The Science Fiction Book Club Reviews Revisited: 1979 (first quarter)

[james_davis_nicoll]

List courtesy of Andrew Wheeler.

Contents from Contento.

* * *

[snip dead links]

* * *



1979
January

The Chronicles of Amber Volume 1 Roger Zelazny (SFBC, Jan '79, hc)

+ o Nine Princes in Amber o n. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1970
+ o The Guns of Avalon o n. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1972
__________________________________________________________

The Chronicles of Amber Volume 2 Roger Zelazny (SFBC, Jan '79, hc)

+ o Sign of the Unicorn o n. Galaxy Jan '75 (+2); Garden City,
NY: Doubleday, 1975
+ o The Hand of Oberon o n. Galaxy May '76 (+2); Garden City,
NY: Doubleday, 1976
+ o The Courts of Chaos o n. Galaxy Nov '77 (+2); Garden City,
NY: Doubleday, 1978


I remember the beginning of the first but these aren't my sort of thing due to a badly justified philosophical problem with the nature of the Shadow worlds. I don't think I finished them and I certainly don't remember enough to have an opinion.


FIRESHIP by Joan D. Vinge

This would be the Vinge novel that refuses to stay in my memory.

(looks at JDV thread). Man with computer. Huh, and in the Dell version came with a second story, "Mother and Child".


TOMORROW AND TOMORROW edited by Ian Summers (Alternate)

No idea what was in this. Doesn't seem to be on contento.

BTW, in case anyone cares why I am using contento it is because
they get the stories in the correct order.

[This was an artbook with what looks like hundreds of illustrations]

THE ULTIMAX MAN by Keith Laumer (Alternate)

This is a rather sad novel, because half way through it the plotting side-effects of Laumer's early 1970s stroke suddenly make themselves known. The first half is a rather pedestrian Laumer story of a man forced into superhumanity and the second half is awful.


February MISSION TO MOULOKIN by Alan Dean Foster

This was the sequel to Icerigger. Moulokin is a terrestrial world that undergoes periodic global ice ages of the sort Earth used up until roughly a billion years ago. On Earth, a Snowball Earth scenario would be associated with a terrific mass extinction event but not on Moulokin for some reason. Ah well, nobody reads Foster for the science content.

Don't really remember this all that clearly, although I was surprised to discover when I tried to reread Icerigger how badly it had aged.


Infinite Dreams Joe W. Haldeman (St. Martin's, 1978, hc)

+ o Counterpoint o ss Orbit 11, ed. Damon Knight, G.P.
Putnam's, 1972
+ o Anniversary Project o ss Analog Oct '75
+ o The Mazel Tov Revolution o ss Analog Sep '74
+ o To Howard Hughes: A Modest Proposal o ss F&SF Nov '74
+ o A Mind of His Own o nv Analog Feb '74
+ o All the Universe in a Mason Jar o ss Cosmos SF&F Magazine
Sep '77
+ o The Private War of Private Jacob o ss Galaxy Jun '74
+ o A Time to Live o ss Analog May '77
+ o Juryrigged o ss Vertex Oct '74
+ o Summer's Lease ["Truth to Tell"] o ss Analog Oct '74
+ o 26 Days, On Earth o ss Galaxy Nov '72
+ o Armaja Das o ss Frights, ed. Kirby McCauley, St. Martins,
1976
+ o Tricentennial o ss Analog Jul '76
+ o Afterword ["Great SF About Artichokes & Other Story Ideas"]
o aw Algol Press Sum '78

This is a very good collection from a good author.

As I recall, "Tricentential" became the Worlds trilogy but did not become more upbeat thereby.


THE ROAD TO THE STARS by Iain Nicholson (Alternate)

I *think* this is a nonfiction book on starships.


DAWN OF THE DEAD by George Romero and Susanna Sparrow (Alternate)

And this is likely a novelization of the [second] movie, in which the dead rise (possibly due to a returning Venus probe) to feed on the
living. A group who survive the initial appearance of the Living Dead
take refuge in a house and by virtue of being idiots (Even I would
not use a firearm to get a lock off of a gas pump) manage to be
outsmarted by brain dead corpses.

[This is the second one; a small group of survivors try to find safety in a shopping mall. This is only very slightly better than hiding from the walking dead in a pub]


March


The Far Ends of Time and Earth Isaac Asimov (Doubleday, 1979, hc)

+ o Introduction o in
+ o Pebble in the Sky o n. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1950
+ o Earth Is Room Enough o co Garden City, NY: Doubleday Oct
'57
+ o The Dead Past o nv Astounding Apr '56
+ o The Foundation of Science Fiction Success o pm F&SF Oct '54
+ o Franchise o ss If Aug '55
+ o Gimmicks Three ["The Brazen Locked Room"] o ss F&SF Nov '56
+ o Kid Stuff o ss Beyond Fantasy Fiction Sep '53
+ o The Watery Place o ss Satellite Oct '56
+ o Living Space o ss Science Fiction Stories May '56
+ o The Message o vi F&SF Feb '56
+ o Satisfaction Guaranteed o ss Amazing Apr '51
+ o Hell-Fire o vi Fantastic Universe May '56
+ o The Last Trump o ss Fantastic Universe Jun '55
+ o The Fun They Had o ss The Boys and Girls Page Dec 1 '51;
F&SF Feb '54
+ o Jokester o ss Infinity Science Fiction Dec '56
+ o The Immortal Bard o vi Universe May '54
+ o Someday o ss Infinity Science Fiction Aug '56
+ o The Author's Ordeal o pm Science Fiction Quarterly May '57
+ o Dreaming Is a Private Thing o ss F&SF Dec '55
+ o The End of Eternity o n. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955

This seems to be an omnibus of some sort. It isn't clear to me what the unifying theme is, aside from being by Asimov.


ELECTRIC FOREST by Tanith Lee

I don't know this one.

[I like her books so why have I not read more Lee?]


THE FANTASTIC ART OF BORIS VALLEJO, introduced by Lester del Rey (Alternate)

Self-descriptive. I am not a Vallejo fan.


THE ART OF THE BROTHERS HILDEBRANDT by Ian Summers (Alternate)

Nor am I a Hildebrandt fan.

Comments

[oh6]

The Amber novels were very popular among my circle of acquaintances but for some reason I resolutely put off reading any of them until the follow-up series (which said acquaintances recommended against) was almost complete. For my purposes, the first book is a jam-packed thrill-ride, the second completes some of the business begun in the first, and from there through the fourth book it's mostly a bridge to the eschatological razzmatazz in the fifth.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

The short-story portion of that Asimov omnibus seems to be the collection Earth Is Room Enough, stories that were all set on Earth. Pebble in the Sky is set on Earth and I guess The End of Eternity is in some sense as well (in "the far ends of time"), so it's pretty much what it says on the tin.

[carbonel]

If "Tricentennial" became the Worlds trilogy, it did so by a rather roundabout route -- I don't see much connection between the two other than the fact that both are about colonization of planets by people from Earth.

[chrysostom476.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, I wonder how many SF stories feature "A Modest Proposal" in the title? There's this Haldeman, and a Niven (collected in "Limits")at least....