If you regard science fiction, fantasy, and horror as throwaway literature, think again. It is within such tales that the contest between good and evil is given center stage, wherein heroic acts are celebrated, and virtue discussed in all its many permutations. I would call speculative fiction a worthy successor to the medieval morality play, a dramatic form that used allegorical characters to teach moral lessons. To wit—stories are an instrument of culture, a way to promote common values and an important activity for any civilization that intends to stick around. You won’t find an abundance of this vibe in ‘serious’ fiction—and when you do, it’s not as much fun.
A short story compilation, within which the title ‘Uncle Einar’ made such an impression that I still, to this day, remember what it was about, who wrote it, and when I read it. I found it on my dad’s nightstand 65 years ago. That’s how much I liked it. Although the collection falls mostly into the fantasy genre, the title Uncle Einar is something of a crossover (Mutants!) and heartwarming to boot.
Many of these stories were first published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales, but keep in mind we’re talking about the 1940s and 50s. They called it ‘macabre fiction’. These days, we call it YA.
But this is, first and foremost, a work of literature, a timeless classic upon which the author made a splendid reputation, replete with lyrical prose, imaginative concepts, surprise endings, and persuasive dialogue. Also, an example of Magical Realism, a literary approach I once referred to as ‘wrapping the fantastic in the mundane’ before I knew there was a standard term for it.
The October Country is Ray Bradbury’s own netherworld of the soul, inhabited by the horrors and demons that lurk within all of us. Renowned for his multi-million-copy bestseller, Fahrenheit 451, and hailed by Harper’s magazine as “the finest living writer of fantastic fiction,” Ray Bradbury proves here that he is America’s master of the short story.
This classic collection features:
The Emissary: The faithful dog was the sick boy’s only connection with the world outside—and beyond . . . The Small Assassin: A fine, healthy baby boy was the new mother’s dream come true—or her worst nightmare . . .…
I was 9 years old when I read this title for the first time—which is not to say the John Carter series is suitable for that age group. In 1959, I was given a junior bookworm card for the library at Union Church, Metro Manila, Philippines, where I discovered a lot of material I was too young to read.
Burroughs was a man of his times—scholar, cowboy, rancher, drifter, would-be soldier—a young adult at the turn of the 19th century when every house on every street was occupied by durable, resilient people. That was his reality. It shows in the work.
In 1866, a U.S. Army captain is mysteriously transported into conflict on the planet Mars. Airships, monsters, warring clans, beautiful women, giant doglike creatures. You name it, Mars has it. Preposterous, right? I took another read just to see and suspended disbelief right away. There’s that Magical Realism act again. Fantastic concept, rational narrative. Hero strong, anti-hero stronger; a flourish many authors fail to execute.
Thematic content on the topics of honor, duty, persistence, and sacrifice — core values to live by in the days when the book was conceived, delivered with sincere conviction. Burroughs was quite the eloquent narrator and not at all shy about showing off. To his credit, he did so without bogging down the story. If you’re a writer, take notes.
Rediscover the adventure-pulp classic that gave the world its first great interplanetary romance-now featuring an introduction by Junot Diaz
In the spring of 1866, John Carter, a former Confederate captain prospecting for gold in the Arizona hills, slips into a cave and is overcome by mysterious vapors. He awakes to find himself naked, alone, and forty-eight million miles from Earth-a castaway on the dying planet Mars. Taken prisoner by the Tharks, a fierce nomadic tribe of six-limbed, olive-green giants, he wins respect as a cunning and able warrior, who by grace of Mars's weak gravity possesses the agility of a…
The future is uncertain, and the stakes are high. Climate change has wreaked havoc on the planet, and humanity is on the brink of extinction. The only hope lies in the Olympus Project, a plan to colonise the moon and build on the Artemis Base.
Epic, in every sense of the word. A masterwork, speaking to the topics of religion, politics, relationships, poverty, exclusion, and so forth. A phenomenal best-seller, widely regarded as the most ambitious Science Fiction novel of all time.
As such, it is a hefty tome at 892 pages. It is a costume-and-culture movie-in-your-head, immersive, with a large cast and intricate plot twists, set in another world in another time—an experience that demands the audience pay attention.
When I read it in 1967, I had a wealth of esoteric SF under my belt and all the likes of Ayn Rand and Simone de Bouvier a teenager would or should stick his nose into. In addition, we had been living in Asia for eleven years. I was attending an international school, and my parents had dragged me along on three world tours. I had, and still have, an ear for cultural nuance.
Given these circumstances, Frank Herbert’s deeply textured excursion to the planet Arrakis was not the stretch it might have been for others. The story’s primary challenge for Westerners is the necessity of sounding out unfamiliar words and remembering what they mean. In this and other ways, this book is not for lazy readers.
On the other hand, it is an enduring artistic achievement, skillfully crafted, reeking of authenticity in spite of itself. If you have the moxie for it, you will be entertained.
Before The Matrix, before Star Wars, before Ender's Game and Neuromancer, there was Dune: winner of the prestigious Hugo and Nebula awards, and widely considered one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written.
Melange, or 'spice', is the most valuable - and rarest - element in the universe; a drug that does everything from increasing a person's lifespan to making interstellar travel possible. And it can only be found on a single planet: the inhospitable desert world of Arrakis.
Whoever controls Arrakis controls the spice. And whoever controls the spice controls the universe.
Let us move toward the light, shall we, into the realm of satire and farce—and set aside for a moment the profoundly significant intentions of the author. At least long enough to say the book was fun to read. Witty, sophomoric, frivolous, irreverent, ridiculous. Meanwhile, taking a jab at pride, greed, sloth, ignorance, carelessness, and all the other deadly sins, as demonstrated by the cruel, blind, destructive arrogance of bureaucracy.
A political/philosophical manifesto, if you will, penned by a Literature MFA who wrote gags for the Monty Python troupe and scripts for the BBC television show Doctor Who. (Cover art by fellow Python alumnus Terry Gilliam.)
The book was a huge success and is still worth reading for entertainment value. If, somewhere along the journey, you begin to fret over the cost of surrendering autonomy to unelected pencil-pushers, good for you.
This box set contains all five parts of the' trilogy of five' so you can listen to the complete tales of Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Zaphod Bebblebrox and Marvin the Paranoid Android! Travel through space, time and parallel universes with the only guide you'll ever need, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Read by Stephen Fry, actor, director, author and popular audiobook reader, and Martin Freeman, who played Arthur Dent in film version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He is well known as Tim in The Office.
The set also includes a bonus DVD Life, the Universe and…
Coyote weather is the feral, hungry season, drought-stricken, and ready to catch fire. It’s 1967, and the American culture is violently remaking itself while the country is forcibly sending its young men to fight in a deeply unpopular war.
Jerry has stubbornly made no plans for the future because he…
This is a Gaslamp costume drama set in 1899, which might have motivated the author to overdo the period atmosphere, but she did not. Ten pages in, I was hooked. It was a clever story, masterful execution on a random pull off a new arrivals shelf after I’d done everything else I could think of to find something good to read.
Published in 2024 to wide acclaim, a debut novel by a young writer is exactly what I was looking for, except not space opera. No matter. We may now be certain that Western Civilization has not yet crumbled into the oceans post-literate, nor has the morality play been forgotten by the purveyors of speculative fiction.
It’s the first long-form publication I’ve read since I started writing my own novels. The fact that it held my attention is the most persuasive evidence I can offer that you might want to read it yourself.
For fans of Piranesi and The Midnight Library, a STUNNING HISTORICAL FANTASY set on a grand express train, about a group of passengers on a dangerous journey across a MAGICAL LANDSCAPE
“BREATHTAKING…Abounding with mysteries and marvels.” ―Samantha Shannon, NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING author of The Priory of the Orange Tree
It is said there is a price that every passenger must pay. A price beyond the cost of a ticket.
There is only one way to travel across the Wastelands: on the Trans-Siberian Express, a train as famous for its luxury as for its danger.…
70,000 years in the past, an alien scientist unravels the mysteries of space, time, and matter. My book is Literary Science Fiction with adventure, intrigue, suspense, and family drama.
Thematically, about a) Courage, nobility, loyalty, and compassion and b) What grown-ups do to create successful lives. Mind you, I didn’t understand any of this when I wrote it. All I wanted to do was tell a great story.
Melody and the Pier to Forever
by
Shawn Michel De Montaigne,
A young adult and epic fantasy novel that begins an entire series, as yet unfinished, about a young girl named Melody who discovers that the pier she lives near goes on forever—a pier that was destroyed by a hurricane that appeared out of blue skies in mere moments in 1983.…
Diary of a Citizen Scientist
by
Sharman Apt Russell,
Citizen Scientist begins with this extraordinary statement by the Keeper of Entomology at the London Museum of Natural History, “Study any obscure insect for a week and you will then know more than anyone else on the planet.”
As the author chases the obscure Western red-bellied tiger beetle across New…