Looking Forward (anthology)


Looking Forward is an anthology of science fiction stories edited by Milton Lesser, published in hardcover in 1953 by Beechhurst Press and reprinted in the British market in 1955 by Cassell & Company. The anthology was particularly poorly received, and carried the unusually high cover price, for its day, of $5.00. Its contents include one of the few uncollected and otherwise unanthologized stories by Walter M. Miller, Jr.

Contents

"We Kill People" carried the "Lewis Padgett" byline. "Win the World" was originally published as "The Subversives". "Highway" originally carried the byline "Wilfred Owen Morley". "Lion's Mouth" was originally published under the "Stephen Marlowe" byline. "The Last Monster" was originally published as "Terminal Quest."

Reception

New York Times critic J. Francis McComas described the volume as "exorbitantly priced," found Lesser's introduction "irritating" and "meaningless," noted that the stories were either already available or among their authors' "feebler works," and concluded that Looking Forward was a book "whose over-all merit is dubious indeed." Hartford Courant reviewer R. W. Wallace declared that most of the stories "run to boiled beef rather than grilled tenderloin.... not what you'd pick if you wanted to tempt the appetite of a guest." P. Schuyler Miller more charitably noted the volume's price and declared it was "not bad."