
Bossy was right. Always. Invariably. She was limited only in that she had to have facts—not assumptions—with which to work. Given those facts, her conclusions and predictions were inevitably correct. And that made Bossy a 'ticking bomb.' Bossy had been designed as a servomechanism for guiding airplanes. But she became something much greater: a hypercomputer. Soon the men who worked with Bossy found themselves able to solve their problems, to erase their prejudices - in short, to think. Did the world welcome Bossy with open arms and glad cries? No, because for four decades the world had been in the grip of opinion control, and Bossy represented a serious threat to that dominance. So Bossy had to go underground, and work in hiding. Which was why Joe Carter, the worlds only true telepath, and two brilliant Professors had to assume the role of Skid Row bums. All this is only the beginning of one of the most thoughtfully written, and thought provoking, science fiction novels ever written. It shows convincingly and compellingly, what would happen if everyone in the world were given a single blunt command: Think or die. Only a small handful of people are mature enough to realize that they don’t know all the answers. And it was only to this handful that Bossy offered the greatest gift of all: immortality. But all people wanted immortality, wanted it with a fixed and burning desire. And gradually the tension increased, the mobs grew restless, the military became more demanding—and the 'bomb' ticked swiftly on. And it was up to Joe Carter to stave off catastrophe. THE FOREVER MACHINE is full of excitement, both physical and mental. It is full, too, of rich rewards for the reader who appreciates genuinely mature philosophy tinged with gentle irony. And among other things, it is that rare event: a science fiction novel based on a brand-new idea. Cover art by Wallace Wood.
Author

Mark Clifton (1906 - Nov. 1963) was an American science fiction writer. Clifton began publishing in May of 1952 with the often anthologized story "What Have I Done?". Most of his work fits into one of two series. The "Bossy" sequence was written alone, and in collaboration with both Alex Apostolides and Frank Riley. The "Ralph Kennedy" series, which is lighter in tone, was mostly written solo, including the novel "When They Come From Space", although there was one collaboration with Apostolides. Clifton gained his greatest success with his novel They'd Rather Be Right (a.k.a. The Forever Machine), co-written with Riley, which was serialized in Astounding in 1954 and went on to win the Hugo Award, perhaps the most contentious novel ever to win the award. Clifton is also known today for his short story "Star, Bright", his first of three appearances in Horace Gold's Galaxy (July 1952), about a super-intelligent toddler with psi abilities. From Clifton's correspondence we know that Gold "editorially savaged" the story, which appeared in severely truncated or altered form. The story has been compared favorably to Kuttner and Moore's "Mimsy Were the Borogoves", which was published in Astounding nine years earlier. Clifton worked as a personnel manager during his life and interviewed close to 100,000 people. This experience formed much of Clifton's attitude about the delusions people entertain of themselves, but also the greatness of which they are capable.