The other collection of short stories I own that contains Isaac Asimov's The Dead Past is called The Analog Anthology #1 with an introduction by Stanley Schmidt. It contains both short stories and articles that were previously featured in the magazine Analog: Science Fiction Science Fact and its earlier incarnation Astounding Science Fiction.

Short stories from this book I recommend are And He Built A Crooked House by Robert Heinlein, Stanley Schmidt's The Prophet, Poal Anderson's The Longest Voyage, Can these Bones Live? by Ted Reynolds, and Stanley Weinbaum's The Lotus Eaters. Stories by A.E. Vogt and Theodore Sturgeon among other authors are also featured.

There are also some interesting articles as well. Language For Time Travelers by L. Sprague de Camp talks about how the spoken language changes over time. No Copying Allowed by John W. Campbell is about how future technology that travels backwards in time would be impossible to reverse engineere in the present. The Asking Of Questions by Poal Anderson is basically a dedication to John W Campbell's work as editor of the magazine and how they would move on after his death in 1971.

Roadmarks

by Roger Zelazny



If the Marquis de Sade riding around on the back of a mind controlled Tyrannosaurus Rex doesn't immediately make you want to read this book I'm not sure what will. The premise is basically that time travel is possible by literally driving down a highway. The protagonist Red Dorakeen searches for a place he can't quite remember while being targeted by multiple assassins. This is one of the most fun and refreshingly imaginative road trip stories I've ever read.

No,No I meant it as the other way.Heinlein wrote the book in 1961. SF inclined hippies started using that phrase 5-6 years later and it spread for awhile-15 minutes of famewise. Like the term "Groovy" it was cool for awhile and then it was only used by people trying to sound like hippies. Like Bob Haney in Teen Titans

A collection I found entertaining is 3000 Years of Fantasy and Science Fiction edited by L. Sprague de Camp and his wife Catherine Crook de Camp. It has a foreword by Isaac Asimov and is composed of stories that show the progress that the science fiction and fantasy genres have made through out the millennia. It contains excerpts from Plato's Timaios and Homer's The Odyssey which are absolute classics I recommend everyone read them in full. I also enjoyed the stories A Journey To The Moon by Cyrano de Bergerac and The Cats of Ulthar by H.P. Lovecraft. My favorites are as follows:

H.G. Wells' The New Accelerator is about a scientist who invents a drug that basically gives the user super speed. What I like about this story is it seems like a fairly realistic depiction of what would happen to someone had they gained this power. Long before any Flash comics had brought up the idea.

Before Eden by Arthur C. Clarke is about astronauts on Venus who discover a form of alien intelligence that they are unable to communicate with. It also has a message about the effects that pollution and human carelessness pose on life.

Asimov's The Last Question is about two scientists who on a drunk bet basically ask a super intelligent computer how to prevent entropy. Of course the AI answers them "Insufficient Data For Meaningful Answer". Over millennia human beings evolve as does the AI and again and again the AI is asked the same question with the same results. I can't really answer the question without spoilers but it's a very satisfying ending.

The Scheme of Things by Lester Del Rey


Belmont Publishing (apparently now defunct) - 1966 ... seems like this was only published the one time... surprising, considering how Del Rey went on to BE a publisher.. you'd think he's re-publish his own stuff

Cover: Pretty cool.. sorta James Bond-y (which doesn't match the character at all, but is a nice visual none the less)



Plot: Mike Strong is your typical academic... until he starts living other lives, in other eras, and other timelines. Is he crazy, or amazing? He friend and mentor Paul Bender aims to figure it out.

Analysis: Great character study, but a little disappointing on both the ending(which was both predictable and cheesy) and in the shoehorning in a a few religious elements that seems really out of place. The journey was quite good, though, and definitely makes it a worthwhile read.

Phoenix Prime By Ted White (according to Wikipedia, also an uncredited assist by Marion Zimmer Bradley)







Copyright 1966.. mine is the the 2nd edition, from 1969.. with the white border cover design that Lancer used for their Conan books (which is what caught my eye). Strangely, it has a '3' on the spine, even though it says on the cover it's the 1st of a trilogy, and there are no other books advertised within, other than the Conan ones, and a mystery series I've never heard of.



Plot: Max Quest suddenly has super powers, but the Others want him to give them up, so they kidnap his girlfriend and send her to a parallel universe where Max's powers don't work. He follows, and adventure ensues.



This one took me a bit of time to get through.. it's pretty bad...all the way down to several typos and bad margins. It's kinda a reverse-John Carter, but there are SO many plot holes. Not even a bunch of (not particularly appropriate) comic book references didn't save. Apparently, it's the 1st of a trilogy..(though I've no idea what would happen in a 2nd book, since it all resolves nicely). I'll pass on the others.

The Million Cities
by J.T. McIntosh
Pyramid Books

I don't know too much about Pyramid, other than they were a big publisher for a while.. Wikipedia tells me they turned into Jove books and got rolled into Penguin in the late 70s.

My copy is from 1963.. the story was adapted from an earlier short story. There's apparently a couple earlier short stories, One in 300 , One in a thousand and One Too Many that serve as a first story, but I didn't fell I was missing anything not having read them.

This is the cover I have, and it's a pretty cool one, and extremely appropriate. in fact, judging from the scuff marks on the side, this may well be MY copy, which is totally random (unless those are a 'pattern' that is part of the picture):






Plot: Earth has used up every inch of space... the entire planet is covered with the Million Cities. Despite population controls and burrowing deep underground for more housing, a crisis is around the corner. A secret organization, the Chartists, think the answer is in traveling to the stars, but every past expedition to do so has ended in disaster. With no empty space on the entire planet, another failed attempt could kill millions... it space the last hope?

My take: It took me a while to get into this one... it's pretty slow to start, and meanders along for most of the story. Once it kicks in, though, and reveals the big plot punch at the end (which I was totally surprised by, by the way), it really ended up being a worthwhile read. It seemed like a pretty unique world, with the Earth essential becoming a mega-bee hive instead of humanity spreading through the galaxy after wrecking the planet, which I always appreciate.

I think the slow start was do to the characters... they're really just nothing special. Not bad, exactly, just blah. The plot twist is a killer though, and totally makes the book worth it. I suspect this is another example of a good short story that expanding to a novel didn't do anything for.

I'd give it a B... maybe B+.

I have the Gordon Dickson book that got mentioned a couple pages back, so I'll probably read that one next