"Astounding Science Fiction" (British Edition), June 1947 (magazine, free): Annotated table of contents

Links on author fetch more fiction by author.

British editions used to be mostly reprints from US editions rather than original stories.

Table of contents.

1. [novelette] Theodore Sturgeon's "Mewhu's Jet": 'Mewhu came from--somewhere. He wrecked his spaceship on landing, but the "parachute" he had was something decidedly super--an atomic jet job! The problem was to get into communication--they thought.'
2. [novelette] Clifford D Simak's "Hobbies": "The cities were deserted, save for one. The men & women of that city had hobbies--but no accomplishments. The robots they had left behind were doing better..."
3. [novelette] George O Smith's "Trouble": '"It takes two to make a quarrel" doesn't mean two different people, really--just two different viewpoints!"
4. [ss] Mark Champion's "The Unforeseen": "A prison break is successful only when it employs some factor which neither foresight nor past experience has called to the attention of the guards. The key to freedom is--the unforeseen."
5. [ss] A Bertram Chandler's "Tower of Darkness": "The planet was a deadly place--deadly not to men, but to their ambition. It seemed to be cursed by the Tower, & against the Tower neither strong will, nor the flame of human ambition succeeded. It took something quite different--& unanswerable."

Fact sheet.

Labeled: Vol V No 10 (British Edition).
Download scans as a CBZ file. [via someone@pulpscans]
Note: I could not locate editor's name, but it's probably John Campbell.
Related: Fiction from Astounding/Analog (whole issues only); old pulps; 1940s.

A few relatively minor stories

All stories are online. List is in no particular order.

1. [ss] Brian Aldiss' "Super-Toys Last All Summer Long" (B); download; Harper's Bazaar, December 1969: In this overpopulated world, people prefer living in a dream world instead - via a combination of virtual reality & robots.
2. [ss] Harl Vincent's "High-Frequency War" (B); download; Astounding, February 1940: A patriot will overcome an enemy mole in the US to win a war for the country. Text is littered with fancy-sounding but meaningless jargon about frequency weapons.
3. [ff] Desi Babu's "The giant mosquitoes" (B); download; 3 August 2012 at author's blog: When a pharma company working with growth hormones dumped their lab waste carelessly in the open, they could not have seen the consequences...
4. [ss] A Bertram Chandler's "Naval Engagement" aka "Left-Hand Way" (B); download; Australian Science Fiction Review, #10 (Jun 1967): A robot monk contemplates its "naval"...
5. [ss] Stephen A Kallis, Jr's "The Untouchable" (B); download; Analog, December 1960: A man invented an instrument that lets you pass through solid material horizontally (e.g., lets you walk through the walls). Now he's dead, his instrument has reached government, & has been accidentally thrown on a table which accidentally flicked the button on. So now both the table & the instrument are visible but untouchable - your hands just pass through them!
6. [ss] Robert Sheckley's "Forever" (as by Ned Lang); download; Galaxy, February 1959: Rulers should be immortal but not the ruled!

Free fiction: A Bertram Chandler's "Star Courier"

@Websciption. [via Free Speculative Fiction Online>

I've not read it, but from the way it's formatted, it appears to be a novel.

Free fiction: A few stories of Frederik Pohl & A Bertram Chandler

At Webscription from their respective collections. [via Free Speculative Fiction Online].

From "The Early Pohl": "The Dweller in the Ice" (download) & "The King's Eye" (download).

From Chandler's "First Command": "Spartan Planet" (download).

Related: Stories of Frederik Pohl, A Bertram Chandler.

"Marvel Science Stories", Vol 3 No 1 (November 1950) (ed R O Erisman) (magazine, free): Annotated table of contents

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

"Cataaaa" is the only philosophical story I've seen from van Vogt so far. And a good read too.

Table of contents. 

Links on authors fetch more fiction by author.

1. [novel] Arthur J Burks' "Trin": "WANTED: MAN UNDER THIRTY WITHOUT TIES, AMBITIONS, FEARS OR EXPECTATIONS. --That was the ad I put in the Times. And Joe X answered it. I warned Joe X the job might cost him his life. Joe X replied that that was impossible, he couldn't be killed. I told Joe X that he might be driven insane. Joe X assured me that that was impossible too--because he had no brain!"
2. [novel] Gardner F Fox's "Temptress of the Time Flow": "The universe was going to puff out of existence any moment--unless Tranton was willing to change at once from a decent Earthman to a ruthless space tramp. And his fateful choice did not end there. For beyond the time-flow Alter, he'd have to decide whether he wanted the lovely, gentle golden girl & peace for mankind, or the alluring, flame-haired, red-lipped Drayatha & the conquest of space she promised, the loot & treasure of unguessable centuries!"
3. [novelet] Lloyd Arthur Eshbach's "Overlord of Earth": "Murderer, sadist, product of an earlier, more violent day, Andrev had learned the secret of physical immortality & lay in a hidden crypt for centuries, waiting patiently for men in their growing wisdom to realize the stupidity of war--& so in their new peacefulness, to become easy prey for his blood-thirsty villainy."
4. [novelet] A Bertram Chandler's "Firebrand!"
5. [ss] [reprint] A E van Vogt's "Cataaaa" aka "Cataaaaa" (A); read online (very slow page load); Fantasy Book, Vol 1 No 1 (July 1947): Showing-off is intrinsic to human nature!
6. [ss] Cedric Walker's "The Guinea-Pig": "Feelingless devils, those biologists! They'd never rest until everything in the whole world crept from their ghastly operating tables--even human beings!"
7. [ss] Paul Chadwick's "The Day They Landed": "Why, those other world invaders didn't even have a permit to land their crazy contraption in the town park! The Selectmen of Eastboro were never going to stand for that!"

See also.

1. ISFDB listing for this issue also includes an uncredited short story "Behind the Ate Ball: A Martian Oddity". I don't find it anywhere in ToC. May be they used a different edition (mine is US edition), or more likely, somebody forgot including it on ToC page (I've seen this occasionally in pulps). I haven't scanned the entire issue page by page.

See also.

1. Fiction from old "pulp" magazines.
2. Fiction from 1950s.

"Fantastic Universe", Vol 1 No 1 (June-July 1953) (ed Sam Merwin, Jr) (magazine, free): Annotated table of contents

Inaugural issue of the magazine. Going by sheer number of stories, this looks more like an anthology than a magazine! Its scans in CBR format are online as part of a larger package.

Table of contents. 

Links on authors fetch more fiction by author. Where I have a separate post on a story, link on story title goes there.

1. [novella] Sam Merwin, Jr's "Nightmare Tower" (as by Jacques Jean Ferrat): "Lynne disliked the man from Mars on sight. Yet drawn by forces beyond her control she let him carry her off to the Red Planet."
2. [novelette] A Bertram Chandler's "Vicious Circle": "It's bad to be trapped in a time warp with anyone. And when anyone is Malaprop Jenkins it can adder a man's wits peppermintly."
3. [ss] Frank Belknap Long's "Little Men of Space": "The Children were very young--& the crisis they were called upon to face would have driven most adults into a straitjacket."
4. [novelette] E Hoffmann Price's "The Fire and the Flesh": "Was Agni Deva flame? Or was she flesh? In either case, the woman of volcano was irresistible."
   
   Note: I wonder whatever made the author make "Agni Deva" female? In Hindu mythology, it's a male. Also, "Deva" (also written "Dev" in English) literally means "god" & is clearly male; "Devi" is "goddess" & female.
5. [ss] August Derleth's "The Maugham Obsession": "All inventors seek success. Some few achieve it. And now & then, a Quintus Maugham is a bit too successful for his own health."
   
   From editor's introduction to story: author was the owner of Arkham press at the time the story was published.
6. [ss] Arthur C Clarke's "The Other Tiger": "When a pair of strollers begin to ponder parallel worlds just about anything can happen. And this time about anything does."
   
   From Clarke's introduction to this story in his "Collected Stories": "Originally entitled 'Refutation', this story was retitled by Sam Merwin, editor of Fantastic Universe, as a nod to Frank Stockton's classic but now forgotten 'The Lady or the Tiger'".
   
   For me, it's among the forgettable stories of Clarke. It's very small though, probably just above the boundary of flash fiction.
7. [ss] Gene L Henderson's "The Small Bears": "The aliens looked cute as Koalas. But there was a little matter of a graveyard of dead spaceships."
8. [ss] Philip K Dick's "Martians Come in Clouds": "Among Man's noblest dreams is that of making friendly contact with other world creatures. But dreams may become nightmares..."
9. [ss] Roger Dee's "The Minister Had To Wait": 'The Brass said, "Turn it on!" So Doc Maxey could but obey--which created one hell of a big mess.'
10. [ss] Milton Lesser's "Finders Keepers": "Amhurst wanted to get married. But then an invisible ingenue moved in on his wedding day..."
11. [ss] Ray Bradbury's "Time in Thy Flight": "The circus, Hallowe'en, the Glorious Fourth may go--yet eternal is their pull on a child's heart."
12. [ss] Eric Frank Russell's "It's in the Blood" (B): "Space may flow in a young man's veins. But at times the laws of heredity can take tragic twists."
13. [ss, reprint] Francis G Rayer's "Of Those Who Came" (as by George Longdon); New Worlds, November 1952: "The alien scheme was perfect--a night landing, infiltration, human disguises. Fortunately for us the Policeman was awaiting them."

See also.

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

Free fiction: Space Travel, July 1958 (magazine) (ed William L Hamling)

At Internet Archive in multiple formats.

Among the authors: Edmond Hamilton, A Bertram Chandler.

Related: Pulps; Fiction from 1950s.

A Bertram Chandler's "The Rim Gods" (novelette, religion, free)

This will probably make more sense to readers familiar with Christianity - climax totally escaped me except for a feel that those looking for god ended up finding devil (but I might be wrong in this interpretation).

But rest of the story - preclimax story - was readable, if not particularly noteworthy: a bunch of fanatics want their god to reappear at the new "Sinai" - so "the heathen, the idolators, will take heed and tremble."

And they have a practical way to make the god appear in physical form: a telepath with ability to call ... spirits, whatever ... on a world called "Kinsolving's Planet" at the edge of galaxy where time & space have funny properties. Experiment will result in an appearance, but not of god.

Related.

I recall having read a story of Chandler I cannot recollect the title of that was a sort of prequel to this story. I don't recall a lot of details, but this story too happens on the same world at the edge of galaxy & something appears out of thin air, so to say. I think references to appearance of primitive man in this story are from there.

Fact sheet.

First published: If, April 1968.
Rating: B.
Download full text from Webscription.
Note: This Webscription version appears to be a minor fixup of original magazine version, but reads well enough as an independent story. This is the only version I've read.
Related: Stories of A Bertram Chandler.

A Bertram Chandler's "The Bird-Brained Navigator" (novelette, problem solving, free)

John Grimes, trapped as hostage on a sea going vessel with hostile aliens & a criminal human for crew on the alien world called Tharn, engineers a biological arrangement that will result in authorities freeing him & catching the criminals.

Note.

I found one scene very cooked up. Criminals' vessel with very inadequate crew leaves port against port police's wishes, & authorities don't even challenges the escapees!

Fact sheet.

First published: If, June 1968.
Rating: B.
Download full text from Webscription.
Related: Stories of A Bertram Chandler.

A Bertram Chander's "The Subtracter" aka "The Minus Factor" (novelette, politics, free): Someone has taken Asimov's psychohistory to heart

In the political heart of the Federation, the human galactic empire, a mathematician is in an influential position. Because he's supposed to have worked out a mathematically predictable way of determining the future, & of changing it by influencing significant factors shaping it.

This the story of one of his influencing operations that didn't quite work out as expected...

Fact sheet.

First published: 1969. Where?
Rating: B.
Download full text from Webscription.
This story is part of author's John Grimes' series.
Related: Stories of A Bertram Chandler.

Free fiction: Some short fiction by famous authors

1. C L Moore's "Song in a Minor Key"; download: One of the early Moore stories, & part of the interplanetary adventure series featuring the macho man Northwest Smith. I'm not as much a fan of NWS series as some others are.
2. Theodore Sturgeon's "The Man Who Lost the Sea" (C); download; F&SF, October 1959: An apparently pioneer vehicle to Mars has crashed there, exposing its apparently lone human crew to lethal radiation doses from ship's atomic plant.
   
   Story is mostly the ramblings of this dying man in his delirium.
3. A Bertram Chandler's "Last Day" (download), "Naval Engagement" aka "Left-Hand Way" (download), "Reaping Time" (download), "Two Can Play" (download), & "UFO" (download). Sidebar for each of these links shows a few more Chandler stories, but I'm not able to get their URL (they run JavaScript to generate links, but its JS doesn't run in my Firefox).

[via QuasarDragon & Free SF Reader]

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.

A Bertram Chandler's "The Cage" (short story, science fiction): A shorter version of Pierre Boulle's "Planet of the Apes"

While there are many stories with "men as zoo animals" theme, these two are the only ones I've read where this is the main theme.

Because of shorter length, this is a simpler & less nuanced story than "Planet of the Apes". But plot idea is the same: A group of humans happen to be in a condition where they are mistaken as non-sentient animals by beings that are otherwise intellectual & technological peers. The humans get hunted, caught, & put in zoo & laboratory cages.

Problem for these zoo animals is to convince their captors that they are sentient & deserve better treatment.

Story summary.

About half the story is about how this group of humans ended up in the unfortunate situation; later half is about their capture by an alien "survey ship", life as zoo animals, & eventual release.

"At least two hundred days had passed since their landing on the planet without a name" - these human "survivors from the interstellar liner Lode Star". Ship had to make emergency landing. There was something wrong with its atomic "Ehrenhaft generators"; they had landed on a world in an unexplored region of galaxy & had only chance to send SOS (but not receive acknowledgment).

50 odd passengers were parceled off to a place somewhat away from wrecked ship while Captain & a small crew tried fixing things. They failed; the explosion destroyed both the ship & crew, & left a crater where ship stood. Survivors were stranded on this unfriendly world - always hot, always drizzling, though no hostile local animals, ample local food & water, & breathable air.

They have degenerated into a primitive existence in this period. And there is very skewed sex ratio. "There are fifty-three of us here, men & women. There are ten married couples... That leaves thirty-three people, of whom twenty are men. Twenty men to thirteen ... women... What sort of marriage set-up do we have?" They choose monogamy. If two men want the same woman, they must fight it out; winner takes the woman!

It's during one such fight with the crowd cheering that 6 of them are picked up by an alien hunting helicopter; alien spaceship is parked a little distance away.

"The world to which they were taken would have been a marked improvement on the world they had left, had it not been for the mistaken kindness of their captors. The cage in which the three men were housed duplicated ... the climatic condition of the planet upon which Lode Star had been lost." So hot atmosphere & constant drizzle, & same boring fungi as food that they had adapted to on the world they were taken from!

Of the 6 humans captured, 3 men in this cage are "Hawkins, Boyle, & Fennet". In a nearby cage is "Mary Hart". Remaining two - "Clemens & Miss Taylor" - probably ended up on the vivisection table.

Their captors "aren't the same shape.. And we, were the situations reversed, would take some convincing that three six-legged beer barrels were men & brothers." They try Pythagoras's Theorem with pictures made from twigs to interest their captors, without luck.

They try showing their "manual dexterity by the weaving of baskets" from stuff within their cage. Captors think its a mating ritual - like beaver's dams! So "Mary Hart was taken from her cage and put in with the three men"!

It's during the night of her stay in men's cage that Mary made a racket - when Joe, a little local mouse-sized animal, passed over her when she was asleep. Men consider Joe a kind of friendly pet. She insists men kill Joe; they instead make a basket type cage & put Joe there after trapping it.

It's this trapping & caging of Joe that reaches out to captors. They will be recognized as sentients & gain their freedom because "Only rational beings ... put other beings in cages"!

Collected in.

1. Isaac Asimov & Martin H Greenberg (Eds)' "Isaac Asimov Presents the Great SF Stories 19 (1957)".

Fact sheet.

First published: F&SF, June 1957.
Rating: A

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.