Book Review: New Writings in SF-2

Book Review: 'New Writings in SF-2' 
Edited by John Carnell

3 / 5 Stars

'New Writings in SF2' first was published by Dobson Books in the UK in 1964; this Bantam Books paperback edition (150 pp) was published in October 1966. Most of the stories in this anthology were published in 1964, and were written exclusively for this volume.

The eccentric cover, which would seem to be more apropos for a book on entomology, is designed to signal that this is New Wave SF. So how well does 'SF2' reflect the New Wave ethos ? 

Reasonably well, in my opinion. My capsule reviews of the contents are as follows:

Foreward, by John Carnell: Carnell takes pains here to remark that he is an editor of 'Speculative Fiction', signalling to the world that the genre of science fiction has achieved sufficient maturity to be regarded as Literature. 

Hell-Planet, by John Rankine (pseudonym of Douglas R. Mason): when a damaged Fah' een spacecraft is forced to enter Earth's orbit, the enlightened, Thoroughly Woke aliens aboard are appalled at the content of the radio and television transmissions emanating from the planet. 

This novelette is one of the better examples of an early 60s effort to imbue SF with some type of Message. In this case, there is a note of redemption at the story's conclusion.

The Night-Flame, by Colin Kapp: in a near-future UK, the international arms race comes very close to home. A downbeat, well-crafted tale from Kapp, who in my opinion was one of Britain's best SF authors throughout the 60s and 70s.

The Creators, by Joseph Green: a multiracial coalition investigates mysterious artifacts on a deserted planet. The ending is unconvincing.

Rogue Leonardo, by G. L. Lack: when robots can create legal forgeries of masterpieces by Da Vinci, what, then, is Art ? A slight tale that editor Carnell probably included because it uses SF to say Something Profound about the Human Condition.

Maiden Voyage, by John Rankine (pseudonym of Douglas R. Mason): yet another novelette from Mason, who seems to have been held in high regard by editor Carnell..........perhaps because Mason always met deadlines. Whatever. 

This story features Rankine's recurring character 'Dag' Fletcher, who is more than a little skeptical that the new spaceship Nova is all that the Space Project's bureaucrats seem to think it to be. When the eponymous voyage goes wrong, Fletcher has to mount a rescue mission on a hazardous planet. This is another of the better stories in the collection.

Odd Boy Out, by Dennis Etchison: published in 1961 in Escapade magazine ('Pleasure for Every Man !'), this was one of Etchison's first short stories to see print. It deals with a trio of young people who are obliged to do unpleasant things in order to survive. 

While the story's concept is interesting, as usual, Etchison's tangential prose style makes it a labored read. However, the ending avoids the ambiguity typical of this author's later works, so I regard 'Odd Boy Out' as a success.

The Eternal Machines, by William Spencer: on the junkyard planet of Chaos, the caretaker, a poetic introvert named Rosco, preserves Humanism in age when it has long since been forgotten.

A Round Billiard Table, by Steve Hall: a scientist has perfected a method for conferring invisibility on objects..........and  it's totally useless. Or is it ? This is the type of story that Isaac Asimov routinely published in the SF magazines of the 50s and early 60s, stories mixing an element of hard science with wry humor. With the advent of the New Wave movement, this type of story rapidly went out of style.

Summing up, ''New Writings in SF2' serves its purpose as a snapshot of how the genre stood at the beginnings of the New Wave movement. it has enough entries of quality to make it worth picking up if you should see it on the shelves of a used bookstore.

The Tower King episodes 10 - 14

The Tower King
episodes 10-14
Alan Hebden (writer)
Jose Ortiz (artist)
Eagle (UK) 1982

episodes 1 - 3 are here.
episodes 4 - 6 are here.
episodes 7 - 9 are here.

episodes 15 - 18 are here.

episodes 19 - 24 are here.

This set of episodes features post-apocalyptic Picts.....and Chieftan tanks ?!

Book Review: Zarasthor's Bane

Book Review: 'Zarsthor's Bane' by Andre Norton

2 / 5 Stars

'Zarsthor's Bane' (204 pp) was published by Ace Books in November 1978; this third printing was issued in July 1983. The cover art is by John Pound.

'Bane' is a 'Witchworld' novel. The heroine, a young woman named Brixia, is an outcast from a noble family, roaming the wastes of High Halleck as an outcast in the aftermath of the ruinous wars that have collapsed human society. She is accompanied by a cat named Uta.

Brixia meets up with a boy named Dwed, who is a squire to a warrior named Marbon. Marbon has suffered a serious head injury, and, in his few moments of coherence, is prone to spouting poetry about a long-ago Bane that brought ruin to a vast tract of Witchworld.

Despite her misgivings, Brixia decides to accompany Dew and Marbon in their quest into the depths of the wasteland. This entails confrontations with the remnants of Evil Powers still at loose in the High Halleck. Will the foursome - squire, warrior, cat, and wanderer - be able to overcome the malevolent forces gathering around them ? Or will the Bane triumph and leave the foursome prisoners in the Hell of the Bane's making ?

I picked up 'Zarasthor's Bane' expecting a 'typical' Witchworld novel; that is, one tailored for a Young Adult readership; bloodless; long on phantasmagorical sequences; overly reliant on stilted dialogue; a denouement that involves a young woman's realization that, despite the seeming humbleness of her existence, she is in fact the holder of awesome psychic abilities upon which the resolution of an age-old conflict depends. 

'Bane' is certainly these things, but it also seems tired and meandering, much more so than other volumes in the Witchworld series. This may reflect the fact that at the time she wrote it, Andre Norton (i.e., Alice Mary Norton) was in declining health.

Whatever the faults are inherent in the book's prose, this illustrated edition benefits from the line artwork of Evan Ten-Broeck Steadman. These plentiful illustrations strike a skillful balance of abstract and decorative styles appropriate for presentation within the pages of a mass-market paperback book (never an easy assignment). Indeed, Steadman's art kept me turning the pages even when the narrative became too plodding to hold my interest.

The verdict ? Unless you are a fervent Witchworld fan, 'Zarasthor's Bane' will not be a rewarding read. In my opinion, the earlier novels in the series are better investments.

Race of Scorpions

Race of Scorpions
by Leo Duranona
Dark Horse comics 1990

Leo Duranona is an Argentinian artist who did work for comics from Warren, Marvel, and Dark Horse.

In 1990 he published this 48-page, full-color, owner-created comic: 'Race of Scorpions', with Dark Horse.

'Race of Scorpions' is set on a far-future Earth in the aftermath of an eco-catastrophe that has left the entire planet a desert.

A young boy named Dito, a girl named Alma, and a mysterious man known only as The Stranger find their paths intersecting when a treasure - in the form of an underground lake - is discovered. 

The trio embark on a series of adventures that pits them against Sand Pirates, an evil Emperor, and an army marching on the gates of the Golden City.

'Race of Scorpions' features some very nice artwork, in the European bande dessinee / Heavy Metal style, from Duranona. Unfortunately, the printing process and lower grade of paper used by Dark Horse back in those days gives the artwork a lower-res quality.

Duranona's script isn't exactly the easiest to follow. Some conversations clearly lost something in the translation, and the narrative suffers from too few framing passages. However, the story does come together in the end, and does about as much as any story can do within the format of a 48 page, one-shot book.

All in all, it's a nice little sci-fi comic, and if you are a fan of the European and South American artists showcased in the pages of Heavy Metal in the 70s and 80s, then it's worth picking up. Copies in good condition can be had for under $6 including shipping and handling. 

(Duranona did several follow-up volumes in this series that also can be acquired for reasonable prices.) 

UPDATE: below are some (hopefully spoiler-free) panels from Book Two of 'Race of Scorpions'.

Hold On by Ian Gomm

Hold On
Ian Gomm
August 1979

As author Stephen Davis points out in his biography of Led Zeppelin, Hammer of the Gods (1985), early in 1979 the major record companies in the U.S. succumbed to the wisdom of the rock critics and signed up every 'Punk' or 'New Wave' band they could find.

By May 1979, records from all of these bands began to glut the market. Few people bought them.

According to Davis, the release of the Led Zeppelin album In Through the Out Door on August 15, 1979 'promptly saved the American record industry from bankruptcy'.

That might well be true, but some of the New Wave acts that released songs and albums in that Summer of '79 were actually pretty good (and no, I do not mean The Knack).

Among these worthwhile songs was one from the British singer-songwriter Ian Gomm (b. 1947) whose album Summer Holiday was released in the UK in 1978. A year later it was released in the US as Gomm with the Wind, and the single 'Hold On' got airplay on the FM album-oriented rock stations. 

I remember hearing it in August 1979 and thinking it was one of the better New Wave songs out there.

So here's a grainy clip of Ian Gomm performing 'Hold On'. 

Book Review: Where Have All the Soldiers Gone

Book Review: 'Where Have All the Soldiers Gone' by Con Sellers

5 / 5 Stars

Connie Leslie Sellers (1921 - 1992) was a WW2 veteran who was discharged from the Army in 1956 (apparently for alcoholism). Sellers turned to writing pulp fiction, and ultimately authored over 230 novels in genres ranging from pornography, to melodramas, to crime, to romance, and even television tie-ins (Dallas). 

'Where Have All the Soldiers Gone' (174 pp) was published by Popular Library in February 1969. This was not an easy book to track down, as it's long been out of print, and copies in good condition have steep asking prices.

The novel is set in an undisclosed area in South Vietnam in the late 60s. Lee Boyd, the protagonist, is newly deployed and, as a conscientious objector, is assigned to be the platoon's medic. Boyd comes to Vietnam with plenty of baggage; back in his hometown of Monterey, California, he was an ardent antiwar protester, and the subject of considerable media attention, when he faced a four-year jail sentence for refusing to be drafted. 

Boyd ultimately chose to serve in Vietnam rather than spend four years in a cell. He arrives in-country filled with bitterness and self-pity over his fate, and determined to expose what he sees as the gross immorality of the U.S. military intervention (author Sellers makes clear that Lee Boyd is the physical embodiment of the antiwar sentiment inherent in the Pete Seeger song that serves as the novel's title).

The opening chapters of the novel detail Boyd's efforts to conduct his antiwar mission in the face of skepticism, even indifference, from his fellow soldiers. But as one combat mission after another unfolds, it becomes harder for Boyd to view the war with the simplified ideology he employed back in 'The World'. 

And as for Boyd's major nemesis in the platoon, the veteran Sergeant Garrick ? Lee Boyd finds that the seemingly brutal actions of the Sergeant must be viewed in a new light, as the platoon finds itself trapped in a ville and surrounded by a large force of VC and NVA regulars........

'Soldiers' is proof that for some 'one-man fiction factories' like Con Sellers, the act of issuing such large quantities of literary 'product' results in the fashioning of a capable writer. The novel is fast-moving and the frequent combat scenes convincing (likely benefiting from  Sellers's own experiences in the Army).

Its political stance is subtle, and incidental to the plot, rather than being a Message that the narrative struggles to accommodate. 

'Soldiers' is not perfect; the segments where Lee Boyd finds solace in the stifling bedroom of a Vietnamese bar girl derive a bit too much from Sellers's craft as a porn paperback writer. And the dialogue issued by the black GIs is more than a little unconvincing (few are the white writers who can keep their renditions of 'Black English' from sounding like unwitting parody).

But summing up, perhaps because of its straightforward narrative, and its treatment of the conflict at a time when the war was actually ongoing, 'Where Have All the Soldiers Gone' stands as one of the better Vietnam War novels. It's unfortunate that its long-out-of-print status makes prevents it from getting the recognition it deserves.

Space Relations, Donald Barr, and Jeffrey Epstein

Space Relations, Donald Barr, and Jeffrey Epstein

It's not often that a PorPor Book makes the contemporary news scene, but over at the Vice website I saw something that had me laughing.

(Vice is a news and commentary website aimed at the 'Millennial Hipster' readership; i.e., sample articles include 'how to make a gravity bong', 'meet the group urging people to stop calling the police', 'the midwest is about to have a weed revolution', 'I deal with grief through extreme makeup to make people look at me', etc.)

Becky Ferreira, a science reporter for Vice, writes that hipsters and news junkies are buying up copies of a 1973 sci-fi novel called 'Space Relations' by one Donald Barr who, it turns out, is the father of our current Attorney General, William Barr.

Ferreira is quite indignant over the content of 'Space Relations' :

By far the most disgusting aspect of the novel is its fixation on sexualizing adolescents, and its depictions of rape. Even the adult characters in the book are constantly infantilized. The novel is also rife with casually unsettling observations such as: “To me, pederasty seems utterly lacking in aesthetic appeal.”

For all its faults, speculators at amazon are offering 'Space Relations' for $998.

Over at eBay, other speculators are not only offering copies for exorbitant prices, but Donald Barr's other sci-fi novel 'A Planet in Arms', also has a steep asking price.

I think I might actually have a copy of 'Space Relations' that I picked up 7 years ago. It may be in a box in my basement. I've never read it. Maybe I will now.

If you have your own copy of 'Space Relations', and you're interested in selling it for a profit, well, you may want to sign up for an account at eBay.............?!

And if you have read 'Space Relations', let us know what you thought of it...........!

Beauty and the Beast by Chris Achilleos

Beauty and the Beast 
by Chris Achilleos
Paper Tiger (UK) 1978

Every sci-fi fan and every stoner who lived during the 1970s was aware of this book. It was as indispensable as Bruce Pennington's Eschatus, Patrick Woodroffe's Mythopoeikon, or The Art of the Brother Hildebrandt, or any of the trade paperback collections of Frank Frazetta fantasy art you saw on the shelves of Waldenbooks.

I still remember when I first saw 'Beauty and the Beast': my younger brother's friend Mert brought it over with him one dreary Autumn night in '78 and we all agreed that this was outstanding art. Much too cool for Playboy, but just right for Heavy Metal (and Achilleos did indeed provide covers for that magazine).

Chris Achilleos was born on Cyprus of Greek ethnicity. After his father died while Achilleos was a child, his mother moved the family to London. Achilleos attended the Hornsey College of Art, and in the 1970s began a career in commercial art for UK publishers of science fiction and fantasy books, magazines, and record album covers.

Achilleos's skill with the airbrush gave his work a carefully crafted, 'clean' look that was much in demand as publishers began turning away from the more abstract and figurative styles of the New Wave era. 

'Beauty and the Beast' was one of the first books published by the Dean brothers under their Paper Tiger imprint, and one of the most successful. It's hard to imagine nowadays, where you can walk into Barnes and Noble and see a healthy selection of art books in the shelving of the sci-fi section, but back in '78 such things were rare.

These selections from 'Beauty and the Beast' should give you a good idea of how polished Achilleos's artwork was; these pieces could be mistaken for digitally produced compositions (which of course didn't exist in the seventies).

'Beauty and the Beast' features some of the artists' cheescake / softcore porn illustrations; more plentiful examples are provided in the followup volumes Sirens (also 1978) and Amazona (2004). Unlike 'Beauty and the Beast' these other compilations feature commentary text by the artist.

Copies of 'Beauty and the Beast' can be had for about $10 from your usual online retailers, so there's really no excuse for not having this book in your personal library if you are at all a fan of 70s pop culture, 70s sci-fi, 70s stoner art, and 70s fantasy art. And if you're not a fan of those things, but you have a deep nostalgia for that era, then that, too, is a good reason to get a copy.............

Led Zeppelin at Knebworth

Led Zeppelin
publicity photo for the Knebworth Festival
Knebworth, UK
August 1979

left to right: John Paul Jones, Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, and John Bonham

Book Review: One Very Hot Day

Book Review: 'One Very Hot Day' by David Halberstam

2 / 5 Stars

'One Very Hot Day' first was published in hardback in 1967. In June 1984, to tap into the burgeoning market for Vietnam War memoirs, Warner Books released this mass market paperback edition (230 pp).

David Halberstam (April 10, 1934 – April 23, 2007) was a U.S. journalist and writer, and among the first reporters to travel to Vietnam in the early 60s.

As a liberal, Halbertsam had no qualms about interjecting his political viewpoints into his fiction and nonfiction books about Vietnam. While an advocate for U.S. military intervention in the early 60s, by the early 70s Halberstam was a vociferous critic of the U.S. involvement, and even went so far as to publish a hagiography of Ho Chi Minh, titled Ho, in 1971.

The novel is set in South Vietnam in 1965, a time when the South Vietnamese government was rapidly losing the war in the countryside to the Vietcong. The lead character is a 38 year-old U.S. Army Captain named Beaupre, who agreed to serve as an Advisor to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) less from a sense of opportunity, and more from a desire to escape his deteriorating relationship with his wife.

Along with a young, idealistic West Point graduate, Lieutenant Anderson, Beaupre sets out with an ARVN detachment on a mission to investigate possible Vietcong redoubts, on the eponymous Very Hot Day. The novel's span, occupying no more than that single day, is understood to serve as a microcosm of the U.S. effort in South Vietnam.

'Hot' is not an easy read. Halberstam employs a prose style reliant on a stream-of-consciousness narrative, one featuring lots of run-on sentences and lots of commas. Here's one of the book's shorter passages:

Of all the Americans he was quite sure that Anderson was the best officer he had seen; brave, intelligent, handling himself well with the Vietnamese soldiers, speaking the language better than any American he'd ever seen; similarly he was sure that Beaupre was the worst, sloppy, careless, indifferent to the troops, contemptuous of the Vietnamese, and worse, he was sure he sensed Beaupre's fear.

With the plot preoccupied with relating the physical travails of the march in the hot sun, much of the narrative consists of discourses on the psychological and emotional states of its American and Vietnamese characters. Staples of the Vietnam War narrative are included, such as the obligatory encounters with bar girls while indulging in R & R in Saigon; the segregation between black soldiers and white soldiers; and the deliberate distancing of senior officers from any boots-on-the-ground command posture in favor of relating orders, by radio, from the rear.

The closing chapter tries to redeem with novel with a furious bout of life-or-death action, but it comes so late that it ultimately can't save 'One Very Hot Day' from being underwhelming.

The verdict ? While Halberstam's criticisms of the conduct of the war give 'One Very Hot Day' some degree of validity, when taken as yet another Vietnam War novel in a large inventory of such novels, it's not all that powerful or impressive. I really can't recommend this one.