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Aliens 4
Killdozer! (1944) Cactus Dance (1954) The Comedian's Children (1958) The Widget, The Wadget, and Boff (1955)
223 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1944
57 people want to read
About the author
Theodore Sturgeon
723 books770 followersTheodore Sturgeon (1918–1985) is considered one of the godfathers of contemporary science fiction and dark fantasy. The author of numerous acclaimed short stories and novels, among them the classics More Than Human, Venus Plus X, and To Marry Medusa, Sturgeon also wrote for television and holds among his credits two episodes of the original 1960s Star Trek series, for which he created the Vulcan mating ritual and the expression "Live long and prosper." He is also credited as the inspiration for Kurt Vonnegut's recurring fictional character Kilgore Trout.
Sturgeon is the recipient of the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the International Fantasy Award. In 2000, he was posthumously honored with a World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement.
Sturgeon is the recipient of the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the International Fantasy Award. In 2000, he was posthumously honored with a World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
September 23, 2024
Aliens 4 is a collection of two novellas and two novelettes. Killdozer! is one of my all-time favorite stories; it was first published in Campbell's Astounding magazine in 1944 and is a WWII-era tale about a haunted bulldozer. Cactus Dance is a good Western story with a fantasy slant from a 1954 issue of an unlikely magazine called Luke Short's Western. The Comedian's Children, from the May 1958 issue of Venture SF Magazine, is an excellent social satire, though it may be the most dated of the lot. The final story is one of Sturgeon's best-known ones, a novella from the November 1955 issue of F & SF called The (Widget), The (Wadget), and Boff; it's the most typically Sturgeon of the group, dealing with interstellar invasion and the typical human characters from an apartment building who have to deal with it. They're all four gems. I'll cheat by quoting the inimitable Groff Conklin's cover blurb: "You don't read Sturgeon's stories; they happen to you!"
November 19, 2019
CONTENTS
"Killdozer!"
"Cactus Dance"
"The Comedian's Children"
"The [Widget], the [Wadget], and Boff"
I'm going to cobble together comments about these four stories from earlier reviews of mine of other collections in which they appeared. Some of these are slightly emended:
"Killdozer!" is a kind of horror story mixed with an adventure story. During World War II, an American construction crew is working on an otherwise uninhabited island. They release a malevolent consciousness that takes over a bulldozer and tries to kill them all.
"Cactus Dance" is a fantasy Western. The narrator has traveled thousands of miles to track down Fortley Grantham, his former colleague who holds "the Pudley Chair in Botany" at the Institute in which they work. Grantham has been out West for a long time; if he had died or if he was not going to return to work for some other reason, the narrator wants to become the holder of the Pudley Chair. But Grantham has found out something extraordinary concerning the yucca cactus and he doesn't want to leave.
In the story notes at the back of the Sturgeon collection The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon, Volume X: The Man Who Lost the Sea, Paul Williams quotes something he had written elsewhere: "'The Comedian's Children,' about a manipulative TV personality, was another impossible triumph - that story tore me into little pieces when I was twelve years old, and it remains one of the most powerful pieces of fiction I've ever read."
I am not sure when I first read this story, but I believe that I was also around twelve. I don't think that I felt torn into pieces but I know that I loved it and, as Williams did, I retain my great respect for the it.
"The Comedian's Children" tells of a new illness, affecting children only, that has arisen in the year 2034, seemingly brought to Earth by a ship returning from Iapetus, a satellite of Saturn. The "comedian" in the title is a man named Heri Gonza, who has become the face of the fight against the illness, leading fund-raising, information-gathering, research, and the housing and care of the afflicted children. He has become one of the most revered figures in the world.
In opposition to Gonza, there is Dr. George Horowitz, working independently on a cure for the disease, who because of his refusal to work with Gonza, has become one of the most reviled figures in the world. Dr. Horowitz does not trust Gonza. He believes that Gonza is exploiting the children for self-aggrandizement; he suspects that if a cure is found by people working for the medical foundation established by Gonza, Gonza might conceal it.
Unfortunately, there Sturgeon's logic breaks down. There is no basis shown for Horowitz's distrust of Gonza. When I was twelve, this did not bother me; now it does. The reader must accept that Horowitz is sane and that his response to Gonza makes some sense; equally, the reader should not automatically assume that Gonza is evil.
There are wonderful details in the story. The introduction to the last of Gonza's broadcasts, for example, is close to perfect. The ending of that broadcast is perfect.
One thing that Sturgeon never mentions is the reason that the world is so willing to hate Horowitz. There is not a word in the story about religion, but I think that the likelihood is that Dr. Horowitz is intended to be Jewish, and that Sturgeon assumed that the antisemitism would need no further commentary.
"The [Widget], the [Wadget], and Boff" is set mostly in a boarding house with a varied group of tenants: "a young, widowed night-club hostess and her three-year-old son; a very good vocational guidance expert; a young law clerk; the librarian from the high school; and a stage-struck maiden from a very small small town." The owners of the boarding house are Sam and Bitty Bittleman, who share a peculiar habit; they ask questions - but never give answers. And there are aliens involved.
Four superlative stories, making up an excellent collection.
"Killdozer!"
"Cactus Dance"
"The Comedian's Children"
"The [Widget], the [Wadget], and Boff"
I'm going to cobble together comments about these four stories from earlier reviews of mine of other collections in which they appeared. Some of these are slightly emended:
"Killdozer!" is a kind of horror story mixed with an adventure story. During World War II, an American construction crew is working on an otherwise uninhabited island. They release a malevolent consciousness that takes over a bulldozer and tries to kill them all.
"Cactus Dance" is a fantasy Western. The narrator has traveled thousands of miles to track down Fortley Grantham, his former colleague who holds "the Pudley Chair in Botany" at the Institute in which they work. Grantham has been out West for a long time; if he had died or if he was not going to return to work for some other reason, the narrator wants to become the holder of the Pudley Chair. But Grantham has found out something extraordinary concerning the yucca cactus and he doesn't want to leave.
In the story notes at the back of the Sturgeon collection The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon, Volume X: The Man Who Lost the Sea, Paul Williams quotes something he had written elsewhere: "'The Comedian's Children,' about a manipulative TV personality, was another impossible triumph - that story tore me into little pieces when I was twelve years old, and it remains one of the most powerful pieces of fiction I've ever read."
I am not sure when I first read this story, but I believe that I was also around twelve. I don't think that I felt torn into pieces but I know that I loved it and, as Williams did, I retain my great respect for the it.
"The Comedian's Children" tells of a new illness, affecting children only, that has arisen in the year 2034, seemingly brought to Earth by a ship returning from Iapetus, a satellite of Saturn. The "comedian" in the title is a man named Heri Gonza, who has become the face of the fight against the illness, leading fund-raising, information-gathering, research, and the housing and care of the afflicted children. He has become one of the most revered figures in the world.
In opposition to Gonza, there is Dr. George Horowitz, working independently on a cure for the disease, who because of his refusal to work with Gonza, has become one of the most reviled figures in the world. Dr. Horowitz does not trust Gonza. He believes that Gonza is exploiting the children for self-aggrandizement; he suspects that if a cure is found by people working for the medical foundation established by Gonza, Gonza might conceal it.
Unfortunately, there Sturgeon's logic breaks down. There is no basis shown for Horowitz's distrust of Gonza. When I was twelve, this did not bother me; now it does. The reader must accept that Horowitz is sane and that his response to Gonza makes some sense; equally, the reader should not automatically assume that Gonza is evil.
There are wonderful details in the story. The introduction to the last of Gonza's broadcasts, for example, is close to perfect. The ending of that broadcast is perfect.
One thing that Sturgeon never mentions is the reason that the world is so willing to hate Horowitz. There is not a word in the story about religion, but I think that the likelihood is that Dr. Horowitz is intended to be Jewish, and that Sturgeon assumed that the antisemitism would need no further commentary.
"The [Widget], the [Wadget], and Boff" is set mostly in a boarding house with a varied group of tenants: "a young, widowed night-club hostess and her three-year-old son; a very good vocational guidance expert; a young law clerk; the librarian from the high school; and a stage-struck maiden from a very small small town." The owners of the boarding house are Sam and Bitty Bittleman, who share a peculiar habit; they ask questions - but never give answers. And there are aliens involved.
Four superlative stories, making up an excellent collection.
December 26, 2019
The four short novels in this book are quite different in theme and tone. "Killdozer" is straightforward adventure/suspense. The heavy equipment jargon in places detracted more than it added, and I felt that the theme took a U-turn halfway through as people shifted blame for the problems, but the action worked well. "Cactus Dance" is more a surrealist description of a few characters; the story itself was minor. "The Comedian's Children" (my favorite of the lot) is a medical mystery which becomes a conspiracy when a popular comedian involves himself. Except for the comedian himself, its characters are not as compelling as those of the other stories, but the plot more than makes up for that. "The (Widget), The (Wadget), and Boff" shows five people dealing with problems in their lives, under slight alien influence. This is mainly a character study, at which it excels, but it sometimes gets overly wordy about its other themes.
May 27, 2020
Sturgeon is one of the more unique grand masters of science fiction. Most often, one would not mistake a Sturgeon story as being written by anyone else. For that reason, I was a bit suprised (and disappointed) in the first story--"Killdozer"--which, while it has garnered a lot of praise, seemed to me like it was written by someone (almost anyone) else. It reminded me of Spielberg's early film, "Duel," though in this case it is a bulldozer on the attack rather than a semi. Characters were not up to Sturgeon standards, but mostly stereotypical and flat. That said, the collection picked up after that and I enjoyed "Cactus Dance," "Comedian's Children" (watch out, Jerry Lewis!), and The (Widget), the (Wadget) and Boff, all quirky and just the right amount of corny and concentrated more on human nature (and how alien it can seem) rather than alien creations. So fun to take a nostalgic trip into one of my early favorites when I first started reading science fiction.
June 30, 2020
I only read the Killdozer story in this and it's a blast. So cheesy and it tries to take itself seriously too. I watched the 1974 movie after reading this as well and it's just as cheesy. It's a bulldozer that travels a max speed of under 10mph. You can jog faster than that!!!
September 14, 2022
If "The Martian" by Andy Weir is science porn, then "Killdozer" is heavy duty mechanic porn.
October 14, 2016
This book consists of four sci-fi or fantasy novellas. The first is a tale of an alien intelligence taking possession of a Caterpillar D7 bulldozer and trying to murder a construction crew of eight workers. The bulldozer kills five and drives one insane before the remaining two overcome it; the climax is a battle between the alien-controlled bulldozer and a human-controlled excavator. I didn't think that anyone over the age of six can enjoy a story about construction machinery so much, but apparently it is possible. The second is a Western story with a mystical tinge: in Arizona in 1912, a Hispanic girl reincarnated as a mutant yucca plant directs moths towards peyote cacti in exchange for dolls. The third is an obvious takedown of Jerry Lewis and his muscular dystrophy telethons. The fourth is about alien anthropologists studying how humans deal with cognitive dissonance.
October 3, 2010
I'm writing this for one story, "Comedians' Children," which I think I actually read in some other collection. It concerns (OK, exploits) the idea of TV personalities doing telethons for diseases. Does this make you think of ... Jerry Lewis? Does it? Does it? Well, it damned well should. Because Sturgeon destroys the idea in one of the most insidious and on-the-mark devastations ever. Good for him. And good for the readers, because beyond whatever he had in mind, it's a superlative story.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews