Arthur C. Clarke moved to Sri Lanka because he loved to scuba dive. He brings that same single-mindedness to his short stories. Each one narrows in on a single message or angle. It’s the opposite approach of a lot of modern sci-fi writers (Ted Chiang comes to mind) who explore all the ramifications of a seemingly simple premise. Clark’s approach works better in some stories than others.

“We already looked on the moon as no more than a suburb of earth …

… a stepping stone on the way to places that really mattered.”

Arthur C Clarke’s TALES OF TEN WORLDS is a thoroughly entertaining, eclectic collection of classic sci-fi shorts that have aged like a cellar full of fine wine. There is simply no question that Arthur C Clarke deserves his position as one of the acknowledged leaders in the all-time pantheon of sci-fi writers.

Like Ben Bova’s GRAND TOUR OF THE UNIVERSE series, readers will be treated to a scintillating blend of prescient hard and soft sci-fi themes as they are given a rapid-fire tour of the near neighbourhood of our solar system – a comet, an asteroid, the moon, Venus, Mars, Saturn and Titan. TALES OF TEN WORLDS is too short by half and easily recommended to fans of the classic sci-fi genre.

Paul Weiss

It never gets old travelling to the past (reading almost-50-year-old short stories) to travel to the future.

Some of the anachronisms are cute. The time spent describing communications or space tech or other things that didn't go the way we thought they would or are so commonplace now they require no explanation at all.

Some of the characters and situations are funny. Some are thought provoking. Some of the stories take too long, and some I wish would keep going.

A pleasant mix, more-or-less.