Algis Budrys A Scraping at the Bones
Lisa Tuttle Changelings
Thomas M Disch The Santa Clause Compromise
Barry N Malzberg A Galaxy Called Rome
Peter Redgrove A Twelvemonth
Richard Cowper The Custodians
Stephen Robinett The Linguist
M John Harrison Settling the World
John Updike The Chaste Planet
Joe Haldeman End Game
Louis Phillips The Lop Eared Cat That Devoured Philadelpia
Michael Moorcock A Dead Singer

Philip Jose Farmer. After King Kong fell.
Originally in : Omega

The King Kong story as fact rather than fiction.

Sydney J. van Scyoc. When Petals Fall.
Originally in : Two views of wonder.

The very elderly are clinging on to life in the hope of achieving immortality, and the younger generation are demanding their turn.

Robert R. Olsen. Paleontology: an experimental science.
Originally in : Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact

A Tyrannosaurus Rex is recreated from DNA found in fossils (Jurassic Park but tongue in cheek), with disastrous results.

James Tiptree Jr. The Women men Don’t See.
Originally in : Fantasy and Science Fiction

A small plane crashes in a mangrove swamp, leaving the pilot, the protaganist, and two women, to survive. The women achieve a survival beyond that of the two men.

Thomas Baum. Lost and Found.
Originally in : Playboy

Pulitzer-winning dramatist Sidney Wise has a brief encounter with an alternate reality in which his wife and son are the achievers, and not he.

Alfred Bester. The Four-Hour Fugue.
Originally in : Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact

Blaise Skiaki’s nose for scent leads him into potentially fatal trouble.

Kate Wilhelm. The Scream.
Originally in : Orbit 13

Post-holocaust/eco-disaster scenario (Ballardian) in Florida.

Angela Carter. The Executioner’s Beautiful Daughter.
Originally in : Fireworks

Dark Dark Ages.

Kit Reed. Songs of war.
Originally in : Nova 4

The Women’s Liberation Movement takes on a more militaristic attitude leading to armed revolt.

Craig Strete. Time Deer.
Originally in : Red Planet Earth Worlds of If

Native American oldster.

Doris Piserchia. A Typical Day.
Originally in : Galaxy

Ian Watson. Programmed Love Story.
Originally in : Transatlantic Review

Once upon a time in the Year 2000.

William Harrison. Roller Ball Murder.
Originally in : Esquire

The book that led to the film.

Kingsley Amis. Mason’s Life.
Originally in : Sunday Times

The very short life of George Herbert Mason, a figment of a Daniel R. Pettigrew dream.

Robert Sheckley Welcome to the Standard Nightmare.
Originally in : Nova 3.

Johnny Bezique makes first contact. On the planet Loris he achieves high status, with major implications for all back on Earth.

Brian W. Aldiss Serpent Burning on an Altar.
Originally in : Orbit 12

Romantic Fantasy – Lambant and Prian on the first day of the autumn fair.

Joe W. Haldeman We are Happy Here.
Originally in : Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact

Far Future Deep Space War (extensive description of combat tactics), with a Marine who chooses to leave the Space Fleet and finds civilian life not to his liking.

Thomas M. Disch The Birds
Originally in : The Ruins of the Earth

Post-holocaust scenario with intelligent animals.

Robert Silverberg. The Wind and the Rain.
Originally in : Saving Worlds

Reclamation teams try their best to restore a desolate Earth.

Max Beerbohm. Ten Years Ago.
Originally in : A Peep into the Past.

Not Science Fiction – description of a painting.

R.A. Lafferty. Parthen.
Originally in : Galaxy

Aliens land and inform the earth that one half of the population is redundant, and the other will be enslaved. But Roy Ronsard (and all his mates) don’t worry too much about it – never had the girls been so pretty.

Tor Age Bringsvaerd. The Man Who Collected the First of September 1973.
Originally in : Gyldenhals Magasin.

The title says it all.

Josef Nesvadba. Captain Nemo’s Last Adventure.
Originally in : View from Another Shore.

Lieutenant Feather (popularly known as Captain Nemo) makes a long space trip to save the Earth, and returns (relativity) many centuries later.

Gene Wolfe. Le Befana.
Originally in : Galaxy Magazine.

Ken W. Purdy In the Matter of the Assassn Merefirs
Brian W. Aldiss As For Our Fatal Continuity…
James E. Gunn The Old Folks
Jonathan Ela From Sea to Shining Sea
Keith Roberts Weihnachtabend
Robert F. Young The Years
Andre Carneiro Darkness
Alex Hamilton Words of Warning
Howard L. Myers Out, Wit!
Victor Sabah An Imaginary Journey to the Moon
Christopher Priest The Head and the Hand
Joe W Haldeman Hero

Robert Sheckley. Doctor Zombie and His Furry Little Friends.
Originally in : Can You Feel Anything When I Do This?

A jokey, trite title, for a spine-tingling teaser set in the back streets of Mexico City. Can mankind’s threat to other species justify the genetic experiments being undertaken to provide a challenge to our continuing threat of extinction of other species? A short tale with a big dose of the eldritch creepies.

Barry N. Malzberg. Gehenna.
Originally in : Galaxy

First Contact with Mankind’s chosen ambassador having a big choice to make – will he choose the right option. A short, mini-episodic story.

Barry N. Malzberg. Conquest.
Originally in : New Dimensions 1

Short story (very nice, but not SF and not really fantasy) which gives three different perspectives and three different outcomes of a troilistic relationship.

Arthur C. Clarke. A Meeting with Medusa.
Originally in : Playboy

Falcon, surviving an airship crash (more than surviving!) is the logical choice for a balloon-drop visit to Jupiter’s atmosphere. Lots of science stuff for the discerning Playboy reader (“I only read it for the fiction, darling!”).

Donald Barthelme. The Genius.
Originally in : The New Yorker

Contemplation (yawn!) on the nature of Genius. Pretensious silliness.

Thomas M. Disch. Angouleme.
Originally in : New Worlds 1

Little Mister Kissy Lips and his gang in NY.

Arnold M. Auerbach. If ‘Hair’ were revived in 2016.
Originally in : New York Times.

Very short, very lightweight newspaper review of the 2016 revived stage show ‘Hair’. You could give the idea to a class on their first day of Creative Writing in SF 101, and get better material.

James Blish. Statistician’s Day.
Originally in : Science Against Man

In the depths of the charming English countryside, returned to its idyllic beauty by population control, an elderly novelist is visited by a journalist. They both know that the novelist’s obituary is being written. The novelist has been studying the statistics behind the obituaries and has spotted a pattern. But just for whom does the bell toll?….

Brian W. Aldiss. The Hunter at his Ease.
Originally in : Science Against Man

Against a background of a global First World/Third World conflict, a remote island is being bulldozed to be used as a base from which Africa can be bombed. The local population are forced to submit to the rule of the developers, and the terrible price of ‘progress’ is shown, with a village elder and two young idealists paying the ultimate price, and one of the scientists a lesser, but still painful, price.

Gahan Wilson. The Science Fiction Horror Movie Pocket Computer.
Originally in : National Lampoon

A multiple-choice flowchart to assist with SF/horror movie plots.

The Cohen Dog Exclusion Act. Steven Schrader.
Originally in : Eco-fiction.

Frustration with sidewalks made perilous by dog poo leads one man to make a stand. Or a squat, to be more precise.

Richard E. Peck. Gauntlet.
Originally in : Orbit 10

Commuters have to take turns in driving underground trains through very unpleasant city centre to their safe suburbs. Fairly routine story.

Report. Kingsley Amis.
Originally in : New Statesman.

Poem. Oh dear!

Fisherman. Lawrence Sail.
Originally in : New Statesman.

More poetry. Oh dear!

The Ideal Police State. Charles Baxter.
Originally in : The Little Magazine.

Further poetry. Oh dear!

Cynthia Ozick. The Pagan Rabbi.
Originally in : The Pagan Rabbi and Other Stories.

Extremely dense Jewish SF. If you have read it, why not try the online quiz here, and if you want to get a feel for the type of story this is, check out this site or this site. If I had a week to read it, re-read it, do a lot of research into Jewish orthodoxy, history and attitudes to idolatory, then perhaps I could begin to provide a helpful review!

Steven Herbst. An Uneven Evening.
Originally in : Clarion

Peter, after bemoaning the boring nature of his life, meets up with his friends who suggest they go ‘torming’. They all seem to know what they’re talking about. He doesn’t.

B. Alan Burhoe. Ornithanthropus.
Originally in : Worlds of If.

Winged humanoids living in/on a Skyhunter.

Norman Spinrad. No Direction Home
Originally in : New Worlds 2.

A Spinradian view of the impact of the permanent use of psychedelics in the near-future. Even institutions such as the Catholic Church and the armed forces make use of psychotropic drugs, leaving people to wonder how life could have been bearable when there was only real reality.

Robin Scott WIlson, Gone Fishin’
Slawomir Mrozek, The Ugupu Birg
Robert Silverberg, Black is Beautiful
Josef Nesvadba, The Lost Face
Jerry Farber, Gorman
Naomia Mitchison, Mary and Joe
Hayden Howard, Oil-Mad Bug-Eyed Monsters
Robert Coover, A Pedestrian Accident
Thomas M. Disch, The Asian Shore
William Earls, Traffic Problem
Gleb Anfilov, Erem
Gene Wolfe, Car Sinister
Alvin Greenberg, ‘Franz Kafka’ by Jorge Luis Borges
Kris Neville and K.M. O’Donnell, Pacem Est

Anthony Burgess. The Muse.
Originally in : The Hudson Review

Paley, a 25-year old literary historian, is transported back in time and to an alternate Earth, to discover whether William Shakespeare actually wrote all the works credited to him. He discovers rather more than he expected.

Brian W. Aldiss Working in the Spaceship Yards.
Originally in : Punch

A FTL-fitter’s mate bemoans the the loss of his love, Nellie, to an android in the shipyard.

Frederik Pohl. The Schematic Man.
Originally in : Playboy

Bederkind programs himself into a powerful computer.

James Tiptree, Jr. The snows are melted, the snows are gone.
Originally in : Venture Science Fiction Magazine

Post-holocaust scenario – a female without arms, with the assistance of her wolf, trap a physically perfect, but limited-intelligence survivor.

Paul Ehrlich. Eco-catastrophe!
Originally in : Ramparts

Previews the ecological catastrophes leading to the sooner-rather-than later downfall of mankind.

P. g. Wyal The Castle on the Crag.
Originally in : Fantastic

The history of a fairy-tale castle and its progression to a nightmare conclusion centuries hence.

Ursula K. Le Guin Nine Lives
Originally in : Playboy

Two scientists on Libra Exploratory Mission Base welcome assistance from ten clones (5 female, 5 male – all cloned from the same genius).

J.G. Ballard The Killing Ground.
Originally in : New Worlds

The US is waging global war with just about everyone. Brutal scenario in pastoral England. Not SF.

Ken W. Purdy. The Dannold cheque.
Originally in : Playboy

Joseph Wesley. Womb to Tomb.
Originally in : Analog Science Fact-Science Fiction

Pilots of intergalactic fighters have to undergo extremely distressing enclosure in womb-like eggs to enable them to endure the high-G stresses of battle, resulting in deep psychological trauma when removed from the eggs.

John Hartridge. Like Father.
Originally in : New Worlds

Fingest travels back in time to fertilise a prehistoric woman, to give the human race a genetic boost.

Philip K. Dick. The Electric Ant.
Originally in : Fantasy and Science Fiction

Garson Poole wakes up after an auto-crash to find that he has lost a hand. He then finds out that he is in fact an ‘electric ant’ – an organic robot. He further finds out that what he believes is his subjective reality is in fact being fed from a micro-punched tape in his chest cavity. He explores with this tape, affecting his reality. He totally bolloxes the tape, with a major affect on his reality, and on everyone elses.

Bruce McAllister. The Man Inside.
Originally in : Galaxy

Son with schizophrenic dad.

Algis Budrys. Now Hear the Word of the Lord.
Originally in : Galaxy

Amos Onsett believes that the Earth is at risk from aliens, posing as humans. In fact Walter Kenneally is a robot sent back in time by humans who are unable to time-travel, to prevent the outbreak of WWIII.

Robert Sheckley. Budget planet.
Originally in :

Jobbing builder’s version of Genesis.

Bob Shaw. Appointment on Prila.
Originally in :

Candar, a shape-changer, attempts to duplicate one of six exploration modules that are carrying out a recon.

David I. Masson. Lost Ground.
Originally in :

Part of rural England is affected by time distortions, with a husband following his wife into the future.

J.R. Pierce. The Rime of the Ancient SF Author, Or Conventions and Recollections.
Originally in :

Poetry. Oh dear!

John D. MacDonald. The Annex.
Originally in : Playboy

Whilst his body is in intensive care, living out its final hours, Dave is elsewhere, visiting a hotel with an annexe. And more.

Isaac Asimov. Segregationist.
Originally in : Abbottempo

Patients are opting for metal organ transplants rather than organic ones, whilst the Metallos are increasingly opting for organic replacement parts. At which point do mankind and robotkind merge?

K.M. O’Donnell. Final war.
Originally in :

Multi-perspective on the stupidity of war – shades of Catch-22.

Kit Reed. Golden Acres.
Originally in : Mister Da V and other stories.

Hamish and Nelda arrive at the Golden Acres retirement complex and have immediate misgivings.

Mack Reynolds. Criminal in Utopia.
Originally in : Galaxy

Credit-card crime.

Fritz Leiber. One Station of the Way.
Originally in : Galaxy

The spaceship Inseminator is travelling the Universe, taking part in an immaculate conception on a number of planets.

Stephen Goldin. Sweet Dreams Melissa.
Originally in : Galaxy

Computer MLSA 5400 had been programmed to develop a personality, which it has been doing for five years. But the 5-year personae is having nightmares.

Robert Silverberg. To the Dark Star.
Originally in :

A three-person crew are to view the death throes of a giant star. A human, an adapted girl, and a microcephalon. One of the three has to risk their life to achieve close up data collection.

Theodore Sturgeon. Like Young.
Originally in :

The last members of Mankind graciously leave their accumulated wisdom for the race that will follow them.

Robert Silverberg. Hawksbill Station.
Originally in : Galaxy.

Opponents of a global 21st century reactionary regime are transported to a prison camp in the Cambrian period.

C. C. Shackleton. Ultimate Construction.
Originally in Titbits

Why would the Last Man on Earth be playing with a bucket and spade?

John T. Sladek. 1937 A.D.!
Originally in :New Worlds.

Inventor Emil Hart uses his bicycle-powered time machine to travel forward to 1973 a.d. He finds that events in the future can actually have an impact of events in the past.

Ben Bova. Fifteen miles.
Originally in :

Three explorers on Moon, one of whom finds water in the form of ice, but has to be rescued by one of his colleagues, who redeems himself after a previous fatality.

Kit Reed. The Vine.
Originally in : The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction

A family tends a humongous vine generation after generation, until the vine begins to….

A. Bertram Chandler. The Left Hand Way.
Originally in : Australian Science Fiction Review

The gaussjammer Lode Trader crashes onto a planet, leaving only the priest Lee Chang alive. He is kept company by the cargo of robots.

Frank M. Robinson. The Wreck of the Ship John B.
Originally in : Playboy

Long-haul freighter Cassiopeia, en route to a distant colony planet, and manned by several increasingly insular men, finds the drifting body of a crew member of a previous freighter, and shortly after the empty freighter and similarly drifting corpses of the rest of the crew. They are able to identify the reason behind the loss of this and other freighters.

Kris Neville. The Forest of Zil.
Originally in :

On a distant planet covered by trees, the forest moves in the warm sunlight to the motion of the gentle breeze, making their soft sounds, zil, zil, zil.

J.G. Ballard. The assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy considered as a downhill motor race.
Originally in :

Argues that a less conventional view of the events leading to the assassination of JFK may provide a more satisfactory explanation. Uses Alfred Jarry’s The Cruxifiction Considered as an Uphill Bicycle Race as a model.

James Thurber. Interview with a Lemming.
Originally in : My World – and welcome to it.

A scientist and a lemming have a conversation about their species respective failings. Why do lemmings run en masse over cliffs? ponders the scientist. The lemming replies : we have wondered why humans do not.

Fritz Leiber. Answering service.
Originally in : Galaxy

An old Lady torments a doctor’s receptionist on the other end of her phone.

Keith Laumer. The Last Command.
Originally in :

A Mark XVIII Combat Unit (bolo) long-buried in a concrete tomb, is reawakened by construction work. Reynolds, an old soldier who fought alongside the unit in his youth, saves the day.

Gary Wright. Mirror of Ice.
Originally in : Galaxy

The Stuka is a 20km bobsleigh run, in which the sleds are powered, and the risks are high.

Harlan Ellison. Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes.
Originally in : Knight Magazine

Kostner, down on his luck, plays the silver-dollar slot-machine. The slot that Maggie has played previously. Maggie is now part of the slot, and her blue eyes peer out at him. His luck changes. Classy.