Anand Neelakantan's "Asura" (novel): Retelling Ramayan from the point of view of Ravan!

This post may not make a lot of sense for readers outside South Asia. Ramayan is a well known epic here, & my commentary below assumes familiarity with it.

While there have been many retellings of Ramayan, they mostly don't question its premises, heroes & villains. This one is unusual in that it tells Ramayan from the point of view of Ravan, & from the point of view of an ordinary Asura citizen of the period. Apart from questioning a lot of premises of Ramayan, it uses the opportunity to make commentary on modern India - high growth rate that is invisible to poorer & less skilled sections of society, skin color prejudices, politicians claiming & appropriating far more resources & rights compared to ordinary citizens, ... It also devotes a lot of space to caste system, though I find its rigidity completely unfamiliar; may be times have changed!

A few noteworthy departures from conventional Ramayan:

1. 10 heads of Ravan represent him as a complete man, as against a saint. I don't remember the list of 10 attributes he lists, but they're like one head for lust, another for wisdom, another for greed, ... Ravan is a man, with all the failings it implies, & doesn't aspire to be a God by overcoming what are claimed to be human "shortcomings".
2. Sita is Ravan & Mandodari's eldest child! Someone foretells that she will bring destruction to the family & clan, so a lot of people want her killed when she's a baby. To protect her, Ravan takes her with him during a campaign north. But those fearful of future conspire to plan her killed even here; only the man charged with disposing her off doesn't have heart to murder a helpless baby & manages to have her found by Janak. Ravan kidnapped her later to protect her from Ram, whom he thinks is unworthy of his daughter.
3. It sets up the stage as a conflict between Devas & Asuras. India is initially owned by native tribes of Asuras, Kinnars, Nagas, etc. Deva invaders have come from Central Asia, & Indra is the first of the successful raiders. Asuras are a casteless society; Devas have brought casteism with them.
4. Vanars are half castes - mix of Devas & Asuras, unwanted by both. They inhabit central India, acting mostly as a buffer zone between Asuras & Devas.
5. Brahma is not a god but a clan of teachers, one of whom will teach Ravan in his young years.

Story isn't always consistent, though. It takes pains to tell us Vanars are nothing but ordinary human half castes, & yet they move up trees & buildings far more nimbly than most men, & are often referred to as "monkey men". I think there is a place before Lanka Dehan where Hanumanji's tail is referred to! And there is reference to steel somewhere during fighting in Lanka; did steel even exist in the period the story is set in?

I found some of the takeaways of the book disturbing:

1. Dashahara: (Incidentally, today is Dashahara.) What does it tell us about Indians as human beings? That we are a vengeful unforgiving lot? Even assuming everything in classical Ramayan is true, Ravan got death as his punishment. Why do we still keep taking revenge by burning his effigies?
2. Lanka Dehan: Assume that the Prime Minister does something stupid. As a revenge & to put pressure on him, someone comes & bombs your neighborhood. What would you call this avenger? A lot of innocents must have died when Lanka was set on fire! Why do we never discuss it?
3. Disfigurement of Soorpnakha at the hands of Lakshman: Why do we simply brush it aside? OK - so she was promiscuous & was trying to entice Lakshman. Does that justify cutting off her nose?
4. Agni Pareeksha & the exile of a pregnant Sita: I've heard pious explanations for it but never found them convincing. This book imagines the dirty details to make you squirm.

It did however took me a long time to finish - well over a month. I didn't normally get bored reading it, but once I put it down, I usually had to make an effort pick it up again. May be because it's rambling ... or too long ...

Fact sheet.

First published: 2012.
Rating: A.

Edgar Rice Burroughs' "Carson of Venus" (novel, adventure, free): Hero helps win a war

This is #3 in author's Venus series. I've not read the earlier books, but it's pretty much an independent adventure. And very readable if you can keep plausibility aside.

Story summary.

Carson Napier, hero of the story, along with his ladylove Duare, is homeless & wanted in many jurisdictions on Venus. But he has an airplane he built that can stay up in the air without maintenance or refueling for 50 years! But he needs to land for food. The duo are seeking a home where they will be wanted.

They'll end up on a large island (Korva) with war going on - a common soldier has usurped power & has imprisoned the king. All of Korva has fallen except one holdout, the walled city of Sanara. The city is now under seize.

Carson will end up befriending the holdouts, & help them win the war by bombing enemy from his plane & by playing a spy in usurper's city.

Notes.

There is also an unrelated short story length adventure at the beginning of the novel - tribals kidnap Duare & Carson will rescue her.

Fact sheet.

First published: As a serial in 6 parts in Argosy, Jan 8, 15, 22, 29, & Feb 5 & 12 issues, 1938.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg of Australia or Feedbooks.
Rating: A.
Nominated for Retro Hugo Awards 1939 in novel category.

H L Gold's "A Matter of Form" (novella, brain dump): When a man lived in a dog's body

A surgeon has discovered that the pineal gland at the brain's base is the source of an
animal's identity; surgically extract & transplant it in another animal's brain, & you've put the original in a new body. And he has a rich, old & seriously ill financier who wants a young man's body!

In one of the experiments, the surgeon exchanged the identity of a kidnapped man with a dog. Only the resulting man-in-dog's-body turned out to be more determined & resourceful than either the surgeon or his financier expected...

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, December 1938.
Rating: A.
Nominated for Retro Hugo Awards 1939 in novella category.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of H L Gold.

John R Pierce's "Period Piece" (as by J J Coupling) (short story)

A modern man finds himself in 31st century, with no recollection of how he got there. He's being treated very well & kindly, but he's smelling something fishy - why's is no one curious about the period he's come from, not even an eminent historian?

Very curious & unexpected ending.

Collected in.

1. Everett F Bleiler & T E Dikty (eds)' "The Best Science Fiction Stories: 1949".

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, November 1948.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of John R Pierce.

Isaac Asimov's "No Connection" (short story, puzzle, free)

Millions of years into future, man is long extinct. The world has two dominant intelligent races:

1. Americas dominated with "Gurrows", intelligent descendents of bears;
2. Rest of the world dominated by "Eekahs", intelligent descendents of chimpanzees.

Eekahs are far more technologically advanced, are aware that Americas are sparsely populated, & are planning raids to claim that land.

This is the story from the point of view of a Gurrow archeologist who knows a bit about the long extinct man (the "Primate Primeval"). And of his seriously incomplete piecing together of the history of the continent & what lays ahead as they come into more frequent contact with Eekahs...

Collected in.

1. Everett F Bleiler & T E Dikty (eds)' "The Best Science Fiction Stories: 1949".

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, June 1948.
Download full text from AlfaLib.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Isaac Asimov.

Fredric Brown's "Knock" (short story, alien invasion, free)

Going by the comments online, it appears to be among the better known stories of Brown. Not a very believable conclusion, but light fun read.

Story summary.

Aliens called "Zan" have raided earth. They took a few hundred animal specimen alive - among them a man & a woman, & killed off all other life on earth. These specimen, including the humans, have now been put as exhibits in a zoo on earth, & this advanced raiding party of aliens is preparing to claim earth as permanent residence.

The man will pull off a coup of sorts, scaring aliens enough with his
ingenuity to make them leave earth...

Collected in.

1. Everett F Bleiler & T E Dikty (eds)' "The Best Science Fiction Stories: 1949".

Fact sheet.

First published: Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1948.
Download full text.
Download audio of X Minus One radio adaptation of this story from Internet Archive. (alt MP3 link)
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Fredric Brown.

Kenneth Schneyer's "Life of the Author Plus Seventy" (short story, humor): Legal implications of human hibernation

Three major themes here, often told in a hilarious way:

1. Customer service dysfunction.
2. A parody of US copyright law, particularly w.r.t. Disney case.
3. Legal implications of human hibernation.

Story summary.

A not very successful author has a novel published but it's not selling much. He bugs local library enough to make them buy a copy, but no one is borrowing it. So he himself borrows it, but forgets to return it.

He'll later get a job with a company in a creative role, & is made to sign a curiously twisted copyright clause in the employment contract that gives the company the copyright over his creations for hundreds of years rather than "just" 120 years: when he's about to die, the company will have a right to hibernate him for up to 500 years, so copyright rule of author's life + 70 years applies!

A decade after borrowing the book, library has handed over the overdue & fines collection to a debt collection agency, & he receives his first overdue & fines bill - a couple of hundred thousand dollars. Hilarity ensues as he gets into negotiations with the debt collector, & later tries evading it...

Fact sheet.

First published: Analog, September 2013.
Rating: A.
Added to my "best of 2013" list.

Alice Sheldon's "The Man Who Walked Home" (as by James Tiptree, Jr) (short story, post apocalypse, free)

Apocalypse here results as a side effect of a time travel experiment. While I found the time travel part positively incomprehensible & boring, the rest of it is very readable - a dead world in the process of rebuilding itself.

Story summary.

At the site of the time travel experiment, there was an explosion, a crater, & the side effects that killed much life of earth. But there is also a curious physical phenomenon that is a side effect of original experiment: once a day, every year, at the same time, at a place in the original crater, a "monster" appears for a few seconds - a monster that appears to be moving but is not, it leaves bad smell after it's gone, & any attempt to touch it tends to cost you your limbs.

Story is mostly a view of this curious phenomenon, & eventually an explanation, from the point of view of sundry people who'll watch it over the centuries as the dead place keeps slowly getting inhabited.

Fact sheet.

First published: Amazing Science Fiction, November 1972.
Download full text from Baen eBooks.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Alice Sheldon (as by James Tiptree, Jr).

Frederik Pohl's "The Kindly Isle" (short story, biological weapons, free)

A government agency in cold war era US is building biological weapons for possible use against Russians. One of its researchers has developed a virus that affects a part of the brain that's supposed to drive the infected person nuts, only the effect is a bit different - it makes the infected person irritable & nasty. On the day of his triumph, the scientist vanishes with all the data - so the government no longer has the weapon.

Years later, a colleague sights the scientist on an idle isle, & suspects he has been testing the virus for selling to highest bidder. But subsequent investigation with throw up a completely different direction of his research...

Fact sheet.

First published: Asimov's, November 1984.
Download full text from Baen eBooks.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Frederik Pohl.

Robert A Heinlein's "Double Star" (novel, politics): When an imposter became the ruler

This is a fast paced action story with a lot of election politics. I didn't like it as much as I wanted to because at some places the world view is too provincially Western; the thing that irritated me most was a small passage on the classification of world's languages - confidently told & totally bogus.

Story summary.

Here is a solar Empire spanning many worlds, dominated by humans though there are aliens on other worlds. It's a monarchy similar to British one - emperor is supreme but is a rubberstamp, & sits in a city on the moon. The parliament has the power & is elected; aliens can vote but must choose a human representative. Head of government is the "Supreme Minister", probably majority leader in Parliament.

Current ruling party has arranged the kidnapping of the leader of opposition at a time where he's absolutely required to be present at a Martian ceremony. So his underlings will recruit an actor, Lawrence Smith aka Lorenzo Smythe, to act as an imposter at the function. One thing will lead to another & new situations will keep coming up & the imposter will end up becoming the politician he's impersonating.

The story is, first & foremost, the character study of this actor, & evolution of his personality.

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, Feb/Mar/Apr 1956.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Winner of Hugo Award 1957 in novel category.
Related: Stories of Robert Heinlein.

Hal Clement's "The Nitrogen Fix" (novel, apocalypse)

This is an action packed adventure. Like many other stories of author, it's set on a world with atmosphere toxic to humans but not to their alien friends, only the world is earth! And unlike vast majority of stories of author, this one has real villains, in addition to his standard "nature is adversary enough".

This also has an apocalypse setting common to many modern stories: "a closed human habitat has limited oxygen & if you have a third child, someone from family will have to be thrown out ('nomaded')". Only it's far more readable than almost everything I've seen with this setting.

Story summary.

A couple of thousands years into future, much of the oxygen has vanished from earth's atmosphere, all large animals except humans are dead, even humans are very few & dwindling, nitric acid pollutes all open water sources, & there are violent nitrate based plants prone to explosion.

People live in "closed" cities, with water-pool based airlocks. There also are some hardy nomads, folks who were thrown out of cities because of overpopulation but survived. You cannot venture outside without breathing mask & oxygen tank.

There are also "natives" or "Invadors" or "Observers" - curious galaxy-traveling aliens well suited to this earth atmosphere.

This is the story of a nomad couple, their 5 year old daughter, & their alien friend, who arrive at a city somewhere near Boston coast with supplies of salvaged glass & copper nuggets produced from ocean by "pseudu-life" that still survives. Only the customers have some deadly ideas & all hell breaks loose soon after their arrival...

Fact sheet.

First published: 1980.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Hal Clement.

Jack Vance's "Worlds of Origin" aka "Coup de Grace" (short story, murder mystery)

This is classic Vance - the kind of stories he's best remembered for. Very colorful.

Story summary.

In a private space station somewhere far away where men & aliens of many worlds pass through, a man has been murdered.

Ace detective Magnus Ridolph will help the station owner solve the crime. In the process, we meet many suspects of very colorful background each of which could have had a story dedicated to its own culture & customs.

Fact sheet.

First published: Super-Science Fiction, February 1958.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Jack Vance.

Brian Clegg's "Quis custodiet?" (flash fiction, humor, free)

Is human mind ever satisfied? Here we see some unusual & funny political discontent against the "perfect dictatorship"...

See also.

1. Robert Heinlein's "Coventry": While the details are different, political discontent of protagonist is similar.

Fact sheet.

First published: Nature, 3 October 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.
Added to my "best of 2013" list.

Alice Munro's "The Stone in the Field" (novelette, non-genre)

This is a sequel to author's "Connection". In "Connection", we meet the girl's several single aunts on the maternal side; here we meet her several single aunts on father's site. While the maternal aunts are outgoing, paternal ones live too much in their own world. In fact, the central theme in this story seems to the extreme to which some people go to protect themselves in a constantly changing, & hence threatening, world.

Collected in.

1. Alice Munro's "The Moons of Jupiter".

Fact sheet.

First published: Saturday Night, sometime in 1979.
Rating: A. 
Related: Stories of Alice Munro.

Alice Munro's "Connection" (novelette, non-genre)

This is mostly colorful character portraits - her mother & mother's several single cousin sisters, seen from the eyes of a girl.

One theme keeps recurring through the story - how we go about protecting our sense of pride. Some very common situations, but we all seem to engage in this behavior.

Collected in.

1. Alice Munro's "The Moons of Jupiter".

Fact sheet.

First published: Chatelaine, sometime in 1979.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Alice Munro.

Malcolm Jameson's "Brimstone Bill" (novelette, humor, free): Crooks are useful too!

A part of the story deals with sound engineering - how high frequency, inaudible, sounds affect us. I've no idea if there is any truth in that part.

Story summary.

A corrupt politician in high office collects protection money from a little world called Juno in asteroid belt. He maneuvers a spaceship returning home, with a lot of unspent sailors' salary, to land here for hull cleaning, a process that will ground the ship for a month, giving town ample time to clean the purses of the crew.

But ship captain has a weapon up his sleeve...

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, July 1942.
Download full text as part of the scans of the magazine it originally appeared in.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Analog/Astounding issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of Malcolm Jameson.

A E van Vogt's "Secret Unattainable" (novella, teleporting gadget, free)

This is van Vogt at his best. Far off concept, but very entertaining story.

Story summary.

Early in the beginning of WWII, a great German scientist is working on a cool gadget: you "focus" it anywhere in the universe, &, through an "orifice" that is part of the gadget, you can directly reach that location.

1. Want crude? Focus it inside an oil well anywhere, & help yourself!
2. Want to attack London? Focus it on someplace in the city you want your tanks in, & just drive through the "orifice"!
3. Want to put an enemy ship out of action at sea? Just drain its fuel tank!
4. ...

Scientist comes to the notice of establishment. Establishment wants his gadget, but the man cannot be trusted - his brother was executed by Nazis for political reasons sometime back. So they get him working on the gadget under careful watch, & arrest him as soon as the gadget is finished. Only the gadget is not going to do them any good, because the scientist indeed was using it as a tool for revenge...

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, July 1942.
Download full text as part of the scans of the magazine it originally appeared in.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Analog/Astounding issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of A E van Vogt.

Alice Munro's "The Moons of Jupiter" (short story, non-genre)

I'd not heard the name of the author until a few days back - when the announcement that she'd won this year's Literature Nobel Prize came. When I looked around for her works, a short story collection with the title "The Moons of Jupiter" sounded like sf - so I picked it up. But at least this title story is not sf.

Story summary.

Story is mostly about a woman's relationship with her father & her two grown up daughters, but mostly father who's about to undergo heart surgery. Nice language & some very interesting observations on everyday life.

Title comes from some small talk she's having with her father in hospital about her visit to a local planetarium, a game where dad is going to name the moons of Jupiter.

Fact sheet.

First published: The New Yorker, 22 May 1978?
Rating: A.

Henry Kuttner's "Before I Wake..." (short story, dreaming, free)

What is more real - conscious or unconscious, waking state or dreaming state? In this story, the distinction is blurred.

Story summary.

A young boy, somewhere on Florida coast in the US, has read too many fairy tales & believes them in all innocence. He dreams of sailing to places with magical & colorful characters & things. Until his the world of imagination begins to appear far more desirable than the real world...

Fact sheet.

First published: Famous Fantastic Mysteries, March 1945.
Read online at UNZ.
Note: The text at the link above appears to end abruptly. Story appears complete, but the link has a lot more text beyond the end of the story, with no clear marker to end the story, leading to feeling of abrupt ending.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Henry Kuttner.

Lara Vapnyar's "Katania" (short story, non-genre, free): A woman cannot let go of her childhood longings

I think I liked it because it's both mundane & absurd. And nice language.

I'm not sure how accurate the political aspects of Soviet Union are: a neighborhood in Moscow of mostly women, men either dead, defected to West, or in labor camps of Siberia. But political aspects are just background; main story is simple enough.

Story summary.

It's the story of two girls - friends, neighbors & classmates, one envious of what the other has. And what the envious one grows up into in adulthood.

Title, "Katania" is an imaginary country thought up for their dolls, combing their own names - Katya & Tania.

Fact sheet.

First published: The New Yorker, 14 October 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.

Henry Kuttner's "No Greater Love" (novelette, fantasy, free): Too much love can kill!

A man with no morals comes to possess a charm, built for a pixie, that makes everything around love you. Everything, i.e., including stray sparrows, dogs, people, pixies, ...! Pixie owner of the charm is after the man to get it back.

Eventually, getting in a tight corner, man will invade the pixie charm shop again, & take charge of another charm too - the one that grants 3 wishes everyday. And will quickly discover how deadly a combination the wish charm makes when combined with the love charm...

Fact sheet.

First published: Unknown, April 1943.
Read online at UNZ.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Henry Kuttner.

Henry Kuttner & C L Moore's "All is Illusion" (short story, humor, free): Never pick up a fight with a magician...

A man picks up a fight with a midget magician in a bar, & gets cursed: "I lay on you the curse of illusion. The blight of the five senses! I put upon you the veil of Proteus!"

And the fun begins... others sometime get a foul smell out of him but he himself cannot smell it, others hear funny noises from his stomach when he cannot, other see a duck or a horse where he is, ...

Fact sheet.

First published: Unknown, April 1940.
Read online at UNZ.
Note: If you are using an Android tablet, here is a way to pick up this file as a pdf from Google Drive: note 1 & note 2. This method doesn't, however, work at least in my Firefox on Windows XP, & Android browsers don't let me copy the URL of pdf.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Henry Kuttner, C L Moore.

Bud Sparhawk's "The Snack" (short story, humor): App assisted healthy living

I found it easy to relate to because I'm in a similar quandary: years of attempts at shedding weight got me nowhere. An app based approach - food & exercise tracking using Simple Calorie Count on Android phone - seems to be working now, but is far from satisfactory - healthy meals aren't as satisfying when body is used to junk food & it seems to be working rather slowly - I've lost just 3 kg in may be 4 months.

Story summary.

A man, to impress his girlfriend, is pretending to be a health freak & has all sorts of apps watching him all the time in a world where network connected sensors are everywhere - bathroom tiles measure your weight, your underwear measures your waist, ...

I found the story sometimes quite funny.

Fact sheet.

First published: Analog, March 2013.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Bud Sparhawk.

Kurt Vonnegut's "The Humbugs" (short story, humor, non-genre): My husband is better than yours!

Two painters - one old worldly wise, other young & idealistic. Younger one is poor, older one knows how to make money (will make a painting where the color of sunset matches your curtains, e.g.). Each thinks he's crappy & the other one has got all the talent. Each has a wife that adores her husband for his talent & thinks other is a humbug, a fraud.

One day, a wives' altercation results in a wager: each husband will make a painting in the style of the other, & we'll see who's more talented! Curious events follow...

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Ted Chiang's "The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling" (novelette, auxiliary memory, free): On the fallibility of human memory

Just how reliable is our memory? How much of it is fabricated to make us feel good about ourselves? These & implications of confronting the documentation that contradicts our feel-good memories are the topic of this beautiful story.

It looks at two documentation technologies - written word because we understand it well, & "Remem", an imaginary video search engine of the lifelogs created by the equivalents of Google Glass. In two different settings - European colonization of imaginary(?) Tivland, & a modern man reacting to Remem.

Fact sheet.

First published: Subterranean, Fall 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.
Added to my "best of 2013" list.
Related: Stories of Ted Chiang.

Kurt Vonnegut's "Bomar" (short story, humor): When a practical joke in office boomeranged

Carmody & Sterling, working in part of the company that does book-keeping for shareholders, have created a myth about a certain Mr Bomar Fessenden III. They picked this name from the shareholders list - because the name looked heavy & interesting! From the name & address they have, they give him an imaginary personality - of a deranged & wealthy playboy friend of one of the duo.

Only their lady office colleague has taken the story seriously. With consequences the duo could not have foreseen...

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Kurt Vonnegut's "Tango" (short story, humor)

This is a funny coming of age story.

An exclusive highbrow town somewhere in the US where everyone behaves exactly as expected - in a gentlemanly or lady-like way. But a teenager has discovered fun dancing the wild "Tango" - an indiscretion that will lead to both hilarity & chaos!

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Kurt Vonnegut's "Out, Brief Candle" (short story, love story, non-genre, free)

A lonely widow finds friendship & tender love in a pen pal, a pen pal who would rather not exchange pictures. When she learns the pal is sick, she'll make a real journey to see him, & we'll learn a little more about the pal than she does...

See also.

1. Eric Frank Russell's "P.S." (download scans as part of a larger package): Another fond pen pal story where at the other end of friendship lies something unimaginably ugly.

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Download full text from Sorin Despot@Facebook or Scribd.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Kurt Vonnegut's "Girl Pool" (short story): Life in a call center of a bygone era

Montezuma Forge & Foundry Company runs a call center for its products. Customers write letters to the company, a customer service center responds. This customer service center comprises of two wings - a men's area that handles the technical & content parts of the response to customers, & a stenographic area that types the men's dictations recorded into cassettes via "dictaphones" & posts the letters. This stenographic area comprises only of women & is called the "Girl Pool".

This is the story of a bored girl in the Girl Pool, one dying to have an adventure...

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Neal Stephenson's "The Great Simoleon Caper" (short story, anarchy, free): Anticipating BitCoin in mid 1990s!

This is my first story of Stephenson, though I have Diamond Age lying around somewhere (unread). And if this is typical Stephenson, he just won a new fan.

Its appeal to me might have been both because I'm a programmer, & because I'm fed up with my fiscally irresponsible government. Your leverage will likely vary depending on how excited you get about these things. As a narrative, I'll say it's just about ok; it's the content that I found interesting.

Story summary.

An internet company has invented a new online currency called "Simoleons". With the promise that it will be better managed than the official government issue currency. And, of course, government wants to nip it in the bud.

This is the story of anarchist hackers rescuing the baby currency from government villains.

Fact sheet.

First published: "TIME Domestic SPECIAL ISSUE, Spring 1995 Volume 145, No. 12 (March 1, 1995)".
Download full text from Mark Damon Hughes or Internet Archive. [via Best Science Fiction Stories]
Caution: Later is the badly formatted original from Time magazine; you'll have to endlessly click "next page" that once would have generated more clicks for Time. Former link is much easier to read.
Rating: A.

Harry Turtledove's "It's the end of the World as We Know It, And We Feel Fine" (short story): Dog is to Man as Man is to...

According to the story, differences between wild dogs & domesticated ones are mostly confined to a gene called "WBSCR17", a gene also found in humans. Can humans be turned into cute pets?

Update 25 September 2013:  Don Sakers' fiction review article, "The Reference Library", in the same Analog issue that contains this story, has a review of one of Iain M Banks' novel "The Hydrogen Sonata". He discusses, among other things, some key characteristics of the Culture universe of the author where this novel is set. Some of these characteristics of the Culture universe sound a lot like things in this Turtledove story. But I've not personally read any Culture book.

Story summary.

Last big human fracas not only killed off most people, the few left around were relatively docile. And there was something around that intended to presumably make the world a better place...

Here we get a glimpse of this docile future world. Beautiful.

Fact sheet.

First published: Analog, March 2013.
Rating: A.
Added to my "best of 2013" list.
Related: Stories of Harry Turtledove.

Christopher Anvil's "Positive Feedback" (short story, humor, free): How inflation works, & a remedy

This is hilarious stuff. And while the story is about car repair rather than programming, if you are a programmer who grew up writing C code in vi & handcrafting makefiles, & lived through the transition to Visual Studio, you'll likely find bits of it very familiar.

Story summary.

A company called Superdee Equipment has invented a new "Automated Car Service Handling Machine" but is unable to sell it to garages. So the managers figure out a way to push the machines through...

Fact sheet.

First published: Analog, August 1965.
Download full text from an archived copy of what used to be Baen Free Library. [via Stephen Harker @rasfw]
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of Christopher Anvil.

Kurt Vonnegut's "Hundred-Dollar Kisses" (short story, non-genre)

A cop is questioning a man on why he hit his office colleague on the head with a telephone receiver hard enough to send the victim to hospital. Very interesting reason.

It starts out light enough, but it has the authors' usual hard hitting ending.

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Eric Brown's "Diamond Doubles" (flash fiction, humor, free)

This discovery of old correspondence between an sf editor & a wannabe author should shed some light on a series of human disappearances...

Plots elements of the story have been done any number of times before, but I still liked it.

Fact sheet.

First published: Daily Science Fiction, 16 July 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site. [via Quasar Dragon]
Rating: A.

Manly Wade Wellman's "O Ugly Bird!" (short story, free): Hero frees a town of a curse

This is not science fiction; it's witchcraft. I loved it because of beautiful language - content didn't really matter!

Story summary.

Penniless hero is taking a long walk along a trail. On the way he sees & hears stories about the evil Mr Onselm & his Ugly Bird. Mr Onselm can hex anyone, & whole town is scared of him.

Of course, by the end of the story, hero will vanquish the villain.

Fact sheet.

First published: F&SF, December 1951.

Download full text from Baen Ebooks or Oregon Literary Review.

This is the first of the author's "Silver John" series.

"there was a Silver John movie made back in 1972, sometimes found under the title The Legend of Hillbilly John, but it bombed at the box office. It was originally released as Who Fears the Devil?"

Rating: A.

Some online fiction by well known authors

Most are courtesy of Free Speculative Fiction Online. Where I have a post on a story, link on title goes there. Link labeled "download" fetches the actual story. Link on author fetches more fiction by author.

Among the ones I've read, my favorite is "Two Yards of Dragon".

1. Arthur Clarke's "A Walk in the Dark"; download text/audio; horror: Our primeval fears...
2. L Sprague de Camp's "Nothing in the Rules; download; humor: What if mermaids were allowed in women's swimming competitions?
3. L Sprage de Camp's "Two Yards of Dragon" (A); download: Adventures dragon hunting...
4. Fritz Leiber's "The Bleak Shore"; download.
5. Murray Leinster's "Nightmare Planet"; download: I don't recollect this title but it appears to be yet another variant of "The Mad Planet".
6. Frederik Pohl's "The Kindly Isle"; download.
7. Manly Wade Wellman's "O Ugly Bird!"; download.
8. Alice Sheldon's "The Man Who Walked Home" (as by James Tiptree, Jr); download.
9. John Varley's "Air Raid"; download.

Carrie Vaughn's "The Best We Can" (short story, first contact, free)

This is hard sf. If you don't have the right taste, it probably will appear very dry.

Story summary.

An object has been found in a solar orbit. Something that's not natural. And not human. Story is speculation about what it could be & the fight of discoverer with the funding agencies to go look more closely at it.

See also.

1. James E Gunn's "The Listeners": Another hard sf & realistic look at a first contact scenario.

Fact sheet.

First published: Tor.com, 17 July 2013.

Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.

Added to my "best of 2013" list.

Related: Stories of Carrie Vaughn.

Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (collection): Annotated table of contents & review

Where I have a post of a story, link on title goes there. My rating appears in brackets. Where I'm aware of an online copy, I include the download link too.

Table of contents (best first, unread last).

1. [ss] "Hundred-Dollar Kisses" (A): Some people are so insensitive... 
2. [ss] "Tango" (A): A teenager's coming of age via the wild Tango dance. 
3. [ss] "Bomar" (A): When a practical joke in office boomeranged...
4. [ss] "Girl Pool" (A): Life in a call center of a bygone era...
5. [ss] "Jenny" (A): Sad love story of a romantic...
6. [ss] "The Humbugs" (A); non-genre, humor: My husband is better than yours!
7. [ss] "Out, Brief Candle" (A); download: A lonely widow finds romance in a pen pal.
8. [ss] "The Epizootic" (B); download text & audio: Tragically securing family's future as jobs are threatened... 
9. [ss] "$10,000 a Year, Easy" (B); non-genre: Your mother doesn't always know what's best for you...
10. [ss] "Ruth" (B); non-genre: Two women coping with the loss of a loved one.
11. [ss] "The Man Without No Kiddleys" (B); non-genre: How many kidneys are there among 2 men? 
12. [ss] "Mr Z" (B): When a wannabe priest fell in love with a woman criminal... 
13. [ss] "Money Talks" (B): A broke man's love for a rich girl. Is he after her money?
14. [ss] "With His Hand on the Throttle" (B): A man's obsession with model trains is ruining his family life...
15. [ss] "While Mortals Sleep" (B); christmas; non-genre: A newspaperman is making news out of a chore...
16. [ss] "Guardian of the Person" (B); non-genre: A newly married young man goes to his home town to collect his inheritance & meet an Uncle.

Fact sheet.

First published: 2011.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

Stories from "Nature" magazine, June 2013 issues

Four stories, all flash fiction length, all online. While I really liked only the first one, each of the first 3 have curious ideas.

List below is in order of my preference - best first. If I have a separate post on a story, link on story title goes there.

1. 20 June: John Grant's "Buzz off" (A); download; humor: Helpful aliens are baffled by human hostility...
2. 27 June: Euan Nisbet's "Probability-1: termination" (B); download; alternate history: An unusual method to change the present...
   
   Story itself didn't really interest me - it's alternate history of the world, with a lot of famous name throwing - many of which I'm not familiar with. Only the method of changing now interested me.
3. 6 June: Tony Ballantyne's "Rondo code" (B); download: Programming computers via music rather than text...
4. 13 June: Jessica May Lin's "Mortar flowers" (C); download: A man in a war ravaged town is playing "Cement Florist", decorating the scars created by bombs at public places.

Related: Fiction from Nature; fiction originally published in 2013.

John Grant's "Buzz off" (flash fiction, first contact, humor, free)

A fleet of elder alien race of "Sgrin'th" has arrived on earth, hoping to help the aborigines grow out of their "cultural infantilization" & to help fix the ruined climate.

But on contact, humans are extraordinarily hostile. Aliens are baffled, but perhaps you as a human can figure out the reason for hostility...

Fact sheet.

First published: Nature, 20 June 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.

Rudy Rucker's "Apricot Lane" (short story, dystopia, humor, free)

Crazy future where not only is every person always connected to the network directly via a brain link, but so is every inanimate object. In fact, inanimate objects get a certain computer intelligence. And everything is a service: you turn a doorknob to enter a room, a small micropayment is automatically deducted; you walk on a pavement, a micropayment is deducted; you look at a picture & like it, a payment is deducted; don't have money to pay & dare to walk on the street, the system will be at your throat!

It's silly & funny at the same time. Told from the point of view of a broke programmer of this networked world.

Caution: It will likely work only if you have at least a few years of sf reading behind. I know I would have hated it when I was starting.

Fact sheet.

First published: "An Aura of Familiarity: Visions from the Coming Age of Networked Matter" (anthology, 2013).
Download full text from publisher's site. [via SF Signal]
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Rudy Rucker.

Kurt Vonnegut's "Jenny" (short story, robot): Sad love story of a romantic

A brilliant engineer builds "Jenny", a robot refrigerator - a fridge that can walk around, & with a woman's flexible face mask attached to the door with springs. It connects with its "brain", a big computer nearby, via radio; computer also connects to a controller in the form of over-sized shoes with control buttons under toes - an experienced wearer can use them to make Jenny say things & give appropriate expressions.

Then he begins finding his wife "imperfect" in ways Jenny need not be, & a love story with the unreal begins, ultimately leading to a sad ending.

See also.

1. Lester del Rey's "Helen O'Loy": A far more famous story of a human inventor falling in love with his feminine robot creation.

Quotes.

1. "A man who hasn't built up a certain immunity to love through constant exposure to it is in danger of all but killed by love when the first exposure comes."
2. "I wound up loving her as a human being, as a miraculous, one-of-a-kind, moody muddle of faults & virtues--part child, part woman, part goddess, & no more consistent than a putty slide-rule."

Fact sheet.

First published: Kurt Vonnegut's "While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction" (2011).
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Kurt Vonnegut.

William Tenn's "Time in Advance" (novelette, free): 50% discount on pre-murder conviction!

I'd recently read a story from Astounding, August 1958 (British ed) where I liked the concept: Stanley Mullen's "Fool Killer". Looks like that was an imitation of this excellent original.

Story summary.

On this future earth, you get a 50% discount on a murder sentence, provided you seek conviction before committing the murder! 7 years on deadly prison planets. You can, of course, change your mind part way through the sentence & return without prejudice, but then you forfeit the served sentence. But on successful completion of the sentence, you've earned the right to murder one human being!

One such precriminal, just returned after serving the pre-murder sentence, will actually get some completely unexpected enlightenment...

Collected in.

1.  William Tenn's "Time in Advance".

Fact sheet.

First published: Galaxy, August 1956.
Note: I'd read this in an anthology, but scans of the issue where this story originally appeared is online.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of William Tenn.

Mark Niemann-Ross' "A Cup of Dirt" (novelette): Turning dirt into soil

This is easily the best I've seen so far of 2013 fiction. And, at least in my book, among the better all-time stories of the genre. Modern sensibilities & technology, in a classic fun story of a tinkerer who thinks he can make living a little more interesting...

Story summary.

In the sterile atmosphere aboard an under construction earth-orbiting space station, hydroponic food is not really well loved. So hero sets down on growing tomatoes "in soil". Only problem is: there is no soil here, there is heavy emphasis on keeping the environment clean, & management will likely shut the project down on contamination fears should it learn about it. So the secret project to manufacture tomato-friendly soil from local dirt like human skin-sheddings collected by air filters begins...

Update 29 May 2013:  I've seen at least one online post questioning the technical facts of composting in the story. I personally am not qualified to judge this.

Fact sheet.

First published: Analog, June 2013.
Rating: A.
Added to my "best of 2013" list.
Related: Stories of Mark Niemann-Ross.

Alex Shvartsman's "The epistolary history" (flash fiction, time travel, humor, free)

While the idea is like any number of old time travel stories - a man travels to make a "minor" tweak to past to make a better present, it made me smile more than once.

Fact sheet.

First published: Nature, 25 April 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Alex Shvartsman.

Stanley Mullen's "Fool Killer" (short story, justice, free): Do you _really_ want impartial & logical justice?

While it has a mundane start, it changes gears in a completely unexpected way part way through. Much of the story is about the implications of this twist, but almost anything I say about it will spoil the most interesting moment in the story.

Notes.

Author clarifies the title near end: "The Fool Killer never has to kill; it is enough if the fools know he is present, ready to strike, to keep them on their toes, make good citizens of bad, or at least careful citizens of those inclined to heedless cruelty or stupidity."

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, May 1958.
Download full text as part of the scans of Astounding (British ed), August 1958.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.

Frank Herbert's "You Take the High Road" (short story, detective, free)

Here is a peaceful place, its peacefulness asserted by its natives. Natives that were told beforehand that they'll get a significant prize if they're peaceful! And there are no obvious signs that suggest they're not peaceful.

But a detective's got a hunch they're putting up a false show...

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, May 1958.
Download full text as part of the scans of Astounding (British ed), August 1958.
This is the first of the four stories that went into the making of author's fixup novel "The Godmakers".
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of Frank Herbert.

Ludmilla Petrushevskaya's "The Goddess Parka" (short story, non-genre)

I loved the first half - a scheming worldly wise old woman from Moscow trying to catch an unmarried man in small town Russia for a girl she knows in Moscow.

Later half is rather ordinary in comparison - the old woman is actually very lonely, ...

Fact sheet.

First published: ?
This post is based on the English translation from Russian by Anna Summers in Playboy (US), March 2013.
Rating: A.

David G Blake's "To my father" (flash fiction, free): Lament of an unloved "child"

It read like just another story till: "to learn what it was that I felt as I stared down at you and your new family: diminished, as though I had become nothing more than an outmoded contrivance." From then on, it was a different story for me.

It's an emotional one - lament of a sentient robot, abandoned by its creator during a disaster. Replace robot with an unloved adopted child or a pet, & it might feel a little more familiar.

Fact sheet.

First published: Nature, 31 January 2013.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: A.

James E Gunn's "The Listeners" (fix up novel, hard sf, first contact): Just what does SETI do?

Another important classic that doesn't get included in many classics lists of genre. While a fix up novel constructed from stories published earlier, it doesn't really feel like a disjointed one.

It gives a realistic view of how impossible a task SETI has set for itself (but I found it occasionally over-dramatic, predictable & sometimes boring).

Listeners of title are scientists on "The Project", funded by US government, to listen to signals from the stars - hoping there are intelligent aliens out there broadcasting. It brings out starkly how remote are the odds of catching alien signals even if there are a lot of aliens out there. And how much patience & perseverance is required for the task.

Fact sheet.

First published: 1972.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of James E Gunn, first contact fiction.

Karel Capek's "War wih the Newts" (novel, satire, free): Man is the lord of Earth. Or is he?

I wonder why this epic doesn't get listed in many classics lists. In my book, it's among the very best of science fiction.

It's a satire on human folly, mostly from the point of view of colonial Europe. There were places that made me wince, but author appears to be only satirizing certain views. It's sometimes very funny, but is occasionally a bit draggy too.

Story summary.

Newts are prehistoric animals living in shallow salt water, unknown so far because the sole small group that survived since prehistoric times lived in a salt water lake on an isolated island. They're intellectually man's equal, but are far behind technologically.

When a group of colonials discover them, they are mercilessly hunted & killed. Only two who survived are being transported back to Europe, but escape en route.

They multiply & thrive in shallow waters near an island. So, of course, when they're rediscovered by the European man, they're fair game for hunting, slavery & worse. Tables will eventually turn, however...

Fact sheet.

First published: 1936 (original Czech).
Download full text from Project Gutenberg of Australia or eBooks@Adelaide.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Karel Capek.