Monday, June 25, 2012

Couple of stories from Galaxy magazine

Both these stories are from Galaxy, August 1958, & are online. McIntosh's story has last few sentences missing in the online copy, but that didn't come in the way for me. Keyes' is only the second story I've seen of the author yet, besides the seminal "Flowers for Algernon".

Both stories are humorous, but I'll prefer McIntosh's from among these two.
  1. J T McIntosh's "In Black and White" (B): A couple of alien traders selling
    "ergeron", the stuff needed to fuel interstellar craft, have arrived on earth. Since humanity is barely on the verge of reaching moon, they've to help expedite the process of colonizing solar planets - so there will be demand for their product a few of centuries down!

    And the way to do this is by introducing a rejuvenation elixir - so mankind is fitter & less neurotic...
  2. Daniel Keyes' "The Trouble with Elmo" (B): "Elmo" is "ELectronic MOnitor", an AI. Originally built to solve humanity's problems, but now on the death row because it's expensive to maintain. To stay alive, it designs solutions that invariably create new & bigger problems!

    Eventually, Elmo & its human attendant, Jake Busby, will figure out a way to keep Elmo alive, but without taxing the US taxpayer.

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