edited by Stanley Schmidt
Founded in 1930 as Astounding Stories of Super-Science, the magazine Analog Science Fiction/ Science Fact got its current name in 1960, but its ascendancy in the field began in 1937 when John W. Campbell Jr., one of the founding fathers of modern science fiction, took over as editor. This collection begins with his 1934 tale Twilight, written under a pseudonym, Don Stuart. The book concludes with Ted Reynolds' 1979 fantasy Can These Bones Live? In between, many of the writers who legitimized science fiction—Isaac Asimov, Fredric Brown, Theodore Sturgeon, A.E. Van Vogt and Robert Heinlein—are represented. Heinlein's prescience is shown in his 1941 fourth-dimension story And He Built a Crooked House. It begins, "Americans are considered crazy anywhere in the world. They will usually concede a basis for the accusation but point to California as the focus of the infection." The anthology should prove irresistible to those new to science fiction; for those familiar with these stories, going back to them will be a most pleasant form of time travel. (The Dial Press, $10.95)
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