Twelve stories by science fiction master Stanislaw Lem, nine of them
never before published in English.
Of these twelve short stories by science fiction master Stanislaw Lem,
only three have previously appeared in English, making this the first
new book of fiction by Lem since the late 1980s. The stories display the
full range of Lem's intense curiosity about scientific ideas as well as
his sardonic approach to human nature, presenting as multifarious a
collection of mad scientists as any reader could wish for. Many of these
stories feature artificial intelligences or artificial life forms, long
a Lem preoccupation; some feature quite insane theories of cosmology or
evolution. All are thought provoking and scathingly funny.
Written from 1956 to 1993, the stories are arranged in chronological
order. In the title story, The Truth, a scientist in an insane asylum
theorizes that the sun is alive; The Journal appears to be an account by
an omnipotent being describing the creation of infinite
universes--until, in a classic Lem twist, it turns out to be no such
thing; in An Enigma, beings debate whether offspring can be created
without advanced degrees and design templates. Other stories feature a
computer that can predict the future by 137 seconds, matter-destroying
spores, a hunt in which the prey is a robot, and an electronic brain
eager to go on the lam. These stories are peak Lem, exploring ideas and
themes that resonate throughout his writing.
