Cover artist Ric Binkley Publication date 1952 Pages 191 pp Country United States of America Genres Novel, Science Fiction | Language English Media type Print (Hardback) Originally published 1952 Publisher Fantasy Press OCLC 3102548 | |
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Similar Gertrude Barrows Bennett books, Science Fiction books | ||
The heads of cerberus by francis stevens book reading british english female voice
The Heads of Cerberus is a science fiction novel by author Francis Stevens. It was first published in book form in 1952 by Polaris Press in an edition of 1,563 copies. It was the first book published by Polaris Press. The novel was originally serialized in the pulp magazine The Thrill Book in 1919. A scholarly reprint edition was issued by Arno Press in 1978, and a mass market paperback by Carroll & Graf in 1984.
Contents
Plot introduction
The novel concerns people who are transported to a future totalitarian Philadelphia in 2118, after inhaling a grey dust.
Reception
Groff Conklin called it "perhaps the first science fantasy to use the alternate time-track, or parallel worlds, idea." Boucher and McComas praised the novel as "a slightly dated but still originally imaginative and acutely satiric story.". P. Schuyler Miller found Cerberus "dated and old-fashioned," but noted it was "a pioneering variation on the parallel worlds theme."
Everett F. Bleiler described the novel as "highly imaginative work, one of the classics of early pulp fantastic fiction," commenting that despite simplistic characterization, "the cynical anti-authoritarianism" in the description of the imagined future culture "is refreshing." Bleiler also noted that the novel's resolution "is a fine anticipation of the work of Philip K. Dick."