The new and the old.

One day more, and it’s 2004.

It’s a good time to reread the science
fiction classics I grew up with. I remember the attempt in the 80s to rename the
genre “speculative fiction.” I didn’t see the sense in it; all fiction
speculates, in one way or another.

Today I
finished C.J. Cherryh’s Hunter of Worlds. This has been rereleased in an omnibus
paperback together with Brothers of Earth; my copy lacks a cover and is a
reprint from the early 80s. Two evenings ago I revisited Robert Heinlein’s The
Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag. Next on the list is Roger Zelazny’s To
Die in Italbar, and Damnation Alley; and Stanislaw Lem’s The
Cyberiad.