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hazelsf's review against another edition
2.0
This was very challenging to read, however, I did enjoy some of the stories and had to DNF 3 of them.
I love the idea of surreal science fiction, and I was attracted to this book for the strange rooted face on the cover, and the amusing description of the first short story on the front. However, I need for there to be something satisfying about the stories, whether it is an interesting character, view point, idea, or general feel of reading them. I didn't get this from most of the stories. 'The Elephant with Wodden Leg' was a lot of fun, with mad scientists trying to save the world and sinister cockroaches. I liked 'The Face' because it went in a direction I didn't expect. 'A Game of Jump' was odd, with its limited vocabulary making it wildly interesting to interpret the text.
The standout fivestar story for me was 'Poets of Millgrove, Iowa', It was written clearly enough for me to be immersed in it, the characters interesting and flawed, and the ending unexpected and wonderful.
I wouldn't recommend this to any but the most avid fans of surreal science fiction. That said, I am interested to read a novel or two to by John Sladek to see if they are more readable, because he is an amusing and unique writer.
I love the idea of surreal science fiction, and I was attracted to this book for the strange rooted face on the cover, and the amusing description of the first short story on the front. However, I need for there to be something satisfying about the stories, whether it is an interesting character, view point, idea, or general feel of reading them. I didn't get this from most of the stories. 'The Elephant with Wodden Leg' was a lot of fun, with mad scientists trying to save the world and sinister cockroaches. I liked 'The Face' because it went in a direction I didn't expect. 'A Game of Jump' was odd, with its limited vocabulary making it wildly interesting to interpret the text.
The standout fivestar story for me was 'Poets of Millgrove, Iowa', It was written clearly enough for me to be immersed in it, the characters interesting and flawed, and the ending unexpected and wonderful.
I wouldn't recommend this to any but the most avid fans of surreal science fiction. That said, I am interested to read a novel or two to by John Sladek to see if they are more readable, because he is an amusing and unique writer.
lordofthemoon's review
2.0
In his introduction to this collection of short stories, the author denies that these stories are 'surrealist', claiming that they were just written to entertain. I suspect they probably entertained the author since I bet they were really fun to write, but they certainly aren't fun to read. After more than a few of these stories, you start getting worn down, they mostly just feel clever for their own sake which made it a difficult book to plough through. There were a few stories that were worth it (such as the one nesting nine layers deep, which was fun) but mostly I was just impatient with them. I must confess that I broke towards the end and only skimmed the second last story and skipped the last one, reading only the first few pages in the vain hope that it might be readable. Only worth it if you're a fan of surrealist writing.
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