Topic Actions

Topic Search

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 17 guests

First SF experience?

For anyone who might want to have a side conversation...you're welcome here!
Re: First SF experience?
Post by Annachie   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 4:44 pm

Annachie
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3099
Joined: Fri Jun 17, 2011 7:36 pm

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

Sent from my SM-G920I using Tapatalk
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You are so going to die. :p ~~~~ runsforcelery
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
still not dead. :)
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by Daryl   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 5:51 pm

Daryl
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3562
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2010 1:57 am
Location: Queensland Australia

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

Michael Everett
Admiral

Posts: 2619
Joined: Tue Nov 03, 2009 3:54 am
Location: Bristol, England

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...
~~~~~~

I can't write anywhere near as well as Weber
But I try nonetheless, And even do my own artwork.
(Now on Twitter)and mentioned by RFC!
ACNH Dreams at DA-6594-0940-7995
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by John Prigent   » Thu Feb 25, 2016 5:57 pm

John Prigent
Captain of the List

Posts: 592
Joined: Sun Aug 09, 2009 8:05 am
Location: Sussex, England

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

DDHvi
Captain (Junior Grade)

Posts: 365
Joined: Mon Dec 15, 2014 8:16 pm

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.
:?
Douglas Hvistendahl
Retired technical nerd
ddhviste@drtel.net

Dumb mistakes are very irritating.
Smart mistakes go on forever
Unless you test your assumptions!
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by Daryl   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 1:02 am

Daryl
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3562
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2010 1:57 am
Location: Queensland Australia

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).
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by dscott8   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 10:37 am

dscott8
Commodore

Posts: 791
Joined: Thu Jul 15, 2010 6:17 am

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.
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by cthia   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 1:03 pm

cthia
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 14951
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:10 pm

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.

https://youtu.be/7KYv5s_yVm0

Son, your mother says I have to hang you. Personally I don't think this is a capital offense. But if I don't hang you, she's gonna hang me and frankly, I'm not the one in trouble. —cthia's father. Incident in ? Axiom of Common Sense
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by Brigade XO   » Fri Feb 26, 2016 3:55 pm

Brigade XO
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3190
Joined: Sat Nov 14, 2009 12:31 pm
Location: KY

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. .
Top
Re: First SF experience?
Post by Hutch   » Tue Mar 01, 2016 11:45 am

Hutch
Vice Admiral

Posts: 1831
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 12:40 pm
Location: Huntsville, Alabama y'all

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.
***********************************************
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow.

What? Look, somebody's got to have some damn perspective around here! Boom. Sooner or later. BOOM! -LT. Cmdr. Susan Ivanova, Babylon 5
Top

Return to Free-Range Topics...