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New Writings in SF #1
New Writings in SF-1
THE SCIENCE FICTION OF THE FUTURE
From England--the country where it all began--here is the first radical departure in science fiction in a generation. Here is a dazzling collection of new writers and stories that extends the frontiers of science fiction into the endless realms of the infinite future.
From England--the country where it all began--here is the first radical departure in science fiction in a generation. Here is a dazzling collection of new writers and stories that extends the frontiers of science fiction into the endless realms of the infinite future.
147 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1964
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About the author
John Carnell
124 books4 followersLibrarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 20, 2014
'New Writings in SF' was an experiment of sorts, in that the hardback/paperback would take over the role of SF magazines, publishing original short SF on a quarterly basis, but in book format. The aim of the series, as stated by original Editor John Carnell, was to be "a new departure in the science fiction field,". The first volume was hardly that, featuring, with perhaps one exception, a fairly dated selection. Nevertheless, the series was fairly popular and kick-started a limited trend for anthology series of new work. This series ran until 1977 under three editors with an intermittent publishing schedule.
Contents
Key to Chaos – Edward Mackin
Two’s Company – John Rankine
Man on Bridge – Brian Aldiss
Haggard Honeymoon - Joseph Green & James Webbert
The Sea’s Furthest End - Damien Broderick
Key to Chaos – Edward Mackin
A low-key comic piece featuring a wise-cracking opportunist and a cowardly con-man who, in an attempt to fleece a wealthy businessman, unwittingly create a device which mass-produces portable rejuvenation machines. It reads rather more like an unstructured and rambling first draft than a polished final piece and in style is very traditional.
Two’s Company – John Rankine
A variation on the theme of Tom Godwin’s ‘The Cold Equations’ in that two scientists on a planet which is in the process of being terraformed find themselves stranded and have to use the male’s ingenuity and the female’s mathematical prowess in order to return to their base before their oxygen runs out. The romantic element comes over as stilted and unrealistic, leaving the story itself with little of interest other than the terraforming details.
Man on Bridge – Brian Aldiss
This tale, in comparison to its fellows in this collection, stands out like a sharp and polished gem. In a future totalitarian world, Cerebrals (ie, intellectuals or naturally intelligent humans) are segregated in concentration camps but allowed to engage in scientific research. It is a testament of Aldiss’ skill as a writer that this rather improbable scenario is made chillingly plausible. One of their experiments features Adam (a name chosen possibly for both its biblical connotations and its connection with Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’, a book which Aldiss was later to explore in more depth.)
Adam has had half his brain removed and has become the ultimate Cerebral, the future of Humanity, an intellect driven only by logic and devoid of emotion.
Haggard Honeymoon - Joseph Green & James Webbert
At the lowest end of the quality spectrum in this anthology we have this story of a Uranium mine on Canopus 37.
Miners sent to work here began having nightmares and became psychotic unless it was discovered that not only are women immune to this malady, but newly-wed men are far less susceptible. Subsequently only young newly married couples are sent to Canopus 37 for six month stints. It obviously begs the question why they didn’t employ only female miners. As it turns out, the devolved race of aliens living on the planet are beaming visions of their racial memory into the miner’s heads. The solution: Kill the aliens responsible for the broadcasting. Happy ending, apparently.
A story with no redeeming features whatsoever.
The Sea’s Furthest End - Damien Broderick
A competent but otherwise unremarkable Shaggy God Story (as Brian Aldiss might put it). The heir to the throne of a Feudal Galactic Empire challenges his father’s claim in order to usher in Galactic Federation & Democracy, although it’s not quite as simple as that and things are not what they might at first appear. An immortal figure is at work behind the scenes.
It’s too short a piece to do justice to the basic premise and Broderick does not explore (as many writers do not) the mechanics of running a Galactic Empire.
Of the six writers in this book, Aldiss and Broderick are the only ones whose names might be recognised by today’s readers, although John Rankine did go on to produce many novels.
As the first book of a series which ran to some twenty-odd volumes it’s a weak start, and apart from the Aldiss piece, of dubious quality.
Contents
Key to Chaos – Edward Mackin
Two’s Company – John Rankine
Man on Bridge – Brian Aldiss
Haggard Honeymoon - Joseph Green & James Webbert
The Sea’s Furthest End - Damien Broderick
Key to Chaos – Edward Mackin
A low-key comic piece featuring a wise-cracking opportunist and a cowardly con-man who, in an attempt to fleece a wealthy businessman, unwittingly create a device which mass-produces portable rejuvenation machines. It reads rather more like an unstructured and rambling first draft than a polished final piece and in style is very traditional.
Two’s Company – John Rankine
A variation on the theme of Tom Godwin’s ‘The Cold Equations’ in that two scientists on a planet which is in the process of being terraformed find themselves stranded and have to use the male’s ingenuity and the female’s mathematical prowess in order to return to their base before their oxygen runs out. The romantic element comes over as stilted and unrealistic, leaving the story itself with little of interest other than the terraforming details.
Man on Bridge – Brian Aldiss
This tale, in comparison to its fellows in this collection, stands out like a sharp and polished gem. In a future totalitarian world, Cerebrals (ie, intellectuals or naturally intelligent humans) are segregated in concentration camps but allowed to engage in scientific research. It is a testament of Aldiss’ skill as a writer that this rather improbable scenario is made chillingly plausible. One of their experiments features Adam (a name chosen possibly for both its biblical connotations and its connection with Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’, a book which Aldiss was later to explore in more depth.)
Adam has had half his brain removed and has become the ultimate Cerebral, the future of Humanity, an intellect driven only by logic and devoid of emotion.
Haggard Honeymoon - Joseph Green & James Webbert
At the lowest end of the quality spectrum in this anthology we have this story of a Uranium mine on Canopus 37.
Miners sent to work here began having nightmares and became psychotic unless it was discovered that not only are women immune to this malady, but newly-wed men are far less susceptible. Subsequently only young newly married couples are sent to Canopus 37 for six month stints. It obviously begs the question why they didn’t employ only female miners. As it turns out, the devolved race of aliens living on the planet are beaming visions of their racial memory into the miner’s heads. The solution: Kill the aliens responsible for the broadcasting. Happy ending, apparently.
A story with no redeeming features whatsoever.
The Sea’s Furthest End - Damien Broderick
A competent but otherwise unremarkable Shaggy God Story (as Brian Aldiss might put it). The heir to the throne of a Feudal Galactic Empire challenges his father’s claim in order to usher in Galactic Federation & Democracy, although it’s not quite as simple as that and things are not what they might at first appear. An immortal figure is at work behind the scenes.
It’s too short a piece to do justice to the basic premise and Broderick does not explore (as many writers do not) the mechanics of running a Galactic Empire.
Of the six writers in this book, Aldiss and Broderick are the only ones whose names might be recognised by today’s readers, although John Rankine did go on to produce many novels.
As the first book of a series which ran to some twenty-odd volumes it’s a weak start, and apart from the Aldiss piece, of dubious quality.
December 21, 2023
Contains five stories…
"Key to Chaos" by Edward Mackin--silly thing about a grifter-cyberneticist who helps an inventor invent a machine that invents other machines…? The snappy dialog was great fun, the technobabble a bit less so, and the story ultimately just kinda lays there.
"Two's Company" by John Rankine--LIKED IT! Straightforward SF survival story--the dangers of an alien planet's exotic environment. Lots of "sciencey"-sounding stuff. GOOD!
"Man on Bridge" by Brian W. Aldiss--was I paying attention at all? No idea what this was even supposed to be. I might just have been having an ADD episode.
"Haggard Honeymoon" by J. Green & J. Webbert--I liked this one, even though it depends on old fashioned gender roles and ends with an info dump, it won me over on fun, cool, SF ideas.
"The Sea's Furthest End" by Damien Broderick--way too much clearly Foundation-inspired SF crammed into a too-short space--and with an exceedingly what the--? ending, but I liked this one, too.
Overall, well worth a read.
"Key to Chaos" by Edward Mackin--silly thing about a grifter-cyberneticist who helps an inventor invent a machine that invents other machines…? The snappy dialog was great fun, the technobabble a bit less so, and the story ultimately just kinda lays there.
"Two's Company" by John Rankine--LIKED IT! Straightforward SF survival story--the dangers of an alien planet's exotic environment. Lots of "sciencey"-sounding stuff. GOOD!
"Man on Bridge" by Brian W. Aldiss--was I paying attention at all? No idea what this was even supposed to be. I might just have been having an ADD episode.
"Haggard Honeymoon" by J. Green & J. Webbert--I liked this one, even though it depends on old fashioned gender roles and ends with an info dump, it won me over on fun, cool, SF ideas.
"The Sea's Furthest End" by Damien Broderick--way too much clearly Foundation-inspired SF crammed into a too-short space--and with an exceedingly what the--? ending, but I liked this one, too.
Overall, well worth a read.
December 1, 2021
The first of what would prove to be a long-running series of original sf anthologies out of the UK, finishing with 30 volumes in total. This was rather ground-breaking stuff in its time, being the first of this particular type of publication. Carnell was just off editing New Worlds magazine (1946, 1949-63), leaving after that publication had been sold to a new publisher. There are five stories here – 2 short stories and 3 novelettes – with the best of them being “Man on Bridge” by Brian W. Aldiss and “The Sea’s Furthest End” by Australian writer Damien Broderick. The rest read like standard sf material from the late 50s. This is not a great collection, though a competent one, but needs to be praised for what it was attempting to do, and for what the series became.
R: 3.2/5.0
R: 3.2/5.0
October 22, 2025
"Key to Chaos" by Edward Mackin
6/10
I didn't like it much at first. Then something interesting finally happened, and I was reminded of "Steins;Gate" (two men unwittingly inventing something beyond their understanding).
...
"Two's Company" by John Rankine
5/10
This had the strangest writing style I've ever encountered. I don't think it's necessarily wrong (all the right words are there, but I just couldn't process them for whatever reason). I can't put my finger on what makes it so weird. But it took me three days to get through this 14-page story. I failed utterly on the first day to even finish one page. On the second day, I took deep breaths and read one word at a time. That worked, but it was slow going, and I didn't finish it until the next day. Again, I'm not sure what it was. I did notice that the sentences were long and had very few commas. Also, the word "and" was used rather heavily. But I'm sure there's more to it than just that. The story itself wasn't too interesting. (If you don't want third parties reading your private letters, have them typed out by Mr. John Rankine; no one will be able to decipher them.)
...
"Man on Bridge" by Brian W. Aldiss
4/10
The opening portion of this story was written in "Headlinese" (like the title), which was very annoying. Thankfully, it transitioned to a first-person account in the form of a letter (with an unrealistic level of detail for such). It wasn't poorly written, but the story was stupid.
...
"Haggard Honeymoon" by Joseph Green and James Webbert
7/10
I enjoyed this one. I was going to point out that if these people knew that women were unaffected by the mysterious madness, they should have simply sent an all-female crew to the planet. But then one woman is affected (it's never explained why). But still. Sending all those men (and their wives) to the planet and back so regularly was a huge waste of resources that could have easily been avoided. Also, there's a character named "Bert Simpson"; close, but no cigar.
...
"The Sea's Furthest End" by Damien Broderick
5/10
The writing was fine, but the story ended up being a waste of time.
...
6/10
I didn't like it much at first. Then something interesting finally happened, and I was reminded of "Steins;Gate" (two men unwittingly inventing something beyond their understanding).
...
"Two's Company" by John Rankine
5/10
This had the strangest writing style I've ever encountered. I don't think it's necessarily wrong (all the right words are there, but I just couldn't process them for whatever reason). I can't put my finger on what makes it so weird. But it took me three days to get through this 14-page story. I failed utterly on the first day to even finish one page. On the second day, I took deep breaths and read one word at a time. That worked, but it was slow going, and I didn't finish it until the next day. Again, I'm not sure what it was. I did notice that the sentences were long and had very few commas. Also, the word "and" was used rather heavily. But I'm sure there's more to it than just that. The story itself wasn't too interesting. (If you don't want third parties reading your private letters, have them typed out by Mr. John Rankine; no one will be able to decipher them.)
...
"Man on Bridge" by Brian W. Aldiss
4/10
The opening portion of this story was written in "Headlinese" (like the title), which was very annoying. Thankfully, it transitioned to a first-person account in the form of a letter (with an unrealistic level of detail for such). It wasn't poorly written, but the story was stupid.
...
"Haggard Honeymoon" by Joseph Green and James Webbert
7/10
I enjoyed this one. I was going to point out that if these people knew that women were unaffected by the mysterious madness, they should have simply sent an all-female crew to the planet. But then one woman is affected (it's never explained why). But still. Sending all those men (and their wives) to the planet and back so regularly was a huge waste of resources that could have easily been avoided. Also, there's a character named "Bert Simpson"; close, but no cigar.
...
"The Sea's Furthest End" by Damien Broderick
5/10
The writing was fine, but the story ended up being a waste of time.
...
March 11, 2016
In two minds about this book. As a late golden-age collection, it's more than passable, and the five novella-length stories are, generally speaking, OK, but the book certainly isn't the welcoming of a new age of writing it purports to be. The first two stories are enjoyable enough 50s-style tales, one tongue-in-cheek and one an adventure type, but neither of them is near the top of even that type, and certainly not a step up to a new style. The Brian Aldiss story is the best written, and is the only story of the five to indicate a change in science fiction towards a new style. The remaining two stories... the fourth has the sort of preposterous level of pseudoscience and jumping from idea to conclusion that you'd expect in early 1930s tales. The last is a sword-and-sorcery tale in spacesuits, accompanied by a neat but far too jarring twist in the tail that almost seems to have been added on at the last moment just to make the story seem different from the norm. It would have been a better, if more ordinary, story without the twist.
November 22, 2014
5 short stories: two hapless con artists (new tech sales and engineering) try to keep their jobs; Icy relations between male/female military pair are softened in a freak crash on a rapidly cooling planet; dystopian anti-intellectuals contemplate lobotomy as a population control method; stupid alien artifact makes stupid people act stupidly; space fantasy role of a reincarnating prometheus, steeped in chess metaphor. All protagonists were privileged males.
I didn't agree with the premise stated in the forward that these stories are in any way different or break any previous molds in sci-fi--on the contrary, I found most of them dull and uninspiring. One story--the first, Key to Chaos by Edward Mackin--I didn't even bother finishing. Why was this collection allowed to start a series (New Writings in SF#)? Will I not like other collections edited by John Carnell?
I didn't agree with the premise stated in the forward that these stories are in any way different or break any previous molds in sci-fi--on the contrary, I found most of them dull and uninspiring. One story--the first, Key to Chaos by Edward Mackin--I didn't even bother finishing. Why was this collection allowed to start a series (New Writings in SF#)? Will I not like other collections edited by John Carnell?
December 18, 2016
My first delving into SF fiction. Bought for me by my mum when we were out one day.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews