simply no mysteries to keep you intrigued beyond the central one.
And the central one is stupid. The premise is that the absence of nitrogen triggers all sorts of biological miracles. Free from the shackles of nitrogen, our bodies become more efficient, our brains get smarter, our skin sprouts tiny fields of gills fer Chrissakes. It reminds me of the early stories about long-term weightlessness, when, because we had no data, sf writers filled in the blanks any way they wanted.
Except we do have data. Gemini 7 was in space for 14 days, its crew breathing a pure, 5psi oxygen atmosphere. None of them got any smarter or developed vacuum-breathing gills or what-have-you.
Dumb. Two stars.
Cithaeronion farewell
As you can see, this issue is sort of like the work of a taxidermist. It looks like F&SF, many of its contents are familiar, but the breath of life is missing. Would that someone new could come along and instill the esteemed publication with the vigor it enjoyed under its past master.
Lest all we have left is fading echoes…
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by Janice L. Newman
When we learned that last year’s Countdown was playing in San Diego theaters, The Traveler and I decided to make a night of it and drive down to watch it. The Traveler is a space buff, of course, so it was a natural fit. Would I recommend it? Well, it depends.
The story is simple and straightforward, with few surprises. When the Russians send up a civilian astronaut to circumnavigate the moon, with three more astronauts presumably soon to follow and actually land, NASA implements an emergency plan to get a man on the moon at any cost. He’ll be stuck there for a year, provided he can find and enter a previously-sent shelter pod before his oxygen runs out. Public relations concerns force NASA to tap the less-qualified civilian Lee for the role rather than their first choice, Colonel Chiz. After many conversations, discussions, arguments, and training sequences, Lee is sent to the moon to land a few days after the Russians. What happens next is, shall we say, narratively predictable, but I'll let you watch the movie to see for yourself.
Lee and Chiz in the modified Gemini that will go to the moon–it's clear NASA helped Warner Bros. make this film.
By Jessica Holmes
We approach the end of another series of Doctor Who, and it’s been a bit of a rough one, hasn’t it? Other than the occasional standout, I feel that I’ve ended up finding every other story terribly repetitive. As I began to watch the last serial of the current run, I had hope that my faith in the series would be rewarded. After all, when Doctor Who is good, it’s really, really good, and this latest serial was scripted by David Whittaker (who wrote The Enemy Of The World, possibly my favourite story) based on a story by Kit Pedler (who is to the Cybermen as Terry Nation was to the Daleks). With a writing duo like that, things looked very promising for the serial. Was my faith rewarded? Let’s mull it over as I give you a quick rundown of The Wheel In Space.
Continue reading [May 12, 1968] Slow And Steady… (Doctor Who: The Wheel In Space [Part One])
by Gideon Marcus
Three and Two make Two
I imagine Vegas bookies are tearing their hair out trying to predict the Presidential race this year. On January 1, the hard money would have been on President Johnson beating Governor George Romney in a fairly easy race. Then McCarthy and Nixon won in New Hampshire. The former sent LBJ announcing his resignation and the latter gave the former Vice-President the first victory of his own since 1950.
Then Bobby Kennedy jumped in, trying to steal McCarthy's lunch. Inevitably, Vice President Humphrey threw his hat in the ring, instantly commanding the loyalty of most democratic party bosses. Meanwhile, Romney's dropped out, but Nelson Rockefeller, who said he wasn't going to play this year, has jumped in.
So, who will face each other come Labor Day? It's anyone's guess, especially since both McCarthy and Kennedy just won recent primaries. I guess we'll have to see if the New York Governor's campaign has legs, and if Humphrey's position translates to delegates at the convention.
Stay tuned…
Nine to Rule Them All
It's similarly a horse race with the latest issue of Galaxy, which presents a solid batch of stories. Which one is the best? That's a hard choice, too!
by Paul E. Wenzel
But first, the editorial. Remember a few months ago F&SF ran competing ads from SF authors for and against the war in Vietnam?
Well, now Pohl's mags are doing it.
Pohl (Galaxy's editor) says it's not just enough to bitch about it. Someone needs to come up with a solution. He figures SF fans are about the smartest people around, so why don't we try our hand at it?
So now there's a contest, first prize $1,000, details at the bottom of this article. Of course, given that you can't devote more than 100 words to the issue, and given that the war has been going on since 1945, in one way or another, and given that a lot of smart people have been trying to fix this thing…I somehow feel 100 words is not enough.
Or as my friend the divorce lawyer likes to say: "Imagine trying to fix a car. Now try to imagine fixing that car while another party is actively trying to dismantle it."
Yeah. Lots of luck, Pohl.
On to the stories!
The Beast That Shouted Love, by Harlan Ellison
by Jack Gaughan
Ever wonder why all people seem to go psycho all of sudden? Why a race with countless religious texts devoted to peace, harmony, and brotherhood just goes buggy every so often?
What if some other planet, in order to preserve their peace, harmony, and brotherhood, is beaming all their psycho energy to us? Sort of a bad emotions disposal process.
This is one of Ellison's lesser pieces. It probably means a lot to him, but it's rather disjointed and vague and not as profound as he wants it to be.
Three stars.
How We Banned the Bombs, by Mack Reynolds
by Vaughn Bodé
Right now, the world population is 3.5 billion and rising. Naturally, this has been the cause of concern and the topic of more than a few science fiction stories. Bombs is one of the lesser efforts.
Reynolds posits a Reunited Nations government so powerful that, in response to the Population Explosion, it can enforce a ten-year ban on childbirth through mandatory provision of contraceptives to women. At the end of the ban, it turns out that the contraceptive drug's effect was permanent, and all human women are completely sterile.
This, by the way, is the end of the story. The rest of it involves characters talking to each other, telling tales they all know about how the world ended up in this predicament (which doesn't make for much of a story).
The whole premise is silly. The population in this projected, not-too-distant future is 3.5 billion, same as it is now, yet resources are so scarce, they're banning the production of alcohol so as to husband their grain crops. Somehow, the ReUN can sterilize EVERY woman on Earth, none slipping through the cracks. And then, no one foresees or predetermines that the universal contraception has adverse effects.
In the words of Laugh-In's Joanne Worley: "Dummmmmb!"
One star.
Detour to Space, by Robin Scott Wilson
(uncredited artist)
Object 3574 is circling the Earth in a polar orbit. Unannounced, the General is convinced it's a secret Russkie bomb. NASA's long-hair thinks otherwise. The majority decides to send up an Apollo to check it out. The object is covered in green slime and pebbled with tektites, suggesting extraterrestrial origin…
There's a lot to like about this tale, especially the sting at the end of it. Scott convincingly describes the apprehension with which we Americans greet the arrival of a new star in the heavens. I know I scour the papers and call my Vandenberg buddies whenever anything goes up to get some insight into otherwise classified launches.
Where the story beggars credibility is the use of Apollo spacecraft, launched from Vandenberg, to intercept 3574. You just can't do it–there's no way to get a Saturn there. Much more likely would be to send up an Air Force Gemini (they're making them for the planned Manned Orbiting Laboratory). But that would have killed the story.
This is what happens when you know too much about a subject, reviewing a story by someone who doesn't quite know enough… three stars.
Daisies Yet Ungrown, by Ross Rocklynne
Joe Wehrle, Jr.
After the big bombs created the time-space Rift, God told Rickert to jump through with Sears catalog robots and claim a new world 350,000 trillion light years from Earth. But this is so far away that God's grace cannot reach, and Lucifer's tool, the newcomer Dorothy, has arrived to take his planet away from him.
This is an odd, poetic story that you, at first, think is going to be satirical, sort of a cross between Sheckley and Bunch. Instead, it's kind of pretty and sweet, way different than I was expecting.
Three stars.
For Your Information: Jules Verne, Busy Lizzy and Hitler, by Willy Ley
This is a pretty interesting piece on attempts using a gun rather than a rocket to fire a projectile, if not into space, at least a terrific distance. Essentially, it's like a rocket, but with the propellant on the outside.
Long story short: rockets are better. Four stars.
Waiting Place, by Harry Harrison
(uncredited artist)
A man taking the matter transmitter home finds himself in the future version of Devil's Island, a colony for hardened criminals. Surely, there has been some kind of malfunction, for he can remember no crime. But the wheels of justice never make a mistake, or do they?
This would be a fairly slight tale if not for the execution. Luckily, Harrison (who I understand has just retired from the editor helm of Fantastic and Amazing) is a master of execution.
Four stars.
The Garden of Ease, by Damon Knight
by Jack Gaughan
As expected, the first adventure of Thorinn, a human raised by trolls in a Nordic nightmare, has a sequel. Last time, the resourceful Thorinn had been tossed into a deep well as an offering to the gods to end a ceaseless winter. Making his way through the caves he found, Thorinn discovered a hatch that opened not onto but above a new world. This story details what he finds below.
In an almost Oz-like setting, the people of the Vale enjoy a life of complete ease. The grasshopper men and the doughwomen and the fancymen and the children, they eat the food that grows on trees and bushes, they frolic, they discuss, and when they want adventure, they seal themselves up in the pleasure pods for the night…or sometimes an eternity.
Thorinn is the snake in the garden, slowly poisoning the place with his foreignness and his willingness to kill. Ultimately, he hatches an escape plan, but not before leaving his mark.
This is an interesting episode, but not as compelling or as clever as the first one. Three stars.
Booth 13, by John Lutz
Here's a new author, or at least, new to me. John paints a grim future in which populational ennui has settled in. All that's left is war, the tranquilizer lysogene, and the death booths. If life gets just a bit too monotonous, there's always a quick and easy exit–and now, people are taking it in ever-increasing numbers.
It's not badly done, but my biggest issue is not enough explanation is given as to why everyone is so melancholy. Perhaps that's the point–if you give everyone an easy out, even the mildest inconveniences can trigger a snap decision. Or maybe the author is simply extrapolating from the current, profound American despondency.
At the very least, I liked it better than Sales of a Deathman.
Three stars.
Goblin Reservation (Part 2 of 2), by Clifford D. Simak
by Gray Morrow
Last time, if you recall, Pete Maxwell has gone off to do research at the crystal planet, a world with the accumulated knowledge of two universes (it had lived through the last Big Crunch). The fading intelligences of the planet offered all of its wisdom in exchange for The Artifact, a featureless black object dating back to the Jurassic period. When Maxwell got back to Earth, he found that he'd already come back, duplicated by some quirk of matter transfer, and died.
This datum takes a back seat to bigger concerns–the Wheelers, bags of insect colonies bent on acquiring the lore of the crystal planet, have already purchased The Artifact, and once it is in their possession, plan to take over the universe. It is up to Maxwell, his tentative ally Carol, her sabre-tooth tiger Sylvester, their Neanderthal pal Alley Oop, the Ghost, William Shakespeare, the librarian who sold The Artifact, the goblin O' Toole, and several bridge-dwelling trolls to somehow stop the transaction before it's too late.
I must say, Simak pulls off a large set of emotional tones very well. You feel the sense of impending dread when it seems the Wheelers have clinched the deal. The comedic scenes are genuinely amusing. Yet, there is a grounding to the story that keeps it from being Laumerian or Anvilian lampoon. The revelations of the true nature of the fairies, little people, banshees, and whatnot are pretty good, too, though a bit abrupt. Perhaps they'll have more time to breathe in the novel version.
The only bit I had trouble with was The Wheelers, for whom I felt sympathy once I learned their motivation. There's an undertone of unconscious racism where they're concerned–they're bad because they're icky, different. When you learn what their status had been vis-à-vis the crystal planet, it all becomes a bit more unsettling.
Nevertheless, pleasant reading by a master. Four stars.
Picking a Winner
Well. It's obvious which story was the loser here (let's just call the Reynolds tale 'Harold Stassen'). But as to a winner, well that's a little harder. Several of the three-stars are quite nice; my four-star to the Harrison may be arbitrary. We can exclude the Simak because it's a serial, but it anchors this and the last issue well.
I suppose in an issue where (all but one of) the stories are good, the real winner is…us.
Happy reading! And don't forget to write to Pohl…
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by Gideon Marcus
Chertona Dyuzhina (Baker's Dozen)
Luna 14 is the Soviet Union's latest space success story. Launched April 7, it slipped into lunar orbit a couple of days later and began relaying data. Per TASS, the spacecraft is still working fine, returning space weather reports and mapping the moon's hidden contours through the wobbling of its path due to lunar gravity.
No pictures have been returned, nor has there been any mention of an onboard camera. However, since Luna 12 (launched October '66) did have one, it is generally believed that Luna 14 has one too–and it broke. We'll probably never know.
Campbell's Seven
The latest issue of Analog is also not an unmixed bag. However, it's still the best issue of the mag by a long shot since January. That's something worth celebrating!
by Chesley Bonestell
Satan's World (Part 1 of 4), by Poul Anderson
David Falkayn is back! The fair-haired protoge of Polesotechnic League magnate Nicholas van Rijn has been sent to Earth to find untold fortune. More specifically, to inquire at Serendipity Inc., storehouse of all the universe's lore, for the quickest route between Point A (Falkayn) and Point B (wealth). It's amazing what can be done with computers in the Mumblethieth Century!
by Kelly Freas
To do so, he puts himself at the mercy of the board of Serendipity, becoming a guest on their lunar estate. His crewmates, Adzel the monastic saurian who talks like Beast from The X-Men, and Chee, who talks like Nick Fury from Sgt. Fury, stay behind…and worry.
With good reason, for Falkayn has been shanghaied, purportedly in love with one of the Serendipity board, but probably brainwashed or something. Van Rijn gives Adzel and Chee the green light to investigate.
Falkayn stories are always somewhere in the lower middle for Anderson–serviceable but unexciting. Once again, the author utilizes some cheap tricks to move things along, even calling them out in text in an attempt to excuse them (the long explanation of Serendipity's modus operandi; the sudden coincidence of a call by a critical character, etc.) None of the characters is particularly interesting, perhaps because of the extremely broad brush with which they're described, particularly Van Rijn.
Nevertheless, mediocre is pretty good for a Falkayn story, and I'm kind of interested. Plus, Anderson's astronomy is always pretty good.
Three stars so far.
Exile to Hell, by Isaac Asimov
by Kelly Freas
This story is remarkable for being the first time Isaac has appeared in Analog (the magazine was Astounding when wrote for Campbell). It is otherwise unremarkable–this vignette is written in '40s style, with a hoary "twist" ending, which was already incorporated as one of many elements in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.
Two stars.
Conquest by Default, by Vernor Vinge
by Kelly Freas
This one surprised me: alien anarchists, who by their law are forbidden to have polities larger than 10,000 people, take over a recovering post-nuclear Earth. The Terrans are worried that they will suffer a fate similar to that of the Cherokees–annihilation, assimilation, relocation, or a combination of all three.
Told from the point of view of one the conquerers, it very much seems like this will be one of those fatuous Campbellian tales where it turns out that free enterprise and libertarianism are the superior forces, and that the solution to "the aboriginal problem" has a neat and obvious solution.
But the story has a sting in its tail.
I had not expected to find an anti-capitalist, anti-libertarian screed in the pages of Analog, much less an acknowledgement of the American genocide…yet there it is! And because the viewpoint character is an alien (and a comparatively sympathetic one, at that), the full impact of the story is saved for the end.
Four stars.
His Master's Vice, by Verge Foray
by Kelly Freas
Prox(y)ad(miral) Elmo Ixton lands his patrol ship, the sentient craft, Rollo, on the planet of Roseate on the trail of a rebel proxad who has gone to ground and recruited a network of criminal accomplices. The agoraphobic and irritable Ixton ingratiates himself with very few people, but he does get his man…in time for the tables to be turned when the renegade takes over his ship.
Luckily, Rollo is not about to become an unwitting accomplice.
Not bad. I didn't much like the Gestapo methods with which the "good guys" extracted the truth from suspects, though.
Three stars.
Fear Hound, by Katherine MacLean
by Kelly Freas
In late 20th Century New York, the city seethes with a despair so palpable, it almost seems the echoes of one person's broadcast pain. Indeed, that is exactly what it is. And the Rescue Squad, a corps of intellectual empaths, are on the case to find the source before s/he perishes in anguish, and in the process, telepathically pushes hundreds, maybe thousands more, to the brink of insanity or even death.
There's a lot of neat stuff in this one. Obviously, you have to buy telepathy as plausible (something Campbell obviously does). Given that, the idea of a group of people tracking down injured folk by their subtle telepathic emanations, and the unconscious mass effects these have on others, is pretty innovative. MacLean writes in the deft, immediate style that has made her one of SF's leading lights for two decades; the dreamy, choppy execution fits the circumstances of the story.
On the other hand, the bits about smart people essentially providing the brain for dozens of sub-average IQ types through unconscious telepathic links was something I found distasteful. There are also a few, lengthy explainy bits that could have been better worked in, I think.
A high three stars.
Project Island Bounce, by Lawrence A. Perkins
by Kelly Freas
The alien Ysterii arrive on an Earth not unlike that depicted in Conquest by Default. Here, the crisis is that the blobby amphibians prefer the archipelagos of Asianesia to the dry expanses of Eurica. This is causing a trade imbalance that will ultimately not only destabilize the world, but potentially lead to a cut-off of peaceful relations with the galaxy altogether.
Perkins doesn't tell the story very well, especially compared to Vinge's writing, and the "solution" is dumb. Two stars.
Skysign, by James Blish
by Leo Summers
Carl Wade, a Berkeley radical type finds himself trapped on an alien vessel floating above San Francisco. As memory returns to his headachey brain, he recalls the he was the one "lay volunteer" among dozens of men and women chosen as ambassadors for their various technical expertise.
Now, Carl and a hundred-odd humans are prisoners in the gilded cage of the ship, offered all manner of food and a fair bit of recreation. But they are nevertheless under the control of the alien crew, humanoids in skintight suits, with the ability to teleport and put the human captives to sleep at any time.
That is, until Carl, with the help of the Jeanette Hilbert, a brilliant meteorologist, figure out how to wrest control of the whole system from the aliens. That's only half the story, since Carl and Jeanette have differing ideas on what to do with absolute power.
I liked this story, and Blish does a good job of putting us in the boots of a not-entirely savory character. I find it particularly interesting that our radical protagonist is something of a jerk; I originally thought that this might be a subtle, anti-leftist dig, but Blish is an outspoken peacenik, so I think he just wanted to create a nuanced character.
Four stars.
Batting Average
Analog thus ends up at a reasonable 3.1 stars–not stellar, but certainly worth the 60 cents you pay for it (less if you have the subscription, of course). That puts it at the bottom of the new mags (vs. IF and Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.5), but better than the reprints (Fantastic (2.7) and Amazing (2.0)). The magazine average for the month was 3.1.
All told, if you took the four and five star stories of this month and squished them into one mag…well, you'd need one and a half. That amounts to about 40% of all new fiction this month. Again, not bad.
The sad news is only one story this month was woman-penned, making up for 4.3% of the newly published works. And that one was MacLean's, meaning Analog wins this month's pink ribbon in a mass forfeit.
Well, I suppose you take your victories where you find them. At least we ended up on the positive side of the ledger this month…
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By Jessica Holmes
I am poorly, I am tired, and to add insult to injury, I had to review this dreary serial. I’m going to chug some cough syrup, and then we’ll take a look at the latter half of the latest Doctor Who serial, Fury From The Deep.
Continue reading [April 22, 1968] Bored Of The Rigs (Doctor Who: Fury From The Deep [Part 2])
by Gideon Marcus
Pleasures of the Flesh
There are lots of different kinds of science fiction, from the nuts-and-bolts problem-solving variety one might call the Astounding style, to the literary style of the British New Wave, to the softly surreal speculation that often characterizes Galaxy. This month's issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction is one of the more sensual mags I've read in a long time, putting you, the reader, firmly into the viewpoint of its protagonists. From an SFnal perspective, the pickings are pretty slim, the speculations rather shallow. But from a visceral point of view, well, each story sends you pretty far out, making for a perfectly satisfactory experience whose highlights come, welcomely enough, at the beginning and the end.
by Russell Fitzgerald (this suggestive cover is a little frustrating as it gives away the end of the story it illustrates…)
Strange New Worlds
Lines of Power, by Samuel R. Delany
First up, and rightfully so, is the latest novella by a man who has taken SF by storm. It is set in or around the year 2050, when the world has been knit by endless power cables, providing no limit of electricity and prosperity. The lines are laid out by self-contained crawler units (think the highway patrol motor homes from Rick Raphael's Code Three). By the middle of the 21st Century, all of the world, from Siberia to Antarctica has been knit with energy.
But there are occasional holdouts. One such Luddite concentration is in Canada, where a flight of future-day motorcyclists, soaring on winged choppers, have made their haven in the woods. These "angels" are violently opposed to the encroachment of the self-described "demons" and "devils" that comprise the Power Corps crew of the "Gila Monster".
It is progressive in the extreme, with women bosses and free love: interracial, intergenerational, and any-sexual. Modern-day (1968) hangups are completely discarded in a manner that Purdom pioneered and Delany has perfected. At the heart of the story is the moral question, one we've seen explored on Star Trek several times–is it right to give the fruit of knowledge to those who actively reject it?
Like all Delany stories, this is a highly sensory piece, although it also requires close reading, as Delany likes to be a bit sparse with his linking sentences. It's a simple story. You will find no revelations, and the characters are bit shallow. Chip (the name by which the author traditionally goes) has his kinks and tics, and they are all on display here, suggesting that this was a labor of love, but not necessarily too much effort.
Thus, a pleasant, but slightly hollow four stars. You could start a magazine with much worse!
by Gahan Wilson
The Wilis, by Baird Searles
This is a beautifully told spotlight on an opera company, from the pen of someone as experienced with the field as, say, Leiber is with the theater. Honestly, the supernatural components are almost superfluous, coming as they do at the end of the story, with little surprise and rather clunky integration. But without them, I suppose the piece would not have been published, at least in this magazine.
Three stars, as well as the prediction that we won't ever see anything by Mr. Searles again–this was obviously a very personal piece, and I would be surprised if he has more ideas in him. But you never know!
Gifts from the Universe, by Leonard Tushnet
Another fellow who writes what he knows is Leonard Tushnet, whose pieces have a delightful yiddish tinge to them. Here, a retailer of gifts happens upon a wholesaler in ceramics whose stock is beautiful beyond compare–and at such a deal as to prices! But the rather unusual wholesaler only accepts silver as currency, and his tenure and his wares have a definite expiration date…
You'll enjoy it; you'll even remember it. A pleasant three stars.
Beyond the Game, by Vance Aandahl
The second-darkest piece of the issue comes from a young man who filled the pages of F&SF in the early '60s but then disappeared in 1964. He returns with the tale of Ernest, a boy trapped in a sadistic game of dodge ball, huddled for safety behind the broad backsides of two of his teammates. When the sadistic Miss Argentine (who may be a robot) notices the cowering tyke, she commands all of the kids to teach him a lesson. In doing so, she unlocks the child's unearthly powers, which facilitate his escape.
Nicely told, this feels like it was conceived by Aandahl when he was quite young, and he waited until he was deft enough with writing that he could effectively put it to paper. It's fine for what it is, which isn't all that much. Three stars.
Dry Run, by Larry Niven
Now for the darkest piece, a fantasy from a fellow I normally associate with straight-forward "hard" SF (though I suppose The Long Night, which also appeared in F&SF, was also an exception).
Murray Simpson grips the wheel of his Buick, cigarette smoldering between his white knuckles, the stiffening body of his Great Dane in the trunk. The dead dog is Simpson's doing, a dry run for the murder of his wife.
An accident forestalls the culmination of Simpson's plan. Those who judge in life-after-death decide to find out how things might have otherwise played out.
Upon first reading this decidedly unpleasant tale (not just the subject matter; the depiction of a San Diego freeway traffic jam is too spot on for any local's comfort!) I was inclined to give it three stars. After reading it aloud to my family as their bedtime story, the piece came to life for me.
Thus, four stars.
Backward, Turn Backward, by Isaac Asimov
The Good Doctor takes a stab and planetary rotations and axial tilts in this month's science fact article. I do appreciate that he advances his own theories as to what caused both the "direct" (counter-clockwise) rotations of most of the planets (the natural spiraling in of the bodies as they coalesced) as well as what caused Uranus to spin on its side and Venus to spin retrograde (perhaps collisions early in formation).
It's still a somehow dry and shallow piece. I'm not quite sure what I want from Isaac, but he's not quite doing it for me these days.
Three stars.
A Quiet Kind of Madness, by David Redd
In the snowy winter wastes of Finland, lone huntress Maija comes across a strange creature, shivering and near death. He looks something like a polar bear, but not quite. As she nurses him back to health, she discovers he is intelligent, telempathic, and from an entirely different world. When they sleep, her new Snow Friend takes her to his place-without-men, a warm place of perpetual sunshine. It is a paradise to Maija, who would just as soon leave our world behind.
For a man pursues her, the relentless Igor, who six months tried to have his way with her, and is now back to claim her again. But it is not just fear of Igor that spurs her on, rifle in hand, to fend off the man, but fear for Snow Friend, who will be just a pretty pelt to Igor.
As with Redd's previous story, Sundown (which also features a snowy landscape–Redd must have a deep familiarity with icy terrain), Madness is vivid and compelling, and more artfully told than Sundown. It's almost a contemporary Oz story, with Snow Friend a refugee from a magical land. It's also a beautiful character study, of the bitter and solitary Maija, of the not-entirely-bad Igor, of the well-meaning but still male Timo, and of the sweet, alien Snow Friend.
This time, it is not for lack of deftness that this piece falls just short of five stars, nor for its almost incidental fantastic qualities, but simply because the end is not quite satisfying–almost as if Redd, himself, was unsure how to conclude the piece.
Still, it kept me hooked. A high four stars, and my favorite piece of the magazine.
Back to reality
As my colleague Kris puts it (and Kris insists it originated with me), Fantasy and Science Fiction's experiment at being a monthly version of Dangerous Visions appears to be paying off. The May 1968 issue scores a solid 3.5 stars with no clunkers in the mix. If none of the stories quite achieves classic status, well, maybe next month.
I only wonder where all the women went, given that the pages of F&SF were once the bastion of SFnal femininity. Maybe they're all writing Star Trek scripts.
In any wise, pick up this issue and enjoy. In this tumultuous day and age, it's nice to breathe the rich air of other worlds for a while.
Speaking of other worlds, come join us tonight at 8pm (Eastern and/or Pacific) for the rerun of "The Doomsday Machine", one of Star Trek's best episodes!
Here's the invitation!
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by Jason Sacks
Planet of the Apes is already one of the most talked-about films of 1968. My friends have been buzzing about this movie since it was first announced, and now that it’s appeared Apes is certain to dominate all the chatter until Mr. Kubrick delivers his long-promised science fiction film.
A lot of the conversation has been about the ending of this film. I can’t talk about Planet of the Apes without revealing the incredible climax ending in this review, so if you want the twist to be fresh to you, you will want to turn the page around paragraph twelve of this review. You have been warned!
As you probably know, the movie stars Charlton Heston as George Taylor, an astronaut who journeys with his four compatriots to an alien planet via a deep sleep device. One companion dies along the way, so Taylor and his remaining pals journey across a desert. For three days (and thirty minutes of screen time), Taylor and his friends wander like Moses and the Jews across a desolate desert. Unlike wandering tribes of Israel, the astronauts eventually discover an oasis. This verdant area is beautiful and welcoming and perfect for a skinny dip. It’s also the absolute worst place they can end up.
See, the astronauts' clothes get stolen and then the visitors become witness to an incredible tableau. It seems there are many living humanoids on this planet. They look like humans, in fact. They are dressed in rags, running around like savages, terrified of something even stranger.
What sparks their fear is something even more uncanny. What sparks their fear as gorillas. Riding horses. Attacking the humans, and slaughtering them like a big game hunter might hunt gorillas in Africa in our world. The apes are clearly the dominant species on this world. We witness the slaughter of hundreds of humans under the apes’ vicious attack. One of Taylor’s companions is killed in the massacre, while Taylor’s vocal chords are damaged by an ape rifle. Taylor is tied hands and feet, and brought to a very odd sort of jail.
Amazingly, it’s a bespoke sort of jail, in which various ape species come to perform experiments on the humans. Scientist apes Cornelius (Roddy McDowell) and Zira (Kim Hunter) are amazing in their portrayals of these oddly humanlike creatures, full of empathy and confusion about Taylor and yet also a deep commitment to their own ape world. The script nicely walks a fine line with these characters.
The story squarely embeds Cornelius and Zira in the middle of this fictional world, explicitly having them react as members of their society first and foremost. Our hirusite leads react as apes with moral codes and professional ethics and wow is this a wonderful breath of fresh air compared with the way most science fiction movies portray societies.
I’ll move away from this plot summary, at least for the moment (gotta talk about the astonishing ending!) because I must make sure I discuss the many other ways this movie stands out.
First and foremost, Planet of the Apes is a fun movie. It’s full of action and twists and surprises. The crowd at the Northgate Theatre seemed on the edge of their seats the entire time as we watched this film, and the buzz at exit was full of joy.
Which implies the film had a great script. Rod Serling of The Twilight Zone wrote the initial outline, but Michael Wilson completed it. Wilson has previously worked on the David Lean films Bridge Over the River Kwai and Lawrence of Arabia, and he brings this film a similar combination of epic feel and personal intimacy we get in those films. Specifically, he creates a complex and fascinating society for the apes. This society has a history, and a religion, and social castes, and even mythologies they’ve created. All of it feels smartly earned, based on how I would imagine an ape society would be constructed, and I keep finding myself pondering this world.
One of the most important things about Apes has been receiving a lot of buzz in Famous Monsters and other recent zines: The makeup in this movie is amazing. I know there’s no Academy Award for best makeup, but the category should be reinstated just for this film. I was initially skeptical about the design of these characters going into the movie, but Dan Striepeke and his crew at Fox deliver an amazing design.
Franklin J. Schaffner directs the film. I’m not familiar with any of his recent work, but I know he directed Heston in The War Lord, and it’s obvious their previous project built some tremendous trust between the men. The direction is solid, professional and not showy. I’ve been pondering what Kubrick might be showing us in his sci-fi film, and I’m sure it will be much slicker and showier than Schaffner’s work here.
Leon Shamroy’s cinematography delivers in every scene, whether the gorgeous vistas of the American desert, the weird interiors of the Apes’ abodes, or the claustrophobic cages. Jerry Goldsmith’s atonal music adds so much to the story being told, and the set design work by Walter M. Scott and Norman Rockett really brings this world to life.
Okay, okay, yeah this movie is fantastic. It’s full of some thrilling and hilarious moments. Heston screaming “get away from me you damn dirty apes” is already starting to enter our lexicon. Sock it to me!
But the biggest reason everybody seems to leave this film giggling, the “Frankly, Scarlett, I don’t give a damn!” or “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship!” moment which will go down in history, is that awesome tableau at the very end. Schaffner films the sequence perfectly. Taylor and his female companion Nova are riding a horse on a beach. We think they’re still on an alien world as the camera zooms up. We see a triangle on the edge of the screen, we witeness a pull back, and at last we get a stunning image and a powerful primal scream of anger from Heston…
Ohh yeah! If you’re not smiling thinking about this ending, you saw a different movie than I did.
This is clearly the best science fiction movie of the year so far. I don’t know much about what Stanley Kubrick has planned, but this odyssey to the Planet of the Apes is stunning.
5 stars.
![[May 31, 1968] Euler's Issue (June 1968 <i>Analog</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/680531cover-672x372.jpg)
![[May 20, 1968] Dying, deflating, and deorbiting (June 1968 <i>Fantasy and Science Fiction</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/680520cover-665x372.jpg)
![[May 16, 1968] Counting down, and a blast from the Past (<i>Countdown</i> (1967) and <i>The Time Travelers</i> (1964))](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/680516posters-672x360.jpg)
![[May 10, 1968] Horse race (June 1968 <i>Galaxy</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/680510cover-393x372.jpg)
![[April 30, 1968] (Partial) success stories (May 1968 <i>Analog</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/680430cover-672x372.jpg)
![[April 22, 1968] Bored Of The Rigs (<i>Doctor Who</i>: Fury From The Deep [Part 2])](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/680422really-672x372.jpg)
![[April 20, 1968] A treat for the senses (May 1968 <i>Fantasy and Science Fiction</i>)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/680420cover-672x372.jpg)
![[April 18, 1968] "You Damn Dirty Apes!" (Planet of the Apes)](https://galacticjourney.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/poster-672x372.png)