Andre Norton was not the first science fiction author I ever read but, the first book of hers I read – Star Man's Son 2250 AD (1952) – was her first published SF novel, although some years passed between publication and my discovery. "Star Man's Son" is considered by some to be the first modern post apocalyptic novel, and it is my go-to book when trashing McCormac's "The Road."

I discovered SF on the bookshelf of my 4th grade classroom. The title of that glorious space opera is long lost but I remember the brown cloth cover with a little rocket ship on the bottom of the spine, a device used by Doubleday around then. I remember scouring the shelves of our tiny school for that little rocket, and having a surely confusing conversation with my teacher about the difference between "fiction" and "novels." I had the notion that "fiction" was the catchall for non-fact writing and "novels" were top-drawer literature.

There were two sources of SF in my early life – the public library and our neighbor Mr. Meyers. The library had a few shelves (which in retrospect seems quite a lot for a small town) and the Meyers house had piles. I was allowed to read all there was, because pre-1969 there was no sex in SF. One of my life regrets is not begging for Mr. Meyers' collection when he died.

In any case, Mr. Meyers was an Andre Norton fan and of the books I read, it is hers I remember. (well, and Gully Foyle.) And it is the space opera Star Man's Son 2250 AD, that I remember first and best, and in this remembering, I say to you that Tales of High Halleck is not the place to start reading Andre Norton.

Take a moment to look at Andre Norton bibliography pages online. They are a mess. The woman published for 70 years and her titles were repacked, renamed, reissued, reanthologized and otherwise remarketed to the point that scholars are mostly content to clump series together (if a short book with a single follow-on can be called a series) and choose a publication date, sprinkling the stand-alones in like nonpareils. The less scholarly take the clumps and put almost any old date on them. ACE doubles have a lot to answer for.

The dates are important though because like any writer of pulp fiction (much as I love her, Andre Norton was no Pulitzer candidate), Ms Norton's books reflected the literary trends of the time. Her work is also self-reflexive in that while her style evolved over time, it also curls around itself when something clicked with readers. She was not immune to the siren call of fashion either, as when she sidetracked into Authurian legend following Monty Python and Marian Zimmer Bradley.

The early works, their themes and their language are pulp. Space ships, time travel, ESP and the reworked themes of the classic western (ref Firefly). The shift to magic and a more convoluted voice is most easily seen, I think, in the Moon of Three Rings (1966) in which the star man meets the shapechanger. Norton used idiom brilliantly as a cultural shortcut. (We may never know if Elmore Leonard read Ms Norton in his youth.)

In about 1982 I did a quick tally of my Norton paperbacks and decided that the average length was 187 pages. That's 187 old style paperback, not these tall things with wide margins we have today, so these tales are well under 100,000 words. Compact and exciting. But, and this is a big thing, by 1969 and Dangerous Visions, her audience moved on to more exotic reading, but fortunately for her, unlike some others writing around then, a new audience was waiting.

I, like other readers my age, was thrilled by Moon of Three Rings, Catseye (1961) and the tales of ESP and animals, and by Witchworld (1963) where ESP was transformed into witchcraft, with a tiny bit of sexual tension thrown in (perfect for a teen reader, right?). Witchworld is written from the POV of Simon Tregarth, a modern man who meets and loves Jaelithe, a witch of Estcarp who sacrifices herself, she thinks, for him. Witchworld became a series and then a franchise and then took over and the convoluted idiom of Maelen and later Jaelithe became the Norton norm. Even the later space operas, few as they are, are tainted (now that's a strong word that will raise ire) by Maelen's voice.

So be it. Andre Norton became a legend with a huge modern following and I do not begrudge it, but I straddled the transition and I like space opera better.

Which brings us the long way round to why Tales of High Halleck should not be your Andre Norton introduction or if it must be (you are stranded on an island or something) you should approach it carefully. Read the stories in chronological order, not the order presented.

The first story in this collection is called The Last Enchantment (1995), a retelling of Nimuë's story. If you don't already know Arthurian legend and its modern permutations you will be completely mystified. It is a terrible first story for a collection, especially when the second is Sword of Unbelief a lateish Witchworld tale originally published in 1977. By then, Witchworld idiom had become so peculiar that it only qualifies as English because each word is an English word. You have to know the language to be able to read the story. It's a pretty good story but even I, with the deepest affection, groan at the tortuous phrasing.

"It was contagious magic which I used to track Jervon, for about my throat I wore the amulet of a strange stone shaped not unlike an eye, which he had found and carried for a luck piece since he was a boy, and then had put into my keeping upon our handfasting, having in those years of war no other bride-jewel to offer."

"Colors rippled here that had no name I knew, sensations wrenched at the inner core of my determination and Talent as if they would pull me apart while I yet lived."

"Now the stones of the forgotten ruins drew together, formed tumbled walls, with here or there some uprise of worked rock which might have once been a statue. But these were now so worn away by erosion that such shapes remained only vaguely unpleasant ones, hinting of ancient monstrous beings. Gods or guardians? What man now living could say?"

If you are new to Andre Norton and have the tenacity to read these pieces in chronological order you will enjoy yourself much more.

I received review copies of "Tales from High Hallack: The collected short stories of Andre Norton , Volume 1, 2 and 3" by Andre Norton (Premier Digital Publishing) through NetGalley.com. I received and read these books in 2014 and thought I had uploaded this review then. I am sorry for being negligent.