Television Writer J. Michael Straczynski (Spider-Man: One More Day, Babylon 5, Murder, She Wrote) has announced the contents of the upcoming HARLAN ELLISON’S GREATEST HITS, a new collection of the sci-fi story writer’s best-known pieces from his career.
J. Michael Straczynski, the executor of Ellison’s estate, has pledged himself to make certain the rambunctious “Uncle Harlan,” as he was affectionately known by his audience, to keep the notorious writer’s works in print. Ellison was very prolific in the industry, having written dozens of stories, essays, reviews, and even television appearances. Though he died in 2018, he had been writing stories since 1949, his talents spanning over half a century.
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Harlan Ellison was also known for being a controversial figure in his day, something Science Fiction Fandom does not look too highly upon these days. Though called as a sexist and misogynist among the WorldCon crowd today, he was very well respected for his intellect and writing prowess, even despite making gaffes like supporting Ed Kramer during his arrest for pedophilia. Harlen Ellison was known to rant about anything and everything, including the oncoming irrelevancy of the Hugo Awards, before the internet proved his prophetic words correct.
On January 24th, J. Michael Straczynski announced the full contents of the oncoming sci-fi book on Twitter/X, including a foreword by Internet Archive opponent and detractor Neil Gaiman, as well as a preface from the Babylon 5 creator himself.
The resulting book reaches nearly 500 pages with the amount of content and purports to be the true testament of Harlan Ellison’s entire career.
The nineteen included stories are as follows:
- “Repent, Harlequin,” Said the TickTockman
- I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream
- The Deathbird
- Chatting with Anubis
- The Whimper of Whipped Dogs
- Jeffty is Five
- Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes
- Shatterday
- Mefisto in Onyx
- On the Downhill Side
- Paladin of the Lost Hour
- The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World
- I’m Looking for Kadak
- How Interesting: A Tiny Man
- Djinn, No Chaser
- How’s the Night Life on Cissalda?
- From A to Z, in the Chocolate Alphabet
- Eidolons
- All the Lies That Are My Life
The sci-fi book is scheduled to be released on March 24th, 2024, and is available for preorder on Amazon as of this writing.
What do you think? Are you interested in this release of Harlan Ellison’s sci-fi short story material edited by J. Michael Straczynski? Leave a comment below!
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Nice selection. Too bad I already have all of those.