This month's Old People Read New SF is a review of Carnival Nine by Caroline M. Yoachim. I am one of the old people doin' the reviewin'. Guess which one.
It's possible that some people clicking on that will be puzzled that the website name is youngpeoplereadoldsff.com. I am, every single time, but that's because I'm old. The website is called that because noted SF reviewer James Nicoll's original project was to have Young People Read Old SF (and F) to see if it was as enthralling to them today, as current young people, as it was to us back in the day when we were also young people. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, they rarely fell over each other with enthusiasm about the Old SF they were assigned to read. I did find it a bit disappointing, as many of the stories were multiple-award winners and many were repeatedly reprinted up until the present day, and I did think they had something going on.
Shirley Jackson's The Lottery? Jerome Bixby's It's a Good Life? (Better known as the wishing people into the cornfield Twilight Zone one.) Light of Other Days? Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand? Flowers for Algernon?
And many, many more.
I read, or rather re-read, all of them before reading the Young People's views and thought that most held up well. The most common complaints, that the characters are of purest cardboard and 'women' characters are sprinkled in for decoration only, were, alas, quite true but...I guess I was used to it, back in the day. If you go looking for the stories, beware that not all of them are legally online, although most of almost all of them are in PDF form in some teacher's notes or other, and therefore googleable, if unlike me you do not have an extensive musty library teeming with silverfish.
Young People Read Old SFF is here.
Another one of James's projects is New People Listen to Old SFF. These old radio shows are available on the web, and linked before each set of reviews, so get listening and see if you agree with the young people!
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