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Bug-Eyed Monsters
THE ALIENS ARE COMING!
Bug-Eyed Monsters is one of the finest collections available of classic science fiction masterpeices by internationally-acclaimed authors.
Fredric Brown
A.E. van Vogt
James Blish
Philip José Farmer
Damon Knight
Frank Herbert
William Tenn
and others pay their bizarre and superbly entertaining tributes to the weird and wonderful nasties (and not-so-nasties) who lurk in the remote, timeless regions of space and fantasy...
Cover Illustration: Bruce Pennington
Bug-Eyed Monsters is one of the finest collections available of classic science fiction masterpeices by internationally-acclaimed authors.
Fredric Brown
A.E. van Vogt
James Blish
Philip José Farmer
Damon Knight
Frank Herbert
William Tenn
and others pay their bizarre and superbly entertaining tributes to the weird and wonderful nasties (and not-so-nasties) who lurk in the remote, timeless regions of space and fantasy...
Cover Illustration: Bruce Pennington
255 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1974
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 23, 2014
Fronted by a beautiful and apt Bruce Penninton painting, this is a wonderful selection of stories devoted to 'the alien'. Cheetham has compiled a nicely balanced selection with not really a bad apple in the barrel. One of my favourite anthologies, this. Highly recommended.
Invasion From Mars – Howard Koch (1940)
Not only Dead Men – AE Van Vogt (Astounding Nov 1942)
Arena – Fredric Brown (1944)
Surface Tension – James Blish (1952)
The Deserter – William Tenn (1953)
Mother – Philip Jose Farmer (1953)
Stranger Station – Damon Knight (1956)
Greenslaves – Frank Herbert (1965)
Balanced Ecology – James H Schmitz (1967)
The Dance of The Changer & Three – Terry Carr (1968)
This is a curious little collection. It has seemingly been revised since its first publication (this is the 1974 reprint) as the unnamed Bertram Chandler novella mentioned in the introduction has been replaced by the Van Vogt story (Annoyingly Van Vogt has been spelt Van Voigt in both the contents and the story heading.)
No previous publishing details are given apart from the original date of publication so any errors in names of magazines etc. is purely down to me.
Despite the slipshod manner of its publication this is rather a decent collection – in chronological order – of quality work (with the possible exception of the Van Vogt) featuring alien intelligence of one sort or another; in a few cases First Contact situations.
‘Invasion From Mars’ is not, strictly speaking, a short story, but the transcript of Orson Welles’ famous radio broadcast (adapted by Howard Koch) of HG Wells’ ‘War of The Worlds’ which famously sent many gullible Americans packing their bags and heading for the hills.
In ‘Not Only Dead Men’ a whaling ship encounters an alien craft and is enlisted in the hunt for the Devil-blal; a space-borne deadly creature, which has landed in the Earth’s ocean. Unfortunately, humans who learn of the existence of galactic society have to be silenced – permanently.
‘Arena’ is the original story on which the Classic Star Trek episode of the same name is based. Sadly, due no doubt to logistical and budgetary issues, a man in a Godzilla-like rubber suit replaced the spherical rolling tentacled alien of the story
Humans find themselves at war with hostile aliens, so alien that no co-existence is possible. A highly advanced gestalt being intervenes and sets one individual of each race against each other in an arena, where they have to battle to the death, using their strength and intelligence. The loser’s civilisation will consequently cease to exist.
Excellently written, it still stands as a classic short of the genre.
‘Surface Tension’ was later incorporated into Blish’s ‘Seedling Stars’
In ‘The Deserter’ we are once more in a war between species. This time Humanity is fighting for its existence against huge Jovian creatures, one of which has deserted and is being held in a military facility in a vast refrigerated tank.
One man, once a prisoner of the Jovians, is recruited to interrogate the monster and find out what it knows. As it happens, prisoner and interrogator turn out to have a great deal in common.
‘Mother’ is one of the most memorable stories I’ve come across and is – apart from a darkly humourous SF tale – a satirical look at a dysfunctional mother/son relationship.
‘Stranger Station’ takes us to a far darker place where, despite the best efforts of both sides, humanity and the alien race which has given them a longevity drug, cannot communicate or bear to be in the same vicinity.
‘Greenslaves’ is an ecological warning and is no doubt far more relevant today that it was in the Sixties. In South America, a project which aims to eliminate unnecessary insects produces a violent reaction when the remaining insects begin to mutate, some of them forming a gestalt and developing the ability to physically join together to mimic human beings. This I suspect was the basis for Herbert’s novel, The Green Brain.
‘Balanced Ecology’ takes a similar premise, whereby a sentient ecosystem, managed as family business dealing in rare timbers, takes matters into its own hands (or leaves) when threatened with destruction. A little too juvenile and cute in sections, it nevertheless cleverly examines the nature of ecosystems sand symbiosis.
In ‘The Dance of the Changer &Three’ Carr attempts to translate an element of the history/mythology of the energy beings who live in the forbidding environs of a gas giant. It’s an attempt to examine a possible alien mind-set or point of view, but despite it being a memorable and readable tale, Carr never really succeeds in doing so.
Invasion From Mars – Howard Koch (1940)
Not only Dead Men – AE Van Vogt (Astounding Nov 1942)
Arena – Fredric Brown (1944)
Surface Tension – James Blish (1952)
The Deserter – William Tenn (1953)
Mother – Philip Jose Farmer (1953)
Stranger Station – Damon Knight (1956)
Greenslaves – Frank Herbert (1965)
Balanced Ecology – James H Schmitz (1967)
The Dance of The Changer & Three – Terry Carr (1968)
This is a curious little collection. It has seemingly been revised since its first publication (this is the 1974 reprint) as the unnamed Bertram Chandler novella mentioned in the introduction has been replaced by the Van Vogt story (Annoyingly Van Vogt has been spelt Van Voigt in both the contents and the story heading.)
No previous publishing details are given apart from the original date of publication so any errors in names of magazines etc. is purely down to me.
Despite the slipshod manner of its publication this is rather a decent collection – in chronological order – of quality work (with the possible exception of the Van Vogt) featuring alien intelligence of one sort or another; in a few cases First Contact situations.
‘Invasion From Mars’ is not, strictly speaking, a short story, but the transcript of Orson Welles’ famous radio broadcast (adapted by Howard Koch) of HG Wells’ ‘War of The Worlds’ which famously sent many gullible Americans packing their bags and heading for the hills.
In ‘Not Only Dead Men’ a whaling ship encounters an alien craft and is enlisted in the hunt for the Devil-blal; a space-borne deadly creature, which has landed in the Earth’s ocean. Unfortunately, humans who learn of the existence of galactic society have to be silenced – permanently.
‘Arena’ is the original story on which the Classic Star Trek episode of the same name is based. Sadly, due no doubt to logistical and budgetary issues, a man in a Godzilla-like rubber suit replaced the spherical rolling tentacled alien of the story
Humans find themselves at war with hostile aliens, so alien that no co-existence is possible. A highly advanced gestalt being intervenes and sets one individual of each race against each other in an arena, where they have to battle to the death, using their strength and intelligence. The loser’s civilisation will consequently cease to exist.
Excellently written, it still stands as a classic short of the genre.
‘Surface Tension’ was later incorporated into Blish’s ‘Seedling Stars’
In ‘The Deserter’ we are once more in a war between species. This time Humanity is fighting for its existence against huge Jovian creatures, one of which has deserted and is being held in a military facility in a vast refrigerated tank.
One man, once a prisoner of the Jovians, is recruited to interrogate the monster and find out what it knows. As it happens, prisoner and interrogator turn out to have a great deal in common.
‘Mother’ is one of the most memorable stories I’ve come across and is – apart from a darkly humourous SF tale – a satirical look at a dysfunctional mother/son relationship.
‘Stranger Station’ takes us to a far darker place where, despite the best efforts of both sides, humanity and the alien race which has given them a longevity drug, cannot communicate or bear to be in the same vicinity.
‘Greenslaves’ is an ecological warning and is no doubt far more relevant today that it was in the Sixties. In South America, a project which aims to eliminate unnecessary insects produces a violent reaction when the remaining insects begin to mutate, some of them forming a gestalt and developing the ability to physically join together to mimic human beings. This I suspect was the basis for Herbert’s novel, The Green Brain.
‘Balanced Ecology’ takes a similar premise, whereby a sentient ecosystem, managed as family business dealing in rare timbers, takes matters into its own hands (or leaves) when threatened with destruction. A little too juvenile and cute in sections, it nevertheless cleverly examines the nature of ecosystems sand symbiosis.
In ‘The Dance of the Changer &Three’ Carr attempts to translate an element of the history/mythology of the energy beings who live in the forbidding environs of a gas giant. It’s an attempt to examine a possible alien mind-set or point of view, but despite it being a memorable and readable tale, Carr never really succeeds in doing so.
January 25, 2009
This was one of the best anthologies I've ever read, though to be honest it's been far too long since I read one at all. If there's a movie producer in your life, you could do a lot worse than pressing a copy of this book into her hands.
Some of the stories, like Fredric Brown's "Arena" and The War of the Worlds (represented here by the script of Orson Welles' radio version) have already made it to the large or small screens, while William Tenn's "The Deserter" seems to be the missing link between the Starship Troopers (the hawkish book) and Starship Troopers (the satirical film) (complete with brain-sucking alien bugs). Frank Herbert's "Greenslaves" perhaps has too much in common with Mimic to make adapting it worthwhile. Others, though, as far as I know, are still pristine, unspoilt, and ready for exploitation!
AE van Vogt's "Not Only Dead Men", in which a World War II-era whaling ship encounters alien life at sea, would make a stunning movie - preferably starring Tom Hanks as the captain. In fact, it would almost certainly be one of the best films of all time! Sadly I can also easily imagine it as a cheap direct-to-DVD movie, which would be a shocking waste of its potential. I can only dream of how good it would have been as a black and white film made in the 1950s.
Pixar and Brad Bird could do much worse than adapt "Surface Tension" by James Blish. I say that because the premise, of tiny people living in a puddle, although brilliant, might be a hard sell to adults, as I've found when trying to explain to my wife and friends why it was such a superb story. Children would love it, though.
When reading "Stranger Station" by Damon Knight I couldn't help mentally repurposing shots from films like Solaris and Sunshine – it might make quite a short film, but like James H Schmitz's "Balanced Ecology", Terry Carr's "The Dance of the Changer and the Three" and Philip Jose Farmer's "Mother" it would make for an amazing episode of The Outer Limits, if some version of that programme ever gains the budget to match its ideas.
Of course, even if no one ever makes a movie out of any of these stories, it won't lessen them one bit. That I've taken that angle in this review is just an illustration of how exciting I found the concepts. That's what really marks this out as an exceptional collection of science fiction - every story has an utterly different and astonishing premise. And of course, no film could ever be this perfectly executed as these stories are – on screen there's always some flaw, however tiny, something that doesn't quite work. That's not the case here. Antony Cheetham has done a marvellous job of bringing together a superb range of stories, by an immensely talented group of writers. The book's only arguable flaw is its title, which makes it sound rather sillier than it really is, but even that can be excused, given that it was what made me buy the book in the first place.
Some of the stories, like Fredric Brown's "Arena" and The War of the Worlds (represented here by the script of Orson Welles' radio version) have already made it to the large or small screens, while William Tenn's "The Deserter" seems to be the missing link between the Starship Troopers (the hawkish book) and Starship Troopers (the satirical film) (complete with brain-sucking alien bugs). Frank Herbert's "Greenslaves" perhaps has too much in common with Mimic to make adapting it worthwhile. Others, though, as far as I know, are still pristine, unspoilt, and ready for exploitation!
AE van Vogt's "Not Only Dead Men", in which a World War II-era whaling ship encounters alien life at sea, would make a stunning movie - preferably starring Tom Hanks as the captain. In fact, it would almost certainly be one of the best films of all time! Sadly I can also easily imagine it as a cheap direct-to-DVD movie, which would be a shocking waste of its potential. I can only dream of how good it would have been as a black and white film made in the 1950s.
Pixar and Brad Bird could do much worse than adapt "Surface Tension" by James Blish. I say that because the premise, of tiny people living in a puddle, although brilliant, might be a hard sell to adults, as I've found when trying to explain to my wife and friends why it was such a superb story. Children would love it, though.
When reading "Stranger Station" by Damon Knight I couldn't help mentally repurposing shots from films like Solaris and Sunshine – it might make quite a short film, but like James H Schmitz's "Balanced Ecology", Terry Carr's "The Dance of the Changer and the Three" and Philip Jose Farmer's "Mother" it would make for an amazing episode of The Outer Limits, if some version of that programme ever gains the budget to match its ideas.
Of course, even if no one ever makes a movie out of any of these stories, it won't lessen them one bit. That I've taken that angle in this review is just an illustration of how exciting I found the concepts. That's what really marks this out as an exceptional collection of science fiction - every story has an utterly different and astonishing premise. And of course, no film could ever be this perfectly executed as these stories are – on screen there's always some flaw, however tiny, something that doesn't quite work. That's not the case here. Antony Cheetham has done a marvellous job of bringing together a superb range of stories, by an immensely talented group of writers. The book's only arguable flaw is its title, which makes it sound rather sillier than it really is, but even that can be excused, given that it was what made me buy the book in the first place.
June 28, 2023
I didn't know how I'd feel about this collection of stories when I picked it up. I'm not as much into the "bug-eyed monster" subgenre of SF. But, I picked it up for the novelette "Arena" and would see how the rest of the book went. There were two amazing stories in this collection, one good, and the rest I didn't care for.
One of the amazing stories was indeed Arena, so I lucked out with my choice of this book! Fredric Brown wrote this in 1944 and some think it was adapted for the original Star Trek episode Arena. Some quick, superficial research said that it wasn't adapted but the idea was so similar that the Star Trek writers paid Brown for his story and gave him a writing credit in the episode. This novelette is a great example of the best of psychological SF. It was brilliant and it just flowed from start to finish.
The second excellent story was the novelette "Stranger Station" by Damon Knight (1956). I've grown to love Knight's writing and this might have been a secondary reason to pick up this collection. This work was haunting, building up like a slow boil. It was absolutely perfect.
I also enjoyed (say, 3 stars) the novelette "Invasion from Mars" by Howard Koch (1938). This was basically a story version of the great Orson Wells' radio broadcast that scared America into thinking a real invasion from Mars was happening. The story was okay, but it would have been something to have heard that radio play live. I’ve listened to the recording of it and it's palpable.
One of the amazing stories was indeed Arena, so I lucked out with my choice of this book! Fredric Brown wrote this in 1944 and some think it was adapted for the original Star Trek episode Arena. Some quick, superficial research said that it wasn't adapted but the idea was so similar that the Star Trek writers paid Brown for his story and gave him a writing credit in the episode. This novelette is a great example of the best of psychological SF. It was brilliant and it just flowed from start to finish.
The second excellent story was the novelette "Stranger Station" by Damon Knight (1956). I've grown to love Knight's writing and this might have been a secondary reason to pick up this collection. This work was haunting, building up like a slow boil. It was absolutely perfect.
I also enjoyed (say, 3 stars) the novelette "Invasion from Mars" by Howard Koch (1938). This was basically a story version of the great Orson Wells' radio broadcast that scared America into thinking a real invasion from Mars was happening. The story was okay, but it would have been something to have heard that radio play live. I’ve listened to the recording of it and it's palpable.
July 1, 2014
Found in a second-hand bookshop and expecting something hit-or-miss, this is an anthology of superior stories that have stood the test of time. I'd pick 'Surface Tension' if I had to choose one bit of writing to take away with me; it's a superb balance of technological 'what if' and understanding humanity - you're really rooting for those little guys. I'm not sure that 'War of the Worlds' fitted in with the rest, but that might just be me.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews