Proteus Island
Proteus Island
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Book Excerpt
forest. Suppose Austin Island did harbor a few mutants, freaks, and individual species. What of it? So much the better; it justified the Fortune expedition. It might contribute to the fame of one Alan Carver, zoologist, if he were the first to report this strange, insular animal world. And yet--it was queer that Mawson had said nothing of it, nor had the whalers.
At the edge of the forest he stopped short. Suddenly he perceived what was responsible for its aspect of queerness. He saw what Malloa had meant when he gestured toward the trees. He gazed incredulously, peering from tree to tree. It was true. There were no related species. There were no two trees alike. Not two alike. Each was individual in leaf, bark, stem. There were no two the same. No two trees were alike!
But that was impossible. Botanist or not, he knew the impossibility of it. It was all the more impossible on a remote islet where inbreeding must of necessity take place. The living forms might differ
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Stanley G. Weinbaum was one of the best of the pre-Golden Age science-fiction writers, and his work remains eminently readable. In this story, a zoologist marooned on a mysterious island near New Zealand discovers that its flora and fauna are distinctly and dangerously odd. There's a bit of Jane meets Tarzan in it, and some unlikely science, but it's all very plausible and a fun, fast read.
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