Inconstant Moon (collection)

This Niven collection was one of the first that I bought, rather than stole - pardon, borrowed - or read from a library, back there in 1977. I had just discovered Niven, via the pulp magazines, and this was an amazing discovery. There are seven tightly-written, masterpiece stories, all completely different from one another with possibly one being set in the Known Space universe.

This is Niven at his wide-ranging and eclectic best: the title story explores what happens when someone notices that that the moon is WAY too bright, and what he does about it. Bordered in Black relates what happens when a species raised as food, with one oceanic food source, gets too numerous - and what happens to the peole who find them. How the Heroes Die - is a Martian mystery. With appropriate chemistry, desiccation - and Martians. At the Bottom of a Hole is the same Mars - later, with death by Martians. And in Known Space. One Face is reminiscent of Poul Anderson's Tau Zero, and for the same reason: accidentally getting to near teh heat death of the Universe, and tehn having to figure out how to survive. Death by Ecstacy is about drouds - and Belters, and ARMS - the longest story of teh seven, and possibly the best. I loved it - and I still do.

Top of the re-read list!