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Isaac Asimov

100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories Hardcover – 1 March 1978

by Isaac Asimov (Editor)

23 ratings

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Product details

Publisher : Doubleday (1 March 1978)
Language : English
ISBN-10 : 0385130449
ISBN-13 : 978-0385130448

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23 ratings

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Customer reviews

5 star		57%
4 star		16%
3 star		7%
2 star		13%
1 star		8%

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michael schmidt

Great Book But Seller Misrepresented Book

Reviewed in Canada on 29 March 2018

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I love this book. I read it when I was a child and fell in love with it, and over the years have often thought about buying it.
For me, this was in large part a nostalgic purchase.
So, my star rating is not based on the content of the book. The book is wonderful.
The star rating is based on the misrepresentation of the the seller.
I'm sorry, but when you advertise a book coming with the dust jacket, then you need to send one that comes with a dust jacket.
Clearly this seller just went online and grabbed a photo of this book and attached it to the listing rather than taking 30 seconds and actually photographing the book they were selling.
No dust jacket. And no response from the seller based on my complaint.
I guess it's just not worth getting back to me about.

Great book. Deceitful seller.

Shagbark

Highest idea per word count ever

Reviewed in the United States on 3 September 2013

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I've read a lot of science fiction novels, and a lot of science fiction anthologies. I think I've read every collection of Hugo and Nebula award winners published up through 1999, and the anthologies by Dozois and others. This book is my favorite science fiction anthology, and my second-favorite anthology of any kind (behind Borges' /Labyrinths/ and / Ficciones (English Translation) /, which I am counting as the two halves of one book, and which is science fiction without science).

It's so /dense/. None of these stories are famous; they're too short to trigger the emotional identification needed to get on a Hugo ballot. But if you're reading for emotional identification, why are you reading science fiction? Science fiction is about ideas, and this book hits you with one idea after another. Many of them are small ideas; few are deep philosophical ideas; but they are all clever, the sort of thing a smart nerdy friend might say. Most people think of nerds as the media presents them, like in "The Big Bang Theory"--smart people as they appear to dumb people, like a TV show about humans written by dogs. Reading this book can give you the experience of being a nerd.

I read this book over the course of a few evenings about 30 years ago, and I still encounter things in the real world on a regular basis that make me think, "That reminds me of a story in 100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories". I came here to buy another copy on Amazon because I'm tired of wanting to look stories up in it, and not being able to find my copy, which disappeared sometime within the past 10 years.

12 people found this helpful

John M. Ford

Pre-1980s Short Short Science Fiction

Reviewed in the United States on 1 August 2010

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Science fiction Grand Master Isaac Asimov assembles a collection of the shortest science fiction stories available to entertain and to illustrate a point. "As a story grows shorter and shorter, all the fancy embroidery that length makes possible must go. In the short story, there can be no subplots; there is no time for philosophy; what description and character delineation there is must be accomplished with concision." He has chosen 100 short shorts "from the science fiction blowgun" of experienced writers, including himself.

Some of my favorites, with their pithy, Asimovian tag lines:

1. Jerome Bixby's "Trace" - Imagine hitting that tiny bit of impurity.
2. Larry Niven's "Safe at Any Speed" - The womb was never like this.
3. Isaac Asimov's "Exile to Hell" - Well, look about you, wise guy.
4. Fred Saberhagen's "Martha" - And that's how television programming works, too.
5. Larry Niven's "Mistake" - Updating the pink elephant.
6. Roger Zelazny's "Collector's Fever" - Golly, isn't any form of depredation safe?
7. Alfred Bester's "The Die-Hard" - Yes, but how do you define man?
8. Anthony Boucher's "Star Bride" - Romeos come in all varieties; so do Juliets.
9. Thomas Monteleone's "Present Perfect" - You said it, not I, Tom.
10. Mildred Broxon's "Source Material" - That explains a lot of my own teachers.

The stories are good examples of the short-short form. The reader's enjoyment is somewhat hampered by their age. The tone of a science fiction story is affected not just by when in the future it is set, but by the vision of the future in vogue during the time it was written. Readers will encounter Martians, building-sized computers, and English-speaking, humanoid aliens. And a number of formerly surprising and hard-hitting endings have become less so with the passage of time.

But there are some classics and some obscure gems, too. This collection is recommended for science fiction fans, connoisseurs of the short-short form, and writers learning to write brief, high-impact narratives. Developing writers of short-shorts may also benefit from The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction: Tips from Editors, Teachers, and Writers in the Field .

3 people found this helpful

Spike Spiegel

Very Good All Around Fiction And Science Fiction Short Stories

Reviewed in the United States on 1 September 2014

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Three of my favorite science fiction short stories are in this compilation (if Light Of Other Days was in here it would truly be complete). If you like having a book of short stories by your bedside while and as you read the ponderous tome you are currently plowing through, and you like Fiction and Fantasy, because you can't call some of this Science Fiction, then you will certainly like this book.

One person found this helpful

Kevin Frushour

This is what I call a proper short story collection!

Reviewed in the United States on 17 January 2016

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I like novels, and I like really short stories. I really don't like the in-between "short" stories that can't be consumed in a sitting. That's what I love about this book. All the stories are short enough to consume a few in a sitting. Long car trip? Plenty of stories. Short car trip? Bang a few out. Perfect.

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