Algis Budrys SF Gateway Omnibus: The Iron Thorn, Michaelmas, Hard Landing

by Algis Budrys

Algis Budrys was one of the few writers who managed to carve out a successful role as an influential critic and editor alongside his fiction writing. BENCHMARKS, his collection of reviews from the pages of GALAXY SCIENCE FICTION, is extremely well-regarded, and for almost two decades he was a judge of the Writers of the Future programme, but it is for his fiction that he is best known. This omnibus collects three of his later THE IRON THORN, MICHAELMAS and HARD LANDING. THE IRON THORN : Honor White Jackson was a human being. But his planet was not Earth, nor his time Now. His world was dominated by a giant Iron Thorn. Beyond the reach of this tower there was supposedly nothing - except a frozen, airless desert where huge winged beasts called Amsirs roamed. Michaelmas and Domino, man and computer, were linked to each other, and to the complete database of Earth. There they virtually ruled the world. For by making the right subtle manipulations, they had the power to change the course of human destiny. HARD The body was found dead on the tracks, electrocuted. The autopsy confirmed what some had always feared, that we are not alone in the universe - and that even now, some visitors are still at large.

Genres: Science Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy

401 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 16, 2014

About the author

Algis Budrys was a Lithuanian-American science fiction author, editor, and critic. He was also known under the pen names Frank Mason, Alger Rome, John A. Sentry, William Scarff, Paul Janvier, and Sam & Janet Argo.

Called "AJ" by friends, Budrys was born Algirdas Jonas Budrys in Königsberg in East Prussia. He was the son of the consul general of the Lithuanian government, (the pre-World War II government still recognized after the war by the United States, even though the Soviet-sponsored government was in power throughout most of Budrys's life). His family was sent to the United States by the Lithuanian government in 1936 when Budrys was 5 years old. During most of his adult life, he held a captain's commission in the Free Lithuanian Army.

Budrys was educated at the University of Miami, and later at Columbia University in New York. His first published science fiction story was The High Purpose, which appeared in Astounding Science Fiction in 1952. Beginning in 1952 Budrys worked as editor and manager for such science fiction publishers as Gnome Press and Galaxy Science Fiction. Some of his science fiction in the 1950s was published under the pen name "John A. Sentry", a reconfigured Anglification of his Lithuanian name. Among his other pseudonyms in the SF magazines of the 1950s and elsewhere, several revived as bylines for vignettes in his magazine Tomorrow Speculative Fiction, is "William Scarff". He also wrote several stories under the names "Ivan Janvier" or "Paul Janvier." He also used the pen name "Alger Rome" in his collaborations with Jerome Bixby.

Budrys's 1960 novella Rogue Moon was nominated for a Hugo Award, and was later anthologized in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two (1973). His Cold War science fiction novel Who? was adapted for the screen in 1973. In addition to numerous Hugo Award and Nebula Award nominations, Budrys won the Science Fiction Research Association's 2007 Pilgrim Award for lifetime contributions to speculative fiction scholarship. In 2009, he was the recipient of one of the first three Solstice Awards presented by the SFWA in recognition of his contributions to the field of science fiction.

Budrys was married to Edna Duna; they had four sons. He last resided in Evanston, Illinois. He died at home, from metastatic malignant melanoma on June 9, 2008.

Reviews

[Jon Mann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Been years since I read _Michaelmas_, and reading more Budrys reminded me how much I liked it. A little like Wolfe & Delany (both great stylists), with his own peculiarities. _The Iron Thorn_ starts simply and viscerally, but goes off in unexpected directions. _Hard Landing_ takes a subject that would be groan-worthy from most SF writers and gives it some depth (better to avoid spoilers here). _Michaelmas_ is still the stand-out, about a celebrity journalist who has rather more influence over the world than anyone realises. Its forecast of future media holds up surprisingly well for something written in the seventies.