Eric Frank Russell's "Study in Still Life" aka "Still Life" (novelette, bureaucracy, satire)

This would rank among my all time favorites. Very funny satire on bureaucracy.

Only puzzling thing is: why hasn't it been widely anthologized?

Story summary.

A star faring human empire spread across many worlds. Moving goods between worlds is expensive, so they're prioritized. Of course, the liqueur for an influential bureaucrat on an outworld has higher priority than equipment needed to make the place habitable!

We get to view a fat bureaucracy in action, as a well intentioned insider games the system to get the cargo shipments' priorities right...

Collected in.

1. Eric Frank Russell's "Major Ingredients" (ed Rick Katze).

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, January 1959.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of Eric Frank Russell (annotated list).

A E van Vogt's "The War Against the Rull" (fix-up novel)

This is collection of mostly good but not outstanding stories that would have been better left as a short story collection; changes made to accommodate the fix up actually make this book less than what it would have been as a collection of included short stories.

Stories mostly involve 3 species: Man who's at war with rull who are invaders from another galaxy. And ezwal whose world man has grabbed for "strategic" reasons in war against the rull. My first impression was that Man stand for US; rull for communists; & ezwal for ... was it Korea? But these stories all predate US/USSR stand off, & I'm not sure where exactly the author edited for fix-up. But it still reads well as this cold war story!

My notes below are essentially on short stories comprising this fix-up, though they're not named as such in fix-up. But in one or two cases, this fix-up is the only version of the stories I've read. In other cases, I read the original short story long ago but my description is probably more influenced by their fix-up version.

Some of the stories are online. I include links when I'm aware of them.

1. [novelette] "Co-Operate - Or Else!"; download; Astounding, April 1942: Ever since man invaded ezwal world as a strategic war asset, the telepathic ezwal have been fighting a guerrilla rebellion - picking off man at will, but pretending themselves to be animals. When a captured ezwal was being transported to earth, he wrecked the ship & ended up stranded with a man on an uninhabited world - the man who now knows the secret that ezwal are sentient. This is the story of forced cooperation of the two on this dangerous world, or both will die.
2. [novelette] "Repetition" aka "The Gryb"; Astounding, April 1940: An adventure on the moon of ezwal world whose highlights are two clever hunts with unusual weapons: one of grazers for meat by a improvised stick the animals are tricked to eat that causes internal hemorrhage, & second of a hunting animal tricked to cut its tongue (on a fixed knife) enough to bleed to death.
   
   This story is unrelated to everything else in the book.
   
   Note: ISFDB notes '"The Gryb" was a new (standalone) story with this book, and not reprinted independently until 1976.' Yet lists it as from Astouning, April 1940!
3. [novelette] "The Second Solution"; download;Astounding , October 1942: A mother & a child ezwal, captured by man, are now being transported to earth. A gunfight on ship will kill the mother; child will survive the shipwreck on earth & escape in the wilds. Story is of its hunt by Man & of its eventual capture with the help of the man who knows ezwal are telepathic & sentient, & wants them to alley with man.
4. [novelette] "The Green Forest"; Astounding, June 1949: Rull have a device that lets them appear in any shape - in this case, as specific men, so long as you don't try touching them! And they have an unusual technique for implanting hypnotic suggestions in a man: via especially etched pictures on surfaces like walls!
   This is the story of our hero, tricked by these agents to go to a dangerous frontier world where they have a plan to kill him while making the death appear natural! Of course, hero will escape, killing the agents instead.
5. [novelette] "The Sound"; Astounding, February 1950: A star ship is being built somewhere on earth to eventually go to another galaxy to look for Rull world. A ship that will take a lifetime to build, is the size of a city, & the future crew is already living there. And, of course, the place is teeming with rull agents posing as humans using their clever device.
   
   This is the story of a young boy busting an operation involving many Rull agents, with some help from human military & from telepathic ezwal captured in "The Second Solution".
   
6. [novelette] "The Rull"; Astounding, May 1948: Hero is stranded on an uninhabited world with rull supremo! Each has fancy hypnotic devices. Eventually, man will plant a suggestion in rull's mind to end the war & begin a conquest of some galaxy other than Milky Way!

Fact sheet.

First published: 1959.
Related: Stories of A E van Vogt.

Fred Hoyle's "Ossian's Ride" (novel, espionage): Adventures of an English spy in Ireland

Ireland is suddenly the world's most technologically advanced country, thanks to major advances in basic sciences that have obviously suddenly become available to it. And they're making the world even more curious by putting up a very heavy security cordon around their crown jewel - the "Industrial Corporation of Eire" (ICE).

So a curious English government sends a spy...

While I wasn't bored, it's not a book that could not be put down either. And some of the humor will probably be better accessible to British readers.

Fact sheet.

First published: 1959.
Rating: B. 
Related: Stories of Fred Hoyle.

3 stories

None top notch. Neither crappy. Average fare.

1. Christopher Anvil's "Leverage" (B); download; Astounding, July 1959: Human pioneers on a new world are harrased by local versions of gnats, crows, & dinosaur birds. Until someone has an idea...
2. Christopher Anvil's "The Sieve" (B); download; Astounding, April 1959: Pioneer (human) agricultural communities on this tough planet need to get rid of the useless & lazy among themselves to survive.
3. [ff] Kathryn Cramer's "You, In Emulation" (B); download; Nature, 20 October 2011: What if you could check out my brain dump from your local library & interact with it during rental period & make friends with it?

Frank Herbert's "Operation Haystack" (novelette, free): Spy exposes a secret society

I got a feeling there is an undercurrent here, & it is a general comment on women's character. But I don't know the atmosphere in US when this story was written; someone familiar with the period will likely see more here.

While the plot itself is not much, it's a fast moving spy story: a government agent exposes a very old secret society of women with Arabic roots, determined to achieve a single goal - political control of the galaxy.

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, May 1959.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg, Manybooks, Feedooks.
Rating: B.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of Frank Herbert.

Algis Budrys' "The Stoker and the Stars" (as by John A Sentry) (short story, post-war, free): Familiarity breeds trust

When the war-like man first started going out to stars, he went out to conquer. He was smashed as a fly by gentler but far more powerful aliens. After surrender, man was allowed to keep Sol, & to do minor trading with some aliens in some nearby star-systems.

This is the story of an unnamed human war veteran, one of the few war survivors, seen through the eyes of a colleague. One fine day, he signed up for a dull & risky job on the spaceship Serenus at a Martian landing field - Serenus was then on its way to Alpha Centauri on a trading trip.

He jumped ship during trading, & signed up as crew with the aliens. Since then, he's been jumping ships all over galaxy, going farther & farther on all sorts of alien ships. One lone harmless man just wandering around. Effect of his wanderings on the attitudes of aliens towards mankind has, however, been remarkable...

See also.

1. Robert Heinlein's "The Green Hills of Earth" (download old radio adaptation): One of the less interesting but rather famous stories of Heinlein, with the hero behaving within the spaceship in ways very similar to one in this story.

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, February 1959.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg, Manybooks, Feedbooks.
Download audio from LibriVox.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Analog/Astounding issues edited by John W Campbell, Jr.
Related: Stories of Algis Budrys.

Tom Godwin's "Empathy" (novelette, bureaucracy, free): Actions speak louder than words

Two warring factions of frontiersmen in a star-faring humanity: ERB ("Extraterrestrial Relations Board"), & Frontier Corps. Later are competent, former are pompous politicians out for power. ERB seems to be winning ... so far.

This is the story of their conflict, as played out on the world of Deneb Five, an outpost Earth wants for farther exploration of space. Comically idiotic & cowardly General David A Beeling of ERB vs the very competent Captain Harold Rider of Frontier Corps.

Fact sheet.

First published: Fantastic Science Fiction Stories, October 1959.
Download full text from Baen CD.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Tom Godwin.

"Fantastic Universe", Vol 11 No 3 (May 1959) (magazine, free): Annotated table of contents

Scans of this magazine in CBR format are online as part of a larger package.

Table of contents. 

Links on author fetch more fiction by author.

1. [novelet] Eric Frank Russell's "The Army Comes to Venus": "He was secretly surprised to find himself enjoying this spell of gallantry. But worse was to happen."
2. Robert F Young's "The Wistful Witch": "Anybody might think that she wanted to be a witch--& anybody thinking so would have been correct."
3. Ron Goulart's "Parlor Game": "Luanne made it almost a challenge. She really was pretty. And there were so few women on Prospero II."
4. Sam Rosenfeld's "Citizen Meekle": "What happens when a little man who's not aggressive--but who does dream--finally makes a startling discovery?"
5. Lloyd Biggle's "Traveling Salesman": "The Feds were getting tough. It was costing too much to distribute the stuff. He'd probably have to go away..."
6. Joy Leache's "Miss Millie's Rose": "a very different story about Tomorrow's Mars."
   
   'The Customs man announced he had an old dame there "with one of them Jap trees." How was he to know what'd happen?'
7. John Victor Peterson's "The Amnesic Men": "Venus! She remembered the harsh record of hostory & shuddered at the thought of the many men who had died."
8. G Harry Stine's "Letter from Tomorrow" (as by Lee Correy): "Maybe the man was nutty as a fruitcake. Maybe he thought he was a little green man--& maybe he was very sane..."

See also.

1. Fiction from Fantastic Universe.
2. Fiction from old "pulp" magazines.
3. Fiction from 1950s.

Notes.

1. There is no mention of editor on ToC page, though Hans Stefan Santesson is noted as the "Editorial Director".

"Astounding Science Fiction", October 1959 (ed John W Campbell, Jr) (magazine, free): Annotated table of contents

Scans of this magazine in CBR format are online as part of a larger package.

Table of contents. 

Links on author fetch more fiction by author. Where I'm aware of other online copies of a story, I include them too. If I have a separate post on a story, link on story title goes there.

1. [novelette] Christopher Anvil's "The Lawbreakers": "Their mission was sabotage--the destruction of critical installations. Their victims? Hah! Their victims were most eagerly awaiting their hoped-for coming..."
   
   I've a feeling I've seen text version of this story online somewhere, but cannot locate the URL now.
2. [novelette] Jack Vance's "Dodkin's Job": 'The really essential question was, "Who's runnin' this shebang, anyhow?" The rough part of that question is, of course, that one man may think he is--while a quite different man does. So who do you ask?'
3. [ss] Murray F Yaco's "Unspecialist" (A); download: "A machine can be built to do any accurately described job better than any man. The superiority of a man is that he can do an unexpected, undescribed & emergency job ... provided he hasn't been especially trained to be a machine."
4. [serial - part 2/2] Randall Garrett & Laurence M Janifer's "That Sweet Little Old Lady" aka "Brain Twister" (as by Mark Phillips); download text/audio: "It was tough enough for the FBI men to have to hunt out a telepathic spy...but when the only known telepath-locator was a more than somewhat peculiar little old lady who had to be humored..."
   
   ISFDB notes that "Brain Twister" is the title of its 1962 book version.

See also.

1. Fiction from Analog/Astounding (only issues edited by Harry Bates, John Campbell).
2. Stories written by John Campbell.
3. Fiction from old "pulp" magazines.
4. Fiction from 1950s.

New at Project Gutenberg (8 May 2010)

Of late, Project Gutenberg has been adding short fiction from old magazines rather regularly. Only problem is - their feed contains little information to isolate genre stories from other stuff. Sometimes, even opening the linked page is not enough; I need to open the actual content page to be sure. Occasionally, I miss it altogether but find the stuff when reconciling links from other sources.

In fact, during my daily troll of various feeds, Project Gutenberg is where I seem to be recently spending most time. I'm not sure I've motivation to make this is a regular feature, but here is today's haul (sorted by publication date):

1. Elisabeth R Lewis' "Know Thy Neighbor"; download; Galaxy, February 1953.
2. Patrick Wilkins' "For Every Man A Reason"; download; If, November 1954.
3. Vernon L McCain's "The Hitch Hikers"; download; If, Novemner 1954.
4. Clyde Brown's "First Man"; download; Galaxy, April 1958.
5. Charles A Stearns' "Pastoral Affair"; download; Galaxy, February 1959.

Related: Fiction from old "pulps".

Free fiction: "Amazing Science Fiction Stories", December 1959 & April 1960 issues

Both at Internet Archive in multiple formats.

Both issues are edited by Cele Goldsmith. I don't know if there is any relation to the Amazing Stories of Hugo Gernsback.

1. December 1959; download: Includes a novel by Robert Bloch.
2. April 1960; download: Among the authors: Henry Hasse & Gordon Dickson.

Related: Old "pulp" magazines.

Rick Raphael's "A Filbert Is a Nut" (short story, humor, free): A lunatic asylum inmate who could make magic

Not exactly the kind of story I would normally associate with Campbell as editor, though I've seen a few others like this from Astounding issues he edited.

Story summary.

Thaddeus Funston, an inmate of a mental institution, is shaping modeling clay into something he calls an "atom bomb" - in a crafts class for inmates. That night, there is indeed a detonation of small atom bomb that actually did little damage besides destroying the crafts building.

Now the befuddled military guys investigating the detonation are in for some education...

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, November 1959.
Rating: B.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg, Manybooks, Feedbooks, or Munseys. Or download audio in multiple formats from LibriVox.
Listed among the stories from John Campbell's Astounding/Analog.

George Oliver Smith's "Instinct" (short story, free)

This is more a juvenile story than for grown ups.

Story summary.

Six times during the human history, all powerful aliens bludgeoned human civilization to savage stage just as they were about to reach the critical stage for galactic adventure.

Now is the seventh time. Bull-headed humans have again reached the same stage through the same process. Worried aliens now want to understand what makes the humans tick.

To this end, Jerry Markham is kidnapped. He was piloting the first ship to Venus & got picked up on the way. While the aliens are "studying" him, magic happens...

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, March 1959.
Rating: B.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg, Manybooks, Feedbooks, or Scribd.
Listed among the stories from John Campbell's Astounding/Analog.

Al Sevcik's "Alien Offer" (short story, alien invasion, free)

Much of this story sounds like a less interesting variation of plots from two Arthur Clarke novels - "Childhood's End" & (I think) "Garden of Rama" (with Gentry Lee). In the light of impending doom of earth, good aliens are offering to transport 1,00,000 human children to their world - so at least some of humanity will survive. There is a threat implicit too, like in "Garden of Rama".

By the end of it, humans would have trivially destroyed bad aliens ("Eleele") from another galaxy that have been destroying whole worlds with impunity! I found two things about these bad aliens very silly (apart from their so easy destruction):

1. They're capable of travel across galaxies; yet they seek slaves rather than having machines do the work! And why bother with slaves of alien species you will have so much trouble working with? And if you do want slaves, why take a few rather than the whole world? Or at least the healthy samples rather than some picked at random?
2. Their only motive is to destroy worlds inhabited by intelligent beings! They don't even seek these worlds for their own occupation - going to so much trouble traveling across galaxies to simply destroy worlds!

Fact sheet.

First published: Amazing Stories, January 1959.
Rating: B
Download full text from Project Gutenberg. [via QuasarDragon].

Murray Leinster's "The Pirates of Zan" aka "The Pirates of Ersatz" (novel, space opera, free): A young man's struggle to up his social station

This very readable story is a study in extremes - a super-competent young man (confused only in matters of romance), a super-farcical persecution of an individual by a sick government, an ugly feudal society that offers much scope for old-fashioned adventure, ...

Alternate title - "The Pirates of Ersatz" - is a fancy way of saying "The False Pirates".

Story summary.

This is the story of a young man named Bron Hoddan. A genius, including in matters of machinery. Daring, brave, do-gooder, ...

He was born on a poor world called Zan, where the primary economic activity is space piracy! His grandfather is a competent pirate, & will play a role later in the story.

But Bron wants a better life. Takes much trouble to migrate to Walden, a super rich world that also happens to be utterly static & decaying. Bron's attempts to earn a decent living will get him into serious trouble with authorities that don't like change, & he will be barely able to escape with his skin.

Walden is also home to Nedda, a girl Bron thinks of as his girlfriend. He will have much heartache on her account through the story.

Bron's next stop is the feudal world called Darth. There will be much adventure here: Fighting the customs officials looting his baggage on arrival. Taking over spaceport control room to charge his electric-powered guns! Need of Don Loris - His feudal employer - to hang him on arrival! Rescue of Fani - his employer's daughter - after her kidnapping, & their subsequent romantic entanglement.

Third series of episodes begins with his escape from Darth because his employer has struck a deal with Walden officials to trade him. I found the Walden cops kind of too zealous over nothing, but that's a minor matter.

He will meet a planet's worth of refugees who have been thrown out of their own world ("Colin") by ruthless colonials, & are now headed to colonize a new virgin world called Thetis - only these colonists have no will power left. Bron will not only help them gain self respect, but will play Robin Hood to gather some resources for them by becoming a pirate.

The piracy episodes near end are farcical but great fun. And his gentle heart's longing to compensate those he looted will turn Bron quickly into a major business magnate - through logic that was a bit too good for me to take seriously.

All ends well - including Bron's twin romantic entanglements - with Nedda & Fani.

Collected in.

1. Murray Leinster's "A Logic Named Joe" (collection), edited by Eric Flint.

Fact sheet.

First published: As a 3-part serial in Astounding Science Fiction, February/March/April 1959, under the title "The Pirates of Ersatz".
Rating: A
Download full text from Webscription/Project Gutenberg/Manybooks/Feedbooks.
Nominated for Hugo Award 1960 in novel category.
Listed among the stories from John Campbell's Astounding/Analog.
Related: All stories of Murray Leinster.

Roger Kuykendall's "We Didn't Do Anything Wrong, Hardly" (short story, humor, free)

This juvenile story has the feel of one of the earlier Arthur Clarke stories - "How We Went to Mars".

A couple of adolescent US kids, one of them superbright, build a spaceship using available materials like discarded refrigerator & TV components, for fun! And go around an adventure ride circling earth a few times!

Title comes from a little good-faith tinkering they do with a Russian satellite in orbit because "it was just a menace to navigation, and the batteries were dead, and it wasn't working right anyway," causing a bit of diplomatic row & a minor mistake they made putting it back.

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, May 1959.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg.
Rating: B
Listed among the stories from Campbell's Astounding.

Gordon Randall Garrett's "... Or Your Money Back" (novelette, humor, free): Goodluck charms aren't illegal at roulette table!

Lot of smiles & giggles, after a modest start - particularly during the courtroom drama in later half.

Drawbacks of the story are completely irrelevant last para that extends the story to Mars exploration, & utterly lame explanations of the curious gadget that is at the heart of the story. The gadget & your thoughts together can, wirelessly, "cause minute, but significant, changes in the velocities of small, moving objects" - e.g., the outcome of certain gambling machines, including roulette wheel the story uses. It would have been far more fun if the gadget, functioning in ways beyond human comprehension, had arrived from a magical source - the way it often happens in Kuttner/Moore stories.

Story summary.

Jason Howley, an inventor, has arrived somewhere in Neveda from New York City - both in US. Gambling is legal in former, illegal in later. He has come here to gamble - as a way of attracting world's attention to the "psionic" "science".

The plan is to use his curious gadget at a prominent local gambling joint to effect big wins. Idea is to attract attention, get caught by cops, get even more attention during the court trial, & come out scot free because no one can even begin to figure out how the gadget can influence the wheel. In this endeavor, he will enlist support of a competent unnamed narrator & local lawyer who will manage the legal end of drama.

He uses the gadget openly at the roulette wheel in Golden Casino. Quickly converts his $50 into $3,00,000! Attracts attention of the establishment's goons & cops. Gets arrested. And we are treated to good fun during defense. Of course, he gets away scot free - how can the court declare a gadget that works like a good luck charm illegal?

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, September 1959.
Rating: A
Added to the list of stories from Campbell's Astounding.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg; cellphone versions from Manybooks.

M I Mayfield's "On Handling the Data" (short story, science fiction, free): A sobering look at human reaction to "facts" from "experts"

---

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, September, 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text (from Project Gutenberg).

---

Very beautiful story. And very much near the top on my all time best stories. Makes a light reading, but raises both smiles & thought provoking issues.

Story summary.

Story is in the form of a bunch of some half dozen letters from Jonathan Wellington Wells to Dr Robert Von Engen - letters spread over the period of a year. Jonathan is a graduate student of biology; Robert is a well known mathematician. Robert has written some papers, hypothesizing similarities in the way brain & computers process data; that's what got Jonathan talking to him.

Gist of Jonathan's letters is: hard laboratory data he obtains empirically & with a lot of care tends to be self-conflicting, except when he has been clued to expect a certain kind of result. Through the story, he runs through issues, brainwashing, & social conciliation we all go through when "growing up".

Murray F Yaco's "Unspecialist" (short story, science fiction, free): Overspecialization kills flexibility

I won't place it among the top rung of sf stories, but it's not far below them. Great concept. Space centric execution didn't work as well with me, but not a moment of boredom.

Story summary.

Arnold, an unspecialist, is forced by authorities as a passenger on an unarmed military spaceship with 2 crew - on a mission to deliver some "potato fertilizer and tractor fuel" to a far off farm world.

After picking up their load, but before delivery to destination, they'll discover an asteroid full of a military fleet of aliens called Ankorbadians - obviously intended to raid human worlds soon, & before this ship can seek help.

While the pilot Banner & co-pilot Harcraft are insisting there is no way out, Arnold will save the day by rigging together a bomb from onboard load of fertilizer & diesel plus whatever tools are at hand in this unarmed ship.

They'll successfully blow up the alien fleet.

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, October 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text.

A Bertram Chandler's "Chance Encounter" (short story, first contact, free): Even friendly encounter with aliens can be deadly

Not among the better stories of Chandler, but with an ending I've not seen before. Science part is generally flimsy, but it's not a boring story.

Story summary.

People living at the edge of human worlds in galaxy ("Rim Worlds") are feeling neglected alienated & from earth. So they've chartered a galactic survey ship of their own to look for aliens they can trade in their immediate vicinity!

Of course, this survey ship encounters aliens on its mission. Not an alien world, but some kind of trading ship in open space. These aliens are pretty much hominid, including in their thought processes & general physiology.

Contact is no problem, given that both sides have good telepaths - male on human side, female on alien side. And these two are already in love!

In this atmosphere of cordiality, they agree to exchange gifts. Not in either ships, but in the intervening space. The two telepath lovers will physically meet there . But this meeting will turn out to be very violent, & show the absolute physical impossibility of the two sides ever getting in contact.

Fact sheet.

First published: New Worlds, March 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text.
This story is part of author's John Grimes' series.
Related: Stories of A Bertram Chandler.

Murray Leinster's "A Matter of Importance" (novelette, psychological warfare, free): A smart cop against a planetful of military

Except for stylistic differences, this could have been a story by Eric Frank Russell: a single smart alec pitted against a planetload of bureaucracy with its set ways of thinking. And, of course, winning. It's not as humorous as some of the Russell stories, but there is a basic charm to the plot. I was entertained.

If you've read Greg Egan's "Glory" (one of this year's Hugo nominees), this story starts off with the journey of a similar but less fanciful (almost pragmatic) gadget called a "message-torp". But only for conveying a message over vast interstellar distances using a reasonable amount of power.

One of the "message-torp" traveling technique ("jerky fashion") - hyperspatial hop, exit to normal space, another hop - are also found in interstellar passenger ships in several of Asimov's Foundation series of novels, including the original 3.

Mentions of the "glass-lined hole a rocket leaves" in the ground is a favorite of Larry Niven & is found in many Niven stories.

Story offers a lot of worthy quotations. I collected them here.

Story summary.

Story has space faring humans & space faring aliens called "Huks". Humans have far flung interstellar empire, & had actually kicked Huks off to "far side of the galaxy" when they first came in contact more than 80 years ago (yes, just 80). There is a lame excuse given for kicking them out - they won't live peacefully with humans on human terms, or some such.

We also find mentions of "delinks", the human terrorists, spread through the story. While not exactly words of wisdom, some of the statements regarding these terrorists are very contemporary. But they are part of background, unrelated to main story.

This is a human world where both war & military has been abolished. It's civil cops that do even the job normally expected on military, but with a difference in style. It was these supercops that had actually fought Huks during early contact days.

An interstellar human passenger ship "Cerberus" has developed some trouble midway through a voyage, has sent an SoS via a message-torp to traffic control at the planet "Varenga IV", & is now limping towards the nearest world called "Procyron III". Story follows the convention where Procyron is the local sun, & "III" means third planet going outward.

Curious thing about Procyron III is: it was once an Huk world, before they were kicked out. Everyone is assuming Procyron III is uninhabited, but of course there won't be a story if that were true.

Now a fast 2-crew traffic police "squad ship 390" with Sergeant Madden & Patrolman Willis is headed towards Procyron III to make basic inquiries. "Aldeb", a slower repair ship with the crew of 15 is coming behind. Madden is the supercop that will play smart alec here - with others playing the supporting role.

What the 2 cops find after landing on Procyron III is signs that Cerberus landed there, & then took off. But Cerberus didn't have spare power for take off, it only had for landing.

They could not have taken off without help. But there is no signs of any locals or other ships.

Investigations quickly find (these are supercops!) a local uranium mine, obviously in use. And signs of landing in "an artificial shoal" near the mine door. Looks like Huks are still around, & mine here. But they don't leave equipment behind; bring it every time, do the mining, & go off.

When Cerberus landed, some human passengers that came outside apparently saw the aliens & their uranium mine. So they had to be removed in a way that human authorities will find impossible to trace.

Poor Huks. They'd not accounted for supercops. Cops quickly locate a nearby steller system called "Sirene 1432" that could have a still remaining Huks planet. Of course, they find it - on Sirene IV.

Rest is the story of psychological warfare that safely recovers the kidnapped passengers & their ship Cerberus. This is a less dramatic version of the Russell's hilarious novel "Next of Kin".

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, September 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text.
Related: All stories of Murray Leinster.

Quotes from Murray Leinster's "A Matter of Importance"

This story offers a lot of interesting quotes. I collect them here.

Story uses the word "delinks" where it means"terrorists".

Quotes.

1. "The importance of a matter is almost entirely a matter of your attitude."
2. "delinks... They practice adolescent behavior even after they grow up--but they never grow up. It is delinks who put stink-bombs in public places and write threatening letters and give warnings of bombs about to go off--and sometimes set them... Delinks do most of the damaging things that have no sense to them. There is no cop who has not wanted to kill some grinning, half-scared, half-defiant delink who hasn't yet realized that he's destroyed half a million credits' worth of property or crippled somebody for life--for no reason at all."
3. "Learned books explained why people went delink... Mostly it was that they were madly ambitious to be significant, to matter in some fashion, and didn't have the ability to matter in the only ways they could understand. They wanted to drive themselves to eminence, and frantically snatched at chances to make themselves nuisances because they couldn't wait to be important any other way."
4. "A superior officer should never do anything useful, so long as a subordinate isn't making a serious mistake."
5. "Intelligent nonhumans would have to have hands, and with some equivalent of opposable thumbs, if their intelligence was to be of any use to them. They pretty well had to be bipeds, too, and if they weren't warm-blooded they couldn't have the oxygen-supply that highgrade brain cells require."
6. "Huks are soldiers. Which means that they're after feeling important--after glamour.
   
   A delink tries to matter in the world he lives in. It's a small world, with only him and his close pals in it. So he struts before his pals. He don't realize that anybody but him and his pals are human.
   
   A soldier lives in a bigger world he tries to matter in. He's protectin' that world and being admired for it. In old, old days his world was maybe a day's march across. Later it got to be continents... there've got to be enemies to protect a world against, or a soldier isn't important."
7. On cops vs soldiers: "Soldiers couldn't do what we've got to. They'd fight, to be admired. We can't. It'd spoil our job. We've got to persuade 'em to behave themselves."
8. "Huks or their ancestors would need to have been flesh-eaters also, for brains to be useful in hunting and therefore for mental activity to be recognized as useful. A vegetarian community can maintain a civilization, but it has to start off on meat."
9. "They couldn't even tell us to go to hell, because it looked like we didn't care what they said... Characters that make trouble ... do it to feel important. And we'd left them without a thing to tell us that was important enough to mention--unless they told us about the _Cerberus_. We had 'em baffled. They needed to say something, and that was the only thing they could say!"

Robert Heinlein's "All You Zombies" (short story, grandfather paradox, humor, free)

Who is whose mother, father, lover, child, kidnapper, employer, ...? Solid confusion.

Very amusing & totally crazy tale of convoluted relationships. Rusty has more to say at Best Science Fiction Stories.

Glenn Davies' "In His Image" is a simpler & less interesting variation published a few months back.

Fact sheet.

First published: F&SF, March 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text, or MP3 audio.
Related: Stories of Robert Heinlein; time travel stories.

Murray Leinster's "Long Ago, Far Away" (novella, time travel, free): A couple faces extreme dilemma

It's actually longer than a typical novella - may be near the upper limit.

Idea is very similar to John G Hemry's relatively recent & interesting story "Small Moments in Time": time travel has put an individual or two to extreme dilemma - to let large population of the other time die so own present is secure, vs jeopardizing current time by acting in a humane way. I personally find Leinster's version more interesting - he uses longer length to make it a more nuanced story.

This is the first story I've read that includes the idea of conservation of mass & energy during time travel. It fixes the total mass + energy in the universe at any moment in time. To time travel, you must exchange this with target time to keep the universe consistent! I suppose this idea alone can be used to build a good story; here it's peripheral.

Story is not always logical & sometimes challenges credulity; but it's a fast moving story, & I found it easy to ignore minor issues.

Story summary.

Humans have been around on earth for millions or billions of years! And in those remote times, they were technological way ahead of current humanity. It was a disaster that wiped them out. Most of them, anyway. A few discovered time travel, & are seeking refuge in our time. This is the story of an advance party of teenage refuge seekers, & the complex reactions they generate in current time.

Disaster that struck this ancient world was the explosion of the fifth planet, along with its "two moons". It not only created the current asteroid belt between Mars & Jupiter, but also resulted in severe mountain-sized meteor bombardment of inner worlds - including earth.

They didn't get a lot of warning. Colonizing other worlds in Sol won't solve the problem - all inner worlds were being hit. We aren't told (or may be I forgot) why they didn't try interstellar colonization - probably lack of time. Only at the eleventh hour, when much of this world was dead, did a small community successfully built time travel machine - to seek refuge in a far & safe enough future.

The advance party of 4 teenagers - Fran (boy of 14), Zani (girl), Mal (girl), & Hod (boy) - will set up some equipment in current to ease transfer of rest of the party - some 2000 individuals in all. That is all that remains of this world.

But a lot goes wrong on kids arrival in present time Antarctica. Brad Soames of US station in Antarctica smashes the gate they are building to let rest of their people come. Kids blow up rest of their stuff except minor toys to ensure it doesn't fall in wrong hands. They're taken to US - to a secure military facility.

Only Soames (feeling guilty for stranding kids) & Gail Haynes (a reporter who was in US station in Antarctica at the time kids arrived) have been with kids all along, & slowly piece together the story & gain kids' confidence. Rest of US establishment has its own agenda where kids welfare doesn't count. Rest of the world is also concerned - US getting advantage of alien technology (most of the world thinks they are aliens).

A lot of adventure & confusion. Escape from military facilities... much drama. Eventually, Gail & Soames realize that only 2000 refugees are going to come - not a whole earth population. That's when they will help the kids get their people into current time. Happy ending for all concerned.

Notes.

1. Story has an interesting wearable communications gadget (among a lot of gadgets of time travelers). Two or more wearers can exchange all kinds of sensory perception at a distance - sort of shared virtual reality environment.

Fact sheet.

First published: Amazing Science Fiction Stories, September 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text.
Related: All stories of Murray Leinster.
Credits: I found this story via QuasarDragon.

Murray Leinster's "The Aliens" (novelette, first contact, free): Description of a space battle

Early parts of it felt like a sequel to Leinster's much better known "First Contact" - the story that gave name to this class of fiction. But it's a very different & unrelated story, though similar in that both consider it best to assume during first contact that any aliens out there are going to destroy humanity (& the feeling is mutual).

Story summary.

Humans know there is a race of sentient space faring aliens out there; humans call them "Plumies" because of distinctive markers found on many worlds. Plumies are also aware of humans. Neither knows the home world of the other race. Both want to be first to locate the home world of the other, & exterminate the other: "It wasn't likely that the galaxy was big enough to hold two races of rational beings capable of space travel. Back on ancient Earth, a planet had been too small to hold two races with tools and fire. Historically, that problem was settled when Homo sapiens exterminated Homo Neanderthalis."

So both sides have scout ships out there looking for other's home world. This is the story of a battle between the human armed ship Niccola & an unarmed Plumies' ship "inside the Theta Gisol solar system".

Both become aware of the other. Humans attack. Plumies are too good at defense. Much action. Physical collision of the two ship that has welded them together as a single solid body - & now on a course that will make it fall into the local sun!

Truce, cooperation. Discovery that the two have different chemistry, hence technology - and are comfortable on different kinds of worlds. While the question of whether there is space only for a single race is not settled, there is understanding that may be it's possible. Both will escape unhurt after a lot of drama.

Except for a way too dramatic part near end involving Taine, the madman "weapons officer" of the human ship, I found it very an interesting story.

Collected in.

1. David Drake, Jim Baen, & Eric Flint (Ed)'s "The World Turned Upside Down".

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, August 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text.
Related: All stories of Murray Leinster.

Mark Clifton's "What Now, Little Man?" (novelette, science fiction, free): On racial superiority prejudices

During the last month or two, I've sampled may be a dozen authors I'd not read before from scifi.com classics section. Two have been good finds - Bertram Chandler & Clifton; I'm ready to consume more of their stories.

While Clifton's endings don't really have great resolutions, he appears to address rather big subjects - sometimes without easy answers. I liked both his stories while I was reading, though their details were easy to forget afterward.

Story summary.

When humans colonized a new world Libo, they found "goonies" among its natives. Goonies have body structure rather similar to humans, though they're not humanoid. And they are in some kind of symbiosis with a local tree called "pal"; each goonie is attached to its own pal tree, & would rather die than eat the fruits of any other tree. And their newborn numbers are automatically regulated to available pal tree population.

Humans consider them animals. This is the story of slow downing on humans of their true nature, & the innate human nature to stubbornly refuse to accept things that violate established prejudices in spite of hard evidence.

There is a thin thread based on Mahatma Gandhi's non-violent protests - a rather passive form of Mahatma's methods. Goonies submit to every cruelty humans have afflicted on them - they just stand & get slaughtered when hunted, they meekly & cheerfully submit to hard labor or physical abuse, ...

Story is narrated by Jim MacPherson, a human colonist & a goonie "farmer". He began by planting pal trees, hence making goonie breed. And using goonies as meat animals. He slowly found they can be trained for virtually any task - in the end, tasks that even many humans are bad at - & their full potential nowhere in sight. This leads to ill will among people, & tension in the story.

In the end, there is wild speculation by Jim - may be goonies are aliens at a post-human stage of development, ... I found the arguments in this part unsatisfactory. That's where the title comes from - human nature has not outgrown its earth bound complexes even after going out to stars:

"Go out to the stars, young man, and grow up with the universe!

All right! We're out there!

What now, little man?"

Fact sheet.

First published: F&SF, December 1959.
Rating: A
Download full text from Internet Archive.
Included in Ellen Datlow's Sci Fiction classics.
Related: All stories of Mark Clifton.

Ralph Williams' "Cat and Mouse" (novelette, science fiction, free): A colorful pest control problem!

There are no great moral or technical ideas here, but it's good entertainment.

Story summary.

God-like aliens maintain cosmic scale game parks. One such park is "World 7" where a "natural ecology was being maintained ... as a control for experimental seedings of intelligent life-forms in other similar worlds."

But the park Warden has got a problem at hand - in some unexplained way, a pest called the Harn has reached here, & is threatening to overrun the game!

Harn is a carnivore, & a rather efficient hunter. And it's not a single animal, but a colony of animals specialized for various tasks. "The Harn" is the nerve center of this complex organism - itself an animal that does most thinking but is not very mobile, & can (apparently telepathically) communicate with mobile units. And in the manner of the parrot containing the soul of evil magician kids' tale (was it from Arabian Nights?), killing Harn will kill off the entire hive - even animals currently physically far off.

Warden doesn't like killing animals in the park, not even pests. And he doesn't fancy the idea of introducing natural enemies of Harn in the park. But he has an idea - involving a somewhat intelligent animal from a nearby world. Not difficult to guess his chosen pest killer - humans.

So a transfer gate magically appears "not fifty feet" from the cabin of Ed Brown, living only with his dog somewhere in interior Alaska. Ed is in his sixties, is well versed in living off nature, is well stocked with guns, & is technically competent in rigging up gadgets from available material.

The gate is in the form of vertical "six by three" opening, as a door, just standing in the wilderness. From one side of it, you can see the other world & even move into it just by walking across (& similarly return). It doesn't exist if you trying seeing if from what would normally be its "back" side. Gate opens in the area of World 7 inhabited by Harn.

Story is mostly of Ed's cautious adventures across worlds. Attack on him by a mobile unit of Harn, his retaliation that bothers Harn, his attack on Harn's nest, Harn's very determined counter attack, & ultimately killing of Harn at the hands of Ed. Ed doesn't escape unhurt, but Warden's god-like powers will save him.

See also.

1. Clifford D Simak's "The Big Front Yard": Another story where you just walk across a door to reach another world!

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, June 1959.
Rating: A
Nominated for Hugo Award 1960.
Download full text.
Credits: I found this story via QuasarDragon.

A Bertram Chandler's "Familiar Pattern" (novelette, science fiction, free): A replay of European colonization of other lands some centuries ago

Chandler summarizes colonization pattern of that era in a template: "the chance contact, the trader, the missionary, the incident, and the gunboat", ... Only, in this story, the natives are earthmen, & colonists are aliens. Very well told story, though the later parts are a bit rushed.

Note the aliens in this story don't quite look alien. In fact, they are very human - even on first contact, they are able to eat our food & vice-versa, not to speak of other similarities like physical appearance. Point of this story is the dramatization of the colonization pattern.

Story summary.

Captain Lessing is in charge of "Woollabra" - a sea-going merchant vessel somewhere near Australia on a routine run. At night, he's awakened with reports of the sightings of a curious contraption lying on water - obviously capable of flight, but unlike any known airplane, & too big to be a satellite.

Further investigations will show it to be a "pineapple"-shaped starship named "Starlady". First contact is easy; aliens have a wearable "psionic translator" for communications. One f humans visits alien ship, an alien visits human ship. Humans are told the alien ship was forced to land in the sea because they had a water leak & earth was easiest to get to; they are here to get some water from the sea.

And that they thought earth was uninhabited - ha, we will later be told they listened to radio broadcasts & took pictures! But the humans play gullible - buy the uninhabited argument easily enough. Their is also some trade - cigarettes, match sticks, alcohol from humans in exchange from solar powered torches & cigarette equivalents from aliens.

Aliens depart. Human crew of the ship will be put to a lot of grilling by media & government, even though no one can explain the traded gadgets. During the grilling, alien ship lands again - & those on board want to talk to Lessing.

During the talks, aliens make the proposal. They will set up a trading outpost on earth - only harmless goods like all-season clothes that never get dirty (but don't ask for antigravity, stardrive, or other advanced stuff). Lessing will be their agent. An alien named Korring vis Korring will be overall in-charge of this trading outpost.

Well - traders come, along with scientists & priests & sundry others. The priests set up their own church. A while later, local mobs attack the church because of its alien ways & the local interests that are getting compromised. Riots will see the killing of priest & couple of other aliens, along with many humans.

We will soon learn the alien military ships are in orbit around earth for retaliation. Some earth cities destroyed, men on the run.

We are left to guess what is yet to come, with this hint (Tom is a Polynesian):
"The chance contact—The trader—The missionary—The incident—And the gunboat—"
"And after the gunboat?" asked Lessing.
"We learned the answer to that question many years ago," said Tom. "Now it's your turn."

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding Science Fiction, August 1959 as by George Whitley.
Rating: A
Download full text from Internet Archive.
Included in Ellen Datlow's Sci Fiction classics.

Daniel Keyes' "Flowers for Algernon" (novelette): Don't make fun of the mentally retarded, please

First raw impressions: fabulous first half, ok to good next quarter, & good last quarter.

This note is based on the original novelette version of the story. This version was later expanded into a full length novel of the same title. There is a movie adaptation of the same title too. And innumerable other adaptations.

For a story this widely dissected, different people are bound to see different things in it. I was most reminded of otherwise sensible people making fun of a hapless mental retard - because I've actually seen it & felt bad.

For Indian readers - another take on this story: If you've seen last year's superb movie "Lage Raho Munnabhai", there is a scene where the girl in restaurant calls Munna at radio station seeking advise on how to judge the man she's about to meet at the advise of her dad. Munna consults the ghost of Mahatma Gandhi, & is given this advise: "If you want to judge a man, observe how he behaves with those below his social station." There are strong echoes of it in this story.

When I looked around the web, I found rather varied takes of different individuals from this story. Here are a few that I can still recall:

1. A case for being compassionate with your social inferiors.
2. Pain of an Alzheimer's patient. While the last quarter sees the protagonist getting into loss similar to this, it's super-quick compared to Alzheimer's & also has some differences if my experience with someone who eventually died of it is any indication.
3. Abstracting human growth - from child who finds everyone superior to decay in old age. Except that normal human children don't really consider themselves inferior, nor get defensive when they grow up with an inferiority complex vis-a-vis their elders.
4. There is a cross-section of readers that feels the last quarter is fantastic because it's a tragedy & it makes them cry.

I've collected some quotes from this story. They don't have many pearls of wisdom, but they probably give a feel of the story & sentiments.

Story summary.

Story is set in New York (I suppose "City" is meant).

It's is in the form of diary entries, dated "martch 5, 1965" to July 28, of Charlie Gordon, 37, mentally feeble at the beginning of the story & a janitor at "Donnegan's Plastic Box Company".

Over the course of the story, a new experimental surgery will transform him into a genius; & then a mental decay back to old state & almost certain death (as a side effect of surgery). He is writing diary at the insistence of Dr Strauss, neurosurgeon who performed the surgery. He is free to write whatever comes to mind.

Story is not really about surgery or what goes into making a supermind. It's about human issues - Charlie getting routinely mistreated by those he trusts; then recognizing this & getting bugged by it; then lapsing again & seeking company of those old "friends" - only the friends have also changed for the better.

Characters.

1. Charlie Gordon: The protagonist. Initially feeble minded, but goes on to see greatness & mental decay.
2. Algernon: A laboratory mouse who also has got the surgical treatment to triple his intelligence. In the beginning of the story, Charlie has many "races" with him - of solving mazes. Algernon keeps beating Charlie, until the transformational point in Charlie's treatment. Charlie will develop soft feelings for the little mouse - even make a grave for him when he dies to decay that will eventually set as side effect of surgery. Title comes from the flowers Charlie regularly puts at the grave of Algernon.
3. Dr Strauss, 50, neurosurgeon who operated upon Charlie & is normally monitoring him.
4. Dr Nemur, 60, "psychoexperimentalist". He seems to have a key role in discovery of this treatment for intelligence, though we are not given details. Prodded by an overbearing wife, he is driven by social status & recognition from others.
   For a while, during his shining days, Charlie will give him an inferiority complex & will take his work further in the form of a paper titled "The Algernon-Gordon Effect: A Study of Structure and Function of Increased Intelligence" that says the treatment is effectively no good & will always end up killing the subjects.
5. Miss Kinnian, 34. She teaches at a school for the mentally feeble. Charlie was her student, & she recommended him to Dr Strauss. During his shiny days, Charlie will fall in love with her but the relationship has always been doomed.
6. Joe Carp, Frank Reilly: Charlie's coworkers at factory. While Charlie thinks of them as friends, they treat him as joker. Relationship will strain when Charlie gets smart. In the end, with Charlie lapsing again, they will become real friend & defend him against those who now abuse him.
7. Amos Borg: Foreman at Charlie's factory. Another man who makes jokes at Charlie's expense. Has a very small role in story.
8. Mr Donnegan: Proprietor of Charlie's factory.
9. Mrs Flynn: Charlie's land lady. A woman with a golden heart.
10. Burt: A lab assistant at hospital. Will play a role in helping Charlie figure out the world as he gets smarter.

See also.

1. C L Moore's "Daemon" (1946): There is so much similarity between Moore's & this story that I'll be very surprised if Moore's version wasn't a major direct influence on Keyes'.
   
2. Ted Chiang's "Understand" (1991): Obviously inspired by this story of Keys'. While it's not the best of Chiang, now that I've read both, I think Keys' version is incomparably more competent.

Collected in.

1. Robert Silverberg (Ed)'s "The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume One, 1929-1964".

Fact sheet.

"Flowers for Algernon", short story, review
First published: F&SF, April 1959.
Rating: A
Listed in Contento's Top Ten Most Reprinted Stories.
Winner of Hugo Award 1960 in "short fiction" category. This category is now-a-days split into short story, novelette, & novella. I didn't do word count, but I have a feel this story is novelette length.
This story was expanded in 1966 to novel length under the same title.

Quotes from Daniel Keyes' "Flowers for Algernon" (novelette)

This document is a companion to the main post on this story. Many of the quotes below will probably make sense only if read in the context of main post.

Quotes are in order they appear in the story. Misspellings are normally not mine but from the story (they are a feature of the story, not a bug). Of course, I might have added typos of my own.

Most quotes are not pearls of wisdom, but capture the sentiment of the story. Charlie Gordon is protagonist.

1. "some men in white coats took me to a difent part of the hospitil and gave me a game to play. It was like a race with a white mouse. They called the mouse Algernon... They said it was amazed and that Algernon and me had the same amazed to do. I dint see how we could have the same amazed if Algernon had a box and I had a paper but I dint say nothing...
   that test made me feel worser than all the others because they did it over 10 times with difernt amazeds and Algernon won every time. I dint know that mice were so smart."
2. "she said ... If you volenteer for this experament you mite get smart. They dont know if it will be perminint but theirs a chance. Thats why I said ok even when I was scared because she said it was an operashun."
3. "If the operashun works I'll show that mouse I can be as smart as he is. Maybe smarter."
4. "I had lots of tests and different kinds of races with Algernon. I hate that mouse. He always beats me."
5. "Sometimes somebody will say hey look at Joe or Frank or George he really pulled a Charlie Gordon. I dont know why they say that but they always laff."
6. "If you can get smart when your sleeping why do people go to school... I use to watch the late show and the late late show on TV all the time and it never made me smart. Maybe you have to sleep while you watch it."
7. "I told Dr Strauss what good is it to get smart in my sleep. I want to be smart when Im awake. He says its the same thing and I have two minds. Theres the subconscious and the conscious... And one dont tell the other one what its doing. They dont even talk to each other. Thats why I dream... I forgot to ask him if it was only me or if everybody had those two minds."
8. "Mr Donnegan said I was the best janiter he ever had because I like my job and do it good and never come late or miss a day except for my operashun."
9. "I beat Algernon! ...
   Then the second time I lost because I got so exited I fell off the chair before I finished. But after that I beat him 8 more times. I must be getting smart to beat a smart mouse like Algernon...
   I said can I feed him because I felt bad to beat him and I wanted to be nice and make frends."
10. "It's a funny thing I never knew that Joe and Frank and the others liked to have me around all the time to make fun of me."
11. "People think it's funny when a dumb person can't do things the same way they can."
12. "I guess I'm still a little angry that all the time people were laughing and making fun of me because I wasn't so smart."
13. "IQ measures a lot of different things including some of the things you learned already, and it really isn't any good at all.
    So I still don't know what IQ is except that mine is going to be over 200 soon... I don't see how if they don't know what it is, or where it is - I don't see how they know how much of it you've got."
14. "Dr Nemur wanted to publish the results of the experiment at the end of this month. Dr Strauss wanted to wait a while longer to be sure. Dr Strauss said that Dr Nemur was more interested in the Chair of Psychology at Princeton than he was in the experiment. Dr Nemur said that Dr Strauss was nothing but an opportunist who was trying to ride to glory on his coattails...
    Dr Nemur had a shrew of a wife who was pushing him all the time to get things published so that he could become famous."
15. "Mr Donnegan insisted that it would be better for all concerned if I left. What did I do to make them hate me so?
    ... Mr Donnegan showed me the petition. Eight hundred and forty names, everyone connected with the factory, except Fanny Girden. Scanning the list quickly, I saw at once that hers was the only missing name. All the rest demanded that I be fired."
16. "This intelligence has driven a wedge between me and all the people I once knew and loved. Before, they laughed at me and despised me for my ignorance and dullness; now, they hate me for my knowledge and understanding."
17. "I realize that Dr Nemur is not at all a genius. He has a very good mind, but it struggles under the spectre of self doubt. He wants people to take him for a genius."
18. "I was shocked to learn that the only ancient languages he could read were Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, and that he knows almost nothing of mathematics beyond the elementary levels of the calculus of variations. When he admitted this to me, I found myself almost annoyed. It was as if he'd hidden this part of himself in order to deceive me, pretending - as do many people I've discovered - to be what he is not. No one I've ever known is what he appears to be on the surface."
19. "Dr Strauss told me I was giving Dr Nemur an inferiority complex. I thought he was mocking me and I'm oversensitive at being made fun of."
20. "I saw Miss Kinnian last night... I tried to avoid all discussions of intellectual concepts and to keep the conversation on a simple, everyday level, but she just stared at me blankly and asked me what I meant about the mathematical variance equivalent in Dorbermann's Fifth Concerto...
    No matter what I try to discuss with her, I am unable to communicate."
21. "How strange it is that people of honest feelings and sensibility, who would not take advantage of a man born without arms or legs or eyes - how such people think nothing of abusing a man born with low intelligence."
22. "even in my dullness I knew that I was inferior, and that other people had something I lacked - something denied me."
23. "Last night I couldn't remember where I lived. A policeman took me home. I have the strange feeling that this has all happened to me before - a long time ago."
24. "I put flowers on Algernons grave about once a week. Mrs Flynn thinks Im crazy to put flowers on a mouses grave".
25. "Its easy to make frends if you let pepul laff at you. Im going to have lots of frends where I go."

Eric Frank Russell's "Next of Kin" (novel): Smart monkey/dumb crocodile kids' tale adapted for adults

This hilarious & very readable story reads like a longer version of familiar smart monkey/dumb crocodile story of primary school: A monkey about to land on the dinner table of a crocodile family sweet talks the crocodile to let him bring his tastiest part, his heart, that he left on the tree, as his kind normally do when they go around wandering around! I think original is from Panchtantra, widely loved kids' story collection that is said to have inspired Aesop's Fables & Arabian Nights; translations should be available in almost every language.

You will need to suspend credulity when reading this novel. Everything is not logical. But that doesn't come in the way of fun.

I collected some quotes from the novel here.

Story summary.
A galactic war has been going on between Allies & Combine over occupation of some planets. Allies include humans, "Sirians, Rigellians and others". Combine is led by Lathians, & includes some 20 odd sentient species - among them Zebs & Zangastans. Zangastans are among the weakest in Combine, & are primarily contributing to war effort as wardens of prisoners of war; they play a major role in later half of the story.

Military Intelligence of humans, wants to know how deep behind the Combine war front does the influence of Combine extend. A new kind of space ship engine has recently been invented that can outrun anything Allies or Combine have, & has a much longer range without refueling.

Scout Officer John Leeming will take one of the only 3 ships fitted with this engine for this intelligence task. He will have no weapons save the capability to outrun everything sentient. Engine is outfitted with a bomb; he must destroy the ship rather than letting it into enemy hands - even if it means his own death. But he is a survivor.

We are treated to some tidbits on earth during preparation, voyage, an encounter with enemy fighters mid way, etc. He penetrates deep into enemy lines, gets promoted mid-way through the mission to Lieutenant, & finally, near 83rd planet of his mission, he runs into trouble. Twenty "propulsors" in his ship have tube lining that has limited life because of extreme heat & pressure; many of them fail. He is forced to land near a forest on this planet of 10% more gravity than earth & a bit more oxygen in the air. This is the planet of reptilian Zangastans.

He gets out some essential supplies, blasts the ship, & wanders in the jungle a while. Is eventually picked up by locals, & is questioned by Major Klavith - the sole individual on the planet who can speak "Cosmoglotta", the common language of the galaxy. Makes a sensational escape, wanders again in jungles a while, loots a truck, drives to space port, & tries to run away with a spaceship! It is when entering the spaceship that he gets caught & sent to prison as PoW.

This is where the most discussed part of the story begins, half way through the book. He is the sole human in jail. But there are some 2,000 Rigellian prisoners - among the civilians arrested when Combine attacked the unarmed colonists on newly inhabited planets. They have been here 2 years; many have died attempting escape. A new escape attempt is underway, & will happen a few months down the line.

Rigellians are good to John, but live separately & won't involve him in any escape attempts. He finally figures a plan of escape sometime during his fourth month in prison. This is a ridiculous plan, & enemy must be really credulous to pull it off, but that's the fun part of the story.

It begins with creation of bopamagilvie, a useless gadget comprising a bit of twisted tin wire inserted into & wrapped around a small block of wood - former stolen from a factory in prison with the aid of a Rigellian, later picked up in common area during exercise time.

He convinces his captors that he is not alone but two! Physical form is what they can see, John Leeming. Plus an invisible ghost called "Eustace Phenackertiban"! Story is:

1. Every human is accompanied by a Eustace - from birth to death! Eustace has his own name, apart from physical; John's is called Phenackertiban.
2. The two can communicate directly via mind. No physical senses needed.
3. Gadget is needed by physical to locate the ghost when ghost has wandered off far.
4. The two are kind of symbiotic. Ghost is superior, actually lives off physicals, has an acute sense of justice, & is very sensitive to physical's emotions.
5. Ghost will extract revenge in his own way from anyone who hurts his physical!

Also, that similar ghosts called Willis also control Lathians. Also, any life form that has a symbiosis between a physical & a ghost is called "nut", & its specimen "nuts"!

Of course, captors want to verify this. So some human prisoners on another Lathians world are questioned by Colonel Shomuth, a Zangastan liason officer. Lovely dialogs.

1. Are "our Lathian allies really are Nuts"?
2. "And they have the Willies?"
   ...
   "Not only have they got the willies but they'll have a darned sight more of them before we're through."
   "How can that be? We have learned that each and every Lathian is unconsciously controlled by a Willy. Therefore the total number of Willies must be limited. It cannot be increased except by the birth of more Lathians."
   "You've got me wrong. What I meant was that as Lathian casualties mount up the number of unattached Willies will increase. Obviously even the best of Willies cannot control a corpse, can he? There will be lots more Willies loafing around in proportion to the number of Lathian survivors."
   ...
   "have you any reason to suppose that a large number of partnerless Willies might be able to seize control of another and different lifeform? Such as my own species, for example?"
   "I wouldn't be surprised."
3. "The Lathian heavy cruiser Veder crashed on landing and was a total loss. The Lathians attributed it to an error of judgment on the part of the crew. But that was just three days after you prisoners were brought here. Was it a mere coincidence?"
4. "The biggest fuel dump in this part of the galaxy is located a few degrees south of here. A week ago it blew up to total destruction. The loss was a severe one; it will handicap the Combine fleets for quite a time to come... Lathian technicians theorize that a static spark caused a leaking tank to explode and that set off the rest in rapid succession. We can always trust technicians to come up with a glib explanation."
   ...
   "You have admitted yourself that more than four hundred Eustaces are roaming this area, free to do as they please."

Similar good fortune has been piling up around John: "At one time or another eight of my guards earned your enmity, by assaulting you. Of these, four are now in hospital badly injured, two more are to be drafted to the fighting front."

Eventually, for their own safety, the captors arrange John's safe transport to earth!

Fact sheet.
"Next of Kin", novel, review
Rating: A
Related: All stories of Eric Frank Russell.

First published.
This story has had a bit complex evolution.

1. First appearance as a short story titled "Plus X", Astounding 1956 edited by John W Campbell, Jr.
2. Novel length adaptation under title "The Space Willies" in 1958.
3. A larger novel titled "Next of Kin" (reviewed here), 1959.

See also.

1. Story has a small reference, with a misquote, to Arthur Clarke's "Nine Billion Names of God".