Showing posts with label Macmillan's Best Of Soviet Science Fiction. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Macmillan's Best Of Soviet Science Fiction. Show all posts

Wednesday, 9 June 2010

WORLD'S SPRING

Macmillan hardback, 1981. Cover painting by Richard M. Powers.

"The stories in World's Spring cover the entire spectrum of science fiction, from apocalyptic visions of a future dominated by an all-knowing, all-seeing, and all-intrusive computer, to a mocking view of a fully ordered society knocked haywire by fallible humans. We meet people inhabiting an Earth we cannot recognize, and aliens on distant planets who are not unlike ourselves. These twenty-one stories are a fine blend of fantasy and allegory. Introductions and commentary are by Vladimir Gakov."

Contains The Surf Of Mars by Dmitri Bilenkin, The Port Of Rock Storms by Genrikh Altov, World's Spring by Victor Kolupaev, Nine Minutes by Genrikh AltovThe World In Which I Vanished by Anatoly Dneprov, The Sun Sets In Donomag by Ilya Varshavsky, Testing Grounds by Sever Ganovsky, The Ultimate Threshold by German Maksimov, City And Wolf by Dmitri Bilenkin, An Ugly Bioform by Kirill Bulychev, The Very Biggest House by Victor KolupaevAppendix by Andrei Balabukha, The Great Actor Jones by Gennady Gor, The Stanislavsky Method by Alexander Gorbovsky, Life Space by Marietta ChudakovaDay Of Wrath by Sever Ganovsky, Once At Night by Dmitiri Bilenkin, The Choice by Kirill Bulychev, An Old Robot's Two Times Two by Vladimir Grigorev and Coincidence by Alexander Gorbovsky.  

Monday, 4 February 2008

WORLD SOUL

Collier / Macmillan paperback, first edition, 1979. Cover painting by
Richard M. Powers.

"Sergei Arefyev is a brilliant scientist at the Institute of Telepathy. Torn by a sense of isolation and alienation, he dreams of a human future where telepathy allows mankind to share its experiences fully. His dream seems to be fulfilled by the World Soul, a biological mutation that links human consciousnesses through telepathy. Lies and deception become impossible, wars can no longer be fought, and people experience an ecstasy of full communion with each other. However, human relations change dramatically as the lack of individual privacy leads to a loss of  personal identity. In the midst of this turmoil the World Soul evolves until it acquires a will of its own, and Sergei and his friends must face the horrible challenge of reestablishing individual autonomy before mankind is completely engulfed."

Wednesday, 5 December 2007