Wow Georgia - What a memory. All you other folks, go read Georgia’s story - it is definitely worth it!
Here’s something I wrote a while ago about the day I met Ray Bradbury (aka the best day of my life).
I’ve been meaning to update it about what happened next.
I read this many moons ago - many, many moons. Written in the 1950s, this deeply cynical and darkly prescient dystopian novel in which advertising, conspicuous consumption and capitalism have run rampant in a world beset with overpopulation and environmental degradation, seems all too apt.
From the Cover:
It is the 20th Century, an advertisement-drenched world in which the big ad agencies dominate governments and everything else.
Now Schoken Associates, one of the big players, has a new challenge for star copywriter Mitch Courtenay. Volunteers are needed to colonise Venus. It’s a hellhole, and nobody who knew anything about it would dream of signing up. But by the time Mitch has finished, they will be queuing to get on board the spaceships.
About the Authors
Pohl and Kornbluth started writing together as early as 1940, although both authors produced a wide variety of stories separately, under their own names and using psuedonyms. Each wrote sections, starting where the other left off, and through long experience they developed an almost telepathic awareness of each other’s intentions.
Frederik Pohl was born in 1919 and has been professionally involved in sf as an editor and writer since his teens. Among his many books are A Plague of Pythons, Gateway, Man Plus and JEM: The Making of a Utopia.
C.M. Kornbluth (1923-1958) was the bureau chief of a Chicago news agency until 1951 when he took up fiction writing full time. He established himself very quickly as a brilliant short-story writer with works such as ‘The Little Black Bag’, ‘The Marching Morons’, ‘The Cosmic Charge Account’ and ‘Two Dooms’. Pohl and Kornbluth started writing stories together in 1940 and their collaborations include The Space Merchants, Search the Sky and Gladiators-at-Law.
Definitely worth picking up a cheap copy.
(thanks spacenoir for reminding me of how much I like this book. Shall be digging this off the shelves and giving it a reread quite soon!)
Sheri S Tepper has crafted a far-future fantasy that reads like the best of whodunits: murder, religion, treason, a mysterious ailment called Batfly Fever, interplanetary spies, true love, and planetary consciousness are the strands woven into this colourful tale.
Singer from the Sea begins with a simple storyline and evolves into an eco-feminist tale of the struggle to save the women of Haven, and the planet itself, from a uniquely hideous end.
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Leguin: a strange science-fictional journal-book pushing the boundaries of biology and gender. Good stuff. Kemmer, anyone?
Contextual notes and questions for your consideration via Prof William Warner.
(via thisrecording)
A rather dry, impossible book at times, but I remember it quite clearly and vividly now, a decade after I first read it. Take that as a sort-of recommendation.
I read this on publication (that dates me, somewhat) Very good, thought provoking, a bit of a hard read, but then it is Ursula.
