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Post by dem on Mar 22, 2016 10:00:39 GMT
Damon Knight (ed.) - The Dark Side (Corgi, 1967) Damon Knight - Introduction
Ray Bradbury - The Black Ferris
Robert A. Heinlein - They
James Blish - Mistake Inside
H. L. Gold - Trouble With Water
Peter Phillips - C/ O Mr. Makepeace
Avram Davidson - The Golem
H. G. Wells - The Story Of The Late Mr. Elvesham
Theodore Sturgeon - It
Anthony Boucher - Nellthu
Richard McKenna - Casey Agonistes
T. L. Sherred - Eye For Iniquity
Fritz Leiber - The Man Who Never Grew Youngi Blurb: Turn the wheel of Science Fiction and you come to the other side, the side that does not deal with Space, or Time,. or Motion ...
Here are twelve stories — written by masters of S.F.— that explore the imagination ... tales of forgotten, impossible things — things that are faceless ... nameless ... formless ... things that come from THE DARK SIDE"Prepare to graft the selected memory track at once." It didn't make the SF-Horror anthologies in Pulp Horror 2, but The Dark Side is far from bereft of morbid treats, with Theodore Sturgeon's famous Frankenstein variation perhaps the pick of the nasty material (will come to It shortly). Ray Bradbury - The Black Ferris: With each turn of the Ferris Wheel, the diabolical Mr. Coogar the Carnival man either gains or loses a year depending on which way the demented hunchback turns the lever. Two plucky kids, Hank and Peter (well, maybe Peter isn't quite to plucky) have his number, but can they get a dozy stupid grown up to believe them? Meanwhile Darke, masquerading as a twelve year old orphan, has designs on separating the kindly widow Foley from her loot. It is down to the boys to stop him, but how? Terrific story - so much prefer it to the bloated novel it eventually spawned. Robert A. Heinlein - They: Dr. Hayward and his staff are kindness personified, so good thing our asylum inmate is wise to their game. Like every other human being on this sorry planet, they are all in on the conspiracy versus himself. The world around him is a sham, scenery shifted to order for purpose of distracting him from his doubtless cosmically important mission - if only he could remember what it was! Alice, the one person he foolishly trusted when the loneliness grew too much, gave the game away with that alarming faux pas - she forgot to control the weather. I've not read The Puppet Masters but am guessing that this is the blueprint. Avram Davidson - The Golem: "Do you not know I have come to destroy you?" The grey faced monster escapes from its creator, Prof. Allardyce, and moves in at the Gumbeiner's, but the couple are two busy bitching at one another to pay his threats any heed. Eventually they stop squabbling for long enough to rewire their guest. If he's gonna stay here, he can earn his keep. Cute. Anthony Boucher - Nellthu: Martin learns the secret of beautiful, adorable, impossibly gifted Ailsa's success - a pact with a demon. Mildly risque short-short, very Fredric Brown circa the Nightmares And Geezenstacks collection.
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Post by mcannon on Mar 23, 2016 4:48:56 GMT
>>Ray Bradbury - The Black Ferris: With each turn of the Ferris Wheel, the diabolical Mr. Coogar the Carnival man either gains or loses a year depending on which way the demented hunchback turns the lever. Two plucky kids, Hank and Peter (well, maybe Peter isn't quite to plucky) have his number, but can they get a dozy stupid grown up to believe them? Meanwhile Darke, masquerading as a twelve year old orphan, has designs on separating the kindly widow Foley from her loot. It is down to the boys to stop him, but how? Terrific story - so much prefer it to the bloated novel it eventually spawned.>> This is the anthology (albeit the hardback edition) in which I finally got to read "The Black Ferris", several years after I'd first seen the magnificent Coye illustration that accompanied its original "Weird Tales" publication; it didn't feature in any of the Bradbury collections I had. While my opinion of "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is higher than Dem's (and I think the film is woefully underrated), there's no doubt that the short story packs a magnificent macabre punch. Oooh, and I see that the "Ray Bradbury Theatre" adaptation of the story is on YouTube....... www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3S8BTIZoh0Mark
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Post by dem on Mar 23, 2016 6:58:27 GMT
This is the anthology (albeit the hardback edition) in which I finally got to read "The Black Ferris", several years after I'd first seen the magnificent Coye illustration that accompanied its original "Weird Tales" publication; it didn't feature in any of the Bradbury collections I had. While my opinion of "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is higher than Dem's (and I think the film is woefully underrated), there's no doubt that the short story packs a magnificent macabre punch. Mark Take no notice of me, Mark, that will just be my bias toward the shorter form getting on its high horse. Think my problem with Something Wicked ... was that I'd already had the pleasure of The Black Ferris and, for me, it was the most exciting sequence in the novel. I ought to schedule a rematch .... Theodore Sturgeon - It: ( Unknown, August 1940). The grisly adventures of a rotting heap of animated filth at large in the forest surrounding the Drew family farm. It, "the thing, the mold with a mind," is beyond good or evil, it is just .... curious about everything, which is very bad news for Kimbo, Alton Drew's plucky little hunting dawg. When Alton finds the torn remains of his faithful hound discarded in the mud, he vows to kill the sadistic bastard responsible and not even brother Cory can talk sense into him. Their relationship is done from the moment Alton pulls a rifle on him. Meanwhile, mischievous little Babe slips mum Clissa's guard to set off in search of her beloved uncle. 'It,' sludgier by the hour, is there to greet them both. No explanation is forthcoming as to how or why that which was once Roger Kirk should return from the grave, but "radiation" has been suggested by at least one proper critic. |
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Post by jamesdoig on Mar 23, 2016 8:40:12 GMT
No explanation is forthcoming as to how or why that which was once Roger Kirk should return from the grave, but "radiation" has been suggested by at least one proper critic. No explanation forthcoming here either:   Also contains H.G. Wells "The Invisible Man", and Robert E. Howard's "Valley of the Worm." |
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Post by dem on Mar 26, 2016 14:42:38 GMT
Peter Phillips - C/ O Mr. Makepeace: (MFSF, Feb. 1954). Another winner, more psychological ghost story than SF-as-this-reader-understands-it, not that it matters. Medically retired from the army at close of WWII, Tristram Makepeace makes an uneasy return to civilian life. The horrors he's witnessed weigh heavy on a mind already haunted by guilt over his role in his abusive father's death. And then the first of the letters marked 'Mr. Grabcheek, C/ O Mr. Makepeace' arrives. Each postal delivery brings another envelope addressed to the phantom squatter sharing his premises. When the desperate invalid voluntarily enters a psychiatric clinic, the address is amended to 'Mr. Grabcheek, C/ O Mr. Makepeace, Seaton Mental Hospital, Essex.' The psychiatrist marvels at the most extreme case of schizophrenia ever to come to his attention. Can it really be that Makepeace's tortured personality has unleashed a doppelgänger?
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