Tales of Wonder

Mark Twain's unsettling imagination and passionate curiosity roamed far and wide - racing across microscopic worlds and interstellar voids, leaping ahead to fearful utopian futures, and speculating on dazzling inventions to come. "Tales of Wonder" features some of the most notable but little known speculative fiction available, penned by the famed American humorist and writer.

With characteristic wit and acuity, Twain embarks on an epic journey into a drop of water, catches a glimpse of an invisible man, reveals a generational world in the heart of a drifting iceberg, and imagines futuristic devices of instantaneous communication, such as the "phrenophone" and "telelectroscope." As he did in "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court", Twain employs time travel to look centuries ahead and envision a radical utopia of absolute suffrage and alternate future histories in which a global theocracy holds sway or a monarchy rules America.

This entertaining and absorbing collection of tales reminds us that the former steamboat pilot dreamed about the stars, anticipated and dreaded the future, and above all was continually surprised and enchanted by the world around him.Mark Twain is the author of such classics as "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" as well as many short stories, including those appearing in the recent collection, "How Nancy Jackson Married Kate Wilson and Other Tales of Rebellious Girls and Daring Young Women" (Nebraska 2001).

David Ketterer is a former professor of English at Concordia University.

He is the author of several books, including "Imprisoned in a Tesseract: The Life and Work of James Blish" and "Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy".