# Ask the guy who is pretty good at SF Story Identification **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** books-writing-myths\ **Created:** [September 7, 2008, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417 "2008-09-07T00:08:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 39
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2020, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/761 "2020-12-20T20:38:00Z")
“Inspiration” by Ben Bova, perhaps [LibraryThing | Catalog your books online](https://www.librarything.com/work/3744231) says “A time traveller conspires to have a depressed young Albert Einstein meet H.G. Wells, in order to be inspired. The jaded scientist Kelvin is also present at the informal meeting - as is a bigoted waitress.” and her son… ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2020, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/762 "2020-12-20T20:38:34Z")
Available here [- \INSPIRATION\](https://www.baen.com/Chapters/9781476781211/9781476781211___5.htm) ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2020, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/763 "2020-12-20T20:53:17Z")
I had thought that one was Einstein, but didn’t want to prejudice the answer. OK, just saw the answer. I was thinking it was Bova, but I’ll have to check. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2020, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/764 "2020-12-20T21:08:27Z")
Did you see the link to the story above? ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2020, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/765 "2020-12-20T21:50:27Z")
Interestingly, Bova died less than a month ago from coronavirus complications. ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2020, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/766 "2020-12-21T00:13:17Z")
Not initially. ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2020, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/767 "2020-12-21T00:14:20Z")
I know. Maybe that was part of what made me think of that story even though my top mind didn’t know what my bottom mind was doing. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2020, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/768 "2020-12-21T00:15:41Z")
I figured. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/769 "2020-12-26T06:57:57Z")
I actually started another thread about this, before I saw this thread. Anyways… At least ten years ago, I read an online amateur science-fiction story. It took place in a near future affected by dramatic climate change. Things I remember from the story: - The US is balkanized. - Cascadia in the Pacific Northwest becomes a country, and in one scene a pickup truck approaches the protagonist’s house with an unfamiliar blue, white, and green tricolour flag on the side, the flag of Cascadia. - The rising seas create a larger Gulf of Mexico, a new bay covering what had been the lower Mississippi river. Near the end of the parts of the story I’d read, people were starting new fishing communities near the northern edges on this bay, climbing over the ruins of old cities to build their docks. Around this time, the weather in the area stabilizes into a new pattern based on monsoons. - I seem to recall a long plot arc revolving around searching underground ruins for some kind of data that would help deactivate (?) some hazard (?) from the old days. I never finished the story. It may have been posted in segments, and it just wasn’t finished by the author. I _think_ it was posted in parts on a forum devoted to climate change and green technology, but I’m not sure. Can anyone help me identify and find it? ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2021, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/770 "2021-01-15T21:35:34Z")
Here’s one with not much to go on. I remember this from a long time ago, maybe the 80’s, maybe even before. Many of my memories seem very visual, I don’t know if that was due to vivid description on the part of the author, or if it was actually a TV episode of something (or even a movie, but it doesn’t seem long enough). It might have been from one of the Dangerous Visions books, but I was reading a lot of SF in those days so that’s just a guess. All I really remember is the premise: everyone lives isolated in their own sort of pod room, and no-one ever (or hardly ever) actually interacts with another person. Everything they do is through an electronic medium like a combination of Facebook and Zoom (way before either of those was invented). They spend most of their time in their very comfortable chair, in front of their very large screen. I don’t remember much besides that, especially I don’t remember what the story was. It seems it was kind of an iconic story, but maybe that’s just my ret-con of my own memories, because so much of it has come true. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2021, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/771 "2021-01-15T21:41:42Z")
Was it E.M. Forster’s _The Machine Stops_ (from 1909)? > **[The Machine Stops](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > > > "The Machine Stops" is a science fiction short story (12,300 words) by E. M. Forster. After initial publication in The Oxford and Cambridge Review (November 1909), the story was republished in Forster's The Eternal Moment and Other Stories in 1928. After being voted one of the best novellas up to 1965, it was included that same year in the populist anthology Modern Short Stories. In 1973 it was also included in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame,... ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2021, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/772 "2021-01-15T21:49:09Z")
What you are describing sounds a lot like Solaria, the fictional planet in Isaac Asimov’s Robot series, especially _The Naked Sun_ > **[The Naked Sun](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Naked_Sun)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > The Naked Sun is a science fiction novel by American writer Isaac Asimov, the second in his Robot series. Like its predecessor, The Caves of Steel, this is a whodunit story. It was first published in book form in 1957 after being serialized in Astounding Science Fiction between October and December 1956. > The story arises from the murder of Rikaine Delmarre, a prominent "fetologist" (fetal scientist), responsible for the operation of the planetar... On Solaria, the small population of humans live mostly apart from one another, rarely having face-to-face contact, and communicating via Zoom. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2021, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/773 "2021-01-15T21:55:51Z")
It seems like “The Machine Stops” is one of the more frequent stories to show up in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2021, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/774 "2021-01-15T22:22:30Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > … “The Machine Stops” is one of the more frequent stories to show up in this thread. Ah, now that name sounds familiar. I just read a synopsis of that story, and that sounds like what I remember. Amazing prescience by an Edwardian author, I never would have guessed it was E M Forster, famous for Passage to India and Howards End. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2021, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/775 "2021-01-17T02:22:15Z")
I gave a copy of that to my dentist and he LOVED it! A dentist as a hero. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2021, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/776 "2021-01-28T19:39:39Z")
There was a book, maybe a novella, has a man popped into a alternate universe from this one, and he is some sort of religious Hierarch in a alternate USA, and he finds it better than his 'real world ". Something about a “wheel” where when he got pushed into the alternate, someone from another alternate got slipped into his. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2021, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/777 "2021-01-28T20:40:35Z")
Rings a bell. I know I can find that one. “The Wheels of If” by De Camp: [The Wheels of If - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheels_of_If) ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2021, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/778 "2021-01-28T20:40:49Z")
I ninja’d myself… ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2021, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/779 "2021-01-28T22:32:42Z")
My Hat is off to you sir. 🤠 ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2021, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417/780 "2021-02-10T21:28:12Z")
More sword/sorcery/sandal than SF, but here goes anyway: Our (kindasorta) Hero starts out as a member of an order of wizards who use red stones as their tokens and serve an entity (evil, natch) called the Unborn. In the course of the story he meets and (again, natch) falls in love with the king’s wife, and encounters another order of (good) wizards who have something called the godseye as their token. Eventually he defeats the head of his order and destroys the Unborn using a godseye. As a reward, the king divorces his wife on a trumped-up charge of adultery (what a guy!) so Our Hero can whisk her away to his home across the sea, where presumably they will Live Happily Ever After™. I have no real idea why this has been rattling around in my brain of late — it’s one of the spate of s/s/s books that came out in the late '60s and early '70s, and very far from the best of the lot. But I figure if I can get an ID, at least I can put it to bed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417.md?page=38) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-guy-who-is-pretty-good-at-sf-story-identification/462417.md?page=40)