Thu 30 Jun 2022
Diary Review: KENNETH BULMER – Cycle of Nemesis.
Posted by Steve under Diary Reviews , Science Fiction & Fantasy[3] Comments
KENNETH BULMER – Cycle of Nemesis. Ace G-680, paperback original, 1967. Cover art: Kelly Freas.
After 7000 years, Khamushki the Undying is able to break the seven locks on the Time Vault in which has been imprisoned. The compete destruction of Earth for the second time is threatened, and it is up to our group pf five (plus one robot named Charlie) to prevent it. K the U has control over both time and space but the weakening of his guardians aid in his defeat for another 7000 years.
The terror of mythology comes to life as science. Ridiculous. About as bad as a Fantastic Adventures story from the thirties. Even Bulmer cannot adequately motivate the continuity of he project, though he tries hard, every two or three pages. Probably too hard. Acceptance [of the basic story line] might otherwise come easier. Most people [caught up in a situation such as this] would become quietly drunk if not insane.
The beginning is promising, at least, but by halfway through, reading is a struggle.
Rating: *½
June 30th, 2022 at 9:33 pm
You either like Bulmer when he is like this or not. I found it a romp, because it was a throwback, but if I had gone in looking for solid SF I would have run as hard as I could.
June 30th, 2022 at 9:58 pm
It obviously was not what I was looking for, not at the time. But in all honesty, maybe not even today — and yet, who knows?
June 30th, 2022 at 10:08 pm
Bulmer’s entry in the online SF Encyclopedia sums up jhis career thusly:
“As fan, writer and editor, Bulmer was one of the mainstays of UK sf for more than four decades; he served as a council member of the Science Fiction Foundation from its inception to 1988. The late eclipse of his career, as far as publications in English were concerned, owed more to changes in marketing than to any pronounced decline in his work. Though much of that work is routine, especially series tales written under pseudonyms, he consistently showed himself to be one of the most competent, though not perhaps the most original, workers in the field. [JC]”