Martin Dudley’s Shelfie
The bottom shelf features some of my all-time favourite SF authors. There's the full set of the NESFA Collected Stories of Roger Zelazny which also includes the very informative literary biography by Chris Kovacs. Although Zelazny is best known for his Amber series, I think he really shines as a short story writer, and "Comes Now the Power" moves me every time I read it.
Next to those are the three-volume Complete Rynosseros by Terry Dowling - a wonderful series of 44 short stories set in a far-future Australia ruled by Tribal Princes who are attempting to assert dominance over the very AIs they created. Fighting against them is Blue Tyson, captain of the land yacht Rynosseros, inspired by the anonymous English poem Tom O'Bedlam:
The punk I skorne and the cut purse sworn
And the roaring boyes bravadoes.
The meeke, the white, the gentle
Me handle, touch and spare not;
But those that crosse Tom Rynosseross
Doe what the panther dare not.
I also wrote a concordance of all the characters, locations, and themes for the stories. Which Terry Dowling was kind enough to read and offer support.
Having done that, I'm now in the process of a concordance for Lavie Tidhar's "Continuity" stories, which is proving a much bigger project!
To the right of the Rynosseros books are Cordwainer Smith's short stories and a concordance (not mine) of his works.
Next to those is a one-volume edition of Gormenghast which was a life-changing experience for me at the age of ten.
On the top shelf are some non-fiction. A marvellous volume of British Folklore Myths and Legends, compiled by Reader's Digest in the Seventies.
Then a few more volumes of archaeology and mythology reference books.
There's a very interesting slim book called The Truth About Cinderella, by Martin Daly and Margo Wilson, which explores the evolutionarily-based conflicts surrounding the concept of step-parenthood.
Moving along onto a couple of books about the history of Spain, my adopted home; and a history of Shanghai where I also lived for several years. An incredible city which, in many ways, was much more the centre of twentieth-century China than Beijing.
Finally, at the front, there's a little beermat showing the beautiful mural in the King Cole Bar in the St. Regis hotel, NYC.
Martin Dudley is a retired materials scientist living in the beautiful town of Ronda, Málaga. He’s a lifelong fan of Science Fiction, but recently been delving deeply into evolution and psychology - the origins of language, consciousness, behavioural psychology, etc. The rest of his time he spends walking in the mountains with his Boxer, Bruno.
Shelfies is edited by Lavie Tidhar and Jared Shurin.
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