Alfred Van Vogt influenced Western science fiction as much as Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov. One of the master’s many students, Philip K. Dick, wrote about his teacher this way: “Much of what I wrote and what looks like the result of drug use is in fact the result of a very serious reading of Van Vogt... He showed that people, no matter what they no matter who they are, they may actually be different, and I found this idea absolutely wonderful.” The collection you are holding in your hands includes the best examples of the writer’s short prose, which are unlikely to leave all connoisseurs of the fantastic genre indifferent.