Ascents of Wonder

by David Gerrold (Editor), Stephen Goldin (Associate Editor), Mel Gilden (Contributor)

• Introduction - essay by David Gerrold
• Tom Sawyer's Sub-Orbital Escapade - Steven Utley and Lisa Tuttle
• The Light at the End of the Penumbra - Gregory Feeley
• Love Among the Symbionts - Michael Reaves
• A Modern Parable - Christopher J. Crowley
• Portrait of the Artist as a Young God - Stephen Goldin
• The Exempt - George Alec Effinger
• Scrapings - Kenneth Von Gunden
• The Perambulator - Mel Gilden
• White Hole - Daniel P. Dern
• Just an Old-Fashioned War Story - Michael G. Coney
• Contact Myth - Joseph F. Pumilia
• Equinoctial - John Varley

288 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1977

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a pretty good un-themed (other than to promote a sense-of-wonder) anthology of original science fiction stories that Gerrold edited in 1977. There's a proto-steampunk story by Lisa Tuttle and Steven Utley about Tom Sawyer and his pals building a moon rocket, a somewhat needlessly politically oriented story about alien exploration by Greg Feeley, a very good story about a commune for disabled individuals by J. Michael Reaves that made me think of Shirley Jackson and Ursula K. LeGuin, a short fable by Christopher J. Crowley that I believe may have been based on an old football fans joke, a story by Stephen Goldin about God as a mathematician, a nice George Alec Effinger tale that views his beloved New Orleans as a magical nexus, a good short horror-in-space tale by Kenneth Von Gunden, a novelet by Mel Gilden that is told in the zany Ron Goulart style but goes on just a bit too long, a strange piece by Daniel P. Dern (what? sharp distance? rust never sleeps?), and a very good story by Joe Pumilia that reminded me how popular Erich Von Daniken was in 1977. The book closes with a post-human symbiosis novella from John Varley that's set in his Ophiuchi Hotline/Eight Worlds series that's interesting, if a little hard to follow. I thought the best story in the book was Michael G. Coney's Just an Old-Fashioned War Story, a very clever and deftly written...well... old-fashioned war story, I guess. Altogether it's a good, warts-and-all, representative collection of the field as it was at the time.

[Patrick Pritchard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of the stories in this anthology were good reading, though there were a couple that I just couldn't make heads with and skipped'm. For the most part a good collection of speculative fiction. My favorite was Contact Myth by Joe Pumilia.