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The Book of Skaith #3
The Reavers of Skaith
Stark aulló. Un grito extraño y penetrante que sorprendió incluso a los Isleños. Un grito que venía de otro mundo; el grito de unos seres subhumanos de rostros de cerdo que divisaban una presa. Los Perros del norte aullaron, larga y siniestramente. Una masa compacta de gente que se aglutinaba en la puerta, estalló en fragmentos bajo las espadas y el terror mental de los Perros. No hubo apenas resistencia. Los Thyranos cubiertos de hierro llegaron después, gruñendo y jadenado. Los Fallarins y los Tarfs se mantuvieron aparte, esperando a que acabasen el trabajo sucio. Halk blandía la larga espada. Solo Pedrallon iba sin armas. Como Heraldo de alto rango antes de la derrota, conoció una Ged Darod llena de orgullo y poder. Stark se preguntí cuáles serían sus sentimientos al ver en lo que acababa su amada ciudad.
224 pages, Paperback
First published July 12, 1976
5 people are currently reading
385 people want to read
About the author
Leigh Brackett
400 books243 followersLeigh Brackett was born on December 7, 1915 in Los Angeles, and raised near Santa Monica. Having spent her youth as an athletic tom-boy - playing volleyball and reading stories by Edgar Rice Burroughs and H Rider Haggard - she began writing fantastic adventures of her own. Several of these early efforts were read by Henry Kuttner, who critiqued her stories and introduced her to the SF personalities then living in California, including Robert Heinlein, Julius Schwartz, Jack Williamson, Edmond Hamilton - and another aspiring writer, Ray Bradbury.
In 1944, based on the hard-boiled dialogue in her first novel, No Good From a Corpse, producer/director Howard Hawks hired Brackett to collaborate with William Faulkner on the screenplay of Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep.
Brackett maintained an on-again/off-again relationship with Hollywood for the remainder of her life. Between writing screenplays for such films as Rio Bravo, El Dorado, Hatari!, and The Long Goodbye, she produced novels such as the classic The Long Tomorrow (1955) and the Spur Award-winning Western, Follow the Free Wind (1963).
Brackett married Edmond Hamilton on New Year's Eve in 1946, and the couple maintained homes in the high-desert of California and the rural farmland of Kinsman, Ohio.
Just weeks before her death on March 17, 1978, she turned in the first draft screenplay for The Empire Strikes Back and the film was posthumously dedicated to her.
In 1944, based on the hard-boiled dialogue in her first novel, No Good From a Corpse, producer/director Howard Hawks hired Brackett to collaborate with William Faulkner on the screenplay of Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep.
Brackett maintained an on-again/off-again relationship with Hollywood for the remainder of her life. Between writing screenplays for such films as Rio Bravo, El Dorado, Hatari!, and The Long Goodbye, she produced novels such as the classic The Long Tomorrow (1955) and the Spur Award-winning Western, Follow the Free Wind (1963).
Brackett married Edmond Hamilton on New Year's Eve in 1946, and the couple maintained homes in the high-desert of California and the rural farmland of Kinsman, Ohio.
Just weeks before her death on March 17, 1978, she turned in the first draft screenplay for The Empire Strikes Back and the film was posthumously dedicated to her.
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Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
May 20, 2019
This concluding volume of the trilogy The Book of Skaith (1977) begins on a surprisingly dark note, considering the upbeat ending of the previous volume, when our heroes set out to fulfill their plans to send an embassy to Pax the galactic capital, acquire the right to emigrate from dying Skaith, and finally unseat the power of the Lord Protectors. But now those plans are dashed, and Stark and Ashton are captives, due to the duplicitous behavior of Penkwar-Che, commander of the small mercenary starships who have become the “reavers” (“plundering foragers”) of the planet. Stark and Aston escape, but without supplies or other resources, and to survive their long journey to the South they—and the followers they recruit along the way—must also become “reavers” of Skaith.
Perhaps the most astonishing achievement of The Book of Skaith(1977) is the detailed, diverse nature of its world-building, and how Brackett’s construction of the customs and character of the many peoples of Skaith is always informed by the nature of their specific climates and terrains. As the mercenary captain Kasimni of Izvand remarks.“The land shapes us. If we were in another place, we would be another people.” And in this final volume, as Old Sun dies and the changes to climate become unmistakable, the peoples of Skaith seek warmer places, abandon old customs, and—as their cultural disintegrates, their characters begin to change too.
The Reavers of Skaith is exciting and surprising, yet its plot seems fated, inevitable. It has moments of pathos and fear, ties up all necessary loose ends, and combines with apparent effortlessness the sharp cultural observations of science fiction with the supernatural pleasures of fantasy. It is an effective ending to a complex and eventful trilogy, and—as it is her last novel—it is also a fitting end to Leigh Brackett’s novel-writing career.
But Brackett was not yet quite finished with her writing. When she died in 1978, at the age of 62, she left behind an unfinished script which was completed by Lawrence Kasdan and two years later became the basis for a movie you have heard of: George Lucas' The Empire Strikes Back.
July 21, 2021
The Reavers of Skaith is an fitting capstone to Brackett's amazing "The Book of Skaith" sword & planet trilogy, as well as to her stellar career. "Winter is coming" proves literally true and sums up the dark tone of this final chapter of Eric John Stark's adventures on the planet Skaith. The hope achieved at great cost at the end of the the previous volume is quickly shattered by one man's betrayal, leaving a dying world in despair and again under the shadow of tyranny.
"The Goddess moves, my lady Cold with her lord Darkness and their daughter Hunger. She has sent her spies before. This winter we shall see the first of her armies. And if the starships do not come soon, there will be no escape for any of us from the Second Wandering!"
The Skaith trilogy blazes with sword & planet adventure, but what really sets it apart is the rich, diverse world that Brackett has so deftly constructed. Skaith is full of fascinating tribes of people, including a variety of genetically altered mutant species. As their sun dies they have been forced through waves of mass migration to the ever shrinking habitable zone of their planet, resulting in mass upheaval. Each has a unique character, as well as deep, even supernatural connections to their dying planet and their ancestral homelands. This imbues the narrative with a sense of mysticism as well as pathos as they face the decision to either abandon their ancestral lands (and ultimately their planet) and in a sense betray themselves and their heritage, or face death from the holy trinity - the goddess of Cold, her lord Darkness and their daughter Hunger.
"“If we fled from this place,” she said at length, and she was speaking not to the Diviners nor even to herself, but to Someone beyond them all, “what would there be for us in the bitter world? We have given ourselves to the Mother. We cannot go back. Nor can we ever build again as we built here under the Witchfires. We ourselves are dying. Better to die where we are loved, in the arms of the Mother, than on the cold spears of the wind Outside.”"
This series is really a standout in the sword & planet landscape, and I can't recommend it more highly to any and all SFF readers!
"The Goddess moves, my lady Cold with her lord Darkness and their daughter Hunger. She has sent her spies before. This winter we shall see the first of her armies. And if the starships do not come soon, there will be no escape for any of us from the Second Wandering!"
The Skaith trilogy blazes with sword & planet adventure, but what really sets it apart is the rich, diverse world that Brackett has so deftly constructed. Skaith is full of fascinating tribes of people, including a variety of genetically altered mutant species. As their sun dies they have been forced through waves of mass migration to the ever shrinking habitable zone of their planet, resulting in mass upheaval. Each has a unique character, as well as deep, even supernatural connections to their dying planet and their ancestral homelands. This imbues the narrative with a sense of mysticism as well as pathos as they face the decision to either abandon their ancestral lands (and ultimately their planet) and in a sense betray themselves and their heritage, or face death from the holy trinity - the goddess of Cold, her lord Darkness and their daughter Hunger.
"“If we fled from this place,” she said at length, and she was speaking not to the Diviners nor even to herself, but to Someone beyond them all, “what would there be for us in the bitter world? We have given ourselves to the Mother. We cannot go back. Nor can we ever build again as we built here under the Witchfires. We ourselves are dying. Better to die where we are loved, in the arms of the Mother, than on the cold spears of the wind Outside.”"
This series is really a standout in the sword & planet landscape, and I can't recommend it more highly to any and all SFF readers!
May 20, 2022
Brackett concludes the Book of Skaith with this installment on a high note for sure. We left the last book seemingly at a conclusion to the saga-- one of the last spaceships was contacted and agreed to take Aston and several high level 'politicians' from Skaith to Pax, the capital of the Galactic Union (GU) to help arrange an evacuation from the dying planet. Alas, the captain of the ship was a greedy rogue, and instead ransomed the people back to their 'kingdoms' and set out to pillage the planet. After escaping from the spaceship's crew, Aston and Eric have to figure out a way to get a message off planet or be doomed to die with it!
Brackett had a real gift for portraying all the various odd societies and peoples on Skaith with very few words. Her sparse but elegant prose reminded me of Jack Vance at times here, and she kept the story moving along at a great pace. This series is really one book, but back in the day trilogies were the word and so it goes. This has, however, been collected in an omnibus published later that can still be found used for not much cash. Fun pulpy read! Looking for a really good sword and planet adventure straight out of the golden age? Look no further. Recommended for space pulp fans and those who are after a little adventure. 4 solid stars!
Brackett had a real gift for portraying all the various odd societies and peoples on Skaith with very few words. Her sparse but elegant prose reminded me of Jack Vance at times here, and she kept the story moving along at a great pace. This series is really one book, but back in the day trilogies were the word and so it goes. This has, however, been collected in an omnibus published later that can still be found used for not much cash. Fun pulpy read! Looking for a really good sword and planet adventure straight out of the golden age? Look no further. Recommended for space pulp fans and those who are after a little adventure. 4 solid stars!
June 17, 2010
I love the concept of the Skaith series--evolve the sword and planet literary trope of the Barsoomian dying world. The Barsoom skeleton is visible, but the flesh is given new consideration: What sort of society would develop? How would a planet go about dying? I liked that thinking and the answers that were developed.
Skaith, like Barsoom, is a planet in ecological and social decline. The society that has developed to deal with the climate is deeply flawed, and those flaws become more jagged as Skaith's condition worsens. The planet notches one more step towards uninhabitability: the Fertile Band narrows, the summer season becomes too brief for practical agriculture, and the hardiest of the people of Skaith move toward the equator, where life is still possible and food still can be obtained.
The story harbors a grimness that you don't see in Burroughs's equivalent. For Burroughs the aged Barsoom is the backdrop for unlimited adventure, and when the inevitable is mentioned, it is only as some far-off event (and until then there is war to fight and princesses to win). Here, Skaith's doom in integral, from the lay of the land to the people to the essentials of plot, and it all builds to a purpose, and that purpose comes to a head in this book.
The characters are all rough, hardened people with an edge of brutality, even (and especially) the hero Eric John Stark, a condition which made the story difficult to read at times.
Skaith, like Barsoom, is a planet in ecological and social decline. The society that has developed to deal with the climate is deeply flawed, and those flaws become more jagged as Skaith's condition worsens. The planet notches one more step towards uninhabitability: the Fertile Band narrows, the summer season becomes too brief for practical agriculture, and the hardiest of the people of Skaith move toward the equator, where life is still possible and food still can be obtained.
The story harbors a grimness that you don't see in Burroughs's equivalent. For Burroughs the aged Barsoom is the backdrop for unlimited adventure, and when the inevitable is mentioned, it is only as some far-off event (and until then there is war to fight and princesses to win). Here, Skaith's doom in integral, from the lay of the land to the people to the essentials of plot, and it all builds to a purpose, and that purpose comes to a head in this book.
The characters are all rough, hardened people with an edge of brutality, even (and especially) the hero Eric John Stark, a condition which made the story difficult to read at times.
February 23, 2016
First released in 1976, "The Reavers of Skaith" serves as both the wonderful finale of author Leigh Brackett's Skaith trilogy AND a fitting coda to her 36-year career. "Reavers," as it turned out, would be Brackett's final piece of published fiction before her death, at age 62, in 1978. Of course, the so-called "Queen of Space Opera" was not completely idle during her final years--she kept busy by writing the initial draft for a little picture to be later known as "The Empire Strikes Back"--but "Reavers" would serve as the finale of her legendary authorial career. Fortunately, Brackett went out with a bang, and fans of the first two books in this particular trilogy--"The Ginger Star" and "The Hounds of Skaith"--should be left happily grinning by the exploits of Brackett's most famous character, Eric John Stark, here. The third installment is at least as colorful, fast moving and thrill packed as the first two had been, and ties up all loose ends very pleasingly, indeed.
In "The Ginger Star," Stark had traveled to the planet Skaith, in the Orion Spur, to rescue his friend and mentor Simon Ashton from the planetary rulers, the Lords Protector, and their underlings, the Wandsmen. Skaith was a planet in ferment, a dying world orbiting a dying sun, with one of its city-states, Irnan, petitioning the Galactic Union for the right to emigrate, and the Lords Protector doing everything to maintain the status quo. In "Hounds," Stark and Ashton had gathered together a motley assemblage of desert tribesmen and had gone on to conquer one Skaithian city after another. By the end of Book 2, it had seemed as if the Irnanese had indeed won their right to emigrate, as a delegation of them--along with the seeress Gerrith, the Iubarian queen Sanghalain, the amphibian Morn of the Ssussminh people, Alderyk of the winged Fallarin, Stark and Ashton, the sympathetic turncoat Wandsman Pedrallon, and several others--was being taken to the G.U. capital world of Pax to discuss the situation. In "Reavers," however, we learn that all had not gone as planned. Rather than bringing the delegates to Pax, the greedy Antarean Penkawr-Che, the starship captain, had kidnapped the lot, ransomed them to their respective peoples, and made plans to plunder and sack the entire planet! As Book 3 opens, Stark and Ashton are being tortured by the piratical captain, and this final volume in the trilogy details their escape and subsequent flight into the southern half of the planet, all the while recruiting allies again to retake the Wandsmen stronghold at Ged Darod....
As in the previous two books, Brackett throws any number of exciting set pieces into her story, including Stark and Ashton's thrilling escape from Penkawr-Che's clutches atop an inhospitable heath; another escape from the mutated Children-of-the-Sea's sacrificial ceremony; a raid that Stark and his followers, including the telepathic Northhounds, make on one of Penkawr-Che's ships; Stark's initial meeting with the Four Kings of the White Isles (a people of the polar south who live on drifting ice floes); and the final gigantic battle at Ged Darod. Again, Brackett displays a formidable talent in the depiction of crowded, multisided and complicated martial scenes. It is a marvel how she can make the reader clearly envision the fighting between the Wandsmen and their mercenaries on one side, and Stark, his hounds, the Fallarin, the four-armed Tarf, the Ssussminh, the six desert tribes, the Iubarians, Pedrallon's people from Andapell, and the Four Kings' barbarians on the other. And there are any number of wonderful lesser scenes, too, such as the raid that Gerrith and her band make on a harbor town to steal a sailing ship; Stark's solo mission to rescue Pedrallon from his own castle in Andapell, where he is being held prisoner; and the marvelous sequence in which Penkawr-Che and his men break into the mountain stronghold/treasure repository of the mutated Children-of-Skaith-Mother, resulting in a battle between laser blasters and more primitive poison darts. Ever imaginative, Brackett adorns her book with pleasing touches at every turn; I love those hibernating worshippers of the Cold Goddess, the Nithi, as well as those carnivorous trees, sentient flowers and vicious, yellow birds.
Unlike the first two books in the series, Stark himself is not present in every single scene. Rather, we get sections depicting what is going on with the various nations we had previously encountered, and wonderfully well-done chapters amongst the Lords Protector and the Wandsmen. The net effect is to portray an entire planet in turmoil, as winter sets in, the harvests fail, and the peoples begin to grow restive. I would have to say, thus, that "The Reavers of Skaith" is the most fully fleshed out, most well rounded and detailed of the three books in the trilogy. Indeed, so much is going on by the time the reader is 20 pages short of completion that it seems doubtful that the author will be able to wrap things up satisfactorily; remarkably enough, she does.
I have said this before, but Brackett really was one helluva writer. In her violent battle segments, she could depict with the red-blooded gusto of a Robert E. Howard, and in her quieter moments, she could compose a line of almost poetic beauty; e.g., "Her voice rang, clear and strong, with a haunting melancholy, a bell heard across hills when the wind is blowing." As in the first two books, she often employs archaic language here to reinforce the notion of a primitive people on the decline ("Get you to the rowing benches. We are foredone…"), and has her hero, Stark, come off as a kind of Conan/Tarzan of the spaceways (never more apparent than when Stark kills a furry jungle animal, breaks it in half, and eats it raw!). But we also get to see another side of Stark's character here, and his reaction to Gerrith's ultimate fate is a touching one, indeed.
In all, "The Reavers of Skaith" is a sweeping finale to a wonder-filled trilogy. As was "The Lord of the Rings," this trilogy is really meant to be taken in as one long book, and has been published as such in the past, under the title "The Book of Skaith." It is a terrific feat of world building, and at the end of nearly 600 pages, the reader feels that he/she knows the various cultures, religions, politics, geography and history of this particular planet very well. It is a pleasing combination of space opera and sword & sorcery-type fantasy, those fantastic elements including the Corn King's ability to summon the Cold Goddess to freeze his foes; the prophesies of Gerrith the seeress; the Eye of the Mother jewel that can foresee future events; and the ability of the Fallarin to talk to (!) and control the winds.
Books 1 and 2 of the trilogy had each featured detailed maps depicting Stark's epic journeys north and south, and happily, Book 3 performs the same useful service. But this new map is the most complex one yet, showing us Stark and Ashton's journey AND Gerrith and her band's journey, their eventual uniting and wending down farther into the polar south, and then north again into the tropics and the Fertile Belt. Hats off to the artist who executed these three wonderful drawings, as they greatly assist the reader in visualizing Stark's lengthy wanderings. Book 3 also includes a preface describing the background, places and peoples of the previous two novels, but of course, this is hardly a substitute for having read those books in full.
I mentioned earlier that this novel was Brackett's swan song as an author, but that is not entirely true. In recent years, a posthumous short story has been released by Haffner Press, entitled "Stark and the Star Kings." The only collaboration between Brackett and her husband, pulpmaster Edmond Hamilton, this story would seem a must for yours truly to seek out. And speaking of Haffner Press, its upcoming release "The Book of Stark," which will include the Skaith trilogy as well as three Stark novellas from 1948 – ’51, will also include "Brackett's working notes for the abandoned fourth Stark novel from 1977"! The mere thought of a fourth Stark, possibly Skaith, novel is a fascinating one. What a tremendous loss to the world was the passing of "The Queen of Space Opera"!
(By the way, this review originally appeared on the FanLit website at http://www.fantasyliterature.com/ ... a most excellent destination for all fans of Leigh Brackett....)
In "The Ginger Star," Stark had traveled to the planet Skaith, in the Orion Spur, to rescue his friend and mentor Simon Ashton from the planetary rulers, the Lords Protector, and their underlings, the Wandsmen. Skaith was a planet in ferment, a dying world orbiting a dying sun, with one of its city-states, Irnan, petitioning the Galactic Union for the right to emigrate, and the Lords Protector doing everything to maintain the status quo. In "Hounds," Stark and Ashton had gathered together a motley assemblage of desert tribesmen and had gone on to conquer one Skaithian city after another. By the end of Book 2, it had seemed as if the Irnanese had indeed won their right to emigrate, as a delegation of them--along with the seeress Gerrith, the Iubarian queen Sanghalain, the amphibian Morn of the Ssussminh people, Alderyk of the winged Fallarin, Stark and Ashton, the sympathetic turncoat Wandsman Pedrallon, and several others--was being taken to the G.U. capital world of Pax to discuss the situation. In "Reavers," however, we learn that all had not gone as planned. Rather than bringing the delegates to Pax, the greedy Antarean Penkawr-Che, the starship captain, had kidnapped the lot, ransomed them to their respective peoples, and made plans to plunder and sack the entire planet! As Book 3 opens, Stark and Ashton are being tortured by the piratical captain, and this final volume in the trilogy details their escape and subsequent flight into the southern half of the planet, all the while recruiting allies again to retake the Wandsmen stronghold at Ged Darod....
As in the previous two books, Brackett throws any number of exciting set pieces into her story, including Stark and Ashton's thrilling escape from Penkawr-Che's clutches atop an inhospitable heath; another escape from the mutated Children-of-the-Sea's sacrificial ceremony; a raid that Stark and his followers, including the telepathic Northhounds, make on one of Penkawr-Che's ships; Stark's initial meeting with the Four Kings of the White Isles (a people of the polar south who live on drifting ice floes); and the final gigantic battle at Ged Darod. Again, Brackett displays a formidable talent in the depiction of crowded, multisided and complicated martial scenes. It is a marvel how she can make the reader clearly envision the fighting between the Wandsmen and their mercenaries on one side, and Stark, his hounds, the Fallarin, the four-armed Tarf, the Ssussminh, the six desert tribes, the Iubarians, Pedrallon's people from Andapell, and the Four Kings' barbarians on the other. And there are any number of wonderful lesser scenes, too, such as the raid that Gerrith and her band make on a harbor town to steal a sailing ship; Stark's solo mission to rescue Pedrallon from his own castle in Andapell, where he is being held prisoner; and the marvelous sequence in which Penkawr-Che and his men break into the mountain stronghold/treasure repository of the mutated Children-of-Skaith-Mother, resulting in a battle between laser blasters and more primitive poison darts. Ever imaginative, Brackett adorns her book with pleasing touches at every turn; I love those hibernating worshippers of the Cold Goddess, the Nithi, as well as those carnivorous trees, sentient flowers and vicious, yellow birds.
Unlike the first two books in the series, Stark himself is not present in every single scene. Rather, we get sections depicting what is going on with the various nations we had previously encountered, and wonderfully well-done chapters amongst the Lords Protector and the Wandsmen. The net effect is to portray an entire planet in turmoil, as winter sets in, the harvests fail, and the peoples begin to grow restive. I would have to say, thus, that "The Reavers of Skaith" is the most fully fleshed out, most well rounded and detailed of the three books in the trilogy. Indeed, so much is going on by the time the reader is 20 pages short of completion that it seems doubtful that the author will be able to wrap things up satisfactorily; remarkably enough, she does.
I have said this before, but Brackett really was one helluva writer. In her violent battle segments, she could depict with the red-blooded gusto of a Robert E. Howard, and in her quieter moments, she could compose a line of almost poetic beauty; e.g., "Her voice rang, clear and strong, with a haunting melancholy, a bell heard across hills when the wind is blowing." As in the first two books, she often employs archaic language here to reinforce the notion of a primitive people on the decline ("Get you to the rowing benches. We are foredone…"), and has her hero, Stark, come off as a kind of Conan/Tarzan of the spaceways (never more apparent than when Stark kills a furry jungle animal, breaks it in half, and eats it raw!). But we also get to see another side of Stark's character here, and his reaction to Gerrith's ultimate fate is a touching one, indeed.
In all, "The Reavers of Skaith" is a sweeping finale to a wonder-filled trilogy. As was "The Lord of the Rings," this trilogy is really meant to be taken in as one long book, and has been published as such in the past, under the title "The Book of Skaith." It is a terrific feat of world building, and at the end of nearly 600 pages, the reader feels that he/she knows the various cultures, religions, politics, geography and history of this particular planet very well. It is a pleasing combination of space opera and sword & sorcery-type fantasy, those fantastic elements including the Corn King's ability to summon the Cold Goddess to freeze his foes; the prophesies of Gerrith the seeress; the Eye of the Mother jewel that can foresee future events; and the ability of the Fallarin to talk to (!) and control the winds.
Books 1 and 2 of the trilogy had each featured detailed maps depicting Stark's epic journeys north and south, and happily, Book 3 performs the same useful service. But this new map is the most complex one yet, showing us Stark and Ashton's journey AND Gerrith and her band's journey, their eventual uniting and wending down farther into the polar south, and then north again into the tropics and the Fertile Belt. Hats off to the artist who executed these three wonderful drawings, as they greatly assist the reader in visualizing Stark's lengthy wanderings. Book 3 also includes a preface describing the background, places and peoples of the previous two novels, but of course, this is hardly a substitute for having read those books in full.
I mentioned earlier that this novel was Brackett's swan song as an author, but that is not entirely true. In recent years, a posthumous short story has been released by Haffner Press, entitled "Stark and the Star Kings." The only collaboration between Brackett and her husband, pulpmaster Edmond Hamilton, this story would seem a must for yours truly to seek out. And speaking of Haffner Press, its upcoming release "The Book of Stark," which will include the Skaith trilogy as well as three Stark novellas from 1948 – ’51, will also include "Brackett's working notes for the abandoned fourth Stark novel from 1977"! The mere thought of a fourth Stark, possibly Skaith, novel is a fascinating one. What a tremendous loss to the world was the passing of "The Queen of Space Opera"!
(By the way, this review originally appeared on the FanLit website at http://www.fantasyliterature.com/ ... a most excellent destination for all fans of Leigh Brackett....)
August 23, 2018
The Book of Skaith, volume 3. Serious spoilers ahead.
In fact, it's a bit deus ex machina, the opening, where the starship captain they had deal with at the end of Hounds turns treacherous. Thus, among other things, sticking Ashton back on the planet, and letting Stark know that no help will be coming.
The starship captain is extracting information from Ashton about what he can loot. That Stark, under drugs, reverts to the language of the aboriginals who raised him cramps this, but he lets Stark regain his senses, and after some discussion, Stark starts to explain how to raid the House of the Mother, which lets him near enough a lamp to escape.
And then they must forge onward in a desperate and bitter land. It involves another prediction from Gerrith, a boy known as the Bridegroom of the Daughter; that not all of the Children of the Sea-Our-Mother can live in the sea; a temple where there was a massacre, but they feel less pity for the priests after their search; a people who pray every night that the sun will never rise again, and practice the ritual Death of Summer, which takes a while because it is a wicked season; a sea voyage, and more.
In fact, it's a bit deus ex machina, the opening, where the starship captain they had deal with at the end of Hounds turns treacherous. Thus, among other things, sticking Ashton back on the planet, and letting Stark know that no help will be coming.
The starship captain is extracting information from Ashton about what he can loot. That Stark, under drugs, reverts to the language of the aboriginals who raised him cramps this, but he lets Stark regain his senses, and after some discussion, Stark starts to explain how to raid the House of the Mother, which lets him near enough a lamp to escape.
And then they must forge onward in a desperate and bitter land. It involves another prediction from Gerrith, a boy known as the Bridegroom of the Daughter; that not all of the Children of the Sea-Our-Mother can live in the sea; a temple where there was a massacre, but they feel less pity for the priests after their search; a people who pray every night that the sun will never rise again, and practice the ritual Death of Summer, which takes a while because it is a wicked season; a sea voyage, and more.
July 28, 2008
The third and final book in the Skaith series. A fine ending to the trilogy.
June 6, 2018
As the world dies, there's just less and less, less and less land, less and less food, less and less people. On the other hand, there's more and more human sacrifice, more and more prophecy, more and more violence. That's all OK with the people in charge. They'll gladly rule over less so long as they can continue to rule. Reminds me of when I worked at RKO Warner Video in Times Square.
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February 24, 20164.5 stars: A sweeping finale to a wonder-filled trilogy by an SF master!
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February 11, 2016
Great SiFi adventure from the pulp era. Recommended
July 31, 2025
The works of Leigh Brackett are, to-date, my favorite literary discovery of 2025. I'm always on the lookout for pulpy space opera, so when I learned that Brackett was nicknamed the "queen" of Golden Age space opera, I knew that I had to give her a read. The only problem is that it has been decades since many of her works received a major printing. A testament to Brackett's bizarre anonymity among contemporary readers, and a fact that forces lovers of physical media to seek out a vintage copies… In any case, it was quick work to order a (semi-reasonably priced) set of used paperbacks for Brackett's Book of Skaith trilogy. And now that I've finished The Reavers of Skaith, I can confirm that the entire series is a must-read for fans of fast-paced sci-fi fantasy in the vein of Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter novels. Top-notch adventure fiction.
As with its predecessors, The Reavers of Skaith is a quintessential example of the "Sword and Planet" sub-genre. We once again follow Eric John Stark- a human mercenary who finds himself on the primitive backwater planet known as Skaith. Stark has succeeded in rescuing his foster-father Simon Ashton from the clutches of the despotic Lords Protector, and has secured passage off world for Ashton and a number of Skaith's prominent dissidents. Yet just when Stark's adventure appears to be over, the space captain contracted by our heroes decides to imprison Stark and begin raiding the planet. Stark soon escapes, and he spends the remainder of the story undermining the space pirates while organizing a final defeat over the Lords Protector. Meanwhile, Skaith itself is rapidly plunging into an ice age, and Stark must somehow contact the galactic Commonwealth to send a humanitarian rescue mission for the planet's beleaguered inhabitants. Secondary storylines include the continuing romance between Stark and the prophetic Gerrith, as well as Stark's uneasy lordship over the vicious Northhounds.
The Reavers of Skaith provides a satisfying conclusion to Stark's storyline. Although the introduction of new, off-world antagonists was unexpected, it helped to keep the story fresh. It also allows for the incorporation for more sci-fi elements: whereas the first two installments in the trilogy leaned heavily toward the fantasy side of the Sword and Planet sub-genre, The Reavers of Skaith feels truer in spirit to the full-on sci-fi/fantasy hybridization in the John Carter novels. My only complaint about the core plot is how the first act felt extremely rushed. Seeing as the conclusion of The Ginger Star was similarly rushed, I'm forced to conclude that this was a product of length restraints. It still would've liked to have seen a brief epilogue, outlining the fate of our major characters. Otherwise, I was also slightly underwhelmed by the conclusion of the Stark/Gerrith storyline, and would've appreciated a bit more of the Northhounds, but the new plot additions more than make up for the absence of both of those secondary plot elements.
Overall, I'd place The Reavers of Skaith marginally ahead of The Hounds of Skaith as the best installment in the trilogy. Possibly a bit less interesting in its characterizations, but also a slight improvement in terms of world-building and overall plot. The Reavers of Skaith should be a blast for anybody who enjoyed The Ginger Star and The Hounds of Skaith.
As with its predecessors, The Reavers of Skaith is a quintessential example of the "Sword and Planet" sub-genre. We once again follow Eric John Stark- a human mercenary who finds himself on the primitive backwater planet known as Skaith. Stark has succeeded in rescuing his foster-father Simon Ashton from the clutches of the despotic Lords Protector, and has secured passage off world for Ashton and a number of Skaith's prominent dissidents. Yet just when Stark's adventure appears to be over, the space captain contracted by our heroes decides to imprison Stark and begin raiding the planet. Stark soon escapes, and he spends the remainder of the story undermining the space pirates while organizing a final defeat over the Lords Protector. Meanwhile, Skaith itself is rapidly plunging into an ice age, and Stark must somehow contact the galactic Commonwealth to send a humanitarian rescue mission for the planet's beleaguered inhabitants. Secondary storylines include the continuing romance between Stark and the prophetic Gerrith, as well as Stark's uneasy lordship over the vicious Northhounds.
The Reavers of Skaith provides a satisfying conclusion to Stark's storyline. Although the introduction of new, off-world antagonists was unexpected, it helped to keep the story fresh. It also allows for the incorporation for more sci-fi elements: whereas the first two installments in the trilogy leaned heavily toward the fantasy side of the Sword and Planet sub-genre, The Reavers of Skaith feels truer in spirit to the full-on sci-fi/fantasy hybridization in the John Carter novels. My only complaint about the core plot is how the first act felt extremely rushed. Seeing as the conclusion of The Ginger Star was similarly rushed, I'm forced to conclude that this was a product of length restraints. It still would've liked to have seen a brief epilogue, outlining the fate of our major characters. Otherwise, I was also slightly underwhelmed by the conclusion of the Stark/Gerrith storyline, and would've appreciated a bit more of the Northhounds, but the new plot additions more than make up for the absence of both of those secondary plot elements.
Overall, I'd place The Reavers of Skaith marginally ahead of The Hounds of Skaith as the best installment in the trilogy. Possibly a bit less interesting in its characterizations, but also a slight improvement in terms of world-building and overall plot. The Reavers of Skaith should be a blast for anybody who enjoyed The Ginger Star and The Hounds of Skaith.
January 23, 2020
So between Book 2 and this one, Stark's trip back from Skaith to space civilization went afoul: the ship captain sold him to his enemies on the dying planet, then set about looting the world. Stark doesn't stay a prisoner long but can he contact someone to get him and his friend Simon off-world or will he end up dying with Skaith as the world slips into an eternal ice age?
This is more brooding than the previous two books. Skaith has always been a dying world, but now it's no longer possible for the people to deny that they either emigrate or die. The view is panoramic, as we see the various cults and species adopt their endgame. I don't think it worked quite as well, but it is a colorful and striking world.
This is more brooding than the previous two books. Skaith has always been a dying world, but now it's no longer possible for the people to deny that they either emigrate or die. The view is panoramic, as we see the various cults and species adopt their endgame. I don't think it worked quite as well, but it is a colorful and striking world.
April 19, 2023
A strong conclusion to the series as betrayal places Stark in the hands of an unsuspected enemy. Stark must seek new allies in southern Skaith while his comrades in the north hope to intercept him and prevent disaster. This is a short series, but Brackett has created a rich and imaginative world. Surprisingly, the series is timely in that the action is set against a time of climate change, and refugees from the cooling regions of the planet have upset the rule of the Wandsmen (elderly white guys who think that they know best). The series is an unabashed planetary romance with touches of Burroughs, Howard and Vance. Extremely readable and entertaining.
February 12, 2019
7/10. Media de los 5 libros leídos de la autora : 6/10
La autora iba con media de notable hasta que leí suyo "La ciudadela de las naves perdidas", que bajó la media drásticamente.
En esta saga de Space Opera tenemos un planeta cuyo sol se muere y los jerarcas andan en que si dejan salir a la población o no.
Aventuras y personajes simples, mucha acción y poca ciencia. De los clásicos, vamos.
La autora iba con media de notable hasta que leí suyo "La ciudadela de las naves perdidas", que bajó la media drásticamente.
En esta saga de Space Opera tenemos un planeta cuyo sol se muere y los jerarcas andan en que si dejan salir a la población o no.
Aventuras y personajes simples, mucha acción y poca ciencia. De los clásicos, vamos.
August 17, 2020
Ms. Brackett closes out her trilogy with an orgy of fire and blood, including (effective) blood sacrifices to the Ginger Star. Grim and unexpected, full of the strange beauty that limned the inside of her head, I wish she had been able to break this trilogy out of the pulp run-and-gun mold into a more complex and political narrative a la Snow Queen/Summer Queen.
Still, though, enjoyable.
Still, though, enjoyable.
February 11, 2018
A tight finish to this trilogy. Leigh Brackett leaves no loose ends and provides a fast, furious ending to Old Sun’s world. And she leaves hope intact for those that wish for it.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 19, 2024
So far I'm wishing I stopped at book 2... I'll update later!
Alright, the book moved along. A lot of it seemed like... "OK I want this character to go here, so I'll just say that..." where we don't really get much detail into what happened like we did in earlier books. It was less interesting to me that way, however we did get to see our honorable protagonist do his thing here and there, which was one of the reasons for liking this series. I particularly liked the interactions at the end with the expected duel between the wary allies. Some other interesting tying up of loose ends in the disaster that the planet is becoming.
Alright, the book moved along. A lot of it seemed like... "OK I want this character to go here, so I'll just say that..." where we don't really get much detail into what happened like we did in earlier books. It was less interesting to me that way, however we did get to see our honorable protagonist do his thing here and there, which was one of the reasons for liking this series. I particularly liked the interactions at the end with the expected duel between the wary allies. Some other interesting tying up of loose ends in the disaster that the planet is becoming.
November 16, 2013
The Reavers of Skaith by Leigh Brackett is the final book in the Skaith trilogy, and it's just as fun and good of a book as the first two were. A quick recap - Brackett's hero, Erik John Stark, has come to the remote planet of Skaith to rescue his friend and mentor. During this process, he is thrust into the center of a political struggle between the rulers of the planet, the Wandsmen, and some of it's repressed groups of citizens. This forces Stark to turn the entire planet on it's side, and crush the Wandsmen army. As part of this, Stark arranges for one of the last remaining spaceships on the planet to take a group of delegates from the repressed peoples of Skaith to the galactic center to request aid in relocating off world, since their sun has been slowly dying over the past 2000 years.
This book starts off with that plan a shambles, as the captain of the spaceship has decided it would be more profitable to return to Skaith and loot it, while marooning Stark and his allies on the remote world. With the superior firepower of three armed ships and their smaller planet hopper shuttles, they easily capture Stark, and ransom the delegates they were supposed to be helping. Not surprisingly, Stark manages to escape, but into the southern half of Skaith, where he has no allies, and no weapons. From there he must somehow find a way to stop the off world reavers, and once again stop the Wandsmen from destroying resistance to their rule. This is further complicated by the balance of the ecosystem finally tipping to a world too cold to support all of it's life, and massive armies and refugees on the move, desperately seeking a way to survive.
Stark remains a ruthless killer and the ultimate survivor, with a combination of trained fighting prowess and animal instincts keeping him alive. Brackett once again spins a compelling story that gets the blood pumping and grabs the reader and wont let them go until the conclusion of the story. One of my favorite lines from the series perfectly exemplifies both traits: "He woke with a snarl and a lunge; and there was a man's neck in between his hands, ready for the breaking."
As mentioned in previous reviews of Brackett, she is known for many things, including being the author of the first draft of The Empire Strikes Back. Due to this, Paizo was able to get a well known filmmaker to write the introduction to the book. George Lucas does a good job praising Brackett, as well as acknowledging his strengths and weaknesses. It's a shame he didn't repeat his advice for the 2nd Star Wars films with the prequel trilogy.
This book starts off with that plan a shambles, as the captain of the spaceship has decided it would be more profitable to return to Skaith and loot it, while marooning Stark and his allies on the remote world. With the superior firepower of three armed ships and their smaller planet hopper shuttles, they easily capture Stark, and ransom the delegates they were supposed to be helping. Not surprisingly, Stark manages to escape, but into the southern half of Skaith, where he has no allies, and no weapons. From there he must somehow find a way to stop the off world reavers, and once again stop the Wandsmen from destroying resistance to their rule. This is further complicated by the balance of the ecosystem finally tipping to a world too cold to support all of it's life, and massive armies and refugees on the move, desperately seeking a way to survive.
Stark remains a ruthless killer and the ultimate survivor, with a combination of trained fighting prowess and animal instincts keeping him alive. Brackett once again spins a compelling story that gets the blood pumping and grabs the reader and wont let them go until the conclusion of the story. One of my favorite lines from the series perfectly exemplifies both traits: "He woke with a snarl and a lunge; and there was a man's neck in between his hands, ready for the breaking."
As mentioned in previous reviews of Brackett, she is known for many things, including being the author of the first draft of The Empire Strikes Back. Due to this, Paizo was able to get a well known filmmaker to write the introduction to the book. George Lucas does a good job praising Brackett, as well as acknowledging his strengths and weaknesses. It's a shame he didn't repeat his advice for the 2nd Star Wars films with the prequel trilogy.
May 11, 2015
This is a classic sword and planet type book. The third in a trilogy by Leigh Brackett. Ms Brackett was a writer from the Golden Age of Science Fiction writing for many of the pulps and science fiction magazines in the 40s and 50s when much of the Sci Fi took place in our own Solar System. The hero of these stories (The Trilogy is known as the Book of Skaith) is her greatest fictional creation Eric John Stark. Her husband was Edmond Hamilton who also wrote many Sci Fi stories at the time including the more juvenile Captain Future stories.
Her character, Stark, is inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter with a bit of Tarzan thrown in. His parents were from Earth but when his parents were killed on a mining expedtion on Mercury he was raised by the Aborigines there and finally saved by Simon Ashton, an Earthman and Galactic Administrator. There were about 6 short stories published in the 40s and 50s featuring Stark in our Solar System and Ms Brackett returned to her favorite character in the mid 70s to feature him in this trilogy. This is the first time the action takes place on a planet far from the Solar System where he goes in search of Simon Ashton, his foster father, who has been missing on Skaith, a planet with a dying sun. The action is plentiful and the alien characters unusual as he cuts a swathe across the planet where he is apparently the "Dark Man" of prophecy who has come to destroy the Citadel of the Wandsmen and lead the population away from their dying planet to find a new life in the stars. Good reading and fascinating characters.
BTW Leigh Brackett was a well known screenwriter in Hollywood as well as an author of Sci Fi. She wrote the Screenplay for the Bogart-Bacall movie "The Big Sleep" with William Faulkner as well as several Howard Hawks' John Wayne movies like "Rio Bravo", "El Dorado", and "Rio Lobo" and finally the Robert Altman-Elliott Gould version of "The Long Goodbye". She also wrote the first draft of "The Empire Strikes Back".
Her character, Stark, is inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter with a bit of Tarzan thrown in. His parents were from Earth but when his parents were killed on a mining expedtion on Mercury he was raised by the Aborigines there and finally saved by Simon Ashton, an Earthman and Galactic Administrator. There were about 6 short stories published in the 40s and 50s featuring Stark in our Solar System and Ms Brackett returned to her favorite character in the mid 70s to feature him in this trilogy. This is the first time the action takes place on a planet far from the Solar System where he goes in search of Simon Ashton, his foster father, who has been missing on Skaith, a planet with a dying sun. The action is plentiful and the alien characters unusual as he cuts a swathe across the planet where he is apparently the "Dark Man" of prophecy who has come to destroy the Citadel of the Wandsmen and lead the population away from their dying planet to find a new life in the stars. Good reading and fascinating characters.
BTW Leigh Brackett was a well known screenwriter in Hollywood as well as an author of Sci Fi. She wrote the Screenplay for the Bogart-Bacall movie "The Big Sleep" with William Faulkner as well as several Howard Hawks' John Wayne movies like "Rio Bravo", "El Dorado", and "Rio Lobo" and finally the Robert Altman-Elliott Gould version of "The Long Goodbye". She also wrote the first draft of "The Empire Strikes Back".
June 17, 2013
(4.5)
Definitely the best of the three. There was one element, or plot development, that kind of annoyed me because it didn't seem to fit with the rest of the pretty tight worldbuilding, but I guess I can forgive it. Brackett nails that tone of bleakness and the sorrow of things ending that seems a hallmark of the genre--and like I said, the worldbuilding is super cool.
Definitely the best of the three. There was one element, or plot development, that kind of annoyed me because it didn't seem to fit with the rest of the pretty tight worldbuilding, but I guess I can forgive it. Brackett nails that tone of bleakness and the sorrow of things ending that seems a hallmark of the genre--and like I said, the worldbuilding is super cool.
January 7, 2025
Brackett sticks the landing. Refugee flows, riots and war caused by the planet’s rapid cooling. Rulers cling to power and deny their subjects the relief of planetary escape by means of starship. It’s all pretty damn intense but at the same time as always with Brackett a joy to read thanks in no small part to her breakneck plotting, imaginative worldbuilding and lean prose. Fantastic stuf.
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May 5, 2009The Book Of Skaith III: The Reavers Of Skaith by Leigh Brackett (no date)
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April 7, 2012Ne abbiamo parlato sul blog nell'articolo sul planetary romance:
http://wp.me/p29Hyy-2w
http://wp.me/p29Hyy-2w
January 9, 2013
It was okay with a couple of highlights but a certain passivity to the lead character which I found frankly revolting.
August 2, 2013
While not up to Burroughs' excellence, Brackett does well in this formulaic swords and spaceship tale.
May 1, 2014
I love Leigh Brackett's writing but this particular book didn't quite grab me. I didn't read the first two however, so that may be my mistake there. It's worth a look for her prose alone.
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April 30, 2019I have the german edition: Planet in Aufbruch
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