Science Fiction
FIRST LIGHT.
London: Hamish Hamilton, [1989]. Octavo, boards. First edition. The author's fourth novel.
LIFE, THE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING.
New York: Harmony Books, [1982]. Octavo, First U.S. edition. First printing with numeric code on copyright page ending with "1." Inscribed by Adams on the half title page. The third Hitch Hiker book. With their vast fleet of spaceships and huge army of killer robots the people of Krikkit pursue "their new and absolute purpose -- the destruction of everything that wasn't Krikkit." See Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-3.
THE MORE THAN COMPLETE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE...
[Stamford, CT]: Longmeadow Press, [1987]. Octavo, full leather, a.e.g. Later edition, (line of letters starts with "b"). Omnibus edition that collects THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY, THE RESTAURANT AT THE END OF THE UNIVERSE, LIFE, THE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING, SO LONG, AND THANKS FOR ALL THE FISH and YOUNG ZAPHOD PLAYS IT SAFE. This edition also includes an introduction by the author.
MOSTLY HARMLESS.
Norwalk, Connecticut: The Easton Press, [1992]. Octavo, frontispiece by Frank Mayo, full leather, a.e.g. First limited edition. One of an unspecified number of copies signed by Adams. Introduction by James Gunn. The fifth book in the Hitch Hiker series. Part of the Easton press signed first edition series. See Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-3.
TIME MACHINES.
New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., [1998]. Octavo, boards. First edition. Collects twenty-two stories by Jack Finney, Ray Bradbury, Edgar Allan Poe, Larry Niven, Robert Sawyer, Connie Willis, Rudyard Kipling and others.
BEST SF STORIES OF BRIAN W. ALDISS.
London: Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1988. Octavo, boards. First edition. Collects twenty-two stories, only nine of which appeared in earlier "best of" collections. Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-6.
THE BRIGHTFOUNT DIARIES.
London: Faber and Faber Ltd, [1955]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. The author's first book.
CRACKEN AT CRITICAL: A NOVEL IN THREE ACTS.
[Worcester Park, Surrey]: Kerosina Books, 1987. Octavo, cloth. First British edition. One of 250 numbered copies signed by Aldiss. Text revised from that of the earlier U.S. edition published as The Year Before Yesterday.
DRACULA UNBOUND.
[New York]: HarperCollinsPublishers, [1991]. Octavo, cloth backed boards. First edition. Time travelers connect with Bram Stoker to fight Dracula from a future where the human race is enslaved.
EARTHWORKS.
Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1966. Octavo, cloth. First U. S. edition. "An overpopulated world drifts towards nuclear Armageddon as the only 'solution' to its problems." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 115.
HOTHOUSE.
London: Faber and Faber, [1962]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Signed by Aldiss on the title page. Issued earlier in the U.S. in a shorter version as The Long Afternoon of Earth (1962). Novelization of five Hothouse stories that won the 1962 Hugo award for best short fiction published in 1961. Anatomy of Wonder (1995) 3-3. Pringle, Science Fiction: The 100 Best Novels 34.
INTANGIBLES INC. AND OTHER STORIES.
London: Faber and Faber, [1969]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Collects five novellas. The American edition title NEANDERTHAL PLANET (1970) has slightly different contents.
NON-STOP.
London: Faber and Faber, [1958]. Octavo, boards. First edition, first printing. Signed by Aldiss on the title page. The author's first sf novel. Issued later with textual differences in the U.S. as STARSHIP (1959). "... a brilliant treatment of the generation starship and also the theme of conceptual breakthrough in a kind of spacegoing ruined-Earth society; it has become a classic of the field and in 2008 was awarded a retrospective British Science Fiction Association Award for best novel of 1958." - John Clute / David Pringle, SFE (online). Anatomy of Wonder (1995) 3-4. Pringle: Science Fiction: The 100 Best Novels #25. Gerber, Utopian Fantasy (1973), p. 160.
A ROMANCE OF THE EQUATOR.
[Birmingham: The Birmingham Science Fiction Group, 1979]. Octavo, printed wrappers. First edition. Limited to 550 numbered copies. Signed by Aldiss on the limitation page. Booklet issued for Novacon 10 at which Aldiss was guest of honor. Prints the short story.
SOMEWHERE EAST OF LIFE.
New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., [1994]. Octavo, cloth backed boards. First U. S. trade edition. The last volume in the author's "Squire Quartet." "Roy Burnell likes his job; he travels the globe for World Antiquities and Cultural Heritage, an agency that researches, registers, and attempts to protect fine architecture from the dangers of wars that have broken out in Europe and Asia. While inspecting a cathedral in Budapest, Burnell encounters another danger of the 21st century: memory pirates. Ten years of his architectural knowledge and sexual experiences have been stolen from him, packaged, and offered up for sale on the e-mnemonicvision black market; Burnell is left confused and bereft. In search of his career and his stolen memories, Burnell travels east, into the heart of ethnic warfare and human depravity. On his journeys he encounters a faithless priest concealing a priceless icon, a brutal conqueror, ruthless profiteers and apathetic prostitutes, and, perhaps most frightening of all, his ex-wife. He braves sandstorms, scorpions, cholera, terrorists, and government bureaucracy, trying to make sense of his own life and the lives of others. Intelligent, funny, and hopeful in spite of itself, Aldiss's (A Tupolev Too Far, 1994) latest fantasy serves as a powerful warning about the perils of the future and a rueful assessment of humanity's likely response." - Kirkus Review 1 June, 1994.
SOMEWHERE EAST OF LIFE.
Norwalk, Connecticut: The Easton Press, [1994]. Octavo, frontispiece by Frank Mayo, full leather, a.e.g. First limited edition. One of an unspecified number of copies signed by Aldiss. Introduction by James Gunn. "Roy Burnell likes his job; he travels the globe for World Antiquities and Cultural Heritage, an agency that researches, registers, and attempts to protect fine architecture from the dangers of wars that have broken out in Europe and Asia. While inspecting a cathedral in Budapest, Burnell encounters another danger of the 21st century: memory pirates. Ten years of his architectural knowledge and sexual experiences have been stolen from him, packaged, and offered up for sale on the e-mnemonicvision black market..." - Kirkus Review, 1 June, 1994. Part of the Easton press signed first edition series.
SPACE, TIME AND NATHANIEL.
London: Faber and Faber, [1957]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. The author's first SF book, a collection of fourteen short stories. Includes "The Shubshub Race," a satire set partly on Upotia, a destination planet for wealthy individuals. "Fourteen lyrical stories, comprising its author's first collection. Notable entries are 'Outside' (1955), 'Psyclops' (1956) and 'The Failed Men' (1957)." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 338. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 264.
SPACE, TIME AND NATHANIEL.
London: Faber and Faber, [1957]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. The author's first SF book, a collection of fourteen short stories. Includes "The Shubshub Race," a satire set partly on Upotia, a destination planet for wealthy individuals. "Fourteen lyrical stories, comprising its author's first collection. Notable entries are 'Outside' (1955), 'Psyclops' (1956) and 'The Failed Men' (1957)." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 338. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 264.
NEBULA AWARD STORIES TWO.
Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1967. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Collects eleven stories by Richard McKenna, Bob Shaw, R. A. Lafferty, Jack Vance, Frederik Pohl, Philip K. Dick, and others. Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-1364.
BEST SF STORIES OF BRIAN W. ALDISS.
London: Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1988. Octavo, boards. First edition. Collects twenty-two stories, only nine of which appeared in earlier "best of" collections. Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-6.
CRACKEN AT CRITICAL: A NOVEL IN THREE ACTS.
[Worcester Park, Surrey]: Kerosina Books, 1987. Octavo, cloth. First British edition. One of 250 numbered copies signed by Aldiss. Fix-up novel in which "the author has built a framing narrative, about an alternative Europe still under Nazi domination, around two old space adventure novellas from the 1950s ... The modern story is fine, but, unfortunately, it comprises less than a fifth of the whole book." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 80. Text revised from that of the earlier U.S. edition published as THE YEAR BEFORE YESTERDAY.
THE EIGHTY-MINUTE HOUR: A SPACE OPERA.
Garden City: Doubleday & Company, 1974. Octavo, cloth. First edition. "In this wild fantasy, the lavish use of nuclear weapons has caused distortions in the space-time continuum which bounce the characters from era to era. This effect is used mainly to create various incongruities after the manner of Aldiss's post-psychedelic war novel BAREFOOT IN THE HEAD (1972)." - Brains, Nuclear Holocausts: Atomic War in Fiction, 1895-1984, p. 112. "An over-the-top comic romp which unfortunately fails to amuse. One of Aldiss's few duds." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 117. The Doubleday edition and the later Cape edition have minor textual differences.
ENEMIES OF THE SYSTEM...
New York, Hagerstown, San Francisco, London: Harper & Row, Publishers, [1978]. Octavo, cloth-backed boards. First U.S. edition. "Authoritarian dystopia." - Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 384.
ENEMIES OF THE SYSTEM: A TALE OF HOMO UNIFORMIS.
London: Jonathan Cape, [1978]. Octavo, boards. First edition. "Authoritarian dystopia." - Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 384. Representatives of the highly evolved Homo uniformis are stranded on a backwater planet. A brief, dystopia satire on conformity and collectivism, and one of Aldiss's more forgettable works." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 121. Lewis, Utopian Literature, pp. 3-4.
FRANKENSTEIN UNBOUND.
New York: Random House, [1974]. Octavo, cloth. First U.S. edition. A 1990 film directed by Roger Corman was based on this novel. Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-9. Barron (ed), Horror Literature 4-10. Survey of Science Fiction Literature II, pp. 840-4.