Tag Archives: john brunner

[February 18, 1969] (February Galactoscope)

Is ten books a record for the Galactoscope?  Lucky we have so many folks reading furiously for the Journey.  And it's a good thing, because amidst the dross and mediocrity, there's a couple of gems…


by Tonya R. Moore

Let the Fire Fall by Kate Wilhelm

Kate Wilhelm is perhaps better known for her debut short story, "The Mile-Long Spaceship" (1963) and Clone (1965), the Hugo Award nominated novel written in collaboration with Theodore L. Thomas. Perhaps you've read her work in Orbit, edited by her husband, Damon Knight.

The ominous title of this book, Let the Fire Fall, promises fire, brimstone, and a violent alien invasion—but the bad guys in this story aren't the extraterrestrials. The plot: A spaceship inhabited by pregnant alien women lands in small town America. The aliens are friendly, and clearly hope to be welcome on this new planet they’ve discovered. One vile and opportunistic man named Obie Cox– under normal circumstances, a small-town philanderer of no account, blessed with uncommon charisma–manages to worm his way to the pulpit. One there, he takes advantage of humanity’s rampant xenophobia and the ineffectuality of Earth’s bureaucracy through flat-out lies, hate, and fear mongering. What he wants is control and he achieves that by weaponizing humanity’s worst traits and using them to brainwash the populace and plunging the world into dystopian chaos.

At first, Wilhelm’s strangely familiar-feeling and deliberately matter-of-fact writing style, peppered with many clever twists of phrase, seems to capture the spirit of Ray Bradbury or an episode of the Twilight Zone. What we get, instead, is a riveting and decidedly tragic tale of First Contact gone awry in a world populated by an almost irredeemable cast of humans.

Wilhelm’s courage and ambitiousness in attempting to capture the vile side of human nature is admirable. Still, even a forward thinking and imaginative author such as herself cannot seem to escape the discriminatory views of our time. Let the Fire Fall perpetuates the sexist view that women must be submissive to men and even the women important to the plot are given no initiative to steer their own destinies. While Wilhelm is progressive enough to acknowledge the existence of homosexuals, the way she characterizes homosexuality as one of the “vices” permitted by the villainous Obie Cox’s vaunted religion suggests a personal disapproval of such individuals. (To be fair, what her characters feel, even the "good" ones, doesn't necessarily reflect Wilhelm's feelings on a subject.)

In any wise, Let the Fire Fall is an excellently written novel. The author’s insight and ability to imagine a dark future, all too possible, are incredible. I love this book but I hated reading it. The way it mirrors our current reality where opportunistic charlatans have risen to political power by preying on the gullibility of the American populace fills me with trepidation. Let the Fire Fall is an insidiously horrifying and damning condemnation of the human race. This book will make you squirm and fret about the world as we know it, and the future of our species. You will not feel comfortable reading this book. You should not.

4 out of 5 stars.



by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier

House on the Strand by Daphne Du Maurier 1969 hardback cover from 1969
cover by Flavia Tower

Daphne du Maurier has been a favourite of mine for a long while. I read Rebecca in my teens and have slowly been building up a collection of her writings. However, she has only had one truly SFnal release to date, the marvellous collection The Apple Tree, most notable for containing the original short story of The Birds.

That was until this year, when she followed in the footsteps of fellow literary darlings Naomi Mitchison and Virginia Woolf and put out a book on a mainstay of science fiction, time travel.

Dick Young goes down to visit his old university friend Professor Magnus Lane in Cornwall. Dick agrees to be the test subject of the Professor’s new alchemical invention and finds himself transported back in time to the era of Edward III’s infancy. The story follows Dick and Magnus’ trips back and forth between the 14th and 20th centuries.

What Du Maurier always does well is give a real sense of atmosphere to her tales. As is usual in her books Cornwall takes on the mysterious atmosphere of Bronte’s Yorkshire and Doyle’s Dartmoor: a strange wild place where anything can happen. She also illustrates well the sense of dislocation Dick feels moving between the periods, making him feel like an outsider in both.

Tom's Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce cover from 1958.
Cover by Susan Einzig

And yet, I don’t feel like it did anything particularly new or interesting here. The children’s book Tom’s Midnight Garden explores similar themes better for me. Also, in spite of the period being underserved in historical narratives, I didn’t feel like I gained much more insight or understanding of it than I would have done from an encyclopedia summary.

This almost reads like one of those historical stories that had a touch of added SFnal content to get into the magazines. Of course, that is not the case here (DuMaurier could release her shopping list and it would be a best seller) and this is still a good read, but I did not feel like it is doing anything exceptional nor is it destined to be one of my favourites.

Three Stars

New Writings in S-F 14 ed. By John Carnell

Cover for hardback edition of New Writings in SF-14 ed. by John Carnell

As John Carnell has now edited as many editions of New Writings as Ian Flemming wrote James Bond novels, he is entitled to enjoy himself. As such, he says this volume is entirely composed of stories he personally loved, rather than mixing in some he knew were good but not to his taste. But how much do my feelings ally with his?

Blood Brother by James White
We start with the always reliable James White with another tale of Sector General.

Following on from Vertigo, a team is returning with Surreshun to “Meatball” to assess the species' medical needs and to locate the manufacturers of their responsive organic tools. Unfortunately, the native entities of the planet believe that Surreshun was kidnapped by the crew of the Descartes and are not keen to let this happen again.

This once again is a fascinating exercise from White, trying to imagine a wholly alien species from our understanding and the problems it could cause. The natives of “Meatball” have an inbuilt dislike of anything similar to themselves and have no central form of government but exist in a deep layer of animal life. How to communicate ideas like friendship to a species like that is a true challenge.

What White is always great at is giving us a sense of how diverse the species in the Galactic Federation are, whilst still making it seem like an everyday occurrence at the hospital. For example:

Despite the fact that one species was covered in thick silver fur and crawled like a giant caterpillar and the other resembled a six-legged elephant, they were fairly easy to deal with because they had the same atmosphere and gravity requirements as Conway. But he was also responsible for a small ward of Hudlars, beings with hide like flexible armour plate whose artificial gravity system was set at five Gs and whose atmosphere was a dense high-pressure fog – and the odd-ball TLTU classification entity hailing from he knew not where who breathed superheated steam. It took more than a few hours to tidy up such a collection of loose ends…

He continues to know what he does well and produces the most consistently strong series currently ongoing in Science Fiction.

Four Stars

If You're So Smart by Paul Corey

Ibby has a mental disability and suffers from regular seizures, so lives permanently at a mental hospital. He also helps out in the animal testing lab. However, he may be able to understand the animals better than the scientists.

A pedestrian tale, poorly told. Whilst I have heard that Corey is an American writer and journalist of some renown, I am only familiar with him from his awful appearance in New Worlds earlier in the decade. Apparently he has an SF novel out from Robert Hale but this isn’t inspiring me to pick it up.

A low Two Stars

The Ballad of Luna Lil by Sydney J. Bounds
Gerard The Rhymer wrote The Ballad of Luna Lil many centuries ago. This work analyses the historical accuracy of the tale to the real life of Captain Bartholomew “Black Bart” Sparrow, a space free trader, and Lily La Lune, singing star of the videos.

I am a great lover of analyses of fictional works and this one doesn’t disappoint. It turns what could be a standard pulpy adventure into an exploration of a fictional universe, containing fascinating ideas and raising questions about the power of art.

A high Four Stars

The Eternity Game by Vincent King
In a tale told from four perspectives (A, G, P & Z), two different species find themselves in the Place, attempting to survive in their collapsing galaxy.

We learn from the introduction that Vincent King is also a visual artist and Carnell describes this work as being like an abstract painting. I am not sure I agree with that, it is certainly not as obscure as some of the writings of Ballard, Burroughs, or Farmer. Rather, you have a puzzle that fits together by the end.

I don’t think it is quite as effective as his usual Medieval Futurism, but still a worthy piece.

Four Stars

Tilt Angle by R. W. Mackelworth
The Earth has entered a new Ice Age, and Tomas and Donna are sent on a mission from the City to find food stores. But is this parasitic existence right or sustainable?

Another one of these Frozen Earth tales that have been popping up a lot recently in the UK (we do like to moan about the weather). Whilst evocatively told, it feels abrupt and incomplete. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw further stories in this world.

Three Stars

The Song of Infinity by Domingo Santos
Once again we have a work in translation, this time from a Spanish author. He is apparently well known in his own country but I am not aware of any prior translations into English. This one was selected and translated by the late great Arthur Sellings.

We get the internal monologue of an astronaut who finds himself accidentally floating through space without any hope of rescue.

This is a well told and melancholic tale but one that nevertheless didn’t really affect me as much as I felt it was trying to.

Three Stars

Green Five Renegade by M. John Harrison
Astronaut of the Green 5, Chad Redeem, encounters alien life forms. Discovering them to be naïve and peaceful compared to the human race, he goes on the run rather than risk his knowledge of them becoming known to the authorities.

Oh dear, I am not sure what happened here. Even putting aside some weird printing errors, it is overwritten, cliché driven and full of creepy descriptions of women. I know Harrison can do a lot better so I am surprised to see this come from his pen.

One Star

So, the good ship New Writings continues steadily on its course. Some good works, some poorer, still generally very much in Carnell’s usual mode. Much the same crew manning the rigging with nary a woman in sight*. Whilst it may not always be the most exciting voyage, it shows little signs of leakage. Onward!

*I believe it has now been over 5 years since Carnell published a story by a woman, the last being Dial SCH 1828 by Gweneth Penn-Bull in December ‘63’s Science Fantasy.



by Gideon Marcus

Ace Double 72400

The High Hex, by Laurence M. Janifer and S. J. Treibich

Here is the sequel to Target: Terra that nobody asked for.  In this one, the African space station has begun broadcasting a menacing message, all chants and tribal drums, that seems to presage a heating up of the White/Black cold war.  The crew of Space Station 1 are recalled to duty and tasked with infiltrating the second station.  The plot is thickened with robots and destructive aliens, and the Africans aren't the bad guys after all.

If you enjoyed the gaggish and frivolous tone of the first book, you'll like this one.  Otherwise…you won't.

Two stars.

The Rim Gods, by A. Bertram Chandler

If you read and enjoyed the four stories of John Grimes, a space captain running the rim of galactic space, then this is an opportunity to get all of them in one convenient package.  In this fix-up, they are unchanged, with only short concluding scenes added to each piece to link them together.

They all appeared in IF, where David gave them three stars apiece.  I see no reason to change his assessment.



by Victoria Silverwolf

War And No Peace

Two new novels deal with armed conflict, international or domestic.  One takes place in the very recent past, but not the one with which we're familiar.  The other is set in the near future, one we'd like to avoid.  Let's start with something that didn't happen less than two years ago. 

If Israel Lost the War, by Richard Z. Chesnoff, Edward Klein, and Robert Littell


Uncredited cover art.

In the tradition of Bring the Jubilee (1953) by Ward Moore (the Confederacy wins the American Civil War) and The Man in the High Castle (1962) by Philip K. Dick (the Axis wins the Second World War), this book reverses the result of a war. 

The title makes that obvious, of course.  We're talking about the so-called Six Day War (June 5 through 10, 1967), in which Israel triumphed over a coalition of Arab nations.

I know less about military stuff than almost anybody, so I won't try to analyze the war.  However, there seems to be general agreement that Israel's preemptive strike, devastating the Egyptian Air Force and giving Israel complete control over the skies, was a key factor in the victory.

What if Israel didn't attack first?  What if Arab forces destroyed most of Israel's air power instead?

That's the premise of the novel.  The result is overwhelming victory for the Arab nations, with Israel's territory soon being divided up among them.


The book's map, showing the progress of the imagined conflict.

The occupying forces initiate a reign of terror.  As in many wars, looting, rape, and murder follow the victory.  The big winner is Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, who dominates his allies and intends to create a new, bigger United Arab Republic.

(The UAR was the name given to the union of Egypt and Syria from 1958 to 1961.  The United Arab Republic is still the official name of the nation better known as Egypt.)

As I said, I'm no expert on war, so I don't know how plausible this scenario might be.  It assumes closely coordinated action among the Arab states, which is questionable.  It also presumes that Arab aircraft would be able to bypass Israel's early warning defense system.  (There are even some lines in the book that indicate that this is unlikely.)

So how is the book as a work of fiction?  Well, given the fact that the three authors are journalists (all working for Newsweek), it's no surprise that it reads like nonfiction.  There are a few minor fictional characters, but all the major ones are real people.  We follow politicians and military leaders from Israel, the Arab nations, the USA, and the USSR. 

The work is obviously very pro-Israel.  (Richard Z. Chesnoff is married to an Israeli woman, and used to live on a kibbutz.) Whether one sees the book as reasoned justification for Israel's preemptive strike, or as anti-Arab propaganda, it is sure to stir up controversy.  Judged strictly on its literary merits, I'd have to say that it's readable enough.  The authors are definitely more interested in getting their message across than in creating a work of art.

Three stars.

The Jagged Orbit, by John Brunner

Let's turn from an imaginary past to a speculative future.


Cover art by Diane and Leo Dillion.

The race problem in the United States is much worse in the year 2014 than it was in our own time.  Some cities (Detroit, Washington, etc.) are under the control of kneeblanks, while others are still firmly dominated by blanks.

Oh, you're not familiar with those terms?  Maybe it'll help if I point out that blank is derived from the Afrikaans word blanc (white) and that kneeblank (often just knee) comes from nieblanc (not white.)

This is a sample of the book's futuristic terminology, which takes some time to get used to.  It's not as difficult as the slang in A Clockwork Orange (1962) by Anthony Burgess, but it requires a little effort.

Anyway, ordinary citizens are forced to defend themselves with serious weapons, supplied by arms dealers.  The dominant supplier of deadly devices is a family-run corporation that resembles the Mafia.

That's the background.  What about the story?  Well, it's complicated.  There are a lot of important characters and a lot of plot threads.  Let me try to come up with a greatly oversimplified synopsis.

There's a psychiatric institute under the direction of a megalomaniac who treats his patients with extreme isolation from society.  One of the inmates is a kneeblank soldier who suffered a breakdown in war, but who now seems perfectly sane.  In fact, he's an electronics genius.

A woman who produces enigmatic prophecies while under the influence of drugs (as in ancient times, she's called a pythoness) performs at the institute.  A fellow who exposes scandals on television (the book calls him a spoolpigeon) records her act.  He also happens to be married to one of the patients.

Meanwhile, a kneeblank spoolpigeon gets kicked out of Detroit by the city's kneeblank mayor, at the instigation of a blank South African.  (The tragic situation of apartheid is still going strong in 2014.)

In addition to that, a kneeblank revolutionary who put kneeblanks in control of much of the United Kingdom is on his way to the United States.  Even though US officials are terrified of him, he easily gets through customs.

What does this all have to do with a secret project of the arms dealers?  Suffice to say that the kneeblank soldier I mentioned above isn't what he seems to be.

I've only given you a vague hint of what the novel is like.  In addition to the convoluted plot, there's the narrative style.  The first two chapters, for example, consist of a single word split into two parts.  Many of the chapter titles are very long and often satiric.  In the middle of the book, Brunner provides quotes from real newspaper articles about the American race problem.

The climax involves science fiction themes that are more speculative than those found earlier in the book.  These may strain the reader's suspension of disbelief.

This novel isn't as groundbreaking as the author's stunning masterwork Stand on Zanzibar, but it's pretty close in quality.

Four stars.



by David Levinson

A Familiar Refrain

In music, it’s common for artists to cover an old standard or just something someone else has already done. Usually, they have a different approach that may be about the same, worse, or better. Once in a while, they’ll take an old song and make entirely their own (Jimi Hendrix and Frank Sinatra have a singular talent for this).

There’s a similar phenomenon in science fiction. Someone comes up with an interesting idea—time travel, alien invasion, what have you—and eventually almost everybody tries to see what they can do with the concept. Harry Harrison’s latest novel is just such a work. How well did he do?

Captive Universe, by Harry Harrison

Art by Paul Lehr

Two Aztec villages lie on either side of a river in a valley long isolated from the outside world. We soon learn that things are not as they seem. The serpent-headed goddess Coatlicue is a physical presence that stalks the river bank at night, and typical Aztec features include blonde hair and blue eyes.

Into this world is born Chimal, a young man with a penchant for asking uncomfortable questions. When he inadvertently causes the death of the high priest (and the sun fails to rise, because there is no one to say the necessary prayer), Chimal must flee the valley. The society he finds outside the valley is no less hidebound and no fonder of questions with uncomfortable answers.

Although I’ve talked around it for the benefit of those who would like to experience the surprise on their own, I suspect many of you have figured out what’s going on. Although Harrison adds one or two interesting flourishes, the novel follows the expected course to one of the standard endings. Indeed, the story follows such a predictable course, I found myself more interested in what happened centuries earlier to create the situation or what is going to happen a few decades after the end.

Is it worth your time? Maybe. Is it worth your money? Definitely not, especially not at hardback prices.

Three stars, but not recommended.



by Brian Collins

Spacepaw, by Gordon R. Dickson


Cover art by Leon Gregori.

Dickson has been busy as of late, with his serial Wolfling currently running in Analog, and with a new paperback original alongside it. Spacepaw is a less serious novel and seems to be aimed at a younger readership, which is fine by me. It takes place on Dilbia, the same planet featured in Dickson's 1961 novel Special Delivery. Like that earlier novel it features the Dilbians, a race of nine-foot-tall bear-like aliens who are not exactly hostile but who certainly have a curious way of going about things.

Bill Waltham is an agriculture scientist sent to Dilbia, supposedly to meet up with Lafe Greentree, his on-site superior, and Anita Lyme, a "trainee assistant" working under Greentree. The problem (actually two problems) is that Greentree is not here: he had sustained an injury whose severity the off-planet hospital is strangely vague about disclosing, and Anita has been taken captive by a pack of Dilbian outlaws. The only possible help Waltham can get are the mischievous Dilbian the Hill Bluffer (that's his name, the Hill Bluffer) and a Hemnoid named Mula-ay (italics not mine). The Hill Bluffer is not terribly useful and Mula-ay seems to be working for a third party—in Waltham's favor or not remains to be seen.

This novel is basically a comedy of manners. To rescue Lyme and convince the Dilbians to pick up agricultural skills (the race is a rural lot that lives off the fat o' the land), Waltham will have to adapt to Dilbian customs. The black-furred giants are a comical lot, with silly names like More Jam, Perfectly Delightful, and Grandpa Squeaky; they even give Waltham a Dilbian name, "Pick-and-Shovel," which the serious-minded human does not appreciate. The leader of the outlaws, Bone Breaker, is pretty affable despite his name and occupation. The stakes are kept somewhat low, even when Waltham is duped into accepting a duel to the death, which is fitting for a comedy, even if doesn't leave the reader with much to think about.

Dickson's brand of humor is unlikely to spark laughter, but it's effective at often invoking a smirk. Waltham himself is a bit of a wet blanket, but the comedy mostly stems from this straight-laced hero type being forced to deal with some deeply unserious aliens. Lyme is a bit of a shrew, but Dickson does write her as competent and independent-minded, even if I suspect he does not think very highly of her.

A solid three out of five stars, possibly four for young readers.

The Tormented, by Dorothy Daniels


Cover art by Jerome Podwil.

A good deal less enjoyable is a new Gothic horror novel I picked up, by an author I've never heard of before. Despite having been published this year, The Tormented reads like a fossilized dinosaur, but not one of the interesting ones. It's a pastiche of late-19th century supernatural horror. I'm sure Daniels likes Henry James and Arthur Conan Doyle, but unfortunately she is not remotely as good a wordsmith as James or even Doyle.

Sharon Aldrich lived on a New Orleans plantation called The Pillars until both her parents died, and it turns out all the money had dried up. After a stint or two abroad she returns to The Pillars as governess for a new family that's moved in, the Beaumonts. Craig Beaumont and his wife Emily are stuck in a loveless marriage while Emily's sister, Sarah, tags along as a third wheel. Cassie, Craig's daughter, is a reasonably well-adjusted child despite the fact that she had witnessed a horrific death in the family not long ago. And there seems to be a ghost problem on the plantation. The place is most certainly haunted (it takes all of about five minutes upon Sharon's arriving for a ghost to start whispering in her ear), and worse yet, Sharon must now deal with a dysfunctional upper-class family.

You would think that at only 160 pages this would be a densely packed narrative, but it's not. There's quite a bit of padding. Most of the wordage is dialogue, with characters often getting into arguments with each other and then almost immediately apologizing for causing a fuss. Emily and Sarah are major shrews, and Sharon is not much better. It soon becomes clear Sharon and Craig like each other but are hesitant to take action, what with the whole marriage thing. Even the ghost does not pose much of a threat. No wonder the Confederacy lost. The Tormented is probably a few thousand words longer than James's The Turn of the Screw, but feels shorter because it spins its wheels so often. Not much actually happens, and despite the New Orleans setting Daniels injects practically no atmosphere into her writing.

The most damning part is that this is 1969, not 1889. I kept thinking, "Why play such an old and tired genre straight? What point is Daniels trying to make by doing this?" After having read the whole thing, I still don't know.

Two out of five stars.




[January 14, 1969] Ten for the road (January Galactoscope)


by Gideon Marcus

We've got a whopping ten titles for you to enjoy this month.  Part of it is the increased pace of paperback production.  Part is the increased number of Journey reviewers on staff!  Enjoy:

Double, Double, by John Brunner

From the author of Stand on Zanzibar, and also a lot of churned-out mediocrity, comes this mid-length novel. Can it reach the sublimity of last year's masterpiece, or is it a rent-payer? Let's see.

The band "Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition" (great name, that) have a bit of a Be-in on a deserted beach south of London. Their frivolity is marred by the appearance of a flight-suited zombie, half his face eaten away.

Strange happenings compound: the lushy Mrs. Beedle, who lives in a wreck of a home by the beach, suddenly starts appearing in two places at once. Those who encounter her find themselves doused with some kind of acid. Meanwhile, Rory, a DJ on the pirate radio ship Jolly Roger, hauls up a fish on his line that transforms halfway into a squid before breaking free.

The local constabulary, as well as the scientific types in the vicinity, are increasingly alarmed and then mobilized, as the true nature of what they're dealing with is determined: an alien or mutated being with the power to digest and mimic anything it encounters.

In premise, it's thus somewhat akin to Don A. Stuart's (John W. Campbell Jr.) seminal "Who Goes There". In execution, it's not. The rather thin story is developed glacially, with lots of slice-of-life scenes that are not unpleasant to read, but don't add much. Indeed, one could argue that it is possible to unbalance things too far in the direction of "show, don't tell"—Double, Double is written almost like a screenplay, with endless little cliff-hangers, and always from the point of view of the various characters.

Beyond the writing, the premise is fundamentally flawed: digestion is never 100% efficient. Heck, I don't think it's 10% efficient. And this creature can not only digest but duplicate, down to memories? Color me unconvinced. Also, we are lucky that it chose to come to land as quickly as it did—if it had just stayed in the sea, all of the sea life in the world would have been these… things… in very short order.

All told, this is definitely a piece written for the cash grab, perhaps even a recycled, rejected script for the TV anthology Journey to the Unknown. It's not a bad piece of writing, but I'll be donating it to my local book shop when I'm done.

Three stars.



by Brian Collins

For my first book reviews as part of the Journey, I got some SF and fantasy in equal measure. Neither are really worth it, but here we can see the difference between a deeply flawed novel and one that is virtually impossible to salvage.

Omnivore, by Piers Anthony

I know it’s only been a few months since Piers Anthony hit us with his second novel, Sos the Rope, but he has already given us another with Omnivore. That’s three novels in two years! For all his faults, you can’t say he’s lazy. It’s quite possible that in thirty years there will be more Piers Anthony novels than there are stars in the sky.

Omnivore is a planetary adventure, not dissimilar from what Hal Clement or Poul Anderson would write, but with some of those “lovable” Anthony quirks. Here’s the gist: A superhuman agent named Subble is sent to investigate three explorers who have returned to Earth from the “dangerous but promising” planet Nacre, each with his/her trauma and secrets as to what happened. Why did eighteen people die while exploring Nacre prior to these three, and what did they bring back with them? There’s Veg, who as his nickname suggests is a vegetarian; Aquilon, an emotionally fraught woman who now has a case of shell shock; and Cal, gifted with a brilliant intellect but cursed with a frail body. Veg and Cal love Aquilon and Aquilon loves both men. Romantic tension ensues. Anthony pulled a similar love triangle in Sos the Rope, but for what it's worth this one is not quite as painful.

Nacre itself is the star of the show, and it would not surprise me if Anthony were to return to this setting in the future. It’s a fungus-rich planet in which the land is covered in an unfathomable amount of “dust”—spores from airborne fungi. There’s so much airborne fungi, in fact, that the sun has been more or less blocked out, and the animal life has adapted not only to low-light conditions but to move about with only one (big) eye and one limb. Clement would have surely treated this material with more scientific enthusiasm, but Clement sadly is no longer producing his best work and this novel is a serviceable substitute for the not-too-discerning.

Omnivore is Anthony’s best novel to date; unfortunately it’s still not good. There are two crippling problems here. The first is that Anthony simply cannot help himself when it comes to writing women unsympathetically, and the first section of the novel (there are four, each focusing on a different character) is the worst. Veg, while heroic, is unfortunately a woman-hater. I don’t necessarily have an issue with characters having unsavory flaws, but the problem is that this dim view of women bleeds into the rest of the novel to some degree. It should come as no surprise that Aquilon, the sole female character, is also the only one driven purely by emotions as opposed to intellect. Subble himself may as well be a robot, but Anthony writes him as a human so that he can a) take drugs, and b) seduce Aquilon.

The second is that it’s clear that this novel is About Things, but I can’t figure out what those Things could be. There is obvious symbolism at work. The trio of explorers play off of elements (herbivore/carnivore/omnivore, brains/brawn/beauty, and so on), but I’m not sure what statement is being made here. This is especially glaring in a year where we got many SF novels that are About Things; indeed 1968 might’ve been the year of SF novels that try to say Something Very Important. Omnivore might’ve been fine in the hands of a Clement or Anderson, but rather than be true to itself (an Analog-style adventure yarn), it has delusions of importance. It doesn’t help that Anthony gives us a puzzle narrative, but then takes seemingly forever to tell us what the puzzle actually is. The solution, thus, is unsatisfying.

At the rate he’s progressing, Anthony may be able to pen a decent novel in another few years. Two out of five stars, maybe three if it had caught me in a very forgiving mood.

Swordmen of Vistar, by Charles Nuetzel


Cover by Albert Nuetzell

Now we have the latest in what's proving to be an avalanche of heroic fantasy releases, and this one is simply painful to read. We know something is amiss just from looking at the title; to my recollection Nuetzel never used "swordman" or "swordmen" in the novel itself, which leads me to wonder what he could've been thinking. The writing between the covers is no less clumsy.

Thoris is a galley slave, in an ancient world not far off from the mythical Greece of Perseus and Pegasus, when he and the princess Illa find themselves possibly the only survivors of a shipwreck. Thoris falls in love with Illa before the two have even had a full conversation together. They first arrive at an island of cannibals before escaping, only to fall into the clutches of the tyrannical Lord Waja and his sword(s)men of Vistar. Also imprisoned is the wizard Xalla, who is father to a woman named Opil whom Thoris had saved earlier. With no other options, Thoris makes a deal with Xalla to vanquish Waja and then free the wizard—on the ultimate condition that Thoris also take Opil as his bride.

The back cover compares Thoris to Conan the Cimmerian and John Carter of Mars, and indeed Swordmen of Vistar is supposed to be a rip-roaring adventure with a damsel in distress, a morally ambiguous wizard, and a giant snake. One problem: the prose is some of the most ungainly I've ever laid eyes on. Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard were not tender in their use of the English language, but they had a real knack for plotting which Nuetzel lacks. This is a 220-page novel and surprisingly little happens in it. I hope you still like love triangles, because this novel also has one. Lord Waja and his top henchmen are defeated by the end of the eleventh chapter, but we still have two more to go with Opil as the final obstacle. We need to pad out this already-short book, obviously.

With how much I've been reading about love triangles, I think God may be telling me to try acquiring a second girlfriend. If I were Thoris I would be stuck with a tough choice. Do I pick the tough-minded woman who clearly appreciates my swordsmanship, or the haughty princess who's been degrading me for much of the novel? Sure, the former threatens to kill me if I refuse her, but nobody's perfect.

By the way, Nuetzel may be excusing the awkward prose by stating in the preface that the Thoris narrative is a translation of an ancient manuscript that some academic had written up and given to him. Unfortunately academics, by and large, are terrible writers with no ear for English, and this shows in the "translation." It doesn't help that yes, this is derivative of the John Carter novels, along with a few other things; and while Robert E. Howard's Conan stories are often About Something, Nuetzel doesn't really have anything to say. If you've read hackwork in this genre then the good news is that you've already read Swordmen of Vistar, and so can save yourself the trouble of buying a copy.

Basically worthless, although the illustrations (courtesy of Albert Nuetzell) are at least decent. One out of five stars.



by Jason Sacks

The Star Venturers by Kenneth Bulmer

Bill Jarrett is a galactic adventurer, a man who spans the stars to find excitement, glory and money. He’s a flirt and a fighter and the kind of guy who can work himself out of situations. But when Jarrett gets abducted, has a mind-controlling creature strapped to his head, and is sent to overthrow a man who he’s told is a dictator, Jarrett finds himself in a situation he might not be able to win.

Well, yeah, of course, Jarrett does end up winning in the situation he finds himself in, with the help of his friends and a few mechanical contrivances. Because of course he does. As a galactic adventurer, that’s what you might expect from him.

The Star Venturers is an entertaining Ace novel, a quickie star-spanner with a handful of ideas which might stick to your brain. Author Kenneth Bulmer occasionally throws in a small element of satire or self-awareness which enlivens the plot; there’s a bit of a feeling of the author kind of winking at us as he tells this story. But there’s not nearly enough of that stuff to make this book stand out.

Bulmer does play a bit with an interesting concept, the sort of self-learning machine, a kind of artificially intelligent creature called a frug (which Jarrett nicknames Ferdie the Frug) which is placed on a person’s forehead like a headband and which compels the person to follow orders lest they feel horrific agony.

Mr. Bulmer with his wife Pamela

Bulmer takes pains to imply that the device is both mechanical and semi-sentient, a kind of uncaring vicious machine which Jarrett sometimes reasons with and almost treats like a pet – if the pet was a giant tumor which could only cause pain, that is. This idea of artificial intelligence dates back at least to the first robot stories, but the author gives the idea a fresh coat of paint here, and that concept is a real highlight for me.

Other than that, this is a pretty basic space fantasy Ace novel, which is entertaining for its two hour reading time but which will have you quickly flipping over to read the novel by Dean Koontz on the other side. At least it’s not About Things or Very Important. Instead The Star Venturers is just forgettable.

2.5 stars

The Fall of the Dream Machine by Dean Koontz

On the other hand, the flip side of this Ace Double is pretty memorable. Dean R. Koontz, an author new to me, has delivered a fascinating satire of a world which is easy to imagine and just as easy to dread.

In the near future, post apocalyptic America, television rules our world. All the people in America live for a special show which all can experience viscerally. That TV show, called The Show, has seven hundred million subscribers. Those subscribers watch a continuing story, kind of a soap opera, about the characters on the screen. But they don't just watch the characters, they also feel the same emotions as the characters. They feel empathy and pain for the characters. In a real way the characters and viewers are bonded.

Because the actors are so well known, so much a part of their audience's lives, even the act of replacing an actor can be tremendously fraught with stress and worry. The act of leaving The Show can be freeing but also terrifying. And when lead actor Mike Jorgova leaves The Show, it makes his life much more complicated. He becomes untethered, is trained to become part of a revolution, and discovers the deeper frightening truths behind a world he scarcely understood.

Young author Dean Koontz delivers a clever and exciting story which shows tremendous potential. He does an excellent job of creating his world in relatively few words, delivering character in just a few broad strokes and creating memorable villains and settings. The end action set-piece, for instance, is built with real suspense and ends with a thrilling struggle which is filled with energy.

Dean Koontz

Along with that aspect, young Mr. Koontz delivers two more elements which separate this book from many of its peers.

First, he paints a fascinating future which seems like a smart extension of McLuhan's concept that "the medium is the message." Koontz creates a TV show which feels like reality, in which the characters live in some semblance of real life while engaging in exaggerated, bizarre actions. That's a concept which feels all the more possible these days, with controversies about the Smothers Brothers and Vietnam dominating headlines about television in 1969.

Koontz also delivers a series of philosophical asides which discuss human evolution from village to society and the ways mass media both shrinks the world and expands our horizons. Nowadays we know everything about people who live across the world but nothing about the people who live next door to us, and that gap only promises to get wider. As our social networks grow, the strengths of our connections only shrink.

This is heady stuff for an Ace Double – and I've only touched on a few of the many ideas shared almost to overflowing here. In fact, the book is chockablock full of ideas but the ambition is a bit high for their achievement.  Like many a new author, Koontz has many, many ideas he wants to explore but there are a few too many on display. Nevertheless, despite its thematic density, The Fall of the Dream Machine reads like a rocketship, hurtling ahead until it lands gracefully, sharing a thrilling journey for the readers.

Keep your eye on Mr. Koontz. I predict great things from him.

3.5 stars.



by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Frontier of Going: An Anthology of Space Poetry, ed. By John Fairfax

Frontier of Going 1969 Cover

Poetry has always had a strange place in science fiction. Long before appearing in Hugo Gernsbeck’s magazines, poets have been attempting to explore fantastic themes. However, in spite of their regular presence in almost every SFF periodical, and many fanzines, they rarely seemed to be talked about, nor are they represented in either the Nebulas or the Hugos (although we here give out Galactic Stars to them).

Enter John Fairfax and Panther publishing, who have put together this anthology of responses to the space age. The selection inside is varied. Some are original and some are reprints. Some are SFnal, some are fantastical, others closer to reality. And, as the editor puts it:

Some poets are optimistic about the space odyssey, others view it with cynicism…and other poets do not care if man steps into space or the nearest bar so long as human relations begin with fornication and end with death.

As this book contains almost 50 separate pieces, I cannot hope to cover them all here; rather I want to give an overview and highlight some of the best.

Possibly due to my natural cynicism, Leslie Norris’ poems were among my favorites. He is willing to engage deeply with the future, but believes the same problems we have down here will continue there. For example, in Space Miner we hear of the fate of those travelling to distant worlds for such a job:

He had worked deep seams where encrusted ore,
Too hard for his diamond drill, had ripped
Strips from his flesh. Dust from a thousand metals
Stilted his lungs and softened the strength of his
Muscles. He had worked the treasuries of many
Near stars, but now he stood on the moving
pavement reserved for cripples who had served well.

Just a small part of one of his moving poems that raise interesting questions about where we are headed.

Closely related is John Moat’s Overture I. His works concentrate less on the science fiction but still wonder if we are heading in the right direction:

That twelve years’ Jane pacing outside the bar,
Offering anything for her weekly share
Of tea; those rats now grown immune to death –
I ask you, in whose name and by what power
Have you set out to colonize the stars?

This is only an extract and continues in that fashion. It ponders if what we are bringing to other planets is something they would care for.

Not all are so negative. Some, instead, write about the wonder and artistic possibilities of space travel. Robert Conquest (who SF fans may know from his anthologies or short fiction in Analog) produces a Stapledon-esque epic among the stars in Far Out:

While each colour and flow
Psychedelicists know
As Ion effects
Quotidian sights
Of those counterflared nights.

Yet Conquest still asks within, what is the value of these views to the artist? A complex piece for sure.

There are probably only two other names you have a reasonable chance of recognizing inside: D. M. Thomas and Peter Redgrove, both for their occasional appearances in the British Mags. As you might expect these are among the most explicitly science fictional. For example, in Limbo Thomas gives us a kind of verse version of The Cold Equations, whilst Redgrove’s pieces are trains of thoughts of two common character types of SFF.

However, it should not be thought others have written repetitively on the theme. These poems include such diverse topics as the difficulties of copulation in space, how to serve tea on a space liner, the first computer to be made an Anglican bishop, and explorers getting absorbed into a gestalt entity.

The biggest disappointment for me are the poems from the editor. It is to be expected Fairfax would have a number of pieces inside but, unfortunately, they are among the most pedestrian. For example, his Space Walk:

Around, around in freefall thought
The clinging cosmo-astronaut,
Awkward and expensive star
Dogpaddles from his spinning car.

The poem has nothing inherently wrong with it, but it does not feel insightful, nor does it do anything experimental. It more feels like what would win a middle-school poetry competition on the Space Race. Probably deserving of a low three stars but little more.

I feel, at least in passing, I need to point out we have the recurring problem of the British scene. In spite of the number of poems contained within, none of the poets appears to be woman. There are no shortage of women poets, either in the mainstream or within the fanzines, so I find it hard to believe there were no good pieces available. Hopefully, this can be remedied in a future volume. The Second Frontier, perhaps?

Either way, this is still a fabulous collection. Of course, it will not be for everyone. Poetry is probably the most subjective form of literature, and not everyone likes to sit down to read more than forty poems in a row. However, the selection here is a cut above what we tend to see from our regular science fiction writers (looking at you, de Camp and Carter) and I hope it helps raise the form to higher standards and recognition.

Four Stars for the whole anthology with a liberal sprinkling of fives for the poems I have called out.



by Victoria Silverwolf

The Four Seasons

Four new novels suggest the seasons, at least for those of us living in the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. Let's start with the traditional beginning of the year, as opposed to our modern January.

Springtime of Life

Spring is associated with youth. Our first novel is narrated by a teenager, and is obviously intended for readers of that age.

The Whistling Boy, by Ruth M. Arthur


Cover art by Margery Gill, who also supplies several interior illustrations.

The first thing you see when you open the book is musical notation. The melody is said to be a very old French tune, and it plays a major part in the plot.


Those of you who can read music may be able to whistle along with the boy.

Christina, known as Kirsty, is a schoolgirl whose mother died a while ago. Her father remarried, this time to a much younger woman. Like many stepchildren, Kirsty resents her.

An opportunity to escape the awkward situation for a while comes when Kirsty gets a job picking fruit in Norfolk. She moves away from her home in Suffolk and lives with a kindly elderly couple.

Strange things start to happen when she hears music coming from an empty room next to her attic bedroom. She meets a local boy who experienced amnesia and sleepwalking when he stayed in the house. More alarmingly, he almost drowned when he walked toward the sea in a trance.

In addition to this mystery, which involves the supernatural, there are multiple subplots. Kirsty has to learn to get along with her young stepmother. A schoolfriend has no father, an alcoholic mother, smokes, admits to having tried marijuana, and is later arrested for shoplifting. One of her two young brothers suffers an accident.

Despite all this going on, and a dramatic climax, the novel is rather leisurely. The author captures the voice of her young narrator convincingly, and never writes down to her readers. There's a love story involved, and the book might be thought of as a Gothic Romance for teenage girls. In addition to this target audience, adults and even boys are likely to get some pleasure from it.

Three stars (maybe four for teenyboppers.)

The Long, Hot Summer

Our next book takes its characters into a place of tropical heat.

Genesis Two, by L. P. Davies


Cover art by Kenneth Farnhill.

Two young men are hiking when they get lost in a storm. They wind up in a tiny village with only a handful of people living there. It seems that a dam under construction is going to flood the place, so most folks have moved out.

They spend the night in the home of an elderly couple whose son was killed in World War Two. (That may not seem relevant, but it plays a part in the plot.) The other inhabitants of the doomed village are an ex-military man, his adult son and daughter, a somewhat shady fellow, and the former showgirl who lives with him.

Things get weird when this quiet English village develops a tropical climate overnight. Bizarre plants, some like hot air balloons and some like birds, show up. The surrounding countryside changes into a land of earthquakes and volcanoes. What the heck happened?

We soon find out that people from a time thousands of years from now use time travel to transport folks hundreds of thousands of years into the future. Why? Because the future people face an all-encompassing disaster, and want to start human life all over again in the extreme far future.

(They only select folks in the past who were going to be wiped out of history anyway. The village was just about to be buried under a huge landslide, leaving no evidence behind.)

The rest of the book shows our reluctant time travelers exploring, figuring out a way to survive, and fighting among themselves. The two young women pair up with a couple of the men, but not in the way you might expect.

Near the end, the plot turns into a murder mystery, which seems a little odd. The conclusion is something of a deus ex machina. Otherwise, it's an OK read. The characters are interesting.

Three stars.

Autumn Memories

Fall is a time of nostalgia and anticipation. We gaze at the past, and ponder the future. Our next book features a lead character who has a lot to look back on, and plenty to concern him coming up.

Isle of the Dead, by Roger Zelazny


Cover art by Diane and Leo Dillon.

The book takes its title from a famous painting by 19th century Swiss artist Arnold Böcklin.


The artist created several versions of the work. This is one of them.

Francis Sandow, our narrator, started off as a man of our own time. (There are hints that he fought in Vietnam, or at least somewhere in Southeast Asia.) He went on to travel on starships in a state of suspended animation, so he is still alive many centuries from now. In fact, he's one of the wealthiest people in the galaxy.

(Some of this is deduction on my part. The narrator only offers bits and pieces of his life throughout the text. The same might be said about the book's complex background. The author makes the reader work.)

Francis made his fortune by creating planets as an art form. If that isn't god-like enough for you, he's also an avatar of an alien deity, one of many in their pantheon. It's unclear if this is a manifestation of psychic power or a genuine case of possession. The mixing of religion and science in an ambiguous fashion is reminiscent of the Zelazny's previous novel Lord of Light.

Somebody sends Francis new photographs of friends, enemies, lovers, and a wife, all of whom have been dead for a very long time. He also gets a message from an ex-lover (still alive) stating that she is in serious trouble.

This sets him off on an odyssey to multiple planets, as he tracks down an unknown enemy. Along the way, he participates in the death ritual of his alien mentor. The climax takes place on the Isle of the Dead, a place he created on one of his planets as a deliberate imitation of Böcklin's painting.

The bare bones of the plot fail to convey the exotic mood of the book, or Zelazny's style. His writing is informal at times; in other places, he uses extremely long, flowing sentences you can get lost in.

As I've suggested, this novel requires careful reading. Stuff gets mentioned that you won't understand until later, so be patient. I found it intriguing throughout. If the ending seems a little rushed, that's a minor flaw.

Four stars.

The Winter of Our Discontent

Winter has its own special beauty, but it is often seen as a dismal time. The characters in our final book face a bleak future indeed.

S.T.A.R. Flight, by E. C. Tubb


Uncredited cover art.

About fifty years before the novel begins, aliens arrived on Earth with what seemed to be benevolent intent. Well, you know what they say about Greeks bearing gifts.

The Kaltichs brought longevity treatments and advanced medical techniques that could replace any damaged organ. The catch is that Earthlings have to pay a high price for these things.

There's also the problem of overpopulation. The Kaltichs promised to give humans the secret of instantaneous transportation to a large number of habitable planets. It's been half a century, and we're still waiting.

Because the longevity treatments have to be renewed every ten years, and the Kaltichs deny them to anybody they don't like, Earthlings are subservient to them. We have to call them sire, and punishment with a special whip that inflicts extreme pain follows any transgression.

Our protagonist, Martin Preston, is a secret agent for S.T.A.R., the Secret Terran Armed Resistance. (I guess we're still not over the spy craze, with its love of acronyms.) The agency asks him to imitate a Kaltich and infiltrate one of their centers, which are off limits to humans.

(I should mention here that the Kaltichs are physically identical to Earthlings. That seems unlikely, but it's a plot point and we get an explanation later.)

Because the previous fellow who tried this had his hands cut off and sent back to S.T.A.R., Martin understandably refuses. An incident occurs that changes his mind. With the help of a brilliant female surgeon (who, like most of the women in a James Bond adventure, is gorgeous and sexually available), he sets out on his dangerous mission.

What follows is imprisonment, torture, escape, killings, double crosses, and the discovery of the big secret of the Kaltichs, which you may anticipate. The book is similar to a Keith Laumer slam bang thriller, if a little more gruesome. Hardly profound, but it sure won't bore you.

Three stars.


There you have it, folks. Take ten and enjoy all the new novels coming out. We'll be back next month to help you figure out which ones to put at the top of the pile.




[December 26, 1968] Comfort OK? Looking Forward, Not Backwards New Worlds, January 1969


by Mark Yon

Scenes from England

Hello again.

A recent comment from our leader here at Galactic Journey caused me to pause for thought. As he summed up the year in science fiction, it struck me that we are about to end one year (not that un-obvious, admittedly) and about to begin the last year of the decade, in what must be one of the most significant decades in recent human history.

Personally, the near-end of the decade seems to have crept up on me, but I can’t deny that it has certainly been eventful. Who knows, judging by all the recent activity (e.g. the Apollo missions!) we could be seeing people on the Moon in the next couple of years. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?

Anyway, I digress. My point is that I was suddenly made aware of how much things have changed in the last decade.

Which in a roundabout way brings me to the many changes involving New Worlds in the last few years. The New Worlds of 1968-69 is a very different beast from that of ten years ago. Some will say ‘better’ – more intelligent, more literary, more complex, more adult in nature – whilst others will say ‘worse’ – perhaps summarised as “Where’s my Science Fiction?”

After reading Gideon’s final article of November, I wrote him a letter, noting:

“More seriously, despite my personal grumblings, New Worlds is miles ahead of what the magazine used to be, even if its science-fictional content varies enormously. Much more inner space than outer space these days.

And there’s a whole debate over whether we can count it as an SF magazine any more – many of its older readers think not! – but it is noticeably different to pretty much anything else out there at the moment. I do hope that New Worlds can keep going next year, although it's not entirely certain.

That applies not just to the US but to Britain as well, of course – there is no other magazine to compare it to, as all the others have been cancelled!"

This year exemplified that range of content. In the last issue alone we had, on one hand, the stunning Samuel R. Delany story, Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones, which I am still thinking about, and on the other a story about a man repeatedly raping a paralysed patient and making her pregnant. Talk about eclectic….

Cover by Gabi Nasemann

Anyway, this month’s issue feels like the return of the old guard. Although the cover is in the new format started last month – a strangely coloured but generic photo of two heads, text from one of the main stories within – the roster of authors is mainly the usual. Even these stories are mostly connected to previously published stories… more later.

Lead In by The Publishers

More about the contributors this month: Ballard, Disch, Langdon Jones. They also sneak in an apology for the contents of this issue being different to what was expected due to the Post Office delivering the manuscripts too late for publication. Hmm.

The Tank Trapeze by Michael Moorcock

Last month the magazine declared that Mike Moorcock’s character Jerry Cornelius would continue in future issues by stories written by others, starting with James Sallis’s Jeremiad.

For whatever reason this hasn’t happened, and so we get a story from Jerry’s originator instead, the sixth by my reckoning. And we’re straight into contemporary issues, with assassin-for-hire Jerry being in Czechoslovakia whilst the Russians take over the country. Jerry plays cricket whilst Dubrovnik burns, seduces (or is seduced) by a woman and executes a young boy-monk, who may or may not be important. Memorable, shocking, surreal – a typical Jerry Cornelius story. 4 out of 5.

Anxietal Register B by John T. Sladek

Back in the April 1968 issue Sladek wrote New Forms, an increasingly surreal fictious form. It was amusing and quite popular (I liked it.) As befits the current mood of this issue, if it works once, why not do it again?

This time it is about testing how anxious you are. Mundane responses are encouraged amongst shockingly provocative ones – “Have you ever suffered from: arthritis… rheumatism…homosexual tendencies” etc. It is still amusing, but its impact is diminished as the shock novelty value of the first time is less of a surprise second time. 3 out of 5.

Epilogue for an Office Picnic by Harvey Jacobs

A story in the form of a unrequited love letter between "Bald Mr. X from Data Processing" to "Sherill" – or  Sheril, or Sherrill – the writer isn't sure. An odd tale that's meant to be amusing. I just found it sad. 2 out of 5.

The Summer Cannibals by J. G. Ballard

Ah, J. G. “Chuckles” Ballard. Lots of imitators of late, none really of his ability. After the last few stories by him have underwhelmed me (see The Generations of America in the November 1968 issue), we’re back into a better story of Ballard’s usual observational descriptions of societal bleakness – sex, cars, money, belongings, the American lifestyle. (Anybody else notice how often Ballard’s characters are just walking?)

With its sections of different prose styles, photos and sheer oddness, this is a better piece of work than his last one, although I’m not quite sure about the strange juxtaposition of sex and car parts. (Really. Try reading the section entitled “Elements of an Orgasm”.)

As perplexing yet as iconic as ever, The Summer Cannibals is typical Ballard and therefore welcome, if only to be brought down by the point that this is like Ballard-things we’ve read before and – of course! – another extract of something that will soon be a novel. Does it matter? Echoing the tone of Ballard – not really. Appreciate the style, consider the content. 4 out of 5.

Spiderweb by John Clute

An author we’ve read before, back in the November 1966 issue, but has been very quiet since. This seems to fit the current New Worlds template – a surreal story of love, sex, race and graphic hallucinations, although mainly sex. Vivid imagery. Bug Jack Barron has a lot to answer for by setting a standard for this sort of thing. 3 out of 5.

Article: Sim One by Christopher Evans


The welcome return of Dr. Christopher Evans brings us an interesting article about how close we are to creating a life-like human robot. I think Asimov would be pleased at the progress, but I keep thinking about Philip K. Dick’s stories about simulacra and personally am a little horrified. 4 out of 5.

Hospital of Transplanted Hearts by D. M. Thomas

Erm.. poetry warning. If you’re a regular reader of my reviews, you know my general view on poetry. But perhaps you know more about it than I do, New Worlds reader.

Just to be clear – New Worlds editors really like D. M. Thomas. As in, REALLY like. Declaring the poet to be “without question, one of England’s very best poets” in the Lead In, they like this particular poem so much it is available as a poster, courtesy of Charles Platt.


Here, I’m less enthused. This was the ‘poet’ who wrote that awful Mind Rape poem back in the March issue, after all, but I try not to let that affect me.

Here the poem is like a pick and mix jumble of statements and phrases so you can make up your own as you skip through the Battleships-type grid. It is amusing, but less important than it would like to be. It is certainly not an event on the scale of the Second Coming of the Messiah that New Worlds seem to want to create. (How’s that for a Christmas reference?)

The thing about creative work such as poetry is that people often passionately agree or disagree about such things. This may be a case in point. Others may love it – me, less so. 3 out of 5.

Juan Fortune by Opal Nations

A story in deep homage to Ballard here – broken into sections, with lists of characters WRITTEN IN CAPITAL LETTERS like a play…and (of course!) all about sex. Seems pointless to me. (the prose, not sex!) 2 out of 5.

Ouspenski’s Astrabahn by Brian W, Aldiss

It hurts to write about this one. “The longest part of the Charteris series”, it says in the Lead In, about to be published as a book. As a series I have grown to actively dislike, I have little to say on this one. Yes, it’s clever, and as ever with Aldiss, well written. But at the same time, it’s an incomplete extract of a story that may make little sense if you haven’t read the previous parts and secondly, it degenerates (like some of the previous parts) into a variety of prose styles that I can only politely describe as stylistic gobbledygook.

Does the story, such as it is, make sense? Is it worth my time? In the end I didn’t care about the characters, the setting or the story.

Others will disagree, I’m sure – I’m just pleased that this, whatever it is, is finished, and I can move on (see also Bug Jack Barron earlier this year too.) 2 out of 5.

Book Reviews

J.G. Ballard reviews The Voices of Time by J. T. Frazer in a very Ballardian way, Langdon Jones reviews Silence by John Cage as if it was a questionnaire, John Brunner reviews four psychology books published by Allen Lane, whilst at the same time trying to persuade me that as a reader of science fiction I should read such books (I’m personally not too convinced), and William Barclay reviews Jack Trevor Story’s books, an author I only know because of Hitchcock’s film of his novel, The Trouble With Harry.

It is left to James Cawthorn to review some British science fiction books, although Thomas M. Disch reviews Quicksand by John Brunner. Joyce Churchill (who I believe is a pseudonym for M. John Harrison) briefly reviews a bunch of anthologies and John Brunner’s Stand on Zanzibar. Langdon Jones also gives us the sad news of Mervyn Peake’s recent death, illustrating it with some of Peake’s drawings.

Summing Up

I think Moorcock and his team have been pushed to get an issue out this month. (Perhaps they’ve been Christmas shopping instead?) Whilst Langdon Jones has been away, his absence, not to mention the effect of Post Office delays, as mentioned in the Lead In appears to have led to what feels like an issue cobbled together from remainders from old established authors with nothing really new to say, just finishing off what has already been started.

I realise that some readers may see the issue as a comfort, as in the return of old friends, but to me, it is like a shop clearing the shelves of tired, old stock ready for the new year. The Ballard is entertaining, but even then just a variation on a previous theme. I’ve said on many previous occasions (even last month!) how much I’ve come to dislike Aldiss’s Charteris stories, and it doesn’t help that this conclusion fills up much of the issue. At least the Jerry Cornelius was good.

I know that there are readers that will love both the Ballard and the Aldiss and even D. M. Thomas’s ‘poem’, but not me, sadly. The standard has been raised so much in recent years that it is almost a given now that each issue of New Worlds will surprise, amuse, antagonise and annoy. For the first time in a long time, this issue for me has really let me down.

Really the only good thing I can say about the issue is that at least these series are finished, and as the new year begins, we can look at new material in the future – looking forward, not backward. Rather appropriate for the end of one year and the beginning of the next, I think.
On a more positive note, have a great Christmas, and I look forward to returning next year when (hopefully) I will be less grumpy. “Bah, Humbug!” and so forth.

I'm off to look at the Christmas Radio Times to cheer myself up and see what's worth watching and listening to (Morecambe and Wise?)

Until next time!



[December 10, 1968] Back and forth (January 1969 Galaxy)


by Gideon Marcus

Return to sender

The French economy has been rocky ever since the wave of strikes and protests in May.  As a result, France has been getting more and more goods from its industrial neighbor, West Germany.  The problem is France has to buy German goods in francs, which means that, more and more, francs are ending up in West German hands.  Franc reserves, at $6.9 billion in April 1968, are now down to $4 billion and plummeting.

To forestall a devaluation of the franc (reducing its value, thus making imports more expensive and exports more affordable to other nations, but playing hell with international economic relations in the process), DeGaulle's government is evaluating all sorts of Hail Mary options to stabilize the economy.  One that was rejected was the West German offer to invest directly in the French economy, which would leave them too in control of French assets (including the dwindling franc supply!) A proposal that was adopted was an increase in vehicle fuel costs; I gather fuel production is nationalized, and the government can't afford to sell it so cheaply.

But a sadder development involves the French post office-letters written to Santa Claus will no longer be answered.  Previously, kids who wrote to St. Nick got a colorful postcard with a message of Christmas cheer.  A West German offer to donate Elven postal braceros has been rejected.

Merry Christmas, indeed.  Maybe DeGaulle should convert to Judaism.  Then he can pray a great miracle will happen in Paris for Hannukah, and the franc reserve will last eight years instead of one…

Flickering candles

Here in the good old U.S. of A., we don't have such economic woes (though inflation is kicking in).  All I have to worry about is whether the first Galaxy of the year is any good.  In other words, has the value of the magazine been devalued?  Let's find out!


by Gray Morrow

Foeman, Where Do You Flee?, by Ben Bova

On Titan, the alien machines (first seen six years ago in "The Towers of Titan") rumble on, their purpose unknown, as they have for millennia.  Humanity, terrified of their implications, begins searching the stars for their creator.  And so, one ship, the Carl Sagan, makes the 15 year trip to Sirius A-2, a barren but Earthlike world orbiting the blazing blue sun.

Sid Lee, an anthropologist onboard, is convinced that Earth once warred with the aliens who build the machines of Titan, and that humans lost, reverting to savagery.  The crew of the Sagan are surprised not only to find a group of intelligent beings on the alien world, but that they are indistinguishable from Homo Sapiens Sapiens.  Lee volunteers to live among them, hiding his extraterrestrial origin, to learn the truth of the Sirians, and how they fit into the ancient, hypothetical war.


by Reese

There's a lot to like about this piece, especially the methodical, painfully slow, expedition protocols.  The crew wear suits when they go outside.  Extreme caution is taken in scouting.  It takes months before Lee is even allowed to infilitrate the aliens.

Bova reminds me a bit of Niven in his weaving together hard science fiction and a compelling story.  However, the author does not have Niven's mastery of the craft, and the story feels a bit clunky.  Moreover, the "revelations" of the tale are telegraphed, and the red herrings Bova throws in to keep the mystery going are not convincing.

I enjoyed the story, but it's difficult to decide if it's a high 3 or a low 4.  I think I will go with the latter because it's clear this novella is only part of a bigger story, one that looks like it will be fascinating to read.

The Thing-of-the-Month Clubs, by John Brunner

In what looks like the final entry in the Galactic Consumer Report series, the editor of the fictional magazine reviews various [THING]-of-the-Month Clubs.  Specifically, the editor is looking for high cost and ephemeral items for worlds with >100% income tax.

Droll.  Forgettable.  Three stars, I guess.

Parimutuel Planet, by James Tiptree, Jr.


by Blakely

A fellow named Christmas runs the premier racing planet in the galaxy: Raceworld!  He deals with a number of headaches including various attempts to fix the games by a number of different species.  The thing reads breezily, shallowly, in a style I was sure I'd read before…and sure enough, looking through back reviews, I found the story I was thinking of ("Birth of a Salesman") was, indeed, written by one James Tiptree Jr.

I found this story even less compelling.  One star.

Dunderbird, by Harlan Ellison and Keith Laumer


by Jack Gaughan

I'm not sure how Harlan Ellison ends up bylining with so many different authors these days: Sheckley, Delany, and now Laumer.

The premise: a giant pteranodon falls out of the sky onto the streets of New York, crushing 83 people under its unnaturally heavy corpse.  The rest of the story is a detailing of the many odd characters who come across the flying lizard and their reactions to it.

Pointless and unfunny, I have to wonder if Ellison attaches his name to things just to get them published for friends.  It's not doing the brand any favors.

One star.

For Your Information: The Written Word, by Willy Ley

This is a nice piece on the history of writing materials (which is, by definition, the history of history) from Greek times to modern day.

Ley wraps up with a primer on how to send and decode interstellar messages, which I quite enjoyed.

Interestingly, though he talks about microfiche and microfilm, he does not mention the possibility of more-or-less permanent documents within the memory banks of computers.  I know it may seem frivolous to store the written word on such expensive media as the Direct Access Storage Devices (DASD) used by IBM 360 computers, but in fact, such is being done as we speak.  I have used time share systems to send frivolous messages to others on home-grown "mail" systems, and also created data sets that were text files, both as memos and as "documents" for other users to read.  And, of course, there are data sets that are programs that, once loaded into permanent memory via punch card or teletype, are there to stay.  At least until an electrical pulse fries the whole thing.

Of course, that's a pretty rarefied use, but it's still interesting and relevant for those in the biz.

Anyway, four stars.

The Organleggers, by Larry Niven


by Jack Gaughan

Gil Hamilton, an agent of the the United Nations police force —Amalgamated Regional Militias (ARM)—is called regarding a death.  Not because he's a cop, but because he's next of kin of the deceased, a Belter named Owen Jennison.  The spaceman's demise looks like a particularly elaborate suicide: he is in a chair hooked up to a device that uses electric current to stimulate the pleasure center of one's brain, and he apparently starved, quite happily, to death.

But as Gil puts the pieces together, he comes to the conclusion that Jennison must have been murdered.  Which means there's a murderer.  Which means there are clues.  And since it's Niven's Earth in the 22nd Century, organleggers are probably involved.

Did I mention that Gil also has psychic powers?  He has a third, telekinetic arm, which comes in very handy.  It's also the first time that I've seen this particular idea.  It breathes new life into a hoary subject.

As does all of the story, honestly.  Niven is simply a master of organically conveying information, letting you live in his universe, absorbing details as they become pertinent.  There's nothing of the New Wave to his work save that his writing is qualitatively different from what we saw in prior eras.

He's also written a gripping fusion of the science fiction and detective genres, perhaps the best yet.

Five stars. 

Welcome Centaurians, by Ted Thomas

Aliens arrive from Proxima Centauri.  Though they make contact with many of Earth's nations while cautiously assaying us from orbit, their captain forms a bond with Colonel Lee Nessing of NORAD.  After a long conversation, the aliens agree to land in New York, whereupon friendly relations are established.

This is a cute, nothing story whose charm comes mostly from the chummy relationship between Lee and "Mat", the Proximan that looks like a floor rug.  My biggest issue is the gimmick ending, in which it is revealed that ancient Proximans caused the death of the dinosaurs by seeding the Earth with food animals—which turned out to be early mammals.

The problem: mammals evolved from reptiles 200 million years ago.  That event is well documented in the fossil record and is referenced in my copy of The Meaning of Evolution (1949) by George Gaylord Simpson.  This sort of basic evolutionary mistake seems pretty common in science fiction, where writers try to ascribe extraterrestrial origin to obviously terrestrial creatures (humans are the most frequent example).

Three stars.

Value for money

If there's anything the January 1969 issue of Galaxy proves, it's that even good money can't guarantee a return.  Editor Fred Pohl paid 4 cents a word for all of the pieces in this issue, and to his credit, more than half the words are in four/five star pieces.  On the other hand, two of the stories are mediocre, and two are absolutely awful.  It's like Pohl got his tales from a mystery bag and had to take what he got, good or bad.

Well, the superior stuff would fill an ordinary sized magazine, so I shan't complain.  Read the Bova, the Ley, and the Niven.  Then put the issue under your tree for others to discover Christmas morning…






[October 12, 1968] (October 1968 Galactoscope)


by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Although only bi-annual, rather than quarterly, at the moment, Carnell continues to regularly release his anthology series, easily eclipsing Pohl’s Star series and Knight’s Orbit. Will it be lucky #13?

New Writings in S-F 13
Hardback cover for New Writings in SF 13
Carnell notes there is an international flavour to this volume, with four Brits, Two Aussies, One American and One Belgian. Has any English Language SF publication series managed to have a male Belgian author before a woman author of any nationality? I think it may be a first! (International SF had both in its second issue.)

The Divided House by John Rackham
Leaving in 1984 on a ten-year voyage to look for intelligent life, Space-Farer IV now returns (due to time compression) in 2104. They find an Earth divided by genetics between the ruling Croms and their slaves, the Nandys, and the crew are split into the different camps.

I recently saw Judgement at Nuremburg on the BBC and this brought to my mind a scene where a witness on the sterilization procedure says:

My Mother…She was a hardworking woman, and it is not fair what you say. Here. I want to show you. I have here her picture. I would like you to look at it. I would like you to judge. I want that you tell me, was she feeble-minded? My mother! Was she feeble-minded? Was she?

This story addresses the question of eugenics, how we can judge one type of person to be inferior to another and how easy it is for science to be perverted. Important ideas.

And yet, I am not 100% sure I understand the conclusion he is meant to be reaching, nor the way in which it is delivered. I suspect this may be a story Rackham is planning to expand to novel length.

Three Stars for now.

Public Service by Sydney J. Bounds
On a densely populated island city, the fire service are reduced to a policy of containment instead of stopping fires. The poor are crying out for change, but what else can Fire Control do?

Reading this, I wondered if it was inspired by Kowloon Walled City, where the lack of access roads make it impossible for fire vehicles to enter. As such, it felt believable even in its exaggerated fashion, and Bounds put it together with great style. Dark, atmospheric but an all too realistic vision of the future.

Four Stars

The Ferryman on the River by David Kyle
The tower platform is a common site from which people throw themselves to their death. Hector is a salvager who takes away those who jump and offers them a new life. But is he salvation or slaver?

This is very much a stylistic piece, so your opinions will likely depend on how you feel about a regular switch between long run-on sentences full of descriptions and short clipped statements, in other words, how I write. I like it.

Four Stars

Testament by Vincent King
The Exploration Corps travel to 3m2t670, the last unexplored planetary system in the galaxy. Their mission, to determine if any other world has ever evolved life. We hear the record of Officer Dahndehr as his apparent discovery of the remnants of an ancient civilization turns to disaster.

King has tended to specialize in Vancian Medieval Futurism, but he manages to do well here in more common SFnal settings. It is a touch old fashioned, like a combination between Clarke and Ashton Smith, but he adds a unique style to it and has a twist in the tail I did not expect. Well done all round.

Four Stars

The Macbeth Expiation by M. John Harrison
On an unexplored planet an expedition shoots a group of alien beasts. When they return to the site, however, there is no sign of the encounter. Did they fail to hit them? Were they hallucinating in the first place? Or is something stranger going on?

This is described as a psychological thriller, and I would say that is accurate. It is a fairly atmospheric example, which makes us question what is real, albeit an unexceptional one.

A high three stars, probably a fourth for those who really enjoy the subgenre.

Representative by David Rome
Catton is an insurance salesman who is annoyed by his young neighbours, The Brownings. They laugh off his sales attempts and are convinced they will never need it. However, upon discovering a near identical couple have moved in next to his friends, he suspects something stranger is happening.

This is another example of what I term “Exurban Uncanny”, which often turns up in New Writings, unnerving stories about the sterileness of new towns. This is a pretty good story of this type, if rather obvious.

Three Stars

The Beach by John Baxter
People live in the warm embrace of the beach. Swimming, partying and in full contentment. One day Jael suddenly notices that buildings exist beyond the beach and leaves to investigate.

I am not sure what to make of this. Is it meant to be a mockery of surf bums? A stylistic experiment? An exploration of how people cope with trauma?

Whatever it is, Baxter writes it well enough to earn Three Stars.

The City, Dying by Eddy C. Bertin
Written in a sloping up and down fashion: A Thousand separate pieces each crying out for help Then below in big bold letters: Destroying
In breathless and experimental style, Bertin tells of Wade’s attempts to find meaning whilst living in a police state. But, in such a place, what is reality and what is nightmare?

Apparently, this was originally written for a Belgian literary contest, then translated into Dutch and further into English, revised by the author each time. However, you wouldn’t know it. It reads incredibly well and makes use of the kind of typographical experiments en vogue in New Worlds.

Yet, it doesn’t feel like it is doing anything particularly new; rather it is what might happen if Kafka had submitted a piece to Michael Moorcock.

A high three stars

Keep Calm and Carry On
So, overall, this was a pretty solid volume of his series. Nothing that would rise to an all time classic but nothing I did not find interesting to read. Will the series continue its success? Given the British John C. has been editing SF publications for just as long as his American counterpart, I don’t see either of them putting down their red pens any time soon.



by Victoria Silverwolf

Laughing to Keep From Crying?

The latest Ace Double (H-91) contains two short novels (probably novellas, really) with plots that seem comic, at first glance, but are treated mostly in a serious manner. Let's take a look at them.

Murphy's Law

The shorter of the two presents a situation in which anything that could go wrong does go wrong.

Target: Terra, by Laurence M. Janifer and S. J. Treibich


Cover art by Jack Gaughan.

Some folks are inside a space station carrying nuclear weapons to be used against the Enemy should war break out. Our hapless hero, Intelligence Officer Angelo DiStefano, has to deal with artificial gravity that changes from zero to three times Earth normal, and everything in between, at random. His magnetic boots wander around on their own. The food machine produces inedible stuff that looks like weirdly colored snakes.

Bad enough, but when he finds out that the station's weapons are aimed at every major city on Earth, Good Guys or Bad Guys, he's got real problems.

So far, the story seems like a black comedy farce. I was taken by surprise, therefore, when an expository chapter reveals that the majority of Asians died in a plague that didn't harm non-Asians. Not exactly funny. Anyway, that's got something to do with the surviving Asians getting ready to attack the others, which will cause the station's missiles to launch.

(I should mention that the station has run out of sex suppressant, so the only woman aboard has a paranoid fear of being raped. Sorry, I'm not laughing.)

Angelo tries to figure out who's trying to wipe out all life on Earth. Aliens? A mad saboteur? And what can be done to prevent total Armageddon?

There's a lot of quirky characters, from a "midget" electronics genius to a captain who never leaves the bridge. Besides the distasteful content I mentioned above, there's also another armed space station containing Africans. The implication that there's a sort of racial Cold War going on doesn't fit very well with the silly slapstick that starts the story.

Two stars.

Far Out Music

The other, slightly longer, half of the book features a musical group set on going where no one has ever rocked and rolled before.

The Proxima Project, by John Rackham


Cover art by John Schoenherr.

Horace McCool is a rich guy who is obsessed with the band's female singer. The members of the Trippers call themselves Jim, Jem, Johnny, and Yum-Yum. Nobody knows their real names, or anything else about them.

Horace wants to marry Yum-Yum, even though he's never even met her. When he manages to make his way backstage during a concert, she's not interested at all. (Her utter disdain may be best demonstrated by the fact that she casually strips nude in front of him in order to take a shower.) Unable to take a very firm No! for an answer, Howard gives her a gift that has a tracking unit hidden in it. With his loyal secretary, who has her own crush on one of the male members of the group, Horace follows Yum-Yum and the others to a mansion on the Moon, and then much further.

Sounds like a romantic comedy, doesn't it? And yet there's a serious tone to much of the story. The four members of the Trippers are super-geniuses who only started the band so they could raise enough money for their secret project. They're cynical about the rest of the human species, and just want to get away from Earth forever, even if it means a seemingly suicidal one-way voyage.

Horace's mad passion seems way out of character for an otherwise sensible fellow. The climax of the story strained credibility to the breaking point. I suppose the author might be saying something about the worship of celebrities and the Generation Gap, but it's not a profound work in any way.

Two stars.

A is for Anywhere

Next on my reading list is a book that takes its two protagonists on another wild journey, but not into outer space.

Dimension A, by L. P. Davies

The narrator is a teenage boy who gets a message from a buddy of the same age. It seems that the other fellow's uncle disappeared, along with his mysterious helper. Enlisting the aid of a scientist, for whom the narrator works, they try to figure out what happened.

Not much of a mystery, really, because we find out right away that the uncle was working on a way to reach a parallel reality known as (you guessed it) Dimension A. (Does that mean our own universe is Dimension B?)

What with one thing and another, the two kids accidentally land in Dimension A, and don't see a way back. They have to deal with hallucinations created by an unseen entity behind a green mist, as well as primitive humans who somehow manage to have ray guns. Can they find the missing uncle and make their way home?

The novel seems intended for younger readers, mostly because of the age of the two main characters. The language isn't overly simple, and adults of any age can read it without feeling they're being talked down to. The book doesn't try to be anything but an imaginative science fiction adventure story, and it succeeds at that modest goal.

Three stars.

New and Improved?

Two well-known writers recently published expanded versions of earlier works.

Into the Slave Nebula, by John Brunner

This is a revision of one half of an Ace Double from 1960. (D-421, to be exact. The other half was Dr. Futurity by Philip K. Dick.)


Cover art by Ed Emshwiller.

I haven't read it, so I can't compare it with the new version.


Cover art by Kelly Freas.

At some time in the far future, Earth is a place of wealth and leisure. Robots and androids (artificially grown humans, with blue skin to identify them) do the work, while other folks enjoy themselves.

(There's a brief mention of people who have lost their wealth through foolish behavior. They're known as the Dispossessed. Otherwise, poverty doesn't exist.)

During a time of wild celebration, the protagonist stumbles across an android who has been severely beaten and maimed. Another android, knowing his fellow slave can't survive, puts him out of his misery with an injection. The protagonist is horrified by what happened to the dead android, but it's just considered destruction of property instead of murder.

(Given the different skin color of the android and their legal position in society, an analogy with American slavery prior to the Civil War seems likely.)

Adding to the mystery is the discovery of a dead man nearby with a knife in his chest. A police detective comes by, but doesn't seem very interested in solving the case.

The surviving android, noticing that our hero is sympathetic, slips him an item taken from the dead man. It reveals that he was a very important person everywhere but Earth. This sends the protagonist on a journey to several different colonized planets, where he learns the dark secret behind the manufacturing of the androids. Along the way, people keep trying to kill him.

(There's a plot twist that made me want to call the book Blue Like Me, but that seemed too frivolous.)

Not in the same league as the author's groundbreaking masterpiece Stand on Zanzibar, but a competent science fiction novel.

Three stars.

Hawksbill Station, by Robert Silverberg

The novella Hawksbill Station appeared in the August 1967 issue of Galaxy.


Cover art by Sol Dember.

The Noble Editor gave it a positive review when it first appeared. Will the novel be better, worse, or about the same?


Cover art by Pat Steir.

In the twenty-first century, the United States is under a totalitarian (but superficially benign) government. Capital punishment is banned, but political prisoners are sent back in time about one billion years. Since travel to the future is impossible, this is equivalent to a life sentence.

The protagonist is the de facto leader of the exiles. (All male, by the way; there's another prison colony for women millions of years apart from the men. The novel never visits the female prisoners, and that might make for an interesting sequel.) He's more or less sane, unlike many of the other guys. One is trying to make a woman out of mud. Another is trying to use ESP to escape. Yet another attempts to contact aliens.

The situation changes when a new prisoner arrives. He's younger than usual, for one thing. More telling is the fact that he claims to be a economist, but doesn't known a darn thing about economics. What is he doing here?

If you've read the novella, you know that's the same plot. What's been added is a series of flashbacks, showing how the main character became a revolutionary and how he was betrayed and imprisoned. (These sections also feature the novel's only female character. She doesn't show up too much, but her fate adds a certain poignancy.)

The flashbacks make the character and the world in which he lives seem more real, but they're not absolutely necessary. Whether you prefer the leaner novella or the richer novel is a matter of taste. There isn't a big difference in quality, if any.

Four stars.



by Gideon Marcus

The Spawn of the Death Machine, by Ted White

Ted White has done it again…in more ways than one.

Some of you may remember Rosemary Benton's stellar review of Android Avenger, in which she gave five stars to the tale of Bob Tanner, a cyborg and revolutionary in a staid, computer-run future.

In the luridly (but appropriately) titled Spawn of the Death machine, Bob Tanner is back, and so is Ted White in fine form.

First, a little background, from the horse's mouth:

SPAWN was sold originally to Paperback Library, but was not my first submission to them (through my agent). The first book I submitted to them (in outline) was BY FURIES POSSESSED. They said they were looking for an Ace-Book-type book, so I figured, wothell archy, how about the sequel to an Ace Book? Which SPAWN is, being the sequel to ANDROID AVENGER (original title, changed by Don Wollheim, was THE DEATH MACHINE). That they bought.

The cover of the original edition of SPAWN was by Jeff Jones, who showed me the painting before I'd finished the book. The protagonist is holding a knife and defending the girl. So I wrote that into the book as a scene. But the art director decided to "improve" the cover and had the knife repainted (crudely) as a sword, and had shackles added to the girl, twisting her body in an anatomically absurd position. Pissed Jeff off no end, and me too.

Per Ted, Jeff is working on rewriting the rules of conduct for cover artists (keeping original paintings, selling only one-time repro rights). If successful, it will be a boon for all artists.

Anyway, as for the story…

Bob Tanner is wakened inside some sort of vault, naked, amnesiac. The robot brain inside exhorts him to explore the outside world, to spend a year amongst the humans, then report back with what he finds.

It turns out that civilization is long passed. He first arrives at the ruins of New York, the outskirts of which are inhabited by the most primitive of survivors, generations removed from the civilization Tanner only remembers in fragments. He is captured but escapes, taking with him the young Rifka, a captive member of the tribe.

Thus begins a series of adventures including a tangle with a bear, a run-in with a more advanced town with a mayor who doesn't let newcomers leave, a widespread constellation of farming communities at a 19th Century level of technology, and even a super-advanced enclave run by a group of individuals who were once the underdogs of society.

Through it all, Tanner becomes increasingly aware of his non-human nature—his metal bones, his ability to breathe fire, the hyperspeed he is capable of in brief spurts. And, at last, he discovers who he really is and decides what destiny he will forge for himself.

As is typical for Ted's books, I tore through this novel in short order. The man can't write a dull sentence even with a gun to his head. He takes the most cliché of settings and turns it into something fresh, certainly a damnsight better than Zelazny's recent stab at postapocalypse with Damnation Alley.

This may sound silly, but what I really liked about the book is that it's a romance. And not a "superman claims grateful damsel as prize" romance, but a believable progression of a relationship. Rifka is a well-realized character, one imbued with passion and an independent nature and set of priorities. It's not surprising that Ted draws her with such care—she is named after his wife, Robin Postal (Rifka means Robin in Yiddish). But, in general, the author is good with his female characters, surprising not just for the genre, but for the pulpy subgenre and venue.

I also really appreciate that one gets a pretty full picture of Bob Tanner even without having read the first book (in fact, I haven't, though it's on my shelf—it's really tough to find the time to read everything; even stuff you know is good). Honestly, the only real demerit to the book is its structure, really a series of vignettes. In that way, it is reminiscent of Omha Abides, C.C. MacApp's recent After-The-Apocalypse novel. Sure, White writes it better than most anyone else, but it still suffers from the disjointed, episodic nature of it.

Still, 4.5 stars, and I'm sure it'll make the Galactic Stars or at least get honorable mention this year.



by Jason Sacks

Star Well, by Alexei Panshin

I have a new favorite science fiction writer whose work I’m going to track. His name is Alexei Panshin and he’s had a terrific 1968.

Several months ago I reviewed Panshin’s novel Rite of Passage and found it intriguing, with great atmospherics, complex characters and a clever attitude which seemed to tell the story in multiple dimensions. Panshin told his story with a slightly ironic reserve to it, an approach which gave a detached commentary on the events, as if the narrator of the tale was someone looking back fondly at the events which shaped her.

That element is on display again in his newest novel, Star Well, but this time that ironic detached commentary reads like wry takes on the world readers are experiencing in the novel. For instance:

The apparently frightening and hopeless situation may turn out to have a candy-cream interior. That has been the main premise of the happy ending since the return of Ulysses.

Or he brings in a cute, clever meta-commentary about plot elements which gives the reader an aha! kind of feeling:

When managers of illicit traffic meet, their biggest plaint is the employment problem. In a word, henchmen. There are all too few young crooks willing to take training service under older and more accomplished men.

… a commentary which then goes into a detailed explanation of why it’s so dang hard to get good help these days, especially in a star base many light years away from anything important.

In short, these excerpts read like a bit of postmodern commentary on the space opera of Robert Heinlein. And since Panshin has written a monograph about Heinlein (Heinlein in Dimension, available through your local library, I’m sure), that reference has to be intentional.

Mr. Panshin's analysis of Heinlein

The lead character here is one Anthony Villiers, a kind of lazy trust fund baby who’s spending his life just wandering the Nashurite Empire, occasionally drifting when he has cash, occasionally grifting when he doesn’t have cash. He’s aristocratic and hates getting his hands dirty, but he also has a gentlemanly aspect about him which makes Villiers feel charming and kind.

Villiers finds himself at the Star Well, a space port/gambling hall/shopping stopover which has been drilled into an asteroid in an area of space in which “the stars don’t grow”; in other words, a simple stopover for travelers who need a warm bed and maybe a touch of the illicit while on their way to their final destination. As such, it’s a perfect place for illegal smuggling and inept, corrupt bureaucrats who are striving to improve their social position or at least their bank accounts.

A photo of Mr. Panshin from last year.

As you might guess, Villiers can’t help but get involved in the events at the Star Well, becoming quite the reluctant hero as he finds himself in conflict with Godwin, a man of low birth who yearns to be aristocratic, and Godwin’s boss Hisan Bashir Shirabi, a man with a massive inferiority complex who yearns to be like Villiers. Our protagonist also becomes unexpectedly close friends with the fifteen-year-old Louisa Parini, who traveled to Star Well en route to a stuffy finishing school but who craves adventure.

This is all so lightweight and enjoyable, and this whole charming souffle of a novel comes in at a mere 154 very quick pages – just like a Heinlein juvenile. And just like one of the juvies, there’s plenty of hints we’ll see more of Anthony Villiers in the future as he continues his peripatetic wanderings. I hope to spend many years following our besotted aristocrat as he wanders through the Nashurite Empire.

3.5 stars






[September 18, 1968] Dangerous Visions (Not Those Dangerous Visions!) (September 1968 Galactoscope)


by Victoria Silverwolf

Finlandia

Emil Petaja is an American writer of Finnish ancestry. His best known works are a series of novels based on the Finnish national epic the Kalevala. (Saga of Lost Earths, The Star Mill, The Stolen Sun, and Tramontane. These were all published from 1966 to 1967.)

Petaja's latest novel, although not part of this series, also deals with themes from Finnish mythology.


Cover art by Jack Gaughan.

Doctor Stephen McCord is an anthropologist. Although he's the only major character who isn't of Finnish descent, he's studied the culture and knows something of the language.

Before the novel begins, his college buddy Art Mackey took off for a remote area of Montana, in search of his girlfriend Ilma, who mysteriously returned to her old homestead. Stephen gets a tape recording from his friend, giving him a few hints as to what's going on. (It also serves as exposition for the reader.)

It seems that the former logging town of Hellmouth, inhabited by Finnish immigrants, was completely destroyed in a huge forest fire in 1906. When Art arrived in search of Ilma's nearby farmhouse, he found the place looking exactly the way it did six decades ago, with some of the former citizens still alive and kicking.

Intrigued by this mystery (and wondering if his pal has gone nuts), Stephen makes his way to the supposedly vanished town. He discovers that Hellmouth is indeed still around. Furthermore, the inhabitants worship Ukko, the chief god of Finnish legend. (Roughly comparable to Zeus or Thor, I believe.)

Stephen finds Art, and they both search for Ilma. Things get weird when they actually run into what seems to be Ukko, a being whose presence is so overwhelming that it's almost impossible not to fall to one's knees in adoration. The apparent god promises to make Earth a utopia, in exchange for worship. Ukko also has plans for Stephen.

What happens involves Ilma's elderly father Izza, her hunchbacked brother Yalmar, the local schoolteacher/librarian, and the steel plate inside Stephen's head, a souvenir of his time as an ambulance driver during a conflict in Southeast Asia. (Maybe Vietnam, as the story takes place just a little bit in the future, some time in the 1970's.)

The author writes clearly and elegantly. I always knew what was going on and was able to keep track of the characters. There are many vivid descriptions of Petaja's home state of Montana. (He now lives in San Francisco, which is also depicted excellently in the early part of the book.)

Besides having a compelling plot that kept me reading in one sitting, the novel has some intriguing and controversial things to say about the nature of deity and its relationship with humanity. Even at the very end of the text, Stephen still isn't sure if opposing Ukko was the right thing to do.

Four stars.

Comedy and Tragedy

The latest Ace Double to fall into my hands (designated as H-85, for those of you keeping score) offers a pair of short novels with contrasting moods. One is lighthearted, the other is serious. Let's start with the humorous one.

Destination: Saturn, by David Grinnell and Lin Carter


Cover art by Kelly Freas.

David Grinnell is actually the well-known fan, writer, and editor Donald A. Wollheim. He also created the Ace Double series, so he must feel right at home.

This novel was published last year in hardcover.


Cover art by Michael M. Peters.

The protagonist is a filthy rich and rather egotistical fellow named Ajax Calkins. A little research reveals that Wollheim (without co-author Carter) has been writing about him since 1941, sometimes under the pen name Martin Pearson. Most recently, this old material was recycled into the novel Destiny's Orbit. The Noble Editor gave it a lukewarm review a while back, calling it a juvenile space opera.

In the current volume, Ajax is the king of an asteroid that is actually a gigantic spaceship built by the civilization that was destroyed when their home planet blew up long ago, creating the asteroid belt. He and his fiancée Emily Hackenschmidt are on Earth, leaving the asteroid in the hands (so to speak) of their loyal Martian friend, a spider-like being called Wuj.

Dastardly amoeba-like aliens, the inhabitants of Saturn, are the sworn enemies of Earth. (In a touch of satire, we find out that they were perfectly nice folks until they learned aggression from humans.) Two of the Saturnians disguise themselves as Ajax and Emily and convince Wuj they're the real thing. They set off for Saturn, eager to uncover the ancient spaceship's secrets and use its advanced technology to conquer the solar system.

What I've failed to convey is the fact that this is a comedy. Ajax manages to save the day, of course, but he's also something of a fool. The more levelheaded Emily is often exasperated at him, with good reason.

The novel is written in a dryly tongue-in-cheek style that is more amusing than the usual science fiction farce. There are quite a few witty lines. I'm not a big fan of comic SF, but this one is better than some.

Three stars.

Invader on My Back, by Philip E. High

Let's flip the book over and take a look at something without laughs.


Cover art by Jack Gaughan.

The cover proudly announces that this is the novel's first book publication. I assume that's true, but there's also a British hardcover edition that came out this year.


Cover art by Colin Andrews.

The story takes place a few hundred years after society fell apart, for reasons not apparent until later in the novel. Humanity has managed to build itself back up, but there's been a strange change in people. They're divided up into castes. Again, the explanation for this is unknown.

Roughly half of the population consists of Norms; ordinary folks. The other half are Delinks; murderers and other violent criminals. Some Norms and Delinks are also Scuttlers. These are people who have an intense phobia about the sky, and can't bear to look at it.

A small number of folks are Stinkers. Everybody else hates these people; so much so, that few of them survive. Those who do isolate themselves and protect their lives with various resources.

Michael Craig is a Stinker. (That looks like an example of nasty graffiti, doesn't it?) He gets a message from the police (by mail; if he came anywhere near them they would try to kill him) asking him to try an experiment. The cops want to know what would happen if two Stinkers met. Would they loathe each other on sight?

Michael agrees to meet Geo Hastings, a Stinker who lives in Africa. The oddly named Geo turns out to be an attractive woman. If you think the two are going to fall in love, give yourself an A in predicting familiar plot developments.

Besides not trying to kill each other, the two discover that they can communicate telepathically. Things would seem to be turning out nicely, if it were not for the Geeks.

A Geek is a type of human being that has just appeared recently. They are physically superior, tend to be cold-bloodedly calculating, and are intent on wiping out the rest of humanity. In particular, they are bent on destroying the Stinkers; not for the usual reason (pure, unexplained hatred) but as part of their plan to conquer the world.

Without giving anything away (although you may be able to predict the novel's plot twists), let's just say the reason for all these weird happenings is revealed. Can Norms, Delinks, and Stinkers work together against the Geeks and the secret menace behind them? Not to mention the Scuttlers, who have a vital role to play.

This isn't a bad novel. Not great, but not bad. The story held my interest. (I haven't mentioned Michael's three heavily armed robot birds, who are the most charming characters.) It's worth reading once.

Three stars.



by Cora Buhlert

The Long Con: God Save the Mark by Donald E. Westlake

Science fiction may be my first love, but I read other genres as well. And so my latest pick-up at the local import bookstore was a crime novel entitled God Save the Mark by Donald E. Westlake. The reason I bought the book is that it just won the prestigious Edgar Award, i.e. the mystery genre's equivalent to the Hugo and Nebula Awards, for the best crime novel of the year, beating out Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin. Any novel that can beat a juggernaut like Rosemary's Baby is certainly worth checking out, so I picked it up. And reader, I was not disappointed.

God Save the Mark by Donald E. Westlake

The Most Gullible Man in New York City

The protagonist of God Save the Mark is one Fred Fitch, who must be the most gullible man in New York City. Fred is a magnet for con artists and there's not a scam in existence that Fred will not fall for.

The novel opens with Fred getting a phone call from a lawyer that his Uncle Matt has died and left Fred more than three hundred thousand US-dollars. This makes even the extremely gullible Fred suspicious, especially since he does not have an Uncle Matt.

So Fred alerts his friend his best and probably only friend, Detective Jack Reilly of the NYPD's "bunco squad", i.e. the police department dealing with fraud. Reilly tells Fred to go to the appointment with the fake lawyer, so Reilly can arrest him red-handed. Alas, Fred is late for the meeting because he got scammed… again and it turns out that the lawyer is not a fraud after all, but the real deal. As is the will of the late Uncle Matt. Fred really did inherit more than three hundred thousand US-dollars.

However, there's a catch or rather several. For starters, Uncle Matt was a con artist himself and the black sheep of the family, which is why Fred has never heard of him. What is more, Uncle Matt, though terminally ill, was murdered. Which makes Fred the prime suspect.

A City of Con Artists

The situation quickly escalates. To begin with, Fred's new found riches make him a target for even more would-be con artists, including a childhood sweetheart who intends to hold him to a marriage proposal made as a kid or sue him for breach of promise and a neighbour who wants to publish his alternate history novel Veni, Vidi, Vici with Air Power via a predatory vanity press. Worse, whoever murdered Uncle Matt is now taking potshots at Fred. Finally, Fred also finds himself entangled with two very different women, Gertie Divine, a former stripper who was the late Uncle Matt's nurse, and Karen Smith, Reilly's bit on the side who still hopes he'll marry her someday, once he gets over his Catholic guilt induced reluctance to divorce his wife.

The intense pressure under which Fred finds himself finally makes him wise up. He tells off several would-be con artists and also puts his skills as an independent researcher to use to investigate Uncle Matt's murder himself, since he no longer trusts the police.

However, there are still many twists and turns ahead, including a hilarious chase scene where Fred steals a child's bicycle to escape his pursuers and ends up tumbling headfirst into a pond in Central Park.

This was the first novel by Donald E. Westlake (who also writes as Richard Stark and under a number of other pen names and has even dabbled in science fiction on occasion) that I read, but it certainly won't be the last, because this book is laugh out loud funny and a complete and utter delight.

In many ways, God Save the Mark is a reminiscent of the screwball comedies of thirty years ago, yet it is also a solid mystery that plays fair with the reader and delivers plenty of red herrings as well as all the clues needed to solve it. The novel also offers an excellent overview of the various cons and scams going around, some I was aware of and others that were completely new to me. The ending is a perfect fit.

A Deserving Winner?

Edgar Award trophy

So is this novel better than Rosemary's Baby? Well, the two books are difficult to compare, because they are so very different. But all in all, I'd agree with the verdict of the Mystery Writers of America that God Save the Mark is a most deserving winner of the 1968 Edgar Award.

A fluffy, frothy caper that will leave you rolling on the floor laughing and guessing till the end.

Five stars.



by Jason Sacks

Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner

Sometimes as a reviewer you just don’t quite trust yourself when you encounter something totally unexpected. When you read a work which feels sui generis for science fiction, a book which draws comparison to literary fiction like Dos Passos, Burges and Nabokov, it’s hard to assess that book in its own context.

John Brunner’s fascinating new novel Stand on Zanzibar is the spiritual successor to those modernist writers.

Brunner’s novel reads as part pulp fiction and part assault-the-senses bursts of information. Zanzibar is a prophecy and a critique, a satire and a work of deep seriousness. It has plot lines and complex emotions and an energy that won’t quit, and at 576 pages of very short chapters, it somehow felt exhausting and left me craving more. It’s also extremely hard to describe, so be aware I’m barely skimming the surface here, and I welcome anybody who’s willing to add their own comments in an LoC to this magazine.

Let’s start with the easy parts to describe. On its most basic level, Stand on Zanzibar is about the problem of overpopulation.  When we all were in diapers, if stood side by side, all of humanity could take up a space roughly the size of the Isle of Wight. By the distant year of 2010, however, as Brunner writes, "If you allow for every codder and shiggy and appleofmyeye a space of one foot by two, you could stand us all on the 640 square mile surface of the island of Zanzibar."

There’s so much information contained in one sentence. You get one of the key themes of the novel and also a feeling of Brunner’s approach to his writing. Like Burgess’s punks in Clockwork Orange, the characters in this book chatter and mumble in an invented slang which feels clever and becomes part of the larger reading experience of the book. (Brunner admits a strong influence on  him from Burgess.) The language forces readers out of our comfort zones and therefore pay closer attention to the often fractured way Brunner chooses to tell his tale. (A codder is a certain type of man and a shiggy a certain type of woman and an appleofmyeye is a child, by the way.)

Mr. Brunner

The other key piece of information in that sentence above how fears of world overpopulation has led to strong laws against procreation. Those restrictive rules in turn have created a vast black market in child-rearing, as citizens are shown considering traveling to the state of Puerto Rico to have kids, much as one might escape their home state for an abortion or divorce to defy difficult local laws. World society also angles towards eugenics, forced sterilizations and genetic modifications. Can suicide booths be far behind?

All of the above is mere background – though thoughtful, fascinating background – for the main   thrust of this sprawling exercise. Much of the book tells the story of the small calm African country of Beninia, population 900,000, which has become the main staging point for refugees from wars in three neighboring countries. Those refugees despise each other, but the country has a kind of tenuous peace under the benevolent rule of President Zadkiel F. Obomi. However, President Obomi wants to retire. And when he retires, what will happen to the peace he worked so hard to broker?

Enter another key aspect of this book’s fascinating plot. Obomi is good friends with American Ambassador Elihu Masters, and as they discuss the problem, Masters comes up with an unexpected suggestion: what if American corporation General Technics (motto: "The difficult we did yesterday. The impossible we're doing right now") took over the country? What if the country exchanged its vast offshore mineral and oil reserves for education and infrastructure creation?

Parts of the book alternate between reveries by Obomi and the life in New York City shared by roommates Donald Hogan and Norman House. House is “Afram”, African-American, and has astutely used his race and his native intelligence to gain himself a powerful role inside GT. That means he will be on the ground while GT moves operations to Beninia – that is, of course, if Norman can shake his deep feelings of melancholia and dissatisfaction with his life and his career. Hogan, meanwhile, seems innocent since he spends most of his days at the New York Public Library. But in fact Hogan is a “Dilettanti”, a spy recruited by the government because of his preternatural skills at discovering patterns in seemingly normal experiences. Hogan is passive until “activated” by the government, and he worries about that aspect of his life.

Until he actually is activated and sent to Socialist Asian country of Yatakang, where the government has announced how eminent geneticist Dr. Sugaiguntung has invented a way for everybody around the world to give birth to perfect children. But is their assertion true, or it just a lie on top of all the other lies circulating in this complex world? Can Donald prove the Yatakang government’s announcement is a lie? Can he persuade the people of Yatakang to support the leader of a guerilla rebellion which is happening in the country’s mountains?

Shades of ol' Fidel

*Whew.* There’s so much there just in the plot. I’m sure you can see the pulpy outlines of a Le Carre style spy novel, as well as chances for Swiftian social satire in both storylines I’ve described, and yet all that description barely scratches the surface of this most profoundly wild novel. Because underpinning this entire book is a deeper critique of world society, a society full of selfishness and cheap thrills and tawdry media which creates false reality in its shows.

Most damningly, Brunner presents a world in which people seem constantly interconnected and yet somehow deeply distant from each other. Hogan and House, for instance, despite being roommates, scarcely know anything about each other. The media consumed by the people in this world prevents them from being social, and that gap has vast societal consequences. When people can literally project fictionalized versions of themselves on fantasy television shows, what attraction does the real world have? Drugs are all pervasive. Suburbs are collapsing. The planet is groaning from the weight of all the people living upon it. Yet the vast majority of men and women in this world care much more about the shows they consume than they do about the world they have created.

And there’s so much more here. There’s Shalmaneser, the super computer which makes critical decisions on Earth (wonder if Brunner heard about Clarke and Kubrick’s 2001 ideas?). There’s the muckers, a group of random people who go on killing sprees for no reason. There’s a drug which forces people to tell the truth which is given to a bishop who spends a Sunday mass telling everyone his real feelings about God. I could go on and on, and dear reader, I know I’m skipping one of your favorite elements of this book.

But I grow filled with a bit of despair that I could do an adequate job of explaining any element of this book; even more, I despair at the idea a mere plot summary would be useful to anybody who might be considering reading this astounding book.

So let me sum my feelings up this way. Like many of us here at the Journey, I’ve long been a fan of Mr. Brunner’s writing. But Stand on Zanzibar takes all of John Brunner’s writing abilities and takes them to a quantum level. He displayed massive potential in many of his earlier works, but here Brunner shows that potential paid off in spades.

No matter the context, on first read, Stand on Zanzibar Brunner has delivered the wildest, weirdest, most successful book of the year so far. Previously I called Alexei Panshin’s Rite of Passage the best book I had read in 1968 up to that point. Brunner’s achievement far exceeds Panshin's. I hope to be rereading this book in that far-flung future of 2010 and seeing how many of Brunner’s prophecies came true.

Five stars.


[And new to the Galactoscope, we are pleased to introduce poet and author Tonya R. Moore, who has dived into New Wave's deep end with her first brush with Chip Delany….]


by Tonya R. Moore

Nova, by Samuel R. Delany

Nova was my first encounter with the work of Samuel R. Delaney who has, thus far, proven himself exemplary of the originality and innovativeness one would expect from the current New Wave of Science Fiction writers. Set in a distant future where humans have migrated to other worlds, this book paints a chaotic but beautiful picture of human turmoil and adventurousness in an ever expanding universe.

Lorq Von Ray is a born upstart from a family of nouveau-riche propelled into high society by their ill-gotten gains. He makes friends and, eventually, enemies with Prince and Ruby, quintessential Earth-nobility driven by power, greed, and a keen sense of self-entitlement.

Von Ray grew up haunted by constant reminders of the social stratum wedging a vast chasm between himself and the siblings. Ever ambitious, Von Ray pits wills and wits against Prince and Ruby, aiming to upset the economic balance of power between the Draco and Pleiades systems.

Further embittered by their twisted and broken friendship, he sets out, with dogged determination, to hit the motherlode of interstellar treasures in the form of illyrion, the ephemeral byproduct of a nova and the most valuable and potent energy source known to mankind.

Should Von Ray succeed in this second attempt to capture this precious material in abundance from the nova, his payload promises to transform the economy of the Pleiades system and upend Prince’s monopoly on interstellar travel technology which allows them to hoard most of the wealth and stratify the balance of power between the Draco and Pleiades systems.

This book introduces a motley cast of characters who are destined to be enmeshed in the many dangers and high drama that comes along with being employed by Von Ray.

Mouse, for example, is a nomadic troubadour eking out a meager living while playing interplanetary hopscotch in the Draco system. He winds up on Triton, Neptune’s largest moon, while seeking employment on one of the spaceships bound for other star systems and greater opportunities.

Here, Mouse encounters Lorq Von Ray, scion of the richest family in the Pleiades system and jumps at the opportunity to join the ragtag crew of cyborg studs on Von Ray’s spaceship bound for the heart of an exploding star.

Ruby Red and Prince don’t appreciate Von Ray’s intent to rise above a station they consider beneath them, not to mention shift humanity’s prosperity from Draco to the Pleiades system. A cargo hold filled with seven tons of illyrion would certainly help him achieve that.

Mouse and his syrynx, a musical instrument that conjures holographic imagery, bear witness to the changing times while the melodrama of a twisted love triangle unfolds among Von Ray, the selectively diffident Ruby Red, and the pridefully neurotic Prince.

The gypsy troubadour playing his syrynx is a recurring motif representing the backdrop humanity's culture and history against which the story unfolds. The syrynx, a stolen object, ironically foreshadows the climax of the story where it is once again stolen then turned into a weapon.

Delany’s command of astrophysics and the science behind supernovas is reasonably solid. He proves himself a master of using literary language to describe scientific concepts and the murky dynamics of human interpersonal entanglements but there are elements of Nova that make little sense.

Ruby Red’s complicity with Prince’s cruelty and neurotic behavior seems arbitrary, for instance. As a character, she seems to lack a will of her own. Despite her prominence in the story, we’re never given a real glimpse inside the mind of the woman. What does Ruby Red want? Why does she do the things that she does?

Ultimately, Nova is a beautifully chaotic and original tale rife with vivid, sometimes visceral prose, exuberant dialogue, and an intriguingly colorful cast of characters.

4.5 stars.





</small

[April 16, 1968] Tripods and Others (April 1968 Galactoscope)


by Victoria Silverwolf

Chalk and Cheese

I recently read two new science fiction novels by British authors that are otherwise as different as they can be. One takes place in the very near future. The other is set centuries from now. One never leaves England. The other ventures into interstellar space. One uses an experimental narrative style. The other is told in a traditional manner. One is New Wave, the other Old Wave. Let's take a look at both.

Bedlam Planet, by John Brunner


Cover art by Jeff Jones.

Before the story starts, unmanned probes discovered a habitable planet orbiting Sigma Draconis. A team of four explorers went to check it out. Everything seemed hunky-dory, so three big starships carried a bunch of colonists there. They named the planet Asgard.

One ship was to be used for raw materials. Another was to be kept intact, in case the colonists needed to get out quick. The third was supposed to carry our hero, one of the original four explorers, back to Earth.

Disaster struck when an error in navigation caused one of the ships to crash into Asgard's moon. Our protagonist, a born wanderer, is stuck on Asgard, a reluctant colonist who doesn't fit in with the others. While off on his own, he is stung by a local critter and spends several days hallucinating.

Meanwhile, a microorganism native to the planet gets into the bodies of the colonists, leading to vitamin C deficiency and thus scurvy. For various reasons, the only permanent solution to this medical problem is for folks to start eating local foodstuffs, not yet known to be completely safe. Half a dozen colonists are selected at random to test native foods.

When our hero returns, he finds the six people locked up, apparently insane and guilty of sabotaging the colony. The other colonists are in a very bad state, barely able to take care of their basic needs and unwilling to make even very simple repairs. Can one man whip them into shape, solve the vitamin C problem, figure out what happened to the six insane folks, and save the colony?

I should mention that the hero's hallucinations, as well as those of the six colonists who eat local foods, take the form of folklore from their individual cultures. A Greek woman, for example, imagines scenes from Greek mythology. A detailed description of these hallucinations is probably the most interesting and original part of the book.

The explanation for what's going on didn't fully convince me; it got a bit mystical for my taste. What is otherwise a problem-solving SF story that wouldn't be out of place in the pages of Analog flirts with things like racial memory. I'll give the author credit for having major characters of both sexes and multiple ethnicities.

Three stars.

Synthajoy, by D. G. Compton


Cover art by Diane and Leo Dillon.

It's nearly impossible to provide you with a simple synopsis of this novel, because it's narrated in a nonlinear fashion. In addition to that, the narrator may be insane, spends most of the day in a sedated condition, and is subjected to a form of therapy/punishment that definitely messes up her mind.

The narrator is the wife of a obsessive scientist, now dead. With the help of a brilliant electronics engineer (later the wife's lover, and also dead), he came up with a way to record the sensations experienced by one person and to allow another to share them. Originally used as therapy, it becomes a form of entertainment as well.

We slowly learn that the narrator has been convicted of a crime, and that she is subjected to mental recordings designed to make her contrite. With multiple flashbacks, some going all the way to the narrator's childhood, we see how the device was invented, how it was used, and how it was corrupted. We also receive varying accounts of how the two men died.

Alternating with these memories, which may be distorted, the narrator also relates events happening to her in the present. Her relationship with the Nurse and the Doctor is a complex one, with hidden motives everywhere.

This is a difficult book. Besides jumping back and forth in time, often from one sentence to the next, the text frequently breaks off in the middle of a line. Events are not only narrated out of order, but also retold in a completely different way. It's impossible to discover the real truth.

Despite the effort required on the part of the reader, and the inherent ambiguity of the work, this is a fine novel. The author happens to be male, but he writes from the point of view of a woman in a completely convincing manner. If you're looking for light entertainment, seek elsewhere. If you want to discover that science fiction can be serious literature, you're in the right place.

Five stars.



by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

The Tripods (The White Mountains, The City of Gold and Lead, The Pool of Fire) by John Christopher

The Covers of the Original Three Tripods Novels

H. G. Wells’ War of the Worlds casts a long shadow over the science fictional world. Whether fans see it as using invasion literature as a satire on imperialism or just an atmospheric horror tale, know it from films, radio or magazines, it is one of the core works of SF.

War of Worlds book cover, magazine cover and film poster

But what if Wells’ Martians came not to exterminate but enslave?

Whilst not officially a sequel to War of the Worlds, it is hard not to read it as anything else. In this version, the Tripods came and conquered more than a century ago. After millions were killed in the war what remains of humanity lives in a feudal society under their tripod overlords. Once people reach the age of 13, a metal “cap” is put into their head which ensures their compliance with the alien commands.

Will Parker, from a Southern English village, meets a vagrant who tells him of the location of free humans. Together with his cousin Henry they journey to The White Mountains, to both learn more of The Tripods, and to fight against them.

At their heart these are juvenile adventure stories, a cross between Ian Serallier’s Silver Sword and Andre Norton’s SF tales. However, juvenile should not be taken to mean shallow or hollow. These are dark tales of children trying to survive in an oppressive society.

The highlight for me is the second book, where we get to see life in a Tripod city and Will is treated as a pet by one of the aliens. It is insightful, vivid and very disturbing.

These do have one flaw and that is found in the final book. Christopher wants to tie up the trilogy in these short books and the ending feels incredibly abrupt and light, given what we see in the others. However, there is still much to enjoy here and worth checking out.

I actually feel the limitations of having to write for a younger audience benefit Christopher. He is forced to remove his tendency for gratuitous shock scenes for the sake of it, nor did I notice any of his usual prejudices against the Celtic nations of the British Isles. If he sticks within this field, I will willingly pick up more of his books.

Four stars



by Blue Cathey-Thiele

Ace Double H-56

Pity About Earth, by Ernest Hill

Pity About Earth introduces us to Shale, a callous, ambitious, often downright cruel man. He and Phrix, his alien assistant, work for the god-like Publisher, in advertising. His ship is automated, as is the rest of the universe. A mistress of his plots with a competitor, and Shale is forced to escape into a labyrinth. There he encounters cages inhabited by humans who have been conditioned to prove concepts in torturous and deadly ways. Shale feels no sympathy, up until a human-ape hybrid named Marylin catches his attention. He is strangely compelled by her. She helps him to escape the maze, and later, the planet.

Despite being a Groil, Phrix has been promoted to Shale's old position. In one of many instances where Marylin tries to redirect Shale from violence, she protects Phrix by setting Shale to go to Asgard, fabled home of the Publisher.

Upon reaching Asgard, they find the long dead remains of the Publisher. In his place is Limsola, a woman who has been gaining the secrets of Asgard executives just before their deaths. Shale is distracted by her allure, breaking Marylin's heart as he was the first being to show her a shred of care. Limsola encourages Marylin to Publish, to change the rules. Marylin confers with Phrix about how change could happen, and she takes up post as the new Publisher. On his homeworld, Phrix follows her lead, and together they begin to breathe life back into a world that had become frozen.

The world of the Publisher is automated to the point of inaction. Life is casually thrown aside even while there are means to prevent suffering. Advertising is a key function yet items only exist to *be* advertised. Phrix tasks himself with upending an entire universe. It is not a matter of ethics to him, only what is and what could be. Marylin has only abstract knowledge, no personal experiences, and yet she has more compassion and care than any other character.

Shale is hardly unique in his views, unwilling or unable to look beyond himself and care for others prior to meeting Marylin, and even after he begins to have some sense of shared "humanity" it is brief and confuses him. There is a special horror in his blasé approach to the labyrinth of experiments, food made of humans, and sexual violence. He doles out death and the dead are simply out of luck. He is a deeply unlikable protagonist; Marylin and Phrix provide far more engaging points of view.

I can't say I enjoyed it, but it left me with thoughts to chew on.

3 stars

Space Chantey, by R.A. Lafferty

Captain Roadstrum plays the part of Odysseus in a loose adaptation of The Odyssey. Along with Captain Pucket, he and the crew of hornet-men visit planets that serve as analogs to the islands on the way home from Troy. Roadstrum is not some wise general, he survives via luck, sheer force of will, and the rare moment of inspiration. Margaret the houri and Deep John the "original hobo", myths in their own right, join the crew.

Roadstrum finds Valhalla, where his crew feast and fight and die, all to rise up ready to fight again the next morning. Upon leaving, the crew have their tongues cut out and grow themselves replacement organs- Roadstrum opts for a forked tongue, which grants him clever speech. They speed through twenty years while being sucked into a black hole, escaping via a recently installed button that reverses time.

Helios' cows are replaced by an asteroid belt orbiting a sun, though that doesn't stop the crew from capturing and *eating* one of these asteroids like a prize calf.

Roadstrum takes over for Atlas, not carrying the physical weight of the world but perceiving existence in its entirety, as anything he drops his attention from ceases to exist.

The crew complains about the size and quality of the hell planet they've been sentenced to for their crime against Aeaea, a version of the witch Circe, before breaking out.

Roadstrum is in no great hurry to get home, and we don't even get the name of his wife or son (Penny and Tele-Max) until the last 15 pages.

There is a degree of self-awareness to both the story and Roadstrum himself, moments when he recognizes that he is acting out a story that has happened before, or even actions he seems to remember. He makes a determined break from repeating actions at the close of the book, choosing not to settle peacefully with his wife and son as the former version of Odysseus did, but to fly off toward more adventure.

Although Space Chantey, like Pity, has characters eating other people, casual killing, and brutality, it's in the format of a tall-tale and with barely half the gritty detail as the first book of this Ace Double. Even the characters who are dying often take it as a bit of a joke. Indeed, this book reads more as a folk story with space-travel trappings than science fiction. Characters die and return with little or no explanation, survive impossibilities and contradict themselves and the narration. It is larger than life and at times quite silly. It also has plenty of dubious poetry in the form of verse interludes.

This would have been better suited as a series of stories around a campfire than a sci-fi novel.

2.5 stars



by Gideon Marcus

Sideslip!, by Ted White and Dave Van Arnam

If you've been following Dave Van Arnam's First Draft 'zine, you're probably rooting for this fan-turned-filthy-pro.  I didn't get a chance to read his Star Gladiator, and this newest book is co-written.  Still, Ted White's name is magic to me, and who could resist this lurid cover.  Therefore, it was with no hesitation that I plunked down my four bits plus a dime to read Sideslip!

I was even more excited to see that the book starred Ronnie Archer, outsized private eye, who starred in the excellent short story, Wednesday, Noon.  Turns out he's a false cognate, however.  Per a letter Ted sent me:

Same name, different characters.  Ron Archer was my penname as a cartoonist in the early '50s, and got applied to subsequent characters, usually private detectives.  Ron was the protagonist in my never-written mystery novel, "The Stainless Steal."

Ah well.  The rest of the book was similarly a disappointment.  In brief, Ron Archer finds himself zapped into an alternate New York in a set-up quite close to that of White's Jewels of Elsewhen.  But in this New York, alien invaders conquered the Earth in 1938, turning our world into a colonial source for raw materials.  The "Angels", who look like tall, luminous humans, are protected by force fields and human collaborators known as Yellow-Jackets.  This does not keep resistance groups from forming, which in the Untied States are represented by The Technocrats (led by Hugo Gernsback and employing Albert Einstein–these are the folks who warped Archer to this alternate world), the Communists, and the Nazis (led by none other than Hitler, himself).

The first half of the novel details Archer getting captured by and escaping from each of the various groups, ultimately ending up in the hands of the Angels.  Well, one particular Angel.  The one female Angel, who of course immediately falls in love with Archer.  At this point, the story practically grinds to a halt as Archer is taken off-world to meet the Angels and argue for Earth's sovereignty.  There are lots of pop-eyed descriptions of advanced technologies that feel better suited to SF from the 20s or 30s.  Archer and Sharna, his Angel lover, have a fraught relationship written with the subtlety and skill of a teenager writing his first fanfiction.  The end is a brief, action-filled segment.  In between, there's a lot more sex and nudity than I've seen in an American SF novel.  I found it a bit embarrassing.

In short, we have the bones of a Ted White novel, but none of the feel.  Missing is the deft, sensual touch that White lends his pieces, as well as any semblance of good pacing.  This actually makes perfect sense–in another letter, White explained that the story was largely executed by Van Arnam:

This was a book which started in a writer's group.  I wrote an opening hook and passed it out to the others.  Dave Van Arnam picked up on it and suggested we collaborate on a book.  Which we did. I was not happy with Dave's writing early on, and heavily rewrote his first drafts, but as I fed these back to him he picked up on what was needed, and the last quarter of the book is mostly his. Pyramid liked the book well enough to ask us to write their Lost in Space book…

The real problem with the book, beyond the technical issues, is that Archer doesn't do anything.  At every turn, he's simply along for the ride, noting his surroundings, occasionally running.  Archer, himself, notes as much at the end of the book.  I suppose that speaks to some authorial awareness, though it doesn't fix the problem.

Still, the book is readable, in a hackish sort of way, and the concepts are fine, if as hamfisted as the cover.  Based on quality, I should give this thing two stars, but I did make it through Sideslip!, and I wanted to know what happened, so I'll give it three.






[March 2, 1968] Rules and Regulations (April 1968 IF)


by David Levinson

New rules

Readers don’t need to be reminded that the Winter Olympics in Grenoble, France came to a close just two weeks ago. Of course, most of the attention has gone to French skier Jean-Claude Killy, who took all three gold medals in the Men’s Alpine events, and American Peggy Fleming’s absolutely dominating performance in the Ladies’ Figure Skating competition. But the Games also saw many firsts. Norway took the most medals with 14, taking the top spot from the Soviet Union for the first time since the latter began participating. Morocco fielded a team for the first time (believe it or not, there’s decent skiing in the Atlas Mountains), and East and West Germany participated as separate countries for the first time. This was also the first time the Winter Games were broadcast in color.

There were also some new rules. There has been growing concern over the last few years about athletes taking various drugs to improve their performance, commonly called doping. In 1967, the International Olympic Committee finally joined most other sport associations in instituting a ban on the practice. A total of 86 athletes were tested for various substances, and all tests came back negative. The IOC also began performing sex tests on female athletes this year in order to prevent intersex persons from competing in women’s competition. None were found, but after the policy was announced last year, several Eastern European athletes announced their retirement, which prompted a great deal of speculation.

The stars of the show. (l.) Jean-Claude Killy sporting his medals. (r.) Peggy Fleming in her spectacular performance.

Rules that bend, rules that break

Sometimes rules may be onerous, wrong, or perhaps just inconvenient. Maybe you need to bend them a little, maybe you need to break them and replace them with something better. The stories in this month’s IF offer several cases in point.

The Advanced Guard prepare to study the fauna of Chryseis. Art by Vaughn Bodé

The Man in the Maze, by Robert Silverberg

Richard Muller was one of Earth’s top diplomats when he was sent to make contact with the first aliens humanity had discovered. On his return, he discovered that no one could stand to be around him for more than a few minutes, for reasons that are not yet explained. In disgust, he retreated to the desolate planet Lemnos and the heart of a million-year-old city surrounded by deadly traps. Now his services are needed again. Charles Boardman, the man who sent Muller on the mission that gave him his affliction, and Ned Rawlins, the son of Muller’s late best friend, have come to recruit him. With the aid of robots to plan a safe route through the maze, they make their way deep into the city. As the installment ends, young Ned is about to find Muller. To be continued.

A robot seeks the next lethal trap. Art by Gaughan

If this sounds familiar, that’s because Silverberg is working with the myth of Philoctetes, the heir to the bow of Hercules whose festering wound caused the Greeks to maroon him on the way to Troy, but who is needed for their victory. More specifically, he’s using the play by Sophocles with a bit of Algis Budrys’s Rogue Moon thrown in for excitement. Muller is Philoctetes, Boardman is wily Odysseus, and Rawlins is the naive and honorable Neoptolemus, son of Achilles. This is all set-up, with Muller’s past revealed in flashbacks as the viewpoint shifts among the three main characters. It’s very good, but the meat will come in the next installment.

A very high four stars, with a probable five for the whole thing.

The Edward Salant Letters, by Jerry Juhl

A series of letters between a customer having trouble with his Phonotyper and the computerized service department of American Business Equipment.

Do not fold, spindle or mutilate. Art uncredited

Jerry Juhl is this month’s new author. More interestingly, he is a writer and puppeteer for the Muppets, which American readers may have seen on The Tonight Show, The Mike Douglas Show, or in commercials. Readers outside the U. S. are probably out of luck, but keep your eyes open for them. They’re very, very funny. As for the story, we’ve seen this a hundred times, but this one has an unusual twist that makes it fresh. I certainly didn’t see it coming.

A high three stars.

The Rim Gods, by A. Bertram Chandler

A group of Neo Calvinists from the planet Francisco has stopped at Lorn on their way to Kinsolving’s Planet. Around a century ago, a Stone Age man, an artist who made animals appear by making cave paintings of them, appeared there. He eventually found his way to Francisco and joined the Neo Calvinists. Also with them is the cave artist’s great-granddaughter, one of Francisco’s Blossom People, who practice a sort of hedonistic Zen. The Neo Calvinists believe she has inherited her ancestor’s power and want to use her to bring the Lord to Kinsolving’s Planet and make it a New Sinai. To his great dismay, Commodore John Grimes has been ordered to accompany them as an observer.

They look like fun. Art by Morrow

John Grimes is a man who enjoys his pipe and likes a good tipple. He’s the last person who should be locked in a small ship with this straitlaced bunch. Of course, that’s where this story gets its humor and most of its tension. It’s an enjoyable read if you’ve liked some of Grimes’ earlier adventures, but the ending is a bit confused and rushed.

Three stars.

Meanwhile, Back at the Worldcon…, by Lin Carter

Carter wraps up his report on last year’s Worldcon. It’s mostly more name-dropping, a brief mention of the costume ball, and an enumeration of the Hugo Awards. As I said last month, you're better off reading the Journey’s con report.

A low three stars.

The Product of the Masses, by John Brunner

An Advanced Guard unit under Commander Jeff Hook has been dispatched to the planet Chryseis to assist Dr. Leila Kunje and her team of biologists in studying the local fauna. Unfortunately, the loose, non-hierarchical style of the Advanced Guard are at odds with the extremely repressed (or uptight as the kids are saying these days) attitude of Dr. Kunje. An attitude so repressed it blinds her to some obvious facts, causing problems for everyone.

The local fauna to be studied. These are the smaller males. Art by Vaughn Bodé

They say John Brunner is two authors: the literary New Wave writer who sells to the British market and the outdated hack who writes for the American market. This is work even the hack ought to be ashamed of. Dr. Kunje is a character type that only British male authors seem to write: deeply, angrily sexually repressed to the point of denying the existence of sex, love or even affection. I’m reminded of the journalist in Arthur C. Clarke’s A Fall of Moondust who suffers from “impacted virginity.” No zoologist who is unable to see the glaringly obvious facts in this story would ever have risen to the level that would allow her to be chosen for this mission. It’s a pity, because this could have been a fun, if inconsequential adventure story.

Barely two stars, based only on Brunner being able to string together entertaining sentences.

Slowboat Cargo (Part 3 of 3), by Larry Niven

On the planet Plateau, Matt Keller has become involved with the Sons of Earth, who hope to overthrow the rule of the crew and become more than a labor force and source of organs. When the group was arrested, Matt managed to escape thanks to his strange ability to make people forget he exists. Meanwhile, a mysterious new technology has arrived from Earth via unmanned ramjet. Matt rescued the leadership of the Sons of Earth, and a bit of coincidence brought them into contact with planetary leader Millard Parlette. Together, they start work on a compromise that will put an end to the unjust treatment of the colonists and one day lead to the end of the organ banks. Unbeknownst to them, Matt and another rebel have entered the Hospital again on slightly different rescue missions.

Matt quickly learns to control his power and discovers a corollary power as well. He rescues the girl he fell for back in the first installment, but she proves either to have been driven insane by torture or to have been a fanatic all along. Meanwhile, the politicians come to the realization that there are more factions than just crew and colonist. Talk will have to be backed up by action.

And as the story ends, an Earth ramrobot bound for We Made It catches the attention of the space-dwelling alien merchants known as the Outsiders.

Matt takes a dive. Art by Adkins

Once again, the more interesting bits are people sitting around talking politics. The action verges on the repetitive, and while the actions of the young woman Matt rescues result in the main antagonist getting his just deserts, they felt unjustified by the story. Of course, we barely got to know her at all, so that could be part of the problem. Nevertheless it’s an enjoyable read. It’s also a reminder that the real work begins once the revolution ends. Plateau has a long way to go to become the equitable and just society we saw in The Ethics of Madness.

Three stars for this installment, but I think the whole is greater than the sum of its parts and might be worth four stars.

Summing up

When I finished the magazine, I thought it was the best issue of IF in over a year. After all, when the worst story is by John Brunner, it’s got to be pretty good, right? Unfortunately, that Brunner story really brings down the average. Still, it does hold the end of pretty good novel, the start of a novel that may be very, very good, and a couple of decent stories. I think I’d be happy if IF was this enjoyable every month.

Looks like MacApp may be investigating another alien society, and new Zelazny. Fingers crossed!



I have no idea what to make of tonight's episode of Star Trek

Come join us and help us figure it out!




[December 16, 1967] Long Distance Travel (December 1967 Galactoscope)


by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Whilst reading the Times a couple of months I was surprised to see a mention of my favourite SF periodical turn up.

Is New Worlds doomed? 3rd Paragraph: "He part-finances the magazine himself by taking three days off on occasions to write hack adventure novels with titles like The Jade Man, The Jewel in the Skull and Twilight Man. He has written 21. 'They're Tokienesque things I sneak out and hope nobody here notices. They're an embarassment to me.'"
Source: The Times 28th September 1967

As regular readers of the publication will know they have managed to get a new publisher (Stonehart) and are continuing on with only a single month’s break to reorganize. What interested me most was the third paragraph, that there were some more adventure stories he was writing specifically for the US market. I have not come across The Jade Man yet but The Twilight Man actually is the book form of his The Shores of Death already released.

And I was able to discover that The Jewel in the Skull was coming out in America in December.

Now Moorcock’s adventure stories are a mixed bag. For every Elric there is a Michael Kane. But with such an anti-endorsement from the writer himself, how could I not want to read it?

The Jewel in the Skull by Michael Moorcock

In one of my favourite kind of settings, post-apocalyptic fantasy, the world has returned to a state of medieval kingdoms fighting each other, with modern technology treated as ancient sorceries people struggle to understand.

This book is primarily set in the Europe of this future, where the dark empire of the Granbretans is attempting to conquer the continent in the name of its King-Emperor. The powerful kingdom of Kamarg remains independent with Count Brass and his fortress of Castle Brass. Baron Meliadus of Kroiden attempts to gain their support for the empire but is thrown out when he attempts to rape the Count’s daughter Yisselda. Swearing an oath by the Runestaff to control the count and seize his daughter for himself he concocts a plan to do so.

In the dungeons of Londra is the rebellious Duke of Köln, Dorian Hawkmoon. He gives Hawkmoon an offer he can’t refuse, granting him his lands back and his freedom if he goes to Castle Brass, kidnaps Yisselda and brings her back to London. As additional motivation, a black jewel is implanted in his skull. This will allow the Granbretans to monitor him at all times and they can also use it to destroy his mind whenever they choose. And so Hawkmoon rides to Castle Brass on this fraught mission.

When I first opened this book I was worried this was going to be another Barbarians of Mars, with some incredibly overwritten descriptions and cod-Shakesperean dialogue. Thankfully, the style soon settles down and we get something much thicker than the Sub-Tolkien fantasy at first suggested. In fact there are some wonderful choices of imagery, a kind of combination of the gothic and the psychedelic.

As you can probably see from the description, this is not a setup where there are any easy heroes. It is also fascinating to see a tale where the British are explicitly setup as “The Dark Empire”, with people regularly suggesting the entire nation has gone insane and our representative of them a manipulative rapist. Instead, our lead character is a German, the inverse of what you will see whenever you go to the cinema.

This is only the first story in a series, so there is a lot left to be told, but, overall, this is an interesting and entertaining fantasy.

Four stars



by Victoria Silverwolf

Synchronicity

As fate would have it, I recently read two new science fiction novels featuring psychiatrists named Paul. In addition to that, both protagonists are involved with women who have a hard time pronouncing that name. Other than this odd coincidence, the books have little in common, except that they both involve people who have traveled a long distance.

A Far Sunset, by Edmund Cooper


Uncredited photographic cover art.

Split Personalities

The first mental health professional we'll meet is Paul Marlowe. He's a psychiatrist aboard the starship Gloria Mundi. (Given the familiar Latin phrase containing those words, that seems like asking for trouble.)

When the novel opens, he's in prison on an alien world. Two other members of the crew, captured at the same time, are dead. Before all this happened, the nine remaining folks aboard the ill-fated vessel disappeared while exploring the planet. For some reason, the locals have supplied him with a concubine, even in prison. That's the woman who can't pronounce Paul correctly. Her name, by the way, is Mylai Tui.

Meanwhile, Gloria Mundi destroys itself, as it's programmed to do when all the crew is gone for a certain amount of time. Sounds like a design flaw to me, but the idea is to keep it from falling into the hands of hostile aliens.

With no way to return to Earth, Paul Marlowe decides to fit into his new world. He does this by creating a second self, in a way. When acting like one of the locals, he calls himself Poul Mer Lo. This mental exercise allows him to control his emotions when witnessing things like child sacrifice.

(I couldn't help wondering if this was a sly allusion to Poul Anderson, whose first name is famously difficult to pronounce unless you're Scandinavian.)

Paul pretty much accepts Mylai Tui as his wife, although he was already married to one of the missing crew members. The marriage was one of convenience, mostly, although the two were fond of each other. Paul left his true love back on Earth, because he wanted to travel to the stars so badly. Be careful what you wish for!

A parallel to Paul's double identity is found in the local god-king, a young man who often takes on a second persona as a peasant, in order to speak freely with Paul in a way he can't as a divine ruler. Their relationship, in which the god-king is eager to learn Earth ways from Paul, may be the most intriguing part of the book. It also creates some suspense, as the god-king is only allowed to rule for a year, after which he is ritually killed.

The plot really begins when Paul and some local companions make a dangerous journey through enemy territory and deadly jungles to an ice-covered mountain. He makes an extraordinary discovery, learns what happened to the missing crew members, and even finds out why the inhabitants of the planet are very similar to Earthlings but have only four fingers on each hand.

The alien culture is interesting and vividly portrayed. Paul is not a very sympathetic protagonist. He beats Mylai Tui when she struggles to pronounce his name correctly, for one thing. The latter half of the book turns into a quest adventure, which is fine if you like that sort of thing. The revelation at the end of the trek to the mountain strains credibility. Overall, a mixed bag.

Three stars.

Quicksand, by John Brunner


Cover art by Emanuel Schongut.

Physician, Heal Thyself

Our next psychiatrist is Paul Fidler. He works at a mental hospital. You'll get to know him well, because much of the book consists of his interior monologues. They're set off from the rest of the text in the manner I'll demonstrate in the next paragraph.

–I hope the editor likes this article.

Paul has doubts about his career and his marriage. He also has a habit of imagining the way that things might have gone badly in the past. It's kind of the opposite of the wistful thinking we probably all do. You know, something like If only such-and-such had happened. Besides all this, he hides the fact that he had a nervous breakdown some time ago from everyone, even his wife.

After spending some time with this sad fellow, the plot gets going when a badly injured man staggers into a pub. He claims a naked woman attacked him. Could it be one of the inmates at the hospital?

Nope. Paul soon runs into the woman, a tiny little thing, sort of like the diminutive Sister Bertrille. Don't worry, she doesn't fly.

As I've indicated, she has trouble saying Paul correctly. She speaks an unknown language, but manages to indicate that her name is Arrzheen. That gets distorted into Urchin by the folks at the hospital, which fits her pretty well.

Much of the book deals with Paul's attempt to solve the mystery of Urchin. What was she doing naked in the woods on a cold, rainy night? How did such a small woman, who hardly seems out of her teens, severely injure a much bigger man? (We'll find out later it was self defense.) Why can't expert linguists identify her speech or her written language? Why does she seem baffled by ordinary objects?

A strange form of mental illness, or something else? (Hint: this is a science fiction novel.)

Urchin proves to be extraordinarily intelligent, and she picks up English quickly. Paul's marriage falls apart completely. Through the use of hypnosis, he learns more about Urchin. He tries to help her adjust to the outside world.

Let's just say that things go a little too far. After some misleading hints about Urchin, we find out the truth at the very end. Don't expect a happy ending.

As with the Cooper's novel, the protagonist is not always very likable. What he does at the end may disturb you. The book seems almost like introspective mainstream fiction, with a science fiction premise forced into it. It's more to be admired than loved, I think.

Three stars.



by Gideon Marcus

The fourth book for this Galactoscope turns out to be another kind of fourth book: Emil Petaja has written the fourth (and final?) book in his science fiction translation of the Finnish national epic, The Kalevala. It's an unusual novel in that it stars a villain, of sorts. Let's learn more about the…

Tramontane

Kullervo Kasi is a most unlovely man. Born of the chance interaction between a rent in the universe and a random act of sex, he is half human/half evil energy. Physically, he is a gnome-like character, though not without a strong back. Humans instinctively recoil from him. When we first meet him, he is on one of the thousands of colonies of humanity, the race exiled to the stars after their home world had been exhausted. Kullervo is bullied near to death, from which he escapes by a jump into a chasm to (he believes) his doom.

But Louhi the star witch has other plans. She takes Kullervo under her wing, unlocks the intelligence lying dormant in his genes as the reincarnation of the ancient Kalevalan anti-hero, Kullervo, and sends him to the wasted Earth. His mission: to destroy any remnants of humanity–the Vanhat race–that may yet survive on the ruined world.

This is for whom we should be rooting?

Well, yes. It's hard not to feel sorry for Kullervo. He was born with a handicap; his human tormentors have no such excuse. Once he arrives on Earth, and through cunning, endurance, and not a little (if grudging) selflessness, surmounts obstacle after obstacle, one can't help admiring the guy. In the end, if he is not exactly the hero of the story, he certainly is the catalyst for a great good.

Such an unusual protagonist is refreshing, indeed. Plus, Petaja really can spin a quill, offering a neo-pulp adventure with a mythical base. His depictions of the rusting supercities, the floating junk islands, and the recovering crags of Scandinavia have a rich, Burroughsian flavor. I particularly enjoyed Kullervo's adventures with Billyjo, a renegade coast-dweller. Their run-in with the pirates of the roving islands, and Kullervo's short-term subjugation to Queen Fiammante, reminded me somewhat of my favorite Baum book, John Dough and the Cherub. I also found interesting the implication that Kullervo, hideous as he was, had a strange appeal to women–both Fiammante and Louhi make him their lover, and the people who treat Kullervo poorly are invariably men.

Tramontane is not a great book: for one thing, it's not science fiction, but space opera. It's also not consistently written: the middle third is excellent, but the last third lags a touch and is quite literally a deus ex machina situation. Still, it is a thoroughly enjoyable book, and it stands well enough alone (I haven't read any of the other books in the series: Saga of Lost Earths, The Star Mill, or The Stolen Sun.)

Three and a half stars.

(Note: Tramontane comprises one half of Ace Double H-36; the other half is Moorcock's The Wrecks of Time, previously reviewed by Mark Yon. The Ace version has apparently been butchered to fit the format, the greatest casualties being the naughty bits.)



by Cora Buhlert

Sex in the Real World

Poster Helga

The most shocking film of the year is currently playing in West German cinemas. It's called Helga – Vom Werden des menschlichen Lebens (Helga – About the Development of Human Life) and has caused scores of cinema goers to faint.

But what exactly is so shocking about Helga? Well, Helga is a movie about – gasp – sex. The plot is simple. An interviewer asks pedestrians in the street about sex education and birth control. Next we meet the protagonist: Helga (newcomer Ruth Gassmann), a naïve young woman pregnant with her first child. Like many women, Helga knows very little about her body and what is happening inside her womb. Luckily, a kindly gynecologist explains the mechanics of conception and pregnancy to Helga and the viewer. The movie then follows Helga through her pregnancy and also documents the birth of her child. It's this birth scene – shot in full, gory detail – that makes particularly male viewers faint in the cinema… and hopefully think twice before impregnating a woman.

In spite of the frank scenes, Helga is not pornography, but an educational film intended to teach West Germans about human sexuality. Shot in a pseudo-documentary style and interspersed with animations showing the human reproductive system, Helga does what parents and schools all too often fail to do, namely teach young and not so young people about their bodies. The film was produced by West German Secretary of Health Käte Strobe, a sixty-year-old lady from Bavaria and unlikely champion of sex education.

Käte Strobel
West German Secretary of Health and champion of sex education Käte Strobel

But don't take my word for it. Because American International has purchased the distribution rights for Helga, so you can soon see it in a theatre near you.

Sex on an Alien World: Outlaw of Gor by John Norman

Outlaw of Gor by John Norman

I wasn't enamoured with John Norman's debut novel Tarnsman of Gor and didn't plan on reading the sequel. However, December 6 is St. Nicholas Day and since St. Nick was kindly enough to put a copy of Outlaw of Gor into my stocking, I of course felt obliged to read and review it.

When I reviewed Tarnsman of Gor earlier this year, I noted that John Norman was obviously inspired by the Barsoom novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs. This influence is even more marked in Outlaw of Gor, for while Tarnsman opened with protagonist and first person narrator Tarl Cabot, Outlaw uses a Burroughs type framing device and opens with the statement of an attorney named Harrison Smith, who describes at great length his relationship with Cabot, Cabot's physical appearance, his mysterious disappearance and reappearance.

Years later, Cabot and Smith rekindle their acquaintance. Eventually Cabot hands Smith the manuscript for Tarnsman of Gor and vanishes again. Smith publishes the manuscript, as the law of framing devices demands, as well as the sequel, which he finds waiting for him on his coffee table.

It is helpful to briefly recapitulate the previous book in an ongoing series for the reader, but the statement of Harrison Smith goes on for pages upon pages. Nor does the novel need a framing device, because this is 1967, not 1912, and readers are accustomed to fantastic adventures in alien worlds by now.

A Gorean Travelogue

The story proper finally starts with Tarl Cabot giving us an extended description of the Gorean scenery, customs, flora and fauna. One of my complaints about Tarnsman was that the opening third of the novel was a dull and interminable lump of information, because Norman was an inexperienced writer uncertain how to present information about his world to the reader. I had hoped that Norman's writing skills would have improved by his second book. Sadly, they have not.

After a trek through the wilderness, Tarl Cabot finds his hometown Ko-Ro-Ba destroyed by the Priest-Kings and its people, including Cabot's father and his mate Talena, scattered to the four winds. Cabot himself is now an outlaw and decides to avenge himself on the Priest-Kings. Again, the parallels to Burroughs are notable, because John Carter also found himself separated from his hometown and wife upon his return to Barsoom and forced to deal with overbearing godlike beings in The Gods of Mars back in 1913. Indeed, many things in Tarnsman and Outlaw of Gor only happen to Tarl Cabot because they happened to John Carter first.

Before meeting the Priest-Kings, Cabot pays a visit to the city of Tharna, which is remarkable for two reasons. One, all Goreans, regardless of their origin, are welcome in Tharna. Two, Tharna is ruled by a woman and – unlike the rest of Gor – women are revered in Tharna and not treated as slaves or possessions.

It's a Women's City… or is it?

The position of women and the institution of slavery on Gor played an important role in Tarnsman and crops up again in Outlaw. And indeed, the descriptions of Gorean slave girls seem to be what attracts many readers to these books. As a modern man of the Sixties, Tarl Cabot abhors slavery and the oppression of women in general, though it is not clear, if the author shares these views, since the narrative repeatedly notes that the slave girls are happy with their lot after initial resistance and that the free women of Gor, who are kept locked up and only venture outdoors in heavy veils, comparable to practices in many Muslim countries, which are thankfully modernising, secretly envy the slave girls their relative freedom. These aspects make the Gor books more disturbing than a simple Burroughs pastiche should be.

Compared to other Gorean cities, Tharna is described as a grey and depressing place full of grey and depressed men. Apparently, treating women like human beings tends to make cities grey and men depressed. In general, Cabot seems inordinately concerned with cities and their appearance, at one point comparing the run-down New York City unfavourably to Gorean cities. I wonder if Cabot (and his creator) blames women for the sorry state of New York City, too.

Revenge of the Masked Lesbians

Cabot has only been in Tharna for a few hours, when he is approached with an offer to kidnap the Tatrix Lara, the city's ruler. He refuses, finds himself framed for a crime and condemned to die in the arena for the amusement of the Tatrix and the haughty masked women of Tharna. Cabot also learns the reason why Tharna is uncommonly hospitable towards strangers – because they are enslaved to labour in the fields or mines. What is more, men are viewed as little more than animals in Tharna and the women are forbidden from loving men, though encouraged to love each other.

Cabot manages to escape with the help of his tarn, the giant bird creatures warriors of Gor ride into battle. However, rather than continuing his journey to see the Priest-Kings, Cabot instead decides to liberate Tharna from the haughty masked lesbians. Needless to say he succeeds and decrees that what the masked lesbians of Tharna need is a man and some good old fashioned Gorean slavery to teach them how to love. Reader, I puked.

Honestly, just read Burroughs

Tarnsman of Gor was mildly spicy Burroughs pastiche. But while John Norman's fascination with slavery, whips, hoods and shackles was already evident, I did not sense anything prurient or anti-feminist in Tarnsman.

Outlaw, however, is another matter. Particularly the second half of the novel and its anti-feminist conclusion gave me the same creepy crawly feeling that Piers Anthony's Chthon did. Worse, since Cabot has neither found the Priest-Kings nor his true love Talena by the end, I fear there will be at least one more Gor book. However, I will not read it.

If you like swashbuckling adventures on alien worlds, Edgar Rice Burroughs' entire catalogue is back in print and the excellent planetary adventures of Leigh Brackett are easy enough to find as well. If you like the spicier aspects, there is plenty of sleaze to be found in the paperback spinner racks, some of it – so I am reliably informed – written by genre stalwarts such as Robert Silverberg and Harlan Ellison under pseudonyms.

However, don't bother with Outlaw of Gor or its predecessor.

One star.

St.Nicholas and his helper Knecht Ruprecht deliver treats and presents to kids in Bremen's historical Schnnor neighbourhood
St.Nicholas and his helper Knecht Ruprecht deliver treats and presents to kids in Bremen's historical Schnnor neighbourhood


by Jason Sacks

 Secret of the Marauder Satellite, by Ted White

There's a new novel out by Ted White, the longtime assistant editor for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Despite its goofy title, the new Secret of the Marauder Satellite is a wonderful quick read with some clever turns of phrase and interesting insights into its lead character.

Our lead is a young man named Paul Williams, recently graduated from "space cadet" school (as he half-dismissedly calls it) and ready for his first major assignment, aboard a satellite orbiting the Earth which also works as a staging site for mankind's further trips through the Solar System.

As you might imagine from a book like this, Paul is a bit of a prodigy in a space suit. He receives a plum assignment, as a roving salvage man assigned to pick up space junk and haul it back to the station for recycling. With resources short on the station, such a job is extremely useful and important. But during his second mission in that role, Paul makes a fateful and surprising discovery which indicates mankind might not have been the first race to orbit Earth's moon.

White separates his prose from his peers with its vividness of description and clever ways he brings common events to life. For instance, he explains why rocket launches require countdowns in the kind of matter-of-fact detail that had me nodding my head, and his explanation of gravitational inertia is as elegant as it is concise.

Mr. White
Mr. White

But the element that really elevates this book is the way White explains Paul's inner life. We learn early on that Paul is an introvert and has trouble talking with people. But White takes pains to show readers Paul's vast intelligence and his completely broken childhood, with Paul's arrogant unfeeling parents seldom giving their small child more than a smidge of attention as they slept and drank their ways through their hedonistic lives. With this background, it becomes clear why Paul was motivated to be a high achieving astronaut, but it also explains why he had trouble with peers and with members of the opposite sex.

Secret of the Marauder Satellite packs a lot into its short length, and every word was necessary. This book teases at the potential for Ted White to deliver a masterpiece, but its brief length does work against the story. The story moves at a breakneck speed but that rapid pace doesn't quite give the reader enough time to consider all the impacts of its events.  Ignore the goofy title and spend an enjoyable couple of hours with Paul White.

3½ stars




[December 4, 1967] Devaluation (New Writings in SF-11 & Beyond Infinity December 1967)


by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

With so much news about social reforms or issues in Rhodesia and Aden, it is easy to forget that the economy was one of the main issues that led to Wilson’s election as Prime Minister, in particular dealing with the trade deficit.

For almost a decade now Britain has been importing more than it has been exporting. With this many British consumers are choosing foreign made goods over domestic ones causing problems for local industry, not a good look for a country that was once dubbed “The Workshop of the World.”

The reasons for this date back a long way. From early adoption of manufacturing and overreliance on imperial exploitation, to the spending of Post-War American aid on military ventures (instead of the intended economic strengthening). However, one of the biggest is the value of the pound.

Whilst other countries trying to recover after the Second World War, such as Japan, had their currency set low, Britain strived to keep its value high. It has even become a point of national pride to have the Sterling as a major player in international trade, and devaluing had been something that had to be avoided at all costs.

Wilson and Callaghan
Wilson and Callaghan, probably not as happy any more

However, world events have continued to put trade and the currency under strain. With the Arab-Israeli war, the fighting in Aden and failure to join the EEC, it was seen by Wilson as a necessary act. Whilst the economic impact will likely come later, the political impact has already been major. The chancellor, Jim Callaghan, has resigned and there have been attacks from all ends of the political spectrum that this is a breach of trust.

As I read this month’s stories in the anthology "New Writings in SF 11" and magazine "Beyond Infinity", I could not help but wonder if there was some devaluation going on here as well. The quality I was getting for my money seemed to decline as I read on:

New Writings in SF 11

New Writings in SF 11

Dobson’s hardback release was delayed, meaning we get the Corgi paperback (and their much prettier cover) first this time.

In another change the theme here is much broader, with imaginative looks at humanity’s future.

The Wall to End the World by Vincent King

Following his brilliant Defence Mechanism, Vincent King gives us another spectacular tale. Five thousand years earlier, the ancients built the Wall, a thousand-mile circle to protect the ordinary people in the City and the Teachers in their Citadel. Our narrator is an officer of the Wall, determined to protect it from all invaders. When he discovers the return of the ancient ones and the appearance of a new star in the sky, he knows the prophecy of the end is coming true.

In a beautiful and cleverly written 25 pages, King gives a deeper more complex world brimming with science fictional concepts than most writers manage in an entire novel series. There is fascinating mix of old & new technologies, with looking screens and robots mentioned in the same breath as horses and crossbows. But it is never ponderous or boring. Throughout it races along like the best adventure stories.

Five stars, only because I can’t give it a sixth!

Catharsis by John Rackham

Professor Caine is on the verge of a major breakthrough in particle physics, when he starts getting terrible headaches. After he checks into Dr. Halleweg’s clinic he discovers he only has 48 hours left to live.

A more experimental story than I would expect from Rackham with limited SFnal content. It is solid but feels like it is aiming for the current New Worlds style without really getting there.

Three Stars

Shock Treatment by Lee Harding

Pietro struggles to keep his memories and personality intact as he searches for The Great Engine of the world.

This is the kind of slow atmospheric apocalypse that seemed to fill the British magazines after Aldiss’ Greybeard was published. Not bad but nothing new.

Three Stars

Bright Are the Stars That Shine, Dark Is the Sky by Dennis Etchison

Space travel has failed to provide a suitable home for humanity and has been abandoned. With Los Angeles’ population reaching twenty million the old city is being torn down to provide enough housing for everyone. This vignette follows a young boy and an ex-spacer night watchman as they visit The Museum of Space Science and Technology before it is destroyed.

This is a lovely melancholy tale of the loss of innocence and the danger of losing hope in the future. Simple but memorable.

Four Stars

There Was This Fella… by Douglas R. Mason

Alf Pearson has a problem: he keeps jumping between planes of reality. His doctors think he is just highly suggestible, but what is real?

I felt this concept was already used to better effect in de Camp’s Wheels of If. I am not sure if I missed something important or if it was all just a bit hollow.

Two Stars

For What Purpose? by W. T. Webb

After an explosion at the Grenville Power Station, Tom Berkley finds himself in Marginburg: town like Grenville but tinged with bizarre touches, such as the sky being patched up with newspaper, an enormous house with no windows, and regular raids from pirates. How did he get here? And can he get back home?

This one is tough to know what to make of, because much of it has the surrealism of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds and then it ends in a manner that could either be read as genius or nonsense. I will be generous and choose the former.

Four Stars (or Suit-of-Armour Newsprint in Marginburg).

Flight of a Plastic Bee by John Rankine

Paul Karadoc is sent to investigate Station K, repository of secure knowledge in orbit around planet Earth, populated by artificially prolonged humans known as Biomechs. Information has been leaking out of the station and it is up to Karadoc to discover how and why.

This is the second tale from Mr. Mason and an even weaker one, I found it dull and often incomprehensible. Even Doctor Who’s Cyberman adventures do a better job of exploring some of these themes.

One Star

Dead to the World by H. A. Hargreaves

I have been reliably informed this is the same Hargreaves who wrote Tee Vee Man 4 years ago, just with a different first initial, possibly a typographical error. Talking of mistakes, this is the story of Joe Schultz, a man accidentally declared dead in a future where administration is primarily run by computers.

This starts out as an interesting Kafkaesque tale, but soon descends into pure silliness.

Two Stars

The Helmet of Hades by Jack Wodhams

On the planet Albermarle, the inhabitants have been turned blind by the farmer Galig as part of a plot to rule over it as the only sighted adult. Marshal and Cresswell work to resist him.

Wodhams is not an author who has appeared in New Writings before but seems to have done quite well for himself writing mediocre tales for Campbell. Unfortunately, this is even more disappointing. It doesn’t seem to make a real attempt to understand blind people or communities, is overlong and the concept had a better treatment from Wells decades ago.

One Star


Beyond Infinity Dec. 1967

Beyond Infinity
Cover and all illustrations by Lynn Goller

With the continued disappearance of SF magazines from the market and others turning to reprints, any time a new publication appears, I am keen to give this new magazine a try.

It opens with a strong editorial from Doug Stapleton, saying you will not see a “wild, Bondian adventure on the outer rim of the universe” within. Instead, he says, this is more devoted to “What-if-ness”, tales of the strange and uncanny.

Perhaps that is why they chose to print the contents in a randomised order?

Beyond Infinity Contents

Anyway, let’s explore these “other dimensions”:

Of Human Heritage by Wade Hampton

Of Human Heritage by Wade Hampton Illustration: Dying Man

Years ago, a ship full of pioneers crashed onto an unknown planet and no Earth ships have found them. As the last of the original colonists, Old Pendennis, lies dying, he worries whether or not the future generations will be able to maintain their humanity.

This is not a bad tale. It is well written, with a nice narrative style and strong ending, but it also feels like a missed opportunity to me, as it could easily have explored some much deeper themes.

Three Stars

Communication Problem by John Christopher

Communication Problem by John Christopher Illustration: Two Aliens Looking at communication equipment

In 2049 instantaneous warp travel between nearby stars has become safe and routine, that is unless you are travelling after Burns Night with a Scottish duty officer. When the Wayfarer lands inside a sub-electronic storm the ship is forced to crash on to a planet, the last survivor of the crew is rescued by The Mori, but why can the two species not communicate?

This feels like a story intended for Analog that was rejected. We have lots of dull explanations of engineering, aliens being baffled by humans, even mentions of ESP. I do get the sense from some of Christopher’s writing he isn’t all too keen on the other nations of The United Kingdom, and this tale is obviously no exception. Maybe the anti-Scottishness was too much for a Campbell?

One Star (and a big apology to my friends north of the border)

Whirligig! by John Brunner

Whirligig! by John Brunner Illustration: Saxophonist in front of various jazz club signs

Of late Brunner seems to be returning to some of his creations from the 50s. We recently got a serial set in his future Empire, and a sequel to Imprint of Chaos. Now it is the turn of his strange jazz troupe, Tommy Caxton and the Solid Six.

This gives us one side of a conversation, as Caxton tries to convince his record label to include Gumshoe Stumble as their next single.

Unfortunately, this is no Traveller in Black. Instead it is a series of run on sentences with barely any SFnal content (at least that I could understand). I know I am in no position to critique another’s grammar but I found it near unreadable. But it is also true that I don’t get jazz.

One Star

Talk to Me, Sweetheart by Ben Bova

Talk to Me, Sweetheart by Ben Bova Illustration: Astronaut in front controls

Finishing the trilogy of big names, we get Bova giving us another space-flavoured tale. Here an astronaut in orbit is losing control and only the woman’s voice on the other end of the communicator can help him.

Basically this is the opening scene of A Matter of Life and Death transferred to space, albeit with a different ending, one most readers will see coming from eight miles high.

Two stars

5-4-3-2- by James McKimmey

5-4-3-2- by James McKimmey Illustration: Man running away from alien face

Christopher Raamsgaard has been hit hard by the death of his business partner and has been working incredibly hard. Is this why he has started doing everything backwards? Or is something stranger going on?

Mr. McKimmey seems to be returning to SF, with two sales to Pohl’s magazines recently. However, just like those, this is not a good piece. Hoary, dull, silly, it would have been a space filler a decade ago.

One Star

The Deadly Image by McHugh Ferris

The Deadly Image by McHugh Ferris Illustration: Two people working on a robotic Abraham Lincoln

Emile Varner creates a robotic recreation of Lincoln and puts on a hugely successful show where people can experience his last night at Ford’s Theatre. But is history doomed to repeat itself?

Pointless piece of filler barely moving on from the current Mr. Lincoln Speaks attraction.

One Star

Revenge at the TV Corral! by J. de Jarnette Wilkes

Revenge at the TV Corral! by J. de Jarnette Wilkes Illustration: Cowboy at various stage of drawing a gun

Ken Dexter was the star of the major TV western, Western Marshal. Now he has been killed off and replaced by Bill Todd. When his wife also left him for Todd that was the last straw and he goes to murder them.

This is an odd story, that seems to be attempting some sort of metafiction, but never really works for me.

Two stars for effort.

The 13th Chair by Michael Quentin Lanz

The 13th Chair by Michael Quentin Lanz Illustration: Short man with briefcase talking to another man in front of a door

Wes Pepper’s syndicated column is extremely popular but, with a huge libel suit against him and twelve deaths resulting from his distortion, his publisher want rid of him. But Mr. Pepper is not so easily got rid of.

A nasty story without much depth and the feel of Weird Tales.

Two Stars

Upon Reflection by Gilmore Barrington

Upon Reflection by Gilmore Barrington Illustaration: Man being surprised by devil figure in front of carnival posters

Wilbur Trimble hates his wife and wants to kill her. Perhaps the Christian carnival that has come to town will provide an opportunity.

A bad horror story about a terrible man.

One star

Mommy, Mommy, You're a Robot by Dexter Carnes

Mommy, Mommy, You're a Robot!! by Dexter Carnes Illustration: Boy between a winding key and cogs

Stevie Bellamy is an ordinary kid during the day, but at night he dreams of travelling from Omicron and that his mother is actually a robot. Do I even need to say where this is going? Unoriginal, poorly put together and speckled with random racist language.

One Star

Greetings, Friend! by Dorothy Stapleton and Douglas Stapleton

Spaceman standing in front of wrecked spaceship

The Ecknode crashes on an unknown planet without any hope of escape. Suddenly he sees another craft come across the sky, is it his chance of escape?

It is ironic, given his introduction, that the editor gives us the most traditional science fiction story. Whilst not a “Bondian adventure” it is a dull old-fashioned first contact story that wouldn’t be out of place in '40s Astounding.

One Star

The New Way by Christopher Anvil

The New Way by Christopher Anvil Illustration: Collage of images, a gun, a dead man, a man falling backwards, a spiral, a chequerboard patten

Burr Macon is Chief of Crime Documents, here helping deal with a prisoner who has confessed to murder. He gets to experience a new form of punishment and rehabilitation instead of the death penalty, reliving his victim’s experience.

If the last story felt like '40s Astounding, this was pure '50s Galaxy. Unfortunately, Anvil is not William Tenn or Robert Sheckley, and the whole thing feels rote. At least it is competent, which is more than I can say for most of this magazine.

Two Stars

The DNE?

END between a series of overlapping circles, reflected horizontally
Odd ending image used throughout Beyond Infinity

Whilst there were some good stories at the start of New Writings and a reasonable one at the start of Beyond Infinity, there was a decline throughout. Hopefully this devaluation can stop and not continue into subsequent issues.