Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s Reviews > The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929-1964
The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929-1964
by
by
![8734459](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p2/8734459.jpg)
Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s review
bookshelves: science-fiction, stole-from-dad, oldies-but-goodies, the-shorts, need-to-reread, favorites
Apr 06, 2013
bookshelves: science-fiction, stole-from-dad, oldies-but-goodies, the-shorts, need-to-reread, favorites
Read 3 times. Last read 1984.
$2.99 Kindle sale, Sept. 10, 2019. An amazing collection of classic SF tales! Of all the very many science fiction books I swiped from my dad when I was a teen, this anthology was one of the best: 26 classic SF short stories, first published between 1929 and 1964, and written by many of the great SF authors of that age: Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke, Sturgeon, Zelazny, and so on. In about 1969, the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) group nominated 132 stories from the pre-Nebula award era and then voted on their favorites. So this collection could be considered the "best of the best" for older SF short stories.
Robert Silverberg, the editor, wrote a highly interesting foreword regarding the selection process. The most intriguing part of this foreword, to Teenage Me, was his disclosure of the top fifteen stories, in terms of votes received. The official top ten:
1. Nightfall (Isaac Asimov)
2. A Martian Odyssey (Stanley Weinbaum)
3. Flowers for Algernon (Daniel Keyes)
4. Microcosmic God (Theodore Sturgeon)
(tie) First Contact (Murray Leinster)
6. A Rose for Ecclesiastes (Roger Zelazny)
7. The Roads Must Roll (Robert Heinlein)
(tie) Mimsy Were the Borogoves (Lewis Padgett)
(tie) Coming Attraction (Fritz Leiber)
(tie) The Cold Equations (Tom Godwin)
Well. As a 16* year old, this kind of ordering was irresistible to me. So I read all of the stories and made my own list, writing my own top 15 in the book, in pencil, next to Silverberg's list. My top 10 at age 16:
1. A Martian Odyssey
2. Microcosmic God
3. The Little Black Bag (C.M. Kornbluth)
4. Flowers for Algernon
5. The Cold Equations
6. The Roads Must Roll
7. Surface Tension (James Blish)
8. Mimsy Were the Borogoves
9. First Contact
10. Arena (Fredric Brown)
*Actually, I have hazy recollections of first reading this book when I was about 13, and creating my first personal top 15 list at that tender age. Unfortunately 16 year old me saw fit to erase that first list from the book and replace it with my updated list. I now remember nothing about that very first list except that "A Martian Odyssey" was #1 then too and, heaven forgive me, "Helen O'Loy" made an appearance in the top 10. Well, I was only 13!
At age 24, I concluded that my tastes as a 16 year old were on the shallow side, and that I had underappreciated some great stories. So written next to the first two lists is a third top 15 list, with these as the top 10:
1. Microcosmic God
2. Surface Tension
3. A Rose for Ecclesiastes
4. First Contact
5. A Martian Odyssey
6. Flowers for Algernon
7. The Weapon Shop (A.E. van Vogt)
8. Nightfall
9. The Roads Must Roll
10. The Little Black Bag
It's a (to me, at least) fascinating history of my evolving view of what I considered a great SF story when I was younger. And now, looking at my carefully handwritten lists again, I've got a definite urge to reread these classic stories once more, and see what I would list as my favorites now, some three decades later.
But in whatever order, you really can't go wrong with this collection of stories. Several of them are pretty dated, but there's also some amazing writing, especially given the context of the times when they were written. It's still one of my favorite SF short story collections of all time, and one of the main reasons I've been a lifelong fan of science fiction.
Thanks, Dad!
Robert Silverberg, the editor, wrote a highly interesting foreword regarding the selection process. The most intriguing part of this foreword, to Teenage Me, was his disclosure of the top fifteen stories, in terms of votes received. The official top ten:
1. Nightfall (Isaac Asimov)
2. A Martian Odyssey (Stanley Weinbaum)
3. Flowers for Algernon (Daniel Keyes)
4. Microcosmic God (Theodore Sturgeon)
(tie) First Contact (Murray Leinster)
6. A Rose for Ecclesiastes (Roger Zelazny)
7. The Roads Must Roll (Robert Heinlein)
(tie) Mimsy Were the Borogoves (Lewis Padgett)
(tie) Coming Attraction (Fritz Leiber)
(tie) The Cold Equations (Tom Godwin)
Well. As a 16* year old, this kind of ordering was irresistible to me. So I read all of the stories and made my own list, writing my own top 15 in the book, in pencil, next to Silverberg's list. My top 10 at age 16:
1. A Martian Odyssey
2. Microcosmic God
3. The Little Black Bag (C.M. Kornbluth)
4. Flowers for Algernon
5. The Cold Equations
6. The Roads Must Roll
7. Surface Tension (James Blish)
8. Mimsy Were the Borogoves
9. First Contact
10. Arena (Fredric Brown)
*Actually, I have hazy recollections of first reading this book when I was about 13, and creating my first personal top 15 list at that tender age. Unfortunately 16 year old me saw fit to erase that first list from the book and replace it with my updated list. I now remember nothing about that very first list except that "A Martian Odyssey" was #1 then too and, heaven forgive me, "Helen O'Loy" made an appearance in the top 10. Well, I was only 13!
At age 24, I concluded that my tastes as a 16 year old were on the shallow side, and that I had underappreciated some great stories. So written next to the first two lists is a third top 15 list, with these as the top 10:
1. Microcosmic God
2. Surface Tension
3. A Rose for Ecclesiastes
4. First Contact
5. A Martian Odyssey
6. Flowers for Algernon
7. The Weapon Shop (A.E. van Vogt)
8. Nightfall
9. The Roads Must Roll
10. The Little Black Bag
It's a (to me, at least) fascinating history of my evolving view of what I considered a great SF story when I was younger. And now, looking at my carefully handwritten lists again, I've got a definite urge to reread these classic stories once more, and see what I would list as my favorites now, some three decades later.
But in whatever order, you really can't go wrong with this collection of stories. Several of them are pretty dated, but there's also some amazing writing, especially given the context of the times when they were written. It's still one of my favorite SF short story collections of all time, and one of the main reasons I've been a lifelong fan of science fiction.
Thanks, Dad!
Sign into Goodreads to see if any of your friends have read
The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929-1964.
Sign In »
Reading Progress
1973
–
Started Reading
1973
–
Finished Reading
1976
–
Started Reading
1976
–
Finished Reading
1984
–
Started Reading
1984
–
Finished Reading
April 6, 2013
– Shelved
April 16, 2014
– Shelved as:
science-fiction
March 27, 2015
– Shelved as:
stole-from-dad
July 2, 2015
– Shelved as:
oldies-but-goodies
July 2, 2015
– Shelved as:
the-shorts
January 21, 2018
– Shelved as:
need-to-reread
January 21, 2018
– Shelved as:
favorites
Comments Showing 1-20 of 20 (20 new)
date
newest »
![Down arrow](https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/down_arrow-1e1fa5642066c151f5e0136233fce98a.gif)
message 1:
by
Marquise
(new)
Jul 02, 2015 09:26PM
![Marquise](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1712278162p1/4674014.jpg)
reply
|
flag
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
Thanks, Marquise. I read more SF when I was younger, but it's still one of those genres that I regularly come back to. I love the ideas that are explored in really good SF.
![Nandakishore Mridula](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1723178344p1/6237864.jpg)
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
I would rank both "Nightfall" and "Flowers for Algernon" higher now, and "A Martian Odyssey" and "The Roads Must Roll" would probably fall out of my personal list of favorites, although I get that they were ranked so high by the SFWA partly because of their historic significance.
![Manny](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1442491692p1/1713956.jpg)
1. The Little Black Bag
2. Surface Tension
3. Nightfall
4. Flowers for Algernon
5. A Rose for Ecclesiastes
I liked all of them when I was 16 and still do!
![Marquise](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1712278162p1/4674014.jpg)
Thanks, Marquise. I read more SF when I was younger, but it's still one of those genres that I regularly come back to...."
I'll be looking out for you when I want to read something from this genre, then. I don't think I have read more than a handful.
![Manny](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1442491692p1/1713956.jpg)
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
"Surface Tension" is probably the story that has grown on me the most over the years. As you mentioned, Manny, almost all of these stories have been anthologized in other collections, many of them multiple times. But I was so young when I first read them (probably about age 12, now that I've thought about this some more overnight), that they were all fresh and new and absolutely mind-boggling to me.
![Manny](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1442491692p1/1713956.jpg)
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
*making note to self to check out more James Blish short fiction*
@Marquise: I would be happy to recommend some nice, complex SF books to you any time you're up for it! My initial thoughts are Dune and A Fire Upon the Deep, but I'll mull it over some more.
![Marquise](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1712278162p1/4674014.jpg)
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
![Roger Walton](https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/m_25x33-8a3530ed95c3dbef8bf215b080559b09.png)
Flowers for Algernon
The roads must roll
Nightfall
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
D: You need to hunt them down, put them in a headlock and get back this book!
![Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1648407601p1/8734459.jpg)
Yeah, that was fun. I got him interested in GR for a little bit but then he let it slide.
![Adrian](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1484242635p1/22809267.jpg)
I really enjoyed your evolving taste, personally I'd probably put Nightfall, Roads must roll, First contact near the top, probably just after microcosmic God and Weapon Shop (my favourite).
Now do I still have my copy or have I got to buy it again 😁