Best of
Speculative-Fiction

1956

The Stars My Destination


Alfred Bester - 1956
    The Stars My Destination is a classic of technological prophecy and timeless narrative enchantment by an acknowledged master of science fiction.

The Door Into Summer


Robert A. Heinlein - 1956
    Then, with wild success just within reach, Dan's greedy partner and even greedier fiancée steal his work and leave him penniless, and trick him into taking the long sleep—suspended animation for thirty years.

Time for the Stars


Robert A. Heinlein - 1956
    It has since been in print for 50 years in paperback, and now returns to hardcover for a new generation. Travel to other planets is a reality, and with overpopulation stretching the resources of Earth, the necessity to find habitable worlds is growing ever more urgent. With no time to wait years for communication between slower-than-light spaceships and home, the Long Range Foundation explores an unlikely solution--human telepathy.Identical twins Tom and Pat are enlisted to be the human radios that will keep the ships in contact with Earth. The only problem is that one of them has to stay behind, and that one will grow old while the other explores the depths of space.Always a master of insight into the human consequences of future technologies, this is one of Heinlein's triumphs.

Double Star


Robert A. Heinlein - 1956
    Then a space pilot bought him a drink, and the next thing Smythe knew, he was shanghaied to Mars.Suddenly he found himself agreeing to the most difficult role of his career: impersonating an important politician who had been kidnapped. Peace with the Martians was at stake — failure to pull off the act could result in interplanetary war. And Smythe's own life was on the line — for if he wasn't assassinated, there was always the possibility that he might be trapped in his new role forever!

The Reefs of Taprobane


Arthur C. Clarke - 1956
    Meetings with dangerous and beautiful marine creatures were only one side of the expedition's activities. Their adventures included the discovery of many wrecks and the investigation of a 3,000-year-old Hindu temple lying on the ocean bed. Clarke and Wilson lived among the Ceylonese natives, their contact with Europeans virtually limited to the dozen members of the Ceylonese Reefcombers Club, who shared many of their underwater adventures. When weather conditions ruled out skin diving, they explored the awe-inspiring ruins of ancient Sinhalese cities, made trips into the jungles in search of wild life, and visited Buddhist monasteries.Clarke and Wilson's experiences provide vivid impressions of old and new Ceylon, one of the key countries of the Far East, and give vivid impressions of the fantastic life of the tropical reefs and the strange transformations which lost ships undergo when the sea works its will on them.