Book Review: Orbit 11

Book Review: 'Orbit 11' edited by Damon Knight

3  / 5 Stars

Well, here we go with another review of another installment in the 'Orbit' franchise, the franchise that delivers pure and unadulterated New Wave sci-fi. Or 'Speculative Fiction', as they were fond of saying back in those New Wave days. Editor Damon Knight always was receptive to stories that pushed the boundaries of the genre, which sometimes worked, but more often, didn't. Anyways.........

'Orbit 11' was issued in hardcover (216 pp.) in 1972 by G. P. Putnam, and in paperback, from Berkley Books, in March 1973. The cover art is by Paul Lehr.

The cover blurb tells us that Orbit 11 offers 'The Most Exciting Fiction of Our Time !'. Does it really ?

Well...............no. It's just another 'Orbit' volume. A few good stories, and some bad ones. Many stories have no sci-fi content. All exclusively were written for this anthology.

My capsule summary of the contents:

Alien Stones, by Gene Wolfe: a miles-long Terran spaceship, the Gladiator, meets up in deep space with an alien ship that is also miles long. Are the aliens friendly or not ? How do you find out ? This novelette stakes a claim to the Giant Spaceship theme a year before Arthur C. Clarke and his 'Rendevous with Rama', which I guess is to author Wolfe's credit. It's a hard sci-fi story, competently written, so it's one of the better entries in 'Orbit 11'.

Spectra, by Vonda N. McIntyre: the first-person narrator endures a dystopian future where dissent is punished by messing with your eyesight. This story is more horror than sci-fi, and is effective.

I Remember A Winter, by Fredrik Pohl: a middle-aged man ponders the choices he made in life and wonders how things could have, and would have, been different...... had he not made those choices. There is no sci-fi content.

Doucement, S'il Vous Plait (Gently, if it pleases you), by James Sallis: I challenge anyone to dispute my contention that James Sallis was the most pretentious of New Wave authors. And yet, the editors of New Wave anthologies never could turn down a Sallis submission. This story is the first-person narrative of a letter, experiencing the process of being delivered. Is such a concept the apogee of Speculative Fiction, or what ?!

The Summer of the Irish Sea, by Charles L. Grant: clad only in a loincloth, a feral man navigates the terrain of a near-future United Kingdom. This early-career story from Grant is quite untoward, reading more as a Harlan Ellison tale than the kind of overwritten, decorative fiction that would come to represent Grant's literary style. Because it emulates Ellison, it's a good story and one of the standouts in the anthology. 

Good-Bye, Shelley, Shirley, Charlotte, Charlene, by Robert Thurston: this tale opens with an allegorical scene of the narrator playing cards with God. I sighed and prepared for metaphysical, artsy-fartsy bullshit in that inimitable New Wave style. But after the prologue, 'Good-Bye' settles into more conventional storytelling, about a man whose girlfriends are so similar in looks and temperament as to suggest otherworldly forces at work. There's little sci-fi content, but it's a readable story.

Father's in the Basement, by Philip Jose Farmer: Millie's father is busy writing the Great American Novel, and he must not be disturbed. A subdued horror tale from Farmer, one that would have been more at home in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine than 'Orbit'.

Down by the Old Maelstrom, by Edward Wellen: some people in a research laboratory have dreams, which are related to the reader in surrealistic prose. The verbs 'amoebaed', 'alligatored', and 'depontiated' are encountered. This easily is the worst story in the anthology.

Things Go Better, by George Alec Effinger: allegory about a nice Jewish Boy named Steve Weinraub who decides to hitchhike across Pennsylvania, to 'find' both himself, and America. It's devoid of sci-fi content.

Dissolve, by Gary K. Wolfe: the author of 'Killerbowl' addresses the philosophies of Marshall McLuhan, who, in 1972, was very much an influential figure in both pop and highbrow culture. The narrative, which is designed to mimic the changing of channels on a TV, is choppy and a bit contrived.

Dune's Edge, by Edward Bryant: some people find themselves in the desert, and compelled to climb a dune. It's all so very existential.

The Drum Lollipop, by Jack C. Dann: Her parents' marital quarrels lead Maureen Harris to project her anxieties onto a toy drum, which in turn leads to all sorts of phantasmagorical phenomena. An exemplar of seventies, New Wave, speculative fiction. I found it boring.

Machines of Loving Grace, by Gardner R. Dozois: in the Future City, machines will do everything for you. And perhaps that can be a bad thing. Sardonic humor makes this one of the standout stories in the anthology.

They Cope, by Dave Skal: in the future, everyone is bipolar, which makes for a complicated society.

Counterpoint, by Joe W. Haldeman: some are born into wealth and privilege, while others, into poverty and misery. This is a very good story, but it's devoid of sci-fi content and would have been more at home in Esquire, Playboy, Penthouse, Cavalier, or any other early seventies 'slick' that published fiction.

Old Soul, by Steve Herbst: a nurse's interactions with a dying elderly man are complicated when his memories of his younger days 'infect' her mind. This story is supposed to say something profound about The Human Condition. I was bored.

New York Times, by Charles Platt: a three-and-a-half page prose poem about the dangers of living in the city. There is no sci-fi content. I was bored.

The Crystallization of the Myth, by John Barfoot: a two-page prose poem about the aftermath of Armageddon. Meh.

To Plant a Seed, by Hank Davis: using something called the 'McJunkins Field', researcher Roy Cullins wants to put a spaceship into suspended animation for billions of years, with the goal of having humans present when a new universe emerges from the old. It's an interesting premise for a sci-fi story but the author's prose veers from the straight-faced, to the awkwardly comedic, even puerile:

Cullins, Cain, and Erika realized simultaneously that the thing looked like an enormous athletic supporter. Looking at it made Erika hornier than ever. 

On the Road to Honeyville, by Kate Wilhelm: Elizabeth and her mom are making the long drive on two-lane blacktop to the town of Salyersville, by way of the town of Honeyville. En route, they enter the Twilight Zone. The story lacks sci-fi content.

The verdict ? As with the other entrants in the 'Orbit' series, Damon Knight's eccentric approach to selecting content meant that the anthology has more than its share of duds. I am comfortable giving 'Orbit 11' a three-star rating based on the contributions from Wolfe,  McIntyre, Grant, Dozois, and Haldeman.

The Art of Ron Cobb

The Art of Ron Cobb

Titan Books, 2022

'The Art of Rob Cobb' (208 pp.) was published by Titan Books in 2022. Like all the Titan titles it's a well-made hardbound book, measuring 9 1/4 inches by 12 1/2 inches.

The book is 'produced' by two women, Rachel Meinerding and Nicole Hendrix Herman, who make up the 'Concept Art Association', an organization "....committed to elevating and raising the profile of concept artists, their art and their involvement in the entertainment industries." The text is written by Jacob Johnston.

Prior to the publication of 'The Art of Ron Cobb', the only book dealing with Cobb's works was 'Colorvision', a 1981 trade paperback that, being long out of print, was very expensive. I was fortunate to pick up a copy back in the early 1980s.

'The Art of Ron Cobb' opens with a Forward by James Cameron, followed by a brief biographical sketch. Cobb (1937 - 2020) was born in Los Angeles but made Australia his home. Early in his career he earned recognition as a cartoonist for the Los Angeles Free Press. When his friend Dan O'Bannon asked Cobb to contribute a spaceship design to the 1973 indie film Dark Star, Cobb found his calling: providing art design and direction for films, particularly science fiction films. Cobb assisted with the creation of some of the aliens in the famous 'cantina' scene aliens in Star Wars, and came to the fore when O'Bannon hired him as an art director for Alien.  Cobb's work on Alien made his reputation among Hollywood producers and directors and set him on the path as one of the premiere art designers of the 1980s, 1990s, and into the 20002.

The book's core is a chronological overview of Cobb's work in film and video game art conception and design, starting from Dark Star and going all the way to The Sixth Day (2000). These chapters are illustrative of how Cobb contributed, in larger or smaller ways, to many of the blockbuster films of the 80s and 90s.

Another chapter deals with Cobb's work in the video games industry.

Also receiving attention are Cobb's contributions to commercial art in the form of magazine covers and LP record covers. Then there is a chapter devoted to Cobb's cartoons for the Free Press.

The text is filled with anecdotes and reminiscences from major film industry figures, such as Cameron, Robert Zemeckis, and Paul Verhoeven, and these give insights into the processes by which Cobb envisioned the sets and images that were used in big-budget productions. it's quite clear that Cobb was a go-to creator for many productions, and his approach to a functional, engineering-based concepts of future technologies had a tremendous influence on science fiction cinema and television.

Then, too, I was unaware of Cobb's presence in the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s. I had no idea that he was the originator of the iconic 'Ecology' flag / symbol.

While 'The Art of Ron Cobb' is a worthwhile book, it's not perfect. Perhaps its biggest weakness is that it's devoid of pictures of Cobb's 'finished' designs as they appeared in the films. This may be because the Concept Art Association was unwilling to pay fees to studios to use copyrighted material. 

It's also true that there is memorable content in 'Colorvision' that, arguably, deserved inclusion in 'The Art of Ron Cobb'. Again, it's not clear if this was due to difficulties in securing permission for reprinting such materials, or if Concept Art Association was disinterested in 'recycling', so to speak, previously presented artwork. 

In my opinion, then, the definitive collection of Cobb's commercial and studio works remains to be published. However, until such time as that takes place, 'The Art of Ron Cobb' is a good overview of Cobb's contributions over the course of his very successful career. 

Book Review: Of Men and Monsters

Book Review: 'Of Men and Monsters' by William Tenn

1 / 5 Stars

I remember buying this book back in September 1978, convinced by the great Boris Vallejo art that it was an action-based sci-fi novel. In reality, to my disappointment, ‘Of Men and Monsters’ (December 1975, 251 pp.) was an exemplar of deceptive marketing by Ballantine / Del Rey: a novel from 1968, repackaged for the 1970s with a more attention-getting cover. 

‘William Tenn’ was the pseudonym of the UK-born writer Philip Klass (1920 – 2010) who began publishing short stories in sci-fi pulp magazines in the late 40s. Tenn published a story called "The Men in the Walls" in the October 1963 issue of Galaxy magazine and later expanded the story into a novel, titled 'Of Men and Monsters', released in paperback by Ballantine Books in June 1968. 

Additional paperback editions since have been issued by a number of US and UK publishers; according to the ISFDB, most recently in 2011, by Gollancz.  

‘Of Men’ is set on a future Earth that has been invaded by a race of giant aliens, with humanity reduced to scrabbling out a precarious existence as vermin within the walls of the alien domiciles. The aliens, and their intentions, never are clearly described, reflecting an effort on Tenn’s part to present them as omnipotent figures whose nature essentially is incomprehensible to humans. The narrative is centered on the adventures of a boy named Eric, who, in the opening chapters of the novel, embarks on a manhood ceremony that involves leaving his tribe’s territory to filch food from the aliens.

Eric's efforts soon come to naught, as he is among a number of tribesmen captured by the aliens, caged in a research facility, and used to validate formulations of 'pest control' sprays (the 'pests', of course, being humans). This segment of the book is Tenn's rather blunt way of informing those more dull-witted readers (who up to this point may be unaware that the novel is satire) exactly what type of sci-fi novel they are reading.

I won’t disclose any further spoilers, save to say that Eric manages to find both allies and an escape plan, and a strategy by which Humanity may persevere in an otherwise indifferent universe.   

Tenn clearly designed his novel to be a mordant rebuke of the sci-fi stories and novels of the pulp and postwar eras, in which plucky humans relied on ingenuity and courage to overcome their oppression at the hands of technologically and militarily superior aliens. In ‘Of Men and Monsters,’ the struggles of its human protagonists fail to do more than attract incidental notice by the aliens; indeed, humanity’s efforts are so inherently futile that they make a mockery of classic sci-fi tropes. Since it is intended as a rather ponderous exercise in allegory, ‘Of Men’ is dull. Action sequences are comparatively rare, and subordinate to overly plentiful dialogue passages which allow Tenn to sermonize, in an oblique fashion.

The verdict ? ‘Of Men and Monsters’ deserves a One Star Rating, nothing more. In the interests of fairness I will note that Joachim Boaz, over at the 'Science Fiction and Other Suspect Ruminations' blog, gave the novel a 4 of 5 Star Rating. I also note that Rob Chilson’s 1989 novel ‘Men Like Rats’ is a homage to ‘Of Men and Monsters’, but, perhaps because Chilson’s novel is more action-oriented, I found it moderately more entertaining than Tenn’s book......... 

Book Review: Science Fiction Terror Tales

Book Review: 'Science Fiction Terror Tales' edited by Groff Conklin

 3 / 5 Stars

Here we go with one of the more than 40 anthologies edited by the indefatigable Groff Conklin (1904 - 1968) between 1946 and 1968.

'Science Fiction Terror Tales' (262 pp.) first was published in hardcover in January, 1955 by Gnome Press. A paperback edition was released by Pocket Books later that year. The edition I have, and which is pictured above, was issued in 1970. The artist who provided the striking cover image is uncredited.

The entries in 'Terror Tales' all first saw print in the 1940s and early 1950s.

My capsule summaries of the contents:

Introduction, by Groff Conklin: Conklin states that with this anthology, he sought to include lesser-known, but high-quality, stories.

Punishment Without Crime, by Ray Bradbury (1950): George Hill, a cuckold, seeks vengeance on his wayward wife. An overwrought, contrived tale from Bradbury.

Arena, by Fredric Brown (1944): a Federation fighter pilot named Bob Carson is obliged to engage in a one-against-one, winner-takes-all combat with an alien. The future of the Earth hangs in the balance. Still a good story after these many decades, and the Star Trek episode which is based on this novelette would have been better, had it adopted Brown's ending.

The Leech, by Robert Sheckley (1952): an alien life form lands on the Earth and it proves to be unfriendly. Sheckley, when he wasn't writing comedic sci-fi, could write very good 'straight' stories, and this is one of them.

Through Channels, by Richard Matheson (1951): Leo Vogel's parents see a very strange display on their television screen. An effective story from Matheson. 

Lost Memory, by Peter Phillips (1952): robots investigate an unusual artifact. This story relies on dark humor and, despite somewhat awkward prose, succeeds as a satirical treatment of human nature.

Memorial, by Theodore Sturgeon (1946): Grenfell, an idealist, seeks to convince the nations of the world to abandon warfare. 

Even by the standards of 1940s sci-fi, Sturgeon's prose is painfully stilted:

"Whew !" said Roway, his irrepressible humor passing close enough to nod to him. "Keep it clean, Grenfell ! Keep your.....your sesquipedalian pollysyballics, for a scientific report."

"Touche !" Grenfell smiled.

Prott, by Margaret St. Clair (1953): an astronaut cultivates friendship with exotic alien life-forms; this turns out to be a bad idea.

Flies, by Isaac Asimov (1953): three men who were college acquaintances attend a reunion. This is a real dud of a story from Asimov: stilted prose (He did not like to witness wild murder-yearnings where others could see only a few words of unimportant quarrel), and an underwhelming denouement.

The Microscopic Giants, by Paul Ernst (1936): strange goings-on in the depths of a copper mine. An imaginative story, and one of the better ones in the anthology.

The Other Inauguration, by Anthony Boucher (1953): a historian accesses a parallel universe and discovers that Absolute Power, Corrupts Absolutely. Boucher intends this story to be a minatory analysis of the American political system, but it's the worst entrant in the anthology, overloaded with obtuse prose, including the use of shorthand (?!).

Nightmare Brother, by Alan E. Nourse (1953): Robert Cos finds himself drafted into an unpleasant experiment. This story is too overwritten, and too slowly paced, to be effective.

Pipeline to Pluto, by Murray Leinster (1945): A young man named Hill is desperate to take the clandestine route to Pluto, where the work is hard and the pay quite generous. While the plot can be a bit confusing to follow, Leinster imparts a hard-boiled sensibility to this story that makes it another of the better ones in the anthology.

Impostor, by Philip K. Dick (1953): Spence Olham is a premiere researcher in what may be Mankind's final, desperate effort to stop alien invaders. But the government seems to think Olham is not quite himself........an effective tale from Dick. I'm sure readers familiar with his later writings will find many of Dick's more prominent themes in those works expressed, in nascent form, in this story. 

They, by Robert A. Heinlein (1941): the un-named protagonist is confined in an asylum, because he is convinced that the rest of the human race are aliens masquerading as people. This story vies with Sturgeon's story for 1940s sci-fi awfulness: badly overwritten, wooden prose, and a denouement that fizzles.

Let Me Live in a House, by Chad Oliver (1954): a team of four Terran colonists endure isolation and psychological stress in their transparent dome on Ganymede. Then, one day, there's a knock at the door............Yet another 'paranoia' themed dud, suffering from too many empty sentences steeped in melodramatic prose.

The verdict ? 'Science Fiction Terror Tales' is too short on quality pieces to rate as a must-have compilation of mid-century sci-fi. Those quality pieces it does possess, impart a Three-Star Rating.

Thorgal: The 'Qa' series

Thorgal: The 'Qa' Series

One of the most memorable episodes in the 29 installments of the 'Thorgal' comic book series (albums de bandes dessinees) was the so-called 'Qa' series. 

It was a four-part series, originally issued by the Belgian publisher Lombard, and consisted of the titles Le Pays Qâ (1986), Les Yeux de Tanatloc (1986), La Cité du Dieu Perdu (1987), and Entre Terre et Lumière (1987).

In 2008 - 2009, Cinebook published an English translation of the four titles, partitioned into two graphic novels: The Land of Qa, and City of the Lost God.

There is a note in The Land of Qa that some of the contents in the original album are deleted in the English translation, so as not to give offence; I suspect this has to do with the depiction of the Aztecs' human sacrifices, mention of which is increasingly politically incorrect nowadays.

Both Grzegorz Rosinski and Jean Van Hamme were in top form with the 'Qa' series. Van Hamme's plot stays coherent for almost all of its length and keeps the story beats to a manageable number. He also throws just about every sci-fi or fantasy trope into this series: ancient astronauts, levitating sailing ships, telepathy, telekinesis, and alien artifacts. 

The series kicks off with Kriss of Valnor, the franchise's central villain, coercing Thorgal, his wife Aaricia, and friend Tjall, into journeying with her to the land of Qa (comprising Mexico and part of South America), and completing a mission that is short on details, but long on danger.

Interspersed with moments of violence and mayhem is some lighter fare, often revolving around the avuncular 'Tree Foot', the elderly guardian for Thorgal's son Jolan.

The artwork is impressive, as always, with Rosinski successfully rendering a variety of peoples and exotic landscapes. The 'Qa' series leaves no doubt that Rosinski was one of the top-tier graphic artists of the 1980s and 1990s.

Who will want a copy of The Land of Qa and City of the Lost God ? If you are a Thorgal fan, then these books are well worth getting. But if you are less well-acquainted with the franchise, but appreciate skilled art and story in a European style, then the books are a good investment. It's possible to get each book for under $20 from your usual online vendors.

Magician by Robert Holdstock and Malcolm Edwards

'Magician: The Lost Journals of the Magus Geoffrey Carlyle'
by Robert Holdstock and Malcolm Edwards
Paper Tiger, 1982

This odd little book of 128 pages was published by Paper Tiger in 1982. While most of the Dragon's World / Paper Tiger catalog was devoted to presenting overviews of the works and techniques of artists active in the fields of science fiction and fantasy illustration, the company did release illustrated fiction titles, of which 'Magician' is representative.

In 1982 the authors were well-established in the fields of science fiction and fantasy, with Holdstock the recipient of the British Science Fiction Association award for his novelette 'Mythago Wood'. Given the emphasis his fantasy fiction imparts to the cultural and religious mores and practices of ancient Britain, Holdstock was well qualified to write 'Magician'.

For his part, Malcolm Edwards was an editor of magazines such as Interzone, and fiction and art books. such as 'Alien Landscapes'. He thus was familiar with the process of creating illustrated books.

With 'Magician', Holdstock and Edwards play it straight all the way. The book purports to be a collection of writings about magic and spellcasting discovered in a secret laboratory housed under the grounds of 'Rockhurst Manor', a 16th century mansion constructed on a site in the Wiltshire Downs with a lengthy history of occult associations. The laboratory was used by one Geoffrey Carlyle, aka 'Rofomagus', 1496 - 1571 (?).

The book is an easy read, with large-font type. Its chapters detail, in a forthright manner, the mechanics of various occult endeavors such as summoning demons and shades, scrying the future, acquiring familiars, and mixing potions for one purpose or another.

One thing that the authors do to promote a sense of verisimilitude to the narrative, is to detail the ingredients and labors associated with casting spells and performing magic. 

Given that the ingredients can be quite unpleasant ('....the spawn of a frog that has been seeped with the juice of hellbore, mixed with semen collected after copulation with a beast, and fouled with the blood of worms, slugs and other creatures of the low earth'), and the more powerful spells require nine or more days of fasting on the part of the mage, it is clear that magic is not a trivial pursuit. 

Magic also is quite dangerous, particularly when involving the summoning of demons; the slightest error on ther part of the summoner can leave him or her vulnerable to a quick and painful death by the hand (or talons) of the summoned entity.

The book has copious illustrations, by Dan Woods. These are competent, but not remarkable. There is some nudity, presumably to signal to parents that 'Magician' is not intended for a juvenile readership.

'Magician' can be had for reasonable prices from used book vendors. Who will want a copy ? Well, if you are fond of the fantasy fiction of the 1970s and early 1980s, when the genre was starting its ascent to a commercial juggernaut, then the book will be entertaining. Those with a fondness for the witchcraft and occult pop culture craze of those years, likely will find the book to be a an affectionate spoof of titles such as 'The Modern Witch's Spellbook' (1971) by Sarah Lyddon Morrison. 

For my part, I'm kind of wondering what would happen if I were to donate a copy to my local middle school's library.........?!

Book Review: The Best of Omni Science Fiction 1980

Book Review: 'The Best of Omni Science Fiction'
Edited by Ben Bova
1980

2 / 5 Stars

In 1973 Kathy Keeton, Bob Guccione's girlfriend, and later wife, asked / insisted on being the CEO of a magazine. Guccione assigned her to Viva, a new 'international magazine for women', and something of a knockoff of Playgirl (which had debuted that same year).

Viva ran through money without earning much in revenue, and folded in 1979. According to Gay Haubner, who worked at Viva as Keeton's secretary, Keeton - whose previous business experience was limited to Exotic Dancing - saw Viva as something of a dabble:

I reminded Miss Keeton of appointments with her hair dresser, dermatologist, astrologer, interior decorator, and jeweler. I fetched packs of Virginia Slims and made cups of tea. After Miss Keeton left for the day, I went into her office to remove and file every paper from her desk; she liked to start fresh every morning. I looked at that empty white desk and wished my mind were as blank.

...........But Viva was only kept alive because of the cascade of cash generated by Penthouse.

Even as Viva foundered, Keeton pressed Guccione to provide her with another outlet, this time, a 'science fiction / science fact' magazine called Omni. The first issue came out in October 1978, and revolutionized the slowly dying enterprise of science fiction periodicals. 

To Keeton's credit, Omni was an immediate success, and stayed in print into 1997.

'The Best of Omni Science Fiction', published in 1980, was an anthology of stories appearing in the first year of the magazine, at which time Ben Bova served as editor.

Interspersed with the stories are pictorial essays, several of which are excerpts from the illustrated novels produced by Harry Harrison in the late 1970s: Mechanismo and Planet Story. Another portfolio came from the art book Immortals of Science Fiction (1980). 

My capsule summaries of the contents:

Found, by Isaac Asimov: a computer, orbiting the Earth inside a customized spaceship, develops error messages. What the repair team discovers is unsettling. A decent enough tale from Asimov. 

Count the Clock that Tells the Time, by Harlan Ellison: Ian Ross lives a remarkably boring life, and as penalty, he finds himself trapped in a Limbo devoted to those who waste time.

This is yet another story where Harlan, in a very earnest and sensitive way, seeks to tell us something Profound about the Human Condition. I was bored.

Body Game, by Robert Sheckley: grandfather is decrepit, and in need of a new body. Could Dapper Dan's Living Model store have what he needs ? A satirical tale from Sheckley.

Unaccompanied Sonata, by Orson Scott Card: in a world where Art is outlawed, Christian Haroldsen risks life and limb to produce music.

This story won considerable praise from the critics and was nominated for a 1980 Hugo award for best short story. It has not aged well, and stands as an exemplar of how sci-fi, at the end of the 70s, simply was recycling themes and motifs (in this case, the lone rebel / holdout who defies Authority because that's what all good humanists must do).  

Iceback Invasion, by Hayford Pierce: the Russians decide to take over the USA by the simple expedient of illegal immigration. A comedic tale, with a political shading that probably would not pass editorial review nowadays.

No Future in It, by Joe R. Haldeman: a short tale about time travel. There is a twist at the very end.

Galatea Galante, by Alfred Bester: Dominie Mainwright decides to create a synthetic woman, a 'Perfect Popsy' that no man can resist.

This easily is the worst tale in the anthology. Bester clearly was trying to display his facility at writing comedic, New Wave sci-fi, but 'Galatea' is an overwritten mess. The adjective 'cringey' didn't exist in 1980, but if it did, it would have applied to 'Galatea Galante'.

Kinsman, by Ben Bova: our Editor decides to apply his Privilege, and prints an excerpt of his 1979 novel here in the pages of Omni. In this excerpt, astronauts training to be space shuttle pilots, annoyed by the hazing meted out by their superiors, decide to turn the tables.

Half-Jack, by Roger Zelazny: a slight tale about a cyborg who 'roams the stars, seeking fulfillment'. Sniff.

Sand Kings, by George R. R. Martin: the odious Simon Kress buys an 'alien ant farm' populated by an unusual species of insect. The so-called Sand Kings may not be quite as tractable as Simon expects them to be........

This is the best story in the anthology.

The anthology closes with an interview with Arthur C. Clarke, with Clarke touching on his 'retirement' from writing sci-fi following the publication of his 1979 novel 'The Phantoms of Paradise' (a clunker about a space elevator). Clarke also addresses UFOs, spoon-bender Uri Geller, and life in Sri Lanka.

The verdict ? 'The Best of Omni Science Fiction' sits quite comfortably in two-star Rating territory. Editor Bova, in an effort to establish that he new magazine was legit, preferentially sought out contributions from 'name' authors, and more than a few of those contributions were underwhelming. 

But it's also important to note that one year after 'The Best of Omni Science Fiction' appeared on shelves, the magazine would publish William Gibson's short story 'The Gernsback Continuum', and in 1985, the cyberpunk classic 'Mozart in Mirrorshades' by Bruce Sterling and Lewis Shiner. So however unadventurous Omni may have seemed in 1980, ultimately the magazine was heading in the right direction.