'K.O.' by Voss
from the February 1981 issue of Heavy Metal

Book Review: Darkover Landfall

Book Review: 'Darkover Landfall' by Marion Zimmer Bradley

 3 / 5 Stars

While I was growing up in the 70s I never paid much attention to the ‘Darkover’ SF novels by Marion Zimmer Bradley. 

When I did try and read one of her books, it was 1982’s Arthurian treatment ‘The Mists of Avalon’, which was so remarkably boring that I decided to never again try a Bradley novel. 

The passage of time mellows sworn vows, however, so I decided that since I’m looking over a lot of the DAW books from the 70s, I might as well give a ‘Darkover’ entry a try.

Starting with ‘The Planet Savers’ in 1958, to her death in 1999, Bradley produced  nearly 40 Darkover novels, some in collaboration with other writers, and some released posthumously. ‘Darkover Landfall’ (DAW Books No. 36,  December 1972, cover art by Jack Gaughan, 160 pp.) is technically the first volume in the series, as it describes the advent of humans to the planet Darkover.

The story opens with a spaceship – originally destined for the colony world of Coronis -  crash-landed on Darkover; many of the crew have perished in the impact, and the dazed survivors are struggling to erect tents and procure food and water while their vehicle is evaluated for repairs. 

Fortunately the atmosphere and chemistry of Darover is compatible with human biology, but the ship’s captain has no idea as to where in the galaxy their emergency landing site is located. Rafael MacAran, the ship’s geologist, is recruited to journey to a nearby mountain to erect instruments capable of analyzing the night-time constellations and other planetary data.

The weather on Darkover is tumultuous, changing from sunshine, to rain, to sleet, and snow, all in the course of a day. Luckily the ship’s crew includes a group of colonists of Scottish descent, whose ancestors lived in the Hebrides and the Orkney Islands. Accustomed to perpetual rain, sleet, snow, overcast skies, and other manifestations of wretched weather, these stalwarts cope by drinking whiskey, dancing, and singing Ballads from the Olde Country. 

However, just as the crash survivors are starting to assess the likelihood of lifting off into space again, the 'Ghost Wind' takes them unawares. Will madness seize the colonists and destroy their chances of ever leaving Darkover ? Are there indigenous life-forms on the planet, and are they hostile ? Will discord among the survivors lead to internecine warfare and doom any chance at escape ?

‘Darkover Landfall’ is a well-written book, but I found it to be lacking in terms of action. Much of the narrative revolves  around the emotional lives of the main characters, and the efforts of the crew to cope with the terrible weather. Evil aliens, rampaging monsters, murderous parasites, and intergalactic warlords are not in evidence. Readers looking for a slow-paced, introspective novel may want to try ‘Landfall’, but those seeking livelier fare will want to pass.

'The Bus' by Paul Kirchner

Little X

'Little X' by Sonsyrea Tate

Celebrating Black History Month 2011

Here at the PorPor Books Blog, we celebrate Black History Month by reading a book about the Black Experience. For Black History Month 2011 we feature an autobiography by Sonsyrea Tate, titled 'Little X: Growing Up in the Nation of Islam' (1997, Harper San Francisco).

Born in 1966,Tate grew up in Washington DC in a second-generation Nation of Islam (NOI) family; her paternal grandparents had joined the sect in the 1950s. Although Tate's father had left the church when he became older and was an on-and-off believer, Tate, her mother, and her siblings were all devout followers, and Sonsyrea attended the NOI Temple and grammar school in the Shaw neighborhood of DC.

'Little X' relates Tate's upbringing and schooling as a member of the NOI, as well as her family life during the 'Black is Beautiful' era of US history in the 1970s. While I was aware to some degree of the rather odd doctrines of the NOI (for example, white people are descended from a race of androids created eons ago by a mad black scientist named Yucub), Tate describes a curriculum that is a strange melange of Black Pride rhetoric, science fiction tropes, and historical facts. The resultant curriculum was designed to provide NOI youth with a unique interpretation, as given by Wallace Dodd Fard and Elijah Poole, of World History.

Tate and her classmates were raised in a self-contained bubble, in which all knowledge and associations were dictated by the NOI. Her awareness of events outside the small world of her family and the Temple was miniscule.

As she grew older, Tate began to realize that not all was well within the NOI and its community of believers. The unrelenting indoctrination about 'white devils' (i.e., Caucasians) and 'lost' blacks (i.e., those that did not belong to the Nation) gradually seemed more and more false with each passing year. As well, the author became increasingly aware of the subservient role women played in the sect's affairs.

Sonyrea Tate's life as a follower of the NOI began to unravel in 1979, when at age thirteen,  she started junior high at Eastern High School. Tate no longer had to wear a hijab, and became more aware of world at large, even trying marijuana. She and her brother began to rebel against their mother and the Nation, even as their neighborhood started to deteriorate from an influx of drugs, crime, and violent gangs. 

As 1982, and graduation from high school, approached, Sonsyrea Tate was disillusioned and even suicidally depressed at the thought of continuing to live as a woman in the NOI, destined to be married, and converted to a housewife, at a young age. As if in recognition of her daughter's disaffection, Tate's mother moved away from the orthodoxy of the NOI and embraced a more liberal version of its doctrines. Sonsyrea Tate was able to defer marriage and enroll in college, eventually becoming a journalist and writer for the Washington Post and other prominent newspapers.

'Little X' is an interesting memoir, something of a black American counterpart to Julia Scheere's best-seller 'Jesus Land'. Readers interested in the NOI, as well as what it was like to grow up in DC during the 70s, will want to look for it on the shelves.

'Questar' magazine February 1981

The contents of this issue were actually compiled in late 1980. They include a portfolio of artwork by Boris Vallejo, a tribute to Hugo Gernsback, the cheesy b & w comic 'Just Imagine Jeannie' (created by Forest Ackerman), and an interview with hard SF writer George Zebrowski ('The Omega Point', 'Macrolife') which I will be posting here later this month.

There are a number of advertisements for geek culture artifacts, providing a trip down memory lane to the days when feathered-back hair parted in the middle was the height of fashion:

There's a full-page ad for the David Cronenberg film 'Scanners', released to theatres in mid-January 1981:

And closing out the magazine's last few pages is an overview of the Year in Fantastic Cinema 80-81 (mostly 1980), which is an interesting look at the state of the genre as the new decade got underway. Some of the films and TV shows in the pictorial were pretty bad, and some (John Russo's film 'Midnight' and 'The Hand' starring Michael Caine) are quite obscure.

Book Review: The Search for Joseph Tully

Book Review: 'The Search for Joseph Tully' by William H. Hallahan

2 / 5 Stars

After reading the favorable reviews bestowed on this novel at amazon.com, and at the ‘Too Much Horror Fiction’ blog, I went and ordered it. 

‘Search’ was first published in 1974; this Avon paperback (283 pp.) was released in 1977.

The novel certainly starts on a gripping prologue, as the reader witnesses a graphic act of torture taking place in 15th century Italy. 

The narrative then shifts to New York City, ca. 1974, where the residents of a stately old apartment house despondently contemplate moving out. An entire block of tenements is being razed as part of an urban redevelopment scheme, and the wrecking ball swings every day on the condemned structures next to the building housing our cast of characters.

The main character is Peter Richardson, an editor, recently divorced and troubled by bad dreams and a premonition that someone means him deadly harm. One of the book’s two major plot threads deals with Richardson’s increasing unease, and the efforts of his neighbors to bring all manner of 70s pop culture resources to bear on the issue, such as Tarot readings and intense discussions of Occult Phenomena.

The other major plot thread is concerned with the efforts of a young English lawyer, Matthew Willow, who makes New York City his temporary home. Willow embarks on a series of researches into the genealogical history of Joseph Tully and his four sons, who emigrated to the American Colonies in the decades prior to the Revolution. The segments of the book dealing with Willow’s adventures constitute something of a primer on how to conduct genealogical investigations.

The ‘hook’ of ‘Search’, the fixture that induces the reader to keep turning the pages, is the how and why these two seemingly disparate threads will ultimately join, and how they will relate to the incident described in the book’s prologue.

Author Hallahan keeps his chapters brief and his prose understated and terse. The book’s Winter-time setting lends an unrelenting note of existential bleakness to the actions of the characters. Indeed, only Peter Straub’s ‘Ghost Story’, another mid-70s horror novel, does as well in using the cold and darkness of January and February to lend added layers of despair and hopelessness to the narrative.

However, by the time I reached the halfway point of ‘Search’ I found that the red herrings popping up every few pages weren’t enough to keep the story from losing momentum. I became increasingly impatient as the storyline puttered along, with only modest signs of moving to a denouement worthy of the Portents of Doom swirling ever more closely around the befuddled Richardson. And the denouement, which occupies just a few of the book’s very last pages, was a letdown; I felt it could have been disclosed 50 pages sooner without losing much of its impact.

I can’t share the enthusiasm for ‘Search’, but readers who are tolerant of a more deliberate type of narrative, one with elements of a mystery rather than those of a frank horror tale, may want to give this book a try.

'Heavy Metal' magazine February 1981

The February 1981 issue of 'Heavy Metal' isn't particularly memorable. The one good feature is the next chapter in Druillet's 'Salammbo', which I've posted below. 

Other comics in this issue are installments of 'Bloodstar' by Corben; 'What is Reality, Papa ?', an 'Alchemist Supreme' spinoff by Godard and Ribera; 'Ambassador of the Shadows' by Christin and Mezieres; and two singletons: a mediocre Moebius entry called 'The Horny God', and 'K.O'' by Voss. 

The William S. Burroughs story trumpeted on the front cover, 'Civilian Defense', is a unremarkable two-page entry. But at least it doesn't feature pederastic themes, something  Burroughs was fond of, and an aspect of his character that the worshipful literary elite preferred not to advertise.....

Book Review: Spacehawk, Inc.

Book Review: 'Spacehawk, Inc.' by Ron Goulart

1 / 5 Stars

'Spacehawk, Inc.' is DAW Book No. 132 and was published in 1974; the cover illustration is by Hans Arnold.

Kip Bundy is a fun-loving young man who likes nothing more than to party and spend time with pretty girls. However, his Uncle Wenzel, an executive in the BKE Corporation, has a task for him. It seems that a cohort of BKE androids, marketed as butlers on the planet Malagra,have a flaw that may cause them to behave in potentially embarrassing, even dangerous, ways.

Accordingly, Kip needs to visit Malagra and fit each butler with a repair module. Accompanying Kip on his journey to Malagra are a lubricious photographer named Palma, and a toothsome young woman named April Arthur.

Once on Malagra, Kip and his friends quickly realize that this is the most chaotic, recklessly governed planet in the system, and seemingly simple tasks will require the utmost in skill and daring.....

This is a really bad book. I gave up on it at page 76 of 160.

I freely admit that I have never been a fan of the sub-genre of humorous / absurdist SF. I've never had the slightest interest in any of the Douglas Adams or Terry Pratchett books. So maybe I just don't 'get' the humor in 'Spacehawk'.

But it's the one of the lamest efforts at being funny I've ever encountered. Author Goulart tries to take Woody Allen / New York Jewish humor and graft it onto a standard-issue SF theme and fails miserably.

Goulart produced a very large number of novels and short stories during the 60s, 70s, and 80s, not all of them in the humor genre, so I'm hoping that some of that material is worth looking into. But his comedic work is something I'm going to avoid.

'There Is A Prince Charming on Phenixon' by Moebius

from the January 1981 issue of Heavy Metal

Book Review: Midsummer Century

Book Review: 'Midsummer Century' by James Blish

1 / 5 Stars

Few SF writers of the 50s and 60s were as consistently over-rated as James Blish. In his entry for Blish in 'The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction' (1995, St. Martin’s Griffin Press), Peter Nicholls describes him as ‘…an SF writer of unusual depth’. But I’ve always been unimpressed with those few Blish novels and stories that I have read (starting in the mid 70s with ‘Spock Must Die’, which was remarkably boring).

‘Midsummer Century’ (DAW book No. 89, February 1974, 159 pp., cover art by Josh Kirby) doesn’t do much to dissuade me of my convictions about Blish. 

The title novelette, first published in 1972 in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, takes as its starting point an accident which befalls contemporary British astronomer John Martels. He awakens from a coma to discover that his consciousness has been lodged within a computer located in a moldering temple in the year 25,000 AD. 

Sharing the computer is a prickly AI known as ‘Qvant’. Together, Martels and Qvant serve as oracles to petitioning tribesmen, who are under some duress from The Birds; it seems that by 25,000 AD, avians have evolved into larger, and more intelligent, creatures who are determined to eradicate Homo sapiens from the earth. Human civilization has been reduced to the presence of some stone-age tribes that eke out an existence in those places not yet conquered by the Birds.

The story concerns itself with Martel’s efforts to escape his computer prison and find some surviving technological outpost, where he can make arrangements to return to his own time and place. But, while ‘Century’ has an interesting premise, Blish fails to do much with this premise. His prose is overly wordy and meandering and the narrative never achieves much in the way of momentum. A climactic sequence, which in the hands of a more capable writer would have dominated the novel,  instead is relegated to half of a page, providing an underwhelming ending to the novelette.

Rounding out this DAW volume are two additional stories:

 In ‘Skysign’ (Analog, 1968) an immense spaceship appears over San Francisco; the humanoid aliens piloting the craft invite some Earthlings to come aboard for purposes unknown, but presumably involving amiable inter-species relations. An affectless hippie named Carl Wade volunteers, and once aboard ship finds himself a prisoner. Can a disheveled stoner hope to defeat advanced alien technology and gain freedom for himself and his unlucky companions ? 

‘A Style in Treason’ (Galaxy, 1970) is an effort to write a Jack Vance-inspired story (the use of the phrases ‘russet breeches’ and ‘a tabard of deeper violet’ are sure tip-offs), albeit an effort  beleaguered with Blish’s attempts at using New Wave prose stylings. The plot is barely coherent, and involves the efforts of one Simon de Kuyl, a courier of state secrets, to foment an alliance between High Earth and the polities ruling the colony world Boadacea. ‘Style’ is very poorly written, featuring clumsy sentence structure and inane metaphors (‘autumn cannibalism’ ???). 

The mediocre quality of ‘Midsummer Century’ perhaps could be excused by the fact that during the early 70s Blish was chronically ill (he died in 1975 from lung cancer). But unless you are a dedicated Blish fan, ‘Midsummer’ is best passed over by those looking for memorable works of the New Wave era.