1975 / Ebook / 160 pages / USA
***
The usual Sagan summary, padded out with blurry black-and-white space pics, Diane Ackerman's space poems, vaguely relevant classical quotes and New Yorker funnies. A fun retro curio, but get one of his proper books.
1993 / Ebook / 92 pages / UK
*
The Sonic writer's bible, spruced up with the bare minimum effort (variations on the same black-and-white sketches, boss tips and 1993 minor celebrity cameos) and sold to well-meaning parents. Sonic the Comic would retell these origin stories in more palatable comic form.
Rhys H. Hughes, The World Idiot and Other Absurdlings
1993-2011 (collected 2011) / Ebook / 99 pages / UK****
If you were new to Rhys Hughes, this would be a cracking sampler. If you've been following along, it's odd. The new stories and obscure magazine/chapbook reprints are conventionally good, but the other half's reappropriated from some of his best-known collections where those stories already worked perfectly by design. It's as if Pink Floyd had plonked some Dark Side of the Moon tracks onto Momentary Lapse of Reason to make it better. Maybe they were out of print at the time.
Fave: 'The Macroscopic Teapot'
Jo Storm, Approaching the Possible: The World of Stargate SG-1
***
A middle ground (tonally, chronologically and geographically) between the serious '90s Star Treks and the rainbow zaniness of Farscape and Doctor Who, this isn't a show I've ever felt compelled to revisit or even to finish, but this look back at the early years was still nostalgic. The first 100 or so pages could stand alone as a slim overview of the series and fandom, then it gets into the meatier episode guide, albeit overly concerned with shipping. Only getting as far as season eight, for eternal want of an update, that's still further than I made it.
1993 (collected 2019) / Ecomics / 168 pages / USA
**
I had quite low expectations for this non-canonical sequel to the rather popular two-parter, but its bogstandard alternate universe plot still managed to underwhelm. I'm surprised it never had a collected edition back in the day regardless, Borgs were the Daleks of the '90s.
