Of the five stories in the January 1994 issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE, more than half of them are stories that would not, under most circumstances, be considered science fiction. Three of the five stories are fantasies of one kind or another, and as I’ve stated before, I will take science fiction over fantasy any time. (I make an exception for contemporary fantasy; in reality, I am not a fan of epic fantasy, sword and sorcery, that kind of thing, but it is to my discredit, and says nothing of the genre.) I said from the outset that I might not comment on every story in every issue, and there have been a few stories I’ve missed. This is not meant as commentary on the story, simply a lack of time (or lack of time management skills) on my part. In the case of this issue, I focused on four of the five stories, three of which are some form of fantasy. It is therefore ironic that the story that I consider to be one of the best stories ever to appear in SCIENCE FICTION AGE through out its entire run is a fantasy that appears in this issue. Don’t worry, you’ll know it when you see it.
Tag: sfage.2007
SF AGE: Volume 2, Issue 1 (November 1993)
Set aside for the moment Scott Edelman’s editorial on “recursive” science fiction, or Norman Spinrad’s controversial essay on how fantasy has infected science fiction. The table of contents for this issue includes 7 stories because, as the magazine cover indicates, “Now: More Pages! More Stories!” And among the stories included in this issue are back-to-back tales by Barry Malzberg and Harlan Ellison. Why don’t we see these guys showing up in Asimov’s Analog, or F&SF as much today as they did in SF AGE 14 years ago?
SF AGE: Volume 1, Issue 6 (September 1993)
I was recently talking about Shakespeare with some friends, and on the same day, opened this latest issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE to read Scott Edleman’s editorial, “Science Fiction is the stuff that dream are made on”, which deals, of course, with Shakespeare. It was a good start to the final issue of SF AGE’s rookie year–and one story in this issue would turn out to be a Nebula-winner.
SF AGE: Volume 1, Issue 5 (July 1993)
Volume 1, Issue 5 is a very special issue for me for two reasons each of which I will explain below so bear with me.
First, it is special because it is the first issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE that I ever saw and that I ever owned. I came across the magazine by accident, on a weekend during the summer of 1993 (the summer between my junior and senior years at the University of California, Riverside). To kill time, we would head out to the Moreno Valley Mall and while there, I could never resist going into the B. Dalton bookstore, even though I never had much spare cash to spend on books (I was, after all, a college student). On this occasion, however, I recall seeing the magazine toward the bottom of the magazine rack. I was attracted by Piers Anthony’s name on the cover and as soon as I had discovered that he had a short story in side, I willingly forked over the $2.95 for a copy of the magazine.
Which leads me to the second reason why this issue was special. It marked a turning point for me in science fiction and in fandom. Up until this point, my exposure to science fiction was limited. I liked science fiction, don’t get me wrong, but I hadn’t read more than a few authors. When I was much younger, I’d read Madeleine L’Engle‘s 1962 classic A Wrinkle In Time. I’d read bits and pieces of Isaac Asimov’s novel The Caves of Steel. I read a few other odds and ends here and there. But I’d read almost no short science fiction. And most of the science fiction I’d read up to that point was Piers Anthony (thus, what attracted me to the issue in the first place).
After reading this issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE I discovered just how good short science fiction was. I immediately subscribed to the magazine. Slowly, but surely, I also began to expand my own reading within the genre. When I could, I bought short story collections from the authors that I was most familiar with. One of the first such collections that I bought was Harlan Ellison’s Deathbird Stories. I started to learn the history of the genre and within a year of picking up that first copy of SCIENCE FICTION AGE, I’d read Dangerous Visions which gave me a much wider exposure to the biggest names in science fiction and lead me in 46 different directions. I read books such as Barry Malzberg’s Beyond Apollo and Herovit’s World. I read Robert Heinlein’s The Puppet Masters. I continued to read Piers Anthony’s books as they came out.
At this point, I had been writing my own stories and submitting them for a little less than a year. After this “expansion” of reading on my part, I noticed a change in my own stories. They were still being rejected, but there was an increased level of maturity in the writing. I attribute this directly to the stuff that I was reading. I was learning how to write from the masters.
There was one other thing that happened. I entered fandom for the first time. Kind of. Because of that issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE, I wrote a letter to Piers Anthony, telling him how much I liked his story and what I big fan I was. I can’t remember how long my letter was. Within a week or two, I received back a 2 page singled-spaced letter, which was clearly personal and which encouraged me to continue to pursue my reading and writing of science fiction. Since then I have never looked back.
I was a late-bloomer when it came to really diving into science fiction. I shiver to think what might have happened if I never saw that green-bordered issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE on the magazine rack in B. Dalton. But that is an alternate history that I no longer have to worry about. Thanks to this issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE, I joined a special cadre of people the world over united by a common bond: the love of science fiction.
SF AGE: Volume 1, Issue 4 (May 1993)
I have had a goal since 1996 of reading on average one book per week. That would amount to 52 books per year and the closest I have ever come is 41 books. It doesn’t sound like a lot especially when I see there are people reading two or three times as much as me. Maybe I’m just a slow (but steady) reader. I am way off my pace this year, and the main part of the reason is that I have been reading and commenting on my SCIENCE FICTION AGE collection. I worried about this through the first three issues. I worried that the time I was spending reading the stories was taking away from other books that I wanted to read–what I considered my “real” reading.
With this issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE, however, I have changed mind. I had so much fun reading the stories in this issue that I thought to myself, so what if I am not finishing as many books as I normally do? I am deriving so much enjoyment from reading through the pages of these magazines, I am learning so much about what makes a story work, that I needn’t worry about what I am missing. I’m having too much fun to worry about it. And so I finally decided that it’s okay if I don’t finish as many books this year as I normally do. It’s okay because you really can’t beat the enjoyment you get from reading stories like these. Each issue is like a “best of” issue and this one is no different. We have Scott Edelman telling us that it’s time to go to Mars. We have Robert Silverberg demonstrating how we live in a science fiction age. We have Frederik Pohl’s words giving added meaning to Barlow’s amazing illustrations. We’ve got debate on fantasy vs. science fiction. We’ve got scientists telling us, in 1993, that we can be on Mars in 10 years. We even have a poignant review of Isaac Asimov’s last FOUNDATION novel, Forward the Foundation. And all this is aside from the five great stories that appear in this issue.
There’s nothing better than doing what you love and I love going back through these magazines, andante lugubre, reading the best that science fiction has to offer.
SF AGE: Volume 1, Issue 3 (March 1993)
I meant to get this out yesterday but I had one more story to go and I didn’t get to the story until this morning. So without further delay, here are my thoughts on Volume 1, Issue 3 of SCIENCE FICTION AGE.
SF AGE: Volume 1, Issue 2 (January 1993)
I’ve finally gotten around to finishing issue #2 of SCIENCE FICTION AGE. It’s been a busy month, since I last posted and thus the delay, but hopefully these posts will come more frequently going forward. It’s amazing how little time there is in a day to do everything you want to get done.
SF AGE: Volume 1, Issue 1 (November 1992)
I have already discussed a few points about the premier issue of SCIENCE FICTION AGE and these can be found here and here. In order to keep these posts manageable, in the future I will try and keep my thoughts to a single post per issue, but I can’t guarantee this will always be the case. That said, here are my thoughts on the rest of the premier issue of the magazine.
SF Signal
Once again, thanks to mabfan, it would appear that my attempts to read through and review SF AGE this year has been picked up by SF Signal. I may need a longer commute to get all of this reading done!
SF AGE: “The Last Robot” by Adam-Troy Castro
When I first began subscribing to SCIENCE FICTION AGE back in the winter of 2003, I had read almost nothing by Isaac Asimov. Other science fiction writers, yes, but I shied away from Asimov. I knew he wrote about robots and I didn’t think that was interesting. It is one of my real regrets that I didn’t learn more about Asimov sooner. In my senior year in college, I read “Nightfall”. Later that year, I. Asimov was released and I bought it–and absolutely loved it. From the moment I read that memoir, I became an Isaac Asimov fan. I remember crying while reading Janet Asimov’s epilogue; I had not known that Asimov was dead, and I felt it was a terrible loss. Eventually, I got hold of the two volumes of his autobiography and read through those; they made me an even bigger Asimov fan. I re-read all three volumes every April, the month Isaac died, and I must have read those books 10 times now; I never tire of them. In the 14 years since I “discovered” Asimov, I have collected more than 200 of his books. I’ve read every F&SF science article he ever wrote with sheer delight. I think Forward the Foundation is one of the greatest science fiction books of all time. I’ve read Isaac’s histories, joke books, miscellaneous essays, even his annotated poems. In short, Isaac Asimov became my favorite science fiction writer.
Reading through SF AGE in 2007
I mentioned in an earlier post that I was going to go back and read through all my issues of SCIENCE FICTION AGE during 2007. Well, yesterday I started with Volume 1, Issue 1, the premier issue. I’m reading the whole thing, cover-to-cover, not just the fiction, and so far, I love it! When I first subscribed to SF AGE, I was still in college, and didn’t have much time to read for fun and so I only managed to read a fraction of what was in the magazine, but I’m trying to make up for that now.
In a way, some of it is amusing, reading it retroactively as I am. When I first started reading it, I liked science fiction but my exposure to it had been limited to a handful of writers, not necessarily even the more popular ones. Now, 14 years later, I like to think I have a pretty good knowledge of science fiction and am far better read within the genre. Looking at the book reviews in the first issue, therefore, makes me smile. It just so happens that I did read the first book to be reviewed, Damon Knight’s Why Do Birds. I found that I enjoyed it, but that it was bizarre. I don’t remember much of it, but I’ll tell you, reading that review made me want to go back and re-read the book. (And why not, it was before I started keeping my reading lists, so I can get the book on my list “officially”.) The review of Connie Willis’ Doomsday Book was also fascinating for its insights, especially considering that book ended up an award-winner.
The movie column was also interesting. I talked about the production of a movie based on Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land. Fourteen years later, I have not seen any movie come out. It reminds me of Asimov’s First Law of Hollywood. (The same column also comments on the fact that just after Isaac Asimov died, the FOUNDATION series was optioned for film for more than $1 million. Again, 14 years later, no film.)
I enjoyed the science column on time travel and paradoxes. And, of course, the fiction is outstanding. As I make my way through these magazines, I’ll be posting about what I read from time-to-time. I won’t be commenting on each of the 273 stories that appeared in the magazine, but I will comment on those that interest me or move me in some way. For those interested in following along on these thoughts as I ramble through SCIENCE FICTION AGE, I will be tagging the posts with “sfage.2007”. You can therefore view all of the posts together at:
http://jamietr.livejournal.com/tag/sfage.2007
One small problem I have discovered: trying to keep the magazines in good condition as I go through them. I have a complete set and I noticed myself trying to be extra careful with the premier issue as I read it on the train ride home this afternoon.
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