Analog Science Fiction and Fact magazine - worth it?

[Venusian Broon]

Just a call out to those that have had recent experience of the magazine.

Thinking about subscribing, really for the SF and industry news, but was a bit put off by the 'science fact' bit on the magazine. How much of it will be science fact articles?

Honestly would prefer to keep them seperate, so get New Scientist, my big science brain and other Internet sources for 'mainstream' science and I have other excellent sources for exploration of science looking at it on a 'SF basis' from other channels and media.

What does an average issue look like, fiction, review and article-wise?

Cheers.

 

[Alex The G and T]

There is one Science Fact article in each issue. What's different than a real science mag is that the science tends to be cutting edge, with the article merging into the speculative/extrapolative future; with some suggestion of how a Science Fiction writer might find it useful.

The other factish article is called "The Alternate View" gets even weirder.

Other bimonthly features:
One book review column by Don Sakers.
A couple of pages of letters to the editor
A con Calendar.
And a guest editorial. New Editor, Trevor Quachri doesn't write editorials. (Not complaining about hearing from Allen M Steele, this month.)

And the September/October 2019 issue, right here, has One Novella, four novelettes, fifteen shorts and two poems.

 

[logan_run]

I have some vintage issues from the 70s there very unique.

 

[mosaix]

Bought my first copy (second hand) in 1965. Subscribed regularly since 1972. Got ever copy.

Of course it’s changed over the years but I still find it enjoyable and recommend it.

 

[DeltaV]

I've been a subscriber for 20+ years. I tend to read more SF short stories than novels, and I've always liked the selection of stories in Analog. And I like looking at the Reference Library for recommendations. I've picked up a few books over the years that were listed there.

 

[Finch]

You can subscribe to Analog via a UK distributer Magsconnect for £44.95 for 12 copies . Or a kindel version for £ 1.99 per copy. The New Scientist , I have stoped reading , it is not as good as it once was , is £4.95 per copy . Even the The Daily Telegraph is £2 50 a go. Analog is not so exspensive that you need to read every word .

 

[Venusian Broon]

You can subscribe to Analog via a UK distributer Magsconnect for £44.95 for 12 copies . Or a kindel version for £ 1.99 per copy. The New Scientist , I have stoped reading , it is not as good as it once was , is £4.95 per copy . Even the The Daily Telegraph is £2 50 a go. Analog is not so exspensive that you need to read every word .

I tend to get New Scientist in spurts, like maybe subscribe for 3-4 years, (so far) every 20 years or so. Science, it turns out, doesn't change that much! And I get bored reading basically the same thing again and again.

Due to pick it up again sometime in 2030 then.

 

[J-Sun]

I know this was first posted awhile back but, since it's come up again, I'll throw in my two cents and say that, as of September 2019, you could still find excellent stuff in it that you wouldn't find in other magazines, but it had mostly become like most every other magazine and was nowhere near as good as it has been. So it wasn't really worth it to me.* The one magazine that seems to have a genuine interest in science fiction, though it doesn't yet have the pull to get really noted authors, is Compelling. (It also doesn't have any of the non-fiction departments and articles that make a magazine a magazine to me, but that may be a bonus if all you want is the fiction.)

* Then, of course, there was the incredibly ignorant, inarticulate, vulgar attack on John W. Campbell by yet another in the recent parade of gracious award winners who didn't even have anything to do with short fiction. The current editor had nothing to say in defense of the magazine's epochal former editor (and, indeed, most of The Powers That Be in the current SF short fiction community either piled on or remained silent) so I abandoned all current short science fiction and went back to reading mostly things from before the era of the current crop of editors.

 

[DeltaV]

Hi J-Sun.

There was an editorial on Campbell in the May-June 2019 Analog, written by Stan Schmidt. I thought it was well balanced, and pretty positive on what Campbell accomplished. I can't speak on the incident you refer to in your post as I have not read anything about it, nor do I wish to. The man has been dead now for almost 50 years. And while Campbell may have had some unusual ideas, I don't think that any reasonable person can deny the impact that he had on science fiction. Is there a SF editor that has had a greater influence than John W. Campbell?

Earlier in the thread Alex The G and T mentions the science columns Science Fact and The Alternate View. Yeah, a lot is on the speculative side, but, man, there are some interesting ideas in those articles. For example, the Science Fact in the Sept-Oct 2018 issue was on alien biochemistry. I am not a bio-chemist (and definitely not a xeno-bio-chemist!) but I found the article well written and interesting. I've re-read it a couple of times since.

 

[Don]

The impotent importance of indignant, self-righteous, obsessed, mad, cross Campbell critics can bring a smile to my face.

 

[Dave Vicks]

I like ASIMOV'S better.