All the Traps of Earth and other stories of fantastic and wonderful worlds

by Clifford D. Simak

Alternative cover for same ISBN: here.

A collection of Simak's sci-fi stories.

Contents:
- All the Traps of Earth (1960) novelette
- Good Night, Mr James (1951) novelette
- Drop Dead (1956) novelette
- No Life of Their Own (1959) novella
- The Sitters (1958) novelette
- Crying Jag (1960) novelette
- Installment Plan (1959) novelette
- Condition of Employment (1960) short story
- Project Mastodon (1955) novelette.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Short Stories, Fantasy, Collections, Anthologies, Ebooks

278 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published June 1, 1963

About the author

"He was honored by fans with three Hugo awards and by colleagues with one Nebula award and was named the third Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) in 1977." (Wikipedia)

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford...

Reviews

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reread because I opine that Simak's shorts are even better than his novels and I cannot get satiated by them. If it's been a few years, an opportunity for a reread shall be grasped. Because the thing about Simak is that he always gives me that Sense of Wonder and that What If. Usually decent world-building (or world-describing, in his pastorals) and characters, too. Often beautiful writing and wise insights. And pretty much timeless... sure, they didn't have cellphones back on the farm, but that lack isn't even noticeable....

All the Traps of Earth (1960) Robots by this author are different from those by Asimov. This one would well be read as a companion to The Bicentennial Man.

Good Night, Mr James (1951) First a horror story, and then an even more horrifying twist. I'm not sure about the word 'puudly' though.

Drop Dead (1956) Erm, not quite what is usually meant by 'going native.' And I hope they at least send a message back home....

No Life of Their Own (1959) This and the following are set in the same town and really should be reversed. Is 'luck' a limited resource? Well, What If it were? Btw, I like the prediction of VR... a "live-it" that's fully portable would be cool, and it has a cool name too. Also there's a good play on words at the end of this.

The Sitters (1958) I didn't get the ending. The principal is feeling Old even though he's not yet 70... and seems to take an extreme measure to cope with aging... or is he actually fighting against it?

Crying Jag (1960) Almost a shaggy dog story in that the payoff isn't a big deal, but still a clever story.

Installment Plan (1959) Lots of ideas related to robots, and merchants vs. pirates, and colonialism. Some poignancy too.

Condition of Employment (1960) Thrilling mystery. Short & intense.

Project Mastodon (1955) Cool premise, unsatisfying execution... but now I'm ready to read Mastodonia.

[Sarah Newton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this, the first Simak I've read; I got a recommendation at EasterCon 2013, and jumped in. It's very much golden age / silver age sci-fi: atomic age themes, rocket ships, male heroes. But it also has a good bit of thought behind it, and the ideas have aged well. Stories about the weirdness of alien life and the multiple copy paradox stick in my mind particularly. Recommended for a good scifi yarn: I'll be picking up more Simak.

[Denise · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of stories, novellas, and "novellettes" from the 1950s and '60s by the brilliant sci-fi writer Clifford D. Simak. These stories are original and surprising, and they wear their age pretty well. That is to say, they are wonderful mind experiments, but don't include any women (except for one housekeeper). Simak's vision of the future went more toward very human and humane robots or aliens and interstellar travel than towards computers; hence you get a trade supervisor on a planet at the far edges of the galaxy supervising his friendly crew of adaptable robots, but struggling with actual PAPERwork in his tent. But it is just this kind of anachronism that gives Simak's writings their warm and familiar atmosphere.

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

My 1974 Manor edition of this book contains six stories; there must be different editions, because I've seen lists with nine entries as the table of contents. Mine opens with the titular story, a robot tale that I think is just as good as any short robot-themed work that Isaac Asimov ever published. Good Night, Mr. James is a quiet and creepy chiller, very much different than the bulk of Simak's work. It was adapted as a fine episode of the second season of the original Outer Limits. Drop Dead is a good first contact story with a very different kind of alien; fans of Robert Silverberg will like this one. The Sitters is another good one featuring another brand of alien; it reminded me of some down-home nostalgic Ray Bradbury stories. Installment Plan is Simak at his best, a wry tall-tale that once more features robots and quirky aliens and how a clever man wins through. The last story included is Installment Plan, a short tale of interplanetary travel with an O. Henry twist. It also includes an interesting and amusing counterpoint to Heinlein's The Green Hills of Earth that must have been intentional. The title story was published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction edited by Robert P. Mills in 1960, but all five of the others originally appeared in Horace Gold's Galaxy Magazine from 1951-1960. I believe many people think of Simak as being primarily for Campbell's Astounding, but mush of his better work appeared in other venues, primarily Galaxy. Simak is always a comfortable read.

[Deedee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clifford D. Simak is an uneven writer. The best of his stories belong in any collection of “the best of science fiction”, while the majority are read once and forget, and he has a few clunkers as well. The best story of this collection is the title story “All the Traps of Earth”, a story that includes robots, space travel, and self-determination. ("No Life of Their Own" is a close second -- space aliens in smalltown America!) “Drop Dead” and “Crying Jag” are good stories also. “Installment Plan” is tedious and very dated. Recommended because most of the stories are good to great.

[Erik Wennermark · Rating 4 out of 5]

This guy's stories remind me of the episode of DS9 when the Prophets send them back in time and all the crew work for a pulp sci-fi mag. The Chief O'Brien character, yeah that's Simak. Robots, robots, and more robots.

[Paul Sand]

Sitting on my varied bookshelves since (I think) I purchased it for the 50¢ cover price back in 1967. (The copy available via Amazon will set you back $5.28, plus $4.49 delivery.) I haven't been the biggest fan of Clifford D. Simak's novels, especially the later ones, but this collection of six short stories/novellas from 1951-1960 was pretty enjoyable. I found myself thinking "This might make a pretty good episode of Twilight Zone or even Black Mirror" for some of them.

Thumbnail summaries:

"All the Traps of Earth": The family that owned domestic robot Richard Daniel has finally died off after centuries of keeping him employed. Which was technically illegal under Earth law, and now he's slated for a memory erasure and a personality transplant. Instead, he stows away on an outbound starship. Specifically, he attaches himself to the outside of the ship, which causes him to be altered in an unexpected way during the hyperspace jump. How will he deal with his new capabilities?

"Good Night, Mr. James": Henderson James awakens on a grassy embankment with no initial idea of how or why he got there. Ah, but gradually it comes to him: he's got a gun, and it is his responsibility to hunt down and kill the disgusting and dangerous Puudly, an alien creature about to breed. And if it succeeds in breeding, it spells doom for humanity. But Mr. James also comes to awareness that his situation is not quite as straightforward as it seems at first.

"Drop Dead". A survey crew is checking out the odd ecosystem of a new planet: there are "critters", herd animals which look like "something from the maudlin pen of a well-alcoholed cartoonist". And, on a daily basis, one of the critters wanders up to the crew's campsite, and promptly (see the title) "drops dead" at their feet. What's going on with that? Well, it turns out this story is probably the one most amendable to a Black Mirror treatment.

But "The Sitters" is also right up there too. It opens with Millville's high school football coach bemoaning to his principal about the loss of a couple of his star players; they would prefer to devote more time to their academic studies. And this turns out to be a more general phenomenon: the youngsters in the town have gotten better-behaved, their test scores are up significantly. Could this be the influence of the "Sitters"? Those are aliens, but don't hold that against them. They settled in, and offer free childcare to harried Millville parents. Asking nothing in return! Except…

"Installment Plan" is another mystery. In the capitalist future, exploration/exploitation teams head out to various planets to find likely items that Earth needs, in exchange for the usual array of trinkets and activities. It's all very laissez-faire, non-coercive, but the team sent to Garson IV (a few humans, mostly robots) has run into a serious snag. The local ecology provides the podar, which can be used to produce a wonder tranquilizer drug badly needed back on Earth. But a previously-negotiated deal has fallen apart for unknown reasons, and even the crew's diligent efforts fail to revive it. What's going on? ("The answer may amuse you.")

And finally: a short-short story, "Condition of Employment". Rocket engineer Anson Cooper is stranded on Earth, running out of money, desperately homesick for the thin atmosphere and arid deserts of Mars. He can't abide Terra's lush greenness, cloying odors, oppressive climate,… Fortunately, an equally desperate spaceship captain hires him on to babysit his rocket's iffy engines all the way back to Mars. It's dangerous and grueling, and when he finally gets back to Mars, … all is revealed.

I'm giving this five stars on Goodreads, because it really brought back memories of reading pulpy sci-fi magazines back in the sixties.

[The Scribbling Man · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one has seen a few reprints. The original publication included a number of stories, whereas subsequent publications have seen some of the originally published stories split off into another collection entitled The Night of Puudly. I own three copies, two of which are in danger of falling apart, so I opted for the less aesthetic of my two foursquare editions, albeit slightly more intact. This edition contains the following four stories:

All the Traps of the Earth - 3.75

Read a while back to help complete a partial read of the Open Road collection I Am Crying All Inside. A Simak classic, as I understand it. Certainly a story often brought up by Simak fans. I enjoyed it very much, though I wasn't too invested in the concept of a mechanical individual evolving to develop psychic abilities, which turns out to be a pretty significant element. It is, however, a great example of pastoral Simak leaking into the epic reaches of space. There's the same flavour here that you'll find in stories like Way Station and City.


Drop Dead - 4

Pulpy, spare prose. Thin characters. Compelling premise that builds toward a fun but dark conclusion. Nothing of Simak’s pastoral flair, but solid concept-driven sci-fi.


No Life of Their Own - 3.75

The definition of quaint. Written from the perspective of a young human child, living in a suburb seemingly dominated by extraterrestrial immigrants. This, however, is incidental. It's a whimsical setting, sets us up with a colourful host of characters and a plot involving luck-bringing extra-dimensional entities. A bit drawn out, but very readable and quite charming. It ultimately held my attention and was an enjoyable read.


The Sitters - 3.75

I've read this one twice so chose not to read it again, but it's a good one. My thoughts aren't fresh, but it's classically Simakian. Playing on age, youth, nostalgia, and a quasi-benevolence from extraterrestrials. Has a nostalgic fairy-quality and similar themes that crossover with the likes of Ring Around the Sun and short story "Immigrant".

[Tomislav · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the early 80s, I was reading through the backlog of Clifford Simak books.

This collection contains some of his earlier stories:
All the Traps of Earth (1960) novelette
Good Night, Mr James (1951) novelette
Drop Dead (1956) novelette
No Life of Their Own (1959) novella
The Sitters (1958) novelette
Crying Jag (1960) novelette by
Installment Plan (1959) novelette
Condition of Employment (1960) story
Project Mastodon (1955) novelette

[Sandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Looking back, it strikes me with some surprise that, up until very recently, I had not read any of sci-fi Grand Master Clifford D. Simak's shorter work in over 40 years. Oh, I had read any number of the author's novels during those four decades, but since reading his 1968 collection "So Bright the Vision" back in 1981, none of his work of a shorter length. Coming to my rescue in this regard was the Wisconsin-born writer's "All the Traps of Earth," which had been sitting here at home on a shelf, unread, for ages now. And as it turns out, the collection is an absolutely splendid one, with nary a clinker in the bunch.

"All the Traps of Earth" gathers together nine of Simak's stories from the 10-year period 1951 - 1960--one short story, six novelettes, and two novellas--most of them drawn from the sci-fi digest magazine "Galaxy." The collection was initially released as a $3.95 Doubleday hardcover in 1962, with cover art by one Lawrence Ratzkin. At least half a dozen different publishers would come out with their own editions over the next decade and a half; the one that I was fortunate enough to acquire somewhere, somewhen is the $2.25 paperback from Avon, released in 1979 with a wonderfully faithful cover by Jan Esteves. I believe that the book's most recent iteration is also from Avon; the 1988 paperback with another faithful cover illustration, this time by Jim Warren. At the time of the collection's initial release, Simak was pushing 60 years old and had already had eight novels and almost 100 stories published, although "Way Station," for which he'd win one of his three Hugo Awards, was still a year away. This collection, thus, reveals the author for the seasoned pro that he assuredly was at this stage in his career, and its nine tales cover a wide range of subject matter while providing top-notch entertainment value. Personally, I just loved every single one of them. Even Scottish critic David Pringle, a much stricter judge than myself, says of the collection, in his "Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction," "Nine limpidly written and very enjoyable stories." Even if you don't believe me, you can always trust Pringle!

Now, as to the nine wonders in the book itself, the collection kicks off in a big way with its title piece, "All the Traps of Earth" (a novelette that originally appeared in the January 1960 issue of "The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction"). In this one, 600-year-old domestic robot Richard Daniel desperately tries to leave Earth after the last member of the Barrington family, for which it had served all those centuries, passes away. Earth, it seems, has a law forbidding the existence of any robots over 100 years old, unless they undergo a complete personality wipe. Richard Daniel, thus, desirous of remaining who it has long been, attaches itself to the outside of a space-bound star cruiser and later undergoes some pretty psychedelic experiences when the ship goes into hyperspace. And Richard Daniel's subsequent adventures on a planet being worked largely by fellow robots, as a stowaway on a tramp spaceship, and on the idyllic planet Arcadia soon reveal that being so directly exposed to hyperspace has done something to its brain; the robot can now see mechanical objects and human beings as diagrams, and move things telekinetically with its mind.... This warm, wonderful and winning story gets the collection off to a terrific start, and is followed by three more really superlative tales.

In "Good Night, Mr. James" (a novelette from the March 1951 "Galaxy Science Fiction" magazine), the titular Henderson James, a 36-year-old alien psychologist, makes the mistake of his life when he brings an alien puudly back to Earth for study--despite its importation being highly illegal. And when the psychotically violent and very pregnant puudly escapes from confinement, James has no other choice but to venture out and attempt to kill it...before it can reproduce! Simak gives the reader no fewer than three big surprises before this hugely suspenseful wringer of a tale draws to its downbeat and memorable close. "Good Night, Mr. James," I should add, served as the source material for the second season "Outer Limits" episode "The Duplicate Man," which first aired on December 19, 1964. The teleplay by Robert C. Dennis changed the puudly to an alien called a Megasoid (a much more intimidating-sounding creature, to be sure) and gave Henderson a wife but remains a very fine adaptation of this classic Simak tale, nevertheless.

In the fittingly titled "Drop Dead" (a novelette from the July 1956 "Galaxy Science Fiction"), a team of six scientists touches down on a previously unexplored planet to make an agricultural survey. They are soon stunned to discover that this world is essentially one giant grassland, its only fauna being a bovinelike creature that is part beef, part fowl, part fish, part fruit and part vegetable; a creature that accommodatingly does indeed drop dead whenever one of the men needs to dissect and study it! The mission seems to go well until the ship's food supply is damaged and the men must perforce chow down on these hybrids, which they refer to as the "critters." And as it turns out, this new food source is both delicious and life sustaining...until, of course, problems arise. Simak again reserves several memorable surprises for his readers in this nicely atmospheric and pleasingly downbeat tale.

The absolutely charming novella "No Life of Their Own" (from the August 1959 "Galaxy" magazine; editor Horace L. Gold had dropped the words "Science Fiction" from the magazine's title as of the September 1958 issue, feeling those words might scare off potential customers!) shows us what happens to a small American town faced with integration...not by people of other races, but by otherworldly aliens! The tale is narrated by a young boy named Steve, who tells us of the alien kids he likes to pal around with, all of whose actual names are unpronounceable. There's Fancy Pants, who can levitate himself about; Nature Boy, who can befriend any animal; and the new kid on the block, a small, owl-faced lad whom they nickname Butch. And it is Butch who starts the action going in this story when he discerns "halflings" loitering about; strange beings who occupy another dimension than ours and who can seemingly bring good luck to those on whom they take a fancy. And when Nature Boy becomes interdimensionally trapped, that's when Steve and his pals--as well as the distraught Earthling and alien adults--get embroiled, too. This is a thoroughly wonderful tale--kind of like what Tom Sawyer's story might have been like had Huck Finn and some of their cronies been aliens blessed with superpowers--that might have made for a top-notch novel, or even a series of books. Alas.

"The Sitters" (a novelette from the April 1958 "Galaxy Science Fiction") finds elderly school superintendent Johnson Dean a very confused man. The kids at Millville High are evincing little interest in sports, their grades have been remarkably high, and they are more mature and levelheaded than most kids their age. Could it possibly have something to do with the titular Sitters--the three alien entities who had baby-sat many of them and opened up a nursery school in the town? What would you think? This is another warmhearted, gentle story from Simak, who did these kinds of tales so well. In parts an ode to loneliness, a moving fantasy and a character study, the tale succeeds on all three fronts. If "Good Night, Mr. James" had been perfect fodder for "The Outer Limits," "The Sitters," it strikes me, might have been adapted as a moving episode of "The Twilight Zone." Again, alas.

"Crying Jag" (a novelette from the February 1960 "Galaxy") can be seen as a companion piece of sorts to "The Sitters," as it also transpires in the town of Millville. Here, a drunken sanatorium janitor named Sam tells the story of how he had been approached by an alien and his robot while peacefully drinking on his front stoop one Saturday evening. The alien told Sam his unpronounceable name but then added that he could just be called Wilbur; the robot bore the imposing name of, uh, Lester. Wilbur, as it turns out, thrived on hearing other people's sad stories; he got positively inebriated by listening to them, while the confessor found that he/she felt immediately better as a result. Soon enough, everyone in town was lining up to tell Wilbur their sorry stories, Sam's employer tried to convince the alien to work in his sanatorium, and beings from Wilbur's home planet arrived to arrest him, in this consistently funny and hugely entertaining romp.

"Installment Plan," the longest story in this collection (a novella from the February 1959 "Galaxy"), introduces the reader to Steve Sheridan, who works for Central Trading. Steve and his crew of around a dozen wisecracking robots are the third delegation to visit planet Garson IV. Its mission: to trade all sorts of wares with the gnomelike inhabitants there for the podar plants that Earth desperately needs. This trade agreement had been arranged by the second delegation 15 years earlier, after it was discovered that the tuberlike plants yielded a perfect tranquilizer drug. But now, the Garsonians are receiving Steve and his robots in stony silence, and refusing to cooperate. Thus, the central dilemmas: What has changed the Garsonians' minds, and how to make them agreeable again? For this reader, those humanlike robots really managed to make this story a delight, and the wonderful, brotherly rapport that they have with one another, as well as with Sheridan, is really something. And the so-called specialized "transmogs" that Sheridan can slip into his robots' noggins to turn them into experts in any given field is an ingenious conceit. Need a salesman? Stick a salesman transmog into one of the robots and voila! Some neat surprises and unexpected plot twists are the cappers to this expertly crafted tale; again, a story that could well have served as the springboard for a whole raft of Sheridan and the robots stories. Oh, well.

This collection's briefest piece, "Condition of Employment" (a short story from the April 1960 "Galaxy"), comes next. Here, Anson Cooper, engineer first class with a black mark on his record, is stuck on a planet that he thoroughly detests: Earth. Cooper, you see, had been born and raised on Mars, and would give anything to find a position on a ship going to the Red Planet. And then one day, Cooper gets his wish, when the captain of a shabby, run-down vessel hires him on, with one catch: The ship is powered by the notoriously cranky Morrison engines, which require round-the-clock looking after. So does Cooper manage to safely bring the old tub back to his home world? Let's just say that another marvelous Simakian twist ending comes as a stunning surprise in this well-written tale.

And this collection is brought to a close by still another masterwork, "Project Mastodon" (a novelette from the March 1955 issue of "Galaxy Science Fiction"). In this one, three men, old pals from boyhood, manage to successfully build a handheld time-travel device, purchase a helicopter to use in conjunction with it, and land in the southwestern corner of Wisconsin (an area of the country that Simak knew well)...of 150,000 years ago! While the machine's actual inventor, Wesley Adams, and his associate John Cooper remain in the past, the third man, Chuck Hudson, comes back to modern-day Washington, D.C. and tries to arrange for the U.S. government to recognize their new country of Mastodonia, preparatory to a trade agreement. Naturally, Hudson is taken to be some kind of a crank, and so he returns to the two others in the past. But major-league trouble arises when a battling mastodon and saber-tooth wreck the trio's helicopter and damage the time-travel gizmo, effectively stranding them in the past! The story then neatly alternates between time periods, as a Washington general tries to convince his associates of Hudson's veracity in the present, while we also witness our time travelers' dilemmas in the past. It is a wonderful story, and the precursor to Simak's 1978 novel "Mastodonia," which I'd really like to read now....

So there you have it...nine expertly crafted stories from a beloved sci-fi Grand Master, each of which is sure to entertain, startle and amuse. It is a generously sized volume, and yet I still found myself wishing for more as I turned the 278th and final page. But I can tell you this: I'm not going to let another 40 years go by before seeking out another Clifford D. Simak collection! More than highly recommended!

(By the way, this review originally appeared on the FanLit website at https://fantasyliterature.com/ .... a most ideal destination for all fans of Clifford D. Simak!)

[Jim Mcclanahan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great collection of Simak tales, including one of my old favorites, "Drop Dead" and a charming story of boyhood adventures in "No Life Of Their Own". All well worth a read, including the title story.

[Michael Tildsley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was, overall, an average collection of sci-fi short stories. On par for what you can expect from the genre, but not collectively strong enough to warrant a second read.

The two stand-outs for me were "All the Traps of Earth," and "Drop Dead." I really like the suspense created in "Drop Dead." I don't think enough has been done in recent sci-fi on alien plant life and symbiosis.

[Simon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretty weak stuff. A couple of good ideas but mostly repetitive and poorly written. And a couple of stories are riddled with basic grammar errors and clumsy syntax; where was the editor?

[Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simak, Clifford D. All the Traps of Earth and Other Stories. 1962. Avon, 1979.
Clifford Simak began publishing stories in the early 1930s and continued to write for 50 years. While writing short stories and novels in several genres, he kept his day job as a daily newspaperman in Minneapolis. He wrote two great novels, City and Way Station, but his real strength, I think, was short fiction. As a working journalist he was trained to write clean, efficient, transparent prose, and we find those qualities in his fiction--well represented in his mid-career collection, All the Traps of Earth. His stories are never needlessly flashy or self-indulgent, they never stray too far from known or plausible science, and they always have something to say about society or human psychology. The last story in the collection, “Project Mastodon,” provides a good example of how he works. As you might guess from the title, it is a time travel story. Like his fellow science fiction grand masters, Asimov and Heinlein, he likes the way engineers approach problems, but his is not as interested in the mechanics of their work. In “Mastodon” three men build a time machine, travel back 150,000 years. They choose a location in Wisconsin where they know the level of the land has not changed much and has not been underwater. But Simak is not so much interested in these practicalities as he is in the question of what you would use a time machine for if you had one. Simak does not bury his lead. The story begins with one of the time travelers going into a government office, declaring that he is a representative of a new nation called Mastodonia, and offering to negotiate a trade deal and apply for foreign aid. Simak has an Aristotelian approach to character. He is not interested in the nuances and quirks of behavior, only in the basics of their character that motivate their decision-making. A timid government clerk reports him to his boss who has him kicked out of the office, but a crusty old general worried about Cold War competition is willing to listen. When I was a teenager, I always liked to see Simak’s name on the covers of magazines like Galaxy. It always meant a good read and it still does. FYI: “Project Mastodon” did not have its copyright renewed and so is available for free on Project Gutenberg.

[John JJJJJJJJ · Rating 2 out of 5]

Je suis content de retrouver Simak, un auteur que j'aime beaucoup. Quoi de mieux que de le lire dans le format dans lequel il excelle le mieux : les nouvelles ? J'ai vite été déçu. Ces nouvelles sont, au mieux passables, au pire indigestes. Et pourtant, il y a une grande variété dans les nouvelles. La seconde édition américaine a une introduction qui se lit :

Qu'attendez-vous de la science-fiction ?

Excitation ?
Un robot plus qu'humain risque les périls du vol galactique pour échapper à TOUS LES PIÈGES DE LA TERRE.

Du suspense ?
Une créature extraterrestre mortelle et un tueur humain se traquent dans la ville endormie dans BONNE NUIT, MONSIEUR JAMES.

Voyage dans l'espace ?
L'ingénieur d'un vaisseau interplanétaire découvre que la solitude éternelle est une CONDITION D'EMPLOI* pour un travail caché.

* traduit par "Le nerf de la guerre".

Fantaisie ?
LES NOUNOUS avaient trouvé le secret de la jeunesse éternelle et voulaient le partager, dans leurs propres termes.

Je suis déçu d'avoir été déçu par du Simak.

[Bruce A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this collection of short stories immensely, even though they are outdated and lack female characters. The points-of-view of the protagonists are interesting, and the androids are almost the same as humans mentally and emotionally. The writing is good.

The stories are from the 1950's, so the reader has to accept the writer's point of view that women are inconsequential, and that the protagonist doesn't have to work much, or at all.

My copy is a paperback, A "MacFadden Book", second printing September, 1967, numbered 50-388.
It has the cover https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...

It only includes the stories:
- All the Traps of Earth
- Good Night, Mr. James
- Drop Dead
- The Sitters
- Installment Plan
- Condition of Employment

[Mike C · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read the actual book with real paper pages!

Having only read (listened to) Simak's "Way Station", which I loved, and "City", which I didn't care for, I figured this book of short stories could be a toss up, but I enjoyed it quite a bit. The stories featured generally amiable characters and often ended with a twist. After a few stories, the "twist" became an expected element, but the specifics weren't really predictable.

I wasn't quite sure about the ending of one of them (The Sitters), but the story concept was very interesting so I could forgive a possibly flat conclusion. The story that lent the title to the book contained a sort of robot servant type character which bore an uncanny resemblance to a character in "City".

An entertaining, easy read. Highly recommended.

[Daniel Hunt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprise!

It is odd. I have been reading Science Fiction and Fantasy all my life and I had never heard of Clifford Simak. It took my wife, who read it behind the Iron Curtain during the cold war, to introduce me to an American Science Fiction author! I am glad she did. These are traditional Science Fiction stories with robots seeking their humanity, odd planets, and quirky aliens. I particularly liked All the Traps of Earth, the first story in this collection, for its sense of the sublime and questioning what life is really about. I believe it won the Hugo. Easy to read, I recommend this book, and I will look for other Simak novels/stories to read.

[Philip Wyeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. "Condition of Employment" was the best by far--an intriguing mystery gets us in, and the ending was thoughtful and satisfying. "Good Night, Mr. James" is another short winner--tense and chilling. "Drop Dead, "All the Traps of Earth," and "Installment Plan" are the best of the longer pieces. The rest of the stories were fairly flat, however.

[Ian Hamilton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid, satisfying assortment of short stories - unfortunately none jumps out to warrant a four star rating. I prefer collections that are thematically curated; this feels like a publisher hastily packaging disparate ones together. Still, enjoyable.

[Marsha Valance · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of Simak's short stories. A Science Fiction Book Club selection.

[Andi Chorley · Rating 4 out of 5]

More wonderful short stories from Simak.

The blurb on my copy reads, "Man faces the challenge of an ever-expanding galactic future"

[Jim Standridge · Rating 4 out of 5]

Classic Simak. All great, entertaining stories. Lot of variety. Might be a couple that could be called maybe dated, but that would be really picky.

[Keith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Installment plan and condition of employment were slogs. The other stories were much better and even though I knew the twist coming on most of the stories it was a fun time.

[Kylie90 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Il racconto di Simak veramente bello, come sempre! Gli altri racconti inclusi nel volume non sono pazzeschi ma comunque godibili.

[Massimo Molina · Rating 2 out of 5]

all the traps of the earth was a great read but mostly all of the others i was just like why.

[Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://gnomeship.blogspot.com/2017/11...

[Joanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Clifford Simak is one of my favorite science fiction writers and one of the first really good writers in the field. Still, as others have pointed out, these are not his best stories. They must also be early stories because they are less gentle, perhaps, than the later ones. There is more competition between men, for example. As in his other stories, women are absent. Wonder why? Many of the stories turn around one key idea. "Good night, Mr. James" is about a clone created to carry one act to save the world, but wants to live and ends up killing its creator. This is the weakest story in the set. "Drop Dead" is based on a really neat idea. There is only one intelligent life form on a planet, it looks a bit like a cow but includes all kinds of different life forms within it. As it turns out it absorbs other forms into it, this is its defense strategy. And finally, it absorbs the humans who arrive too. "No life of their own" is based on the idea of "Halflings," who live in between this dimension and others. Brought to Earth, they bring the person they care about luck but take away luck of others. The story is told through the eyes of a young boy. Other characters include Nature Boy and Fancy Pants, an alien. "The Sitters' is a based on a typical Simak idea: A Millville resident who was persecuted because he was a juvenile delinquent goes to space and after many years brings 3 aliens who become babysitters for all children in town. The children suddenly become serious, well adjusted, and studious but lose their spirit of fun and pranks. As it turns out they can also bring peace to older people. "Crying Jag” is another such story. Here the idea is about aliens, criminals on their own planet, who get drunk on humans' sad stories; in the process, humans feel much better. A janitor at a sanitarium figures out how to make a lot of money on this but then aliens from the whole planet arrive and a deal is struck leading to all such renegades coming to Earth. Turns out there millions. "Installment plan" - this is perhaps the closest to a traditional syfi story. A team consisting of a human and robots (who can become experts on various things when a transmog is plugged into them) come to a planet to finish up a trade for tuberous plants which turn out to be excellent tranquilizers for humans who have needed tranquilizers for millennia! The team represents a kind of Hudson's Bay Company but another renegade enterprise almost manages to beat them but not quite. "Condition of Employment" The idea here seems to be that the only way people will put up with the horrors of space travel, esp. working on space ships, is if they become convinced that they are going home. Finally, "Project Mastodon" seems to be a try out for the novel Mastadonia.

[Timothy]

9 stories:

(6/9 read)

***** All the Traps of Earth (1960)
***** Good Night, Mr. James (1951)
Drop Dead (1956)
No Life of Their Own (1959)
The Sitters (1958)
**** Crying Jag (1960)
*** Installment Plan (1959)
**** Condition of Employment (1960)
**** Project Mastodon (1955)

[Stephen Goss · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent anthology of stories from a master SF writer - I found it impossible to not read each short story in one go! I can imagine some readers will find some of his ideas quaint (my copy is a second printing, so 50 years old) but I found it refreshing in it's lack of techno-babble.