num_pages: 384
description: Over the years since 1965, Algis Budrys has emerged as the leading critic of mod­ern speculative fiction: insightful, ec­lectic, and notoriously uninhibited. Benchmarks collects the material that started it—all 54 Galaxy Bookshelf book-review columns Budrys created for the now-vanished Galaxy Magazine. Writ­ten for what was then the world’s leading SF periodical, these legendary summa­tions and summary judgments coincided with the period when newsstand-borne science fiction and fantasy were evolving from pulp toward literature. Budrys’ Galaxy reviews trace an incisive, some­times wickedly acerb path through that sparsely charted literary territory. Budrys defines his standards and his function in his own words: “A book should he good. A bird should fly. “Writers of imperfect, tousled books should be made aware that standards of breeding and grooming exist. I strive to fulfill that function.” 
language: English
title: Benchmarks: Galaxy Bookshelf
titlecomplete: Benchmarks: Galaxy Bookshelf
ratings_count: 5
awards: awardedAt: 504950400000
name: Locus Award
category: Best Non-Fiction/Reference
publisher: Southern Illinois University Press