08/11/2024
Nice Girl With 5 Husbands
Four quirky short stories by the talented Fritz Leiber: Nice Girl with 5 Husbands, A Pail of Air, The Last Letter and A Bad Day for Sales. – Summary by phil chenevert [chương_files]
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08/11/2024
Short Science Fiction Collection 061
Science fiction is a genre encompassing imaginative works that take place in this world or that of the author’s creation where anything is possible. The only rules are those set forth by the author. The speculative nature of the genre inspires thought and plants seeds that have led to advances in science. The genre can spark an interest in the sciences and is cited as the impetus for the career choice of many scientists. It is a playing field to explore social perspectives, predictions of the future, and engage in adventures unbound into the richness of the human mind. – Summary by A. Gramour Note: Section 16, In The Year 2889 was originally published under the name of Jules Verne, but is currently believed to be the work of his son, Michel Verne. [chương_files]
08/11/2024
War of the Worlds (Version 3)
No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that the Earth was being scrutinised and studied from across the gulf of space. With infinite complacency, humanity went about its little affairs, serene in its assurance of its empire over matter. It is possible that the micro-organisms we watch under a microscope, do the same. Few people gave thought to the idea of life on other planets, and none imagined that it could be so vastly superior in intellect to ourselves. No one considered the possibility of extra-terrestrial danger. Yet the eyes that regarded our planet were envious and unsympathetic, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. (Cori Samuel, adapted from Chapter One.) [chương_files]
08/11/2024
Badge of Infamy (version 2)
Set in the early 22nd century: Dr. Daniel Feldman, stripped of rank and status and named pariah for violating Medical Lobby rules, stows away on a spaceship and flees to Mars Colony. There, while essentially practicing medicine without a license, he stumbles upon a plague organism indigenous to Mars, that threatens the whole colony and potentially the human race. Performing research to identify a cure, (also in gross violation of Medical Lobby rules) he must risk his life to buck the entrenched bureaucracy, bent on sweeping the whole matter under the rug in the name of political expediency. – Summary by Thomas Rose [chương_files]
08/11/2024
Blue Star
The novel is set in a parallel world in which the existence of psychic powers has permitted the development of witchcraft into a science; in contrast, the physical sciences have languished, resulting in a modern culture reminiscent of our eighteenth century. The protagonists are Lalette Asterhax, a hereditary witch, and Rodvard Bergelin, an ordinary government clerk who has been recruited into the radical conspiracy of the Sons of the New Day. Rodvard, though attracted to the daughter of a baron, is commanded by his superiors to seduce Lalette instead to gain the use of her blue star in the furtherance of their revolutionary aims. The witch is no more truly enamored of him than he is of her, but both fall in with the scheme for their own reasons, unaware of how much they are simply pawns in the larger scheme of things. (Summary adapted from Wikipedia) [chương_files]
08/11/2024
Man Obsessed
Jeffrey Meyer had a killing on his mind. It meant nothing to him that his towering Twenty-first Century world was going mad. He shouldered aside the rising tide of narcotics-mania, the gambling fever, the insatiable lust for the irrational. Jeff had his own all-consuming obsession—Paul Conroe must die! After a five-year frenzied chase, Jeff had his victim cornered; he’d driven him into the last hideaway of the world’s most desperate men—the sealed vaults of the human-vivisectionists. And Jeff knew that to reach his final horrible objective, he must offer himself also as a guinea pig for the secret experiments of the world’s most feared physicians! (Summary from original text) [chương_files]
08/11/2024
Creature from Cleveland Depths (Version 2)
The Cold War of the 1960s has grown warmer and warmer over time until, at this time in the future, it is a very hot and nasty war where Atomic and Ionic Bombs are dropped and satellites snoop into everything. The US has decided to move underground for protection from bombs and snooping and society in this future age is happy living there. Everyone lives underground! Well, except for the odd balls and weirdos who insist on staying topside. Gusterson is one of these quirky ones. He is milked for new ideas by the less inventive ‘moles’ as he calls them. One of his ideas is taken and despite his warnings, turns into a monster indeed; something that can and does control people. Listen and hear of the horror of the ‘TICKLER!” (First published in Galaxy magazine, 1961) – Summary by Phil Chenevert [chương_files]
08/11/2024
Mars is My Destination
MARS … Earth’s first colony in Space. Men killed for the coveted ticket that allowed them to go there. And, once there, the killing went on…. MARS … Ralph Graham’s goal since boyhood—and he was Mars-bound with authority that put the whole planet in his pocket—if he could live long enough to assert it! MARS … source of incalculable wealth for humanity—and deadly danger for those who tried to get it! MARS … in Earth’s night sky, a symbol of the god of war—in this tense novel of the future, a vivid setting for stirring action! – From the Book Blurb [chương_files]
08/11/2024
It Could Be Anything
A science fiction story by the great Keith Laumer – what more needs to be said? – But I will say more nevertheless. A young man sets out from his rural town to see the world for himself. What is really over the next hill? What does a big city look like? Is there really an ocean? After all, we only have the testimony of others that tell us about these things. Full confidence and belief in himself, he boards the local train, falls asleep and then ….. finds himself alone, the three cars abandoned …. the engine is gone and the tracks; well, the tracks just end in the middle of a grain field. What is going on? What kind of reality is this? Or is what we ‘know’ just illusions and in fact, It Could Be Anything!!! Summary by Phil chenevert [chương_files]
08/11/2024
Venus Boy
If you ever make a trip to the green planet of Venus, the first thing you’ll see will be the fifty-foot high statue of Venus’ greatest hero. It stands on the very top of towering New Plymouth Rock at the edge of the old colony of New Plymouth. Even from the rocket cradle, anyone can tell that the statue is of a twelve-year-old boy smiling up at the Venusian jewel bear perched on his shoulder. Cut into the huge rock below the statue are the words, “Virgil Dare (Johnny) Watson And the Marva, Baba. May their Friendship Endure!” Virgil Dare Watson, called Johnny by his friends, was the first human being born on Venus. He was named after Virginia Dare, the first pioneer child born in North America, and for a long time he was the only child on all Venus. And that would have been a lonely thing to be if it had not been for Baba. Baba, the bear, was not only Johnny’s pet, but his best friend, too, and the only one who knew about his three secrets. Because of these secrets, Johnny got himself, his jewel bear, Baba, and the whole colony of New Plymouth into desperate trouble. And because of these secrets, he also became a hero worthy of a statue—Venus’ greatest hero. – Summary by Preface [chương_files]