I read a 1960s YA/Juvenile novel about a team of scientists working on a portal to another dimension/universe, looking through the portal drives anyone insane. Can't recall author or title, read it in the early 70s, in a school library hardcover binding. I assume from the style it was a 1960s work, it is possible it was from 1950s.
22366
In the 1960s I read book--an older children's book, I think--which I loved, and still remember, roughly.  I have no idea what the title is or who the author is, and I'm wondering if anyone knows this one:  Scientists had invented a device which they didn't fully understand, and which had puzzling effects.  For example, when a pencil was put into the machine, it disappeared, and then reappeared inside out: The lead was on the outside.  When people went into the machine, they came back dead, having died from fright.  Finally they sent a very open-minded person into the machine.  She was an artist, I think.  She was able to return alive, and described an alternate universe in which geometry was very different.  I distinctly remember that there were supposedly square triangles or four-sided triangles--or was it three-sided squares?  (This is, of course, a literally contradictory claim, but I didn't see the matter as clearly then.)  Thanks!
42002
I'm trying to track down an old sci-fi book I read when I was a teenager.  The book was at the Cottage Grove, OR Public Library around 1982-1985.  The plot followed a brother and sister who were scientists or spies, or both.  The brother once used a series of pills to change his weight, height and appearance.  Towards the end of the book, the brother takes a space ship that his sister invented, removes a governor so that he can travel faster than the speed of light and goes back in time several hours.  This is really vague, but thanks for any leads you can share.
92754
This was the first science fiction novel I completed reading on my own some 36 years ago. Unfortunately the details are very sketchy indeed, but here's what I think I remember:   It was a hard back library book The book was 100 pages long (perhaps exactly or just over) I read it some time pre-1980, possibly in 1979 but it may not have been new then It would've been classified as a "Children's Book" back then, but would be YA or Middle Grade now The POV character was a young boy of about 10-12 years of age It was set on the Moon The boy is rescued by some space gypsies He is befriended by a young space gypsy girl with dark hair When he is returned to his family, his parents are very prejudiced against the gypsies. A scene fragment of transferring from a lunar rover to the entrance tunnel to a lunar base A scene fragment of the boy looking at a computer screen and seeing someone who reminds him of the girl   Like so many here, this is a long term unscratchable itch that I'd love to soothe. Many thanks in advance for any clues or pointers.
7143
I'm a huge fan of SF from the golden age of SF, so this could be a fairly old book.  It was a story about a "generation" starship or sublight starship.  I believe most of the story was about their journey and some of the problems and difficulties.  I believe that something strange is observed along the way which later turns out to be them being passed by an FTL starship which was developed, on their long voyage, after they left Earth.  When they arrived at their destination they were amazed and, I believe, disheartened to be greeted by people from Earth.
45378
It might be a short story or it might be a novel. It must be before 1972 because I read it in my youth and I am OLD.  The following is very impressionistic.  There is a multidimensional/not of this Earth/alien artifact-like tunnel.   Picture a long, perhaps transparent, storm drain like structure sitting in a field but with an opening on only one end.  It is the subject of a lengthy investigation/exploration that has cost many lives. An instrumented investigator enters the "tunnel" and makes the exact movements that his predecessors have made, advancing until he must do something original at which point he survives and a new "move" is added to the list of correct moves or he is destroyed and a "move" is added to the list of things to be avoided at that point.  I remember absolutely nothing else about the work except that (I hope central) feature.
77670
I have a very, very vague recollection of this book that I read around 1999-2001.  A kid or tweenager finds some kind of creature -- the visual image in my mind is of something like a horseshoe crab but that's hardly reliable -- that I think can time travel, or allows him to time travel. Unfortunately that's about all I remember of it, but it was such a distinctively weird concept that hopefully someone else remembers it as well.  The overall vibe seemed "dark" to me, as a young person. There might have been another kid involved later on.
20881
I'm talking about at least two juvenile sci-fi novels, read between second and fourth  public grades (U.S.A.) which for me places them around 1956-9.  The protagonists are a brother and sister, presumably my (then) age. They are friends  with a single man, a scientist who has built a rocket ship. The scientist is little fey,  physically; a (relatively) large, round head, balding, short in stature and striking long,  thin hands and fingers.  The rocket ship's final preparation is to slop a viscous, clear gloop over EVERYTHING, inside and out from a pail with a paintbrush. In flight, there is an encounter with the moon, and a very small planet with (non-threatening) inhabitants not physically unlike the fey rocket scientist. The planet orbits either the moon or the earth, not the sun, and strangely, some kind of mushroom(!) theme runs through the books. Really.  That's it. That's all I got (I was nine at the most, fer chrissake). My recollection tells me there was concealment from parents, a particular name for the planet and people  and flight through a spatial fog. I mention these things separately because I am less sure  of them than the previous two paragraphs. The author was blissfully unrepentant of the laws  of physics:  Earth gravity on a micro-planet, fog in space and super-gloop to ready the  ricketiest rocket. Worked for me.  I'm guessing even Richard, my previous mentor/savior might not be familiar with these.  Anybody? Author, titles? Or do you just recognize one of these?
46074
I read this while up at my grandparents somewhere around 1990ish. Given how many books they had from when my dad was growing up, there's a decent chance that it's older. It was a novel where the government kept pretty strict control of society. They had some sort of mass entertainment covered because I remember a reference to the government giving the citizens "their bread and circuses" as a reference to the Roman practices. The biggish twist is that the resistance isn't so much actively fighting the government as that they're producing a pressure valve by using their hackers to set up telephone relays which act as support lines. Anyone can call and talk about their troubles. The telephone technology was relatively old — I think I remember them talking about mechanical relays — and they advertised the changing numbers (they had to keep going to new ones as the government shut down the old ones) on flyers that they posted all over the place.  The one bit of imagery that really stuck out to me was where a female member of the resistance was explaining to the male protagonist that, no matter how bad things got, they had to stay on the line, and she recounted one of her first calls involving a mother who'd locked her baby into a high-chair and was flinging spoonfuls of vitriol (acid, but they specifically used the word "vitriol") at the baby as she talked.  I don't think I ever got to finish the book, so I have no idea how it ended.
118156
I'm trying to track down a novel I read in my junior high days, which would put it at mid-to-late 80s. I don't remember the overall plot of the novel, but I remember the protagonist ended up matching wits against Death in various games - including a bowling match, of all things. The kid was being helped by a group of weird characters &amp; creatures, and the rules of the world he was in were all screwy. It definitely had a fantasy genre bent to it - wasn't sci/fi or drama. It also wasn't a "Choose-Your-Own-Adventure" book, which I absolutely loved at the time - it was a regular novel with a linear plot.  I was a big fan of AD&amp;D at the time, so I'm thinking it might have been set in the Planescape "universe", which would have explained all the weird characters &amp; rules of reality. I've had no luck finding it based on that, however. I've also had no luck searching for "bowling" + "death"... all I get are a bunch of weird news reports about people dying while bowling.  Does the "bowling with death" thing ring a bell for anyone?
117786
I read a fantasy novel that was implied to be part of a series around 20 years ago (was part of my high school library, not certain how old it was then).  I don't remember the title or author, or admittedly large portions of the plot (or maybe it was just a disjointed book), and would like to request help here.    These are the elements I remember:   A young teenager (in what I believe is regular old Earth) receives a list of instructions from a composer friend of his.  By going through the composer's house and taking a convoluted path through the neighborhood, that starts changing on him as he goes, he arrives in another world entirely. The path ends in a hostile garden or hedge maze that is tended/guarded by a woman in a veil. The village he ends up in seems pretty repressed.  Something about another guardian woman nearby related to the first, but not immediately hostile. Desert or a wasteland nearby that contain monstrous or demonic children. The protagonist eventually learns some ability to leave shadows or decoys behind by breaking off pieces of his emotions, or psyche.  He ends up using this to cross the local wasteland. Climbs a mountain and sees his own face as an adult in a snow vision, although he doesn't realize it until he finally returns home to Earth and sees himself in a mirror again. Someone wants a "song of power" or words of power and traps our traveler for it.  The original composer friend is somehow related to this, but what the traveler ends up writing under duress is a trap, and magically blows the villain's home up.   That's what I got.  Any ideas?
107031
This was a short story/novella published in Gardner Dozois's "The Year's Best Science Fiction" series. It was probably included somewhere around the 2003 20th edition, give or take a number of years.  The story is about 3 or 4 high school friends, one female, who embark on a journey of discovery by traversing down an ancient stairway into the depths of a steep deep ravine to search for the remaining traces of the "ancients." The friends don't really know where their lives are headed and are each descending the ravine in search of some inner truth.  Near the top, the stairway is well maintained but as they descend deeper it becomes more ancient and dilapidated until it is barely traversable. As they near the bottom, where the ancients had their cave dwellings, one person finds his inner strengths, one wills himself out of existence, and the female finally understands everything.  Believe me, the story is magnitudes better than my description of it.  Can you please identify it?
79229
I read a book nearly twenty years ago when I was in Jr high.  What I remember is a man traveling around with a teenage girl, (nothing twisted) in a camper I think, and there were these weird blocks of fog or mist. I believe there may have been a dog also. It was a novel in English. I believe it was written in the 70's or 80's. I remember a part in the book where two blocks of the fog got stuck right where a woman's house was. The man and girls stopped there for the night. I remember the girl didn't talk much. That's about all I can remember. I don't even remember the story behind what caused the fog and I really want to reread the book.
1834
I'm looking for a plot line (it should be a short story) that depicts Earth population (or their close descendants) establishing contact with another intelligent life form deep into space.   After careful studying of DNA samples and language / communication symbols they then realize that the civilization in question is also from Earth but that they departed very long ago and travelled throughout the galaxy in the completely opposite direction so that they are now meeting practically at the point of the circle opposite to Earth. There might have been some anatomical differences as well.  As far as I can remember, the story concludes shortly after that.  This should be a work of a well-known SF author, so I'm hoping for a quick response (if time didn't corrupt my memory too much).  I don't think it was part of an anthology, but it's entirely possible it was in a magazine.  As for the timeline, I've read it about 2-3 years ago, but since I have a passion for older SF works it might not be of much use.  Edit: Not sure if this could help but for what it's worth, it might be contained in .
18064
Back in the 70's my local library had a novel about a human coming to a human-colonized (I think) planet where mind control was common and where he was there to solve a crime. There was a hierarchy based on how many other people you could control, starting in the single digits and eventually going by tens up to eighty or so. The main character's local associate was something like a 40 working on 50, and our hero gets in trouble with his associate at one point for interrupting a mind duel he's engaging in on the road to 50.   Those in the single digits do most of the grunt work, though fortunately for our main character those who have no mind-control powers at all are exempt - he also chats with a "disabled" native at one point who is very glad to be disabled and out of all the competition.  Standard attire is a catsuit with your number over your heart, and what I remember most about the (hardback) book is the dustjacket, which depicted a woman who filled out her catsuit exceptionally well.  I have a vague recollection that the book was originally published in the 50's, but I wouldn't swear to it.
70231
What is the title of the book I read in the 1960s or 1970s about a boy that somersaulted and spun throughout the day?  As he grew it became worse. The boy claimed he had a need to do this to feel right. His parents convinced him to "save it all up" till the end of the day and do it all at once in the privacy of their home.  In the end they discovered that the boy, being born in weightless space, was affected by earth's rotation / gravity (?), and that made him feel tangled up. I can't remember details and may have some of this incorrect. The book may have been targeted at young readers (teens).
41440
I would love to identify a sci-fi novel I read in the late 60s or 70s.  It followed a group of young space cadets through their training in the Space Academy.  The training culminated in small groups of cadets being sent through a gateway in the space station, into different worlds where they had to survive whatever conditions they met beyond the gateway, as part of their training.  One such trip went wrong and the group ended up stranded in a hostile world for days, hoping to be rescued by their trainers.  I can't remember much about the story or protagonists so this may be too vague, but I remember descriptions of a vast space station hall and these young cadets bringing whatever kit they hoped they might need - some brought breathing apparatus and full survival gear, but others came with very little as they believed they would not be sent into conditions where they could die without the right equipment.  They hadn't bargained for the power surge or whatever it was that misdirected them as they passed through the gateway!  I also remember rivalry between the cadets - I think the hero was male and quietly heading for top cadet of the year award... and I think at least one of the group died in the unknown planet before they were rescued.  Does this ring a bell with anyone?  I remember the mood and tension more than the details but it was a long time ago!  I have a 10-year old son who I think would love this kind of story.  If anyone can help you have my thanks!
87814
I read this book about 6-8 years ago, and it was already slightly old at that point. The key parts were that the characters were all from Earth (America, if I remember correctly - one character internally monologues about remembering exactly how many steps it takes to get to a specific beach from his house, and while I don't remember the beach name, I remember thinking it was American) and woke up in a fantasy world, scattered about, and not remembering where they come from for quite a while.  Each abductee is wearing a bracelet with (what I remember as) polyhedral dice, although they aren't named that I think I inferred it from the description, and at some point they start using them as a form of magic. They find out that they were all abducted by a wizard so they go to find him. I can't remember what happens next, other than that eventually they find him and in a later book in the series (that I only saw the blurb of) they go back to his castle.  I think the book might be called "______ Keep", and am fairly certain the later book in the series is called "Return to ______ Keep".  I'd really appreciate it if someone who knew the title could tell me - it's like an unscratched itch at the moment, and I'd love to read it again!