Reviews for The best time travel stories of all time

The average rating for The best time travel stories of all time based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-07-27 00:00:00 Khalif Williams A good collection of science fiction stories about time travel ( which, admittedly, is more of a fantasy, like wizards and dragons). I skipped around in the book and took my time with this one. The Big Three authors of the book are Robert Silverberg, Philip K. Dick, and Poul Anderson with great stories, my favorite one being Anderson's "The Man Who Came Early." Unlike most of the other stories in this book, it does not deal with time paradoxes, but is simply a story about a man who finds himself in the past. Gerald Robbins is a US Army soldier stationed on Iceland during the Cold War and finds himself hurled back into Iceland's Viking past. As a modern man, he believes he knows more than the rather barbaric people among whom he finds himself...but he discovers he barely knows enough to survive in their society...Silverberg's story, "Hawksbill Station," is about a prison set up far in the prehistoric past and is also excellent, while Dick's story, "A Little Something for Us Tempunauts," does deal with time paradoxes. One that sticks with me is "Brooklyn Project" by William Tenn (Phillip Klass). It's a parody of Bradbury's classic, "A Sound of Thunder," but a parody written before Bradbury's better known time travel story! And some of you might remember that a 'Simpsons" episode also parodied the Bradbury story. Another good one, and a darker one, is "The Chronology Protection Case" by Paul Levinson. We discover that the Universe has ways of protecting itself! Jack McDevitt's "Time Travelers Never Die" shows us that time travel is a way to gain immortality...as well as a way to meet some interesting people like Socrates or Einstein. Two stories I did not think much of are by two fine writers, James Tiptree, Jr. (Alice Sheldon) and Jack Dann. Most of the 15 stories in the book are at least above average. Poul Anderson's is a great one I would say, as well as Silverberg's--and I really like William Tenn's story!

Review # 2 was written on 2009-12-13 00:00:00 Debra Brunk A varied collection of short stories involving time travel. Individual stories vary in length from a few pages to several dozen. Tones of the stories range from comedic to light to serious to disturbing. I am not typically a fan of time travel stories. I find usually that the author has a very anti-physical concept of the logical issues involved; one or two of the stories in this anthology declare the problem of causality paradoxes closed by declaring that no human beings may witness the effects of time travel. This type of paradox resolution is more of a fantasy element than science fiction; it sounds like a caveat that a wizard would put in his spell. And yes indeed, the type of thinking necessary to write something like this is everywhere in the stories collected here. It may be that there are "harder" time travel stories than these, which consider physical reality in addition to the world of human affairs; Malzberg, the editor, does seem a bit dainty and foppish, so it wouldn't surprise me if there were a selection bias in favor of Dune-like fantasy. But regardless of plausibility, the real test is pure enjoyment. Many of the stories are well written, and some are not. The worst is Brooklyn Project by William Tenn. After a few pages of dull, semicompetent writing, there is a short sequence betraying an insipid misogyny from the author; I skimmed the rest to find the punchline ridiculous and empty of meaning. I could probably guess Tenn's weight and annual hygiene budget without missing by much. But again, most of the stories are better than this. Hawksbill Station by Robert Silverberg is elegantly beautiful and accomplishes the best that I personally can expect from a time travel plot, which is that it steers the mind away from the preposterous aspects of the device with skillful, engaging writing. I'd never heard of Silverberg but I'm now inclined to pursue more of his material, and in my opinion this piece elevates the entire collection. There are other pieces falling on the good end of the scale. The Battle Of Long Island by Nancy Kress is imaginitive, and Time Travelers Never Die is as expertly written as Hawksbill Station. I don't feel obligated to rate each story, but the upshot is it wouldn't kill you to read this book if you have a long plane ride coming up.