Stephen Baxter: Last and First Contacts

‘Halo Ghosts’ is an early story, a first attempt at the idea that I eventually worked up into my story ‘Traces’ (1991); I later decided I liked the original version too and reworked it.

‘Tempest 43’ is an attempt to look into the middle term future, when current anxieties have played themselves out.

‘The Children of Time’ is a speculation about a further future, a middle way for mankind between galactic cornucopia and extinction. It uses a Stapledonian viewpoint, appropriately enough given the collection’s title. This was the first story bought by Sheila Williams when she took over the editorial chair at Asimov’s, and won the reader’s poll for that magazine’s best short story of its year.

Another of my long-standing fascinations has been alternate history. One such piece with a rather outlandish alternate-historical hinge is ‘The Pacific Mystery’; it features another fantastic voyage, this time through a non-Euclidian geometry. This story was nominated for the Sidewise Award for best alternate-history short story of its year; I later became a judge on the award.

‘No More Stories’ is quite a personal story, an attempt to root a fantastical idea in a story of human relationships.

‘Dreamers’ Lake’ was the outcome of a specific commission: to deliver a story as a tribute to the movie Forbidden Planet. It contains a nod to Shakespeare, like the movie, but unlike the movie there’s also a nod to Dire Straits.

‘The Long Road’ is an attempt at one of the most difficult forms of fiction, the short-short.

‘Last Contact’ was nominated for both the Hugo and Locus awards. It is another attempt to dramatise the cosmological, this time through a personal story: eschatology and gardening. The story was partly inspired by my reading Nevil Shute, my father’s favourite author.

First edition, published in the UK April 2012

by NewCon Press

IMG 002 hardback

This collection copyright© 2012 by Stephen Baxter

Published by NewCon Press by arrangement with the author

All stories copyright © by Stephen Baxter

“Erstkontakt” copyright © 2012, original to this collection

“In The Abyss of Time” copyright © 2006 originally appeared in Asimov’s

“Halo Ghosts” copyright © 2000, originally appeared in Roadworks

“Tempest 43” copyright © 2009, originally appeared in We Think Therefore We Are, Daw Books

“The Children of Time” copyright © 2005, originally appeared in Asimov’s

“The Pacific Mystery” copyright © 2006, originally appeared in The Mammoth Book of Extreme Science Fiction, Robinson Publishing (UK), Carroll & Graf (US).

“No More Stories” copyright © 2007, originally appeared in Fast Forward vol. 1, Pyr Books

“Dreamers’ Lake” copyright © 2006, originally appeared in Forbidden Planets, Daw Books.

“The Long Road” copyright © 2006, originally appeared in Postcripts No. 6

“Last Contact” copyright © 2007, originally appeared in The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, BL Publishing.

All rights reserved, including the right to produce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.

ISBN: 978-1-907069-40-6 (hardback)

Cover art by David A Hardy

Cover design by Andy Bigwood

Minimal editorial interference by Ian Whates

Text layout by Storm Constantine

eBook design by Tim C. Taylor