“Harrison Bergeron” is a 1961 science fiction short story by Kurt Vonnegut. It is about a future society in which talented and gifted people are forced to wear handicapping equipment to make them “more normal.”

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“Neutron Star” is a 1966 science fiction short story by Larry Niven. It is about a man sent to investigate the mysterious deaths of two space explorers who were studying the galaxy’s only known neutron star.

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“We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” is a 1966 science fiction novelette by Philip K. Dick. It is about a man who desperately wants to go to Mars but can’t afford it, so he gets vacation memories implanted instead.

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“The Last Command” is a 1967 science fiction short story by Keith Laumer. It is about an old war machine that is reactivated decades after being buried in a radiation-proof landfill.

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“The First Men” is a 1960 science fiction novelette by Howard Fast. It is about a group of gifted children, raised in a controlled environment, who evolve into super humans.

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A Rose for Ecclesiastes

by Roger Zelazny

• Word count: 12431
• Page count: 29

“A Rose for Ecclesiastes” is a 1963 science fiction novelette written by Roger Zelazny. It is about a gifted linguist who is the first human allowed to read sacred Martian texts.

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The Day the Martians Came

by Frederik Pohl

• Word count: 2579
• Page count: 6

The Day the Martians Came is an interestingly abstract science fiction short story by Frederik Pohl. First published in 1967 it explores the social ramifications of humans discovering an alien race.

The story follows one night of a hotel manager as he struggles to deal with all the reporters in his establishment on the eve of NASA’s returning Algonquin Nine – an expediton to Mars.
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