Finally gotten to read a proper collection of Ellison's short stories, the Herald Classics "Greatest Hits". With a name like that it obviously is going to have some of his best stories that he ever wrote, some of them even winning awards or were nominated.
Harlan never seemed to stay to stay in one genre. At one point I could be reading an SF story, the next; horror, and also a few stories that lean into a bit of fantasy. They can either be really funny, sad or outright terrifying in some instances.
I kind of like this mixed bag approach, honestly, and the much of them are pretty good. His stories tackle some pretty heavy topics like social and even explorations into the characters themselves. This material can be really razor sharp and punchy, and really intense! Sometimes his writing can either be very straight forward or very experimental, and sometimes I do enjoy stories that are like that.
This has some real bangers like "'Repent Harlequin,' Said the Tick Tock Man", "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" and "The Death", plus some very decent stories. But is this really all of his stories? No. But it is a pretty damn good introduction to at least some of his material! There are still a lot of his other collections that have a lot more of his collections that are very much still around, and those contain stories that might even be better! I'm very much likely to come across them in used book stores ( if one happens to turn up) or on amazon or what not.
by i-the-muso-1968