David Langford's writing has been a source of pleasure to the comparatively small group of readers who know his work in the (mainly) British science fiction community for many years (although he has many admirers in the USA, Canada and Australia as well). He is perhaps science fiction's equivalent of Clive James. Much of his output has been in the form of reviews in various magazines, covering the genres of science fiction, fantasy and mystery writing, although one of his many Hugo awards for excellence in the field of science fiction was actually awarded for a short story and he has a couple of novels to his name. He is witty, erudite and above all funny, but wears these mantles lightly.

I have known Dave's writing since the mid-1970s, initially through his fanzine writing, and only later through his professional career. So I came to this collection with a little trepidation; after all, a dense book of over 100 review columns culled from gaming magazines might seem like a fairly turgid proposition, even for such a good writer. And indeed, I took a few reviews to get into the swing of the format - as indeed I'm sure Dave did, as these are collected columns almost from his first professional reviewing appearance. But I was soon finding funny asides and references, some of which involved things I'd seen earlier in fanzines, and some of which I hadn't.

These reviews date from the period 1983-91. It may seem odd to find interest in reviews of books that are now up to thirty years old, but many of them have become well-known in the genre and it was good to see them through eyes that were reading them for the first time when they were fresh. I also found it quite interesting to look at what else was coming out at the same time; I shelve my books by author, so it was instructive to see what author X was producing when author Y brought out book B. A few times, I thought "I'd forgotten those books were contemporary..." Along the way, Dave tells a few stories of his own career and encounters - not necessarily always first-hand - with famous (or infamous) writers such as L. Ron Hubbard and Whitley Streiber.

This was a great exercise in nostalgia for me, and it is good to have some of Dave's non-fiction writing in a more permanent form. ( )