Customer Reviews

Adventures in Time and Space

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This is one of the best collections of science fiction short stories, novellas, and novelettes ever published. Originally released in August of 1946 as collection of 35 works from what are now considered the legends of science fiction. It was tied for 4th on the Arkham Survey in 1949 and the top rated book on the Astounding/Analog polls in 1952 and 1956. In 1966, 20 years after it was published, it was still rated as the 20th best science fiction book on the Astounding/Analog pole, and in 1999 it was ranked as the 3rd best SF anthology of all time.

Fourteen of the original 35 stories have also been long remembered by science fiction fans, including such stories as `Requiem' (Robert Heinlein), `Forgetfulness' (Don A. Stuart, a.k.a. John W. Campbell, Jr.), Nerves (Lester Del Rey), Black Destroyer (A.E. van Vogt), Nightfall (Isaac Asimov), and many more. One must be careful in purchasing this book to be sure to get the full collection. The second edition omits five of the stories, and there are several derivative collections that were released using the same or similar names. The original 35 story collection was republished in 1957 under the title `Famous Science Fiction Stories: Adventures in Time and Space.'

Dated? Of course -- this landmark collection came out in 1946. But "Adventures in Time and Space" defined Astounding magazine as the foundation of modern sci-fi and every single story in it has a twist, a sparkle and that elusive sense of wonder you just can't get any more because we, and science, and science-fiction, and maybe even dreams, have changed. Other good points: lots of humorous stories and passages; a nearly definitive selection of the now almost defunct genre of time-travel tales. If you think of these as uncommonly intelligent Saturday matinees on the page, there's nothing but hours of pleasure here. "Adventures in Time and Space" remains essential for anyone who wants to understand the full range of science fiction.

Due to a combination of hard work, circumstance, and just plain old luck Raymond Healy was able to lock up the reprint rights to many of the best SF stories from the thirties and early forties. They range from what's considered to be the best SF story of all time (Isaac Asimov's "Nightfall") to my own favorite novella (John W. Campbell's "Who Goes There?"). Sure they're dated a bit but there's nevertheless a lot of reading pleasure to be found between it's two covers.

This wonderful anthology contains some of the best short sci-fi tales of the pulp era. An excellent introduction to classic American speculative fiction. Not a klinker in the bunch.
2000x: The Proud Robot (Unabridged)2000x: The Marching Morons (Dramatized)2000x: By His Bootstraps (Dramatized)

'Famous Science Fiction Stories' edited by Raymond J Healy and J Francis McComas was one of my very early hardcover book purchases. At the time, it was 'A Modern Library Giant' selling for $2.95 when this Random House series of inexpensive hardcover books was quite a bargain before the widespread publishing of trade and mass market paperbacks.

I must have read this book from cover to cover at least five times and I probably have read some of the better stories several more times. Other reviews recount all the many accolades the book and its stories have received. I will concentrate on my personal impressions.

I read this first when I would go through four or five similar collections of science fiction stories each summer from my local library. And yet, I would always come back to this volume as more satisfying than all the others.

These are all written before the days of Harlan Ellison, Phillip K. Dick, and Gene Wolfe when things were just a little more literal than they have become when we have become hemmed in by the limits of the speed of light, the Godel uncertainty principle and the unknowability of quantum physics.

I sense an urge to read these again and I envy you if you are coming to them for the first time.

Very highly recommended!

This book is a period piece. My book-club edition has a bullet-shaped spaceship in the cover art, a sure sign of a mistaken notion what science is, and by extension what science fiction is. Still, it's enjoyable, and you can't fault some of its inclusions, no matter how old they are -- specifically, it was in this book that I first read Asimov's "Nightfall," a book that will stand the test of time for a long time to come, I'm sure.