Science Fiction Classics that deserve to be in Fine Press

Interesting article today on the dangers of AI -
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/artificial-intelligence-pioneer-leaves-go...

Made me think of Samuel Butler's classic, Erewhon -- the LEC produced a very nice edition, but is it time for a more modern take on the classic? Well, I think so :)

What other sci-fi classics deserve the fine press treatment, or arguably a new fine press edition? There is of course PKD's "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" -- would be a huge hit if anyone produced a fine press edition (I am aware of the Folio Society's edition, which is nice, but still not fine press). That said, I am not a fan of PKD's writing - I read many of his short stories and the plots are interesting but the writing poor. There is also Harlan Ellison's "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" which I personally thought is greatly overrated. "2001" of course comes to mind, although a good novel I would argue it's the movie that is the true classic. All that said, one book that I have never seen a fine press edition and absolutely deserves it is R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) the work that brought the word "robot" into our lexicon. According to wikipedia, Asimov said "Capek's play is, in my own opinion, a terribly bad one, but it is immortal for that one word. It contributed the word 'robot' not only to English, but through English, to all the languages in which science fiction is now written." I'd love to read it.

Robots aside, other classics that I think really deserve the fine press treatment and readily come to mind are Solaris, The Black Cloud, We, Metropolis, and A Canticle for Leibowitz. As for "The Martian Chronicles" and "451" -- those already have the most amazing fine press editions possible - namely the LEC editions. I love "The Time Machine" and "War of the Worlds" - but again, the LEC edition is going to be hard to beat - although I really think the Suntup editions are equally fabulous depending on your artistic taste. Centipede Press released a gorgeous edition of "Babel-17" and "Nova" - while not truly fine press those editions are gorgeous and will be hard to beat in terms of overall production value.

Anyway, what is on your list? The more obscure the title, the better IMO :)

Memoirs of a Spacewoman by Naomi Mitchison
All Judgment Fled by James White
A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny
The Dying Earth by Jack Vance
The Ark Sakura or Kangaroo Notebook by Kobo Abe
A Maze of Death by Philip K. Dick
The Inverted World by Christopher Priest
The Employees by Olga Ravn
Cycle of Fire by Hal Clement
Report on Probability A by Brian W. Aldiss

>2 Shadekeep: Great list! I would love a fine press edition of Dying Earth series, especially the first one from 1950 :)

Hyperion, by Dan Simmons

>1 astropi:
I don’t pretend to have read as much sci-fi as others on this forum. I love most of the classic work of Verne and Wells, but not a lot of the more recent work. Your nomination of “The Black Cloud” is right on target, though, and I don’t know of any “nice” edition other than EP’s 1986 printing without illustrations except for a frontispiece. I might also nominate “Past Master” by R.A. Lafferty, immortalized only in the Library of America anthology “American Science Fiction: 1968-69.”

>1 astropi: It may not be a “sci-fi classic,” but if I could pick one science fiction novel to get a fine press treatment for the first time, it would be The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula Le Guin.

>1 astropi: Two Richard Matheson titles:

I Am Legend
The Incredible Shrinking Man

>4 ultrarightist: Great choice.

>5 jroger1: Centipede has published a number of Lafferty's works, so they may publish Past Master at some point, although it will be printed offset.

>6 NathanOv: I love Le Guin, although I have not yet read that. Left Hand of Darkness is probably my favorite of her works.

>7 Sport1963: Suntup did publish a genuine (letterpress) fine press edition of I Am Legend :)
https://suntup.press/i-am-legend/

>4 ultrarightist: Already coming from newer fine press Curious King. It has been announced, anyway, though not yet solicited.

https://www.curiousking.co.uk/february-update/

>2 Shadekeep: Not fine press, but Underwood Miller did a very nice edition of Vance's The Dying Earth with cover art by George Barr back in 1976. They did others in that series as well; most, IIRC, were illustrated by the awesome Steve Fabian. It's time for a fine press issue, for sure, though.

I would like to see A. Merritt's Ship of Ishtar in a fine press edition.
And C. M. Kornbluth's The Marching Morons.

I would be thrilled with a fine press Cyteen (probably a three-volume box set, as the original paperback edition was), but given that rights issues have thus far prevented an ebook version from becoming available it seems unlikely a fine press edition would have more success. Also: it's a doorstopper.

More practically, I think it's a crying shame there's no fine editions of any of James Tiptree Jr.'s works, especially since she mostly wrote shorter-length fiction that would be eminently feasible to produce. "The Women Men Don't See," "The Screwfly Solution," "The Girl Who Was Plugged In"--there's a lot of options.

And, of course, I'm game for any Le Guin.

>9 whytewolf1: Thanks

>11 ambyrglow: No Reply Press will be publishing some Le Guin

I'd like to see:
- Earth Abides - George R Stewart
- Star Maker and/or Last and First Man - Olaf Stapledon
- The Dispossessed - Le Guin
- Ubik - Philip K Dick
- At the Mountains of Madness - H P Lovecraft (apparently there is a CP version in the works)
- A Clockwork Orange - Burgess

>6 NathanOv: Fantastic choice, The Lathe of Heaven is superb and a Le Guin novel which isn't part of a larger cycle of books. For Tiptree I would nominated her excellent novel Up the Walls of the World. A collection of her short fiction wouldn't be amiss either though, she was a consummate master of the form. And I Awoke and Found Me Here on the Cold Hill's Side and The Psychologist Who Wouldn't Do Awful Things to Rats are also great stories.

I just finished Octavia Butler's "Bloodchild and Other Stories."

Two stories in particular ("Bloodchild" and "Amnesty") were quite good and thematically similar - humans in a subserviant relationship with a more powerful alien species. I could see those two excerpted and paired together for a shorter letterpress treatment.

>12 ultrarightist: And I have already ordered it! As well as several other letterpress Le Guin works; she is better represented in fine press than many SF authors, although all at the short fiction level.

>15 NoBueno: Thornwillow did Butler’s “Speech Sounds” from that collection, as a companion release to their Parable of the Sower.

>3 astropi: Incidentally, I work with the Vance estate, so if any fine press out there really wants to tackle The Dying Earth or another novel, let me know and I'll bring it to them. I helped broker both upcoming Vance fine press releases from No Reply Press and Cordes Press, and the estate is pretty excited to see Jack's work in this format.

>17 Shadekeep: Dying Earth omnibus!!! Yes! Somebody ought to do all the DE stories in one or more volumes.

Not fine press by many folks standard, but I do believe Centipede has editions of Dying Earth in the works.

I’d love to see some Andre Norton. It’s classic golden age sci-fi that actually has reasonably good writing haha. In particular, I’ve been enjoying Plague Ship recently

>20 Tambien: Cheap Street did an Andre Norton title, Were Wrath, back in the 1980s. It will admittedly cost you an arm and a leg on the secondary market.

Lots of really great choices here. Some of my own picks:

-Behold the Man (the original novella version) and The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock

-anything by J.G. Ballard. Vermilion Sands is my favorite collection of his short fiction, but The Atrocity Exhibition and Crash would be bold choices.

-Camp Concentration by Thomas M. Disch

-Naked Lunch and the Nova trilogy by William S. Burroughs

-Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon (nominated for best novel in the 1973 Nebula Awards so I'm counting it as science fiction; it ultimately lost to Arthur C. Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama)

-Pavane by Keith Roberts

>22 SolerSystem: Camp Concentration by Thomas M. Disch

This. Will also take his novel The Genocides, which is a brilliant twist on the alien invasion tale.

I should probably nominate some Simak and Sturgeon as well. Instead of their obvious titles, for Simak I'll propose Cemetery World or The Visitors, and for Sturgeon Some of Your Blood or Killdozer.

When Worlds Collide by Wylie and Balmer

14> Yes to Tiptree short stories!
15> Yes to Butler short stories!

I’d go for Ridley Walker, though that would be a bear to proofread….

>25 kermaier: I highly recommend the Easton Press edition. Not true "fine press", but a wonderful edition and signed! :)
A few years ago copies were under $100, now the cheapest I saw was $175, but still worth it.

>26 astropi: Thanks for that — I will look for a reasonably price copy.

>23 Shadekeep: At this point I'll take any Disch we can get. He's been a consistent request of mine for Jerad at Centipede for several years, even if it's just a low frills Masters of Science Fiction collection. It's disappointing to me how his fiction has largely fallen into obscurity given how popular his fellow new wave writers continue to be- Ballard, Delany, Moorcock, Silverberg, etc. In my opinion Disch was better than all of them.

>28 SolerSystem: It is curious who thrives and who becomes forgotten in the various realms of fiction. Though an author can be rediscovered, so there's hope for Disch there. He did collaborate with at least one fine press in his lifetime, Toothpaste Press. I've found a couple signed works by him from them. He does seem like a solid fit for Centipede, especially given some of their other selections from canonical authors.

>29 Shadekeep: There's also the Cheap Street edition of "Torturing Mr. Amberwell"....

>29 Shadekeep: It is curious who thrives and who becomes forgotten in the various realms of fiction.
It really is. If you look at PKD and Ray Bradbury - it's clear that they were and remain popular because of Hollywood. Bradbury in particular wrote screenplays, had his own TV show, and lots of adaptations to his work. That said, even without all that I think Bradbury will be remembered as a true master of the genre. As for PKD... I recently re-read many of his short stories which I remember thinking were amazing as a wee lad - they are NOT as "amazing" as I remember! Truth be told, at least based on his short stories, I can say he is not a particularly "good" writer. Great ideas, poor writing. Just my opinion of course. I do think PKD is an important writer in the genre, but I hold Bradbury in much greater esteem. Now all that said, I do plan to read some of PKD's novels that I have not gotten around to reading before so perhaps my opinion will change for the better. Ultimately, if you look at any "big name" - Clarke, Asimov, Verne, etc. they all have Hollywood ties (not that there's anything wrong with that) and that's what really makes you popular/remembered.

>31 astropi: Yes, PKD's ideas were generally much better than his writing -- but his stories made some really cool movies!

One thing is for sure, though: PKD was the worst title writer in the game. :-)

Book: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Movie: Blade Runner

Book: We Can Remember it for You Wholesale
Movie: Total Recall

>32 kermaier: haha! definitely agree that "We Can Remember it for You Wholesale" is just a confusing title and not exactly something that would get someone to give the book a second glance! That said, I actually always thought "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" is quite clever - if I did not know anything about PKD, that title would get me to open the cover at least :)

>32 kermaier: >33 astropi: I assume the title is a play on the novel (and later musical) by Jerome Weidman, I Can Get For You Wholesale. The musical was released just a few years before the novella was published. So at the time, maybe the title would have been more likely to catch someone’s eye

>34 jsg1976: thank you for that, makes perfect sense, and certainly that play on words has to be lost on most people today.

>30 kermaier: That's right. I was looking to see if he was in that Cheap Street collection I picked up, but now I recall it was a separate release.

>34 jsg1976: See also And the Devil Will Drag You Under by Jack L. Chalker, a novel titled after a line from a song in the musical Guys and Dolls. It was ages before I connected the two.

In PKD's defense, it was quite the fashion in sci-fi at the time to have long and complicated titles on stories. Alice Sheldon (as James Tiptree Jr.) had some of the longest, and Harlan Ellison was known for it as well.

>1 astropi: Zamyatin's "We" has two fine press editions. Easton Press (1993) and the gorgeous Folio Edition (2018) that I have.

My nominations are
1. James Blish: Cities in Flight omnibus
2. Some more Stanislaw Lem , particularly where the initial problematic English translations have been greatly improved esp. Solaris, Memoirs of a Space Traveller and also Eden, Fiasco etc.

>38 AlexBookshelfFrog: several options
https://subterraneanpress.com/altered-carbon/
https://www.eastonpress.com/all-categories/signed-editions/richard-k.-morgan-alt...

>39 memeweaver:

Unfortunately, neither of these editions is still available from the publisher. And while I can't speak for Easton Press, the Subterranean Press edition is excessively expensive on the secondary market. I don't know why they never did a reprint for this one. So I'd also appreciate a new edition from a nice publisher, it needn't be fine press in the strictest sense, but maybe someone like Folio Society, Suntup, or Grim Oak Press.

>41 AlexBookshelfFrog: I guess I'm lucky that I managed to get some inexpensive Fine used Easton Press books 20+ years ago before the web really exploded the secondary market.

I haven't bought much Subterranean in over ten years as I frankly loathe a lot of their commissioned cover art and their international shipping got painfully high.

Update: Forthcoming (or already released) fine press from people's lists:

Hyperion -- Curious King, forthcoming (sold out)
I Am Legend -- Suntup Press, released in 2021 (sold out)

Hopefully we'll see more great things in 2024 -- Suntup has already published some amazing Sci-Fi including: Starship Troopers and Stranger in A Strange Land -- I would love to see fine press of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, which I always thought was not only a beautiful title but a truly clever and intriguing premise which is still interesting and relevant today.

Pretty much any Le Guin would be hard to pass up. The Dispossessed proposed above would be a no-brainer if my wallet agreed. The Word for World is Forest or any of the EarthSea Sextology(?) too. Even separate stories from Tales from Earthsea, especially Dragonfly.

I'd love to see The Riddle-Master of Hed (the whole trilogy would be best but...). And maybe The Dosadi Experiment? Oh yeah, and The Fifth Head of Cerberus!

C. S. Lewis' Space Trilogy: Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra and That Hideous Strength.

Also David Lindsay's Voyage to Arcturus.

>44 jveezer: Do you own the EP DLE Left Hand of Darkness? It's not "fine press" in the sense that it's not letterpress, but it is otherwise a wonderful production and signed by the artist and Le Guin :)

>44 jveezer: Couldn’t agree more about Le Guin! I’ve got her work from LOA and Folio, but so much of it deserves a true fine press treatment!

>43 astropi:

I second The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress. I had hoped that Folio Society would do it after the other Heinleins clearly sold well, but so far no luck. I doubt that Suntup will go there since for them, the Heinleins didn't do as well as other books at the same time when sales were quite intense a lot of the time.

>44 jveezer: I'd add "The Telling" to the list of full-length Le Guin works, and "Vaster Than Empires and More Slow" to the short stories that are deserving of fine press treatments.

>45 Glacierman: +1 for Space Trilogy.

>48 SF-72: +1 for The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.

I'd like to second astropi from the top of the thread:

--Zamyatin's _We_ https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/76171.We

And add

--Ted Chiang short stories ("72 Letters" or "Story of your Life")

--Gene Wolfe (Any...I know _The Knight_ is fantasy, but it'd be great)

--Alfred Bester (_The Demolished Man_ or _The Stars My Destination_)

>44 jveezer: The Word for World is Forest

Very much this. If I can't have The Lathe of Heaven from her in fine press, then I want this one.

>45 Glacierman: Out of the Silent Planet is brilliant and a great read. However, the second book put me off so much that I never got through it and onto the third. It's like he realised the first book was too Pagan and needed to extra-Christian from there on out.

>52 Shadekeep: I had a similar reaction! In retrospect, one could probably just do Silent Planet and call it good.

I'd love to see a special edition of Earth Abides by George R. Stewart, one of my favorites.

Side note on We by Yevgeny Zamyatin - there's actually a fairly recent film adaptation of this from Russia, which I just stumbled across the other day. It's confusingly titled 1984 and features some truly naff green-screening which makes it look like a full-motion-video game from the 1990s. Still, probably the closest we're likely to get to a film of this book any time soon.

We need some Zelazny, particularly:

Lord of Light - in the pantheon of great SF imo, Hugo winner (1968) and as an aside also influenced The Book of the New Sun

A Night in the Lonesome October - seconding Shadekeep’s recommendation. Would love to see the original illustrations published (have been omitted I think since the first edition?)

And to echo several others, it’s way past time for a fine press edition of We by Zamyatin

The Female Man by Joanna Russ
Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky brothers (Folio Society has one, but I know some don't consider that a fine press press).

>37 memeweaver: the Folio edition of We is probably my favorite of all their CE publications. A real gem imo.

Still wouldn’t equate it remotely with fine press though

Subterranean Press will be publishing CJ Cherryh's Downbelow Station, 1982 Hugo winner (likely in 2027).
Not fine press, but solid limited edition books.

>59 AjaJin: Nice choice! Coincidentally I just picked that book back up again, having not re-read it recently. Should make a good edition.

Downbelow is fine, but there's already an Easton Press version; I wish Subterranean would dig deeper into her back catalog. (I dream of Cyteen.) Ah well.

Having just recently finished The House of a Thousand Floors, this 1929 Czech novel would make a fantastic inclusion in the fine press canon. It has a wonderful magical-realist feel to it, and it blends politics, social commentary, and philosophy smoothly with an action-intrigue setting.

>61 ambyrglow: Cyteen would be quite an undertaking, due to its length. I think it would be best as a 3 volume set, despite the fact the CJ said "never again" based on the Warner paperback 3 book release (since the story isn't a trilogy and those three were not advertised as incomplete reads on their own). And with Downbelow and Cyteen, the next one (while we're dreaming) would be 40,000 in Gehanna.

Another for the list, Perfect Player Press will be doing The Screwfly Solution.

>64 Shadekeep: I am here for this.

>65 ambyrglow: Likewise. Been hoping for some Tiptree for a long while, this is a great choice from her work.

The Forever War coming from Conversation Tree Press in 2028. Excellent choice.

>64 Shadekeep: Yes! and before that it sounds like we're going to be treated to Blood Music by Greg Bear!
and after Screwfly will be Philip K. Dick’s Second Variety, and then Machen’s The Great God Pan. We may be unworthy, but we are thankful :)

Karel Capek : War with the Newts

On the look out for a nice new edition in any form as the paperback I had last millennium has disappeared.

>32 kermaier: PKD was a big fan of the composer John Dowland and references song titles & lyrics in his titles e.g. Flow My Tears, The Policeman said so it really helps to be up on references to 16th century lute music.

>61 ambyrglow: She may be testing the waters. DAW under Betsy was not a fan of special editions, so.

>67 Shadekeep: I missed out on CP's rendition of The Forever War so hoping I can grab a copy from CTP. 2 years away though!

>71 leennnadine: Yes, and Grim Oak has been publishing some DAW/Astra books, so hopefully the entire catalog will be available. They've done ots of good and important books over the years.

Gene Wolfe's best novellas, which include "Seven American Nights," "The Death of Dr. Island," and "The Eyeflash Miracles," among others. These would ideally be standalone books, I think.

>74 Shotcaller: I've suggested the story The Island of Dr. Death and Other Stories to a press, among a list of other titles. We shall see, perhaps.

>75 Shadekeep: All my fingers are crossed.

I'm a bit surprised no press has done Sandkings, considering the popularity of George R. R. Martin. It's a good one that I originally read in Omni magazine way back when. Was even made into an Outer Limits (new series) episode.

>77 Shadekeep: Great suggestion! Sandkings is terrific.

>71 leennnadine: Unfortunately, DAW doesn't hold the rights to Cyteen--which is one of the reasons no ebook edition exists.

>79 ambyrglow: No, I know. What I meant was that CJ may be testing the waters with special editions. I wish she'd do an eBook, sigh.

A lot of titles here that I'm interested in (Perfect Player).

I put in a proposal for Sandkings months ago, but never heard back. I will try again, assuming no one else does it in the meantime.

Also considering a number of Wolfe titles.

>81 JakePG: Nice, good luck!

>81 JakePG: Very glad to hear you're interested in Sandkings and, maybe, Wolfe. If you do end up publishing Wolfe, drinks are on me.

>83 Shotcaller: Thanks! I'll have a small bottle of your best --

Much appreciated. Thank you.

Sheldon’s estate happens to be managed by the same agency as Wolfe and Varley, both of whom I’d like to publish. The reason Screwfly was moved up in production was to help me secure titles by those other two writers.

>85 JakePG: Oh cool, Varley is another who gets overlooked. Looking forward to what you secure from him as well.

Apparently Disney is going to relaunch Planet of the Apes -- which made me realize, as far as I know there has never been a fine press edition of Pierre Boulle's 1963 novel! So definitely going to add this to my sci-fi wish list. I think it would sell very well.

>87 astropi: I would welcome the novel, while wincing at the thought of yet another movie reboot...

>88 Shadekeep: haha, it's Disney what can you expect :)
I haven't watched any of the "newer" films, any of them good? And you would think with the success of the franchise someone would have published a fine press edition of the book by now...

>89 astropi: Planet of the Apes (2001) is awful across the board. Only redeeming aspect is a tiny cameo by Chuck Heston, this time as an ape. And the charmless, talentless leading man already seems a few evolutionary steps below apes even before the plot gets going.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011) is more watchable, but it's also rise of the CGI apes, which spoils it for me. It's of the grim-and-gritty school, leaving very little of the usual PotA fun and humour. But if you watched The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014) and just wished it took place in San Francisco and had more primates, you may enjoy it.

I basically gave up on the reboots after that, and certainly don't expect anything better from the Haus of Maus, who's basically spent the last decade cannibalising their beloved properties into inedible sausages. I honestly think PotA would work better as a prestige TV series, with time for interesting ideas and character development, like they did with Westworld. I'd be happy to see Logan's Run get that treatment as well.

>90 Shadekeep: Thanks, sounds like the movies are not something I would enjoy. Yeah, Disney (although not just Disney) has indeed cannibalized beloved franchises and characters into something completely disgusting and indigestible. But hey, so long as they make money... :/

>87 astropi: Yes there is no fine press version, but FS did one and I think the pics were well done and they had a great contributor, Frans de Waal. I think Suntup would do the best job because he sometimes has really interesting additional material that he adds to certain books. He can get another good contributor that can maybe do an extended essay on some of the main novel themes, especially insofar as they are slightly different in kind and presentation than in the popular movies. I think Beth Zaiken would be a great artist. She does a lot of realistic animal paintings and so it would be interesting to see what she would do with PotA.

That being said, I believe there are better SciFi properties that should get a fine press version first, like RUR, Klara and the Sun or Never let Me Go.

I also have a soft space for Jurassic Park.

>92 imaginarydata: Thanks, I really hope Suntup publishes Planet of the Apes! The FS has published some very lovely books, although as you noted not quite fine press.

>91 astropi: Disney will probably do a YA version: Bonobo High.

We've had so many YA franchises of horror/creature features, but I am still waiting for Teen Blob.

>94 memeweaver: Some Disney executive will see your message and make it happen "Bonobo High 90210"