# Identify this sci-fi story **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 25, 2007, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572 "2007-02-25T03:36:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Improv\_Geek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b3f665/32.png) [@Improv\_Geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Improv_Geek)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/1 "2007-02-25T03:36:17Z")
I’m trying to help a friend and identify the scifi story. She’s not a big scifi fan and this is a story she remembers from high or middle school, so help me out dopers. The story involves a story who live in a home that is surrounded by mountains of trash. The house has, what she described, sounds like a holodeck. One kid made the room a savannah complete with lions and it attacked his sister. Ringing any bells? – IG ---
**Author:** ![SmartAleq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smartaleq/32/163_2.png) [@SmartAleq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAleq)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/2 "2007-02-25T03:40:14Z")
The “holodeck with lions” part sounds like a Ray Bradbury story, “The Veldt” from \*The Illustrated Man \* but the trash surrounding doesn’t fit in to my recollection. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/3 "2007-02-25T04:15:07Z")
I agree about Bradbury’s “The Veldt.” No trash, though, and the lions attacked the parents of the villainous children (a spoiled-rotten, creepy brother and sister), not the sister herself. ---
**Author:** ![Improv\_Geek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b3f665/32.png) [@Improv\_Geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Improv_Geek)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/4 "2007-02-25T04:59:45Z")
Well she was quite foggy on details and so it is quite possible that some of the elements were mixed from other stories, thanks for the guesses guys - I’ll see if that’s the one 🙂 – IG ---
**Author:** ![A.I.Wintermute](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7bcc69/32.png) [@A.I.Wintermute](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A.I.Wintermute)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/5 "2007-02-25T05:35:10Z")
Note that _The Illustrated Man_ is a collection of short stories by Bradbury, so it would be pretty easy to conflate a few of them. I also recognized “The Veldt” straight off, it being the most memorable of the bunch for me. I don’t remember the others well enough to say if the mountains of trash are from another story in the book, and unfortunately I left my copy at home. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/6 "2007-02-25T16:49:21Z")
I don’t remember any story about mountains of trash in _The Illustrated Man_ (a favorite of mine, which I first read in high school). Maybe she’s thinking of Bradbury’s “There Will Come Soft Rains” (included in _The Martian Chronicles_), about an AI house which survives a nuclear war? I think there’s some reference to the devastation around the house. ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_Rhosis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@Sir\_Rhosis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_Rhosis)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/7 "2007-02-25T18:34:06Z")
I seem to remember Damon Knight writing a story about trash. Actually I remember the introduction he wrote in which he said the idea came to him after seeing one of his neighbor’s mountain of discarded beer cans thrown out the back door. Don’t remember the story, itself, though. Sir Rhosis ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-sci-fi-story/393572/8 "2007-02-25T18:39:10Z")
Sarah Cynthia Silvia Stout? For the garbage part.