Consider Her Ways And Others

The title-story is a short novel at 63 pages (in the Penguin edition) and the best thing in the book. The other five tales are shorter, and certainly lighter, many involving time travel or alternate dimensions. "A Long Spoon" regards an accidental summoning of a demon of Hell and the awkwardness that ensues as the protagonist and wife put him up in a hotel and try to find a way to send him back. A very funny story. "Oh Where, Now, is Peggy MacRafferty", on the other hand proves that Wyndham's humor isn't always so agreeable.. it's a fairly awful story that made me pause and briefly consider picking up another book altogether. It seems very out of place here. Wyndham is almost always worthwhile, and this somewhat slim collection will please Wyndham fans more than others, but even you non-Wyndham-devotees should find entertainment herein, though I hope it won't be the first Wyndham book you pick up. Day of the Triffids is his best work, and I'd start there, ideally.

Consider Her Ways is the classic John Wyndham novella depicting a future society where all men have gone the way of the dodo, and very grim and ant-like it is too. Would an all-female world really be so regimented? Maybe not, but Wyndham's dystopian take on this subject is compelling. The other five stories in this volume are rather a mixed bag, the best of them dealing with time travel and alternative dimensions. After reading these I wondered why the author never actually wrote a full-length time travel novel, although having said that, the short story formula works exceedingly well.

A collection of 6 short stories written by John Wyndham, certainly worth a read if you are a John Wyndham fan.

This book features, for the main part, stories that deal in time travel and distortions in time and place. There are some real gems here, not least the title story `Consider her Ways'. In this tale, a young woman wakes to find herself in a futuristic nightmare in which men have become obsolete and women are divided into groups such as workers, servants, breeders and so on. From being an educated, articulate doctor in her own time, she has awoken in the body of a breeder, a gargantuan woman who is supposed to have no intelligence at all and no thoughts beyond eating and producing babies. Her nightmare is in trying to convince those around her that she is not insane and that she is not who they suppose her to be. Each story is written in a gentle and thoughtful manner, very different from Wyndham's better-known tales such as Day of the Triffids or the Chrysalids. At a mere 192 pages, this is not a book that will keep you going for weeks and it isn't the greatest work ever produced, but it is entertaining nonetheless and certainly worth buying, particularly if you are a fan of classic science fiction.