"The Stainless Steel Leech" by Roger Zelazny

First Printing:  Amazing Stories, April 1963

From looking at this cover you would never know that it contains a Roger Zelazny story.  Later in his career they would put his name on it if he wrote a letter to the editor.  The reason for this was probably because it appeared under the pen name "Harrison Denmark".  His early stories for Amazing appeared under this name.  At the time, readers speculated that "Harrison Denmark" was really Harry Harrison who was living in Denmark at the time.  The name of this story added fuel to this rumor since Harrison was writing the "Stainless Steel Rat" stories.

Zelazny liked working in the science fantasy field.  In this story he combines the traditional end of humanity and robots who inherit our legacy with the fantasy element of vampires.  This is common for the author.  One example would be the combination of alternate worlds with magic in his Amber series.

The mixture works in this story.  The robots inheriting the world from humanity as been done before.  The twist with the vampires is what makes this story different.  When Zelazny does something like this, I don't find myself questioning him. He somehow makes it work.  Part of the success of this endeavor is the way he focus' on the loneliness and friendship experienced by a robot who is an outcast and a vampire who lives in a world where humanity has dies out.

This is another in the long line of recommended Zelazny short stories.

"In the Arena" by Brian W. Aldiss

Recently, I found a copy of Frederick Pohl's The Second IF Reader of Science Fiction. I have read many good stories that Pohl published in Worlds of IF so I was looking forward to this collection.

Javlin is a fighter in the arena. The only ways out of the arena are to win 12 bouts or die. Javlin has won his last 11 bouts when he gets the bad news. He has to fight as part of a team. And his teammate is a woman. The story focuses on the pair getting to know each other. It ends with them charging into the arena.

Brian Aldiss has written many classic science fiction stories. Unfortunately, this is not one of them. I was surprised to see this in a collection of the best from Worlds of IF. The only reason it I believe it was selected was the author's reputation. Personally, I would rather read a good story by an unknown author than a weak story by a big name writer.