THE MOON IS HELL - Book review

 

John W. Campbell’s novel The Moon is Hell was published in 1951; my copy was from 1975, some half-dozen years after the first moon landing. The back cover blurb states ‘... is a great writer’s vision of the first men on the Moon – not as the American space programme made it happen, but as it might have been!’

Regarded as a hard-science classic, it is a relatively short read, 123 pages. It’s in diary form by Dr Duncan, a physicist and second in command.

It’s 1981. Thirteen men have been on the moon in their protected dome for just over a year on the dark side of the moon. The crew consists of a surgeon, two chemists, two mineralogists, an astrophysicist, electricians and mechanics, and an engineer and cook. They expect to be relieved shortly. Unfortunately, the relief spaceship crashes, killing all crew and destroying equipment. ‘The burning fuel destroyed everything’ (p28); yet it’s unlikely that there would be any burning as there’s no air.

Because it’s on the ‘wrong’ side of the moon, there is no direct radio contact with Earth. To compound matters they learn that somebody is stealing food from the storehouse. Nil desperandum: the moon ‘is a single vast chemical laboratory’ (p33).  They begin to manufacture oxygen and, ultimately, artificial food from clothing and paper, and photo cells for electricity and power.

It’s a race against time. By trekking to the earthside of the moon they might be able to send a message to Earth and hope that a rescue ship can get to them. Their ingenuity is laudable and life-saving.

The narrative, being technical, cold and scientific, leaves little room for characterisation, so there isn’t a great deal of empathy for anyone. A story has to have conflict and in this sense their conflict is with the inhospitable satellite itself; however, none of the individuals evince any conflict, save for the thief when finally discovered. On p10 there’s a hint that not all of them will survive. Perhaps not surprisingly for the date of writing, when food becomes an issue cannibalism isn’t considered! Yet what shine through is their adaptability and the determined resistance to defeatism.

A worthy addition to any science fiction collection.

Of course the concept was used, with adjustments, to great acclaim by Andy Weir in The Martian (2014), some sixty-three years later...

WHERE TIME WINDS BLOW - Book review

Robert Holdstock’s Where Time Winds Blow was published in 1981 – and on the surface it appears he is still haunted by time-displacement which he wrote about in Earthwind (1977).  

We’re on an alien planet, Kamelios; the planet is quite like a chameleon; for example there are electric storms called fiersig – ‘the power-fields of change, twisted and distorted the stable mind just that little bit more, scarring the mind irreversibly in a way too insignificant to note at the time, but with mounting effect over the months and years’ (p27).

The archaeological team consists of the leader, Lena Tanoway, Leo Faulcon and Kris Dojaan. They can only venture outside Steel City when wearing protective masks. Steel City is unusual – ‘the city rise on its engines, and hover almost silently above the blackened crater that had been home for the last quarter year’ (p31).  [Interestingly, Philip Reeve’s Mortal Engines (2003) concerns mobile cities].

The archaeologists investigate a particular rift valley where time winds blow and a phantom human occasionally lurks: ‘he had been snatched by time and flung somewhere, somewhen, some place and time where he had screamed and not-quite-died... a prison where the walls were centuries, where time itself was his gaoler’ (49). The winds deposited ancient buildings, or futuristic edifices, and then frustratingly swept them all away. These ephemeral deposits draw scientists and fortune hunters – all of whom risk being caught in a time squall and sent to oblivion. ‘Faulcon watched as white towers winked out of existence, to be replaced by moving spiral shapes that radiated redly as they turned... an immense spider’s web of girders was torn from vision, flickering a moment as a time squall knocked it into Othertime and back, and then it was gone and a hideous shape stood there, the carved, gargoyle-decorated gateway of a primitive era...’ (p185).

In the mountains were other humans who had been altered ‘to accept the organic poisons of the world, to be able to see without their eyes melting away, to breathe without corroding the linings of their respiratory tracts’ (p99). The manchanged.

The actual phrase ‘where the time winds blow’ is used on p202.

Holdstock’s world-building is excellent. The characters interact and are conflicted. There’s hubris, cowardice, bravery and (perhaps too much) philosophising.

A rewarding science fiction excursion from a brilliant mind.

And interestingly the prolific Holdstock wrote The Night Hunter series of supernatural thrillers using the pen-name Robert Faulcon!

Editorial comment:

‘Faulcon thought to himself that...’ (p212). Faulcon thought that... is all that is needed!

THE PARADOX MEN - Book review

Charles L. Harness’s classic novel The Paradox Men was first published as a short story in 1949 and then in novel form in 1953. There’s an Introduction by Brian Aldiss – I read this after I’d finished the book.

We’re in the future – 2177 – (as viewed from the late 1940s), after the Third War. Now, there are small settlements on the Moon, Mercury and solarion stations that hover over the sun’s hot spots, the latter stations  harvesting invaluable muirium. Of the original 27 solarions only 16 now remain; ‘the average life of a station was about a year’ (p114).

It begins with a sort of prologue: ‘He had not the faintest idea who he was’ (p10). At this point we don’t know either. Then we’re straight into the action with a superior thief in the Society of Thieves, Alar, who is burgling Count Shey’s demesne. Shey is future Earth’s Imperial Psychologist. Alar is discovered but escapes. Alar is protected by a plastic invisible shell that makes him impervious to gunfire; however, sword and knife blades can penetrate the carapace. Swords and duelling have made a comeback!

Meanwhile, the Chancellor of America Imperial, Bern Haze-Gaunt is at loggerheads with his female partner, Keiris who used to be married to Kennicot Muir, who had created the Society of Thieves which was dedicated to rob from the rich and buy the freedom of slaves. Keiris is not quite what she appears.

Haze-Gaunt employs a disfigured man, the Microfilm Mind – ‘he functions on a subconscious level and uses the sum total of human knowledge on every problem given him’ (p29). In effect, he scans thousands of books and documents in order to formulate responses – much like AI today.

Imperial Police seem to be everywhere. This is a police state, after all.

There are debates and observations on time and space and gravity which threaten to be mind-boggling, and yet they’re carried off convincingly.

Alar joined the Society of Thieves five years ago and has no recollection of his life before that... So this is a quest for his identity, but also an attempt to overthrow the present administration. In his journey Alar begins to discover certain abilities he was not aware he possessed. His relationship with Keiris develops: there is a devastating revelation in Chapter 14 following an unpleasant torture...

The ending is probably not the ending but most likely the beginning...

Editorial comment:

Uses IP’s for Imperial Police; it shouldn’t have an apostrophe: IPs would do.

They travel to the Galastarium (p88) and yet on the same page it’s spelled Galactarium!

SHAKESPEARE'S PLANET - Book review

Clifford D. Simak’s novel Shakespeare’s Planet was published in 1976. After a thousand years in space, The Ship lands on a planet. Unfortunately, three of the four humans have died due to a malfunction in the cryogenic system, so when Horton is revived, he is alone – apart from the robot Nicodemus. Ship comprises the minds of three – a monk, a grande dame and a scientist. ‘It was only when the three were one, a one unconscious of the three, that the melding of three brains and of three personalities approached the purpose of their being’ (p1). It seems there’s a Biblical allusion here: ‘As the centuries went on, they were collectively convinced they would become, in all truth, the Ship and nothing but the Ship’ (p2). The three minds frequently ‘converse’, explaining how they became The Ship.

Horton and Nicodemus encounter a strange rather vicious creature that is named Carnivore. Not so long ago, Carnivore had shared the planet with a human who called himself Shakespeare, who was a bit of philosopher: ‘The emergence of intelligence, I am convinced, tends to unbalance the ecology. In other words, intelligence is the great polluter. It is not until a creature begins to manage its environment that nature is thrown into disorder’ (p119).

Sometimes Carnivore has an inverted way of expressing himself, much like Yoda in Star Wars: ‘You mean fix it you cannot?’ (p124).

Nicodemus is an interesting character in his own right. He is a basic robot though he can turn his hand to all manner of skills thanks to a number of transmogs that he can plug into – essentially computer apps.

Horton perceives a number of most puzzling aspects to this new planet, including the strange phenomenon of ‘the god-hour’, ancient derelict cities, a potentially sinister black pond, the mysterious arrival of the human female Elayne, and a wormhole that is blocked. ‘Just when you feel that you are ready to grasp some meaning of it, then it is all gone’ (p136).

There is not a lot of action, but there is plenty of mystery. Some of the best bits involve Nicodemus’s humour.

An imaginative excursion. 

THE GATE OF WORLDS - Book Review

Robert Silverberg’s 1967 novel The Gate of Worlds was published in the UK in 1978. It’s an alternative history, set in 1963. Eighteen-year-old Englishman Dan Beauchamp is sailing from Byzantium England to Mexico on the evening of King Richard’s coronation to seek his fortune. Aircraft haven’t been invented yet, but they’re working on it. The Turkish conquest of Europe was long ago now, though they had left England. ‘People who try to rule over other people are going to be hated. That’s true of Turks in Europe, of Incas in the lower Hesperides, of Aztecs elsewhere in the New World, of Russians in Asia’ (p15).

This is a first-person narrative, vastly inferior to Silverberg’s excellent historical novel Lord of Darkness (1983). Yet it is fascinating in relating the coal-driven motor cars, ‘the electrical voice-transmitting machine is not yet perfected’ (p145), and the violent customs of the Incas he befriends on his way. It is laced with self-deprecating humour, too. ‘I was coming to like Mexican food, which was just as well, since I stood little chance of tasting Yorkshire pudding and leg of mutton again for a while’ (p32)

He meets up with a helpful magician and soothsayer, Quequex and they travel together. ‘a cart drawn by two plodding llamas, those sawed-off camels from Peru’ (p49). Dan serves as a bodyguard and Quequex talks of the Gate of Worlds – his belief that each person reaches a number of turning points in life where their life splits, depending on their decision, each going in a different direction in parallel worlds. ‘For each possible future, there is a possible world beyond the Gate’ (p56). Sadly, this sci-fi concept is not realised in any way – it’s a straight-forward picaresque journey, interspersed with new friendships, threat, battles and disappointments.

Thanks to his travels, Dan matures.

Silverbeg is always readable, though this is probably only for fans of alternative history books and completists.

HEROES AND VILLAINS - Book review

Angela Carter’s novel Heroes and Villains was published in 1969; my paperback copy was published in 1981.

We’re in post-apocalypse territory, where remnants of rational civilisation reside in steel and concrete enclaves, administered by Professors. Beyond are tribes of marauding Barbarians; while in the surrounding jungles, forests and derelict cityscapes roam the mutilated Out People.

Marianne is a Professor’s daughter, somewhat pampered and spoiled. During a raid by Barbarians, she witnesses the murder of her brother and later, perhaps bored with her predictable existence in her white tower, she is content to escape the strict confines of her ‘home’ and join a handsome Barbarian, Jewel. Perhaps she is partly drawn by the mystery of ‘outside’ – ‘Around the edges of the horizon spread the unguessable forest’ (p4).

Gradually she is accepted by Jewel’s people, especially when their leader, the enigmatic ex-Professor Dr Donally takes her under his wing. They’re nomadic but presently staying in some ruins: ‘This house was a gigantic memory of rotten stone, a compilation of innumerable forgotten styles now given some green unity by the devouring web of creeper, fur of moss and fungoid growth of rot’ (p31).

There are several reasons to read a book by Angela Carter; one of them is her lush prose. ‘She looked out of her window and, in autumn, she saw a blazing hill of corn and orchards where the trees creaked with crimson apples; in spring, the fields unfurled like various flags, first brown, then green’ (p1).

Now exposed to the filthy, coarse and brutal reality of the Barbarian tribe, Marianne realises her romantic attraction to the unknown ‘outside’ has evaporated. ‘When I was a little girl, we played at heroes and villains but now I don’t know which is which anymore’ (p125).

Some (mostly literary) writers destroy suspense and tension by telling the reader in a bald sentence or two what is going to happen and then go into detail to show it happening. Carter does this when Marianne attempts to escape the tribe: ‘but Jewel found her, raped her and brought her back with him’ (p52) Then for a number of pages we work up to witnessing that traumatic event...

It is a well realised hell on earth, with very little room for compassion, and there is no happy ending – how could there be?

Doubtless the book would benefit from re-reading. But I felt the ending was rushed.

Even so, I came away feeling that Marianne had persevered through hardship and was made stronger and life of a sort would go on.

THE GREEN ODYSSEY - Book review

Philip José Farmer’s 1957 debut novel The Green Odyssey is a classic space opera of the period. Astronaut Alan Green (‘Greed conquered more frontiers than curiosity’ (p74) is stranded on a primitive unknown planet and after some minor adventures ends up becoming a gigolo of a duchess and when he’s not busy with her he’s married to a beautiful slave woman, Amra. At court he learns about two other stranded astronauts at a distant city; his hope was that he could get them to take him off-planet. Guiltily he fretted about leaving his wife and two children (one of them being his).

He escapes, hiding on a ship. These vessels are on wheels and driven by sail-power across a vast plain of Xurdimur. His family have stowed away onboard too!

Getting to the city that holds the two astronauts prisoner isn’t easy; Green has to contend with mysterious floating islands, cannibals (‘these painted people were cannibals and made no bones about it’ (p84)) and pirates, the latter involving a battle on the plain reminiscent of two galleons at sea exchanging broadsides. It’s quite an odyssey.

Maybe the start is slow, but it soon livens up, and there’s humour along the way too; stick with it. It is possible that Farmer was attempting a pastiche of science fiction adventure of the period. Certainly he uses too many unpronounceable names (it’s as if he hit the typewriter keys at random):  Jugkaxtr and Zaxropatr (p9), Grizquetr (p20), Inzax and Anddonanarga (p21), iquogr and Zaceffucanquanr (p24), Booxotr (p69).

Farmer is quite inventive, however. This earthman ‘carried in his body a surgically implanted protoplasmic entity (Green dubbed it his Vigilante) which automatically analysed any invading microscopic organisms and/or viruses and manufactured antibodies to combat them. It lived in the space created by the removal of his appendix’ (p32) – an updated variant of the human white blood cells. Like cancerous white cells, however, ‘deprived of food, it would survive by living upon Green’s tissue. A Vigilante wasn’t all advantage; it had its dangers’ (p150).

‘Everywhere that space travelling Earthmen had gone, they had found that about every fourth inhabitable planet was populated by men of their species’ (p34) suggesting that mankind had seeded planets but in many instances had reverted to less technological cultures.

Green is sometimes overconfident and not beyond false modesty, but you can’t help but root for him.

The so-called ‘roaming islands’ (p73) are believed to be mythical – but Green and Amra soon find out that they are real – and to my mind reminded me of Philip Reeve’s Mortal Engines books (2001-2006) which feature mobile steampunk cities – and in a neat twist prove their salvation.

EARTHWIND - Book review

Robert Holdstock’s followed his science fiction novel Eye Among the Blind (which I read in 1982) with Earthwind which was published a year later in 1977.

The main character is Elspeth Mueller, a lone black Earthwoman who is presently living and studying with the Stone Age natives of Aeran, an alien planet. She is sharing a low-roofed cawl with the young native Darren; all the natives are fur-clad save for their faces above the jawline.

Holdstock is inventive. The natives are naked, as is Elspeth – except for her leather mocks (moccasins); their village is a crog; ‘... her calves were covered with white blisters where yellowspins had fed on her during her light sleep. The blisters were not the result of the bites but her body’s immune reaction to the whip-like parasites that the yellowspins had injected into her’ (p7); she regarded like a nue – hairless humans of either sex (p8) who dwell in the snowlands; blackwings which are huge leathery avians who provide food, bone weapons and decorative garments. Elspeth joins Darren in an exhilarating hunt of blackwings – employing tangleweed as whip-cum-lasso and finally celebrate their success by ‘hanging’ – ‘she didn’t know whether or not she liked the idea of having sex whilst dangling from two whips’ [suspended in trees] (p21). Indeed, she considered that the Aerani ‘communicated, cooperated with and utilised nature without precipitating some drastic ecological change’ (p66).

Elspeth spent her childhood in ‘the sprawling metropolis of New Anzar on Pliedase IV...’ and suffered ‘the ritual mastectomy...’ (p25) which involved sewing two red jewels on her in place of breasts! (This brutalisation is not adequately explained; yes, it’s a ritual, but why?) Later, at some point she volunteered to join a team going to Earth for an archaeological restoration programme in Western Europe. ‘After a three hour war of some centuries before, much that was of historical interest was still buried beneath dust, sand and rubble...’ (p72).

There’s a lot of theorising about the Aerani culture. ‘But imagination is reason’s worst enemy’ (p23).

Another protagonist is shipMeister Karl Gorstein who is on a mission for the Electra, the invaders who have taken over Earth. His ship is the Gilbert Ryle (named after the British philosopher (1900-1976) who coined the phrase ‘the ghost in the machine’. Gorstein is tasked with studying the colony on Aeran and reporting back. He is aided by the ship-board rationalist, Peter Ashka, who uses the oracle to guide the entire crew. The oracle was in effect the tao: ‘Everything is related to everything else, overlapping, intertwining, matter and time as products of the structure of the great tao, each man a fragmentary side effect of that same structure...’ (p37).

It’s probable that Holdstock was influenced by Fritjof Capra’s book The Tao of Physics (1975) which I read in 1980 when studying Psychology: Capra contended that “Science does not need mysticism and mysticism does not need science. But man needs both.”

In her studies of rock-markings made by the Aerani culture, Elspeth encountered a rare triple spiral which Darren said it identified the Earthwind (p51). Now she had an absolute goal, to locate the source, the Earthwind... Elspeth’s several discussions with Ashka are almost mind-blowing: to paraphrase one chat, the special triple spiral appears on many ancient taoist works of art – one spiral = ching or change, the second is the shen, the luminous inner spirit, and the third is the ch’i, the moving vitality – which is in us all (p78).

The leader of the Aerani consults their oracle – the Earthwind – and while there are surprising similarities, they ultimately are destined to conflict, especially when Elspeth discovers the distinct nature of Aeran and its effect on the humans on its surface.

Holdstock tinkers with memory, time-displacement, and psychic energies. When a character states ‘it began to make sense’ (p73) that depends on several factors, not least the reader’s attention!

He clearly hadn’t finished with the conundrum of time; he tackled it with his 1977 novel Where Time Winds Blow.

Robert Holdstock died in 2009, aged 61, leaving behind an incredible output of fiction and non-fiction.

Editorial comment:

Always a problem, this: ‘What was happening to him, she wondered?’ (p155) Of course, it should read What was happening to him? she wondered. The word-processor automatically capitalises ‘she’ so it needs changing. Or alternatively, leave it as: What was happening to him? (The context should show who is doing the wondering.

 

Dan Dare #2 - Book review

 

This is the second deluxe collector’s edition of The Red Moon Mystery and Marooned on Mercury featured in the Eagle comic from October 1951 to February 1953.

I first bought the Eagle in February 1958 (featuring the Dan Dare story The Ship that Lived). Thereafter, I was hooked – not only by the colourful artwork in Dan Dare but also the other features inside. The comic exuded an almost intoxicating smell, either the ink or the paper, or a combination of both. Subsequently, I managed to obtain a good number of the preceding issues, but never had an entire set. So the publication of these deluxe editions published by Hawk Books (1988) in full size and full colour were must-haves!

The story of The Red Moon Mystery is about a mysterious red moon that has appeared. It is threatening the space stations of Mars and, inevitably, it is likely to move against Earth. The other characters are Dare’s batman Digby, Sir Hubert Guest, Professor Jocelyn Peabody, the Yank, Henry Hogan, Sondar, the good Treen and Dr Ivor Dare, an eccentric scientist. It seems only Dan Dare and his pals can avert disaster! This adventure is written and drawn by the legendary Frank Hampson (though also see the reference below). This adventure takes place in 1999 - some 48 years in the future...

Marooned on Mercury. At the end of the previous adventure a massive explosion thrusts Dare’s spaceship towards Mercury, where they crash-land. Little do Dare and his crew know, but the evil Mekon has set up a base on the far side of Mercury; from here he intends to attack Earth, as space-born despots tend to do from time to time. On Mercury the team encounter strange beings, Mercurians, and enlist their help to combat the Mekon and his Treens. This adventure was drawn by Harold Johns as Hampson was ill.

Naturally, the tales are somewhat dated in their speech patterns and unscientific appreciation of planets like Mercury. And yet, they are fast-paced, inventive, even exciting, as well as amusing. There is a tendency to put too many words in the speech balloons – seemingly necessary to explain many of the ‘technological’ goings-on. And, for the time, it was probably ground-breaking to have a female professor as a significant character.

For more insight into the production of the weekly two-page full-colour strip, see WRITEALOT: FFB - The Man Who Drew Tomorrow (nik-writealot.blogspot.com)

ABANDONATI - Book review

Garry Kilworth’s 1988 dystopian novel Abandonati is a slim volume but it packs a powerful punch.

The abandonati are the street people, homeless or mentally ill, with no place to go – the abandoned ones, unwanted castaways from our society.

The blurb inside describes it as a funny and moving fable. And it is that.

Some unspecified apocalypse has left groups of people, mostly dazed and without purpose, save scavenging for food – and hopefully, booze – in a deserted and seriously damaged vast city.

Guppy is one of the scavengers and he is not particularly bright – he didn’t even know he was named after a fish – and he is an alcoholic. ‘You just forgot things. You been boozin’ so long it’s made your brain soft. That don’t mean you’re stupid, do it? Stupid is when you pretend to know everything, and don’t...’ (p32)

He soon encounters a little but cocky guy called Rupert and a big yet docile black fellow Trader.

Rupert is convinced that the rich people have escaped to another planet, leaving the ‘dregs’ behind. He is determined to construct a space ship to follow them.

There are two short italicised sequences. One shows two spacemen landing on a planet with breathable air. They walk on purple springy grass – which is spooky for me, as many years ago when our daughter was small I made up a bedtime story about a boy called Jack who had many adventures, among them walking on purple springy grass! The other sequence again features two men, army officers in a bunker, who appear to be still fighting a war... I’m not sure whether these inserts explain the apocalypse, or are flashback vignettes; to my mind they seemed out-of-place, interrupting the flow of the trio’s journey. A minor quibble.

Before long, the reader is wrapped up with trio’s quest through the devastated city, confronting violent gangs and also a friendly bunch of folk who have found a secret cache of wine in the crypt of a church. Another group they meet are travellers – and one of their women takes a shine to Guppy with amusing consequences.

All three are endearing in their own way.

Rupert has a tendency to swear – not a lot – but it is remarked upon by the gentle giant Trader: ‘You do too much swearing. It doesn’t mean anything if you do too much’ (p67) – which is so true!

However, Guppy is the core of the book, which, among other things, is about humanity surviving despite adversity. ‘Guppy was illiterate, but he could read people like books’ (p106). ‘Guppy couldn’t hold something in his mind for very long. Other thoughts kept coming in, day by day, and evicting the current owners. Guppy’s mind was not inhospitable to thoughts, but there was limited space and only one or two could remain in residence at any set time’ (p130). ‘You can’t help loving someone who makes you think you’re special’ (p131).

There are instances of gentle humour, distress, and even a poignant death – but Guppy manages to swim through it all. This is a very moving book whose characters tend to live on after the last page. Indeed, they are not abandoned. 

PS - The cover features artwork by Dave McKean. He came to prominence with covers for DC comics. My failing, but his artwork - and this cover - do not appeal to me.

IN SOLITARY - Book review

 

Garry Kilworth’s debut novel In Solitary was published in 1977. Since then he has produced novels in a broad number of genres, among them science fiction, fantasy, and history.

Earth has been under the domination of aliens for centuries. The Soal are uncompromising, their laws stating: ‘No member of the Human Race born a native of the Planet Earth may have contact with any other such native by any medium, natural or otherwise, after the age of 170 months [just over 14 years-of-age] except for the performance of mating. No member of the Human Race under 170 months of age born a native of the Planet Earth may have contact with any male member of the same race. The penalty for disobedience of the Soal Law is death’ (p6). Hence, the males are effectively ‘in solitary’ all their life (save for the rare mating events).

The Soal resemble birds with pointed beak-like faces and a web of elastic skin joining the upper and lower limbs; fine hair-like feathers cover their bodies. They’re about a metre tall – ‘more like flying foxes than birds’ (p8).

The book begins with Tangiia – a native Polynesian – embarking to sea on a mating journey in the Oceania area near Ostraylea. Apparently the earthquake of 2083 Old Time had altered the physical relationship between Brytan and Yurop. Apart from the first chapter, the novel is in the first-person, related by another human, Cave, who is serving the Soal in Brytan – until he is banished to live among the mud people… Here, Cave meets a female, Stella, who is quite formidable. They live in tall towers – mushrooms – and barely subsist. Eventually, these two join forces with others, including Tangiia – all the while evading Soal patrols for, clearly, if they were caught congregating, they would be killed.

Of them all, Tangiia is the romantic: ‘She is what makes it so beautiful. Man was made to have woman by his side, otherwise there are just empty holes in our chests where our hearts should be’ (p70).

Kilworth has created an original scenario and populated it with humans and aliens who exhibit all the usual traits – anger, deceit, violence, hate and love. And close to the end, after a rebellion against the Soal, a twist in the tale is revealed.

At 139 pages, it is a short book, but packed with fascinating descriptions of an unusual environment and traumatic events.

THE NIGHT OF KADAR - Book review

 

Garry Kilworth’s second novel The Night of Kadar was published in 1978.

It’s a fascinating novel based on the generation starship concept. It begins in the vast spaceship that had been travelling for a thousand years and is finally nearing its inhabitable planetary destination. Embryos are activated in their tanks and grown rapidly, while being educated. Unfortunately, the ship’s designers did not plan for a subtle minute alien incursion that sabotages the intelligence units irreparably; ‘One of their manipulative interests was ecology – a natural area of study for a static race’ (p177).

The ship lands on an island in a sea of quicksand. The enigma of their purpose remains a mystery, doubtless lost in the wiped tapes. ‘We, the ship’s people. Born of a machine; an engine. But what is a planet, the planet Earth, if not an engine, a large beautiful engine that turns in space, and manufactures life?’ (p93).

The main character is Othman, who was born at the age of thirty Earthyears. Others emerge from the ship, including a pre-programmed wife Silandi. It seems that about half of the complement of settlers were born mentally impaired, referred to as morons; this was due to the malfunction in the circuitry. Inevitably, conflict between individuals arises, causing tension and even rebellion…

The ship automatically constructs tools and machines from its own huge carcass.

The senders, the people who launched the ship were of the Islamic faith; however, no Koran is supplied and their knowledge is bereft of any religion. As time goes by, they recall a childhood they never lived but was imprinted: these ‘false memory’ interludes are detailed in Arabic settings, coloured by the author’s time living and working in the Middle East. ‘She knew these questions could only remain questions. Earth could only be the somewhere of her simulated childhood – a place she had never physically touched’ (p86).

Othman becomes their natural leader and is determined to search for their destiny, their reason for being on this planet. To that end, he enforces the construction of a bridge across the expanse of quicksand to the mainland beyond. This is not always a popular decision, as the number of the island’s trees is depleted: ‘Man is an artist at destruction, even though his intentions may seem pure. Ten, a hundred, a thousand years to grow a tree, and ten minutes to bring it to the ground’ (p41).

The book’s title is from the Koran: ‘Better is the Night of Kadar (Glory) than a thousand months…’ ‘On the night of Kadar, the night he died, he would like to go to those stars, perhaps become one of them’ (p159).

Kilworth’s prose is always good and often eloquent: ‘the crisp salt of their bodies mingling as the wetness flows from their skin, the iron in their blood forming tight wires to jerking muscles, the smell of oxygen burning, circuit fusing in their veins as they reach out to touch the innumerable corners of the universe’ (p99).

Some later scenes are quite horrific. For this planet is no Garden of Eden. And yet they are survivors and they grow as the generations move on. Quite an imaginative feat, this book.

Editorial comment:

When writing, Kilworth could not have imagined that mentioning computer tapes (p3) would be obsolete so quickly.

One of my pet annoyances: ‘Othman first thought privately to himself…’ (p124) ‘thought privately to himself’ is obsolete.

Christmas story - 3 of 3

Over the years I’ve been asked to contribute a Christmas story to a variety of publications. In the next few days I’ll feature some of them. Here is  ‘The End is Nigh’ which was published in The Coastal Press magazine in Spain in 2007. It is one of 21 stories in Nourish a Blind Life, my second collection of stories, here.

THE END IS NIGH

All the churches in the world were full. And the synagogues. And the mosques.

As an atheist I wasn’t surprised that all this prayer wasn’t working. Unfortunately, nothing else was, either. Science had no explanation.

For five years now there hadn’t been a single baby born. Not one.

Plants and flowers no longer bloomed. They didn’t die, they just never blossomed into flower, their leaves a dull grey. The fruit industry was moribund as the trees bore no fruit.

Some people said it was all caused by the massive leaching of hormones and chemicals into the water-table, some reckoned it was due to the many holes in the ozone layer, while others believed it was as a result of those three volcanoes exploding three Christmases back, their dark foreboding smoke obscuring the sun for over six months. International environmental terrorists didn’t help, either, blowing up all the oil refineries. Their smoke added to the nuclear winter of the volcanoes.

Most of the so-called civilised world relied on electricity and that was produced by burning finite resources such as oil and coal. Minor advances had been made with wind- and wave-power, but not nearly enough to support our vast cities.

In fact, all the big cities now had their own lugubrious characters walking the streets with sandwich boards proclaiming that ‘The End is nigh!’ Religious fanatics had a field day.

All this played havoc with my business. My name’s Ambrose King and I’d lived up to my name as I was now king of the airwaves, having established the biggest and best global media company in the world using solar-powered wireless technologies.

Whispers came to me via the Internet connections, when they worked. It had happened several times before. False alarms, hoaxes and rumours. The story about the boy crying wolf came to mind. Still, I was idle, rich and curious. I was one of the lucky people with a private aircraft and the fuel to keep it going.

As my private jet took off at night, the better to conceal my activities, I glimpsed a light through the over-arching murk that stained the heavens. Just a star in the sky. But it seemed brighter than Venus or Sirius and we weren’t due to be close to Mars again for many years yet. Probably a satellite – or a trick reflection caught in the thick glass of the window. I didn’t believe in UFOs.

It was dawn though the sky was a depressing grey, the sun barely penetrating the eerie miasma of dust and pollution in the air. As my jet flew over Palestine I glanced out the window. There were thousands of people clustered outside the small village and the streets were crammed. Television crews were trying to make their way through.

A few minutes later at the airport I paid a small ransom to hire a helicopter. When we got back, another aircraft was already hovering over the flat roof-tops of the village, its side emblazoned with GLBL-4 – my TV crew, I thought with pride. Just outside the village was an oasis of date palm trees, which looked sad and forlorn, the leaves grey.

The pilots acknowledged each other and slowly, as my chopper hovered, I was lowered in a cradle into the jostling crowd.

I’m a big chap, about six-foot-six and manage to keep in trim, yet I really feared for my life for a second as they pressed towards me. But they were just curious. I seemed to tower over most of them. I was surprised how calm everyone seemed. I’d never seen a crowd so serene before. They all seemed to be waiting.

Kidding themselves, I thought. This was bound to be another false alarm.

They were all facing the door to a ramshackle building – apparently, the place had been bombed and part-bulldozed by Israelis a matter of two weeks ago during yet another desperate expression of intifada from the deprived villagers. The Arabic word intifada has several meanings, such as the shaking off or shivering of fear or illness or waking from sleep, and I thought I had seen it all before in our news reports, but I was wrong today.

There was no anger or desperation in the eyes of the men and women gathered here. I made my way unmolested to the door.

On one side of the door was half an oil drum, filled with dry soil and drooping grey foliage.

A scarred one-eyed man in stained robes pressed his shoulder to the wooden door and opened it for me. I ducked under the adobe lintel.

A variety of smells assailed my nostrils. Not what I’d expected, though. There was incense, myrrh and something else I’d known only once before, when I visited a convent. An odour of sanctity. Fanciful, I know, but I couldn’t describe it any other way. The aroma permeated into my body, bathing me in a tingling sense of wellbeing.

The interior was Spartan yet quite clean, the earthen floor swept and hard. Colourful rugs had been spread and on these sat several women and two men garbed in richly embroidered robes. Behind them, a mouse-grey blanket hung down from the rafters; I could hear movement on the other side of it.

‘At last you have come, Mr King,’ said the Negro as he stood to greet me with a large pink outstretched hand. He was as big as me, with gentle shining eyes.

As I shook his hand I said, ‘You’re expecting me?’

He nodded. ‘News travels fast, even in these strange times.’ He grinned, showing huge white teeth. ‘Thanks to your global network, of course.’

‘Of course,’ I answered, bemused.

‘I am King Kassahun Ayele of Ethiopia,’ he said and gestured to the other man who rose to his feet. He was of Asian extraction, I reckoned. ‘This is the King of Thailand, Surakiat Chatusiphithak.’

‘Just call me Sura,’ the Thai king said, taking my hand.

Perhaps it should have clicked then, but it didn’t. I had little time to think, anyway, as we all turned our heads to the drab screen on hearing a baby’s wail rising out of the corner of the room.

It was like a storm washing over us. I felt my face suffuse with blood and for a fraction of a second the skin round my eyes and on my cheeks seemed to be pulled back as if I was facing into a harsh yet warm wind. Our clothes rustled and the dimness of our surroundings suddenly brightened. Colour assaulted our eyes.

Outside the faint murmuring changed into a prolonged almost physical gasp of awe.

The powers of recuperation of the baby’s mother were great, it seemed. She stepped out from behind the now golden screen, the baby’s pink cheek pressed to her left breast. She wore simple white robes and a deep blue scarf covered her head, casting a shadow over her features. Out of the shadow her eyes glowed luminous and I could see that the flesh under them was puffed with lack of sleep. Yet she looked radiant and happy. After all, she was the first woman in the world to give birth in five years.

King Sura unclasped his embroidered cloak and draped it over the mother’s shoulders as she walked slowly across the room to the front door. King Ayele joined them and helped support her.

My throat was constricted and my heart was hammering as I followed the mother and child and the two kings outside.

Everywhere I looked, people were kneeling. A powerful silence had descended on everyone.

Then I noticed the foliage in the oil-drum: it had regained a new lease of life, its shoots were green and it had already blossomed with the intricate beautiful star-shapes of blue and white passion flowers.

My heart pounded as I glanced towards the oasis and noticed the palm trees were shaking in a slight breeze, their fronds now bright green and vibrant. And there were clusters of dates under the fronds where none had been before.

The sky had cleared. It was a gorgeous cloudless blue.

The star I’d glimpsed on taking off was fully visible now, glinting.

And the sun glared bright and warm on this December morning.

A morning of promise for the future.

Maybe this time we might get it right. As I realised I was kneeling alongside the two kings, I knew that I was no longer an atheist. I prayed that this second coming would give us all a second chance.

Christmas story-1 of 3

Over the years I’ve been asked to contribute a Christmas story to a variety of publications. In the next few days I’ll feature some of them. Here is  ‘Outcast’ which was published in Outpost magazine in 1989. It is one of 21 stories in Nourish a Blind Life, my second collection of stories., here

OUTCAST

She came out of the godforsaken planet’s seasonal mists, struggling under her immense weight. She wasn’t welcome.

Abraham Hertzog didn’t like company. That’s why he had settled in this inhospitable place, a last fuelling stop at the rim of the galaxy: a bleak station, where sand and dust vied with alien plants, neither succeeding for long to cling onto the barren rocky landscape. Planetary storms were too frequent. 

Which reminded him: he was due to telecast Headquarters. It was a full 3 months since he last ordered victuals.

His metal shack abutted onto the side of a towering ultramarine cliff. The rock was heavily pitted, from recent meteor showers and severe gales: he used the nearest caves for storage. But now stocks were running low.

He squinted out the porthole, past the thousand-meter landing pad, the fuelling depot and its attendant robot-mechanics.

As the green six-legged creature stumbled onto the tarmac, a robot wheeled solicitously toward her and helped her to large ungainly feet. Even from this distance, Abraham could detect the gratefulness in her protruding eyes. They were so damned trusting!

Perhaps that was why he didn’t want to see her?

Guilt?

Not a thousand kilometres to the west there had been a luxuriant mauve forest, sprouting from purple springy grass. Now there were just a few tree-stumps; the rest was overbuilt by settlers. When mankind seeded the stars, he also brought diseases, pollution, greed, prejudices and weapons... The aliens were decimated, the survivors now outcasts on their own planet.

The robot helped the creature to the door, which chimed.

‘Just a minute,’ Abraham called, ‘Oy veh!’

The airlock whispered and he stepped out of the air-conditioned atmosphere onto the metal veranda. The air was thick with dust, the ozone crackling. ‘What is it?’

But he needn’t ask. The pregnant creature was exhausted, and near term.

Against his better judgement, he directed the robot to bring her round the back and made room in the half-empty storage cave.

‘Stay here with her,’ he instructed the robot, ‘while I get some halvah.’

Later, as he dialled Headquarters about those victuals, he looked out the rear port.

The creature had managed a guttural approximation of English: her name was Yram; she had voraciously devoured his offered confection and now lay contented, watched by a number of mechanic and haulage robots. His attention was suddenly drawn to the green bundle of limbs swathed in sacking as the telecast speaker announced: ‘Merry Christmas, Abe!’

And he looked up at a star, twinkling overhead, brighter than any he’d seen on his journeys through the Milky Way.

‘Yes, of course. It would be, wouldn’t it?’ he mused and realised that perhaps this planet wasn’t God-forsaken after all.