In the case of the young typist, it does corrupt her to some degree because she enjoys her omniscience. In most stories of this sort, we see illustrated the old maxim of how absolute power corrupts absolutely. The characters are interesting and complex. RESEARCH ALPHA – even in this fix up book – is a great stand alone story and reveals what a great teller of short stories A.E. Supermind has a 3.53 rating at Goodreads here’s an excerpt from Brian Schwartz’s 3-star rating, focusing on “Research Alpha”: It follows a secretary as she undergoes two treatments, eventually reaching IQ 10,000…. The third section takes place at Research Alpha, where one of the researchers is experimenting with a serum to rewrite human genetic code to create superminds. Here’s the start of the summary for “Research Alpha.” Wikipedia has a handy (though spoiler-filled) summary of all three tales. In “Asylum” we followed the adventures of an (apparently) average-Joe kind of space pilot, Steve Hanardy, who gets inadvertently tangled up in the battle between a galactic observers who are trying to protect mankind and the solar system from deadly, and superiorly-intelligent, vampire-like aliens, the Dreeghs, from overrunning the solar system and destroying mankind. Prospero’s Isle currently has my favorite one-sentence review of the retro-Hugo nominee “Asylum”: “ The Proxy Intelligence” ( World of If, October 1968) “Research Alpha” ( World of If, July 1965) - Nebula nominee “Asylum” ( Astounding Science-Fiction, May 1942) - 2018 Retro Hugo Nominee, Best Novella Tops on that list at the moment is Supermind, a 1977 fix-up novel composed of three acclaimed novellas originally published between 1942-68, all dealing with humanity’s struggle against a sinister race of alien vampires: That doesn’t mean that there aren’t still Van Vogt titles that interest me, and stubbornly refuse to leave my TBR pile. I tried to reread Slan a few years ago, a book that mesmerized me when I first encountered it in 1977, and I found that to my adult eyes it read very much like a middle grade chapter book. There aren’t a lot of Van Vogt books I would recommend to a curious modern reader. Of the writers I still read read today, his voice most vividly reminds me of the pulp era of science fiction, with all its strengths and weaknesses - including, unfortunately, a simple and unadorned writing style that’s largely unappealing to modern readers. Van Vogt first emerged in the pulps, and he mastered the art of writing for a pulp audience. Dick, just as a few examples - there isn’t a highly visible group of fans fighting to keep his memory alive, or bring his most popular work to the attention of Hollywood. And unlike a lot of popular authors of the era - Heinlein, Asimov, Philip K. His books Slan, The Voyage of the Space Beagle, and The World of Null-A were required reading for any serious science fiction fan, and half a dozen publishers - including DAW, Ace, Berkley and Pocket Books - were competing to keep his large and lucrative back catalog in print. van Vogt was one of the most prolific and respected SF authors on the shelves.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |