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The Crystal Ship: Three Original Novellas of Science Fiction
Contents:
Introduction / Robert Silverberg
The Crystal Ship / Joan D. Vinge
Megan's World / Marta Randall
Screwtop / Vonda N. McIntyre
Introduction / Robert Silverberg
The Crystal Ship / Joan D. Vinge
Megan's World / Marta Randall
Screwtop / Vonda N. McIntyre
208 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 1976
1 person is currently reading
115 people want to read
About the author
Robert Silverberg
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Robert Silverberg is a highly celebrated American science fiction author and editor known for his prolific output and literary range. Over a career spanning decades, he has won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards and was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2004. Inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in 1999, Silverberg is recognized for both his immense productivity and his contributions to the genre's evolution.
Born in Brooklyn, he began writing in his teens and won his first Hugo Award in 1956 as the best new writer. Throughout the 1950s, he produced vast amounts of fiction, often under pseudonyms, and was known for writing up to a million words a year. When the market declined, he diversified into other genres, including historical nonfiction and erotica.
Silverberg’s return to science fiction in the 1960s marked a shift toward deeper psychological and literary themes, contributing significantly to the New Wave movement. Acclaimed works from this period include Downward to the Earth, Dying Inside, Nightwings, and The World Inside. In the 1980s, he launched the Majipoor series with Lord Valentine’s Castle, creating one of the most imaginative planetary settings in science fiction.
Though he announced his retirement from writing in the mid-1970s, Silverberg returned with renewed vigor and continued to publish acclaimed fiction into the 1990s. He received further recognition with the Nebula-winning Sailing to Byzantium and the Hugo-winning Gilgamesh in the Outback.
Silverberg has also played a significant role as an editor and anthologist, shaping science fiction literature through both his own work and his influence on others. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, author Karen Haber.
Robert Silverberg is a highly celebrated American science fiction author and editor known for his prolific output and literary range. Over a career spanning decades, he has won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards and was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2004. Inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in 1999, Silverberg is recognized for both his immense productivity and his contributions to the genre's evolution.
Born in Brooklyn, he began writing in his teens and won his first Hugo Award in 1956 as the best new writer. Throughout the 1950s, he produced vast amounts of fiction, often under pseudonyms, and was known for writing up to a million words a year. When the market declined, he diversified into other genres, including historical nonfiction and erotica.
Silverberg’s return to science fiction in the 1960s marked a shift toward deeper psychological and literary themes, contributing significantly to the New Wave movement. Acclaimed works from this period include Downward to the Earth, Dying Inside, Nightwings, and The World Inside. In the 1980s, he launched the Majipoor series with Lord Valentine’s Castle, creating one of the most imaginative planetary settings in science fiction.
Though he announced his retirement from writing in the mid-1970s, Silverberg returned with renewed vigor and continued to publish acclaimed fiction into the 1990s. He received further recognition with the Nebula-winning Sailing to Byzantium and the Hugo-winning Gilgamesh in the Outback.
Silverberg has also played a significant role as an editor and anthologist, shaping science fiction literature through both his own work and his influence on others. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, author Karen Haber.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
June 28, 2023
All three of the stories included in this book were interesting, and each presented a nice slice of worldbuilding from their respective glimpses at future civilizations. None of the stories were particularly optimistic about humanity (in contrast to some sci-fi that presents humanity's technological progress as morality and have very humanist overtones), but they were enjoyable sci-fi stories.
I liked all 3 stories, but the middle one, "Megan's World" was my favourite of the bunch. It presented the most interesting alien world with nuanced and compelling factions and characters. Just a very fun and intriguing story that kept me interested the whole time. The other two were also interesting but were a little slower than Megan's World and didn't have the same intrigue in my opinion.
I liked all 3 stories, but the middle one, "Megan's World" was my favourite of the bunch. It presented the most interesting alien world with nuanced and compelling factions and characters. Just a very fun and intriguing story that kept me interested the whole time. The other two were also interesting but were a little slower than Megan's World and didn't have the same intrigue in my opinion.
January 23, 2020
3.25/5 (collated rating: Good)
According to a list compiled by Ian Sales [here] only a handful of SF anthologies have hit print solely featuring women authors—none were published before 1972 and, surprisingly, few after 1980 (there seems to be a resurgence in the last few years). The Crystal Ship (1976) ed. Robert Silverberg, is one of these. It contains the three novellas by three important SF authors who got their start in the 70s: Marta Randall, Joan D. Vinge, Vondra McIntyre. The latter two achieved critical success: Joan D. Vinge won the Hugo for her novel The Snow Queen (1980) and Vonda N. McIntyre won the Hugo for her novel Dreamsnake (1978). Marta Randall, on the other hand, despite her Nebula nomination for the intriguing Islands (1976) remains to this day lesser known.
All three of the novellas feature impressive female protagonists and narratives that subvert many of SF’s [..]
For the complete review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...
According to a list compiled by Ian Sales [here] only a handful of SF anthologies have hit print solely featuring women authors—none were published before 1972 and, surprisingly, few after 1980 (there seems to be a resurgence in the last few years). The Crystal Ship (1976) ed. Robert Silverberg, is one of these. It contains the three novellas by three important SF authors who got their start in the 70s: Marta Randall, Joan D. Vinge, Vondra McIntyre. The latter two achieved critical success: Joan D. Vinge won the Hugo for her novel The Snow Queen (1980) and Vonda N. McIntyre won the Hugo for her novel Dreamsnake (1978). Marta Randall, on the other hand, despite her Nebula nomination for the intriguing Islands (1976) remains to this day lesser known.
All three of the novellas feature impressive female protagonists and narratives that subvert many of SF’s [..]
For the complete review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...
April 10, 2017
The first story (The Crystal Ship, Joan Vinge) is an interesting tale of the meeting of a decadent star-spanning human civilization with a furry, collective native race—but the native race's special ability to commune with their neighbors and their ancestors, rather than helping them, causes them to refuse any change or progress and stick to huddling in drafty tents in the cold, fighting among themselves. Their special ability has become an evolutionary dead end. Just as the human "Starmen's" addiction to fantasy has killed theirs.
The second story (Megan’s World, Vonda N. McIntyre) is possibly a modernization of old-school space adventure, the kind that uses descriptives like “the stocky ethnologist” and where wild coincidences are explained by having the main characters say, gosh, what a wild coincidence. The human Federation has discovered a planet that has minerals on it, as if this is a rare thing, and wants them; but the planet also has a race of people who look like cats, call themselves Tabbies (Taebish) and live in a city of panthers (Apantha City). At one point their narrative voice has them calling themselves “humans”, which I assumed was a translation of whatever their own term was, but then their narrative voice calls their infants “kitlings”. It’s just a thin veneer of alienness covering a human perspective —at one point, the ambassador of the nation that considers itself more civilized than the kingdom the Terrans have landed in says that “civilization” has come to the planet, referring not to themselves but to the humans.
It’s biggest problem, though, is that the author has no sense of how *big* space is, and how much it contains. The biggest coincidence is not just a wild coincidence; it is impossible. And the predicament that the mining company is in would theoretically be solvable simply by mining one of the many other planets, asteroids, comets, or whatever stuff happens to be in this solar system. They specifically don't care about the art, the plant life, or the creatures, just the generic minerals. Not only is no explanation given for why they can't use other sources in this system—no mention of this planet being the only surprise source of unobtainium or its equivalent—I don’t even see it acknowledged as a possibility.
The story does have some nice political intrigue in it, as well as some interesting ideas, including a cybernetically-enhanced human who would fit right in with the cyberpunk movement. The book was published in 1976, which I believe predates cyberpunk—which is interesting because that is also sort of what the third story (Screwtop, Marta Randall) is about: a tricked-out human (more genetic than cyber; they may not have any cyber on them) who refuses to do what they were bred to do, and so are sent to a prison planet to convince them to get with the program (so to speak).
I picked this up because I generally remember enjoying a previous three-novella collection edited by Robert Silverberg, and because the story blurbs all seem interesting. And they were; I generally liked them, but the second two had better ideas than execution. The first story was the clear standout, for me, and that may be why it was chosen to title the collection.
The second story (Megan’s World, Vonda N. McIntyre) is possibly a modernization of old-school space adventure, the kind that uses descriptives like “the stocky ethnologist” and where wild coincidences are explained by having the main characters say, gosh, what a wild coincidence. The human Federation has discovered a planet that has minerals on it, as if this is a rare thing, and wants them; but the planet also has a race of people who look like cats, call themselves Tabbies (Taebish) and live in a city of panthers (Apantha City). At one point their narrative voice has them calling themselves “humans”, which I assumed was a translation of whatever their own term was, but then their narrative voice calls their infants “kitlings”. It’s just a thin veneer of alienness covering a human perspective —at one point, the ambassador of the nation that considers itself more civilized than the kingdom the Terrans have landed in says that “civilization” has come to the planet, referring not to themselves but to the humans.
It’s biggest problem, though, is that the author has no sense of how *big* space is, and how much it contains. The biggest coincidence is not just a wild coincidence; it is impossible. And the predicament that the mining company is in would theoretically be solvable simply by mining one of the many other planets, asteroids, comets, or whatever stuff happens to be in this solar system. They specifically don't care about the art, the plant life, or the creatures, just the generic minerals. Not only is no explanation given for why they can't use other sources in this system—no mention of this planet being the only surprise source of unobtainium or its equivalent—I don’t even see it acknowledged as a possibility.
The story does have some nice political intrigue in it, as well as some interesting ideas, including a cybernetically-enhanced human who would fit right in with the cyberpunk movement. The book was published in 1976, which I believe predates cyberpunk—which is interesting because that is also sort of what the third story (Screwtop, Marta Randall) is about: a tricked-out human (more genetic than cyber; they may not have any cyber on them) who refuses to do what they were bred to do, and so are sent to a prison planet to convince them to get with the program (so to speak).
I picked this up because I generally remember enjoying a previous three-novella collection edited by Robert Silverberg, and because the story blurbs all seem interesting. And they were; I generally liked them, but the second two had better ideas than execution. The first story was the clear standout, for me, and that may be why it was chosen to title the collection.
November 24, 2018
Joan Vinge's titular novella started out the collection, and it blew me away. I'd read stuff by her and McIntyre but hadn't even heard of Marta Randall, but I loved all three stories very much. It looks like this book may be a bit hard to find in bookstores (I got mine at the library) but it is definitely a worthwhile read. If you're not familiar with many women sci-fi writers, this would be a good place to get a taste. Feel free to skip the foreward by Robert Silverberg which basically boils down to: "Well, gee-whiz, women are people too, so we should listen to their experience."
April 18, 2025
Very solid work all around, just barely creeping into the 5-star range for me because the middle story, Megan's World, took a left turn near the end that elevated it.
June 1, 2023
Solid 3 stars. This is a three-novella anthology, with each by a different female sf author of the Seventies. A good sampler platter!
"THE CRYSTAL SHIP" by Joan D. Vinge ***½ - A kind of dying-earth, post-contact tragedy of lotus-eating humans and genetic-memory kangaroo-men.
"MEGAN'S WORLD" by Marta Randall *** - First contact with a medieval alien civ, the actual story was decent but (1) the aliens didn't feel that alien, and (2) the humans' motivation of strip mining part of the planet seems comically, cosmically absurd when metallic asteroids exist. It would work if there was something special to be extracted (even something as goofy as 'unobtanium' in AVATAR) but no.
"SCREWTOP" by Vonda N. McIntyre **½ - A prison work-camp story. Not really that sfnal other than that it takes place on another planet and there's a kind of person called a "tetraparental," i.e. a chimera from four genomes, which isn't that relevant to the story in itself, it's more of a "specialness" flag.
HUNDRED BOOK CHALLENGE #8
"THE CRYSTAL SHIP" by Joan D. Vinge ***½ - A kind of dying-earth, post-contact tragedy of lotus-eating humans and genetic-memory kangaroo-men.
"MEGAN'S WORLD" by Marta Randall *** - First contact with a medieval alien civ, the actual story was decent but (1) the aliens didn't feel that alien, and (2) the humans' motivation of strip mining part of the planet seems comically, cosmically absurd when metallic asteroids exist. It would work if there was something special to be extracted (even something as goofy as 'unobtanium' in AVATAR) but no.
"SCREWTOP" by Vonda N. McIntyre **½ - A prison work-camp story. Not really that sfnal other than that it takes place on another planet and there's a kind of person called a "tetraparental," i.e. a chimera from four genomes, which isn't that relevant to the story in itself, it's more of a "specialness" flag.
HUNDRED BOOK CHALLENGE #8
December 12, 2014
3.5 stars.
Let me preface this by saying that this book was never really going to be my thing. I'm not really into sci-fi, and even less into old sci-fi, and I don't really go in for short stories/novellas either. But I am into women writers, so here we are.
Each of these stories was better than the one before it. It's a real pity they weren't all as good as Screwtop, because then I would have enjoyed this collection a lot more. I felt that all three suffered from some overwriting and telling rather than showing, but to different extents.
I found The Crystal Ship confusing and hard to follow. I think it was going for a (heavy-handed) critique of colonialism, but its treatment of the native species mainly felt condescending (it read to me like the "noble savage" trope, set against the decadence of the spaceship dwellers) and made me uncomfortable. I didn't totally follow what was going on in this one, to be honest. It was only about 60 pages long and I still had to skim half of it to get through it.
I enjoyed Megan's World far more, and found the style and the characters much easier to engage with. It read far more like high fantasy to me, and I think it would have done well as a full-length fantasy novel. I really liked Megan herself, and I would have been interested to read what happens after the end of this novella.
Screwtop was far and away my favourite. It felt the most radical, particularly in how it conceptualises relationships. I'm always disappointed in sci-fi in which relationships and gender roles and other norms are somehow all exactly the same, and this was great in that respect. At the centre of this story is a family of two men and a woman, and at no stage is their triad treated as abnormal (or if it is, it's only in relation to making bonds at all in the context of the harsh prison camp). They have a loving relationship with one another that's at the heart of this whole story, and it's wonderful. Kylis is a sympathetic protagonist, and this was the only story that really involved me emotionally. I read it all in one sitting, after taking weeks to get through the first hundred pages of the book.
Let me preface this by saying that this book was never really going to be my thing. I'm not really into sci-fi, and even less into old sci-fi, and I don't really go in for short stories/novellas either. But I am into women writers, so here we are.
Each of these stories was better than the one before it. It's a real pity they weren't all as good as Screwtop, because then I would have enjoyed this collection a lot more. I felt that all three suffered from some overwriting and telling rather than showing, but to different extents.
I found The Crystal Ship confusing and hard to follow. I think it was going for a (heavy-handed) critique of colonialism, but its treatment of the native species mainly felt condescending (it read to me like the "noble savage" trope, set against the decadence of the spaceship dwellers) and made me uncomfortable. I didn't totally follow what was going on in this one, to be honest. It was only about 60 pages long and I still had to skim half of it to get through it.
I enjoyed Megan's World far more, and found the style and the characters much easier to engage with. It read far more like high fantasy to me, and I think it would have done well as a full-length fantasy novel. I really liked Megan herself, and I would have been interested to read what happens after the end of this novella.
Screwtop was far and away my favourite. It felt the most radical, particularly in how it conceptualises relationships. I'm always disappointed in sci-fi in which relationships and gender roles and other norms are somehow all exactly the same, and this was great in that respect. At the centre of this story is a family of two men and a woman, and at no stage is their triad treated as abnormal (or if it is, it's only in relation to making bonds at all in the context of the harsh prison camp). They have a loving relationship with one another that's at the heart of this whole story, and it's wonderful. Kylis is a sympathetic protagonist, and this was the only story that really involved me emotionally. I read it all in one sitting, after taking weeks to get through the first hundred pages of the book.
Want to read
June 8, 20253 novellas:
(1/3 read)
The Crystal Ship (1976) • Joan D. Vinge
Megan's World (1976) • Marta Randall
*** Screwtop (1976) • Vonda N. McIntyre
Notes: Another of those mostly forgotten but invariable worthwhile 70s collections of original sf commissioned by Silverberg. 3 novellas by 3 of the best women sf authors of the day (not named Le Guin, Russ or Tiptree).
(1/3 read)
The Crystal Ship (1976) • Joan D. Vinge
Megan's World (1976) • Marta Randall
*** Screwtop (1976) • Vonda N. McIntyre
Notes: Another of those mostly forgotten but invariable worthwhile 70s collections of original sf commissioned by Silverberg. 3 novellas by 3 of the best women sf authors of the day (not named Le Guin, Russ or Tiptree).
November 9, 2014
Each story was more captivating than the one before it.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews