H. Nearing, Jr. (1915–2004)

I picked this up in a used book store in the 80s. At first I had no idea what I was getting into. It creeps up on you, so ho-hum, the characters so matter-of-fact. Then it dawned on me I was reading humor book so dry it was masterful. The situations are ridiculous, but Nearing tells them so well you don't notice it until they smack you in the face. The author was a college professor and each story is masterfully laid out. I lost that old copy years ago and was happy to find a copy on Amazon. show more Just a great piece of writing and it's a pity Nearing did not produce more fiction. show less

Assuming you like mild academic humor of the sport-coat and bowtie variety, this book is amusing. It's really a linked set of short stories, each involving Ransom and MacTate, two professors at a university. (And, btw, there really aren't any females to speak of in the whole book; it's pretty much an all-male cast.)

The premise is basically that Professor Ransom, in the Department of Mathematics, is trying to win a grant for the school, and he keeps inventing various clever gadgets, but all show more of them have their fatal drawbacks, etc.

Chapters include a number of strange adventures:
* A computer that writes poetry and such...
* An excised tumor that takes over the pipe organ...
* Some odd office visitors from Mars...
* Basketball game played with a hyper-sphere...

The specifics of some stories are a trifle dated to around the post-WWII era, but they're still rather fun. The style and content reminded me a bit of John Kendrick Bangs and/or P.G. Wodehouse, and probably some others I can't think of right now...

The writing is often theatrical, like a stage-play. There's a lot more banter and dialogue than there is description. I could rather see the set of tales being turned into some mid-20th century black/white comedy shorts, to play in movie houses as show-openers for average 1950s sci-fi films.

This book would probably be long forgotten and extremely rare today, except to a few aficionados were it not for the serendipitious fact that the Singularity & Co "Save the Sci Fi" project re-published it as an e-book. show less