Nightfall One

Nightfall series

by Isaac Asimov, Ken Sequin (Illustrator)

Nightfall One is the first half of a collection of Isaac Asimov's science fiction, short stories. Each story has been selected by the author himself, and each has an introduction specifically written for this collection by Dr. Asimov. Together the two volumes showcase Isaac Asimov's story-telling talent.

Nightfall --
Green patches --
Hostess --
Breeds there a man --
C-chase

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Fiction, Collections, Anthologies, Science Fiction Fantasy, Short Story Collection

176 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1969

About the author

Works of prolific Russian-American writer Isaac Asimov include popular explanations of scientific principles, The Foundation Trilogy (1951-1953), and other volumes of fiction.

Isaac Asimov, a professor of biochemistry, wrote as a highly successful author, best known for his books.

Asimov, professor, generally considered of all time, edited more than five hundred books and ninety thousand letters and postcards. He published in nine of the ten major categories of the Dewey decimal classification but lacked only an entry in the category of philosophy (100).

People widely considered Asimov, a master of the genre alongside Robert Anson Heinlein and Arthur Charles Clarke as the "big three" during his lifetime. He later tied Galactic Empire and the Robot into the same universe as his most famous series to create a unified "future history" for his stories much like those that Heinlein pioneered and Cordwainer Smith and Poul Anderson previously produced. He penned "Nightfall," voted in 1964 as the best short story of all time; many persons still honor this title. He also produced well mysteries, fantasy, and a great quantity of nonfiction. Asimov used Paul French, the pen name, for the Lucky Starr, series of juvenile novels.

Most books of Asimov in a historical way go as far back to a time with possible question or concept at its simplest stage. He often provides and mentions well nationalities, birth, and death dates for persons and etymologies and pronunciation guides for technical terms. Guide to Science, the tripartite set Understanding Physics, and Chronology of Science and Discovery exemplify these books.

Asimov, a long-time member, reluctantly served as vice president of Mensa international and described some members of that organization as "brain-proud and aggressive about their IQs." He took more pleasure as president of the humanist association. The asteroid 5020 Asimov, the magazine Asimov's Science Fiction, an elementary school in Brooklyn in New York, and two different awards honor his name.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_As...

Reviews

[Patrik Sahlstrøm · Rating 5 out of 5]

An outstanding collection of some of Asimovs best short stories. It consists of only 5 stories each of which are 20-40 pages, and absolutely brilliant. I just wish that Asimov had managed to maintain this level of quality throughout his whole career. Highly recommended!

[Ashish · Rating 5 out of 5]

Its my first book by Asimov, and a beautiful introduction to his work, before I embark on the bigger journey through some of his series. Being a fan of short stories, and of sci-fi, coupled with the praise that Asimov gets for his stories, I was prepared to be awed. Lets just say, there was nothing that left me disappointed.

The 5 stories that are part of this anathology are hand-picked by asimov himself to serve as a glimpse into his early works. I loved the small introductions that he gives before every story, telling us when and under what circumstances the story was originally printed.

The stories themselves are brilliant,dealing with a variety of ideas, but a common theme of humanity and how space exploration and contact with alien life would affect us, and more importantly,how being human, with all its intelligence,its idiosyncrasies and its sense of individuality,while still maintaining some sort of status quo in singularity, would deal with the experiences and circumstances that it may bring forth. The pacing of the stories in particular are spot-on, and it keeps you desperately in anticipation of whats coming next.

Overall, a beautiful collection,and now I can't wait to read everything that Asimov has written.

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collections of short stories jumped out to me at a second hand bookshop. I'd never read any Asmiov before but learnt that Nightfall is the story that catapulted him to the forefront of science fiction so I thought this would be the perfect launch pad into his work for me. Couldn't have been more right! Absolutely loved it and the short introductions to each story provided excellent context and insight into Asimov's mind and world. Each story was unique and memorable but my favourite would have to be The C-Chute. It's the last one in this collection, combines my favourite elements of science fiction and it's last line will stay with me forever.

[Chris Kalogroulis · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a wonderful collection of short stories! Thank you Adin for buying this for me!

[Leila Anani · Rating 5 out of 5]

Normally when you read a sci-fi anthology some stories are weaker than others. I am delighted to say that is not true here, all 5 stories are excellent.

Nightfall is a fascinating tale of cosmic dread as a planet with multiple suns faces an eclipse. Avoid the film of this, it's terrible and is an insult to such a brilliant story.

Green patches left me haunted with images of rats with patches of green fur for eyes. This is a fun sting-in-the tail story that reminded me of the work of Ray Bradbury.

Breeds there a man is probably my least favourite, but only due to the subject matter. It tells of a scientist going insane with the knowledge that humanity is being directed by an alien force like bacteria in a petri dish. Nicely dark, open ending.

C-chute is a tale of survival when a spaceship is captured by an alien enemy. It's strength lies in its characters. This reminded me of things like the film Lifepod - OK no aliens there but very similar set up - the ragtag bunch of strangers trapped in part of a ship trying to work out how to survive and get back to Earth and indeed similar archetypes - a mouthy antagonist, a heroic dwarf/short guy, an ineffectual military man, a young green guy in the wrong place, somebody claustrophobic who falls to pieces....

My favourite story by a mile however, is Hostess. A recently married female scientist plays host to an alien ambassador. Now I put my hands up - I don't totally get it and I think that's part of the reason I like it so much - there's so much subtly and ambiguity and things going on behind the scenes.

The last line "She had finally learned why Drake married her" is a question in itself - because the reader has to work out what her revelation was. Now there have been various versions of the story published over the years and they have slightly different endings. The 1951 version published in Galaxy tacks on two lines which spell it out:
“Not a conjugal relationship—
“Conjugation.”

The surface meaning is I think fairly obvious. However it's what's going on behind the scenes that continues to fascinate me. I haven't found anywhere that mentions this so maybe I'm seeing things that aren't there, but I get definite homosexual vibes in the antagonistic relationship between Drake/Tharg and indeed the Hawkinsite and missing humans in general.

So first all the missing humans (or those infected with the parasite) are all young men in the first year of marriage. And you have to question just how many of those marriages are “Not a conjugal relationship but conjugation.” in an era where homosexuality is illegal. The Hawkinsite don't have marriage or romantic bonds in the same way humans do.

You've got the queer marriage where Rose wonders why Drake married her. His fascination with Tharg from the outset. The fact that they go out to dinner together and when he returns:

"Rose noticed blood upon his lips. She thought to herself, He's in some kind of trouble. I've got to talk to him. I can't let it go on like this."

The blood on Drake's lips bothers me. It could have course be tomato sauce which they had been eating. In thematic terms its a foreshadow of the violence to come. But it definitely hints to a scene we don't see - Just what happened between Drake and Tharg during that meal? A confrontation? A kiss?

And the fascinating inhibition death. The aliens loose the will to live when their lovers return to earth? Then there's the notion of the parasite and its transmission which definitely has sexual implication. Even the title 'hostess' has a double meaning suggesting that Drake has passed the parasite on to Rose (we presume through intimacy) which definitely makes the reader question the method of transmission to the aliens.

There's so much going on in this story which forces the reader to question every little nuance. I get the feeling that it inspired things like Colin Wilson's The Mind Parasites which makes a great companion piece to this story.

Overall I adored this anthology. Ir reminded me a lot of Ray Bradbury and abolished my misconception that all Asimov's work featured robots and had very little character development. I will most certainly be reading more Asimov in future.

[Dane Cobain · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was unfortunately a little bit of a letdown, which itself is quite surprising. This book is pretty odd because it was published alongside Nightfall Two in paperback, while the hardback just combined the lot of them. I think that might have been the best way to read it.

Perhaps part of the problem here is that the stories are all listed in chronological order, and so Asimov got older as the collections went on. That means that his older stuff comes later, and I personally feel as though he developed as a writer over the years. Not everyone agrees with me.

It’s still worth reading though, if only because everything Asimov wrote is worth reading. I just didn’t get quite as much out of it as I was expecting. Another reason could be that these stories were longer than those in the other book, and Asimov’s great at ideas. Shorter stories means more ideas to consider.

[Vikas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nightfall is perhaps the best sci-fi short story I've ever read.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book (and the companion Nightfall Two) really should be one book - and I know in some pressings it is - and as such is an interesting mix of what Isaac Asimov did best - short effective punchy stories - I cannot go through each and every one of them but I think of all of them green patches is the most memorable one - although like I say I read and treat these two books as one.
One thing to note is that the story that these two books take their name from was later taken and expanded in a project which saw some of Asimov's most famous stories and expanded in to full length novels - nightfall was one of them. Another story was "Sally" which for once steps all to close to the three laws of Robotics and the underlying reason Asimov created them.
For anyone interested in the works of Isaac Asimov they should look at the huge library of work that are his short stories, and this book is a great cross section of that collection.

[Obed M. Parlapiano · Rating 5 out of 5]

Asimov was such a great writer. This is my second time reading some of his short stories, the first one was great experience.

This second time around Asimov didn't let me down either. "Nightfall" being one of his most famous short stories and introducing this book was captivating and superb.

The version I got my hands upon contained the following short stories:

Nightfall - Astounding, Sept 1941
Green Patches - Galaxy, Nov 1950
Hostess - Galaxy, May 1951
Breeds There a Man . . . ? - Astounding, June 1951
C-Chute - Galaxy, Oct 1951

The little book contained something that for me is much more precious, Asimov's introductions. To each and every short story Asimov wrote a bit about his life while writing the stories and what lead to such story, it gives a beautiful glimpse into Asimov's life and they sound so real and honest that I can't avoid loving the introductions as much as the short stories themselves.

Magnificent story telling by Asimov as always. Thank you.

[Johannes Herrmann · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first story is good, but I'm more a fan of his Caves of Steel series and do prefer Robot Dreams to this collection. In fact, there's an overlap, which isn't ideal.

The first story, Nightfall, is classic Asimov (something odd to say since it's his watershed story). It's science fiction but the only things that are different from the world we know (or knew at that time) are the things that are needed for the story. His stories really are more about people and society than toys.

[Olly Colluphid · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nightfall 4*
Green patches 5*
hostess 3* (/so/ dated)
Breeds there a man 3*
C-chute 3*

Overall 4* just

Showing its age in subject matter and details: social setting (especially sexism), smoking, communication...

Good writing though. And green patches is subtle horror.

[STU · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed all 5 of these stories.
Nightfall is the one that was the most memorable.
Can definitely tell that these are old stories: the culture of sexism and machoism underlies most stories.
Onto Nightfall 2 - shorter stories and more of them!

[Moonie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection contains my favourite story by Asimov. Even though he complains that he wrote it before he knew enough about writing. Nightfall is an amazing little short story and you should read it.

[Finlay · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story Nightfall is pretty interesting (I didn't realize at the time of reading that there is also a novel version of it), and there are some other cool sci fi curios in this collection, which I picked up in a charity shop.

It's reminded me that Asimov is a very approachable author.

[Frank Ashe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gets 4 stars because of the main story - Nightfall. A classic.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started off ok but lost interest towards the end

[Łukasz Truszkowski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent short stories, especially 'Green patches' and 'Hostess'

[Bent Andreassen · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 minus. 5 short stories/novelettes. All good.

[Ryan Young · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 good stories.

[xx_aug_xx · Rating 5 out of 5]

Favorite in this collection - Breeds There a Man...?

An incredible collection of short stories.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read (as in 'red') over a period of a year, it is a little difficult to remember and so review all of the 5 short fiction stories in here, but it is also a measure of whether or not any of them are particularly memorable, and thereby particularly good.

Certainly, amidst the many introductions of the many collections of Asimov's short stories, he notes that Nightfall [1941], the story, is particularly significant in both his career as a writer and in his standing in Science Fiction - since it marked the key point at which he realised, from the positive feedback the publication generated, that he could indeed become a dedicated author. The story of a planet about which six suns revolved, the end of the world fast approached. It was a good story, but not great.

Much is the same for all of the stories in this first Nightfall collection. Nightfall and C-Chute [1951] appear most often in the various collections, but even so, Breeds There a Man...? [1951] is the stellar piece. It is often the case as you read (as in 'reed') Asimov's short stories now that certain aspects of them are necessarily dated: because of the growth of the canon over the decades, and the inevitable comparison with the space opera of our modern generation of science fiction writers (Banks, Hamilton, Rajaniemi...); because of his seemingly non-politically correct attitude to women; and because many of the scientific advances of the time - his time of burgeoning creation, the '50s - have been subsequently superceded, such as microfilm and Multivac.

In his preface to Breeds...? he notes this particular problem in relation to the atomic bomb, after the advent of which it was evident that "many of the motifs of [science fiction] were now permanently part of the newspaper headlines." This topicality meant that "science fiction writers were not merely dreamers and crack-pots after all", but "I wanted to write a story that would deal with the things of tomorrow without becoming outdated the day after tomorrow."

Did he succeed? In this collection? Maybe not. But he did in his Robots and Empire series, out which we have the initial superb The Foundation Trilogy: Foundation, Foundation and Empire & Second Foundation Box Set [1951-53], I, Robot [1950], and The Bicentennial Man [1976]. But having read those greats, you must read more and more of his, and out of his 20+ full science fiction novels, there are a handful of true greats (that trilogy, The End of Eternity [1955], The Gods Themselves [1972]). And of his short fiction? Well, certainly The Bicentennial Man is the best, in my view, and any collection of the others must therefore run to second place at best. But second best in the massive portfolio of Asimov SF is pretty good indeed. So this Nightfall collection is well worth a visit.

[Charles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Four of the five stories in this collection are just ok - interesting reads for newcomers to Sci-Fi but nothing great. But the fifth story is 'Nightfall' and it's hard to express just how amazing the story truly is.

I know it has always bugged the good doctor that he had thirty years of solid, star-studded writing and Nightfall - an early work - has been voted "the best science fiction short story ever written" by the Science Fiction Writers of America. The other stories in this collection would rate a 2 or 3, but Nightfall brings the book up to a 5 for me.

[Ponetium HalfTree · Rating 4 out of 5]

The version I have contains 5 srories:

Nightfall - Astounding, Sept 1941
Green Patches - Galaxy, Nov 1950
Hostess - Galaxy, May 1951
Breeds There a Man . . . ? - Astounding, June 1951
C-Chute - Galaxy, Oct 1951
In a Good Cause - "New Tales of Space & Time", 1951

I really enjoyed all of them, especially "Breeds There a Man . . . ?".
Asimov's intro to each story is refreshing and interesting, and adds some dimension to each. His characters useally are quite flat but the stories themselvesare breathtaking.

[Raj · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a collection of some of Asimov's early work that hadn't previously appeared in any of his own collections. In contains, of course, Nightfall itself and four other stories. I had read There Breeds a Man... and C-Chute before but it was good to read them again, and both Green Patches and Hostess were entertaining. An enjoyable collection for Asimov fans.

[Biscuit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite loving his short stories, I'd never actually read his most famous/critically acclaimed, so when I fond a collection centred around Nightfall I was pretty happy. It lives up to the hype, in my opinion!

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nightfall is five star, the other stories are around 4-5 star. Why do I love Isaac Asimov's short stories so much but hate Foundation with a passion? WE JUST DON'T KNOW. Anyway, I bought this book for 25p at a charity shop and highly recommend this experience to others

[FranklinTV · Rating 3 out of 5]

More collected Asimov short stories that began my journey into reading, so kept mainly for that reason rather than to re-read. I do like how Asimov gives a short background to each story before it is presented. However, this one does include the classic Nightfall (and hence the extra star).

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good at the time

[AndrewP · Rating 4 out of 5]

Collection of short stories

[Bob Rubbens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great stories! Pretty old by now but each one if them still pretty relevant (especially "Breeds there a man"!).