Five Science Fiction Novels is a 1952

1952 in literature

The year 1952, in literature involved some significant events and new literary publications.-Events:*J. L. Carr takes over as headmaster of Highfields Primary School, Kettering, which will eventually furnish the subject matter for his novel, The Harpole Report.*November 25 - Agatha Christie's play...

 anthology of five science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 novellas edited by Martin Greenberg

Martin Greenberg

Martin Greenberg is an American book publisher and editor of science fiction anthologies.-Biography:Greenberg married in 1941. He was in the U.S...

. The stories originally appeared in the magazines Unknown

Unknown (magazine)

Unknown was an American pulp fantasy fiction magazine, published from 1939 to 1943 by Street & Smith, and edited by John W. Campbell. Unknown was a companion to Street & Smith's science fiction pulp, Astounding Science Fiction, which was also edited by Campbell at the time; many authors and...

and Astounding.

Contents

• But Without Horns, by Norvell W. Page
  Norvell W. Page
  Norvell Wordsworth Page was an American pulp fiction writer, journalist and editor who later became a government intelligence worker. He is best known as the author of the majority of the adventures of the ruthless vigilante hero The Spider, which he and a handful of other writers wrote under the...
  
  
• Destiny Times Three, by Fritz Leiber
  Fritz Leiber
  Fritz Reuter Leiber, Jr. was an American writer of fantasy, horror and science fiction. He was also a poet, actor in theatre and films, playwright, expert chess player and a champion fencer. Possibly his greatest chess accomplishment was winning clear first in the 1958 Santa Monica Open.. With...
  
  
• Crisis in Utopia, by Norman L. Knight
• The Chronicler, by A. E. van Vogt
  A. E. van Vogt
  Alfred Elton van Vogt was a Canadian-born science fiction author regarded by some as one of the most popular and complex science fiction writers of the mid-twentieth century: the "Golden Age" of the genre....
  
  
• The Crucible of Power, by Jack Williamson
  Jack Williamson
  John Stewart Williamson , who wrote as Jack Williamson was a U.S. writer often referred to as the "Dean of Science Fiction" following the death in 1988 of Robert A...
  
  

Reception

New York Times reviewer Basil Davenport reported the anthology contained "three hits, one near miss, and one bad miss," declaring it "almost always at least entertaining, and at its best provocative." Davenport faulted "The Crucible of Power" as "no more than a short story," and found "Crisis in Utopia," although attractively imaged, to be weakly plotted. Of the "hits," he described "But Without Horns" as a familiar tale "told with real suspense; reported "The Chronicler" to be a typical van Vogt story where action kept the reader's interest even when the ideas became murky; and praised "Destiny Times Three" as the book's high point.