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5.0 out of 5 stars
CERTANLY FOR THE HARDCORE!, March 19, 2009
This work is one of those anthologies of science fiction short stories that were quite popular in the 1970s and early 1980s. Robert Silverberg, one of the better writers in this particular genre himself, has put together a collection of eight short stories of science fiction, and given us a pretty good mix here.
The first offering is The Golden Man by Phillip K. Dick. This is a tale written at a time, several years before this collection was published, where it was felt that atomic war with Russia was pretty well a given and it was just a matter of time before "The Big One." Of course the science fiction canon of that time was loaded with the possibility of genetic mutations, mostly concerning man, as one of the major after effects of such a war. This was one of Dick's earlier works and we can already see the skill peeping through here that we found in most of his later works such as "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep." Good stuff here and an important work for the SiFi historian.
Second is a story by Gordon R. Dickson called Danger - Human. This is a neat little story of a sort of superman, really kind of an average Joe until special powers appear when the poor guy is put under stressful conditions. There is much food for thought with this one. Not one of my favorite in this collection, but that is just my taste; you may quite well find it the best in the lot.
Third on the list of an offering fro R.A. Lafferty who asks the question, "How many people do you know?" Imagine, if you will, that you discovered that you knew absolutely everyone! The hero of our story, Anthony Trotz discovered he did? Think about it! The title of this one is "All the People."
Fourth, Silverberg has chosen a piece by Alfred Bester, "Oddy and Id." The story of an insurance claims adjuster who is quite familiar with accident prone people. Is it luck, carelessness, stupidity, or is it something else? Better yet, what if all were the opposite and everything you did was absolutely perfect? You could make no errors, were brilliant and very, very careful! Bester went on to write such novels as The Demolished Man and The Stars My Destination. This early work shows what Bester would have going for him.
Fifth on the list is "The Man with English" by Horace L. Gold. Many folks are born or blessed at birth with certain gifts, skills, traits and so forth. But not all! Edgar Stone simply went into a hospital with one particular problem, but alas, came out with another! Good Grief! Gold was of course the editor of and founder of Galaxy Magazine in 1950. For those of you not familiar with this publication...what a pity!
Robert Silverberg himself gives us the sixth little story, one called "To Be Continued." Imagine what it would be like to be literally immortal! Enough said...think about it! Silverberg did.
Humpty Dumpty Had a Great Fall by Frank Belknap Long, a friend and contemporary of H.P. Lovecraft and has done a wonderful biographical study on him gives us number seven in this series of stories. This short story has been out of print for years and years and deals with, among other things, other dimensions, alien beings, strange images and very odd people...hmmm, what are nightmares? And what if you could take others into your horrid little dreams with you? Again, think about it.
Last but not least is the well known and somewhat famous underground classic "Bettyann." Sweet Bettyann...the girl is not quite human, is she! "Please drive a little slower," the woman said, and the baby began to fret."
This collection was put together in 1974 but several of the stories date back to the early 1950s. If you are a fan of this genre, then you really need this one in your collection and you need to pull it and others of its ilk out now and again, just to see where we came from. Short stories have gone out of vogue for the present time which is a downright pity.
Don Blankenship
The Ozarks
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