"Runawa," by Leigh Brackett
Chuck C.
Anthony Reid is losing it. Working as a CPA in a future Los
Angeles, he is rapidly coming to the conclusion that nothing he does
has any worth or meaning. His job consists of feeding coded tape into
a machine a pushing buttons. His wife is unsympathetic to his attempts
to explain himself; she simply urges him to get "treatment," to which
she submits twice yearly. His friend George, who has been conditioned
by the psych experts, says the same. Frustrated at every turn, Anthony
is approaching a breakdown.
Seeking some escape, he bribes a passerby for his papers and gets
on a shuttle to Venus. But this is not the Venus of "Lorelei of the
Red Mist," with pleasant temperatures and a breathable atmosphere.
This Venus is a bit closer to the real Venus: temperatures, while not
the 1200 degrees that actually exist, are too hot for anyone to live
outside of a dome. Anthony soon finds that Venus is hell: he is
shanghaied into a work crew with no hope of anything but punishing
work until an early death.
At this low point, help comes from an unexpected source: Earth
authorities have discovered the discrepancy in Anthony's papers and
arrest him. He is immediately transported back to Earth, there to
receive "treatment."
Up to this point, "Runaway" reads like a typical 50's dystopian
nightmare. However, this is the point in the story where things
change.
SPOILER
The "treatment center" at which Anthony finds himself is not quite
what he expected.. As his shrink, Dr. Eckworth puts it, "The most
important thing is to be able to recognize a reality when you see it.
That's what you refused to do when you ran all the way out to Venus to
get away from having to recognize a few. But I think you're beginning
to realize now that there isn't any escape.
"...Look, Reid. Reality isn't something that happened a generation
ago, or a thousand years ago. Reality is now, the contemporary matrix,
the frame of reference you were born into. You may not like it....But
it's real. You can't evade it, except by dying or retreating into
insanity."
It turns out that, far from being an asylum for the mentally
deranged, the center is an "oasis" for persons with creative potential
to work on ideas. Anthony has been identified as one such, and ends by
finding an outlet for his energies.
"Runaway" is a surprising departure for Brackett. As noted, this is
not the Venus of her planetary romances; neither is Reid the cynical,
hard-bitten protagonist we are used to. I would not have been
surprised to read this story in Galaxy or even Astounding of that
period; and if I had not known it was by Brackett, I would never has
guessed it.
Cheers,
CC
Gene Ward Smith
46c9-8ee7-7...@f10g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:
> This Venus is a bit closer to the real Venus: temperatures,
while not
> the 1200 degrees that actually exist, are too hot for anyone
to live
> outside of a dome.
Excellent; a 1954 book with a hot Venus. So much for the idea
no one had heard of it.
Butch Malahide
> " Runaway," by Leigh Brackett (STARTLING, Spring, 1954).
Lacking that issue of Startling, I looked in the ISFDB to see where
that story is reprinted. For no particular reason I did a title search
instead of an author search, and that led me to an idle question:
What is the most-used title in SF? I think "Runaway" must be in the
running: 11 instances in the ISFDB of just plain "Runaway"; 12 more of
minor variants such as "Runaway!", "The Runaway", "Runaways", "The
Runaways"; 12 stories with another noun in the title, e.g. "The
Runaway Skyscraper".
Ahasuerus
Interesting. Here is what I got when I searched the ISFDB for unique
titles with the following caveats:
(a) Novels and short fiction only; no poems, collections or anthology
titles;
(b) Leading articles like "A ", "An " and "The " stripped;
(c) All punctuation stripped except for spaces;
(d) Variant titles counted, which can arguably lead to overcounting,
but shouldn't affect our rough guesstimate;
(e) All characters changed to lowercase to ensure case insensitivity;
(f) Plural forms like "Runaways" counted separately from "Runaway";
(g) The ISFDB team is not responsible for sins of omission or
commission;
48 homecoming
36 changeling
35 gift
34 legacy
33 monster
33 return
30 reunion
30 sanctuary
26 escape
24 plague
24 resurrection
24 sacrifice
23 beast
23 guardian
23 skin deep
22 hero
22 hunger
21 awakening
21 title not known
20 exile
20 invasion
20 second chance
20 shadows
20 survivor
19 experiment
19 initiation
19 mirror
18 nightmare
18 perchance to dream
18 sea change
18 wall
17 bridge
17 choice
17 cure
17 dust
17 healer
17 inheritance
17 messenger
17 trap
16 alien
16 journey
16 mirror mirror
16 runaway
16 stranger
16 twilight
16 untitled
16 wings
15 catalyst
15 fog
15 labyrinth
15 metamorphosis
15 other
15 power
15 promise
15 quest
15 threshold
15 traitor
15 visitors
15 voices
14 assassin
14 birthright
14 breakdown
14 burning
14 curse
14 dead end
14 dream
14 firebird
14 game
14 ghost
14 guardians
14 haunted
14 hide and seek
14 immortal
14 mask
14 nocturne
14 phoenix
14 prey
14 silence
14 survival
14 talisman
13 aftermath
13 barrier
13 castaway
13 chosen
13 chrysalis
13 cry wolf
13 dragons teeth
13 dreamer
13 face
13 home
13 house
13 invaders
13 judgment day
13 monsters
13 outcast
13 relics
13 ring
13 second sight
13 secret weapon
13 sorcerers apprentice
13 survivors
13 time trap
12 answer
12 artifact
12 blood ties
12 brothers
12 chimera
12 door
12 fear
12 final exam
12 fish story
12 genesis
12 ghost of a chance
12 going home
12 hunt
12 intruders
12 lost
12 memory
12 omega
12 oracle
12 peacemaker
12 promised land
12 shelter
12 test
12 turnabout
12 wish
12 witness
11 angel
11 avatar
11 blood brothers
11 boomerang
11 bugs
11 burning bright
11 darkness
11 death sentence
11 harvest
11 in the beginning
11 intruder
11 key
11 little knowledge
11 long way home
11 message
11 mirror image
11 nemesis
11 night watch
11 peace on earth
11 pit
11 possession
11 prodigy
11 question
11 secret
11 shadow
11 shrine
11 stitch in time
11 touch
11 underground
11 uninvited
11 vision
11 visitor
11 voice
11 watcher
11 window
11 witch
Obviously, "Homecoming" is the undisputed champion. "Runaway" is not
at the top of the list, but, at 16 hits, does OK, all things
considered.
Butch Malahide
Thanks! Hmm, "a little knowledge" beats "a little learning", 11-1. I
wonder what that means.
Gene Ward Smith
4fdd-9df5-1...@v46g2000hsv.googlegroups.com:
> Interesting. Here is what I got when I searched the ISFDB
for unique
> titles with the following caveats:
>
And if you can't come up with a name for your latest novel
with the help of this list, you're hopeless. But how many
titles are composed of words entirely from this list, allowing
for articles and plural forms?
ncw...@hotmail.com
"Title not Known" seems to be a surprisingly popular entry !
Cheers,
Nigel.
Kent Allard
"Chuck C." <cunn...@jmu.edu> wrote:
> It turns out that, far from being an asylum for the mentally
> deranged, the center is an "oasis" for persons with creative potential
> to work on ideas. Anthony has been identified as one such, and ends by
> finding an outlet for his energies.
This sounds very familiar. Can't place the title or author, but a similar SF
story comes to mind of a man who gets out of basic education and goes to have
his brain programmed for the job he'll do all his life (Earth exports people who
run complex machines etc, having no other commodities to sell).
It turns out that the protagonist is one of the rare few whose brain can't be
programmed. Expecting the worst, he is brought to a training centre where he has
to learn from scratch. The unprogrammable folk being the ones who come up with
new complex machines for programmable people to run.
Ahasuerus
> Ahasuerus <ahasue...@email.com> wrote in news:5d93337b-4270-
> 4fdd-9df5-1d5214ee0...@v46g2000hsv.googlegroups.com:
>
> > Interesting. Here is what I got when I searched the ISFDB
> for unique
> > titles with the following caveats:
>
> And if you can't come up with a name for your latest novel
> with the help of this list, you're hopeless. But how many
> titles are composed of words entirely from this list, allowing
> for articles and plural forms?
As in _Monster's Gift: Legacy of the Changeling (Book 3 of "Escape
from the Sanctuary")_? If you want it to be reasonably accurate, then
it will take a fair amount of massaging to account for irregular
plural forms. If you want some basic numbers so that we could say
"Look, X out of Y SF/F titles published after 200Z were made of 100%
pure recycled pablum!", then I can do it tonight.
Ahasuerus
> On 4 Feb, 06:45, Ahasuerus <ahasue...@email.com> wrote:
> > On Feb 3, 9:42 pm, Butch Malahide <fred.gal...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Feb 3, 12:16 pm, "Chuck C." <cunni...@jmu.edu> wrote:
>
> > > > " Runaway," by Leigh Brackett (STARTLING, Spring, 1954).
>
> > > Lacking that issue of Startling, I looked in the ISFDB to see where
> > > that story is reprinted. For no particular reason I did a title search
> > > instead of an author search, and that led me to an idle question:
>
> > > What is the most-used title in SF? I think "Runaway" must be in the
> > > running: 11 instances in the ISFDB of just plain "Runaway"; 12 more of
> > > minor variants such as "Runaway!", "The Runaway", "Runaways", "The
> > > Runaways"; 12 stories with another noun in the title, e.g. "The
> > > Runaway Skyscraper".
>
> > Interesting. Here is what I got when I searched the ISFDB for unique
> > titles with the following caveats:
>
> "Title not Known" seems to be a surprisingly popular entry !
That's because we were unable to identify some of the stories sold to
_The Last Dangerous Visions_ ( http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?TLSTDGV19XX).
Additions and corrections are more than welcome! :)
Lawrence Watt-Evans
If that's a YASID, it's by Isaac Asimov. The title might be
"Profession," or it might not.
--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The seventh issue of Helix is now at http://www.helixsf.com
Mike Schilling
"Lawrence Watt-Evans" <l...@sff.net> wrote in message
news:8skeq39g979u062i1...@news.rcn.com...
'Tis.
Butch Malahide
> Ahasuerus <ahasue...@email.com> wrote in news:5d93337b-4270-
> 4fdd-9df5-1d5214ee0...@v46g2000hsv.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> for unique
> > titles with the following caveats:
>
> And if you can't come up with a name for your latest novel
> with the help of this list, you're hopeless. But how many
> titles are composed of words entirely from this list, allowing
> for articles and plural forms?
I'll bet Peter Phillips's "Lost Memory" is the most famous story whose
title is constructed by juxtaposing two consecutive entries on the
Most Overused Titles list. And Van Vogt's "The Monster" alias
"Resurrection" must be the most famous story using two of the top
dozen as variant titles.
Gene Ward Smith
443a-8433-4...@f47g2000hsd.googlegroups.com:
> If you want some basic numbers so that we could say
> "Look, X out of Y SF/F titles published after 200Z were
made of 100%
> pure recycled pablum!", then I can do it tonight.
>
You are on the track of an important breakthrough. Don't
stop.
Mark_R...@hotmail.com
> On Mon, 04 Feb 2008 12:05:49 -0500, Kent Allard
>
>
>
>
>
> <evil@hearts_of_men.net> wrote:
> > "Chuck C." <cunni...@jmu.edu> wrote:
>
> >> It turns out that, far from being an asylum for the mentally
> >> deranged, the center is an "oasis" for persons with creative potential
> >> to work on ideas. Anthony has been identified as one such, and ends by
> >> finding an outlet for his energies.
>
> >This sounds very familiar. Can't place the title or author, but a similar SF
> >story comes to mind of a man who gets out of basic education and goes to have
> >his brain programmed for the job he'll do all his life (Earth exports people who
> >run complex machines etc, having no other commodities to sell).
>
> >It turns out that the protagonist is one of the rare few whose brain can't be
> >programmed. Expecting the worst, he is brought to a training centre where he has
> >to learn from scratch. The unprogrammable folk being the ones who come up with
> >new complex machines for programmable people to run.
>
> If that's a YASID, it's by Isaac Asimov. The title might be
> "Profession," or it might not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profession_(short_story)
Includes a link to the actual story.
William Hyde
> "Chuck C." <cunni...@jmu.edu> wrote in news:ec392d97-8129-
> 46c9-8ee7-7353df3ec...@f10g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> > This Venus is a bit closer to the real Venus: temperatures,
> while not
> > the 1200 degrees that actually exist, are too hot for anyone
> to live
> > outside of a dome.
>
> Excellent; a 1954 book with a hot Venus. So much for the idea
> no one had heard of it.
Poul Anderson in "The Big Rain" (1955) explicitly mentions the
greenhouse effect, and in the story the outside daytime temperature is
given as around "the boiling point of water", which would be rather
high at that pressure, but even assuming he means 100C, it's still a
hot Venus.
William Hyde
Steve Heller
<evil@hearts_of_men.net> wrote:
"Profession", by Isaac Asimov.
Steve
ahas...@email.com
> Ahasuerus <ahasue...@email.com> wrote in news:ddcf7808-dc5e-
> 443a-8433-4937d7c5e...@f47g2000hsd.googlegroups.com:
>
> > If you want some basic numbers so that we could say
> > "Look, X out of Y SF/F titles published after 200Z were
> made of 100%
> > pure recycled pablum!", then I can do it tonight.
>
> You are on the track of an important breakthrough. Don't stop.
Here is a preliminary list:
_Alien Artifact_ (1965) by Dannie Plachta
_Alien Dust_ (1953) by E. C. Tubb
_Alien Game_ (1995) by Catherine Dexter
_Alien Harvest_ (1995) by Robert Sheckley
_Alien Invasion_ (1954) by Marcia Kamien
_Alien Prey_ (1993) by John Peel
_Alien: Resurrection_ (1997) by A. C. Crispin
_The Angel Experiment_ (2005) by James Patterson
_Angel Hunt_ (2007) by Mike Ripley
_The Beast House_ (1986) by Richard Laymon
_Burning Angel_ (1995) by James Lee Burke
_The Burning Bridge_ (1960) by Poul Anderson
_The Burning Bridge_ (2005) by John Flanagan
_A Burning House_ (2008) by Keith R. A. DeCandido
_Burning Question_ (1966) by Brian W. Aldiss
_The Changeling Hunt_ (1987) by Robert R. Chase
_The Changeling Plague_ (2003) by Syne Mitchell
_Darkness, Darkness_ (2002) by Peter Crowther
_Dream House_ (1991) by E. Patrick Murray
_The Dream House_ (2000) by Melissa Hardy
_Dream Journey_ (1989) by Janet Fox
_Dream Messenger_ (1993) by Masahiko Shimada
_The Dream Wall_ (1987) by Graham Dunstan Martin
_The Dust Assassin_ (2008) by Ian McDonald
_The Fear Experiment_ (1993) by Jesse Harris
_The Fear Trap_ (1957) by Richard R. Smith
_Game Face_ (1994) by Joe Loeber
_The Genesis Quest_ (1986) by Donald Moffitt
_Ghost Game_ (2003) by Debbie Dadey with Marcia Thornton Jones
_Ghost House_ (1986) by Clare McNally
_Ghost Hunt_ (1948) by H. Russell Wakefield
_The Ghost Pit_ (2001) by Stephen Baxter
_Ghost Shadow_ (1996) by Cheryl J. Franklin
_The Ghost Trap_ (1995) by Lisa Tuttle
_Ghost Vision_ (1996) by Janni Lee Simner
_Guardian Angel_ (1966) by Gerald W. Page
_Guardian Angel_ (1995) by Victor Milán
_Guardian Angel_ (1950) by Arthur C. Clarke
_Guardian Angel_ (1982) by Christopher Evans
_Guardian Angel_ (1940) by Raymond Z. Gallun
_Guardian Angel_ (1986) by Timothy Zahn
_Guardian Angel_ (2007) by Warren Murphy and James Mullaney
_Guardian Angel_ (2005) by Mike Resnick
_Guardian Ghost_ (1988) by Christine Nöstlinger
_Guardian's Key_ (1996) by Anne Logston
_Harvest Home_ (1973) by Thomas Tryon
_The Haunted House_ (1986) by Rebecca Brown
_Haunted House_ (1949) by Chester S. Geier
_The Haunted House_ (2004) by Roger Burrows
_Haunted House_ (2005) by Jan Pienkowski
_The Haunted House_ (1913) by E. Nesbit
_The Haunted House_ (1859) by Charles Dickens
_The Haunted Inheritance_ (1900) by E. Nesbit
_Haunted Journey_ (1988) by Ruth Riddell
_The Haunted Mask_ (1994) by R. L. Stine
_The Hero Curse_ (1991) by Steve Perry
_The Hero Trap_ (1995) by Jo Clayton
_Home Key_ (1997) by Barbara Delaplace
_Home Visitor_ (1998) by Ann K. Schwader
_House Haunted_ (1991) by Al Sarrantonio
_Immortal Game_ (1996) by Douglas Niles
_The Immortal Game_ (1954) by Poul Anderson
_Invasion Dust_ (1944) by Don Wilcox
_The Journey Home_ (2003) by Kathleen Duey
_The Journey Witch_ (1980) by Melanie Rawls
_The Labyrinth Key_ (2004) by Howard V. Hendrix
_The Lost Choice_ (2004) by Andy Andrews
_The Lost Door_ (1936) by Dorothy Quick
_The Lost Face_ (1964) by Josef Nesvadba
_The Lost Ghost_ (1903) by Mary E. Wilkins
_The Lost Guardian_ (1995) by Ronald Anthony Cross
_The Lost Inheritance_ (1897) by H. G. Wells
_Lost Legacy_ (1941) by Robert A. Heinlein
_Lost Memory_ (1952) by Peter Phillips
_The Lost Power_ (1949) by Chester S. Geier
_The Lost Power_ (1949) by Guy Archette
_The Lost Secret_ (1983) by Laurence M. Janifer
_Lost Threshold_ (1968) by Thomas Gerald Wheeler
_The Lost Voice_ (1908) by F. H. Spearman
_Memory & Dream_ (1994) by Charles de Lint
_Mirror Monster_ (1987) by Stephen Meade
_The Mirror Monster_ (1987) by Stephen Meade
_Monster Hunt_ (1995) by Richard E. Geis
_The Monster Trap_ (2004) by Dean Morrissey
_The Monster's Legacy_ (1996) by Andre Norton
_The Monster's Ring_ (1982) by Bruce Coville
_The Nightmare Dream_ (1990) by Jonatha Ariadne Caspian
_The Nightmare Game_ (2007) by Gillian Cross
_The Nightmare Hero_ (2005) by Amin Emilio Aun Joven
_Nightmare House_ (1999) by Douglas Clegg
_Nightmare House_ (1973) by George T. Wetzel
_Nightmare House_ (1932) by Sax Rohmer
_Nightmare Journey_ (1975) by Dean R. Koontz
_The Omega Game_ (2000) by Steven Krane
_The Omega Game_ (2000) by S. Andrew Swann
_The Other Door_ (1955) by Arthur Coster
_The Other Door_ (1955) by Richard deMille
_The Other Face_ (1961) by Donald Malcolm
_The Other Gift_ (1996) by Roger Martin
_The Other House_ (1972) by Ramsey Campbell
_Other Voices_ (1988) by Colin Greenland
_Phoenix House_ (1975) by Jesse Miller
_Plague Pit_ (1987) by Mark Ronson
_The Plague Pit_ (2000) by Jonathan Green
_The Power Game_ (2004) by Joseph S. Nye, Jr.
_Question Quest_ (1991) by Piers Anthony
_Return Journey_ (1961) by Charles V. De Vet
_Ring Ring!_ (1998) by Seth Hill
_Runaway Home_ (1954) by E. G. Von Wald
_The Secret Fear_ (1923) by Kenneth Duane Whipple
_Secret Invasion_ (1953) by Walter Kubilius
_The Secret Mirror_ (1975) by Joyce Carol Oates
_The Secret Power_ (2005) by Marie Corelli
_The Secret Shelter_ (2004) by Sandi LeFaucheur
_The Secret Visitors_ (1957) by James White
_The Secret Visitors_ (2000) by Willis Hall
_The Shadow Beast_ (2003) by Justin Richards
_Shadow Game_ (2003) by Christine Feehan
_Shadow Hunt_ (1992) by Anne Logston
_Shadow Quest_ (1985) by Brad Linaweaver
_The Shadow Trap_ (2003) by Jude Watson
_Shadows Return_ (2008) by Lynn Flewelling
_The Silence Game_ (1954) by Fritz Leiber
_The Survival Game_ (1976) by Colin Kapp
_Survivor's Quest_ (2004) by Timothy Zahn
_Turnabout Intruder_ (1972) by James Blish
_Twilight Hunger_ (2002) by Maggie Shayne
_Twilight Journey_ (1968) by L. P. Davies
_The Uninvited Face_ (1955) by Michael Asquith
_Vision Quest_ (1989) by Pamela F. Service
_Vision Quest_ (1993) by Joseph F. Pumilia
_Voice & Silence_ (1995) by Annick Perrot-Bishop
_Witch Angel_ (2005) by Trana Mae Simmons
_The Witch Door_ (1995) by Ray Bradbury
_Witch House_ (1945) by Evangeline Walton
_The Witch House_ (1990) by Norma Tadlock Johnson
_Witch Hunt_ (1995) by Wendy Corsi Staub
_Witch Hunt_ (1990) by Devin O'Branagan
_Witch Hunt!_ (1995) by Diana G. Gallagher
_Witch Hunt_ (1969) by James E. Gunn
_Witch Hunt_ (1995) by Christie Golden
_Witch Hunt_ (1990) by Bobbi Miller
_Witch Hunt_ (1993) by Andrew Vachss
_Witch Hunt_ (1955) by Len Guttridge
_Witch Hunt_ (1990) by Janet Morris
_Guardian Angel_ and _Witch Hunt_ are doing well.
Gene Ward Smith
news:92043f2e-f725-43f1-b6cf-ba04d34e0ef1
@s12g2000prg.googlegroups.com:
* _Shadows Return_ (2008) by Lynn Flewelling
A new Lynn Flewelling out, I see. Will the magic title help?
ahas...@email.com
On Feb 10, 5:34 am, Gene Ward Smith <g...@chewbacca.org> wrote:
> "ahasue...@email.com" <ahasue...@email.com> wrote in
> news:92043f2e-f725-43f1-b6cf-ba04d34e0ef1
> @s12g2000prg.googlegroups.com:
>
> * _Shadows Return_ (2008) by Lynn Flewelling
>
> A new Lynn Flewelling out, I see. Will the magic title help?
Not quite "out" yet. Amazon hopes to have it in stock on 2008-06-24
and her site (http://www.sff.net/people/Lynn.Flewelling/) also thinks
that it's likely.