Page:Avon Fantasy Reader 05.djvu/3

 Another member of C. L. Moore's sex is Clare Winger Harris whose tale of THE MIRACLE OF THE LILY also tackles boldly a problem of communication between worlds (this time the planet Venus) and an even more desperate problem, the struggle of man against Nature. Nature includes many things besides the sciences we recognize. There are forces still to be guessed at, and Carl Jacobi has written a new story for us dealing intriguingly with the possibility of THE RANDOM QUANTITY.

Stephen Vincent Benet's story, THE GOLD DRESS, is a ghost story, told in the manner that has made Benet famous among American storytellers. And W. F. Harvey's SAMBO is a tale of a different type of weird force, manifesting itself through a dreadful African doll. Africa, that continent of dark marvels, called forth from the hand of Robert Bloch the eerie narrative, FANE OF THE BLACK PHARAOH, wherein the whole of the past, present, and future comes to a grim focus.

Frank Owen likewise knows how to tie in the past with the present as you will find in his enthralling modern legend of China, A STUDY IN AMBER. We cannot fail to see the doorways of power and terror that open up in the startling tales of C. M. Kombluth and Robert W. Chambers.

You'll find this an all-around collection of really superior fantasy. Write us and tell us what you think of it and what you would like to see in the future numbers.

—DONALD A. WOLLHEIM