Preview by Frank Belknap Long
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Preview by Frank Belknap Long is a science fiction short story written in the mid-20th century. It centers on a film preview that turns into an alien intrusion, exploring how perception can be hijacked and how memory and culture can be stripped away by watchers beyond Earth. At a private screening, the smooth-talking Mr. Scanlon promises critics a new, brutally realistic experience and showcases Stella, a “stripped” actress. A grand Western unspools,
then ruptures: a tentacled being rides into the Black Hills, the landscape mutates, Stella grotesquely transforms, and Scanlon abruptly vanishes. The tale closes with a chilling coda: a week later saucer-folk arrive in force and erase from human minds the treasured knowledge of Earth’s wonders, ensuring that no one remembers the preview—or understands why it happened. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
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About this eBook
| Author | Long, Frank Belknap, 1903-1994 |
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Emshwiller, Ed, 1925-1990 |
| Title | Preview |
| Original Publication | New York: King-Size Publications, Inc., 1955. |
| Series Title | Produced from Fantastic Universe, January 1956 (Vol. 4, No. 6). |
| Credits | Tom Trussel (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature |
| Subject | Science fiction |
| Subject | Short stories |
| Subject | Motion pictures -- Fiction |
| Category | Text |
| eBook-No. | 78072 |
| Release Date | Feb 28, 2026 |
| Copyright | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 6679 downloads in the last 30 days. |
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