The 1953 anthology of The Year’s Best Science Fiction Stories demonstrates the increasing diversity of science fiction from that era. Zenna Henderson makes her first appearance with “Ararat.” John Jakes, who would later find fame writing the historical Kent Family Chronicles, explores the drama of “Machine.” John D. MacDonald, who would be best remembered for the Travis McGee series, plays a “Game for Blondes.” Of course, veteran SF writers like Murray Leinster, Erie Frank Russell, Fritz Leiber, and Alfred Bester are represented. But Brits like John Wyndham and William F. Temple make their presence known with strong stories. I continue to be impressed by these Bleiler & Dikty anthologies. GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Trematode, a Critique of Modern Science-Fiction, by Alfred Bester
“The Fly”, by Arthur Porges
“Ararat”, by Zenna Henderson
“Counter-Transference”, by William F. Temple
“The Conqueror”, by Mark Clifton
“Machine”, by John W. Jakes
“The Middle of the Week After Next”, by Murray Leinster
“The Dreamer”, by Alfred Coppel
“The Moon Is Green”, by Fritz Leiber
“I Am Nothing”, by Eric Frank Russell
“Command Performance”, by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
“Survival”, by John Wyndham
“Game for Blondes”, by John D. MacDonald
“The Girls from Earth”, by Frank M. Robinson
“Lover, When You’re Near Me”, by Richard Matheson
“Fast Falls the Eventide”, by Eric Frank Russell
About the Authors

The play version of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is based on the best selling novel with the same title by Mark Haddon. The story concerns an autistic 15-year-old named Christopher John Francis Boone. Christopher appears to be a mathematical genius, but he struggles with dealing with people. Christopher hates to be touched. He hates metaphors (which confuse him). Christopher loves Sherlock Holmes and when a dog is killed in his neighborhood, Christopher decides to investigate and solve “the murder.” Christopher’s parents are stressed by their son’s autism. Director Marianne Elliot creates an innovative set which allows the audience to experience second-hand what autism is like. Within these demanding conditions Luke Treadaway, playing Christopher, projects confusion with frustration as he tries to solve the mysteries of his Life. This National Theatre production was broadcast at our local Regal Theater as part of their Fathom Events series. Excellent! GRADE: A

About a month ago, I purchased a Samsung TV for our computer room. I like to have MORNING JOE or CNBC on in the background while I’m working on the computer. But, as we all know, the sound of flat screen TVs is tinny and weak. The Wall Street Journal recently featured an article on sound bars. They loved the Polk Command Bar ($300) and the new SONOS Beam ($400). But I was attracted to their review of the VIZIO 29″ 2.0 SOUND BAR. It lists for $99 but you can order it from AMAZON for $75. It’s perfect for a TV you occasional use. You’ll want better sound for your main 4K HDTV, perhaps a surround sound system. But, for TV in a guest room or computer room, the VIZIO 2.0 SOUND BAR improves the sound at a bargain price! You can read the Wall Street Journal article here. GRADE: B+

This second season of Legion upped the ante with surrealism and Time Travel. Dan Stevens plays David Haller, a powerful mutant who has been treated as a schizophenic since childhood. He had also been infected by an alien presence who calls itself Amahl Farouk or Shadow King. David managed to oust Shadow King at the end of Season One, but now Shadow King is searching for his body which will restore his full, terrible powers.

I like the women in Legion. Jean Smart plays a telepath. Rachel Keller plays Sydney ‘Syd’ Barrett, David’s girlfriend in the present and the Future. Aubrey Plaza plays the psychopathic Lenny Busker. There’s also a guy with a basket on his head protected by female cyborgs with mustaches. Yeah, go figure.

If you’re looking for something far, far from ordinary, you might give Legion a try. It’s brilliant, confusing, and frequently baffling. But fun! Legion has been renewed for a Third Season. GRADE: B+

Michelle Dean Dedicates Sharp “For every person who’s ever been told, ‘You’re too smart for your own good'” Dean’s chapters about Dorothy Parker, Rebecca West, Hannah Arendt, Mary McCarthy, Susan Sontag, Pauline Kael, Joan Didion, Nora Ephron, Renata Adler, and Janet Malcolm present women who challenged the System and advanced the cause of women’s rights. Some, like Dorothy Parker, achieved her successes by using sardonic humor and wit. Yet, bad personal choices left her destitute. Hannah Arendt, who coined the term “the banality of evil” in her writings about the Eichmann trial, conducted a long affair with German philosopher Martin Heidegger (who was active in the Nazi Party). Rebecca West had a stormy relationship with H. G. Wells. As you can see from these examples of Michelle Dean’s focus, opinions don’t factor as highly as personal problems. I learned Dorothy Parker’s first husband was an alcoholic who introduced her to gin. Later, he fought in World War I and picked up a morphine addiction, too. Parker’s second husband might have been gay, according to Dean. Edmund Wilson, while drunk, punched Mary McCarty when she was two-and-a-half months pregnant. Susan Sontag had Stage 4 breast cancer. Michelle Dean provides plenty of information on personal relationships, literary feuds, and affairs. So Sharp is a bit of a mixed bag. I enjoyed learning about these women’s lives, but their opinions take second place to other factors. GRADE: B
Table of Contents
Preface ix
Chapter 1 Parker 1
Chapter 2 West 31
Chapter 3 West & Hurston 59
Chapter 4 Arendt 65
Chapter 5 McCarthy 92
Chapter 6 Parker & Arendt 122
Chapter 7 Arendt & McCarthy 132
Chapter 8 Sontag 146
Chapter 9 Kael 175
Chapter 10 Didion 203
Chapter 11 Ephron 229
Chapter 12 Arendt & McCarthy & Hellman 253
Chapter 13 Adler 260
Chapter 14 Malcolm 284
Afterword 309
Note on Sources 313
Bibliography 315
Notes 317
Index 349

Sandra Bullock plays Debbie Ocean, Danny Ocean’s sister. Debbie decides to rob the Met Gala to get the famous Cartier diamond necklace called the Jeanne Toussaint necklace (worth $150 million). Debbie recruits her old partner in crime, Lou (Cate Blanchett), jewelry maker Amita (Mindy Kaling), a fence Tammy (Sarah Paulson), a pick-pocket Constance (Awkwafina), a computer hacker Leslie (Rihanna), and a fashion designer Rose Weil (Helena Bonham Carter). Beating the best security system in the world is child’s play according to Gary Ross and Olivia Milch’s screenplay (Gary Ross of The Hunger Games also directed this movie). This is my major quibble with Ocean’s 8. It’s too easy.

In classic capers (both novels and movies) we see the team prepare for the crime, we see them commit the heist, but then…something goes wrong! The team has to improvise to overcome the unexpected problems. In Ocean’s 8 nothing goes wrong. There’s also the question of how Sandra Bullock and her crew will sell hundreds of millions of dollars in diamonds in a market controlled by the Diamond Cartel. I thought Ocean’s 8 had an excellent cast, but a flawed script. GRADE: B

First Birthday present of 2018: a personalized mouse pad from my sister, Paula! I love it!

Back in 1952, Everett F. Bleiler and T.E. Dikty decided their yearly anthology of YEAR’S BEST SCIENCE FICTION STORIES wasn’t including some of best stories because of their length. Their solution was to edit a companion volume titled YEAR’S BEST SCIENCE FICTION NOVELS: 1952. What Bleiler and Dikty call “novels” we today would call “novellas.” These stories are about 70 pages long. Walter M. Miller, Jr.’s “Izzard and the Membrane” is a typical Cold War story where an American cyberneticist is tricked into helping the Soviets in World War III attack on America directed by an intelligent computer (we would call this Artificial Intelligence). Eric Frank Russell’s famous “…And Then There Were None” presents the dilemma of Freedom. “Flight to Forever” is one of Poul Anderson’s patented Time Travel stories. My favorite story in this anthology is another Cold War story, “The Hunting Season” by Frank M. Robinson. A totalitarian society punishes dissent by allowing “citizens” to hunt down dissidents and kill them. Arthur C. Clarke’s “Seeker of the Sphinx” explores the results of a lack of Progress in the Future. All in all, this is an entertaining collection of novellas. GRADE: A-
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Introduction, by Everett F. Bleiler & T. E. Dikty 9
“Izzard and the Membrane”, by Walter M. Miller, Jr. (Astounding Science Fiction) 17
“…And Then There Were None”, by Eric Frank Russell (Astounding Science Fiction) 81
“Flight to Forever”, by Poul Anderson (Super Science Stories) 165
“The Hunting Season”, by Frank M. Robinson (Astounding Science Fiction) 225
“Seeker of the Sphinx”, by Arthur C. Clarke (Two Complete Science-Adventures) 295

I was struck by the fact that none of these “Best” stories came from Astounding Science Fiction. This breaks a string of Astounding stories from 1949, 1950, and 1951 that were included in Bleiler & Dikty’s previous YEAR’S BEST SCIENCE FICTION volumes. Also, various “new” SF magazines like Worlds Beyond and New Worlds are now represented. By 1951, the SF publishing landscape was changing. This volume includes C. M. Kornbluth’s “The Marching Morons” about a future when the average IQ is 45. Fredric Brown and Mack Reynolds shocked the SF field with their “Dark Interlude.” Time travel plays a role in several of these stories. My favorite is “Of Time and Third Avenue” by Alfred Bester with its clever ending. Anthony Boucher’s fabulous “Nine-Finger Jack” shows how to defeat a Venusian invasion. Jack Vance’s “Men of Ten Books” explores the positives and negatives of motivation on a societal level. GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Introduction (The Best Science-Fiction Stories: 1952) – (1952) – essay by Everett F. Bleiler and T. E. Dikty 7
The Other Side – (1951) – shortstory by Walter Kubilius (SUPER SCIENCE STORIES, April 1951) 21
Of Time and Third Avenue – (1951) – shortstory by Alfred Bester (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, October 1951) 38
The Marching Morons – (1951) – novelette by C. M. Kornbluth [as by Cyril Kornbluth] (Galaxy Science Fiction, April 1951) 47
A Peculiar People – (1951) – shortstory by Betsy Curtis (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, August 1951) 81
Extending the Holdings – (1951) – shortstory by Donald A. Wollheim [as by David Grinnell] (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April 1951) 97
The Tourist Trade – (1951) – shortstory by Wilson Tucker (Worlds Beyond, January 1951) 102
The Two Shadows – (1951) – novelette by William F. Temple (Startling Stories, March 1951) 113
Balance – [Max Larkin] – (1951) – shortstory by John Christopher (New Worlds, Spring 1951) 140
Brightness Falls from the Air – (1951) – shortstory by Margaret St. Clair [as by Idris Seabright] (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April 1951) 159
Witch War – (1951) – shortstory by Richard Matheson (Startling Stories, July 1951) 166
At No Extra Cost – (1951) – shortstory by Peter Phillips (Marvel Science Stories, August 1951) 172
Nine-Finger Jack – (1951) – shortstory by Anthony Boucher (Esquire, May 1951) 190
Appointment in Tomorrow – (1951) – novelette by Fritz Leiber (Galaxy Science Fiction, July 1951) 196
The Rats – (1951) – shortstory by Arthur Porges (Man’s World, February 1951) 225
Men of the Ten Books – (1951) – shortstory by Jack Vance (variant of The Ten Books) (Startling Stories, March 1951) 235
Generation of Noah – (1951) – shortstory by William Tenn (Suspense, Spring 1951) 258
Dark Interlude – (1951) – shortstory by Fredric Brown and Mack Reynolds (Galaxy Science Fiction, January 1951) 271
The Pedestrian – (1951) – shortstory by Ray Bradbury (The Reporter, August 7, 1951) 280
About the Authors (The Best Science-Fiction Stories: 1952) – (1952) – essay by uncredited 286

One of the books I considered for my Gardner Dozois tribute last week was this writing guide from 1991 from “The Editors of Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine and Analog.” Of course, some of these essays are dated but Gardner Dozois’s “Living in the Future: You are What You Eat” is still relevant. My favorite essay is Connie Willis’s “Learning to Write Comedy, or, Why It’s Impossible and How to Do It.” Willis discusses plenty of comic writers and shows how they work their magic. If you’re interested in reading about what editors in the early 1990s were interested in buying, this is the book for you. GRADE: B
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
Introduction 1
PART ONE: STORYTELLING
On the writing of speculative fiction / Robert A. Heinlein — 5
Living the future : you are what you eat / Gardner Dozois — 12
Plotting / Isaac Asimov — 28
Dialog / Isaac Asimov — 33
You and your characters / James Patrick Kelly — 38
Seeing your way to better stories / Stanley Schmidt — 50
Turtles all the way down / Jane Yolen — 62
Learning to write comedy, or, Why it’s impossible and how to do it / Connie Willis — 76
PART TWO: IDEAS AND FOUNDATIONS
Good writing is not enough / Stanley Schmidt — 91
The creation of imaginary world : the world builder’s handbook and pocket companion / Poul Anderson — 105
The creation of imaginary beings / Hal Clement –Building a starfaring age / Norman Spinrad — 129
How to build a future / John Barnes 147
Building a starfaring age / Norman Spinrad 185
The ideas that wouldn’t die / Stanley Schmidt — 200
PART THREE: THE BUSINESS OF WRITING
The mechanics of submission / Sheila Williams — 211
Revisions / Isaac Asimov — 221
Writing for young people / Isaac Asimov — 226
New writers / Isaac Asimov — 231
Authors vs. editors / Stanley Schmidt — 236
Market resources / Ian Randal Strock — 250
PART FOUR: APPENDIX
Guidelines (Analog and Asimov’s) 259