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The Fourth Science Fiction Megapack
The Fourth Science Fiction Megapack selects 25 more modern and classic science fiction stories, by talented authors new and old. Authors in this volume include: Mary A. Turzillo, E.C. Tubb, Murray Leinster, Philip K. Dick, Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Jason Andrew, Henry Kuttner, Cynthia Ward, George H. Scithers and John Gregory Betancourt, Milton Lesser, John Russell Fearn, Harry Harrison, Isaac Asimov, Ayn Rand, and many more Complete contents
"Zora and the Land Ethic Nomads," by Mary A. Turzillo
"Food for Friendship," by E.C. Tubb
"The Life Work of Professor Muntz," by Murray Leinster
"Tiny and the Monster," by Theodore Sturgeon
"Beyond Lies the Wub," by Philip K. Dick
"Pictures Don't Lie," by Katherine MacLean
"The Big Trip Up Yonder," by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
"Storm Warning," by Donald A. Wollheim
"The Application of Discipline," by Jason Andrew
"Tom the Universe," by Larry Hodges
"Wild Seed," by Carmelo Rafala
"Tabula Rasa," by Ray Cluley
"The Eyes of Thar," by Henry Kuttner
"Regenesis," by Cynthia Ward
"Not Omnipotent Enough," by George H. Scithers and John Gregory Betancourt
"Plato's Bastards," by James C. Stewart
"Pen Pal," by Milton Lesser
"Living Under the Conditions," by James K. Moran
"The Arbiter," by John Russell Fearn
"The Grandmother-Granddaughter Conspiracy," by Marissa Lingen
"Top Secret," by David Grinnell
"Living Under the Conditions," by James K. Moran
"Sense of Obligation," by Harry Harrison
"Angel's Egg," by Edgar Pangborn
"Youth," by Isaac Asimov
"Anthem," by Ayn Rand
And don't forget to search this ebook store for more entries in the "Megapack" series -- covering Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Mysteries, Westerns, Cthulhu Mythos, and many other subjects.
"Zora and the Land Ethic Nomads," by Mary A. Turzillo
"Food for Friendship," by E.C. Tubb
"The Life Work of Professor Muntz," by Murray Leinster
"Tiny and the Monster," by Theodore Sturgeon
"Beyond Lies the Wub," by Philip K. Dick
"Pictures Don't Lie," by Katherine MacLean
"The Big Trip Up Yonder," by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
"Storm Warning," by Donald A. Wollheim
"The Application of Discipline," by Jason Andrew
"Tom the Universe," by Larry Hodges
"Wild Seed," by Carmelo Rafala
"Tabula Rasa," by Ray Cluley
"The Eyes of Thar," by Henry Kuttner
"Regenesis," by Cynthia Ward
"Not Omnipotent Enough," by George H. Scithers and John Gregory Betancourt
"Plato's Bastards," by James C. Stewart
"Pen Pal," by Milton Lesser
"Living Under the Conditions," by James K. Moran
"The Arbiter," by John Russell Fearn
"The Grandmother-Granddaughter Conspiracy," by Marissa Lingen
"Top Secret," by David Grinnell
"Living Under the Conditions," by James K. Moran
"Sense of Obligation," by Harry Harrison
"Angel's Egg," by Edgar Pangborn
"Youth," by Isaac Asimov
"Anthem," by Ayn Rand
And don't forget to search this ebook store for more entries in the "Megapack" series -- covering Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Mysteries, Westerns, Cthulhu Mythos, and many other subjects.
750 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 2012
427 people are currently reading
453 people want to read
About the author
John Gregory Betancourt
397 books68 followersJohn Gregory Betancourt is a writer of science fiction, fantasy and mystery novels as well as short stories. He has worked as an assistant editor at Amazing Stories and editor of Horror: The Newsmagazine of the Horror Field, the revived Weird Tales magazine, the first issue of H. P. Lovecraft's Magazine of Horror (which he subsequently hired Marvin Kaye to edit), Cat Tales magazine (which he subsequently hired George H. Scithers to edit), and Adventure Tales magazine. He worked as a Senior Editor for Byron Preiss Visual Publications (1989-1996) and iBooks. He is the writer of four Star Trek novels and the new Chronicles of Amber prequel series, as well as a dozen original novels. His essays, articles, and reviews have appeared in such diverse publications as Writer's Digest and The Washington Post.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews
July 3, 2019
A balanced collection of the old and the new
Review of Kindle edition
Publication date: April 25, 2012
Publisher: Wildside Press
Language: English
ASIN: B0085TK53K
Most of the sci-fi I have been reading for the past couple of years is space opera, military sf, fantasy and similar genres. This volume reminded me of why I began to read sci-fi in high school. The older Isaac Asimov story was a welcome reintroduction to one of the old masters whose work I have not read in a very long time. The stories are a balanced collection of the old and the new.
Review of Kindle edition
Publication date: April 25, 2012
Publisher: Wildside Press
Language: English
ASIN: B0085TK53K
Most of the sci-fi I have been reading for the past couple of years is space opera, military sf, fantasy and similar genres. This volume reminded me of why I began to read sci-fi in high school. The older Isaac Asimov story was a welcome reintroduction to one of the old masters whose work I have not read in a very long time. The stories are a balanced collection of the old and the new.
June 26, 2015
As usual, I've reviewed each tale as I've got to it:
Zora and the Land of Ethic Nomads by Mary Turzillo
The struggles of your average family on Mars, as they suddenly find themselves perched on the dusty red precipice of catastrophe. It’s a tale with great ideas, but seems curiously reluctant to develop them – instead just rounding them off neatly to make itself nothing more than a shaggy dog story.
Mary Turzillo – an author I’ve never read before – seems to have written a great many stories about Mars, and I wonder if this will work better in the context of her other work. On its own however, it’s distinctly lacking.
Evocative title though.
Food for Friendship by E.C. Tubb
In the future man will travel to far off worlds where he will undoubtedly learn to hate them and then have his hunger to get away exploited by unscrupulous bosses.
Here we have two down and outs who love nothing better than to bitch and whine about their circumstances. All the way through you just know their ending is going to be a kick in the belly.
The Life Work of Professor Muntz by Murray Leinster
It’s definitely an amusing idea to make the protagonist of a tale about overlapping parallel universes be a not too bright delivery man who is totally oblivious of what’s happening to him. And I suppose it’s witty to cast this story as almost academic report into the incident. Yet the tale itself never goes anywhere further than those (admittedly good) two ideas. Clever, but insubstantial and unaffecting.
Tiny and the Monster by Theodore Sturgeon
This breezy tale of a super powered dog, the couple he can communicate with and their wise cracking chaperone seems like some long lost Disney live action movie. (I’m liking Mary Tyler-Moore and Dean Jones for the casting!) It has a certain charm to it though,
Beyond Lies the Wub by Philip K. Dick
A story about conquest, colonisation and just desserts (as well as, I suppose, just main course). I’ve read a few Philip K. Dick novels and so this was more straightforward than I was expecting – but without a doubt entertaining and pointed.
Pictures Don’t Lie by Katherine MacLean
It’s a great idea to have humans and an alien race communicate with each other through the transmission of television dramas. As the way most of us encounter extraterrestrial is through television and movies (and okay, stories like this) – why shouldn’t we use these same broadcast dramas to actually communicate with aliens? This is proper old fashioned science fiction – spaceships and cutting edge research, alongside cathode ray TVs, smoking in laboratories and actual paper newspapers – and it’s a lot of fun with a hell of an ending.
The Big Trip Up Yonder by Kurt Vonnegut jr
That’s the problem with the one day invention of anti-aging, anti-death drugs – everybody will end up with unwieldy families. There will be no space at home, no space to move to and even 103 year old men will end up being hassled by their grandfathers.
As one would expect from Vonnegut: a witty, insightful and all round excellent tale.
Storm Warning by Donald A Wollheim
It takes a lot of talent to write an interesting and gripping story about weather fronts, and it also must take a curious mind to create a tale of alien invasion which concentrates on elements and gasses and concepts that our human narrator can only just stretch his mind to understand.
Definitely one worth a slow and careful re-read one day.
The Application of Discipline by Jason Andrew
On the one hand we have here a rather dry work of fiction about an ethics debate amongst academics; on the other we have a talking orang-utan, telepaths and an actual duel to the death. I’m not sure all these elements coalesce though and at the end we just have a particularly polite and well mannered surrealism – and politeness and good manners are not necessarily what you want from your surrealism.
Tom the Universe by Larry Hodges
Or ‘The Delusional Adventures of an Accidental God...’
Even though this is at its aching heart a story about eternal love and the pain of betrayal, it does feel like the aims of this particular deity – particularly when compared to the size and scope of a whole universe (or even to any nearby hill of beans) – are particularly small. Yes, revenge stories always, by law, have to end badly, but since this one takes place over billions of years you’d have thought that the protagonist would have gained a greater sense of perspective.
Wild Seed by Carmelo Rafalá
In which scientist Karlyn ano-Kerr finds herself assailed by rampant techno-babble.
Actually I’m in no position to say whether the concepts under-pinning this tale have any basis in your real science, but there is a hell of a lot of terminology – a plethora of jargon – and once you parse through it all there doesn’t seem to be much of a story at all.
Tabula Rasa by Ray Cluley
A cousin I suppose to ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ – a love story where characters, for economic reasons, choose to have their memories sold on. What I liked about this was the real economic pressures these people seemed to be under. How our narrator – an academic – is paid so little in his normal job, he’s forced to sell cherished memories of the woman he loves. The thing is once he sells them, he won’t be able to remember them anymore.
It would be a drastic decision to take, but with financial woes bearing down on you, who wouldn’t consider selling some long ago memory of an ex-lover, or some student holiday or a friendship from school? It’s an interesting question – how much of your past can you lose before you stop being you?
The Eyes of Thar by Henry Kuttner
So here we have an old fashioned hodge-podge of a yarn. Clearly the author wants to write a story of a cowboy, Native Americans and ghosts of the old west, but rather than slap his feet on Arizona soil and write that story, he’s just set the whole thing to Mars. He can’t disguise what he wants to actually write though and so it feels like a particularly ill thought out genre mash-up.
Regenesis by Cynthia Ward
The fact that this tale centres around a broadcast from Google-Fox means that any satire isn’t going to be subtle. But that’s fine. Sometimes you need a full on attack, rather than a clever discourse which is just too oblique. Fashion, genetics and religion are the targets here – although it’s too short to be anything other than scattershot.
Not Omnipotent Enough by George H. Scithers & John Gregory Betancourt
There’s a theme throughout this volume of academics becoming incredibly powerful – having fantastic mental abilities, actually becoming a god, or – as here – rising to the level of intergalactic emperor. But then I guess that science fiction is the triumph of the nerdy and bookish (and i do count myself amongst that number) over any and all obstacles.
What particularly appeals to me about this story is the way history repeating itself is used to the character’s advantage. The history professor will truly inherit the cosmos as he understands plots and machinations like few others – and certainly more than some faceless bureaucrat who just knows today.
Plato’s Bastards by James A. Stewart
A disturbing case of paranoia, but is it paranoia if they actually are out to get you? This is an all encompassing horror story, which feels like its sweat drenched and twitching with nerves in every sentence. It’s made worse by the fact that you can see much of its horror is just our reality slightly bent.
Pen Pal by Milton Lesser
What a weird, yet brilliant story. A woman seeking marriage answers a personal ad from a man with so much more experience than her – but the experience isn’t quite what she was expecting. Maybe the ending is a little pat, but the character’s journey is vividly real and you could easily apply the same story to this internet dating age.
The Arbiter by John Russell Fearn
I incline towards any story which includes a sentence beginning “Shelby Doyle, President of Earth, voted into office by common consent” – it pleases me to think that this planet’s one day democratically elected overlord will have a blandly efficient name like ‘Shelby Doyle’. Beyond that there’s not much more to this story than: Democracy + Progress = Good; Dictatorship + Inertia = Bad – but surely we know that, right?
The Grandmother-Granddaughter Conspiracy by Marissa Lingen
The nature of memory on an alien planet. Perhaps the slightest story in the whole volume, but at least it’s short.
Top Secret by David Grinnell
An amusing sketch of a tale, wherein a hapless tourist inadvertently finds something mysterious at the heart of Washington D.C. The fact that his proof comes down to a mysterious coin means it feels exactly the kind of thing which would be presented as fact by a spooky voiced man on one of those cheap UFO documentaries.
If only those shows and those witnesses had someone as entertaining as David Grinnell to write for them.
Living Under Conditions by James K. Moran
Our protagonist observes that his world is like a dream, and that’s just what this story feels like – with up being down, and 5 being both lower and higher than 12. There’s a depressing reality at the heart of this though. If we did suddenly find ourselves in a world where both gravity and time failed, some “dumb middle aged white men in suits” would try to monetise it.
Sense of Obligation by Harry Harrison
Flash Gordon couldn’t be any more the obvious touchstone here if the central character was named Dash Morgan.
A great athlete and champion of his world is recruited as an agent by a secret organisation and sent to deal with an inter-planetary conflict that could result in the destruction of two planets. At stake is nuclear Armageddon, the destruction of a peaceful utopia, as well the annihilation of a race of man which has evolved to fit in to a remarkable degree with his adopted home. You can see how much they need a hero, as the moment he arrives at his base he has to get down to some very serious admin.
There are some pacing problems here then – as the middle section of this story consists of a long and increasingly tedious march across some dessert, before the aforementioned paperwork. That detail is totally bizarre. Yes, an inter-galactic James Bond would need to read documents and fill in forms, but there’s no need for the author to actually focus on him studiously reading documents and laboriously fill in forms. Although, maybe we should be thankful that there isn’t a whole chapter devoted to the finding of new staples.
Fortunately this follows an exciting start and leads into a heart racing finish. Okay, some of the dialogue and gender politics may raise some eyebrows, but this is for the main good old fashioned, boy’s own sci-fi.
Angel’s Egg by Edgar Pangborn
The opening passages of this tale suggest a more paranoid, 1950s, reds under the bed type tale than the one we actually get. Instead it’s a pretty and dream-like story of a bookish bachelor living with an alien who he perceives as an angel. It’s pleasant enough, but lacks true tension and drama.
Youth by Isaac Asimov
Just as it seems incredibly likely to me that if an alien spaceship were to land to in Central Park, the plot of the original ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’ would play out and some over-eager American soldier would shoot the first creature to emerge; so it seems likely that if intelligent, but small creatures crash landed here, some young boys would swiftly cage them up with thoughts of making money of them. An amusing and charming tale which builds to an elegant twist, even if everyone does speak as if they’re a character in a 1950s TV show.
Anthem by Ayn Rand
So, my first ever reading of Ayn Rand and she doesn’t let me down in the strident shouting of her views. In terms of this story itself then there’s a lot for most people to agree with – man shouldn’t be totally subservient to the state; man shouldn’t have his individuality stifled; man should be free to choose who he falls in love with. Yet when we get to the final two chapters, where our hero escapes the nightmarish communist state and embraces freedom, then some of the implications are a tad troubling. It’s a case of a man escaping the pit of vipers, letting a few others also escape said pit, but ignoring anybody who might need a bit of a hand getting out.
It’s mostly well written (ok, until the preachy bits at the end), which given her literary reputation I wasn’t really expecting; and I have to say that it’s an incredibly well captured world. Having done all that hard work though, it would have been great if it hadn’t turned it into the most unsubtle political tract which is all fury and slogans.
Zora and the Land of Ethic Nomads by Mary Turzillo
The struggles of your average family on Mars, as they suddenly find themselves perched on the dusty red precipice of catastrophe. It’s a tale with great ideas, but seems curiously reluctant to develop them – instead just rounding them off neatly to make itself nothing more than a shaggy dog story.
Mary Turzillo – an author I’ve never read before – seems to have written a great many stories about Mars, and I wonder if this will work better in the context of her other work. On its own however, it’s distinctly lacking.
Evocative title though.
Food for Friendship by E.C. Tubb
In the future man will travel to far off worlds where he will undoubtedly learn to hate them and then have his hunger to get away exploited by unscrupulous bosses.
Here we have two down and outs who love nothing better than to bitch and whine about their circumstances. All the way through you just know their ending is going to be a kick in the belly.
The Life Work of Professor Muntz by Murray Leinster
It’s definitely an amusing idea to make the protagonist of a tale about overlapping parallel universes be a not too bright delivery man who is totally oblivious of what’s happening to him. And I suppose it’s witty to cast this story as almost academic report into the incident. Yet the tale itself never goes anywhere further than those (admittedly good) two ideas. Clever, but insubstantial and unaffecting.
Tiny and the Monster by Theodore Sturgeon
This breezy tale of a super powered dog, the couple he can communicate with and their wise cracking chaperone seems like some long lost Disney live action movie. (I’m liking Mary Tyler-Moore and Dean Jones for the casting!) It has a certain charm to it though,
Beyond Lies the Wub by Philip K. Dick
A story about conquest, colonisation and just desserts (as well as, I suppose, just main course). I’ve read a few Philip K. Dick novels and so this was more straightforward than I was expecting – but without a doubt entertaining and pointed.
Pictures Don’t Lie by Katherine MacLean
It’s a great idea to have humans and an alien race communicate with each other through the transmission of television dramas. As the way most of us encounter extraterrestrial is through television and movies (and okay, stories like this) – why shouldn’t we use these same broadcast dramas to actually communicate with aliens? This is proper old fashioned science fiction – spaceships and cutting edge research, alongside cathode ray TVs, smoking in laboratories and actual paper newspapers – and it’s a lot of fun with a hell of an ending.
The Big Trip Up Yonder by Kurt Vonnegut jr
That’s the problem with the one day invention of anti-aging, anti-death drugs – everybody will end up with unwieldy families. There will be no space at home, no space to move to and even 103 year old men will end up being hassled by their grandfathers.
As one would expect from Vonnegut: a witty, insightful and all round excellent tale.
Storm Warning by Donald A Wollheim
It takes a lot of talent to write an interesting and gripping story about weather fronts, and it also must take a curious mind to create a tale of alien invasion which concentrates on elements and gasses and concepts that our human narrator can only just stretch his mind to understand.
Definitely one worth a slow and careful re-read one day.
The Application of Discipline by Jason Andrew
On the one hand we have here a rather dry work of fiction about an ethics debate amongst academics; on the other we have a talking orang-utan, telepaths and an actual duel to the death. I’m not sure all these elements coalesce though and at the end we just have a particularly polite and well mannered surrealism – and politeness and good manners are not necessarily what you want from your surrealism.
Tom the Universe by Larry Hodges
Or ‘The Delusional Adventures of an Accidental God...’
Even though this is at its aching heart a story about eternal love and the pain of betrayal, it does feel like the aims of this particular deity – particularly when compared to the size and scope of a whole universe (or even to any nearby hill of beans) – are particularly small. Yes, revenge stories always, by law, have to end badly, but since this one takes place over billions of years you’d have thought that the protagonist would have gained a greater sense of perspective.
Wild Seed by Carmelo Rafalá
In which scientist Karlyn ano-Kerr finds herself assailed by rampant techno-babble.
Actually I’m in no position to say whether the concepts under-pinning this tale have any basis in your real science, but there is a hell of a lot of terminology – a plethora of jargon – and once you parse through it all there doesn’t seem to be much of a story at all.
Tabula Rasa by Ray Cluley
A cousin I suppose to ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ – a love story where characters, for economic reasons, choose to have their memories sold on. What I liked about this was the real economic pressures these people seemed to be under. How our narrator – an academic – is paid so little in his normal job, he’s forced to sell cherished memories of the woman he loves. The thing is once he sells them, he won’t be able to remember them anymore.
It would be a drastic decision to take, but with financial woes bearing down on you, who wouldn’t consider selling some long ago memory of an ex-lover, or some student holiday or a friendship from school? It’s an interesting question – how much of your past can you lose before you stop being you?
The Eyes of Thar by Henry Kuttner
So here we have an old fashioned hodge-podge of a yarn. Clearly the author wants to write a story of a cowboy, Native Americans and ghosts of the old west, but rather than slap his feet on Arizona soil and write that story, he’s just set the whole thing to Mars. He can’t disguise what he wants to actually write though and so it feels like a particularly ill thought out genre mash-up.
Regenesis by Cynthia Ward
The fact that this tale centres around a broadcast from Google-Fox means that any satire isn’t going to be subtle. But that’s fine. Sometimes you need a full on attack, rather than a clever discourse which is just too oblique. Fashion, genetics and religion are the targets here – although it’s too short to be anything other than scattershot.
Not Omnipotent Enough by George H. Scithers & John Gregory Betancourt
There’s a theme throughout this volume of academics becoming incredibly powerful – having fantastic mental abilities, actually becoming a god, or – as here – rising to the level of intergalactic emperor. But then I guess that science fiction is the triumph of the nerdy and bookish (and i do count myself amongst that number) over any and all obstacles.
What particularly appeals to me about this story is the way history repeating itself is used to the character’s advantage. The history professor will truly inherit the cosmos as he understands plots and machinations like few others – and certainly more than some faceless bureaucrat who just knows today.
Plato’s Bastards by James A. Stewart
A disturbing case of paranoia, but is it paranoia if they actually are out to get you? This is an all encompassing horror story, which feels like its sweat drenched and twitching with nerves in every sentence. It’s made worse by the fact that you can see much of its horror is just our reality slightly bent.
Pen Pal by Milton Lesser
What a weird, yet brilliant story. A woman seeking marriage answers a personal ad from a man with so much more experience than her – but the experience isn’t quite what she was expecting. Maybe the ending is a little pat, but the character’s journey is vividly real and you could easily apply the same story to this internet dating age.
The Arbiter by John Russell Fearn
I incline towards any story which includes a sentence beginning “Shelby Doyle, President of Earth, voted into office by common consent” – it pleases me to think that this planet’s one day democratically elected overlord will have a blandly efficient name like ‘Shelby Doyle’. Beyond that there’s not much more to this story than: Democracy + Progress = Good; Dictatorship + Inertia = Bad – but surely we know that, right?
The Grandmother-Granddaughter Conspiracy by Marissa Lingen
The nature of memory on an alien planet. Perhaps the slightest story in the whole volume, but at least it’s short.
Top Secret by David Grinnell
An amusing sketch of a tale, wherein a hapless tourist inadvertently finds something mysterious at the heart of Washington D.C. The fact that his proof comes down to a mysterious coin means it feels exactly the kind of thing which would be presented as fact by a spooky voiced man on one of those cheap UFO documentaries.
If only those shows and those witnesses had someone as entertaining as David Grinnell to write for them.
Living Under Conditions by James K. Moran
Our protagonist observes that his world is like a dream, and that’s just what this story feels like – with up being down, and 5 being both lower and higher than 12. There’s a depressing reality at the heart of this though. If we did suddenly find ourselves in a world where both gravity and time failed, some “dumb middle aged white men in suits” would try to monetise it.
Sense of Obligation by Harry Harrison
Flash Gordon couldn’t be any more the obvious touchstone here if the central character was named Dash Morgan.
A great athlete and champion of his world is recruited as an agent by a secret organisation and sent to deal with an inter-planetary conflict that could result in the destruction of two planets. At stake is nuclear Armageddon, the destruction of a peaceful utopia, as well the annihilation of a race of man which has evolved to fit in to a remarkable degree with his adopted home. You can see how much they need a hero, as the moment he arrives at his base he has to get down to some very serious admin.
There are some pacing problems here then – as the middle section of this story consists of a long and increasingly tedious march across some dessert, before the aforementioned paperwork. That detail is totally bizarre. Yes, an inter-galactic James Bond would need to read documents and fill in forms, but there’s no need for the author to actually focus on him studiously reading documents and laboriously fill in forms. Although, maybe we should be thankful that there isn’t a whole chapter devoted to the finding of new staples.
Fortunately this follows an exciting start and leads into a heart racing finish. Okay, some of the dialogue and gender politics may raise some eyebrows, but this is for the main good old fashioned, boy’s own sci-fi.
Angel’s Egg by Edgar Pangborn
The opening passages of this tale suggest a more paranoid, 1950s, reds under the bed type tale than the one we actually get. Instead it’s a pretty and dream-like story of a bookish bachelor living with an alien who he perceives as an angel. It’s pleasant enough, but lacks true tension and drama.
Youth by Isaac Asimov
Just as it seems incredibly likely to me that if an alien spaceship were to land to in Central Park, the plot of the original ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’ would play out and some over-eager American soldier would shoot the first creature to emerge; so it seems likely that if intelligent, but small creatures crash landed here, some young boys would swiftly cage them up with thoughts of making money of them. An amusing and charming tale which builds to an elegant twist, even if everyone does speak as if they’re a character in a 1950s TV show.
Anthem by Ayn Rand
So, my first ever reading of Ayn Rand and she doesn’t let me down in the strident shouting of her views. In terms of this story itself then there’s a lot for most people to agree with – man shouldn’t be totally subservient to the state; man shouldn’t have his individuality stifled; man should be free to choose who he falls in love with. Yet when we get to the final two chapters, where our hero escapes the nightmarish communist state and embraces freedom, then some of the implications are a tad troubling. It’s a case of a man escaping the pit of vipers, letting a few others also escape said pit, but ignoring anybody who might need a bit of a hand getting out.
It’s mostly well written (ok, until the preachy bits at the end), which given her literary reputation I wasn’t really expecting; and I have to say that it’s an incredibly well captured world. Having done all that hard work though, it would have been great if it hadn’t turned it into the most unsubtle political tract which is all fury and slogans.
March 27, 2017
Interesting mix of sci-fi tales, some better than others. Honestly, I'm not a big sci-fi fan but figured I'd give this a try and it worked out pretty well for me in the short story format. Wildside Press Megapacks have to be the best bargain available, and anyone interested in them might want to check out the Goodreads group Wildside Press, a list of them is available there.
3-1/2 stars.
3-1/2 stars.
March 3, 2018
Overall fairly awful.
September 21, 2018
Well, well, well - I found this collection of short stories a pleasant read. Good bang for your bucks. All stories were "consumable", most of them entertaining. I was not a big fan of the angel story, though it was written well.
I was a bit afraid of the Ayn Rand story, because I personally disgust her philosophy and think she was a really unpleasant person. That's probably because me and the people who like her (like the american (neo) conservatives) are fundamentally incompatible. However, though her story was highly formulaic and predictable (because of her philosophy), it wasn't as bad as I thought.
So, overall I would actually recommend this sci-fi short story collection (there's one longer story in it as well).
I was a bit afraid of the Ayn Rand story, because I personally disgust her philosophy and think she was a really unpleasant person. That's probably because me and the people who like her (like the american (neo) conservatives) are fundamentally incompatible. However, though her story was highly formulaic and predictable (because of her philosophy), it wasn't as bad as I thought.
So, overall I would actually recommend this sci-fi short story collection (there's one longer story in it as well).
October 31, 2012
This is a mixed bag, some great stories, and some I didn't enjoy, but being short stories you never get bogged down in a dull one for long.
Currently reading
July 14, 2024“The Big Trip Up Yonder” by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. - This story is a satire based on the consequences of science lengthening the human life span.
"Regenesis" by Cynthia Ward - wc
"Regenesis" by Cynthia Ward - wc
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 30, 2020
Out of all of these I've read so far this was my favorites. In Sense of Obligation by Harry Harrison an Empath from a planet that experiences a long winter travels to a warm desert planet to try and stop two sister planets from wiping each other out with cobalt and nuclear bombs. The natives on the planet are living a symbiosis existence from all life on the planet and the planet itself. This read like an adventure novel and has been re-released under the title Planet of the Damned. The story Angel's Egg by Edgar Pangborn was one of the most beautifully written stories I have ever written, Just wonderful to ready. Anthem by Ayn Rand was my first introduction to her about a future society that outlaws any form of individuality. All the other stories fit in nicely there wasn't one I didn't like. I'm really enjoying these sci fi anthologies. It is introducing me to so many authors and writing style.
June 5, 2017
The Fourth Science Fiction Megapack
There were a couple of excellent stories, a few good ones, and the rest were mediocre.
But at $0.99, it's still a great deal. And really, some of you will like stories I doubt didn't, and dislike the stories I loved.
What I enjoy most is rereading stories that I read and enjoyed from my youth, though finding new authors and stories to enjoy is great fun too.
Results: a good deal and some good stories. There were some issues with formatting, and proofing also. This was mentioned in the book's description, and it was definitely noticeable, so if that is a big problem for you, you may want to skip this particular edition.
There were a couple of excellent stories, a few good ones, and the rest were mediocre.
But at $0.99, it's still a great deal. And really, some of you will like stories I doubt didn't, and dislike the stories I loved.
What I enjoy most is rereading stories that I read and enjoyed from my youth, though finding new authors and stories to enjoy is great fun too.
Results: a good deal and some good stories. There were some issues with formatting, and proofing also. This was mentioned in the book's description, and it was definitely noticeable, so if that is a big problem for you, you may want to skip this particular edition.
April 3, 2018
A very mixed bag. Some oldies that kinda showed their age, some oldies that were quite thought provoking, a bunch of middle-aged fine but unremarkable stories. I enjoyed the Harry Harrison novella quite a lot (made me want to go back to the Stainless Steel Rat), while also cringing at the sexism. And then there was the Ayn Rand story which uuugggghhhhhh and blecccchhhhh.
May 2, 2019
Good selection
The usual range of stories, some good, some less so. Overall an enjoyable read, though two of the contemporary stories left an experienced sf reader wondering what they were all about!
The usual range of stories, some good, some less so. Overall an enjoyable read, though two of the contemporary stories left an experienced sf reader wondering what they were all about!
October 18, 2020
This was a good mix of stories, some really good, some just meh, but it was just nice getting to read many different kinds of stories from different kinds of people. All in all I'm ysquite happy that I read it.
October 22, 2020
So-so mixed bag. Some stories OK and a few pretty good. But none great. But nice to get a sci-fi fix with shorter stories. Sense of Obligation by Harry Harrison really started to drag. The worst was Ayn Rand. Ayn is definitely not a sci-fi writer.
December 10, 2020
Good Mixture
This volume has a good mixture of established names in the science fiction genre along with some relative newcomers. There's a little bit everything from pulp sf to more thoughtful pieces. Whatever your taste there's probably be a story you will like here.
This volume has a good mixture of established names in the science fiction genre along with some relative newcomers. There's a little bit everything from pulp sf to more thoughtful pieces. Whatever your taste there's probably be a story you will like here.
December 21, 2020
Another good collection.
As always, a good collection of public domain science fiction. And (again) yes, these are all available for free but I'll pay 99 cents for the editing and curation.
As always, a good collection of public domain science fiction. And (again) yes, these are all available for free but I'll pay 99 cents for the editing and curation.
May 18, 2017
As with most anthologies there is a mx of mediocre stories with the occasional very worthwhile piece. The trouble is you have to work your way through everything to find those gems.
August 23, 2017
5 out of 25 stories were decent. The other 20 were a waste of my time.
November 17, 2017
Great collection.
Excellent group of stories both old and newer, including an Ayn Rand that was the best of her's I have read (partially because it was the shortest).
Excellent group of stories both old and newer, including an Ayn Rand that was the best of her's I have read (partially because it was the shortest).
April 2, 2018
An anthology of fine stories!
Stories old and new, at least to me, one or two I have read before others were new to me, I enjoyed them all!
Stories old and new, at least to me, one or two I have read before others were new to me, I enjoyed them all!
January 1, 2019
Middle of the road collection.
January 31, 2019
Collection of SF stories. Old ones, and newer ones. I gave up about half-way through. I only liked the one by Katherine MacLean and by Kurt Vonnegut.
November 4, 2022
Some hit and misses not a bad collection of stories .
March 1, 2017
Mixed bag. Good variation of themes
The stories are very different. Some of the sci fi themes, I encountered for the very first time.
On the other hand, since this is an anthology, and some authors are obviously better than others, at times, I found myself having to push myself through pages. I have to note, however, that even in these cases, the overarching narratives were interesting enough that I didn't want to skip them altogether
The stories are very different. Some of the sci fi themes, I encountered for the very first time.
On the other hand, since this is an anthology, and some authors are obviously better than others, at times, I found myself having to push myself through pages. I have to note, however, that even in these cases, the overarching narratives were interesting enough that I didn't want to skip them altogether
July 23, 2014
A collection of sf stories by legends and rising stars, including two of the greatest, Asimov and Philip K Dick.
The general theme of the stories seem to be first contact with alien races, but if you are expecting something in the vain of Spielberg's Close Encounters, than think again. Each of the stories takes its own approach to the concept, often portraying humans as the advanced alien race, or as a space-fairing race coming into contact with new species and entities, like in Beyond Lies the Wub, by Philip K Dick, where the humans barter for a large porcine creatures with the locals but get more than they bargain for. There are other tales too, such as The Life Work of Professor Muntz by Murray Leinster, which is a time travel story and The Big Trip Up Yonder by Kurt Vonnegut Jr., a cautionary tale about the dangers (or the lack of them) of the fountain of youth.
The Megapacks are generally some of the best sf stories curated by some of the biggest names in Sf and will definitely entertain, amuse and challenge the stereotypes of sf.
The general theme of the stories seem to be first contact with alien races, but if you are expecting something in the vain of Spielberg's Close Encounters, than think again. Each of the stories takes its own approach to the concept, often portraying humans as the advanced alien race, or as a space-fairing race coming into contact with new species and entities, like in Beyond Lies the Wub, by Philip K Dick, where the humans barter for a large porcine creatures with the locals but get more than they bargain for. There are other tales too, such as The Life Work of Professor Muntz by Murray Leinster, which is a time travel story and The Big Trip Up Yonder by Kurt Vonnegut Jr., a cautionary tale about the dangers (or the lack of them) of the fountain of youth.
The Megapacks are generally some of the best sf stories curated by some of the biggest names in Sf and will definitely entertain, amuse and challenge the stereotypes of sf.
January 7, 2016
Some of the stories in this collection were ones I've read before over the years while others were brand new to me. Some were clunkers while others were fantastic. I don't plan to review each story but will say that Angel's Egg by Edgar Pangborn was superb! Youth by Isaac Asimov had a twist at the end I didn't expect. Tiny and the Monster by Theodore Sturgeon was a cute little story. Most of the others were readable and some were enjoyable. A number were really pretty dated.
All in all it was a pretty decent collection. Especially for the price.
All in all it was a pretty decent collection. Especially for the price.
June 27, 2013
There are some solid short stories in this collection and I'd recommend it to those into classic sci-fi. As you'd expect, some are better than others and despite a couple stinkers, there are gems to be found here. Two of my favorites were Issac Asimov's "Youth" and E.C. Tubbs "Food for Friendship". The latter was really short and I found myself wanting it to be much longer! At the prices these e-books go for, they're definitely worth checking out.
September 13, 2012
I have already reviewed the the first three of these sexy compendiums, so not much new to say. Again, these stories are skewing newer, so becoming more my speed. Like the last Megapack, some good stuff, some great stuff, some okay stuff. My favorite in this bunch is Food For Friendship. Reminded me of a twilight zone episode. If you liked the others, you'd dig this for sure.
January 28, 2014
Good mix of stories
overall enjoyable collection of stories, many of them not feeling dated. this was my first reading of this series, look forward to the other books in the collection
overall enjoyable collection of stories, many of them not feeling dated. this was my first reading of this series, look forward to the other books in the collection
October 16, 2014
Absolutely fantastic collection of short stories! Seriously, if you're working and just don't dare pick up a novel,in case it keeps you up all night, check this iut. My fave is the Kurt Vonnegut story.
May 6, 2015
As anthologies can be, this was a very mixed bag. The quality of the stories varied considerably. There were a few good ones, but overall, I wasn't too impressed. The description says it is a combination of classic and modern sci-fi, but it seemed to be almost all older material.
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