She's got it…yeah, baby, she's got it

Hey it’s post number three. The book this time is Battle on Venus by William F. Temple. Temple was a Brit, most famous for The Four Sided Triangle, which was made into a film in 1953. His real claim to fame was that before World War II he shared a flat with Arthur C. Clarke. I wonder what that place was like on a Saturday night! Also he was a member of the British Interplanetary Society. Battle on Venus was published by Ace in 1963. Cover price: 40¢

Plot- 4 out of 10: Alright! Now we’ve got some straight up pulpy science fiction. Men go to Venus in a rocketship (with fins!) and land in the middle of a tank battle. Apparently in the 1960's there's breathable air on Venus. They are attacked by a variety of assailants and their ship is knocked over. Suddenly the tanks quit attacking and the Earthmen are given a chance to regroup. They discover that the tanks have no drivers! The captain goes exploring in a helicopter (that they brought disassembled on the ship) and hostile forces quickly shoot him down. He meets an attractive female (of course), and she accompanies him in his quest to find out who is responsible for the warring robot tanks and to discover a passage back to earth.

I really love it when problems in science fiction are solved in what I’m going to call a “lame dungeon master” method. Think of when you played D&D. Don’t pretend like you didn’t. Remember that DM who would make sure that whatever you needed was there, almost to the point of annoyance? Don’t speak the language? Oh, there’s an invention that they sent along with you that translates thought into understandable speech! Awesome! Need to figure out what sorts of traps were set on the door holding the elixir of immortality? Oh there’s a dude with psychic ability. (I’m not making this up!) Also there are some grammatically bizarre text passages. My favorite comes when our hero is returning to his ship with his new found Venus-babe:

Mara consoled him with a kiss. They hugged for a while. Then George returned his attention to the landscape ahead. Almost immediately: “Good grief!”

Cover- 7 out of 10: Here we go. Giant metallic discs chasing a man in a space suit. Oh yeah. That’s what I like. The best thing about this book is the best thing about the cover. Giant spinning robot metal discs that will totally cut you. There is no cover artist accredited, but according to the Ace people, it was Ed Valigursky. Also you may notice that there’s no back cover here. If you haven’t figured it out, I’ll explain on my next post.

What Battle on Venus taught me about the future: We will have devices that can translate our thoughts into speech, but the most sophisticated weapons we will have to take with us to Venus will be bazookas. Otherwise stuff seems like the same as today, except the insects on Mars.

My second post…The Return! (that’s the name of the book)

Hi there! Welcome to post number two. The book I’m going to write about is The Return by Isidore Haiblum. I mentioned to my friend Steve that I was reading a book by Isidore somebody and he said, “Haiblum…Isidore Haiblum. There’s not a lot of Isidores writing science fiction.” Truer words may never have been spoken. Haiblum was born in Brooklyn in 1935. He was nominated for the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for his 1971 novel The Tsaddik of the Seven Wonders. The Return was published by Dell in 1973. Cover price: 95¢

Plot- 7 out of 10: This is the story of Cramer, a veteran of the wars in Texas and California. He is a Starky, prone to manic psychotic episodes. He is institutionalized in a building called Kenmore (like the square!) and when we first meet him he is making a daring escape. He experiences his worst freak-out while watching an astronaut’s return (on a 3-D television!). He can sense something off about the event. He knows that Gibbs, the astronaut, is not the same as he was when he left, and he knows that he is the only one who can sense this. Soon after his return, Gibbs vanishes and Cramer makes it his mission to find him and discover the truth about what has happened to the astronaut. The book is for the most part a fugitive-esque story, with Cramer keeping one step ahead of his pursuers, trying to find the astronaut and maybe the source of his freak-outs.

All in all The Return had a pretty satisfying story. I’m somewhat surprised that Peter Weller didn’t star as Cramer in a mid-nineties adaptation of this novel. I guess there’s still time.

Cover- 8 out of 10: This is a fantastic cover. I love the bizarre head machine thing, and the ice sculptures of deer and birds and seals. It really has nothing literal to do with the plot, but conveys the sense of Cramer’s solitude as a fugitive, and the lack of his control over his mind. Also I love the bizarre heavy-footed typeface used for both the title and author’s name. Cover artist unknown.

What The Return taught me about the future: In the future there will be some sort of war with battlefronts in California and Texas. We will call the government the Fed Gov, which is maybe something we can start doing today. Also we will have 3-D television. Yeah!

What I talk about when I talk about robot brains.

Welcome to my first post. Here I will discuss science fiction books that I read. Science fiction books that also have nice covers. That’s really the only prerequisite. That I find the covers nice or interesting. So here goes.

The inaugural book I have read is The Robot Brains by Sydney James Bounds (aka Clifford Wallace aka James Marshall aka Earl Ellison and aka Rex Marlowe). You’d think this guy was on the run for failure to pay child support or something, but I guess it was the fashion in the 60’s to publish under pseudonyms. It was published by the fine folks at MacFadden-Bartell in 1969. Cover price: 60¢

Plot- 4 out of 10: The book was a moderately enjoyable romp through time with a heroic sea captain named Christian who smokes cheroots and prefers, “to take his adventure neat rather than canned.” Also he sports a Vandyke. Nothing says sea captain like facial hair named after a Flemish painter. It all begins when the world’s scientists start showing up dead. Not just dead but decapitated and neatly cauterized. The culprits are soon discovered to be the “Brains,” a trio of dwarfs with over-sized heads who appear in a freak show that is coincidentally always in the same town that the murders occur.

The short and long of it is that the “Brains” are from the distant future, and after a catastrophic event they were left to live underground while the less mutanty inhabitants of Earth take off for the stars. So of course if the brains can come back in time to ruin any chance of man exploring the stars, everything will be hunky dory. Our hero Christian will have none of it, so he battles the “Brains” in our time as well as in the far future.

Cover- 5 out of 10: The cover of this book is nice, what with a maniacal robotic tank chasing after a fleeing human, but it is completely unrelated to the plot. In fact, half the title is unrelated to the plot. There are “Brains,” but there are no “Robot Brains.” The only Robots belong to the gentle guardians of Earth that come to our hero’s aid in the far future. And they are only around for a couple of pages. Also the man on the cover looks nothing like Captain Christian. Artist: Unknown.

What The Robot Brains taught me about the future: In the future there will be some sort of unexplained cataclysm. As a result half of us will travel to other planets, and the other half will live underground. The men that live underground will become dwarfs with giant craniums and the women will become scantily clad giantesses. Book me a ticket for the space rocket.