When James Blish died in 1975 he was one of the top science fiction writers. in addition, he was perhaps the leading technical critic in the science fiction field.
Following on from the two earlier collections of his critical writing, under the anonymous pseudonym of 'William Atheling, Jr', The Tale that Wags the God is a final selection of the insightful and incisive analyses of one of the field's great critics.
James Blish (1921-75) studied microbiology at Rutgers and then served as a medical laboratory technician in the US army during the Second World War. Among his best known books are Cities in Flight, A Case of Conscience, for which he won the Hugo in 1959 for Best Novel, Doctor Mirabilis, Black Easter and The Day After Judgement.