Crown of Stars

Between her first SF story in 1968 and her suicide in 1987, Tiptree (the pseudonym of psychologist Alice Sheldon) produced a body of acclaimed if sometimes difficult work. Her approach to her characters, which had often been clinical and detached, had in recent years become a sentiment-filled array of heroes and victims in which contact with aliens put the humans in better contact with themselves. The angelic octopus-like creatures of ``Second Going'' offer Earth a substitute for the religious faith it lacks. ``In the Midst of Life,'' an executive shoots himself, only to find a strange fulfillment in the afterlife. Most striking here is Tiptree's sardonic variation of the Peggy Sue Got Married theme in ``Backward, Turn Backward,'' where what the characters find in their younger selves is not hope but hate and despair. Another uneven and unsettling collection from Tiptree. (September)