Oleksandr’s Comments (group member since Feb 02, 2025)

Oleksandr’s comments from the Science Fiction: The Short Stuff group.

Astounding is present (scanned versions) at Archive.org

I read "Lemuria 7 Is Missing," and enjoyed it enough to have it among my 2024 Hugo nominees. Yet to read the sequel

I use their digital version ($36 per year). First I used Magzter for it was even cheaper with a discount (like $25!), but they don't give files, only reading in their app, which isn't compatible with my e-ink reader

Dan wrote: "It does seem to me that one person's weight causing there to be insufficient fuel is a highly dubious proposition scientifically. "

Definitely, the pilot should make every one of his moves perfect, all in a single run, w/o multiple approaches - and this is on a totally new route for him

As for offshots of this story, I liked the version where both people on the ship amputated their legs to lower total mass

I guess that this is an SF story which have received the largest number of stories-responses, including a piece from a fan writer nominated for Hugo a few (three?) years ago. The second place I guess, goes to Le Guin's Omelas, but for quite a different reason.

Thanks and you are welcome. I also often have too many books/magazines to read and can get stuck if it doesn't capture me but I still plan to end it

I finished that summer 2024 issue, my review https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I finally got to my summer 2024 edition and read all the pieces reviewed here by Dan. I agree that the first story is possibly the strongest and the fourth is the weakest. However, 3rd story, Mr Yellow was also quite weak and it seems to mix two meanings for dimensions - as [1] parallel universes and [2] maximum number of independent directions within a mathematical space

Dan wrote: "I only recognize one of those names! I started to read something of Beagle's once that had to do with a unicorn. I may not be as up on current science fiction as I ought to be.
."

Yes, Beagle is 80+ years old and still kicking! His The Last Unicorn is from 1968!

The rest of the names I haven't met while reading novels, but as I started reading more short SFF, they are 'regulars' in the SFF magazines

Dan wrote: "Charles de Lint still writes the book review column, which is pretty interesting so far. I've not finished it. His is the only name I recognize in the issue."

In 2023 there were quite a few more widely recognized authors, like T.R. Napper, Peter S. Beagle, Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki

I've re-read it last year and yes, the concept was interesting even if I like his other stories like Waveries more

I've finished it on audio (search YouTube if interested) and I recalled the idea but not the story or there is another Asimov's story with that idea

Subscription to e-version seems to work https://weightlessbooks.com/the-magaz...

I've read it last year and it was fine but not great, the idea is solid, but the execution is a bit wooden

I'm subscribed to the magazine in its electronic form via weightless books and the last two (winter and summer 2024) weren't very strong. My subscription lets me hope for 4 more...

Dan wrote: "Despite not speaking Russian, Asimov had a fond appreciation for Soviet science fiction and compiled anthologies of Soviet science fiction in the early 1960s."

He was also fond of older SF and compiled the whole series from 1939 to 1962 of Great SF Stories, like this one Isaac Asimov Presents the Great SF Stories 1: 1939, and this series is way larger than all Soviet SF anthologies compiled by all editors in English, like Path into the Unknown: The Best of Soviet SF, so he was much more fond of older USA (plus sometimes UK) SF by this measure.

As for the city of Smolensk in 2010, the composition was notably different in 1920 of the region. Petrovichi, as can be seen on Google Maps https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pet... are way closer to the Belarussian border than to Smolensk. Moreover, as you can read in wiki https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/... it was a shtetl with population was half Jewish, half Belarusian.

There are both Russian and Ukrainian genre short stories, but most of them are not translated. Among some in recent translations, there was an interesting piece in Asimov's Science Fiction, May/June 2024 which is available for free on the translator's website https://alexshvartsman.com/2024/12/03...

I don't think that Asimov, who IIRC left at age of two is in any way Russia-related, from his 'southern USA' image (sideburns, bow tie) to the fact that 99% of so-called Russian Jews are just a consequence of the conquest of the Poland-Lithuanian Commonwealth and its division between three empires. His birthplace was as well on the territories annexed by the Russian Empire. Before the division of Poland no Jews were allowed not only to live in the empire but even visit it

Hi, I'm Oleksandr and I'm an addict (addicted to reading, both fiction and non-fic).

It is hard to pinpoint the first SFF book that 'wow'-ed me. It most likely will be a Soviet version of Dorothy of Oz, starting with Чарівник Смарагдового міста, which was when I was around 7 years old. About 10 I've read The War of the Worlds and stories by Ray Bradbury, about 11 - The Caves of Steel...

I'm in Kyiv, Ukraine. Why? Because I was born here (more precisely in the USSR)

Time travel - I'd like to know more on the state of the future (is there still a biological life?) and whether I will be the same (with age, sex, illnesses, etc.) and where in the world I'd end up? If only the info you supplied in the 1st msg is given then future (even if this means death) for I have health issues that weren't researched in 1775