Challenge 1148

Beyond

In Jon Adcock’s A Handful of Dust:
1. Jason speaks of soldiers being “resurrected.” Why is “resuscitated” a more likely term?
2. Who are the adversaries in the war, and what is its cause?
In Scott C. Scharlach’s Logan’s Law:
1. Why would Logan be equipped with a fairly comprehensive knowledge of human cultures before being sent to survey nearby interstellar civilizations? What other peculiarly human feature does Logan have?
2. In what way are Logan’s space flights and Marshall’s hike similar?
3. Why have Earth societies abandoned space exploration in Marshall’s time?
4. What particular technologies might Earth societies agree to shun for their mutual benefit today? What kind of progress would they need to make in order to do so?
5. What should humanity do if it encounters its twin in space aliens? Embrace its cosmic sibling in trust and friendship? Or turn and run?
6. What literary feature does Logan embody? From what century does its earliest representative date in Bewildering Stories?
In Douglas Young’s Something Else:
1. Why might the very unusual name “Moxley Sorrel” be chosen for the professor in this particular story? For what other reason can the same can be said for the name “Blossom Porter”?
2. Of what subject is Moxley Sorrel a professor? Might the font of knowledge he spouts at one point provide a clue?
3. At what point might Prof. Sorrel close his office door earlier in his conversation with Blossom Porter?
4. Does the professor overburden the student with a sense of moral responsibility? What is his goal?
In Charles C. Cole’s Farmer Webber Gets Company: About how much pocket change would Farmer Webber need to be carrying in order to buy enough product to placate the ambulating salesperson?
In Bruce Ducker’s Henry on the Beach: Enumerate and explicate the elements of name humour in the poem.
In Robin Helweg-Larsen’s Planet Earth: What might the poem say of all the other worlds that the Creator has “spat into space”?
In Rosalind Kaplan’s Dangerous Bedfellows: Rather than encase himself in protective armor or flee in terror from the room, what other measure might the beleaguered husband take to assure he will not be pounded in the course of his wife’s nightmares?

Responses welcome!