Suggestion for a parlor game: Name the Big Name science-fiction authors whose careers began with the following sentences:
Nick looked at the cop, and the cop looked at Nick.
The chairman rapped loudly for order.
It was “The Seashell.” It would have to be “The Seashell.”
Margaret reached over to the other side of the bed where Hank should have been.
On and on Coeurf prowled!
Volumes of one-author short stories included the first collection of the work of Kate Wilhelm, The Mile-Long Spaceship (Berkley) and more of the charming nostalgic time-fantasies of Jack Finney, I Lore Gales-burg in the Springtime (Simon & Schuster). Who Fears the Devil? (Arkham) is a complete collection of Manly Wade Wellman’s rich and idiomatic folktales of John the Ballad Singer (from Fantasy and Science Fiction). S-f, in its broad sense, turns up in a few of The Stories of William Sansom (Atlantic-Little, Brown), in Evan Hunter’s Happy New Year, Herbie (Simon and Schuster), and in Graham Greene’s A Sense of Reality (Viking), especially in Greene’s “Under the Garden,” an extraordinary novelette on the nature of fantasy-and-reality. Readers who last year discovered Jorge Luis Borges may relish the comparably un-classifiable tales in Tommaso Landolfi’s Gogol’s Wife, translated by Raymond Rosenthal and others (New Directions).
Enthusiasts of H. P. Lovecraft could welcome two distinguished volumes: Collected Poems (Arkham), admirably illustrated by Frank Utpatel, and The Dunwich Horror and Others (Arkham; abridged. Lancer)—an ideal introduction to H.P.L., especially for August Derleth’s fine critical-biographical essay.
I do not know how to classify or even to describe the work of Edward Gorey, whose verses and pictures so eerily evoke “... feelings of horror, resentment, and pity/For things, which so seldom turn out for the best.” Let me simply say that the most disturbing (and morally instructive) work of pure fantasy in 1963 was Gorey’s three-volume The Vinegar Works (Simon and Schuster).
[Answers to parlor game, in order of listings L. Sprague de Camp, Robert A. Heinlein, Theodore Sturgeon, Judith Merril, A. & van Vogt.]
HONORABLE MENTIONS
Abbreviations:
Amz Amazing Stories
Anal Analog Science Fact & Fiction
All Atlantic Monthly
BW Book Week
CY Catholic Youth
Csmp Cosmopolitan
DC The Diner’s Club Magazine
Dude The Dude
Fant Fantastic
F&SF Fantasy and Science Fiction
Gal Galaxy
Gam Gamma
Gent Gent
GH Good Housekeeping
If If
LHJ Ladies’ Home Journal
McC McCall’s
Mlle Mademoiselle
NL The New Leader
NW New Worlds (British)
Plby Playboy
Rep The Reporter
R&T Road and Track
Rog Rogue
SEP The Saturday Evening Post
SciF Science Fantasy (British)
SSI Short Story International
WoT Worlds of Tomorrow
WRD The Worm Runner’s Digest
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vance aandahl “The Weremartini,” F&SF, Jun.
Brian w. aldiss “Skeleton Crew,” SciF, Dec.
poul anderson “Turning Point,” If, May.
piers anthony “Quinquepedalian,” Amz, Nov.
Christopher anvil “Not in the Literature,” Anal, Mar.
John ashcroft “The Shtarman,” NW, Aug.
isaac asimov “My Son, the Physicist,” F&SF, Apr.
j. G. ballard “The Sherrington Theory,” Amz, Mar.
stephen barr “The Mirror of Gigantic Shadows,” Plby, Sep.
john baxter “Eviction,” NW, Mar.
peter s. beagle “Come, Lady Death,” Atl, Sep.
k. w. Bennett “The Seventeenth Summer,” SciF, Apr.
frank bequaert “Alice Grebel and the Doomsday Machine,” Csmp
jerome bixby “The God-Plllnk,” WoT, Dec.
robert bloch “Beelzebub,” Plby, Dec.
juan bosch “The Indelible Spot,” SEP, Nov. 16.
lyle g. boyd “The Provenance of Swift,” WoT, Feb.
ray bradbury “Bright Phoenix,” F&SF, May;