Virtual Unrealities: The Short Fiction of Alfred Bester

by Alfred Bester

Paperback, 1997

Status

Available

Call number

813.54

Genres

Science Fiction

All Topics

Fiction

Collection

Your library

Publication

Vintage (1997), Edition: 1st, Paperback, 384 pages

Description

"Dazzlement and enchantment are Bester's methods. His stories never stand still a moment." --Damon Knight, author of Why Do Birds Alfred Bester took science fiction into hyperdrive, endowing it with a wit, speed, and narrative inventiveness that have inspired two generations of writers. And nowhere is Bester funnier, speedier, or more audacious than in these seventeen short stories--two of them previously unpublished--that have now been brought together in a single volume for the first time. Read about the sweet-natured young man whose phenomenal good luck turns out to be disastrous for the rest of humanity. Find out why tourists are flocking to a hellish little town in a post-nuclear Kansas. Meet a warlock who practices on Park Avenue and whose potions comply with the Pure Food and Drug Act. Make a deal with the Devil--but not without calling your agent. Dazzling, effervescent, sexy, and sardonic, Virtual Unrealities is a historic collection from one of science fiction's true pathbreakers. "Alfred Bester was one of the handful of writers who invented modern science fiction. " --Harry Harrison… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member euang

Good writing, poorly presented: The nice thing about this book is that it's pretty much the only way to get a good chunk of Bester's short fiction collected in one place. That said, the book itself suffers from serious problems. It seems that some time after the last copy editor looked it over,

someone in the production process changed the book's type font. Since several of Bester's stories involve playful typesetting and/or characters that are outside the (current) normal set of symbols, a great deal of flavor was lost. One-quarter or one-half fractions replaced by square boxes, that type of thing. Too bad, because the publishers were obviously aiming for a product that you'd call nicer than the usual mass-market paperback. The screwy typeface errors mar that considerably.

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LibraryThing member burningtodd

Alfred Bester had an interesting way of looking at the world. In this collection of what is considered to be his best short fiction, we get a view of his world. He seemed to be obsessed with childhood fantasies, such as time travel and getting all of your wishes, but he viewed them as an adult and

from the POV of what could go wrong and why these fantasies would not quite work. Not every story is like that, only some, others are straight hard Sci-fi, and very very dark. I highly recommend this book to any fan of the genre as a genuine treat.

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LibraryThing member Cheryl_in_CC_NV

Not a definitive collection, but much overlap w/ Starburst, which I just read. ?�Kind of overwhelming to read that much Bester in such a short span of time. ?Ã¡He really is much more modern than most of his contemporaries of the 50s. ?Ã¡Still sexist, though... erotic to the young men for whom

most SF was originally written.

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