I have to confess that I had not really heard of SF writer Barrington J Bayley until I saw a copy of ‘The Fall of Chronopolis’ along with ‘Collision with Chronos’ which also including a sheet with instructions for reviewers. This also names another double story edition plus Bayley was a contributor to ‘Stars of Albion’ Bayley was born in Birmingham on the 9th April 1937 and died in Telford on the 14th October 2008 leaving a long legacy of his work.
“Most commonly described as “underrated” or “visionary”, he has been cited as an influence by writers as well known as Brian Stableford and Bruce Sterling. A long-time friend of Michael Moorcock, who gave him a great deal of early exposure in his role as editor of New Worlds in the 1960s and 1970s, Barrington Bayley was a member of threesome including Moorcock and J G Ballard which plotted to overthrow traditional science fiction. Of the three, Bayley was perhaps the most inventive and the least successful. He is most commonly accused of poor character development and sloppy writing, but as a trade-off for stimulating, pyrotechnic, men’s own adventure space opera, these short-comings are easy to absorb”
(©Fantastic Fiction)
I found this Review Copy slip inside the 1991 Australian printing of ‘The Picador Henry Lawson’ Lawson has published over 40 books poetry, fiction, biography, literary and art criticism, travel, history and stories form children.
Over the years I have managed to pick up 11 of the 12 ‘Piccolo Crossword’ books but number 12 always proved elusive (but not as elusive as X705) in that several sellers listed an edition as number 23, which doesn’t exist, but with the ISBN for number 12. Eventually I found a seller listing 12 with the right ISBN but after placing the order the dispatch note said it was number 23! It was then a case of wait and see and eventually I got …….. the one I wanted which can be seen HERE