Something To Read by Ken Slater

That prolonged and sticky spell in August almost made me wish that John Boland's very realistic WHITE AUGUST (Michael Joseph, 10/-, 239 pp.) would come true—in part, anyway. A small fall of snow to cool me off would have been just right. Of course, the weather-war in Mr. Boland's novel has radio-active snow, which threatens to destroy Britain through disruption of traffic and its consequent fuel and food shortages long before the radio-activity reaches a lethal level. Compared with THE SKY BLOCK, Steve Frazee's (Bodley Head, 9/6, 192 pp.) novel of similar trend, WHITE AUGUST is somewhat slow; the action is not so intense, nor so exciting. However, Mr. Frazee limits his scope to the essential characters of the various government branches and armed services who are trying (when not shackled down with their own interdepartmental red tape) to capture a "Weather­wrecking" machine which is bringing unending drought to the American Middle West. Spies and counter-agents, civilian Platt Vencel co-opted for his local Knowledge, Colonel Catron in charge of the combined op; these and few others in a small area of land form the players and scene for THE SKY BLOCK. Mr. Boland plays on a bigger field, and so has more incident-oft-times trivial — which tends to slow his story down. Both are the antithesis of space-opera, and well worth reading

But George O. Smith's HELLFLOWER (Bodley Head, 9/6, 250 pp.) is space-opera, not very pure or simple. The Hellflower is a flower-drug, by which some triple-toned (vocally) aliens are undermining the Solar culture; an undeclared, underhand war. Charles Farradyne, a boy-scout space-pilot who lost his honour, is engaged (unofficially, of course) to track down the drug-ring, and uncovers the extra-Solarian nature of the affair. Hampered by a drug-fiend female, the distrust of both sides (both Solarians and the aliens are gunning for him in the later stages of the brawl) he finally manages to win peace with honour for both sides, and a certain amount of kudos (not forgetting the d-f-female, now cured) for himself. Exciting, but shallow and lacking the technical gadgetry which goes a long way towards making a George O. Smith yarn worthwhile.

Space opera on the grand scale is expected from Isaac Asimov, and his THE CURRENTS OF SPACE (Boardman, 9/6, 217 pp.) fulfils expectations. The theme is the same as that of HELLFLOWER - "little man done wrong makes good", but the treatment and story are utterly different and (in my opinion) on a far higher level. The story is too complicated to be served out in précis form, but the groundwork is a discovery by a "Spatio­analyst" of a threat to a certain planet; its sun is going nova. This planet is the key to a commercial empire, the farm-world for a galactic-wide product controlled by the Overlords of Sark. You can see the political skulduggery, the sociological theorising, immediately available to master craftsman Asimov. And well spiced with some exciting chases, battles - both gun and verbal - and a splash of romance, it makes a very readable story.

ANGELO'S MOON, by Alec Brown (Bodley Head, 9/6, 221 pp.) is something different. I found this a little hard to start, but once started, I read it straight through. A highly technocratic culture, developed on the lines of a city-state, is threatened when its intensive cultivation is overrun by monstrous weeds. Recalled from his post on a satellite station, Dr. Angelo Gardiner is placed in charge of the efforts to save Hypolitania. Hampered by inter-group politics, he recognises that the answer may be in the methods of intensive cultivation, and seeks to obtain knowledge from the "uncivilised barbarians" (anyone who doesn't live in Hypolitania) outside. Some knowledge and aid he does get, but his efforts are thwarted by the ingrained traits of his own people, who rush madly onwards towards destruction. Angelo himself, one of the few Hypolitanians who might be able to dwell outside, retires to the satellite after the debacle preferring to die with his world, despite appreciating its wrongful path. Mr. Brown is to be complimented on making a very successful story out of a somewhat difficult theme. It would have been too easy to slip into a straight satire (of the Coblentz type) with this story. Happily, he avoided this trap. He did not, however, avoid that other trap into which fall too many established novelists, attempting a science fiction story. The book is loaded with "invented" words and terms, which he has explained in far too many footnotes to the pages. There are even a couple in the last but one chapter!

Now some swift short notes.... ALIEN LANDSCAPES: Jonathan Burke (Museum Press, 8/6) contains six of his short stories, of which I'd grade two good, two average, and two mediocre. It was perhaps unfair to Mr. Burke to collect his stories this early - the good ones are good, and the others suffer by comparison. William F. Temple's MARTIN MAGNUS, PLANET ROVER (Muller) is aimed at the juvenile public, but should not be over­looked. The character Temple has created in Magnus delighted me. THE MINDWORM : C. M. Kornbluth, will be coming from Michael Joseph in October, containing twelve of Kornbluth's best. THE CHRYSALIDS, by John Wyndham, should now be out from the same publisher. The American title is REBIRTH, under which title I read and thoroughly enjoyed a somewhat different treatment of the mutant theme. LEST DARKNESS FALL : L. Sprague de Camp, is the rewritten and lengthened version of that fantasy classic from Unknown. This too should now be available from Heinemann. And for your general information, science-fiction is still sufficiently important in the publishing world to earn a page to itself in an Autumn issue of THE BOOKSELLER.  

from Nebula No. 14. November 1955

 

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