 The Berserker is one of the great ideas of 20th century science fiction. The berserkers are ancient machines, many millions of years old, created by some long-dead race for who knows what purpose. They are the size of small planets. They roam the universe, wiping out all life they come across. And this book from the late 60s is a collection of Fred Saberhagen's earliest berserker stories. The first page of the first story describes the berserkers like this. One such machine could hang over a planet colonized by men and in two days pound the surface into a lifeless cloud of dust and steam a hundred miles deep. If that's not a concept, I don't know what is. This particular collection spawned many more similar collections and great many novels as well. Even novels and short stories written by other authors. The stories are a mixed bag, especially these earlier ones. They're not exactly what you would expect. When I was a kid watching the original Star Trek, there's an episode called The Doomsday Machine. Now I believed, and all my friends believed, and it was common knowledge, that that Doomsday Machine was a berserker straight out of Saberhagen. But reading about it today, you'll find that that episode was written by Norman Spinrad, who at the time said that he was unaware of Saberhagen's stories and that he was in fact inspired by Moby Dick. You can support 30 Second Sci-Fi and my other projects by becoming a patron. There's a link in the description below. And visit the 30 Second Sci-Fi Tumblr. That's my headquarters. In addition to my videos, I publish links and updates there every day.