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The Very Best of Barry N. Malzberg
For nearly half a century, Barry N. Malzberg has been stretching the boundaries of the science fiction and fantasy genres to tell truly entertaining tales. In a collection of fiction that Malzberg himself considers his very best, this anthology showcases a literary career spanning almost 50 years, dozens of novels, hundreds of stories, and countless classic books. Each of the 32 stories in this compilation offers Malzberg’s trademark vision of a future that is equal parts cautionary tale and social commentary. In the fictional world depicted in one story, dreams turn into frightening trips through time to reveal an ultimate horror; in another the rules in a war game change with every flip of the manic military command. Including pieces appearing for the first time in book form alongside rediscovered gems, these hand-picked selections exhibit his versatile imagination and the dark humor so characteristic of his work.
344 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 2012
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29 people want to read
About the author
Barry N. Malzberg
535 books133 followersBarry Nathaniel Malzberg was an American writer and editor, most often of science fiction and fantasy.
He had also published as:
Mike Barry (thriller/suspense)
K.M. O'Donnell (science fiction/fantasy)
Mel Johnson (adult)
Howard Lee (martial arts/TV tie-ins)
Lee W. Mason (adult)
Claudine Dumas (adult)
Francine di Natale (adult)
Gerrold Watkins (adult)
Eliot B. Reston
He had also published as:
Mike Barry (thriller/suspense)
K.M. O'Donnell (science fiction/fantasy)
Mel Johnson (adult)
Howard Lee (martial arts/TV tie-ins)
Lee W. Mason (adult)
Claudine Dumas (adult)
Francine di Natale (adult)
Gerrold Watkins (adult)
Eliot B. Reston
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
January 7, 2022
How I Take Their Measure.
February 7, 2023
This would have received 5 stars if it wasn't for the typos which were fast & frequent & furious.
October 12, 2013
Not My Cup of Future Tea
(Full disclosure: I received a free copy of this book for review through Library Thing’s Early Reviewer program.)
I’m a bit of a newcomer to science fiction – only in the last year have I discovered the likes of Joanna Russ, Suzette Haden Elgin, and Anne McCaffrey – and, having never heard of Barry N. Malzberg, I was unsure what to expect from this anthology.
The collection starts off on a strong note with “A Galaxy Called Rome,” a short story that’s ostensibly not a short story at all, but is rather presented as the author’s notes on how to write a short piece of science fiction. Accompanied only by a ship full of corpses (in cold storage for the day when their respective illnesses can be cured; until then, the bodies are stacked helpfully about the ship in order to absorb gamma rays), Lena is piloting the exploratory ship The Skipstone when it tumbles into a black galaxy. Here, time ceases to have meaning; Lena progresses through a thousand different lives, slowly building toward the day when she can find a way out of her predicament. Though not exactly an easy read, “A Galaxy Called Rome” is nonetheless an enjoyable piece of existential scifi, questioning what it means to be human in an infinite world.
After “A Galaxy Called Rome” – which is on the quirky side – the stories found in The Very Best of Barry N. Malzberg grow increasingly weird and esoteric. Wikipedia describes Malzberg’s style as “distinctive, with frequently long, elaborate though carefully constructed sentences and under-use of commas.” Further, Malzberg “uses metafiction techniques to subject the heroic conventions and literary limitations of space opera to biting satire.” Indeed, his beginnings as a playwright and prose fiction writer are evident in these stories. The result feels vaguely Orwellian, but much less readable.
Most of the stories appear to have been written in the ‘60s and ‘70s, Malzberg’s heyday. War, politics, and bureaucracy are common themes, though as someone who doesn’t really remember the Reagan presidency and wasn’t alive during the Vietnam War, much of Malzber’s satire is lost on me. Older readers – particularly those who were young adults in the ‘60s – might have a greater appreciation of Malzber’s style and viewpoint. Instead, I found myself skimming through the pages, finally giving up about halfway through. Usually I power through books I’m obligated to review, but this collection failed to hold my attention, if even for a cursory examination.
Additionally, horrendous punctuation and rampant typos make an already difficult book nearly impossible to read. Periods placed in the middle of sentences, incomplete pairs of quotation marks, commas that appear where they shouldn’t – this book is a mess. Whether it’s due to incompetent copyediting or poorly edited OCR scans (as another reviewer suggested), the result is the same: a text that’s increasingly difficult to plod through.
Incidentally, at first I thought that these mistakes were intentional – an extra layer of eccentricity provided by the author – that is, until I realized that they are universal throughout the text. Just to give you an idea of the author’s flair.
http://www.easyvegan.info/2013/11/04/...
(Full disclosure: I received a free copy of this book for review through Library Thing’s Early Reviewer program.)
I’m a bit of a newcomer to science fiction – only in the last year have I discovered the likes of Joanna Russ, Suzette Haden Elgin, and Anne McCaffrey – and, having never heard of Barry N. Malzberg, I was unsure what to expect from this anthology.
The collection starts off on a strong note with “A Galaxy Called Rome,” a short story that’s ostensibly not a short story at all, but is rather presented as the author’s notes on how to write a short piece of science fiction. Accompanied only by a ship full of corpses (in cold storage for the day when their respective illnesses can be cured; until then, the bodies are stacked helpfully about the ship in order to absorb gamma rays), Lena is piloting the exploratory ship The Skipstone when it tumbles into a black galaxy. Here, time ceases to have meaning; Lena progresses through a thousand different lives, slowly building toward the day when she can find a way out of her predicament. Though not exactly an easy read, “A Galaxy Called Rome” is nonetheless an enjoyable piece of existential scifi, questioning what it means to be human in an infinite world.
After “A Galaxy Called Rome” – which is on the quirky side – the stories found in The Very Best of Barry N. Malzberg grow increasingly weird and esoteric. Wikipedia describes Malzberg’s style as “distinctive, with frequently long, elaborate though carefully constructed sentences and under-use of commas.” Further, Malzberg “uses metafiction techniques to subject the heroic conventions and literary limitations of space opera to biting satire.” Indeed, his beginnings as a playwright and prose fiction writer are evident in these stories. The result feels vaguely Orwellian, but much less readable.
Most of the stories appear to have been written in the ‘60s and ‘70s, Malzberg’s heyday. War, politics, and bureaucracy are common themes, though as someone who doesn’t really remember the Reagan presidency and wasn’t alive during the Vietnam War, much of Malzber’s satire is lost on me. Older readers – particularly those who were young adults in the ‘60s – might have a greater appreciation of Malzber’s style and viewpoint. Instead, I found myself skimming through the pages, finally giving up about halfway through. Usually I power through books I’m obligated to review, but this collection failed to hold my attention, if even for a cursory examination.
Additionally, horrendous punctuation and rampant typos make an already difficult book nearly impossible to read. Periods placed in the middle of sentences, incomplete pairs of quotation marks, commas that appear where they shouldn’t – this book is a mess. Whether it’s due to incompetent copyediting or poorly edited OCR scans (as another reviewer suggested), the result is the same: a text that’s increasingly difficult to plod through.
Incidentally, at first I thought that these mistakes were intentional – an extra layer of eccentricity provided by the author – that is, until I realized that they are universal throughout the text. Just to give you an idea of the author’s flair.
http://www.easyvegan.info/2013/11/04/...
November 11, 2013
The first thing that must be said about this book is that it is a typesetting disaster, truly the worst I've ever seen. It's as though the stories were imported from one type of file to another and never proofread thereafter. Consequently the book is strewn with spelling and punctuation errors, literally hundreds or thousands of them. This is a great pity as Malzberg deserves a more fitting testimonial than this.
In terms of the stories themselves, there is plenty of interest here but I doubt this can really be called the best of Malzberg. There are classic stories here that were later expanded into the novels The Men Inside, The Cross of Fire and Galaxies. Some of Malzberg's best stories of the seventies are featured here but there's a welcome dash of newer material too. Truthfully, I found a number of these to be too oblique for my liking. My favourite type of Malzberg story now are his alternate histories of famous personages, especially his alternate presidents stories. There's also a gem of a story called 'Corridors' which first appeared in The Engines of the Night.
All up, I'd recommend that those wanting to read Malzberg's best short fiction source a copy of Arkham House's In the Stone House, which I believe to be a stronger collection overall and free of typographical errors too.
In terms of the stories themselves, there is plenty of interest here but I doubt this can really be called the best of Malzberg. There are classic stories here that were later expanded into the novels The Men Inside, The Cross of Fire and Galaxies. Some of Malzberg's best stories of the seventies are featured here but there's a welcome dash of newer material too. Truthfully, I found a number of these to be too oblique for my liking. My favourite type of Malzberg story now are his alternate histories of famous personages, especially his alternate presidents stories. There's also a gem of a story called 'Corridors' which first appeared in The Engines of the Night.
All up, I'd recommend that those wanting to read Malzberg's best short fiction source a copy of Arkham House's In the Stone House, which I believe to be a stronger collection overall and free of typographical errors too.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews