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[September 10, 1965] So Many Thews (Lin Carter's The Wizard of Lemuria)

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by Erica Frank

A Bewildering Epic of Tiny Proportions

ACE Books is practically synonymous with "science fiction," but they also put out quite a bit of fantasy (for instance, most of the works of Andre Norton). The newest addition to their stable of fantasy authors is Lin Carter. His first foray into book-length (barely) work is, shall we say, ambitious…

The book is titled The Wizard of Lemuria but we don't meet the wizard until Chapter 4. There are 12 chapters. The first quarter of the novella-length book is spent introducing our hero, Thongor of Valkarth. He is, although a lowly barbarian mercenary, both mighty and honorable.

The book opens on the aftermath of a wager on a zamph race. Jeled Malkh—an officer and swordmaster—lost the wager, and attacked Thongor rather than pay up. Thongor quickly overcame him, shrugged off the bet, and offered to drink away their differences. Jeled refused and fought dirty, yet Thongor overcame him again, and again, offered him peace.

Very mighty. Very honorable. A man who doesn't like to kill other men, even cheating men.

Jeled Malkh accepted his offer of peace—then betrayed Thongor, stabbing him and throwing him in a cell. Thongor spends a lot of time in cells. Mighty he may be; clever he is not.

Cover for The Wizard of Lemuria
Gray Morrow's cover shows Thongor fighting a grakk from his air boat made of urlium, the weightless metal.

Thongor has friends, though, and one of them got him out of the cell. On his way out of town, he managed to steal an alchemist's experimental airboat. Thus equipped with exotic and fast transport, he aimed for the distant land of Kathool and promptly fell asleep.

He awoke to an attack by lizard-hawks, which battle you may see depicted on the book cover. Thongor did mightily well against them, as is his wont, but the boat was unmoving because its rotors had run down. Also, the winds had blown the boat far into the great jungle of Chush, and below him was one of the mighty dwarks, a jungle-dragon. In the ensuing fight, the boat crashed and he became lost in the jungle.

What would he do during the long watches of the night, still many hours away, when every dreaded predator of the jungles would be out roaming for food? How could he protect himself from the swift-footed poa that could out-race even a trained zamph—or from the man-eating zemedar with its six great arms—or the gigantic flying spiders?

His situation by night would be doubly dangerous, for due to the prevalence of slith in the trees, he would not be able to climb them and avoid the beasts.

By 25 pages into this story, I already had to keep track of twelve species, seven locations (not counting Lemuria itself), three status-related titles, and two deities. Four of these things would never be mentioned again.

Map of Lemuria
Not labeled on the map: the rivers Ysaar and Saan; the Mountains of Mommur surrounding the Dragon Isles; Sharimba, the "mightiest" mountain the range; Zharanga Tethrabaal, the Great Ocean; Neol-Shendis, the "Inner Sea" where the Dragon Isles lie.

Chapter 4 is where the actual plot began. Thongor was rescued by the Great Wizard of Lemuria, Sharajsha, who offers him a job: Help the wizard re-forge the great dragon-slaying sword and take on the remnants of the Dragon Kings, who are due to rise again and attempt to destroy the universe.

Fortunately, Sharajsha is wise, clever, talented, and resourceful, all traits that Thongor lacks. (Thongor, however, has mighty thews—iron thews, we are told—which is exactly what Sharajsha needs to face down the Dragon King hordes.) Sharajsha fixed up the damaged flying boat, and added a new mechanism, so that when one spring winds down, it winds up the other, so it will never again be left without power. With this perpetual motion machine neatly handwaved into existence, they set off on their journey together.


John Keely and one of his fraudulent perpetual motion motors, c. 1890

During their travels, Thongor acquires an ally, a Tsargolian nobleman named Karm Karvus, who was always referred to by both names, and princess/queen/Sarkaja Sumia, a beautiful woman whose throne had been usurped by evil priests.

I'm going to bypass the bulk of their adventures. The recurring sequence of events is: When Thongor gets himself captured (again), his allies in the flying ship look for the biggest scene of carnage and mayhem in the city to find and rescue him. 

Musical Interlude

Each chapter of the book begins with an excerpt of poetry (save one that opens with literature). These are Epic Tales of Battle and Legendary Feats of Yore. They are obviously intended to be sung, or at least recited with something of a tune, to make them easy for a non-literate culture to remember. I do not know what tunes Thongor and his friends may have used for them, but I have found music that works for each of them.

The War Song of the Valkarthan Swordsmen, Thongor sings in battle; he must be formidable indeed if he can hack and stab his way through swarms of enemies while keeping enough breath to belt out a tune.

"All day our swords drank deep and long
Of blood wine-red, of blood wine-strong!
Tonight in the red halls of hell
We'll feast with foes and friends as well!"

As you can clearly see, this sings beautifully to "Greensleeves," and I choose to believe that the tune is much older than originally believed.

Thongor's Saga is presumably written after the conclusion of the book.

"The sliding hiss of scales on stone,
Weird green-flame eyes in shadows black,
When Thongor faced the slorgs alone
And cold steel drove the nightmares back!"

This works nicely with "Greensleeves" as well, which is fitting, as Valkarthians probably don't have the imagination to use different tunes for their war-songs.

Diombar's Song of the Last Battle describes how the Dragon Kings were defeated several thousand years ago.

"From wild red dawn to wild red dawn
    we held our iron line
And fought till the blades broke in our hands
    and the sea ran red as wine.
With arrow, spear and heavy mace
    we broke the Dragon's pride,
Thigh-deep in the roaring sea we fought,
    and crimson ran the tide."

This is more complex, and needs a tune with more variety. It scans wonderfully to the theme song from Gilligan's Island.

The Rituals of Yamath, chanted while making offerings to the God of Fire:

"The naked virgins on thine altars plead
As scarlet flame on pallid flesh doth feed!
Lord of the Fire, drink down young lives like wine—
Hearts, limbs and breasts—their very souls—are thine!"

This was harder to track down, as iambic pentameter is common for poetry, not songs. However, I did verify that "Battle of New Orleans" works nicely. The sacrifices in the book happened long before 1814, so they must have originally used a different tune.

The Scarlet Edda, which contains the prophecy the wizard fears.

"Lords of Chaos dark the sky:
All the Sons of Men shall die.
Dragon-rune and blood of men:
Portals ope—to close again?
Naught can make the Portals fade,
Save the Sword by lightning made."

As is appropriate for such an otherworldly subject, it can be sung to "Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me."


Now you, too, can sing along with Sharajsha as he describes the impending doom of Lemuria.

Words of Wizardry

The vocabulary is downright dizzying. Five of "the nineteen gods" are mentioned by name; one is a goddess. At least 12 cities are mentioned; more than half of them are only mentioned once or twice, and they are not visited. The vorn is a measure of distance: 5,555 "strides," claimed to be roughly the same as our mile. You might expect that distances are only measured in vorn, but no: while the Mountains of Mommur are "a stupendous wall of rock almost two thousand vorn in length," the Inner Sea is "[l]ocked in by miles of mountains"—those exact same mountains.

The various species and cultures of Lemuria are more interesting than Thongor's adventures, which can be summarized as, "Thongor meets great danger; Thongor kills great danger; Thongor is overwhelmed by even greater danger but his friends come to his aid; Thongor then slays the source of the great danger."

A Lemurian Bestiary and Herbarium

Three different creatures have the honor of being the worst monster in Lemuria: the grakks, the drawks, and the zemadar. The grakks and drawks are tied for "fiercest and most deadly fighters," while the "man-eating" zemadar is "the most dreaded." (I don't know why they're called "man-eating." It seems that all the creatures and some of the plants eat men.)

Note: Some creatures are italicized. Some are not. I could not find any pattern in this.

Bouphar, animal: Possibly cow-like. Common food animal, often roasted; also used for leather. The meat is called "beef."

Dream-Lotus, plant: A flower with sedative properties; it works on men and beasts. "One grain [of the dust] will transport a man to the dreamworlds… for many hours."

Dwark, animal: Giant forest dragon found in Chush: 200' long armored body, 60' long neck, and teeth longer than Thongor's sword.

Grakk, animal: Lizard-hawk, a giant predatory flying creature, with 40' batlike wings and a barbed tail. The young are called grakklets.

Lotifer, plant: Huge trees in Chush, sometimes 200 yards tall. All seem infested with slith

Photh, animal: Its skin is used for making scarlet leather pouches.

Poa, animal: Fast predator in the jungle of Chush

Sarn, plant: Berries found in the jungle of Chush, used for making a wine popular in Thurdis.

Slith, plant: Deadly vampire flowers that cover the trees in Chush; they are used for executions in Thurdis. They have "soft petals like a yawning mouth, laying bare the triple rows of hollow fangs."

Slorg, animal: Dreaded woman-headed serpent of Lemuria's deserts. These are near-mindless beasts, that attack in swarms. They have green flame eyes.

Spider, giant flying, animal: Yet another danger in Chush. This one does not make an appearance.

Waterfruit, plant: Fruit from Chush, small enough to be eaten by the handful.

Wolf, green, animal: Sharajsha has a book bound in the fur of a green wolf.

Zamph, animal: Somewhat-draconic creature used for riding or racing. It is a descendent of the triceratops, and somewhat resembles a rhinoceros. The reins are attachehed to iron rings that pierce the ears, the only portion of it that is sensitive to pain. Sharajsha's is wide enough to seat two people.

Zemadar, animal (also spelled zemedar): The shape is never described. It has six arms (plus some number of legs), a triple row of foot-long fangs with poison that instantly paralyzes, a barbed tail, and is very fast; described as a "crimson juggernaut." One of these was the "Terror of the Arena" in Tsargol. It is only vulnerable at the eyes.

But is it any good?

The book is surprisingly readable considering how packed it is with specialized vocabulary, including terms that are only mentioned once. Thongor's story, although rather predictable, contains powerful imagery; this book would do well converted to a movie or comic series.

As a book, however… the plot is cliched; the men are stereotypes; the woman is devoid of personality; the outcome is exactly as expected. Two stars, and half of one of those was probably the fun of singing Diombar's song to "Gilligan's Island."

[Speaking of books, Journey Press now has three excellent titles for your reading pleasure! Why not pick up a copy or three? Not only will you enjoy them all — you'll be helping out the Journey!]




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[September 8, 1965] Still a Stranger in a Strange Land (THE STRANGER SERIES 2, AUSTRALIAN TV SF)

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by Kaye Dee

Back in April, I wrote about The Stranger, Australia’s first locally-produced science fiction television show. The second series completed its run on the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) in late July, so this month I wanted to look at how the story of the Soshunites and their Earthly friends has played out across six new episodes.

The new series of The Stranger opens with the same credits sequence and eerie theme music, although the otherworldy script used for the title has been slightly modified for series two

The ABC Takes Another Chance

When the first series came to its dramatic conclusion, the Soshunites had been granted permission by the United Nations to leave Soshuniss, their moon-turned-spaceship, and settle on Earth. This could have been a suitably happy ending for the story. However, after taking an initial gamble with producing a children’s science fiction adventure for television, the ABC decided on a second bold step. The ratings success of The Stranger, and its popularity with adult audiences, encouraged the national broadcaster to refocus the new series towards an older age group, with a significantly larger budget and a prestigious family audience timeslot at 7.30pm on a Sunday night, making it Australia’s first locally-made prime-time science fiction series.

With Mr. G. K. Saunders again writing the script, all the original cast and production crew have returned for a story that is considerably more complex than the earlier series, involving international politics, intrigue and a ruthless business mogul planning to exploit the Soshunites’ arrival on Earth for his own profit.

Episode 1

Broadcast on Sunday 20 June, the opening episode of series two picks up immediately after the events at the end of the previous series: in fact, together the episodes could be considered a two-part story. The UN’s decision to allow the Soshunites to settle on Earth has been prematurely leaked to the press by a US Senator. Panic ensues, with newspaper headlines proclaiming that an alien invasion is imminent.

In Australia, Soshunite emissaries Adam Suisse (whose Soshunian name, we now know, is Sinsi) and Varossa await the return of Prof. Mayer, who has been acting on behalf of Soshuniss at the UN. Suddenly, the home of their hosts, the Walsh family, comes under siege by the press and television crews. Seeking to protect the aliens, Col. Nash, the Security chief, confines them in Adam’s former home on the grounds of St Michael’s School, with a police guard. While Nash has so far been friendly, his attitude begins to change when Adam, rankled by what he sees as imprisonment (he clearly doesn’t understand the persistence of newshounds!), informs him that there has been a change of leadership on Soshuniss.

In one of Mr, Saunders’ characteristics twists, the female Soshun, whose policy was that her people would only settle on Earth if invited, has been replaced by a new male leader. This new Soshun is determined to establish his people on Earth, and when Adam says he agrees with this policy, Nash begins to suspect that perhaps the Soshunites are not as peaceful as they have portrayed themselves up till now.

The hypnotic stare of a Soshunite pilot as he uses his mind-control abilities to kidnap Peter Cannon!

Meanwhile, Peter Cannon, one of the three teenage children who befriended Adam and the Soshunites in series one, secretly uses Adam’s space radio to contact Soshuniss, trying to advise the Soshun of the situation. Unaware of the change in leadership, when a Soshunian spacecraft arrives Peter approaches it. The pilot then induces him to board the ship using the Soshunites’ mind-control abilities…

Episode 2

In New York, Prof. Mayer receives a visit from Rudolph Lindenberger, the world’s richest man. (Imagine, he claims to be a billionaire! And even though a US billion is considerably less than a British billion-that’s still a fantastical amount of money to be anyone’s personal fortune). Lindenberger tries to persuade Mayer that, as an American, he must use his influence with the aliens to ensure that their scientific knowledge is handed over to the United States. Mayer believes that Lindenberger is a misguided patriot, but his son Edward smells a con and believes Lindenberger is looking to line his own pockets.

Arriving on Soshuniss, Peter is taken to the new Soshun and learns that the Soshunites are now desperate to land on Earth because their computers have determined that there is no other suitable planet that they can reach. The Soshun tells Peter that his people have a powerful weapon that will be used if they are not given permission to land. With Adam and Varossa still on Earth, Peter has been kidnapped to be held as a hostage to ensure their safety.

Lindenberger's aide, Blake, tries to pump Edward Mayer for information about the Soshunites as they fly to Australia

Once Mayer and his son, Edward, arrive in Australia, plans are made to move Adam and Varossa to the Parkes Radio Telescope, in country New South Wales, which will be turned into a space communications facility. Joining them, will be the Mayers and teenagers Bernie and Jean Walsh. Along with Peter, these are all the people who have been to Soshuniss. This will keep them safe from the reporters, but is there another motive?

Adam has now decided that he does not trust Nash. Using their mind-control powers, he and Varossa subdue their police guards and escape. Varossa is shot and captured by another police officer, but Adam jumps into Nash’s car and uses his hypnotic ability to make the driver obey his will.

Episode 3

Varossa is in hospital, recovering from his wounds, although Nash keeps this secret from Mayer and the Walshes. The Security chief discovers that no-one can remember anything after being under the Soshunites’ mind control, including Nash’s driver: Adam has disappeared, his whereabouts unknown. Nash proceeds with his plan to move everyone else to Parkes. Although they evade the pursuing newshounds, Lindenberg’s henchman, Blake, realises where they must be heading. Adam, too, is also travelling to the vicinity of Parkes.

The Parkes Radio Telescope is Australia's most significant scientific instrument and the largest fully-steerable radio telescope in the world. It features in the opening credits of both series of The Stranger and plays a prominent role in series two. A pity the Soshunites destroy it in Episode 5!

Visiting the General Manager of his Australian subsidiaries, Lindenberg reveals that his plan is to make sure that the Soshunites are settled somewhere under his control. He intends to exploit their advanced knowledge to generate huge profits for his businesses – “in the billions”! Edward Mayer was right to distrust his motives.

On Soshuniss, the Soshun decides to demonstrate the Soshunites’ advanced knowledge. Peter is placed under mind control and forced to write a letter to the Prime Minister of Australia. His arrival in Canberra from Soshuniss, it says, will be proof of the power of the Soshunites. Meanwhile, Nash and the others have now arrived at the radio telescope, which is searching the skies for signals from Soshuniss in orbit. As the episode ends, they think they have found it!

Searching for Soshuniss. Professor Mayer joins senior telescope operator Dr. Scott in the control room of the Parkes Radio Telescope

Episode 4

With Soshuniss located, Mayer learns that there is a plan to “fit Moon rockets [presumably American] with nuclear warheads” if no peaceful agreement can be reached with the Soshunites. Meanwhile, Jean has experienced a strange dream that Adam wants her to collect a letter from the post office in a village not far from Parkes. Convinced it is a telepathic message from the Soshunite, Jean escapes secretly from the living quarters at the radio telescope and retrieves the letter. Unfortunately, Lindenberg’s assistant, Blake, who has now arrived in Parkes, manages to tail Jean, and overhears when she calls the boys to tell them where Adam is hiding.

When the three teens reach his hideout, they realise that Nash has been less than truthful, as they know nothing about Varossa’s shooting when Adam enquires about him. Adam asks the youngsters to bring him his radio, which has been brought to the telescope’s lab for study, so that he can contact a Soshunian spacecraft. Blake has been eavesdropping and phones Lindenberg with the news. The ruthless businessman immediately flies to one of his company properties near Parkes.

Even though Adam hides in an old country showground, the persistent Blake manages to track him down

Mayer, as yet unaware there is a new, militaristic Soshun, tries to convince Nash that the Soshunites are completely peaceful. However, his arguments are destroyed when Peter is discovered in a deep coma, of a type unknown to Earthly medicine, in the private Members Courtyard at Parliament House. A threatening letter from the Soshun to the Prime Minister is clutched in his hand, delivering an ultimatum: Earth must allow the Soshunites to land, or they will use their weapon.

Meanwhile, Jean, Bernie and Edward take a risk and enlist Mayer’s help to retrieve Adam’s communication device. Mayer is shocked to learn that, as with the information about the new Soshun, Nash did not inform him that Varossa was shot and captured.

Episode 5

As Mayer attempts to obtain the Soshunian radio, one of Lindenberg’s henchmen tries to steal it at gunpoint from the radio telescope’s lab. In the ensuing confusion, Bernie manages to grab the device and races up the through the telescope building chased by Blake. Desperate to escape, he climbs up onto the telescope’s antenna and makes his way precariously across the dish surface, still pursued by Blake. Suddenly the antenna begins to tilt alarmingly, and they both begin to slide.

The radio telescope operators have realised Bernie is in danger and moved the antenna so that he can slide safely down the surface of the steeply tilting dish and leap off as its rim nears the ground. Blake on the other hand, is left clinging for his life on the elevated side of the antenna. Dr. Scott, the senior telescope operator, then sneaks down to the lab and coshes the gunman holding Mayer and the others at bay. The radio telescope personnel help Blake down from the dish, but he and the gunman escape. Like Mayer, Edward and Jean, Blake follows after Bernie, who is already on his way to Adam with the space radio. Meanwhile, Bernie and Jean’s father has arrived at the telescope, after hearing news of Peter’s mysterious appearance in Canberra.

Hanging on for dear life! Lindenberger's henchman, Blake, clings to the tilted dish of the Parkes radio telescope during his pursuit of Bernie. This scene was actually filmed on the telescope

Mayer tells Adam what has happened to Peter and the three teens are shocked at this ruthless move by the Soshun. Mayer also decides to divulge the secret information about the plans to attack Soshuniss with nuclear weapons. To persuade the Soshun that the scientific community and most people on Earth are of goodwill and would welcome the Soshunites, Mayer offers to travel to Soshuniss on the spacecraft that is coming to collect Adam, to act as a human shield for the Soshunites.

Blake secretly records this conversation. When Lindenburg hears it, fearing the collapse of his plans to exploit the Soshunites, he devises a new strategy. Blake will kidnap Adam and transport him to a private island owned by Lindenberg, off the east coast of Australia. It has facilities large enough to house the entire Soshunian population (numbering just 300). Adam will be persuaded to invite the Soshunites to settle there in secret, so that they will be safely away from Soshuniss if it is attacked – and completely under Lindenberg’s control.

As revenge against Mayer for not falling in originally with his plans, Lindenberg also decides to use Blake’s recording to convince Nash that the professor is a traitor who has betrayed the Earth’s defence plans.

Nash’s Security team, Blake and his henchman, Walsh and the Soshunian spacecraft all arrive at Adam’s hideout at the same time and chaos ensues. Blake kidnaps Adam, who escapes using his hypnotic powers. Nash shoots Mayer in the leg to stop him boarding the Soshunian spacecraft, which hastily departs without either Mayer or Adam.

Episode 6

The final episode of the series is action-packed! Thinking Adam safe, the youngsters have returned to the radio telescope, but Nash arrests Adam, Mayer and Walsh. As they stop at Lindenberg’s farm for medical assistance to the professor, it becomes clear that the Security chief no longer trusts the businessman and now suspects his motives. Mayer persuades Walsh to escape and make a dash to Canberra. He must convince the Prime Minister that the threat from the Soshun is real. If the Soshunites are refused permission to settle, they will crash their moon-ship into the Earth: this is their weapon! Since they will be condemned to a lingering death wandering in space if they cannot land, they have nothing to lose.

Nash takes Adam to the radio telescope, where Bernie, Jean and Edward are now also under house arrest. When Adam realises that the antenna is being used to track Soshuniss so that it can be targetted by the nuclear-armed rockets, he secretly radios the Soshun. High-powered signals from Soshuniss destroy the telescope’s control system, rendering it useless.

Following Walsh’s meeting with the Prime Minister and the destruction of the radio telescope, Nash, Adam and Mayer are summoned to a meeting in Canberra. Dr. Kamutsa, the UN Secretary General’s personal representative, has also arrived. The Prime Minister has astutely realised that the current situation with Soshuniss has arisen from confusion since the initial information leak. He wishes to send Dr. Kamutsa to Soshuniss to discuss a “peaceful and harmonious” resolution and indicates that he already has a search underway for an area in Australia where the Soshunites can settle. 

When Adam contacts the Soshun, the leader insists that Bernie, Jean and Edward, whom he trusts, be sent to Soshuniss as emissaries and hostages, to demonstrate the good faith of the Earth. It is eventually agreed that Dr. Kamutsa will accompany the children as an advisor and they are all transported to Soshuniss. 

Upon arrival, Jean uses a ploy to persuade the Soshun to send medical aid to Peter, who is still in hospital in a coma. The Soshunite leader agrees and negotiations begin. Meanwhile Lindenberger makes a final attempt to gain control of the Soshunites, by publicly offering his private island as their new home – to which he will have access as the owner. However, Mayer and the Prime Minister adroitly outmanoeuvre the businessman, who is trapped into donating his island freely to the Australian Government: it is then placed under UN administration as the Soshunites’ new home.

Welcome to Earth. The Lord Mayor of Sydney formally welcomes the Soshun and his entourage to the Earth and Australia in front of Sydney Town Hall

With a resolution to the Shonunite’s desire to settle on Earth, and Varossa and Peter now out of hospital, Mayer reveals to Adam that he deliberately overplayed the Soshunite threat to crash their world into the Earth: he knew that Earth’s gravity would actually break up the spaceship-moon before it could strike the planet. Adam confesses in turn that the Soshunite’s strategy was all a tremendous bluff. Not only did they know that Soshuniss would be unable to destroy the Earth, they were so lacking in power that they were, in fact, unable to break the spaceship-moon out of its orbit around the Earth. The Soshunites would have died in orbit if their gambit failed and they were prevented from settling on our planet.

The story ends with a grand civic reception at the Sydney Town Hall, in which the Soshun and his people are welcomed to the Earth and Australia. In the final scene, Adam and Varossa depart from the steps of the Town Hall in a small Soshunian spacecraft, flying across Sydney Harbour and out to sea – towards their new home….

A Successful Transition

To judge from its ratings and the generally positive response from the television critics, the ABC should be satisfied that its experiment in prime-time science fiction television has paid off. Certainly, my sister’s family were engrossed, and even though I detected a few holes in the plot and more than a few holes in the science, I give Mr. Saunders full credit for creating a complex, multi-faceted story that turned the children’s adventure of the first series into an exciting family thriller. The story built and maintained its tension and air of uncertainty well, especially with the mistrust created by the multiple twists of Mayer’s bluff and Soshunites’ desperate double bluff. It also included moments of wry Australian humour to appeal to adult audiences, with jibes at bureaucrats and politicians, the military mindset, big business and even our “great and powerful friend”, the United States.

War of the Worlds! The fear of an alien invasion that generates tension in series two of The Stranger is highlighted in this preview article in TV Times

This series’ switch from the juvenile to family/adult category certainly gave more scope for the storyline, enabling it to move beyond the purely Australian focus of series one, to a more international outlook. Particularly interesting is the inclusion of the character of Dr. Kumatsa, a black African diplomat (played by American Negro actor Mr. Ronne Arnold, who has recently decided to live in Australia) as a representation of the role that the newly independent nations of Africa may one day play in the world.

Location, Location, Location

The noticeably higher budget for the second series, enabled producer Mr. Storry Walton to indulge his love of location filming. The Canberra scenes were filmed in Parliament House itself. Prime Minister Menzies even gave his personal permission for the scenes involving the Australian Prime Minister (played with suitable gravitas by veteran Australian actor Chips Rafferty) to be filmed in the private Prime Ministerial offices. Similar official approval was granted for filming at the Sydney Town Hall, which required the construction of a mock-up Soshunian spacecraft at the top of the forecourt staircase, as part of excellent special effects sequences showing the arrival of the Soshun and departure of Adam and Varossa to inspect the Soshunites’ new home.

Flying saucer lands at Sydney Town Hall! The imposing entrance to this iconic Sydney building is transformed into a set for location filming in the final episode of The Stranger

Various other outdoor scenes were filmed around Sydney, the Blue Mountains and Parkes, but ironically, the situation with the Walsh home was reversed. Although the original scenes of Headmaster Walsh’s house in the first series were filmed at a private home, to minimise disruption to the generous owners the house was faithfully replicated in a studio for the remainder of series one and series two. 

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) also gave unprecedented co-operation, presumably in return for the undoubted publicity it provides for the agency. The chase across the Parkes radio telescope in Episode 5 took place, not on a studio set, but on the telescope itself, which was manoeuvred as required for the filming. Actors playing the roles of telescope staff were even permitted to be filmed at the actual controls of the multi-million pound instrument. As with the first series, the CSIRO also provided general scientific advice to the production, which even found its way into some of the dialogue with reasonable accuracy.

The Future?

The sale of the first series to the BBC means that those of you in Britain should be seeing it within the next twelve months, and a sale of the series to the US is also nearing finalisation. While the second series has drawn the story of the Soshunites’ search for a new home to a satisfying conclusion, the ending still leaves open the possibility of a third series. It would be interesting to see how our alien friends cope with the challenges of living in, and adapting to, a new world. I guess only time will tell if the ABC decides to take on another challenge with science fiction television.




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Book, Magazine, Serial

[September 6, 1965] War and Peace (October 1965 IF)

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by David Levinson

War is something of a constant in human history, with nearly every generation facing at least one. Fifty years ago, the great powers of Europe – with a late assist from the United States – fought the “war to end war” (a phrase probably coined by H. G. Wells). Twenty years later, we got to do it all again. And ever since, brushfire wars have flared up around the globe almost continually. War permeates our language and culture even in times of peace. In his State of the Union address last year, President Johnson referred to his Great Society program as a “war on poverty”. It even shows up in our entertainment: war movies are popular; there must be half a dozen TV shows in the new fall line-up set during the War or with military themes (more if you count spy shows); and one of the current best selling novels is a barely fictional account of the U. S. Army’s special forces, The Green Berets. Sometimes it’s enough to make you believe we really are on the Eve of Destruction.


The rawness of the recording makes it that much more powerful

The War in Viet Nam

On August 5th, America got a rather shocking look at the war in Viet Nam. CBS reporter Morley Safer accompanied a Marine unit to the village of Cam Ne, where they came under sporadic fire from the Viet Cong. Communist forces soon withdrew as the Marines advanced. As they entered the village, the Americans found a number of entrenchments and a few booby traps. Their orders were to destroy any village from which they received fire, so the villagers were herded into the nearby fields, and the Marines set fire to the homes with flamethrowers and cigarette lighters. Despite the villagers’ pleas to be allowed to remove their personal belongings, everything, including all the rice stores, was destroyed. Four old men who couldn’t understand the soldiers’ English were arrested. The public is understandably outraged. Alas, most of the ire seems to be directed at CBS and Mr. Safer. President Johnson is also said to be livid.


A Marine uses his lighter to set fire to a peasant hut

War at the foot of the Roof of the World

On August 5th, several thousand Pakistani soldiers crossed into Indian-controlled Kashmir disguised as civilian locals. The belief was that the local Muslim population would rise up and welcome their coreligionists. Instead they reported the intruders to the Indian authorities. Ten days later, the Indian army crossed the ceasefire line. Thus far, both sides have made progress. As this is written, India has captured the Haji Pir pass, roughly 5 miles inside Pakistani territory, though there are also reports of a massive push by Pakistani forces. Hopefully, another ceasefire can be brought into effect and a long-term peaceful solution can be found.


Indian forces in the Haji Pir pass

War across time and space

War is also a prominent feature of this month’s IF. As one war ends, another begins, along with a couple more and a very uneasy peace negotiation.


There are three living being depicted here. Art by Gaughan

Retief’s War (Part 1 of 3), by Keith Laumer

The natives of the planet Quopp are part insect, part machine and come in a variety of forms, each making up their own tribe. There has also been a sizable human presence for a century or so, to the point that there are human farmers and traders who have lived their whole lives on the planet. Now the Corps Diplomatique Terrestrienne has decided it is time for a native government to be established and, in the person of Ambassador Longspoon, has chosen the Voions to form the government and the Federal police force. Unfortunately, all the other tribes on the planet see the Voions as bandits and thugs.

As usual, Second Secretary and Consul Jame Retief has learned several of the local dialects and made friends with many of the common folk. There follow a number of adventures. He discovers crates of weapons labeled as educational material, which he manages to divert. Despite severe restrictions on tourism, a shipload of young women is requesting emergency permission to land. Their captain, by the name of Fifi, seems to know Retief, but he has no idea who she is. Defying orders, Retief grants them permission to land, but the ship crashes out in the jungle. Then there’s an attack on the embassy using smoke bombs which appear to be of Groaci manufacture.

Prime Minister Ikk has Retief arrested, hoping to find out where his guns are. He declares he is executing a coup, after which Retief makes his escape. Retief manages to disguise himself as a native with some help, and steals a barely flight worthy spaceship. He crashes in the jungle and is captured by some Ween, who call him Meat-fall-from-sky. As the situation goes from bad to worse, some more Ween drag in a Voion, loudly pointing out that he is a member of the Planetary Police. To be continued.


Meet the bad guys. While other Quoppians like colors, the Voions prefer basic black. Art by Gaughan

I’ve noted over the last few months that Retief is getting stale, as if Laumer is just going through the motions. This time around, he’s writing with more verve. It feels like Laumer is enjoying himself again. Maybe it’s because there’s more room. Retief pulls off at least three escapades here that would normally have had to resolve the whole situation in a shorter piece. So even though we’re getting all the usual story beats, there’s more flavor to it all.

That said, I’m hoping for a bit more depth as the story progresses. Laumer has set things up for some solid satire on colonialism as well as the sort of Cold War proxy conflicts that are really just colonialism in different clothing. The colonial powers frequently set one tribe over all the others, and it was often the least liked tribe, even before they wound up in charge, just as the CDT has done here with the Voions. We’ll have to wait and see if Laumer makes use of the situation he’s created. Three stars for now.

A Leader for Yesteryear, by Mack Reynolds

When his time capsule materializes above deep water, Lucius Rostock is barely able to escape it before it sinks. He is rescued by some very surprised fishermen and brought to shore. The local people take him in, and Lucius discovers that he is neither where nor when he expected to be. Rather than the future, he is in the distant past. Gradually, he learns the language and finds out where fate has brought him, though he is rather taken aback at how unwarlike the people are.

To say more would give the whole story away. I figured out where and when Lucius found himself quite a while before he did, though I suspect Reynolds expected the reader to do that. I also figured out who the text implies Lucius will become, although that is never spelled out. What I didn’t see coming was who Lucius is. The end really caught me by surprise. I do have a couple of quibbles with this otherwise very good story. There’s an odd gap in the languages that Lucius knows, which would have allowed him to communicate much sooner (but not without some difficulty, nevertheless). Also, the final paragraphs – even though the reveal did catch me by surprise – are a bit stilted and clumsy. Still, a solid three stars.

The Smiling Future, by Miriam Allen deFord

In an overpopulated world where nearly everyone works at producing enough food to keep the human race alive, an intelligent dolphin appears on the California coast and summons the world government to a summit meeting. Five hundred years of dumping radioactive waste into the oceans has resulted in highly intelligent, technologically advanced dolphins. In need of more room, they are planning to flood the world, but one faction has an offer to help preserve the human race.

What bleak, bleak story. It’s made worse by the plodding narrative style, too. Mrs. deFord has been in the writing business for well over 40 years, and up until recently her work has been generally very good. She does spend most of her time writing mysteries, even winning an Edgar a few years ago, and I admit I don’t read all that much in the genre, so perhaps her level of quality there has held steady. But her work in science fiction and fantasy has really fallen off in quality. Two stars.

Origin of Species, by Robert F. Young

Alan Farrell has traveled to the Upper Paleolithic in search of an anthropology professor and his secretary, who have gone missing. Exiting his own mammothmobile (regular readers may remember a similar concept with dinosaurs in Young’s “When Time Was New”), he finds first the professor’s “paleethnologivehicle” and then the professor’s body, apparently killed by Neanderthals. Farrell presses on, searching for the secretary, Miss Larkin, on whom he is developing a crush based solely on her picture and very wholesome résumé.

Eventually, he discovers a cave guarded by a force field, some Neanderthals who shoot blue sparks out of their mouths, and Miss Larkin. As the two make their escape, Farrell is shocked to learn first that the Neanderthals are bringing in what appear to be Cro-Magnon people as prisoners through some sort of portal, and second that Miss Larkin is not the wholesome girl she seemed to be, but rather an ecdysiast attempting to better her lot in life. Will the pair be able to stop aliens from using Earth as a prison? Will Farrell learn that exotic dancers can be nice girls, too? It’s Young. What do you think?


Honestly, this picture tells you everything you need to know about this story. Those gorillas are supposed to be Neanderthals. Art by Morrow

The good news is that Young hasn’t written another modern take on a myth or fairy tale, nor has he written one of his overly sentimental romances. The bad news is that he attempted to write a sex farce (I think). Without the sex. Farrell is a dope, who took forever to figure out the mystery of the spark-shooting Neanderthals, and a hypocrite. He developed his low opinion of strippers by… visiting strip clubs. Two stars.

Purpose, by Edward V. Dong

All life on Earth has been destroyed by an interstellar nucleonic storm. All that is left is the Machine. It was created to save the human race, but failed. In the last moments, technician John Michelson reprogrammed the Machine to be a monument to Man and to wait for new life to appear in the solar system. Eventually, the Machine is freed of its programming and seeks fulfillment.

Dong is this month’s first time author, and I suspect this story was written for F&SF’s Univac/unicorn contest. I’m not terribly impressed. It really felt like I’d read this before. Indeed for most of its three pages I was expecting something along the lines of Asimov’s “The Last Question”. That’s not quite where the author went with his story, but he didn’t get where he was trying to go either. Two stars.

An Ounce of Emotion, by Gordon R. Dickson

Tyrone Ross and Arthur Mial are the Earth delegation on their way to attempt to broker a peace between the Laburti and Chedal using a computer known as a statistical analysis instrument, or Annie. Earth is in Laburti space and, if war breaks out, could be devastated. Unfortunately, the two men hate each other with an inexplicable passion and have from the moment they met. Ross, the viewpoint character, is the technician who can run Annie, while Mial is a diplomat and ostensibly in charge.

Tempers flare between the two as Mial grows ever more high-handed and seems to be making a corrupt deal with the Chedal. Ross goes so far as to attempt to kill Mial, though he fails. Can Ross keep Mial from wrecking the negotiations? And why would Earth send two people who are so incapable of getting along?


I’m not sure why Annie is blowing up here. That didn’t happen. Art by Giunta

The situation Dickson has created feels rather implausible, even given the explanation at the end. Nevertheless, it’s a decent story, if you can get past the tense atmosphere between the two human characters. Gordy has really settled in as a solid writer who rarely wastes his readers’ time. Three stars.

Short Trip to Nowhere, by Robert Moore Williams

Jim Eiler comes home late. His wife Marta is already asleep, as is his three-year-old daughter Nelda. As he slides into his anti-gravity bed and plugs in the cords of the sleep machine, a voice in his head cheerily greets him. There’s a nasty fight with his wife, and eventually he agrees to call in their friend Harold, a psychiatrist. Eventually, it turns out the voice is coming from Nelda’s imaginary friend, who isn’t so imaginary after all. Then Nelda disappears.

This is another one I felt I had already read in better form. Williams is clearly using Peter Pan as his basis, but there were other resonances. Though different, I was strongly reminded of both Henry Kuttner’s “Mimsy Were the Borogoves” and Mark Clifton’s “Star, Bright”. The bitter relationship between the Eilers makes for an unpleasant read and serves no real purpose, when it could have prompted Nelda’s search for something happier. Instead it’s just bickering. Two stars.

Skylark DuQuesne (Part 5 of 5), by E. E. Smith

Sigh. This story does not deserve a detailed summary. In a nutshell, using Ray-See-Nee magic the Skylarkers and friends come up with a new way to combine mind power. They devise a whole bunch of new science and use it to solve the Chloran problem for good. A final solution, you might say. They take the stars from one galaxy and smash them into the stars of planets the Chlorans live on, while taking all the planets with humans living on them and moving them to a third galaxy. And they called Edmond Hamilton the planet killer.

Midway through this attack, the Chlorans counterattack, leaving Seaton and Crane unconscious. DuQuesne leaps into the breach and finishes the job. Afterwards, he proposes to Hunkie de Marigny and the two go off to conquer a galaxy on the rim of the universe. The end. At last.


Dick Seaton gets what’s coming to him. Art by Morrow

Let’s start with the slightly less egregious denouement. From the title of this novel, one would expect that we would witness the redemption of Blackie DuQuesne. He does decide that there is room enough in the universe for both him and Dick Seaton and he does open up his shell just a little bit to let someone else in. But that’s as far as it goes. He still plans to make himself the emperor of a galaxy. Worse, he openly states that he’s planning a program of eugenics, one based not just on sterilization, but extermination. Marc C. “Blackie” DuQuesne remains an evil man to the end.

And then there’s Dick Seaton. In my review of Part 1, I declared Seaton to be a war criminal, based on his destruction of the Fenachrone homeworld in an earlier novel. Here, after general discussion of what to do about the Chlorans – including a proposal to convert them – he compares the Chlorans to a cancer that must be rooted out (a disgustingly familiar argument) and comes up with a plan to kill every single Chloran before they spread to other galaxies. There are nearly 150 million Chloran planets. We’re talking about the deaths of trillions at the very least. War criminal doesn’t even begin to describe it.

Zero stars for genocide and an ending that completely poisons an otherwise mediocre novel whose only redeeming feature is excessive nostalgia.

Summing up

Well, a bleak issue for a bleak month. It got off to a decent start, though the Reynolds story does have a dark tone to it. The Dickson was unpleasant, but in a good way. It was intended to be so and to make readers think. Other than that, poor efforts topped off by a steaming pile of genocide and eugenics. But at long last, it’s over. Do we have anything to look forward to? Let’s hope so.


A wraparound cover this month, so here it is in all its glory. Art, as before, by Gaughan




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Conventions/Performances, Uncategorized

[September 4, 1965] Doctor's Orders (Review of "A Doctor in Spite of Himself")

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by Victoria Lucas

The Best Sign in the World

Time travel is a staple in science fiction. If the nearest planet isn't far enough, try a few hundred years ago, or a few thousand. I recently viewed a performance of Molière's play, "A Doctor in Spite of Himself," and while it does not feature time travel, for me a work of art from another era always requires time travel to appreciate it.

However, to get to the time to which I just traveled–the late Baroque era in Europe–travel in space was important in several ways. First, I had to travel from my home in San Francisco to Saratoga, an exotic kingdom nearly 50 miles south, southwest of San Jose. The object of going there was a play at the renowned Paul Masson Winery, sponsoring "Music at the Vineyards" for the summer, in particular last Sunday the 29th, for the matinee performance. I don't have the kind of money to either buy a ticket for the performances at the Winery, or to buy gasoline to feed my old Dodge car that is parked on the street most of the time, so arrangements were necessary. Travel in time for the travel in space was about an hour each way.

Processed By eBay with ImageMagick, z1.1.0. ||B2

The second type of space travel was the travel in the play I went to see itself. In "A Doctor in Spite of Himself," the French actor and playwright known as Molière takes us to "the countryside" of France. This travel engaged mental faculties only, no gasoline necessary. The transition was made easier by the presence of the Woodwind Arts Quintet of Los Angeles, who had had to do some traveling themselves to get to Saratoga and set up no later than 3:30 pm. Focusing on the late Baroque period in France, when the play was written, the music was mostly by Jean Philippe Rameau, with a little help from Francois Couperin and Christoph W. Gluck. (The originals were heavy on harpsichord, not a feature of wind quintets, so some arrangement was necessary and mentioned in the program, below.)

Program for "The Doctor in Spite of Himself"

The third type of space travel is entangled in time travel in that understanding the late Baroque period requires some adjustment in attitude. In thinking about the play I realized why space and time were so important. Like England's Shakespeare, France's Molière was well-known in his time and changed his language forever. Unlike England's Shakespeare, Molière was condemned by the Catholic Church and shunned by the aristocracy and saw one of his now best known plays, "Tartuffe," banned. When he died, priests refused him the last rites.
Molière, around 1658, as depicted by Pierre Mignard

The difference? I think it was that Molière did not, like Shakespeare, change the space or time of his plays to make it seem that he was not talking about the present or the nearby. Consider "Hamlet"; it was set in Denmark. Consider "Othello"; it was set in Italy. "Henry IV" was set nearly 200 years in the past from the year he wrote it. I am not advocating such subterfuge, I am just opining that it could save your bacon if you are criticizing a current dictator or monarch and/or his/her politics, mores, or religion, or those of the ruling classes. Molière was a favorite of the king and court, but not of the church or the ruling classes outside Paris. Fortunately, in my own space and time, we are allowed to not take Molière seriously, and, as he has his "doctor" say, "When a doctor makes a patient laugh, it’s the best sign in the world." Are we not all patients at some time or other?

Where the Goat is Tied, There It Must Graze

"The goat" is the wet-nurse Jacqueline's image of herself: tied to an ignorant and jealous husband who helps the steward Valere find a doctor who will treat his mute daughter. In my case, no one has gotten my goat, but I am tied to San Francisco. The back story here is that my arrival in Saratoga was associated with a performance by actors and a director (Kermit Sheets) who usually work at The Playhouse in San Francisco. My fortune is such at this time that not only am I a volunteer at The Playhouse, but I know Cyril Clayton, who is an amateur actor associated with the Playhouse, and who was driving anyway to Saratoga to play Valere, so I rode along. In the play, in the process of recruiting the "doctor," Sganarelle (actually "a woodcutter"), Valere and Jacqueline's husband Lucas (no relation, thanks be) beat and kidnap him. Rather a rough recruitment, no?

But this is all a result of the scheme of Sganarelle's wife Martine, whom he beat, and who wanted him to be beaten since she couldn't manage it herself. Sound a little like Punch and Judy? Molière spent 13 years with an itinerant commedia dell'arte group, and of course elements of that raucous and popular tradition are incorporated into his art. Think R. G. Davis and the San Francisco Mime Troupe.

I am not disturbed by the roughness, but I am, as usual, bothered by stereotypes of women, funny as they may be. In this case, women and men share being the objects of a cultural prejudice that it is not a good idea to intervene in fights or bullying, because both sides may turn on the do-gooder. After chasing away an interloper, along with her husband, Martine begins to figure out how to have her husband beaten. Oddly enough, she thinks the best way to do it is to make people believe he is really a wonderful doctor and might have to be beaten to admit that he is.

You may enjoy the play, and I don't want to give anything away, so I won't reveal more of the plot now. I felt very privileged to be in the beautiful surroundings of the Winery's outdoor stage, sampling the wine, and walking among well-dressed and genteel people, enjoying the music.

This performance is over, but watch for more summer fare at this venue. If you cannot find another performance of this play, remember that San Francisco, the surrounding area, and many if not most major cities are engorged with libraries. Molière's work is not hard to find in translation–even this least frequently performed of his plays.

I think, in fact, that this play is exactly what the doctor ordered if you could use some laughs.

[Dn't miss your chance to see Kris, Cora, and Katie Heffner talk about the state of fandom in 1965, right on the heels of Worldcon! Register now!]




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Conventions/Performances

[September 2, 1965] A Clash of Cultures (THE 1965 WORLDCON)

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by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Loncon II

I am not a huge lover of fan conventions. I have attended one of the prior Eastercons and some small local gatherings, but no others, not being one for big crowds and with my job sometimes requiring unsociable hours.

However, I made an exception for LonCon II for a few reasons. Firstly, this is only the second WorldCon to be held outside of North America. Having missed the first one eight years ago, I didn’t want to miss it again. Secondly, the guest of honour is Brian W. Aldiss, who is one of my favorite writers of recent years (competing only with Ballard, Delany and Dick) and I did not want to pass an opportunity to see him speak. Thirdly, I have a number of fan-friends I only correspond with via mail and fanzines who are going to be there, so I will finally get to meet up in person. Finally, with a child on the way my chances to go in the future are likely to be less.

Worldcon 1965 Logo

Unlike many I did not invest in a hotel room but travelled down by train each day. Being only a couple of hours train ride it was not different from my usual work commute. However, I will admit it did make more tired than some of the other attendees who either got bed and breakfast rooms or stayed with friends in London.

Brian Aldiss, Duncan Lunan, Harry Harrison, Peter Day (Image via fiawol.org.uk)
Brian Aldiss, Duncan Lunan, Harry Harrison, Peter Day (Image via FIAWOL)

The first evening’s only panel was an interesting one with Harry Harrison claiming SF is “The Salvation of the Modern Novel”. However, the main feature of the evening was hanging out and meeting friends I hadn’t got to see in person in a long-time. Although crowded, the hotel bar was an enjoyable place to be.

One of the most important differences with the other fan gatherings was the size. Whilst I have heard it is smaller than many of the American gatherings, British conventions tend to only be a maximum of a hundred people. I have heard the estimate of attendees at around 400. There also seemed to be splits in the evening between American and British panellists.

Winners of the Most Authentic Heroic Fantasy costume, Ian and Betty Peters as John Carter and Dejah Thoris (Image via fiawol.org.uk)
Winners of the Most Authentic Heroic Fantasy costume, Ian and Betty Peters as John Carter and Dejah Thoris (Image via FIAWOL)

Ted White set the cat among the pigeons for declaring his distaste for the New Wave, saying that British magazines are full of  “stories which start nowhere and go nowhere” and that they are stuck in a twentieth century mode of writing, simply imitating mainstream fiction, calling for science fiction to be rooted in the adventure stories of the pulps.

But, as usual, the most controversial comments came from John W. Campbell. In the first panel, I previously mentioned, Irene Boothroyd enquired how much SF was slanted towards women readers and Campbell responded that 95% of science fiction readers are men, so economically they cannot do more. Though I found this a very facile argument I did appreciate Pete Taylor suggesting a 2.5 cent section of Analog for women readers and Harry Harrison suggesting a small section for hemaphrodites (whilst I am sure it was meant in jest as I do not consider myself male or female I choose to appreciate the recognition).

Putting aside how absurdly reductive Campbell is being, it definitely didn’t feel that way in this convention, where I would say it looked to me like a quarter to a third of the attendees were women. And the argument we have regularly seen stated in the papers that they are simply wives and girlfriends dragged along was patently shown to be untrue from the engagement on display.

Karen Anderson as she-devil (Image via fiawol.org.uk)
Karen Anderson as she-devil (Image via FIAWOL)

In a later panel on Monday, Campbell responded to the Watts riots by suggesting that the best solution was to reintroduce slavery and compared black people to worker bees who would die without it. Thankfully, the audience and other panellist had little patience for him, with Moorcock mocking Campbell, Brunner carefully disproving his arguments and the audience asking him tough questions he couldn’t answer.

Brian Aldiss in discussion with other European SF pros.
Brian Aldiss in discussion with other European SF pros (Image via FIAWOL)

That is not to say there were not some excellent talks. Brain W. Aldiss led a discussion on science fiction in Europe, and Brunner gave a lengthy talk entitled, How to Get High Without Going into Orbit.

The most notable part of the event was, as usual, the Hugo awards. Silverberg was presenting the winners and doing this incredibly slowly (some found this entertaining, I personally just found it irritating). Anyway here are the results:

Robert Silverberg, Ken Bulmer (Image via fiawol.org.uk)
Robert Silverberg, Ken Bulmer (Image via FIAWOL)

Best Novel

The Wanderer by Fritz Leiber [Ballantine, 1964] – 52 Votes

Nominees

Davy by Edgar Pangborn [St. Martin’s Press\Ballantine, 1964] – 48 Votes

The Planet Buyer by Cordwainer Smith [Pyramid, 1964] – 34 Votes

The Whole Man AKAThe Telepathist by John Brunner [Ballantine, 1964\Faber & Faber, 1965] – 26 Votes

No Award – 14 Votes

Best Novel The Wanderer Fritz Leiber

A tight race for first position with Leiber winning out. He's obviously the bigger name, but most of us at the Journey thought his book was the weakest of the field. However, Leiber has been campaigning hard in some of the British magazines and it received a lot of love for making references to fan culture and numerous other interests.

Best Short Fiction

Soldier, Ask Not by Gordon R. Dickson [Galaxy Oct 1964] – 60 Votes

Nominees

Once A Cop by Rick Raphael [Analog May 1964] – 47 Votes

Little Dog Gone by Robert F. Young [World of Tomorrow Feb 1964] – 37 Votes

No Award – 30 Votes

Soldier, Ask Not by Gordon R. Dickson

The Dickson got an honorable mention on our Galactic Stars, as did the Raphael, and it is definitely a worthy winner

Best Dramatic Presentation

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) [Columbia Pictures/Hawk Films] Directed by Stanley Kubrick; Screenplay by Stanley Kubrick, Terry Southern & Peter George; based on the novel Red Alert by Peter George – 99 Votes

Nominees

The Seven Faces of Dr. Lao (1964) [George Pal Productions/Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer] Directed by George Pal; Screenplay by Charles Beaumont; based on the novel The Circus of Dr. Lao by Charles G. Finney – 41 Votes

No Award – 33 Votes

Mary Poppins (1964) [Walt Disney Productions/Buena Vista Distribution Company] Directed by Robert Stevenson; Screenplay by Bill Walsh and Don daGardi; Based on the novel by P. L. Travers  – 1 Vote – Write In

Best Drama Dr Strangelove

A big win for Dr. Strangelove but not a big surprise there. Seven Faces is a good film, but Dr. Strangelove has been one of the most discussed movies of last year, (even if the Academy Awards appear to prefer musicals).

One interesting element is that all of the films, including the write-in, are based on novels. There are no original TV productions, such as The Outer Limits, Doctor Who or The Twilight Zone nor any original films such as Robinson Crusoe of Mars, The Gorgon or Mothra vs. Godzilla.

With Peter George accepting the award, this makes it the only British win.

Best Magazine

Analog Science Fiction and Fact ed. by John W. Campbell, Jr. – 63 Votes

Nominees

The Worlds of If ed. by Frederik Pohl  – 35 Votes

The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction ed. by Avram Davidson  – 34 Votes

Galaxy ed. by Frederik Pohl  – 30 Votes

No Award – 12 Votes

Best Magazine Analog

Analog's win is no real surprise simply due to the sales level comparative to the other magazines. What is more of a surprise is that If finished second, whilst we got no nods for the Cele G. Lalli magazines nor for the British magazines, which have been excellent recently and usually appear on the nominations list.

Best Professional Artist

John Schoenherr – 58 Votes

Nominees

Ed Emshwiller – 56 Votes

Frank Frazette – 26 Votes

Jack Gaughan – 22 Votes

No Award – 12 Votes

Best Artist John Schoenherr

The closest battle of the awards with Schoenherr just beating perpetual winner Emshwiller by just two votes. Schoenherr is probably the most talented artist working in the field right now and fully deserves the award.

Best Publisher

Ballantine Books – 54 Votes

Nominees

Ace Books – 50 Votes

Pyramid Books – 33 Votes

Gollancz – 20 Votes

No Award – 17 Votes

Best Publisher Ballantine Books

Not a category we do at Galactic Journey [We will this year (Ed.)], but Ballantine is an unsurprising win with it printing 3 of the 4 best novel nominees. I personally have a slight issue with how much of their output is just reprinting Edgar Rice Burroughs novels on a loop, but the newer work they put out is always of a strong quality.

Best Fanzine

Yandro ed. by Robert Coulson and Juanita Coulson – 69 Votes

Nominees

Zenith ed. by Peter Weston – 35 Votes

Double Bill ed. by Bill Bowers and Bill Mallardi – 28 Votes

Best Fanzine Yandro

Parting Comments

I myself did not speak on the main programme but Cora Buhlert, Gideon Marcus, Erica Frank, and other members from the Journey were involved in this year’s events.

I did, however, take part in a slightly controversial fringe event organized by some fans outside of the Con hours. In the one I joined we discussed what books we think will be still being read at the end of the next century (as a new wave fan, you may be able to guess my biases).

In spite some of the problems and overcrowding it was still great to meet people and attend a Worldcon. Whilst I am unlikely to be at another one any time soon, I am sure our worldwide reporting team will keep attending them. So make sure to look out for other Journeyers at Tricon in Cleveland, Ohio next year!

[And don't miss your chance to see Kris, Cora, and Katie Heffner talk about the state of fandom in 1965, right on the heels of Worldcon! Register now!]




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Science / Space Race

[August 30, 1965] 8 Days or Bust! (Gemini 5's epic space mission)

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by Kaye Dee

Mr. Barry McGuire should have waited another month to record his hit song Eve of Destruction. Why? Because then his telling line “You may leave Earth for four days in space, but when you return it’s the same old place” could have been made an even punchier by updating it with the latest space flight record of eight days, set by the crew of Gemini 5.


The Gemini 5 crew, Charles "Pete" Conrad (left) and mission commander Gordon "Gordo" Cooper (right), ready to set a new space endurance record

One for the Record Books

The safe return of the Gemini 5 crew yesterday, at the end of a mission dogged by technical problems, not only captured the record for the longest spaceflight to date, it has catapulted the United States into the lead ahead of the Soviet Union for the first time in the Space Race! From the outset, NASA planned for this mission to last eight days, to demonstrate that astronauts could live and work in space for the duration of an Apollo mission to the Moon and back. That this flight time beat the Soviet record of just under five days set by cosmonaut Valery Bykovsky in Vostok 5 in 1963, is a welcome added bonus. Other objectives of the mission included: demonstrating the guidance and control systems; evaluating the new fuel cell system and rendezvous radar; and testing the ability of the astronauts to manoeuvre close to another object.

A Mission Patch: the Start of a New Tradition?

For this crucial mission, NASA paired veteran Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper, who flew America’s last and longest Mercury mission, with rookie Charles “Pete” Conrad, a member of the second group of astronauts selected in 1962. Because astronauts have been prohibited from naming their spacecraft (following NASA’s displeasure with the name Gus Grissom selected for Gemini 3), Cooper wanted to wear a mission insignia that would symbolise the purpose of their flight. He and Conrad designed a “mission patch”, along the lines of those worn by military units, showing a Conestoga wagon, the type of vehicle used by many of the pioneering families heading into the American West.


The Gemini 5 mission patch as Cooper and Conrad originally designed it, with its pioneer inspired motto (left), alongside the NASA-modified flight version on the right.

On their original design, the wagon carried a motto that was also derived from pioneering times: “8 Days or Bust”. But according to a rumour I’ve heard from my former WRE colleagues, NASA felt that this might leave the agency open to ridicule if the mission didn’t last that long. Because of this, the embroidered patches that Cooper and Conrad wore on their spacesuits during the flight had the ambitious slogan covered by a piece of cloth. But I like the idea of each mission having its own symbolic insignia, so I hope that mission patches become a tradition for future spaceflights.

Launching into History

Gemini 5 was originally supposed to launch on 19 August, but problems with the telemetry programmer and deteriorating weather delayed the lift-off until 21 August. Like previous Gemini missions, Cooper and Conrad lifted off from Launch Complex 39 at the Cape Kennedy Air Force Station. I understand that NASA will continue to use it for the rest of the Gemini programme while its new John F. Kennedy Space Centre is being constructed nearby for the Apollo missions.

During the launch, the astronauts experienced a type of vibration known as “pogo” (as in pogo stick!) which seems to have momentarily impaired their speech and vision. This will need to be further investigated to determine if it poses a threat to crew health and safety on future flights. After the launch, part of the Titan II launch vehicle's first stage was found floating on the surface of the Atlantic Ocean and retrieved; I expect it will go on display in a museum after it has been thoroughly studied.


Recovering the upper half of the Titan II launch vehicle first stage from the Atlantic Ocean

Dr. Rendezvous to the Rescue!

Just over 2 hours after launch, the Rendezvous Evaluation Pod (REP, nicknamed Little Rascal, I’m told) was ejected into orbit from Gemini 5. The crew were supposed to practice rendezvous techniques with this mini satellite. However, about 4 hours into the flight, very low oxygen pressure in one of the spacecraft’s fuel cells that provide onboard power led to a decision to shut both fuel cells down. Gemini 5 is the first mission to use this new method of generating onboard power, but without the fuel cells, the spacecraft has only a limited battery power reserve. As a result, Gemini 5 was powered down, drifting along in "chimp mode," without active control by the crew. It looked for a while as if the mission might be “2 days and bust”, but ground tests showed that the faulty fuel cell should work even with low oxygen pressure and both fuel cells were gradually put back into operation, enabling the mission to continue.


An artist's impression of the Gemini 5 Rendezvous Evaluation Pod, as the mission should have unfolded. Unfortunately, the battery on its flashing beacon, which helped the astronauts to see it against the blackness of space, died before the fuel cell issues were resolved.

The fuel cell failure meant that the REP experiment, and others, had to be scrapped. However, astronaut Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin devised a rendezvous simulation to test the Gemini 5 crew, which would require them to rendezvous with a specific point in space. The other astronauts don’t call Aldrin “Dr. Rendezvous” for nothing: he has a doctorate in Astronautics, specialising in orbital mechanics, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology! The “phantom rendezvous” test took place on the third day of the mission. Cooper and Conrad proved that precision manoeuvres could be successfully accomplished, carrying out four different rendezvous manoeuvres using the Gemini’s Orbit Attitude and Manoeuvring System (OAMS).

On August 24 Cooper reached a cumulative total of 98 hours in space, over his two flights, taking the record for the longest time spent in space by an American astronaut. By the end of the mission he was the world record holder for time spent in space, leaving Bykovsky’s endurance record well behind!

Fuel Cells for Survival


A diagram showing the fuel cells installed on Gemini 5. Despite their problems on this mission, NASA expects to use fuel cells to provide electrical power and water on future space flights.

Another fuel cell problem surfaced on day four of the mission, but this was relatively minor, which was fortunate as the fuel cells not only produce electrical power for the Gemini spacecraft, but also provide the water supply for the crew. Like a battery, a fuel cell uses a chemical reaction to create an electric current. The Gemini fuel cell uses liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen to generate electricity, which creates water as a by-product. Cooper and Conrad reported that the water had a lot of gas bubbles in it (with a predictable intestinal result!) and that it also had a taste they didn’t like. However, it was drinkable when mixed with Tang powdered orange drink, so I think that this will become a staple on future missions (a good advertising opportunity there!).

A plentiful supply of water also means that NASA will be able to provide the astronauts with more rehydratable foods from now on, although the Gemini 5 crew apparently did not have much of an appetite during the mission, only consuming about 1000 calories a day, instead of the planned 2700 calories.


Thanks to fuel cell-produced water, future NASA missions will have more rehydratable foods available. This sample Gemini meal includes a beef sandwich, strawberry cereal cubes, peaches, and beef and gravy. Astronauts use the water gun to reconstitute the food and scissors to open the packages

More Problems to Endure

The fifth day of the mission saw a major problem develop when one set of OAMS thrusters began to malfunction. This meant that all experiments where the thrusters needed to be used were cancelled. One cancellation was a great disappointment for us here in Australia. The Visual Acuity Test was designed to gauge the acuity of an astronaut’s vision from space, by observing patterns laid out on the ground.

Two test sites were prepared for this Gemini 5 experiment: one at Laredo, Texas and the other on Woodleigh sheep station (ranch), located about 90 miles south of Carnarvon, Western Australia. Carnarvon is the site of NASA’s largest tracking station outside the United States, combining both a Manned Space Flight Network facility and a Space Tracking and Data Acquisition Network station. At Woodleigh, piles of white sea-shells were bulldozed into carefully chosen patterns to determine the smallest pattern the astronauts could discern through the window of their spacecraft.


The Visual Acuity Test patterns at Woodleigh station seen from the air. Though they were composed of very white shells from a nearby beach, I think they might have been difficult to spot from space even under ideal conditions.

However, when this experiment should have been performed on 26 August, Gemini 5 was again drifting along powered down, due to the fuel cell and OAMS problems and could not maintain a stable view of the ground. The astronauts could see the smoke markers identifying the Woodleigh site but not the experimental patterns themselves due to the spacecraft's attitude. Attempts to view the site on later orbits were, unfortunately, no more successful, although the crew could see the lights of Carnarvon and Perth on night-time orbits.

During this powered-down period, Cooper and Conrad became quite cold and experienced feelings of disorientation caused by stars drifting past the windows as their capsule slowly rotated. Eventually, Cooper put covers on the windows to shut out the sight. Not only did they have difficulty sleeping, the crew also had to contend with persistent dandruff, apparently due to the low cabin humidity. The dry, flaky skin they shed settled everywhere, making for an unpleasant cabin environment. Even the instrument panels became partially obscured by dandruff!


No wonder the Gemini 5 crew found it difficult to sleep, when they were crowded together in a space about the same size as the front seat of a VW Beetle! Sleeping in alternate shifts was was not successful, but even sleeping at the same time did not make for a restful "night".

Although the mission’s technical problems caused some experiments to be cancelled, many others were still successfully carried out, including medical and photographic experiments. Among the crew's space science pictures were the first photographs of the zodiacal light and the gegenschein taken from orbit. Photographs of the Earth taken from space are also expected to produce detailed images that will have scientific, military and intelligence value once the films taken in flight are processed. I'm really looking forward to seeing them.

100 Orbits

On 28 August, Gemini 5 became the first manned spacecraft to complete 100 orbits of the Earth. In recognition of the achievement, Mission Control in Houston relayed 15 minutes of Dixieland music to the two astronauts, making Capcom Jim McDivitt the first space disc jockey! Because of the cancellation of experiments during the mission, Conrad had previously said he wished he had brought a book to read, or some music to listen to, and both Cooper and Conrad had expressed a preference for Dixieland music. Later that day, the Capcom at Houston also read up to the crew a little poem that Conrad’s wife, Jane, had written.

From Space to Shining Sea

A few hours before Gemini 5 returned to Earth yesterday, Gordon Cooper made a very special long-distance call – to fellow Mercury astronaut Scott Carpenter, who is living and working aboard the US Navy’s Sealab II facility, 205 feet beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean near La Jolla, California. This radio call was apparently made to test the effectiveness of an undersea electronics lab installed on Sealab II, but it was also a nice piece of publicity for NASA and the Navy.


Mercury astronaut turned aquanaut Scott Carpenter, inside Sealab II, talks to Gordon Cooper aboard Gemini 5. Don't ask me how I got this photo!

Eight Days Without Busting!

Finally, on 29 August, at 190 hours, 27 minutes, and 43 seconds into the mission, retrofire commenced and Gemini 5 was on its way home. To demonstrate the level of control provided by the Gemini spacecraft design, the astronauts controlled their re-entry, rotating the capsule to create drag and lift. Unfortunately, due to an error by a computer programmer, Gemini 5 splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean 80 miles short of its target landing site, but the crew were quickly located and retrieved. Gemini 5 ended just a few hours short of the planned eight days, but the epic mission had come to a successful conclusion and lived up to its motto – it was most definitely not a bust!


Safely home! The crew of Gemini 5 look tired, but elated, after what what Conrad has described as "“eight days in a garbage can”. Notice those "censored" mission patches, whose motto was right after all!




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Comics

[August 28, 1965] Love is My Superpower (Reviewing Girl's Love Stories #115)

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By Carla Woodson

A New Frontier

Hello friends! If you wanted to know something about me, I enjoy old-fashioned things, and I mostly read Dick Tracy thanks to my father's love of the comics. I'm therefore something of a novice when it comes to new comics. When my good pal Gideon (the Traveler) recently handed me a stack of a variety of comics to peruse, I decided to choose something different from my usual adventurous fare. I slid past the usual Batman and other superhero comics, and went straight for the Girl’s Love Stories. The most recent issue, Girl's Love Stories #115, is representative: full of slice of life stories about, well, young women in love. Something like this needed to be read with bon-bons and Cola if I wanted the whole intended effect, but it's just as fun on it's own.

Note: I have never reviewed anything, especially a comic before. I usually just hand it off and tell a friend 'read this, I liked it!' But Gideon and I thought it would be fun if I gave it a shot, so let's go!

Girl on the Run.

April O'Day is a young starlet with big dreams on her mind, and like most girls, romance. When Nick Hanson, the dashing young assistant director is teaching April to fall in love on the screen, she begins to fall for him for real.

Oh reader, I was captivated. It wasn't good versus evil; it was your simple love story. Girl meets Boy, Girl literally throws herself at Boy, Boy…isn't interested? Oh no, I'm laughing now. Did she really think this tactic would work? After a good back and forth, and an angry pursuer getting punched, they lean in close… and you'll just have to check it out for yourself, now won't you?

Love- Love- Love!

Helen is surrounded by people in love, literally! Her gal-friends tell her all about their lives and the guys they're in love with, but she has the startling realization: she has never been in love!

Reader, I'm laughing again. I shouldn't — it happens to people outside of the world of comics, but not as dramatically. Anyway, she gets advice from her friends and decides to try it out to no avail. She berates herself for being unable to fall in love, and gets jealous of her friends in the process. But, a mysterious stranger turns up one evening…could he be the turning point in her love life?

There are your usual letter sections, with young girls getting advice from an editor, and an absolutely darling art section, where girls can send in fashion designs. All the designs are smart, cool, and something I could and would make and wear out. But this isn't a fashion review, sadly. [Next article? Gwyn, I think we've found a kindred spirit! (Ed.)]

Part-Time Girlfriend!

Chris is madly in love with her boyfriend Perry. Their young love is the kind that is simply infectious. They kiss every few seconds while saying goodbye, and they are constantly seeing each other.  A few days go by without getting together, so, feeling lonely, Chris goes out on a drive, and she sees none other than Perry, and gasp, another girl?!

But it's ok, reader: she's Sandra, an old friend. Everything is fine and dandy, and they all live happily ever- oh it's not done? He kisses the 'old friend' in the darkened theater? Oh my goodness, I may have have to get some bon-bons. Chris is crushed, they both talk the next day, and she needs time to think everything over (completely understandable, but personally I think she should dump him and go on about her merry life). She goes to visit an aunt in the next town over, and the aunt sets her up with a guy next door, and she decides to go on a date with him, and another date, and another. But they realize neither of them love the other, and they part as friends. She comes back home to tell Perry she's alright with her seeing Sandra, but she hopes he will come back to her.

Whoa boy. That's an interesting way of taking things. This could either end well, or in tears. I quietly munch another bon-bon (yes, I gave into temptation halfway through and secured some!). Next time it's movie night, Chris calls Carl, the guy from her aunt's town, and they go out to a movie, and Perry sees them together. He eventually confronts Chris, but do they reconcile? Oh I would tell you, but you must read this. I think this was my favorite story.

Stuffed

I found these vignettes fascinating. Girl's Love Stories#115 is perfect if you are having a terrible day, and need something of a pick me up, or a quick giggle. As someone who doesn't read enough comics, I'm now looking forward to reading as many genres as possible — including some good old super-hero comics thrown in for good measure. I can't wait to share more reviews with you!

And Gideon: you're not getting this issue back, friend.




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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[August 26, 1965] Stag Party (September 1965 Analog)

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by Gideon Marcus

Boys Only Club?

A very curious phenomenon has taken place over the last several years.  When I started writing the Journey, women were a rising force in professional science fiction. In 1959, three of the six "Best New Authors" were women (Rosel George Brown, Kit Reed, and Pauline Ashwell – all Journey favorites). About 10% of the stories (and 25% of what was worth reading) was produced by women. Both Amazing and Fantastic, two of the main science fiction monthly digests, were helmed by Cele Goldsmith.

Then…something happened. Over the last few years, the appearances of women in magazines has dwindled to a trickle. There are fewer appearing in novels, too (and since women tended to produce short fiction more often than long form, this change was particularly noticeable). As of this month, no single title across all of the published magazines was done under a sole female byline. Five of the last 45 novels this year were written by four women – two were by Andre Norton, who writes under a masculine byline.

Cele Goldsmith became Cele Lalli and left her editor position. This was probably not a result of her getting married but rather due to a change in her two magazines to a reprints-mostly format.

Though the loss of women in SF has not always hurt the quality of fiction produced, (indeed, this was one of the better months in a long time), I've no doubt that this development is bad for the genre in the long run. The fewer perspectives, the less diversity of viewpoints, the more our stories are going to fall into ruts. A wider pool of authors also creates better work as more talented folks get a chance to rise to the top. I don't know why the genre has become bereft of one half of the population, but I hope the situation changes soon.

Still Plugging Along

As I said, this month was, despite the alarming paucity of women SF contributors, surprisingly and refreshingly good. This month's Analog, so often a turgid relic, was a pleasant read from back to front. Let's take a look inside:


by Kelly Freas

Space Pioneer (Part 1 of 3), by Mack Reynolds


by Kelly Freas

A nameless fellow wangles passage on the s/s Titov, a future-day Mayflower carrying 2000 colonists to New Arizona.  His goal is not exploring a new world, however – it's the assassination of the last of the Peshkopi clan. the would-be killer having gotten a tip that Peshkopi was slated to make the interstellar jaunt on the old freighter.

Inadvertently taking on the role of Roger Bock, holder of one of the mission's ten financial shares, the assassin quickly finds himself embroiled in a growing conflict between the mistreated passengers, little more than chattel in the holds, and the comparatively pampered crew and shareholders.  By the end of Part One, the identity of the Peshkopi is yet unknown to "Bock", but it is strongly implicated that it is actually Cathy Bergman, the elected representative of the colonists.  Of course, by the end of the serial's installment, Bock has much bigger things to worry about than his initial mission…

Pioneer is typically competent Reynolds stuff, even though the milieu is more Leinsterian.  If I have any complaint, it's that the science fiction trappings are virtually nonexistent.  This could be a story set in the 18th Century.

That said, I do enjoy the rather unflattering portrayal of colonist (and presumably planetary) exploitation, and the inclusion of developed female characters is nice.  Reynolds is usually good about that.

Four stars thus far.

The Life of Your Time, by Michael Karageorge


by Kelly Freas

On sublight but relativistic trip to Tau Ceti, the starship Emissary makes a shocking discovery: while time dilation affects the crew, slowing down the passage of time for their physical bodies and for the ship's systems, their minds remain at the speed of their original reference point – Earth.  Thus, to them, their bodies increasingly become prisons as their minds experience minutes, ultimately hours, for every second their bodies sense.  It's a story of tragedy, discovery, and triumph.

And a very unusual one for Analog.  It reminds me a bit of Niven's Wrong Way Street, featuring a gender-balanced and ethnically mixed crew (though they are all explicitly and deliberately Americans).  I don't know who Michael Karageorge is, but he definitely hit a triple on his first outing (and I dug the brand new concept of the hydrogen ramscoop ship).

Four stars.

LUT the Giant Mover, by Lyle R. Hamilton

The nonfiction article is both interesting and disappointing.  You can't fault the subject matter, which is the new launch facilities at Cape Kennedy.  But like most articles in Analog, it suffers for lack of subheadings and a coherent narrative.

So, three stars.  At least it's not about dowsing!

Computers Don't Argue, by Gordon R. Dickson


by John Schoenherr

Here is a dark cautionary tale about relying too heavily on computers, in which a fellow is sent a reader's club book by mistake, and is ultimately arrested and executed when he refuses to pay for it.

I get what they're trying to say, but the story takes place next year and while there is merit to avoiding overreliance on automated systems, there are just too many places where human involvement in the system would have broken the digital positive feedback loop. I hope. On the other hand, who knows?

A low three stars.

Test in Orbit, by Ben Bova


by Kelly Freas

Better is this story of a near-future conflict in space: Chet Kinsman, a USAF Captain with a week left to his hitch, is tasked to fly into space on an X-20 derivative and inspect an unknown satellite suspected of being an orbital bomb.  A mortal combat ensues.

I enjoyed all of this piece except the ending, which was both a little maudlin and should have had some falling action after the reveal.  Still, I think Ben Bova is a promising author, and I look forward to more of his stuff.

Three stars.

Psi for Sale, by Walter Bupp


by Kelly Freas

We've seen a lot of installments in the story of "Lefty" Walter Bupp, a telekinetic doctor with the grammar of a mook.  This time, John Berryman (the author's real name) offers us a look at Bupp's prehistory as well as the early history of the organization created for the benefit of American psychics.

I like the series, and this one was probably my favorite installment.  Perhaps a little superfluous, but still welcome (and it was neat to see a piece from the perspective of Maragon, the "Grand Master" of the "Lodge").

4 stars.

Say It with Flowers, by Winston P. Sanders


by Kelly Freas

Last up, we get another piece set in a future history in which the asteroid belt has won independence from the Earth.  Written under Poul Anderson's throwaway pen name, these are usually dry, technical stories of lesser appeal. 

This time, we get a fairly compelling tale about a Lieutenant in the "asterix" space service who is apprehended by North American forces on a courier mission.  It turns out that the message he is transmitting is carried on his person in an unique (but utterly telegraphed and unsurprising) way.

I liked the piece fine enough, though this line irked:

"The revolutionaries were so short of manpower that quite a few women held high rank."

An omission of that line would have gone a long way.  I don't need the suggestion that women are only able to succeed when there ain't enough men to do the work – especially when it's obvious that women can do the work.

Anyway, three stars.

Y marks the spot


Note, for the first time, the lack of women in the Journey round-up image – this one is of an IBM demonstration in Ethiopia.

Distressing lack of women authors aside, this was a good month for science fiction in magazines.  Analog clocked in at a respectable 3.5 stars, ahead of Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.2, largely thanks to its opening novella) and IF (2.9, dragged down by the Doc Smith serial).

Finishing roughly equivalent were Fantastic (3.5), New Worlds (3.5), and Science Fantasy (3.4).  If we include New Writings in SF #5 (3.5), which is a quarterly in book form but feels like a magazine, that makes the numbers even better.

So a mixed pleasure this month.  Let's hope this trend of female non-production reverses itself soon and results in even better times to come!




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Book, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[August 24, 1965] 13 French Science Fiction Stories

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by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

A French Experiment

At Galactic Journey, we've devoted a great deal of space to, well, space — documenting each of the launches and satellite missions beyond Earth's atmosphere. But an equally exciting and unexplored frontier is the world's oceans. There is even some cross-over; this month, Mercury astronaut Scott Carpenter left NASA to become an aquanaut and undertake missions beneath the waves.

This pioneering of the water frontier is an international effort. Famed French Ocean explorer Cmdr. Jacques Cousteau has been conducting a series of underwater experiments to see if humans can live in under sea habitations.

Conshelf 1
Conshelf I Design

In 1962 Conshelf I was setup ten metres down off the coast of Marseilles, where a selection of "Oceanauts" lived underwater for a week. The experiment was successful enough to warrant moving on to the next stage.

Conshelf 2
Conshelf II Design

In 1963 Conshelf II was a more ambitious project supporting a crew living at the bottom of the Red Sea for an entire month. This was also successful enough to move on to the next phase.

Conshelf III
Conshelf III Design

Starting in September a crew will live at an unprecedented depth of 100 metres, working on a submerged oil platform for three weeks. If this test proves successful it may well change the way we live in the years to come.

Looking to this French inspired future, it is a fortuitous time for Damon Knight to release his anthology of translated French science fiction, to see where we may be going.

13 French Science Fiction Stories ed. by Damon Knight

13 French SF Stories Knight

I am a bit of a Francophile but recent French science fiction, I must admit, has been a bit of blind spot. Whilst the more literary fiction and experimental cinema make their way over the channel, the work of science fiction writers does not. As such I was delighted to see Damon Knight, who has translated a lot of French stories for F&SF), put out this collection so I could help rectify this gap in my knowledge. I also liaised with my friend and French science fiction fan, C of The Middle Shelf fanzine, for some more background information on some of these.

So, without further ado, let us get on to the stories:

Juliette by Claude F. Cheinisse

Chienisse has been publishing Science Fiction for a while, but he is primarily known as a satirist due to his work on the controversial Hari-Kiri magazine. Juliette, a story of love between a Doctor and Juliette, his sentient car, has actually passed through the Journey before: in his previous review the Traveler gave it four stars. I would not be quite so generous with my rating. Whilst sensuous I found the style a little stiff, and I would have liked the author to state more clearly that he disagrees with the concept of women as disposable objects.

A low three stars

The Blind Pilot by Charles Henneberg

All three stories in this anthology by Charles Henneberg were written by Natalie Henneberg, using her husband’s name. She has published widely and is known as the “most read” science fiction writer in France. However, she is not without controversy: some of her work has been criticized for tending towards pseudo fascist themes. Whilst this criticism can also be levelled at a number of pieces of Campbellian fiction, I think it is still important to note going in.

In the first of these stories, Jacky, an adventurer who has fallen on hard times, has to pawn his robot porter to the owner of the titular shop. In the shop there are also several mutants, and strange events begin to unfold, as we hear via Jacky’s testimony.

Henneberg is well known for her mixes of science fiction and fantasy, and this definitely fits into this category, with a futuristic take on the Siren myth. This, however, is not a fun adventure but a much darker tale.

Another story that had appeared in a previously reviewed issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction, the magazine review declared this “well-nigh unreadable”. Whilst once again finding the style odd, I didn’t find it quite as bad. The bigger problem I have is that I don’t quite get the point of it. It is neither enjoyable nor particularly meaningful. And though it has a lot of interesting elements they don’t really seem to gel well.

Two Stars

Olivia by Henri Damonti

Henri Damonti is apparently a pseudonym for a writer of children’s radio plays. He has not been anywhere near as prolific as many of the other writers in this collection and so I could find little more than what Damon Knight put in his about the authors section.

In this story, we see a married man’s last days he falls in love with his neighbor Olivia and the lengths he goes to try to be with her.

This feels like it could be the kind of critically acclaimed movie you would see at artistic film festivals. Others may love it, but I find this trite and creepy in a bad way. But I guess it's competently written if you like that sort of thing.

Two Stars for my own subjective views.

The Notary and the Conspiracy by Henri Damonti

The second by Damonti, and one that has appeared before in F and SF. Here Mr. Duplessis receives an invite to a mysterious club, where it is claimed you can live a second life in the past. He selects the life of a notary in fifteenth century Florence. However, he finds himself drifting further away from his present-day life and becoming more concerned with the events in the past.

In a recent New Worlds issue George Collyn discussed how the treatment of fractured time by American authors was one of the most interesting developments of current science fiction. I think this story fits under this umbrella with the backwards and forwards in time being used to comment on the dangers of escapism to the past without considering the importance of being present, and how deadly the past could really be.

Unlike the Traveler, I did not find Knight's translation opaque at all. I actually found it one of the more readable pieces in this collection (or maybe I am just getting used to Knight’s way of writing?)

Four stars

The Vana by Alain Dorémieux

Alain Dorémieux has been the driving force of French science fiction over the last decade, publishing both the premiere French Science Fiction magazine Fiction and a series of original anthologies, as well as being a writer in his own right.

In Vana, to control the population men and women are not allowed to live together until they are thirty and are encouraged to get out their urges in “The House of Women”. Slovic, a twenty-five year old suburban jazz fan, is lonely and nostalgic for the twentieth century. So he decides to buy a Vana, an idle and vegetative extra-terrestrial lifeform who looks like a human woman but cannot get pregnant.

Whilst I have had to try to have a strong stomach for some of this anthology, this story is particularly disturbing and one I wish I hadn’t read.

One star.

The Devil's Goddaughter by Suzanne Malaval

Author, Suzanne Malaval is a young housewife in North Eastern France who started writing for Fiction at the start of the decade and has continued being published since.

The plot: When little Fanche is born the devil comes to claim her as his goddaughter. When she is fifteen she is taken to hell and must devise a way to escape.

When this story first appeared in F&SF the Traveller gave it three stars and complimented the riddles, but it did not work at all for me. This vignette seems to be related to some old folktales from the region but I am afraid I am unfamiliar with them, if so. Even accounting for that, I still found the treatment of rape and domestic abuse poor.

One Star

Moon Fishers by Charles Henneberg

Back to another previously published Henneberg: this time a test pilot is given a part in an experiment where his mind can travel through time. He ends up in Ancient Egypt where he meets an Atlantean called Nester. The whole thing sets off a kind of fantasy yarn.

Overly long rambling fluff that just gets wearisome. For once I am in total agreement with the earlier review.

One Star

The Non-Humans by Charles Henneberg

The final Henneberg piece (also previously published) and a slight improvement on the other two. This time she brings her style of science fantasy to renaissance Italy with a tale of a painter called Nardo and the strange woman he uses as model.

As pointed out in the prior review the twist at the end is kind of obvious (and has indeed been used in other works of science fiction) but this has a much better style and atmosphere than the other stories in this collection.

What also raised it up for me is that it correctly depicts 15th Century Florence as a cosmopolitan community of people of many different races living together. Compared with how often adventure serials will have the whole of Italy as lily-white, it was quite refreshing.

Three Stars

After Three Hundred Years by Pierre Mille

Pierre Mille is well known as a writer, but C of The Middle Shelf was surprised to discover he had written any fantastic fiction. This is the oldest story in the collection, from 1922, first published in Literary Magazine Les Ouvres Libres. Perhaps unsurprisingly it feels very Victorian.

In a future after an unnamed disaster, people are living in a society like the dark ages, most of our modern knowledge is lost and anything beautiful has been given up to survival.

The concept itself has been done better before and since, with much of this story seeming to be about how much women have a desire to wear pretty things.

One star

The Monster by Gérard Klein

Klein is another core figure of the Parisian science fiction scene. So far he has released 10 novels and collections along with being a regular contributor to Fiction and Galaxie.

In The Monster, Marion is waiting for her husband Bernard to return home when an alert is put out for an alien in the park.

This is an old-fashioned story but with a very deft writing style to make it more interesting. A prior review gave it four stars.  I am not quite there but very happy to give a strong three stars.

A Little More Caviar? by Claude Veillot

Veillot has recently come to public attention due to the adaptation of his novel Nous n'irons pas en Nigéria, filmed as 100 000 dollars au solei which was a box office hit and nominated for the Palme d’Or.

In this story, Mademoiselle Moreau is trying to teach a class on the planet Bisupek about Earth. The children are decidedly uninterested. In the course of the class we learn about why these people left Earth and what will happen in their future.

Unfortunately, the method of delivery made it tedious to me. One Star

The Chain of Love by Catherine Cliff

Probably the least famous writer in the collection, mostly known for being married to Jacques Sternberg, a major Belgian writer, she here produces a vignette where our unnamed narrator who is down on her luck gets into a relationship with an alien. The whole thing is disturbing but, at least in this case, I feel like it is supposed to be.

Two Stars

The Dead Fish by Boris Vian

Vian was (he passed away in 1959) a famous writer and is widely known in France, although not so much for his science fiction as for his poetry and detective novels.

In the final story of the collection, we get a very surreal satire that is hard to summarize, but I am going to try my best just so you can understand just how bizarre it is:

It opens with an assistant travelling on a train with a ticket from his boss; the ticket however is a forged one sold by the ticket inspectors, in order to catch people who would buy forged tickets. After paying the fine the assistant's boss' face appears between his toes, which the assistant dissolves by spitting on it.

He then attempts to go to his boss’ house but is attacked by a series of anti-burglary devices. Managing to get inside his boss bemoans the catch he is given. For the assistant is a fisherman of stamps (as in the sticky things you attach to envelopes to send mail); however the net he uses is old so the perforations are sometimes ruined. His boss does not accept these excuses and is also annoyed at him for not noticing the forged tickets or the anti-burglary devices so the assistant must sleep outside. Whilst sleeping in the doghouse, after fending off an attack from rogue stamps, an unnamed living thing cuddles with him and they console together.

The next day, a young woman selling pepper comes to the house, the Boss wants to look at her thighs but she insists he try the pepper first. It turns out she has poisoned him, forcing him to run around the house several times until he falls over, resulting in his feet being detached (but still running).

Coming back from another fishing trip, the assistant has plans to kill his boss, only to discover him already dead from the poison of the pepper seller. Angry that he cannot kill his boss, when the unnamed living thing comes over to console him, the assistant kills the living thing instead. Upset by this, the assistant then makes himself trip into a pool full of stamps whereby he is promptly eaten.

This all takes place over the course of 12 pages, and I have skipped over other bizarre incidents as well.

I have read this piece three times and I am still totally at a loss to what it is meant to be about. I like weird, but it needs to have something underneath it, otherwise it is just describing a bad dream you once had. This feels totally insubstantial and pointless.

One Star

So overall, there are a couple of good stories in here but mostly I was not a fan. In spite of this it is still good to be able to read science and fantasy from other countries and to get at least some understanding of what is happening with SFF on a more international scale.

One other thing to note: this collection is advertised as tales of love. This is most certainly not the case. The only one I would say really qualifies is The Moon Fishers; the rest that involve relationships are about abuse, control and rape. I am fan of love stories but I am not sure why the publishers decided to promote this as such. I think it would have been more true, and likely garnered more interest, if it had been labelled as “disturbing tales that challenge the boundaries of science fiction”.

Perhaps then I might at least have been prepared for what was inside…as you are now.




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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy

It’s (Nearly) All About Aldiss [August 22, 1965] Science Fantasy and New Worlds, September 1965

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by Mark Yon

Scenes from England

Hello again!

As I type this, we’re a few days away from the 23rd Worldcon in London. Worldcons outside of the US don’t happen very often – the last one here was in 1957 – but it somehow seems right at the moment. Despite my feeling of lethargy last month, there’s a lot of optimism about in England, more than I’ve felt for a while. The reasons for it are perhaps many and varied – a young Labour government, the Beatles dominating the world and who seem to be a voice for the young generation, even the New Wave of science fiction that seems to be gaining headway and shaking things up.

To me, a Worldcon in Britain seems to encapsulate this. It promises to be new and exciting, at the cutting edge of the genre, with original writing and new writers out there to make things interesting. If you are attending, I hope it is everything it deserves to be.

With the Worldcon in mind, the magazines have steadily been building up pressure over the year. In this month of Worldcon ‘65, their issues seem to reflect the pent-up feeling of excitement, as both issues have some connection with the convention.

I’ll explain as we go along. As per usual, the issue that arrived first in the post this month was Science Fantasy.

Well, after the comparative lightness of last month’s cover, we seem to have taken on a much darker hue this month. That cover by an unknown artist is a bit too murky for me, almost to the point where I might say that I miss the usual Keith Roberts covers.

However, there may be subtle persuasion at work here, in that because the picture is so dark, the attention of the casual reader may be focused on the magazine’s heading. If, as they say, ‘sex sells’, then this might do it.

The Editorial this month is not usual. Instead of the usual debate created by Kyril, we have instead an article by Brian Aldiss (wonder why?) that seems to do little else but point out that his first-published novel Non-Stop has been republished in England. Whilst the cynical amongst-us might see this as an extended advertisement, it is written with Brian’s own endearing and self-deprecating tone. He explains the background to the original publication, how the American publishers gave away the twist in the story by changing the title, and finally tells us what he would do to revise the novel if he was writing it now. It is quite charming – rather like the man himself. I’ll mention the novel again later.

To the actual stories.

Boomerang, by E. C. Tubb

The return of the prodigious E C Tubb after his popular last serial story, The Life Buyer in the April – June 1965 issues of New Worlds. Boomerang is a story of murder and revenge. Told in the first person, Marlow is a man who from the start freely admits that he went on a murderous rampage against Granger, who he hates. As a result, Marlow burned down Granger’s house, “poisoned his friends, mutilated his pets and did things to his family” – nice chap!

Marlow’s punishment is to be exiled on his own to Hades, which as you might expect from its name is a barely tolerable planet to live out the rest of his days. The story here goes all Robinson Crusoe, and I rather expected it to become an Analog style story of a man overcoming adversity. But wait! The ‘boomerang’ of the title is that – wait for it! – his victim comes to the planet to finish him off! It’s nicely done overall, and reminded me a little of Alfred Bester’s Tiger! Tiger! in the sense of total hate that seems to exude off the page. With this in mind, the ending is satisfying. 3 out of 5.

Coming-Of-Age Day, by A K Jorgenssen

Warning! Warning! Kyril begins this with an explanation that he’s used before. It goes something like – “I read this one and thought. 'I can’t possibly publish this one!' And then I thought some more and decided 'Why not?'”

I must admit that given the lurid blurb on the front cover of a “startling story of sex in the future”, I was rather grimly expecting an over-heated story of a future where the coming-of-age is celebrated by some sort of sexual rite-of-passage, with some pretty obvious clichés and awful sex scenes.

To my surprise, it’s rather a restrained work. The main premise is that in the future everyone who enters puberty is fitted with what I will politely describe as a sexual appliance known as a consex. Andrews, the male character of the narrative tells of the process and explains why most people, male or female, has one fitted. He is fairly happy with the idea, especially when the 'sexiatrist' (doctor) explains that having one fitted is good, because every adult has one. The suggestion also that it is better than sex is also a pretty winning argument.

In a wider perspective, it has solved many social issues and has become a culturally accepted thing for both males and females, reducing basic urges and satisfying the needs of couples and bachelors alike. The story seems to be more about the need for cultural compliance rather than sex, although Andrews overhears Topolski, another more reluctant young man who, despite being put under pressure to comply, appears to refuse the fitting.

Whilst the story fizzles out at the end, it is one that made me think. Is the device a future version of contraception? How would a society, especially a British society, known for its stiff upper lip and reserve, become so accepting of something that would affect everyone at a personal level? Could it happen?

If the sign of a good story is that it makes you think, then this one scores – if you can buy into the idea working. 4 out of 5.

Temptation for the Leader, by R W Mackelworth

The return of RW, last seen in the July 1965 issue of Science Fantasy. Most of Mackelworth’s stories tend to deal with the issues of identity and responsibility in a future society, and this one is no different. A meeting between an alien who names itself “Poniard”, and “the President” of a capitalist nation (who may be the leader of the USA, though it is never clearly stated) leads to an offer of help and guidance for the human race – but at a price. In the end, the offer is rejected because of the effect it would have on individuality and capitalist values.

This is a very talky story, the conclusion is straight out of Arthur C Clarke’s Childhood’s End. There’s some good ideas here but the author seems to go about them in a rather roundabout way. 3 out of 5.

At Last, the True Story of Frankenstein, by Harry Harrison

Over at New Worlds, Harry is having his latest novel serialised. Here he tells a simpler and more serious shaggy-dog story by telling of Victor Frankenstein V, now reduced to being part of a carnival show and in need of a new animated body. At the same time Harry rewrites Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s seminal story in six pages, with a clever mix of humour and horror. Ray Bradbury would be proud of this one. 4 out of 5.

Sule Skerry, by Rob Sproat

Not an author’s name that I remember, so this seems to be the latest ‘new writer’ to grace the magazine. The idea is that Sule Skerry is a folksong collected by people recording old legends but then turned into prose. Whilst I don’t know if this Northumbrian story of the selkie is based on a real folk-song, I found the story quite sad and remarkably moving. A mythic folktale that was better than I thought it was going to be. 4 out of 5.

The Jobbers, by Johnny Byrne

Johnny has produced some very strange stories in the past. They are often too odd for my tastes, although this one was less obtuse than many. It begins with an unnamed man talking to two very small people who then appear to climb into his brain. They are ‘Jobbers’, whose purpose is to get into a person’s brain and prepare their body ready for the next inhabitant. It starts quite light-hearted but by the end becomes rather creepy. The twist in the tale, of whether what is happening is real or some imagined attack of insanity, is left up to the reader to decide. 3 out of 5.

Omega and Alpha, by Robert Cheetham

This month’s offering from a debut author, a bleak short story told in the form of a diary by an author and his wife who have gone to get away from it all on a tropical island. When a missile station on the far side of the island is destroyed – it is not clear whether it is just the island that is affected or a global event – the resultant radiation and ash leads to death. Another post-apocalyptic story of the sort that we’ve had a lot of lately, but it is quite effective in showing what the effects of a nuclear war would be after the bombs have gone off. An interesting debut, even if it treads a familiar path. 3 out of 5.

The Furies (Part 3 of 3), by Keith Roberts

To Keith’s last part of this story, which in my opinion has been one of the magazine’s strengths of the last few months.

Last issue we were left with Bill Sampson, having begun the human fight-back against the wasps, attempting to go and find his young friend Jane in France, only to be shot at by an army patrol and crashing his car.

This final part picks up where we left off. Bill is retrieved and brought back to health by two of his friends still hidden away in the Mendip Hills – Greg and Pete. Once he has recovered, the group hiding in the Chill Leer caves continue their guerrilla attacks upon the wasps, with varying degrees of success. There is an attack by the wasps inside the caves the humans have been hiding in. Eventually Bill and the traumatised girl 'Pete' are captured. To their surprise, rather than be killed, as many of their friends have been, they are spoken to by the Queen Wasp in a deus ex machina conclusion that explains the purpose of the wasps and leaves them with one message – that the wasps are dying because their determination to evolve rapidly has caused racial regression and that the humans must carry on and continue the Wasp’s purpose – to continue Life.

There are questions raised about the importance of hive intelligence, but this all ends rather suddenly, with a huge dollop of exposition and everything being tied up rather too abruptly for my liking. Most of all, the big plot reveal at the end is a bit of a stinker after such a great set-up. It rather feels like the author felt he was running out of time or space to finish the story and it all ends far too conveniently.

Although I couldn’t put this story down, it doesn't have the quality ending I was hoping for. Shame. 3 out of 5.

Summing up Science Fantasy

Despite The Furies not ending quite as well as I hoped it would, I’m very pleased that the story is still fairly strong. The whole issue is generally good, with Rob Sproat’s Sule Skerry being a surprisingly memorable tale.

But is it as good as New Worlds this month? Let’s go to my second magazine to find out!

The Second Issue At Hand

Unlike Science Fantasy, it may not be too surprising to find that New Worlds has gone all out to celebrate the London Worldcon’s Guest of Honour this month. From the enthusiastic comment on the back cover to appreciations by Edmund Crispin and Peter White, most of this issue is about Brian Aldiss. There’s a review of Aldiss’s novel Non-Stop by Mike Moorcock – you know, the one that Brian has reviewed himself in this month’s Science Fantasy. Even when it is not, it includes material from his friends – Harry Harrison’s serialised novel Bill, the Galactic Hero continues with its second part under the title A Dip in the Swimming Pool Reactor.

This month’s editorial from Mike Moorcock is one of two halves. The first tells us how great Harry Harrison’s novel is (I’ll comment on that later) before going on to entice us with future attractions. The second part reminds us that we have a Worldcon in London in about one month’s time, which we should be excited about. (Have I said in the last few minutes that Brian will be Guest of Honour at this month’s Worldcon in London?)

To the stories!

Girl and Robot with Flowers, by Brian Aldiss

So we begin this Aldiss issue with an Aldiss story that at first might make new readers a bit puzzled. It’s set in modern times, reading as if it was in The Times Literary Supplement. The science-fictional element is that the story is of a writer who, after a time has decided to begin writing again. You see, the author writes science fiction! (Tenuous link initiated.) What begins as an initially cosy domestic tale slowly changes, as our writer talks through the story he is thinking of writing comparing it with the reality of the place he is at and the woman he is with. And bam – Brian’s got your attention again, sneaking in a science fiction story without the reader realising it. It’s a gently subversive tale, questioning the purpose of science fiction, and of writing it – and gets extra credit for adding a few sf names in as well (Ballard, Pohl, Moorcock, for example.) Better than last month’s Jungian effort. 4 out of 5.

Old Time’s Sake, by Brian Aldiss

The first Aldiss story is immediately followed by a second, different type of story. As the title might suggest, this is a story about the passage of time. Brian is a fan of HG Wells, and it shows in this story of Alec Sampson, the world’s first immortal man. Aldiss says that it is a story written in 1954, and was meant to be the first of a series which never materialised. It’s a story of loss and envy, cloaked in academia, as Alec meets his peers knowing that the next time his progress is reviewed, most if not all of these people will have died. I would’ve been interested to see where Aldiss would have gone with this, had he taken the story further. I enjoyed it, but it is clearly an early Aldiss. It is interesting reading the two stories together though, as they show how Brian has matured as a writer. 3 out of 5.

Illustration by Douthwaite

Traveller’s Rest, by David Masson

Time travel of a different type now, from this debut author. Traveller’s Rest is this month’s most challenging read. Our main character, Hadolaris, is fighting a permanent war against a never seen enemy. After his latest sortie he is ‘Relieved’ (retired) and moves to a civilian life southwards away from the Front. He settles down with a job as a sales manager, marries and has three children, only to be re-enlisted and back at the front-line at the end of the story.

There’s not a lot of plot. What makes this story unusual is the idea that the war messes with Time and as you travel south away from the war zone time seems to get slower, whereas as you travel north time appears to be faster. Though to Hadol he has been away from the war for twenty years, it is no more than about twenty minutes at the front.

Traveller's Rest is perhaps the densest story in this issue and took me a while to determine what was going on. This complexity is helped by the author’s invention of words throughout to illustrate the plot. There are also interesting little ideas throughout – speech changes as you travel North or South – names become shorter or longer the nearer you are to the Front, for example. I also got a feeling that the time distortion may affect the soldier’s perceptions. The descriptions of war at the front are almost dream-like.

Those who relish untangling the story, deciphering the complexities of language and wrestling with the key concept of time dilation will find this one interesting. An impressive debut, although one that gains credit for the ideas rather than the plot. 4 out of 5.

Bill, the Galactic Hero, Part 2: A Dip in the Swimming pool Reactor, by Harry Harrison

I’m not going to say much about this one, as like I said last month, you will either love it or be unimpressed by it. In this part, blasé Bill stumbles his way through the continuing war against the Chingers. He visits the Imperial planet Helior – a planet plated with gold – to get a medal, meets the Emperor (or someone like him) and goes on furlough. He has things stolen, which upon reporting to the police leads to poor old Bill getting into trouble himself. To solve his troubles he becomes a Garbage-Man (G-Man for short) but is then persuaded by the Opposition Party to become an Anarchist, before being arrested as a deserter. It’s busy life for Bill… still silly but I enjoyed this part more than the first part. 3 out of 5.

Illustration by James Cawthorn

The Pleasure Garden of Felipe Sagittarius, by James Colvin

In which the New Worlds Book Reviewer wanders into the weird world that Mike Moorcock seemed to inhabit in last month’s issue… except that James is really Mike Moorcock!

This has the manner of a detective story, but one from an alternate world. Minos Aquilinas, Metatemporal Investigator of Europe, is asked to investigate the murder of a man in the garden of Police Chief Bismarck in Berlin.

Set in what might be an alternate timeline somewhere between now and the 1920s, this story reminded me of Moorcock’s tale of Jeremiah Cornelius last month. It is fast-paced and determinedly anarchic. Whilst it tries to be provocative – Eva Braun, Adolf Hitler and Stalin all appear, although not as we would expect to see them – the fast pace and attempt to use well-known people in a different way is refreshing. This Hitler is a very different one to the one we all know.  Odd, but I liked it. 3 out of 5.

At the End of Days

And here’s this month’s effort from across the seas. Last month it was Mack Reynolds, this month Robert Silverberg, who I appreciate readers in the US will know pretty well as an up-and-coming young writer. End of Days is short, but works well in the space given to it. 140-years-old Thomas Narin watches people around him as the world is slowly dying. He is suddenly met by a young boy, Jorid Dayson, from Rigel-Six, who is impressed to meet someone from Earth. Earth has become almost mythical to Jorid and his young friends. It’s an elegiac tale that hints of a bright future ahead for the human race – just not on Earth. Though The End of Days covers a relatively common theme, the style is pleasantly lyrical. 3 out of 5.

Book Reviews, Articles and Letters

With all of this Aldiss-adulation (Aldissulation?), the reviews are shorter this month.

Edmund Crispin’s appreciation of Brian emphasises his ability to create visual images through prose. Peter White summarises Aldiss’s work to date and talks of his influence on British Sf today. Both articles are, as expected, pretty effervescent, although Mr. Crispin’s article, as you might expect from the author of the acclaimed Best Of… series of anthologies, is perhaps a more considered response.

Interestingly, Mr. White makes the claim that Brian’s best work to date is not science fiction, but The Male Response, a non-science fictional tale of sexual habits. I would disagree in that the book is not science fiction, as there are aspects that are science fictional – the rise of a future super-state in Africa, for example. I am sure readers will want to debate this further.

James Colvin (aka Mike Moorcock) reviews Aldiss’s Non-Stop, which makes interesting reading when compared with the author’s own review in Science Fantasy. Colvin’s review is unsurprisingly glowing. He then goes on to review in less detail Best SF Four, edited by fellow contributor this month, Edmund Crispin, and finds the story collection “only average in general standard.” By contrast, New Writings in SF Three, edited by John Carnell is “perhaps the best in the series so far.” Next, Colin Kapp’s The Dark Mind is reviewed with the suggestion that the author should spend more time on studying his craft before writing his next novel. Ouch!

The last review is a more detailed one of J G Ballard’s The Drought, which you may know in the US as The Burning World. It is typically enthusiastic: “The Drought is refreshing, original and an authentic creative work which, in its own terms, can only be emulated, one suspects, by Mr. Ballard himself.”

No “Dr. Peristyle” this month – perhaps we have enough Mr. Aldiss this month already! Instead, we’re back to the Letters pages, albeit very briefly. The first letter echoes the common theme of moving the genre forward and not looking back, whilst John Brunner himself replies with a correction to Langdon Jones’ review of his novel The Telepathist, back in issue 151, and there’s an effusive letter from Edward Mackin on E C Tubb’s The Life Buyer back in issue 150.

In terms of Ratings, the great surprise for me from issue 152 in July is how well Night of the Gyul was received. However,  Dikk Richardson’s last placing is what A Funny Thing Happened deserved, sadly.

 

Summing up New Worlds

It is always risky focussing an issue mainly on one writer. If readers are not a fan of the particular author, will they buy the issue? However, I think that it has worked this time around. This feels like a strong issue – all the more so when I think of how New Worlds was two years ago. Again, how much you like this issue will I think depend a little on your love of Bill, the Galactic Hero, but the other elements I personally enjoyed more.

There’s a lot of mischievous fun in this issue, as well as some well-deserved plaudits for one of Britain’s best writers at the moment. The Masson story is a startling debut, which despite its weaknesses reflects the impressive range possible in science fiction at the moment.

Summing up overall

It’s difficult to knock the Aldiss coverage this month, although I’m not sure that the stories given here are his best. The audacious debut by Masson surprises most. I also liked the E C Tubb story in Science Fantasy, whilst continuing to be less impressed than many by Harrison’s silliness. However, the slightly disappointing conclusion of The Furies and the impressive range of material in the Brian Aldiss issue means that for me, this month’s issue of quality is New Worlds.

And with all of this love of Aldiss shared around the genre, that’s it for this time. Anyone going to Worldcon, have a wonderful time. I look forward to hearing the stories!

Until the next…

[Don't miss the next episode of The Journey Show, featuring a panel of amazing artists who will be doodling to YOUR specification!]




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