Search Worlds Without End

An irresistible mix of imagination, satire, and humor, these stories by acclaimed Japanese author Yasutaka Tsutsui imagine the consequences of a world where the fantastic and the mundane collide.

The opening story, "The Dabba Dabba Tree," details the hilarious side effects of a small conical tree that, when placed at the foot of one's bed, creates erotic dreams. In "Commuter Army," a sly commentary on the ludicrousness of war, a weapons supplier becomes an unwilling conscript in a war zone. "The World is Tilting" imagines a floating city that slowly begins to sink on one side, causing its citizens to reorient their daily lives to preserve a semblance of normality. And in the title story, we see how obscenely absurd the environment on Planet Porno appears to a group of scientists. The stories in Salmonella Men on Planet Porno winningly combine madcap hilarity and a sharp eye toward the insanities of contemporary life.

Contents:

• The Dabba Dabba Tree - short story 1974
• Rumours About Me - short story 1972
• Don't Laugh - short story 1970
• Farmer Airlines - short story 1976
• Bear's Wood Main Line - short story 1974
• The Very Edge of Happiness - short story 1974
• Commuter Army - short story 1974
• Hello, Hello, Hello! - short story 1974
• The World Is Tilting - short story 2002
• Bravo Herr Mozart! - short story 1986
• The Last Smoker - short story 2002
• Bad for the Heart - novelette 1974
• Salmonella Men on Planet Porno - novella 2005

The Devil-Tree of El Dorado deals with an expedition to a remote corner of the Earth, the legendary city of Manoa, which sits high atop the seemingly unscalable Mt. Roraima in British Guiana. Sitting on the pinnacle of that mountain is an unthinkable horror--a horror in the form of a fantastic man-eating tree!

This story relates the discovery of a telepathic race living in the Sargasso Sea. A wonderful tale of the mythical continent, told with outstanding imaginative ingenuity, chronicling the adventures of the near-immortal Monella.

When first introduced to Don Lorenzo, railway engineer Arnold Neville was quite taken with the mysterious but wealthy gentleman. And though he was initially flattered by Lorenzo's congeniality, Young Neville soon learned that his fiancé, beautiful Beryl Atherton, suspected Lorenzo's wealth and charm were only a façade, hiding the ambitions of a cruel and dangerous man.

Her worst fears were confirmed when Beryl and her stately aunt found themselves abducted! And before long, Neville and fellow engineer Arnold Leslie were led on cat and mouse chase through the harsh, uncharted jungles of Brazil, in a desperate search for the missing women. But what they found there was a hidden scientific super city called Myrvonia. In this lost citadel lived a forgotten race whose people practiced weird sciences and dabbled in a strange form of magic, a magic so powerful it could literally animate the dead!