October 2006
Foundation, Isaac Asimov (1951)
Foundation and Empire, Isaac Asimov (1952)
Second Foundation, Isaac Asimov (1953)

I have friends with shelves and shelves of science fiction books. My shelf has maybe about two dozen, mostly in series. As I've mentioned here before, although I do read some science fiction, it tends to be the same few books over and over.

Of the series, the one I reread least often is probably Isaac Asimov's Foundation series. That might partly explain why, at a library surplus sale a few weeks ago, I couldn't remember which of the books I'd read and which I hadn't. The other half of the explanation would have to be that I was just muddle-brained that day. Glancing through the 50-cent paperbacks I saw a couple of Foundation books. I knew there was one I needed, but I couldn't recall which. After much puzzling I finally concluded that even though I didn't remember the details, I did know that one of the ones I was missing was the first one, so I bought the first one (Foundation) and dumped it in the box with my other findings.

The next day, while driving, I had a sudden burst of clarity. I wasn't missing that book at all. I have the main trilogy, which I've read several times (though not recently) starting about 20 years ago. About five years ago, I stumbled upon what I took to be a new sequel. Reading the foreword, I discovered that there were in fact two sequels. The original trilogy was written in the 1940s, as stories in a magazine, republished as books in the 1950s. The two sequels were written much later, in the 1980s. The one I had picked up, Foundation and Earth, was the second of the two, ie, book 5. So instead of reading it, I shelved it, figuring that I'd keep an eye out for book 4 (Foundation's Edge).

I then proceeded to forget all about it, until last month at the library sale, where the book I should have been looking for was Foundation's Edge.

With my new duplicate copy of Foundation, I was inspired to refresh my memory, so I read it, and soon after I read the rest of the trilogy. Most of the stories have surprise endings. I did clearly remember the surprise ending of the "Mule" story -- possibly because that one had been revealed to me by a high school friend even before I read it the first time. The other endings I remembered barely at all, which is nice. Other than that, I have little to say. If you're a sci-fi fan, you probably know the series better than I do. If you're not, you probably don't much care.

This afternoon I was at the library, and I remembered to look for Foundation's Edge, the next one in line for me to read. The catalog had said it was at my local branch, so I didn't bother to reserve it. Alas, I found that it was not on the shelf. (Amazingly, that's the first time I've ever had that experience at the King County Library. Admittedly, since I usually prefer to reserve books, I rarely have opportunity to look for them on the shelf, but that's just as true of my dealings with the Seattle Public Library, and I've had the not-where-it's-supposed-to-be experience several times there. And even more so in the San Francisco Public Library, come to think of it.)

In the course of looking for it, I did spot other Foundation books on the shelf, and ... what do you know? There are two more books I didn't even know about. One, which I borrowed and took home, is a prequel (Prelude to Foundation). Leafing through the prefatory material in it, I see that there's also a seventh book (Forward the Foundation) added to the end of the list.

If I reserve Foundation's Edge it'll be ready for me soon enough. In the meantime, Prelude to Foundation is right here in front of me. My question to my sci-fi loving readers out there is thus: Is there any reason why I shouldn't read the prequel first? My inclination is to read the books in the order they were written, but I could be persuaded otherwise.

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