The Heads of Cerberus
The Book that Created Dystopian Sci Fi

This is a proto-SF novel from 1919 (assuming that ‘real’ SF starts with Hugo Gernsback and his Astounding Stories as well as the term itself, for say H.G. Wells’s novels were scientific romance). I read it as a part of monthly reading for April 2022 at The Evolution of Science Fiction group. The sto......more

Though little read and seldom discussed today, in the late teens and early 1920s, Minneapolis-born Francis Stevens was something of a cause célèbre among discriminating readers. "Francis Stevens" was the pen name of Gertrude Barrows Bennett, who published her first story in 1917 at the age of 33. He......more

First tale of alternate universes? A logical progression of The Time Machine by H.G. Wells? A tale of strange time distortion, at any rate. An enjoyable, solid, fun read of twisted, dark events. A stranger with mysterious demands. A vial of gray powder. A friendship lasting beyond space and time. FRE......more

Pure pulp entertainment. If you are looking for something deep, you won't find it here. But this is a fun adventure story. Three people find themselves thrust into a future dystopia, fix the problem (more-or-less), then go home. Not much unlike a Doctor Who episode. The way that they are sent to the......more

Stevens had a surprisingly short career, nearly all his fantastical fiction appearing over a period of about five years in the 1910s-20s. More surprising still, he never existed! Francis Stevens was the pen name of Gertrude Barrows Bennett, the first major American woman author of fantasy. (Her true......more