Conference noted::sf

1191.0. "Anvil/Clingerman/Edmondson/Kaye/Lem" by VERGA::KLAES (Quo vadimus?) Mon Nov 15 1993 18:30

Article: 428
From: [email protected] (Dani Zweig)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews
Subject: REPOST: Belated Reviews PS#24: Anvil/Clingerman/Edmondson/Kaye/Lem
Organization: Netcom Online Communications Services (408-241-9760 login: guest)
Date: 12 Nov 93 13:49:35 GMT
 
  Belated Reviews PS#24: Short Takes: Anvil/Clingerman/Edmondson/Kaye/Lem
 
More authors from whose work I only want to mention a book or two.  As the
title implies, these will be short takes -- typically a paragraph per book
-- with little attempt to present a balanced picture of an author's writing.
Today's offerings will tend towards the lighter side.
 
"Pandora's Planet" (***), by Christopher Anvil (published in 1972 and
based on a 1956 short story), is light-weight, but fun.  It begins with
the conquest of Earth by the Centran empire.  The typical Centran is
loyal, trustworthy, obedient...let's just say, not too bright.  Oh, and
trusting.  The sort of entity you'd love to have visiting your used car
dealership.  Having won the war, the Centrans find themselves losing the
peace, as Earthlings begin to sell them not only used cars, but also used
religions, cults and ideologies.  Parts of the book area bit jingoistic by
today's standards, but it still amuses. 
 
	"While you were on this planet, Horsip, did you happen to
	have any experience with a...ah..." -- Roffis glanced at
	the document flattened onto his desk -- " 'glorious sun-
	drenched quarter acre on the warm sandy shores of a hidden
	inlet on Florida's unspoiled west coast...'?"
 
"A Cupful of Space" (***), by Mildred Clingerman, is an anthology (1961),
something I've been steering clear of in these reviews.  Few of her
stories are best-of-the-year material, but many are (much as I regret the
overworked adjective) charming.  The stories tend to be of unambitious
scope -- touches of the weird in suburban neighborhoods, 1950s women
(these are 1950s stories, with all the social norms that implies) in
other-century circumstances.  My favorite of these is "The Day of the
Green Velvet Cloak", in which a woman who'd have been much more at home in
the nineteenth century meets a man who wishes to return to the nineteenth
century.  If you like good but unambitious short stories, and you see this
book in a used book store, pick it up.
 
	Garnet looked at her in surprise.  "Why, I came to warn you
	about Nina.  She bites.  She kicks.  She pinches babies.  She
	aims her tricycle at the behinds of nice old ladies and never
	misses the target..." 	-- from "The Little Witch of Elm Street"
 
"T.H.E.M." (***), by G.C. Edmondson (1974), is an odd mix of the comic and
the serious.  'T.H.E.M.' stands for Theriomorphic Hellbent Enemy Mission.
They're the monsters from outer space that are on the way to destroy the
Earth.  On our side is the Alliance -- which contributed some obsolete
warships and some platitudes -- and every fighter the planet can muster.
And one ship of misfits who wind up in just the right place at just the
right time to capture a ship that *isn't* obsolete.  At that point the 
book takes a more thoughtful turn, though this takes a while to become
apparent.  Although Earth doesn't know it yet, it has just been catapulted
into a era of high technology, plentiful resources, unlimited destructive
power, and the ethical problems that accompany them.  It's a short book,
well-written, thought-provoking, possibly too strongly influenced by Viet
Nam era politics for many of today's readers.  Readers who enjoy this book
will probably also enjoy Edmondson's "The Aluminum Man", about a pair of
(what else?) misfits who accidentally bring down civilization.
 
	So far the Nishrub II had not dropped a single bomb.  The
	Missiles were "clean" but the smallest would take out half
	a continent.  Some people in South China had thought Jorf
	would not dare use them.  Jorf had set up a computer
	analogue to predict how high the sea would rise if he
	were to bring the starship into stationary orbit over
	South China.  The print-out had been sufficient.
 
"The Cyberiad" (****-) (1967 -- trans. 1974) may not be Stanislaw Lem's
best book, but it's certainly my favorite.  The book is a collection of
tales about a pair of Cosmic Constructors -- super-gadgeteers in a robotic
civilization.  Silly and amusing high-tech fairy tales with an imagination 
and style that comes through quite effectively in translation from the 
Polish.  (I'm not really sure what more I can say.  This is the sort of 
thing that stands or falls on how good the writer is -- not on what he 
writes about -- and Lem is among the best.)  
 
	When the Universe was not so out of whack is it is today,
	and all the stars were lined up in their proper places, so
	you could easily count them from left to right, or top to
	bottom, and the larger and bluer ones were set apart, and
	the smaller, yellowing types pushed off to the corners as
	bodies of a lower grade, when there was not a speck of dust
	to be found in outer space, nor any nebular debris -- in
	those good old days it was the custom...
		-- from "The First Sally, or The Trap of Gargantius"
 
"The Incredible Umbrella" (***+) is by Marvin Kaye.  You might think of
it as a lighter and sillier version of "The Compleat Enchanter".  It's a
fixup novel, composed from three novellas written in the seventies.  In
the first and best of these, Adrian Fillmore finds himself in the world of
Gilbert and Sullivan -- a world in which death sentences are easy to come
by and (with adroit use of chop-logic) easy to avoid -- a world in which
the most crippling birth defect would be tone deafness.  Fillmore's
adventures in this world eventually lead him to John Wellington Wells, the
maker -- but not the inventor -- of the incredible umbrella which brought
him to this universe.
 
The second novella takes Fillmore to the London of Sherlock Holmes -- and
of the brilliant inventor of the umbrella, Moriarty.  Moriarty gets away
from Fillmore (and Holmes) in the end, and since he could have fled to any
of an infinite number of worlds, there doesn't seem to be much prospect of
tracking him -- until Mycroft Holmes points out a way to narrow down the
possibilities.  Part three takes Fillmore to a number of worlds before
Moriarty is finally traced to his hiding place in Flatland.  (That's a 
spoiler, btw, so forget I told you.)
 
Parts two and three of "The Incredible Umbrella" are competent enough, but
it is the first part which makes the book worth reading.  Kaye has a great
deal of fun making sense of a sort out of the anything-but-sensible 
universe of Gilbert and Sullivan, and people who enjoy their comic operas
will enjoy what he's done with them.  (By which same token, downgrade the
book to *** if you are unfamiliar with G&S.)  I believe there is a sequel
to "The Incredible Umbrella titled "The Amorous Umbrella", but I've yet to
track it down.
 
	"Peculiarities?" the sorcerer asked with surprise.  "But
	my good man, our people study music from very babyhood.
	It is expected of them.  To speak without an occasional
	chorus or solo is as unthinkable as to imagine that God
	did not put his Holy Orchestra above to manifest His Will
	to us!  The music is Holy Tone, my lad, showing us the way
	to interpret His Intentions!"  His face took on the fixed
	expression of one who dare not be contradicted on an axiom
	of faith.
 
%A  Anvil, Christopher
%T  Pandora's Planet
 
%A  Clingerman, Mildred
%T  A Cupful of Space
 
%A  Edmondson, G.C.
%T  T.H.E.M.
 
%A  Lem, Stanislaw
%T  The Cyberiad
 
%A  Kaye, Marvin
%T  The Incredible Umbrella
 
=============================================================================
 
The postscripts to Belated Reviews cover authors of earlier decades who
didn't fit into the original format -- whether because the author seemed
an inappropriate subject, or because I was unfamiliar with too much of the
author's work, or whatever -- or sometimes just isolated works of such
authors.  The emphasis will continue to be on guiding newer readers
towards books or authors worth trying out, rather than on discussing them
comprehensively or in depth.  I'll retain the rating scheme of ****
(recommended), *** (an old favorite that hasn't aged well), ** (a solid
lesser work), and * (nothing special). 
 
-----
Dani Zweig
[email protected]
 
   The inability of snakes to count is actually a refusal, on their part,
    to appreciate the Cardinal Number system. -- "Actual Facts"

    "...much as I regret the overworked adjective) charming."
    
    I rather think the adjective must have had a chance to rest up by now.
    I don't recall much of anything, certainly not fantasy and science
    fiction, described as "charming" with any frequency in the last decade
    or so.  Maybe consumer goods intended to be bought by adults for small
    children, but that's about it.
    
    Earl Wajenberg