User:DoctorWho42/The Cube Root of Uncertainty

The Cube Root of Uncertainty is a collection of science fiction short stories by American writer Robert Silverberg, published in hardcover by Macmillan in 25 May 1970 and issued in paperback by Collier Books in 1971. No further editions have been issued.

Background
At the time, Collier-Macmillan published a series of retrospective single-author collections. The Cube Root of Uncertainty was released 25 May 1970. The stories were written between 1954 and 1968. Prior to its paperback publication, stories had appeared in previous collections as Dimension 13 (1969), Moonferns and Starsongs (1971), Needle in a Timestack (1966), and To Worlds Beyond (1965).

Contents

 * Introduction (1970)
 * "Passengers" (1968)
 * "Double Dare" (1956)
 * "The Sixth Palace" (1965)
 * "Translation Error" (1959)
 * "The Shadow of Wings" (1963)
 * "Absolutely Inflexible" (1956)
 * "The Iron Chancellor" (1958)
 * "Mugwump Four" (1959)
 * "To the Dark Star" (1968)
 * "Neighbor" (1964)
 * "Halfway House" (1966)
 * "Sundance" (1969)

"Passengers" won the Nebula Award for Best Short Story and was nominated for the Hugo Award.

Reception
In 1971, SF Commentary's Barry Gillam noted "not a bad collection." Son of the WSFA Journal's James Newton praised The Cube Root of Uncertainty with "certain to enthrall serious lovers of science fiction." The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction's Joanna Russ opined "New Silverberg is something else: a highly colored, gloomy, melodramatic, morally allegorical writer who luxuriates in lush description and has a real love of calamity" but added "needs some time to get out of his system all the sophomoric dark doom that most of us—far less technically expert—dealt with during our apprenticeships." In 1972, Vector's John Bowles said "The collection also demonstrates his progression from a fairly naive, light-hearted writer to the happy pessimist he now is; nevertheless, one cannot help but feel that the majority of these stories are neither nightmare views of our uncertain future nor signposts along Silverberg's road of development: they're just a group of sf stories, some good, some not so good."