Ray Bradbury's "Eat, Drink and Be Wary" (flash fiction, humor, free)

A "Venusian banquet lasts a week or ten days, sometimes more, with eight meals a day & twenty courses to a meal." That's normal for Venusians with their ultra-fast metabolism.

But when a human diplomat is invited to one of these banquets, saying no is not an option & going there is death sentence. So our diplomat will seek some scientific help...

Fact sheet.

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

Free fiction: Ray Bradbury (mostly old radio adaptations)

@QuasarDragon.

Free fiction: 3 issues of "Futuria Fantasia" (all edited by Ray Bradbury)

All at Project Gutenberg.

1. Winter 1940.
2. Summer 1939 & Fall 1939. [both via QuasarDragon]

These appear to be fanzines, with some fiction. I've not read any yet.

Related: Old "pulps".

RIP: Ray Bradbury

Died today morning at 91.

Details at io9 & twitter.

"Imagination: Stories of Science Fiction and Fantasy", Vol 2 No 2 (April 1951) (ed William L Hamling) (magazine, free): Annotated table of contents

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

Bradbury's excellent story is probably logically a part of "The Martian Chronicles", though it doesn't appear to be in the official version.

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] Robert W Krepps' "Beyond the Fearful Forest" (as by Geoff St Reynard): "No hunter dared to venture past the Fearful Forest into the land of--The Nameless..."
2. [ss] Ray Bradbury's '"In This Sign..."' aka "The Fire Balloons" (A): "The Fathers had come to convert the Martians. The question was: did they really exist?"
3. [ss] Hal Annas' "The Longsnozzle Event": "What will the future private detective be like? Meet Len Zitts, Galactic Shamus!"
4. [ss] Richard Matheson's '"Drink My Red Blood..."': "Jules was a strange little boy with a peculier ambition: he wanted to be a vampire..."
5. [ss] Eric Frank Russell's "Afternoon of a Fahn" aka "Rainbow's End" (A): "Here was the planet of a spaceman's dreams--it made every one of them come true..."
6. [novelette] Robert Bloch's "The Hungry House": "Were they afraid of the house, or the thing that lived there--waiting for tenants..."
7. [ss] Mack Reynolds' "Not in the Rules": "Earth's Warrior faced death in the Martian Arena with an untested weapon--strategy!"
8. [ss] Allen K Lang's "An Eel By the Tail": "A physics class was no place for this strip teaser--nor was the Earth for that matter!"

See also.

1. Fiction from Imagination.
2. Fiction from old "pulp" magazines.
3. 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.

Ray Bradbury's "The Marriage"

A "The Martian Chronicles" story, published for the first time last year: "about the marriage of a human, Captain Samuel Pace of the Space Service, to Elta, a native Martian woman".
- Marooned.

Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury.

Couple of tidbits about Ray Bradbury

Maryann Yin collects the at Gallycat.

Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury.

Paul on Ray Bradbury's "The Martian Ghosts"

At Marooned.

A story written apparently long ago as part of "The Martian Chronicles", but published for the first time only last year.

Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury.

Ray Bradbury's "The Disease"

Marooned has a post on this flash fiction piece, written long back as part of "The Martian Chronicles", but published for the first time only in 2009.

It's the story of characters that first appear in "Ylla" (download as part of a larger package).

Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury.

Ray Bradbury's "The Irritated People" (short story, humor, free): In a war of nerves, attack the enemy's vanity

Very funny story that enlarges the scope to international level of a kind of fight often seen among children & sometimes among neighbors.

That makes it sound silly, & determined my initial reaction to it. But countries can behave silly, like the last fortnight's spat between India & Pakistan: privately owned Indian cricket teams for a forthcoming domestic tournament don't hire any Pakistani players during player auctions, & Pakistani government feels "insulted", & India's ministers have to express opinions on the subject! Grow up guys - why the hell does a government, let alone two of them, need to get involved in this?

But I'm digressing. Or may be not. This story is about precisely this kind of governmental idiocy.

Story summary.

"World Organization" is like a world police. They've disarmed the states, & are powerful enough to keep them disarmed.

That's when US initiates a war against Tri-Union, some sort of confederation in Europe. No weapons are used. The idea is to only irritate others. Like (in pre-visa era!) take hundreds of thousands of picnickers to other party's parks & leave back junk. Or throw junk on their streets.

Of course, there is retaliation. And counter-retaliation... eventually truce.

See also.

1. Harlan Ellison's '"Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman' ; download comic book adaptation: Another story where a joker irritates a large number of people by dropping harmless stuff on public places to make a point.

Collected in.

1. Samuel Mines (ed)'s "Wonder Story Annual", Vol 2 No 1 (1953 Edition)".

Fact sheet.

First published: Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1947.
Download full text as part of scans of the magazine where it originally appeared, or as part of scans of this anthology.
Rating: B.
Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury.

Free fiction: Planet Stories, Fall 1950

At Internet Archive in multiple formats. Note the label in description of IA entry wrongly says "Spring 1950".

Includes stories by Poul Anderson & Ray Bradbury.

Related.

1. Fiction from Planet Stories.
2. Old "pulp" magazines.
   

Free movie: Russian movie adaptation of Ray Bradbury's "There Will Come Soft Rains"

At YouTube. [via Republibot]

PS: Looks like YouTube have upgraded software recently. I was told to upgrade my Flash installation before it will play in my browser. I've not yet done that - means I haven't seen the movie myself yet.

Related.

1. Stories of Ray Bradbury.
2. Summary of "There Will Come Soft Rains"; download the story text/MP3.

Free fiction: Scans & HTML of 5 issues of "Thrilling Wonder Stories" - June 1939, December 1940, December 1947, February 1948, & Spring 1945

At Crosseyed Cyclops, as CBR files in 3 numbered RAR packs - #1, 2, 3. Numbers, however, do not tell which issues are inside the pack; my list below does (item 1 is the contents of pack numbered 1, etc).
Note: Sole HTML - December 1947 - is also inside its own CBR file. Just change file's extension to RAR & extract. All other issues are as scans only.

Update, 15 December 2009: An additional CBR file from RAR #2 can be extracted by telling WinRAR to "ignore broken files" during extraction. This yields Spring 1945 issue, with errors - means it might have some pages missing.

1. December 1947 (scans + HTML) & February 1948. Henry Kuttner & Ray Bradbury are among the authors represented.
   
   This gave me a lot of trouble downloading - apparently heavy server overload. But it did eventually download.
2. June 1939, & Spring 1945. Stanley Weinbaum, E E "doc" Smith, Eando Binder, & Jack Williamson are among the authors included.
   
   Note that this RAR - containing more than one CBR files - is corrupt. Tell WinRAR to "ignore broken files" during extraction, & it will get both files; else it will not get Spring 1945 issue. In either case, it issues errors which I ignored.
   
3. December 1940.

Related: Fiction from Thrilling Wonder Stories.

Free fiction: Audio: "Old Time Radio Downloads"

[Link]. [via Crosseyed Cyclops]

Many have been online elsewhere a while. I haven't personally played any from this lot yet.

Among the lot are Heinlein's "Universe" (MP3), "The Green Hills of Earth" (MP3), & "Requiem" (MP3); Asimov's "A Pebble in the Sky" (MP3) & "Nightfall" (MP3); William Tenn's "Child's Play" (MP3); Bradbury's "Marionettes Inc" (MP3), "... And the Moon Be Still as Bright" (MP3), & "Mars is Heaven!" (MP3); Murray Leinster's "First Contact" (MP3) (this is the story that coined the term "first contact").

Free fiction: Old movie based on Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451"

At SF Signal.

I haven't seen the movie yet, though I came back less impressed with its original novel version than it's classic status would suggest.

Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury.

Guardian on Ray Bradbury

In this post by Chris Power.

Kind of ... survey of his career. Stories explicitly mentioned:

1. "No Particular Night or Morning"
2. "Kaleidoscope"
3. "The Long Rain"
4. "The Off Season"
5. "The Fire Balloons"
6. "The Pedestrian"
7. "The Fox and the Forest"
8. "... And the Moon Be Still as Bright"
9. "And the Rock Cried Out"

Related: "Best of" lists.

Tony Daniel recommends some short fiction

In this chart (JPG image) as part of SF Signal's weekly panel called "MIND MELD".
Caution: Depending on browser settings, image text may be difficult to read in browser; might need to save to disk & use an image viewer.

I won't always call the stories on his list good, but they're famous ones. Includes several I haven't read but might now look up.

Of the very famous ones on the list that I personally didn't find good:

1. Damon Knight's "The Country of the Kind"; download MP3.
2. Fredric Brown's "Arena"; download text or comic book adaptation.
   
3. Arthur Clarke's "The Nine Billion Names of God"; download text/MP3: But it's worth seeking out for those interested in ancient history of computers.

Also, many people will likely find Joseph E Kelleam's "Rust" a far better read than Ray Bradbury's much better known "There Will Come Soft Rains" (download text/MP3). Both are essentially on the same subject. Arthur Clarke too has two famous stories on the same subject (neither suitable for those seeking entertainment or for genre newbies) - "The Curse" (download text), & "If I Forget Thee, Oh Earth ...".

One story particularly worth looking out for on his list is Jack Vance's "The Moon Moth". Light fun read in a colorful setting.

Related: "best of" lists.

Kim Stanley Robinson recommends some Mars fiction

At IEEE Spectrum: "My 10 Favorite Mars Novels". [via SF Signal & Marooned]

It's actually 11 books - 8 novels, 2 short story collections, & 1 poetry book.

I've read only 2 from the lot:

1. Arthur Clarke's "The Sands of Mars": First human cities on Mars, including an adventure involving a surface journey from one city to another, getting lost & rescued on the way, & picking up a native animal pet.
2. Ray Bradbury's "The Martian Chronicles": I've read only part of it. A retelling of European colonization of Americas in a fantasy setting - read Europeans for humans & Martians for native Americans. In at least one story, "And the Moon be Still as Bright", author makes this connection explicit.
   
   Later stories apparently deal with nuclear dystopia, but I haven't read most of them.

Related: Fiction set on Mars or its moons; "best of" lists.

Ray Bradbury's "The Veldt" aka "The World the Children Made" (short story, smart home, free)

When George Hadley & his wife Lydia brought an expensive "Happylife Home" with a lot of built automation, & an amazingly realistic "nursery" - a play room for their two 10 year olds that is a cunning telepathically-controlled virtual reality studio, little did they think of shocking consequences.

Title is a name from African savanna - wild grassy planes. This is the kids favorite programmable environment in nursery, & plays a major role in the story.

Auxiliary Memory talks about the historical context of this story, & inspired me to look it up. Best Science Fiction Stories has a longer summary, & provided the online link.

See also.

1. Henry Kuttner & C L Moore's "The Prisoner in the Skull": Features telepathically controlled window panes - so you can have desirable live views.

Fact sheet.

First published: 'as "The World the Children Made", Saturday Evening Post, September 23 1950'.
Rating: A.
Download full text.
Related: Stories of Ray Bradbury; stories that feature a smart house; stories that feature a VR gadget.