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"Henri Lothiere, apothecary's assistant of Paris," he read, "is charged in this year of our lord one thousand four hundred and forty-four with offending against God and the king by committing the crime of sorcery." The prisoner spoke for the first time, his voice low but steady. "I am no sorcerer, sire."Edmond Hamilton is credited with writing the first hardcover compilation of what would eventually come to be known as the science fiction genre. The Man Who Saw the Future is the tale of a man who traveled from the medieval past into the here and now. He did it back when here and now was 1930! Amazing, the scientific breakthroughs that used to happen in those isolated laboratories. . . .

Deathworld is the name of a series of science fiction novels by Harry Harrison including the books Deathworld, Deathworld 2 and Deathworld 3 plus the short story "The Mothballed Spaceship".

It is written that after the Giants came to Tellura from the far stars, they abode a while, and looked upon the surface of the land, and found it wanting, and of evil omen. Therefore did they make men to live always in the air and in the sunlight, and in the light of the stars, that he would be reminded of them. And the Giants abode yet a while, and taught men to speak, and to write, and to weave, and to do many things which are needful to do, of which the writings speak. And thereafter they departed to the far stars, saying, Take this world as your own, and though we shall return, fear not, for it is yours.-THE BOOK OF LAWS

¿. . . .He knew better.But he did write a nice round hand, like a boy's hand. He knew Spanish, and enough English. For the sector that was assigned to him he would not need a map. He knew it better than anyone else, certainly better than any mapmaker. Besides, he was poor and needed the money.They instructed him and sent him out. Or they thought that they had instructed him. They couldn't be sure."Count everyone? All right. Fill in everyone? I need more papers.""We will give you more if you need more. But there aren't so many in your sector.""Lots of them. Lobos, tejones, zorros, even people."

"After I glimpsed a kind of thin, yellowish, shimmering exhalation rising from the nitrous pattern toward the yawning fireplace, I spoke to my uncle about the matter. He smiled at this odd conceit, but it seemed that his smile was tinged with reminiscence. Later I heard that a similar notion entered into some of the wild ancient tales of the common folk -- a notion likewise alluding to ghoulish, wolfish shapes taken by smoke from the great chimney, and queer contours assumed by certain of the sinuous tree-roots that thrust their way into the cellar through the loose foundation-stones. . . ."

The Terran system is growing and expanding all the time. But an old and corrupt Centaurian Empire is holding Terra down, as it encircles the Terran system and will not let the humans grow out of their current empire. For this reason Terra is at war with Proxima Centauri and is trying to find a way of breaking free from the Centaurian's hold upon them.

¿SOMETHING WAS WRONG WITH THE WORLD!The pendulum clock struck slowly, its every other chime as usual setting up a sympathetic vibration in the pewter vase that stood upon the mantel. Mr. Chambers got to his feet, strode to the door, opened it and looked out. Moonlight tessellated the street in black and silver, etching the chimneys and trees against a silvered sky. But the house directly across the street was not the same. It was strangely lopsided, its dimensions out of proportion, like a house that suddenly had gone mad. He stared at it in amazement, trying to determine what was wrong with it. He recalled how it had always stood, foursquare, a solid piece of mid-Victorian architecture. Then, before his eyes, the house righted itself again. With a sigh of relief, Mr. Chambers turned back into the hall. But before he closed the door, he looked again. The house was lopsided -- worse than before!

While on a gambling trip to the casino on the planet Cassylia, he is challenged by a man named Kerk Pyrrus (who turns out to be the ambassador from the planet Pyrrus) to turn a large amount of money into an immense sum by gambling at a government-run casino. Some planet in the galaxy must -- by definition -- be the toughest, meanest, nastiest of all. If Pyrrus wasn't it . . . it was an awfully good approximation!

SF writer and editor Harry Harrison explores a not-too-distant future where robots -- particularly specialist robots who don't know their place -- have quite a rough time of it. True, the Robot Equality Act had been passed -- but so what? New York was a bad town for robots this year. In fact, all over the country it was bad for robots. . . .

The fleet numbered fifteen, more than half the interstellar ships humankind possessed. But Earth's overlords had been as anxious to get rid of the Constitutionalists (the most stubborn ones, at least; the stay-at-homes were ipso facto less likely to be troublesome) as that science-minded, liberty-minded group of archaists were to escape being forcibly absorbed by modern society. Rustum, e Eridani II, was six parsecs away, forty-one years of travel, and barely habitable: but the only possible world yet discovered. A successful colony would be prestigious, and could do no harm; its failure would dispose of a thorn in the official ribs. Tying up fifteen ships for eight decades was all right too. Exploration was a dwindling activity, which interested fewer men each generation.

. . . .He knew better.But he did write a nice round hand, like a boy's hand. He knew Spanish, and enough English. For the sector that was assigned to him he would not need a map. He knew it better than anyone else, certainly better than any mapmaker. Besides, he was poor and needed the money.They instructed him and sent him out. Or they thought that they had instructed him. They couldn't be sure."Count everyone? All right. Fill in everyone? I need more papers.""We will give you more if you need more. But there aren't so many in your sector.""Lots of them. Lobos, tejones, zorros, even people."

Awarded the Hugo Award during 1958, The Big Time is a story involving only a few characters, but with a vast, cosmic back story.You don't know about the Change War, but it's influencing your lives all the time and maybe you've had hints of it without realizing. Have you ever worried about your memory, because it doesn't seem to be bringing you exactly the same picture of the past from one day to the next? Have you ever been afraid that your personality was changing because of forces beyond your knowledge or control? Have you ever felt sure that sudden death was about to jump you from nowhere? Have you ever been scared of Ghosts -- not the story-book kind, but the billions of beings who were once so real and strong it's hard to believe they'll just sleep harmlessly forever? Have you ever wondered about those things you may call devils or Demons -- spirits able to range through all time and space, through the hot hearts of stars and the cold skeleton of space?

"What do you make of it?" Commander Jed Hargraves asked huskily.Ron Val, busy at the telescope, was too excited to look up from the eye-piece. "There are at least two planets circling Vega!" he said quickly. "There may be other planets farther out, but I can see two plainly. And Jed, the nearest planet, the one we are approaching, has an atmosphere. The telescope reveals a blur that could only be caused by an atmosphere. And--Jed, this may seem so impossible you won't believe it--but I can see several large spots on the surface that are almost certainly lakes. They are not big enough to be called oceans or seas. But I am almost positive they are lakes!"According to the preconceptions of astronomers, formed before they had a chance to go see for themselves, solar systems were supposed to be rare birds. Not every sun had a chance to give birth to planets. Not one sun in a thousand, maybe not one in a million; maybe, with the exception of Sol, not another one in the whole universe.And here the first sun approached by the Third Interstellar Expedition was circled by planets!The sight was enough to drive an astronomer insane.

The story is set in the distant future, where humanity is at war with "Yuks", an alien life form which does not use mechanical spaceships nor constructions. Instead, it relies on life forms. The war has been going on for a long time, and humanity has not been able to come up with a solution against the life-form based ships and mines that the Yuks use. A human brain-controlled spacecraft would mean mechanical perfection. This was accomplished, and something unforeseen: a strange entity called . . . Mr. Spaceship!

"A few weeks ago," the Commandant said, "one of our amateurs had a lens on the Hole, just looking. He saw a glow. He reported to us; we checked and saw the same thing. There is a faint light coming out of the Hole -- obviously, a sun, a star inside the cloud, just far enough in to be almost invisible. God knows how long it's been there, but we do know that there's never been a record of a light in the Hole. Apparently this star orbited in some time ago, and is now on its way out. It is just approaching the edge of the cloud. Do you follow me?""Yes, sir," Beauclaire said."Your job is this: You will investigate that sun for livable planets and alien life. If you find anything -- which is highly unlikely -- you are to decipher the language and come right back. A Psych team will go out and determine the effects of a starless sky upon the alien culture -- obviously, these people will never have seen the stars."

Well, as I say, I found myself on a certain night a partaker of all this cheerfulness. I was one guest among many; there were explorers and ambassadors and great scientific personages and judges, and the author who has given the world the best laughter that it has enjoyed since Dickens died: in a word, I was in much more distinguished company than that to which I am accustomed. And after dinner the Persians (as I will call them) have a kindly and courteous custom of praising their guests; and to my astonishment and delight the speaker brought me into his oration and said the kindest and most glowing things imaginable about a translation I once made of the "Heptameron" of Margaret of Navarre. I was heartily pleased; I hold with Foker in "Pendennis" that every fellow likes a hand. Praise is grateful, especially when there has not been too much of it.

"Well, Corporal Westerburg," Doctor Henry Harris said gently, "just why do you think you're a plant?" As he spoke, Harris glanced down again at the card on his desk. It was from the Base Commander himself, made out in Cox's heavy scrawl: Doc, this is the lad I told you about. Talk to him and try to find out how he got this delusion. He's from the new Garrison, the new check-station on Asteroid Y-3, and we don't want anything to go wrong there. Especially a silly damn thing like this!

Her silence was long, and he rolled his head toward her again. Her lips tight, she stared down at the palm of his hand, unfolded his bony fingers, felt the cracked calluses that still welted the shrunken skin, calluses worn there by the linings of space gauntlets and the handles of fuel valves, and the rungs of get-about ladders during free fall. "I don't know if I should tell you," she said. "Tell me what, Martha?" She looked up slowly, scrutinizing his face. "Ken's changed his mind, Nora says. Ken doesn't like the academy. She says he wants to go to medical school. Old Donegal thought it over, nodded absently. "That's fine. Space-medics get good pay." He watched her carefully. She lowered her eyes, rubbed at his calluses again. She shook her head slowly. "He doesn't want to go to space." The clock clicked loudly in the closed room.

James Bolivar DiGriz, alias "Slippery Jim" is a fictional character and the protagonist of a series of comic science fiction novels written by Harry Harrison. It might seem a little careless to lose track of something as big as a battleship . . . but interstellar space is on a different scale of magnitude. Still, a misplaced battleship -- in the wrong hands! -- can be most dangerous.