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First SF experience?

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Re: First SF experience?
Post by Annachie   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 4:44 pm

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Not counting comics (which was x-men 139) the first SF I read was I Robot.

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Re: First SF experience?
Post by Daryl   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 5:51 pm

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John Prigent wrote:After more than 60 years I don't remember the author, the title or the storyline of my first encounter with SF. I do remember the title of Lest Darkness Fall, which was probably my first SF book purchase, and I know that I was reading Astounding/Analog in the early 50s.

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Re: First SF experience?
Post by Michael Everett   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 5:54 pm

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One of the earliest sci-fi books I remember (primary school) was "Keeper of the Isis Light".

At the time, I thought it was mind-blowing in showing the possibilities of someone becoming transhuman in order to live on a different world and how later arrivals might view said person.

I still remember the general flow (and several scenes) from all three books in the trilogy even though I read them about 30 years ago...
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Re: First SF experience?
Post by John Prigent   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 5:57 pm

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Sorry Daryl, wrong book. Maybe wrong title? The one I'm thinking of had some fellow thrown back to the Roman Empire and trying to prevent its fall. As a side-note, my Astounding/Analog collection is almost complete from about 1942 and I have some issues from the 30s.
Cheers
John

Daryl wrote:
John Prigent wrote:After more than 60 years I don't remember the author, the title or the storyline of my first encounter with SF. I do remember the title of Lest Darkness Fall, which was probably my first SF book purchase, and I know that I was reading Astounding/Analog in the early 50s.

Cheers
John

Issac Asimov.
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Re: First SF experience?
Post by DDHvi   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 8:07 pm

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Daryl wrote:
John Prigent wrote:After more than 60 years I don't remember the author, the title or the storyline of my first encounter with SF. I do remember the title of Lest Darkness Fall, which was probably my first SF book purchase, and I know that I was reading Astounding/Analog in the early 50s.

Cheers
John

Issac Asimov.


IIRC, L. Sprague de Camp had a story with this title in the 40s. Someone got thrown back in time to the Roman Empire period, and worked to prevent the decline and fall. This was posted before I read Prigent's reply.
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Re: First SF experience?
Post by Daryl   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 1:02 am

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Sorry, I was thinking of Nightfall (Sept 1941).
If you want one on the Roman time traveler preventing the decline try the Belisarious stories (Flint & Drake).
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Re: First SF experience?
Post by dscott8   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 10:37 am

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My first SF was with the founder of the genre -- Jules Verne. From The Earth To The Moon, 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, Journey To The Center Of The Earth.... I binge-read Verne as a child and still re-read him today.
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Re: First SF experience?
Post by cthia   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 1:03 pm

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Daryl wrote:Superman comics at about 5 years at about 1953 (early reader).
Lensman series about ten years later.


I was exposed to comic books at about that age as well, but I never actually read them at first. But then a cool uncle of mine asked me if I wanted to learn how to make silly putty. "What's silly putty?" I asked. My uncle was shocked that I didn't know what it was. So, how could I know if I'd want to learn how to make it.

At any rate, he proceeded to make some, explaining as he went along how it was an accidental discovery on the way to produce synthetic rubber for the war effort, yatta yatta yatta.

Watching those ingredients turn into this gooey stuff that you could play with almost made me choose chemistry as a profession. That uncle and his wife were both chemists. He showed me how to make it with both borax and starch. I thought it was so cool. But the cool part was yet to come. Holding it in my hand, I asked, "But what can you do with it?" :o

My aunt just fetched a comic book, mashed some putty on it and then slowly lifted the entire image up on the putty like magic. That was so frickin' cool. I was hooked! I made so much putty that all of my friends had some. I had a science project a few weeks later. I elected to make putty right in class. Even the teacher was amazed. I was invited to a few other classes to show how to make it. That was an easy A+. My uncle later showed me how to make putty worms to use for fishing bait. They fool a good share of fish. If you take time and paint the parts of a worm on, you can fool trout! The longer you spend painting the greater the reward. I learned that fish love putty too!

Over the following school years, I used putty to build a fort, a replica of the White House and an entire makeshift town with a lake. I learned to augment model cars with it as well.

After hours and hours of lifting images off of comics, one day I actually read one.

Over the years I've passed the joy along to other kids. They love it, as did I.

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Re: First SF experience?
Post by Brigade XO   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 3:55 pm

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I think it was Clark's "A fall of moon dust", then "The Weapon Shops of Ishtar. The father of a friend in gradeschool had several bookshelves full of SF including a number of books that had a pair of stories each- back to back and upside-down with seperate cover for each. I was hooked. .
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Re: First SF experience?
Post by Hutch   » Tue Mar 01, 2016 11:45 am

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Seventh grade, I was browsing for something to read in the school library, and ran across "The Star Conquerers" by Ben Bova. I quickly started looking for more of these bboks with the spaceship logo and quickly ran into Poul Anderson, Lester DelRay and Robert Anson Heinlein pretty quickly. Still have the first paperback series I ever collected (Lensman and Skylark of Space series by E.E. 'Doc' Smith). Stared reading Analog in College and have about a 15-year collection. Of late, Weber and Flint have filled a couple of shelves.
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