I’ll have to read the Le Guin again, because. Even though it doesn’t seem to be what I’m remembering. Don’t think I’ve read any of Paul Melko. I’m 71 and still getting used to this millennium beginning, so I have some catching up to do.
That sounds like Theodore Sturgeon but I can’t think of a particular story at the moment
It really sounds like Robert Sheckley, though. He published “Specialist”.
He even used the same word, push, for propelling the spaceship.
Read the story on archive.
Better link
That’s the one; thanks!
A scientist was trying to develop fusion power, and decided that, in order to figure it out, he needed a close-up view of the processes in the Sun. In order to make his ship survive the Sun, he first developed a gizmo that would turn ambient heat energy into useful electricity. During this solar mission, his ship was unable to receive communications from Earth, but Earth could still receive his communications. Well, the mission is a success, and he does figure out how to make practical fusion, but when he gets back, he discovers that his beloved fusion is treated by society as a curiosity, because they’re now powering everything with his heat-converter.
Oh the irony. Sounds like a typical Analog story from 1950-1975. I’ll see if I can find it.
Another story. Someone (maybe the boy as an adult?) is looking through the old belongings of a boy and finds some weird tool (like a flash light?) and.a certificate proclaiming the kid to be the protector of earth, signed by the head of the United Nations. It turns out he actually did save earth from an alien invasion (by his kind response when interacting with the aliens?), so they left under the condition that he wouldn’t remember anything about the event. Now he starts to remember, possibly because he found this stuff again, and it is implied the earth is under imminent threat of attack.
I may misremember a few details.
Sounds like a confused memory of We Can Remember It for You Wholesale by Philip K. Dick
Quail turns himself in and is placed with a psychiatrist to figure out what his own personal desires are. When he was young, Quail used to fantasize that as a child he came across minuscule rodent-like aliens that were going to launch a full invasion of Earth with their superior technology. However, young Quail was so kind to and accepting of the aliens that they decided to hold off on their invasion as long as he was alive. While finding the fantasy narcissistic, his commanders agree to plant the memories at Rekal. To everyone’s shock, those memories turn out to be real as well
Absolutely.
I would like to find a SF novel or novella about a satellite that will shoot down any aircraft flying from the Earth’s surface. This shuts down all aircraft traffic on Earth.
The Fittest by J. T. McIntosh
If “The Fittest” was addressed to me then no, that’s not the one I’m looking for.
Thanks, but from that description, no, that’s not it.
You are not talking about the story-within-a-story in the Cyberiad in which they hate the guy so much they keep cloning him just so they can beat him to death again and again? There is no portal or bunker or dictator in that one.
There was an H. Beam Piper story with a similar setup, except that the dictator used a time machine of his own volition to go back in time (and thought he would be able to dominate there).
It ends with a twist ending - one of his attackers wants to go back to stop his plans, but another says there is no need because the dictator, being radioactive and from the future, was stopped by the people back then (us, or our contemporaries) who entombed him at the bottom of the valley under concrete that persists to that day and formed the base on which the time machine was constructed.
Slightly similar but different enough in the particulars to think that it’s not quite right.
Not exactly an original theme. I’ve seen it a few times.
It was the premise of a strip that ran in the UK comic 2000AD, where bounty hunters travel through time to capture Hitler. There was a sequel where they captured Rommel.
Also the premise of the Doctor Who episode Let’s Kill Hitler.
"Flight from Tomorrow ", right?
I think that was the name, yes. (I don’t have my Piper immediately at hand)