Strange Highways: Reading Science Fantasy, 1950-1967. Damien Broderick

Science Fantasy blends science fiction AND fantasy, so it tends to be bolder and more highly colored than pure science fiction. In the middle of the last century, the British magazine SCIENCE FANTASY created its own distinctive strains of fantasy narrative, most famously by such writers as Brian W. Aldiss, J. G. Ballard, John Brunner, Michael Moorcock, and Thomas Burnett Swann, among others. This book looks closely at the whole trajectory of that lost magazine, from its birth in 1950 through 1967, when it was briefly called (SF) Impulse. John Boston provides a brilliantly insightful and often every funny account of the rise, evolution, and final fall of SCIENCE FANTASY, its writers, and its quirky editors. Boston is joined by writer and critic Damien Broderick, adding his own waspish and nostalgic comments. This volume, the first of three dealing with the history and development of the major British SF magazines, is a compelling night journey into the past, where the future took a turn down paths not often explored. It's a trip not to be missed.