Science Fiction & Fantasy


WORLDS OF FANTASY #1, 1968. Editor: Lester del Rey, Cover art by Jack Gaughan. Overall rating: ***½.

JOHN JAKES “Mirror of Wizardry.” Brak the Barbarian. Novelette. Brak the Barbarian is of course based on Conan, but that doesn’t make his adventures any less enjoyable. This time Brak’s escape through the mountains is hindered by a wizard hunting the girl he has befriended. (4)

BILL WARREN “Death in a Lonely Place.” A vampire who preys on prostitutes shows that he has a heart. (4)

ROBERT SILVERBERG “As Is.” Novelette. A computer salesman buys a car with a mysteriously sealed trunk. Easy to read, but not believable, with a miserable ending. (3)

MACK REYNOLDS “What the Vintners Buy.” Trust Reynolds to put a lecture on hallucinations into a fantasy. (2)

LIN CARTER & L. SPRAGUE de CAMP “Conan and the Cenotaph.” Novelette. According to [Webster], a cenotaph is a monument for someone whose body is buried elsewhere. The one Conan is lured to is magnetic, and the home of a slime-monster. (4)

PARIS FLAMMONDE “After Armageddon.” Suppose the last man in the world had happened to have found the Fountain of Youth. (3)

ROBERT HOSKINS “The Man Who Liked.” Before the bombs fell, Death was a happy person. (1)

ROBERT E. HOWARD “Delenda Est…” Hannibal’s ghost comes to life to help a barbarian’s attack on Rome. Obsessed with historical background. (2)

ROBERT LORY “However.” Novelette. Hamper the However’s trip from Balik to Overnon by way of [grath (?)] is hampered by his lack of magical powers, However, if people believe that one has these powers, what difference can it make? (3)

— November 1968.

ANALOG SF – October 1967. Edited by John W. Campbell. Covert art by John Schoenherr. Overall rating: **½

ANNE McCAFFREY “Weyr Search,” [Dragonriders of Pern] Short novel. Reviewed separately here.

TOM PURDOM “Toys.” A good idea, the effects of advanced toys on children, is completely wasted. Two policemen save hostages from kids holding them prisoner. Action, action, unreadable action. (0)

CARROLL M. CAPPS “The Judas Bug.” Novelette. A sense of paranoia pays off, as a member of Phase Two of the Expedition begins to suspect that the leaders of the original party are plotting against him. Is the author C. C. MacApp? (3)     [Answer: Yes.]

W. MACFARLANE “Free Vacation.” In a society run by consensus, dissenters are given the choice of rehabilitation or space exploration. The author has little sense of either description or dialogue. (1)

J. T. McINTOSH “Pontius Pirates.” Novelette. Pontius Pirates are cautious, looking both ways trying to be in the clear whatever happens. But IP agent Jack Sheridan’s suspicions of the girl who picks him up in a bar on the planet Molle tell him someone there has something to hide,. Amazing by-play that does not develop into anything serious. (3)

— October 1968.

FRED SABERHAGEN – The Broken Lands. Ace G-740. Paperback original, 1st printing, 1968. Cover art: Richard Powers. Baen Books, paperback, 1987. Collected in The Empire of the East (Baen, paperback, 1990; Tor, trade paperback, 2003).

   The are very few good examples of effective combinations of science fiction with swords-and-sorcery. This may be the best so far, better to my mind than anything by Andre Norton, for example. Since a sequel is definitely required, Saberhagen may have more in preparation, very good news indeed.

   Some large indefinite time in the Earth’s future, magic and sorcery have replaced science and technology in the scheme of things. Magic works, while science is regarded with superstitious awe. But the old things do work, and a nuclear-powered tank found buried under a mountain comes to life to help fulfill a myth, as an evil satrap is overthrown by the outlaw Free Folk.

   Try to imagine a Barbarian learning the operation of that tank, succeeding by trial and error. The fascination is so great that it truly comes as a disappointment when he is captured and the secret of tank’s existence is lost.

   Humor is present, too, as when instructions for a magic stone allowing its holder to escape go unread because of the very active requirements of doing so, ’Tis a very deep stone, too, to be able to determine which side of a barrier leads to the “outside” or to the “inside” …

   Not to be put down easily.

Rating: *****

— October 1968.

STARTLING MYSTERY STORIES, Summer 1968. Editor: Robert A. W. Lowndes. Cover art by Virgil Finlay. Overall rating: *½.

COL. S. P. MEEK “The Black Mass.” Originally published in Strange Tales, November 1931. The monastery of St. Sebastian is attacked by Asmodeus, the master of a c oven celebrating the Black Mass. Is not made believable. (1)

EARL PEIRCE, JR. “The Last Archer.” Novelet. First published in Weird Tales, March 1937. A hated Crusader Knight, put under a curse by a dying Saracen, is condemned to die only at the hands of the world’s greatest archer. An electronics expert is brought to his deserted island castle to help him killing himself as his mirror image. Effectively weird, in spite of diary format. (3)

JAY TYLER “The Sight of Roses.” Lester Morrow thinks he has contacted the Devil in his efforts to have his unfaithful wife done away with, but his perfect plan works too well. Uneven writing, some good, most terrible. (1)

FERDINAND BERTHOUD “Webbed Hands.” Originally published in Strange Tales, November 1931. A South African uses a monstrously deformed assistant to kill female relatives for insurance money. The author uses clumsy inverted sentence structure as he generally displays ignorance of the English language. (0)

PAUL ERNST “Hollywood Horror.” Dr. Satan #3. Novelet. Originally published in Weird Tales, October 1935. Dr Satan invents a ray that makes flesh invisible and uses it to threaten the motion picture industry, Not very scientific to be sure, but fun reading. (2)

— October 1968.

TED WHITE – The Spawn of the Death Machine. Paperback Library 63-680; paperback original; 1st printing, July 1968.  Jeff Jones cover art. Warner Books, paperback, April 1974.

   Sometime after Chaos, the computer-complex know as the Death Machine sends Tanner out into the world to report on the state of humanity. Tanner is superficially human, but he has non-human superpowers that at times isolate him from the humans he finds. Some are savage barbarians, others are pioneer frontiersman, but the group he and the girl Rifka finally find have developed empathetic powers and seem to be the future of the race.

   Tanner’s memories of the pre-Chaos past haunt him and contribute to his worries about his quasi-human condition. That he is human is proven by the birth of his son, but he must learn to live with his discovery that it was he who helped decide that destruction must precede rebirth for the human race.

   The violent story of an outsider, realistic in treatment of both violence and sex, equated with humanity. Very easy to read, but also lacking in depth, and no deep conclusions result.

   Nero Wolfe is a popular character, The Mayor of New Mercer, later brutally killed by Tanner, has the same physical characteristics and habits (page 93). And what becomes of the town after his death? Tanner passes through, destroys, and goes on.

Rating: ***

— October 1968.

BOB SHAW – The Two-Timers. Ace SF Special H-79; paperback original, 1968. Cover art: Leo & Diane Dillon.

   Nine years earlier John Breton’s wife Kate had been saved from a murderer;s attack by an unknown rifleman who disappeared as suddenly as he had appeared. Now when he returns, he claims Kate as his wife; his point seems well taken, for he is John Breton himself.

   In his alternate, parallel universe Kate had died, and guilt had forced him to find a way to travel in probability, as it were. A new sort of eternal triangle, but before the new John Breton’s plans for resolving it can be carried out, his presence in what is for him World B changes the fabric of space/time itself, foreshadowing the end of the world.

   If migraine is a symptom, there are many frustrated time travelers! Imagine the troubles or the police lieutenant still investigating the case: a hopeless sort of detective tale, but effective in science fiction. The characters are real enough to be living creatures, and the effort to make them so is clear and appreciated,

   Anyone who has ever been uneasy about answering the phone will understand Breton’s fear of opening his life to the unknown caller on page 6. The touches of the future involved are natural, so only the ending fails to live up to the originality one is led to expect. As a mathematical note, Shaw makes a mistake about a topological problem on page 108, but it is nothing that affects the story.

Rating: ****1/2

— September 1968.

E. C. TUBB – Derai. Dumarest #2, Ace Double H-77; paperback original. 1st printing, September 1968. Cover artist: Jeff Jones. Published back-to-back with The Singing Stones, by Juanita Coulson (reviewed here).

   Dumarest is a wanderer, looking for legends of lost Earth. [This is the second in a series of his adventures.] In this one he takes on the job of returning the strange young girl named Derai to her home planet of Hive, not knowing she has telepathic powers that will involve him in a struggle for control of the planet,

   More importantly, however, is the the interest that the cybernetic brain Cyclan has in the girl, leading to a deadly competition in the mazes of Folgone, and to Derai’s death.

   These are interesting worlds, well described, with all the perversions, customs, and other necessities of life these worlds entail. Tubb displays an ability to write between the lines: or is he just unable to explain everything well? It does come off quite effectively.

Rating: ***½

— September 1968.

JUANITA COULSON – The Singing Stones. Ace Double H-77; paperback original; 1st printing, 1968. Cover art by Kelly Freas. Published back-to-back with Derai, by E. C. Tubb (a review of which will be posted here soon).

   Strange stones that entrance those who touch them with their mysterious essence of music appear on the black market, and Geoff Latimer is sent by the Federation to the protected planet of Pa-Liina to discover their source. Also part of his assignment is the task of stopping slave trade carried on through “protecting” planet of Deliyas. To be done, of course, without requiring official intervention.

   A mutated goddess has developed the stones for the benefit of her fellow Pa-liinians, and Geoff must decide which side he will back in the struggle for rule of the planet.

   Things are not made clear at once, in a decidedly casual approach to the plot, but everything does finally get explained. Latimer works like the CIA is supposed to. He doesn’t much like it, but in this case, his manipulations work out fine. A strange way of doing business, after all that time.

Rating: ***½

— September 1968.

BRETT STERLING – Danger Planet. Captain Future #18, Popular Library 60-2335, paperback; 1st printing thus, 1968. Cover artist: Frank Frazetta. Previously published in Startling Stories, Spring 1945, as “Red Sun of Danger.”

   The solar system’s supply of vitron, the chemical giving mankind lengthened life, is being threatened. Captain Future is sent in disguise to the planet Roo to investigate the native uprisings which threaten to bring about the colonists’ open rebellion, And independent government would then control a monopoly on vitron.

   With the help of his Futuremen and several scientists, Captain Future discovers what is upsetting the Roons – imminent release of the monstrous Kangas imprisoned on their moon.

   On page 7, one scientist’s opinion of Captain Future is that he is nothing but a cheap popular hero. Unfortunately not much happens to change the reader’s mind. Obviously a juvenile tale, and it does seem adequate on that level, though bad science and idiot plotting hurt. Actually a detective story, as enough clues are given to discover the evil Lu Suur’s secret identity before Captain Future does.

Rating:

— September 1968.

EMIL PETAJA – Doom of the Green Planet. Ace Double H-70. Paperback original; 1st printing, 1968. Published back-to-back with Star Quest, by Dean R. Koontz (reviewed here). Never reprinted. Cover artist: Jerome Podwil.

   Evidently a sequel to Lord of the Green Planet (Ace, 1967), and a continuation of the adventures of Diarnid Patrick O’Dowd, ex-starman, on the planet Eu-Tarah, protected from the outside by an impenetrable green barrier. Diarmid is now High Lord of the Islanders, having defeated their god-king and creator.

   But this very act is leading to the gradual destruction of the green barrier, leading to the challenging appearance of a new renegade starman.

   A collection of cultural conflicts has an isolationist theme: the Green must continue to protect the people of Eu-Tarah from the exploitation of space-faring man. Too much scientific achievement is compulsively driving the rest of the universe, without reason or conscience. A similar theme of conflict between opposing societies is carried out by the Islanders and the barbaric Nords.

   And then there are the original inhabitants of the planet, who have a part in saying what their world shall become. As a style, Petaja’s SF reads strangely like fantasy.

Rating:   **½

— August-September 1968.

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