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Planets for Sale
Planets for sale!
They said that Artur Blord was ruthless, a heartless manipulator whose blind lust for power would ruin the Ridge Stars.
They said he had to be eliminated because he was too much of a threat to their secret.
But just who were they, the accusers of Artur Bloyd?
And what was the secret which Artur Bloyd threatened?
Beyond the answers to these two questions lay a tortured path along which Artur Bloyd compelled himself to travel. Menaced by a terrifying array of lethal forces, Blord risked his life against alien aggressors as well as more human adversaries.
Never knowing at what moment death might overtake him, he fought to fulfill a dream; that he might one day claim the title that riches couldn't buy: Master of the Ridge Stars!
Originally published in 1954. It is based on these short stories, all by E. Mayne Hull:
Competition (1943)
The Contract (1944)
The Debt (1943)
Bankruptcy Proceedings (1946)
Enter the Professor (1945)
They said that Artur Blord was ruthless, a heartless manipulator whose blind lust for power would ruin the Ridge Stars.
They said he had to be eliminated because he was too much of a threat to their secret.
But just who were they, the accusers of Artur Bloyd?
And what was the secret which Artur Bloyd threatened?
Beyond the answers to these two questions lay a tortured path along which Artur Bloyd compelled himself to travel. Menaced by a terrifying array of lethal forces, Blord risked his life against alien aggressors as well as more human adversaries.
Never knowing at what moment death might overtake him, he fought to fulfill a dream; that he might one day claim the title that riches couldn't buy: Master of the Ridge Stars!
Originally published in 1954. It is based on these short stories, all by E. Mayne Hull:
Competition (1943)
The Contract (1944)
The Debt (1943)
Bankruptcy Proceedings (1946)
Enter the Professor (1945)
184 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1954
About the author
A.E. van Vogt
590 books468 followersAlfred Elton van Vogt was a Canadian-born science fiction author regarded by some as one of the most popular and complex science fiction writers of the mid-twentieth century—the "Golden Age" of the genre.
van Vogt was born to Russian Mennonite family. Until he was four years old, van Vogt and his family spoke only a dialect of Low German in the home.
He began his writing career with "true story" romances, but then moved to writing science fiction, a field he identified with. His first story was "Black Destroyer", that appeared as the front cover story for the July 1939 edition of the popular Astounding Science Fiction magazine.
van Vogt was born to Russian Mennonite family. Until he was four years old, van Vogt and his family spoke only a dialect of Low German in the home.
He began his writing career with "true story" romances, but then moved to writing science fiction, a field he identified with. His first story was "Black Destroyer", that appeared as the front cover story for the July 1939 edition of the popular Astounding Science Fiction magazine.
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
October 23, 2020
A fix-up novel consisting of short works credited solely to E. Mayne Hull upon first publication of the first hardback edition. The publisher added van Vogt's name as co-author to ensure reasonable sales, and Hull's name was removed altogether for later printings.
Contents:
Chapters 1-4 "Competition" 1943
Chapters 5-9 "The Debt" 1943
Chapters 10-17 "The Contract" 1944
Chapters 18-21 "Enter the Professor" 1945
Chapters 22-? "Bankruptcy Proceedings" 1946
Chapters ?-36 linking material?
If you have ever read enough work van Vogt wrote during the 1940’s and compared them to those credited to E. Mayne Hull, you'd be hard pressed to prove that these were not actually written by van Vogt himself, but this is just speculation of course. E. M. Hull may have come up with the base for these stories, as she would have on any work in progress written by her husband, as she was his typist up until her death in 1975. I can’t imagine these stories assembles and packaged as “Planets for Sale” (a title that would suit a novel by Scalzy) was not mostly rewritten by van Vogt due to the constant use of such words as “nullify”, “vague(ly)” and the suffix “ness” added to adjectives almost at random, the somewhat stiff dialogue, plots based on battles of intellect between an earthmen and the genius super-race of either a mutated humans race or a reptilian beast, and so on... Typical of van Vogt's work of the time. I have not found, upon little research admittedly, any works published by E. Mayne Hull before her marriage to A.E. vanVogt, thus suspect he would have had a hand in anything that his spouse would have written. I would, however, be interested in reading the original Astounding magazine versions of these stories, or if anyone knows, more about Mrs. M Hull's work or contributions to her husband's work.
A strong case was made by the late Isaac Walwyn on the E. M. Hull matter. It could be found here: http://icshi.net/sevagram/biblio/plan...
One of the points that Isaac makes is that during the 1940’s at Astounding magazine, due to the limit of stories publishable in the monthly, top authors such as Heinlein, Hubbard and such were encouraged to use pseudonyms in order not to have more of their work appear sometimes simultaneously in subsequent issues. Or, a pseudonyms might be credited to a particular story that wasn’t quite up to par with previous efforts (Heinlein’s under Anson MacDonald, Lyle Monroe for example). A.E. van Vogt was particularly prolific between 1940 and 1948 and may have had it suggested by Astounding's editor, John Campbell, in order for him to print some of his stories under his wife’s name - Campbell himself wrote using a variation of his own wife’s name.
In "Planets for Sale", Blore is a billionaire CEO or business tycoon of some sort and Evana Travis a sort of abducted girl that becomes his secretary by force... I kid you not... It reads sorta like a comic book where the hero defeated an enemy, in this case, a telepathic reptilian creature known as the Ska. The novel, being constructed as it was, is episodic and can be a bit difficult to follow, which is typical of van Vogt fix-up novels. However, it is extremely fast paced right from the start, and the myriad of gadgets and things like seven day poison, and the futuristic urban setting and such, along with the classic golden age scifi happy ending was really fun. That is, I like to think, along with all the best bits to this are Hull's best contributions.
Overall, one of the better van Vogt's fix-ups. Perhaps more of them might have turned out even better had he had more of Hull's impute.
Contents:
Chapters 1-4 "Competition" 1943
Chapters 5-9 "The Debt" 1943
Chapters 10-17 "The Contract" 1944
Chapters 18-21 "Enter the Professor" 1945
Chapters 22-? "Bankruptcy Proceedings" 1946
Chapters ?-36 linking material?
If you have ever read enough work van Vogt wrote during the 1940’s and compared them to those credited to E. Mayne Hull, you'd be hard pressed to prove that these were not actually written by van Vogt himself, but this is just speculation of course. E. M. Hull may have come up with the base for these stories, as she would have on any work in progress written by her husband, as she was his typist up until her death in 1975. I can’t imagine these stories assembles and packaged as “Planets for Sale” (a title that would suit a novel by Scalzy) was not mostly rewritten by van Vogt due to the constant use of such words as “nullify”, “vague(ly)” and the suffix “ness” added to adjectives almost at random, the somewhat stiff dialogue, plots based on battles of intellect between an earthmen and the genius super-race of either a mutated humans race or a reptilian beast, and so on... Typical of van Vogt's work of the time. I have not found, upon little research admittedly, any works published by E. Mayne Hull before her marriage to A.E. vanVogt, thus suspect he would have had a hand in anything that his spouse would have written. I would, however, be interested in reading the original Astounding magazine versions of these stories, or if anyone knows, more about Mrs. M Hull's work or contributions to her husband's work.
A strong case was made by the late Isaac Walwyn on the E. M. Hull matter. It could be found here: http://icshi.net/sevagram/biblio/plan...
One of the points that Isaac makes is that during the 1940’s at Astounding magazine, due to the limit of stories publishable in the monthly, top authors such as Heinlein, Hubbard and such were encouraged to use pseudonyms in order not to have more of their work appear sometimes simultaneously in subsequent issues. Or, a pseudonyms might be credited to a particular story that wasn’t quite up to par with previous efforts (Heinlein’s under Anson MacDonald, Lyle Monroe for example). A.E. van Vogt was particularly prolific between 1940 and 1948 and may have had it suggested by Astounding's editor, John Campbell, in order for him to print some of his stories under his wife’s name - Campbell himself wrote using a variation of his own wife’s name.
In "Planets for Sale", Blore is a billionaire CEO or business tycoon of some sort and Evana Travis a sort of abducted girl that becomes his secretary by force... I kid you not... It reads sorta like a comic book where the hero defeated an enemy, in this case, a telepathic reptilian creature known as the Ska. The novel, being constructed as it was, is episodic and can be a bit difficult to follow, which is typical of van Vogt fix-up novels. However, it is extremely fast paced right from the start, and the myriad of gadgets and things like seven day poison, and the futuristic urban setting and such, along with the classic golden age scifi happy ending was really fun. That is, I like to think, along with all the best bits to this are Hull's best contributions.
Overall, one of the better van Vogt's fix-ups. Perhaps more of them might have turned out even better had he had more of Hull's impute.
January 16, 2020
Evana Travis was supposed to be traveling to live with her sister on Doridora III. But there was a reason this spaceflight was so inexpensive. After Earth had finally gotten its act together and improved working conditions to be actually comfortable, the stream of immigrants to the Ridge Worlds had dwindled. So the Ridge Worlds had come up with a new gimmick, cheaper-than-cost outbound flights…that didn’t go where claimed! Instead, each shipload is sent to a world that needs more people, in this case Delfi II.
We will eventually see that this isn’t the worst thing that could have happened to Evana, but her troubles are just beginning. Fresh off the ship, Evana is abducted and injected with a seven-day poison that only her captors have an antidote to. These men want her to become private secretary to Artur Blord, top “operator” of the planet. This is more easily accomplished than Evana would have thought, as Blord has a well-known type.
Artur Blord is intelligent, handsome, super-competent and astonishingly rich, so it’s no surprise that Evana starts falling in love with her boss. Too bad her mission is to betray him!
This is a fix-up novel from several short stories written at least in part by Edna May Hull van Vogt, wife of A.E. van Vogt. They were originally published under her name alone, but his writing style is pretty obvious from time to time in the narrative. Possibly her main contribution is that Evana and other women in the stories get to actually do things.
Make no mistake, Artur Blord is the star of this book. He’s almost always two steps ahead of the competition, so prepared that he has a selection of corpses stored away in various locations just in case he ever needs a decoy corpse. One of his few worthy opponents is the Skal, a seemingly immortal lizard-thing of immense mental powers who develops a grudging respect for Blord.
Oh, and one of Blord’s amazing talents is that he’s still friends with all of his exes!
The book comes within an ace of passing the Bechdel Test. Two named women have a conversation about science…but we don’t see it, instead Evana tells Blord about it later. (And no, it’s not just because Blord is the hero, we have several scenes with Evana or Marian (the scientist) alone or talking with men who aren’t Blord.)
The Ridge Stars are not a friendly place for women overall; polygyny is a recognized thing but not polyandry, and sex slavery for women only is a repeated plot element. (Blord’s against it, but he can’t be everywhere.) Brainwashing technology exists, and both good and bad guys use it.
The final storyline ties up the various plot pieces nicely, and Blord realizes that the Ridge Stars will have to move on to a more civilized way of life as he himself is settling down.
While as mentioned the women in the story do get a look in, this is very much a book for readers who like their heroes omnicompetent and beholden to no lesser men. There’s a smack of protagonist-centered morality too, Blord lying and murdering when he feels the whim doesn’t stop him from being treated as a paragon by the narrative.
Recommended with reservations for those who like van Vogt’s style.
We will eventually see that this isn’t the worst thing that could have happened to Evana, but her troubles are just beginning. Fresh off the ship, Evana is abducted and injected with a seven-day poison that only her captors have an antidote to. These men want her to become private secretary to Artur Blord, top “operator” of the planet. This is more easily accomplished than Evana would have thought, as Blord has a well-known type.
Artur Blord is intelligent, handsome, super-competent and astonishingly rich, so it’s no surprise that Evana starts falling in love with her boss. Too bad her mission is to betray him!
This is a fix-up novel from several short stories written at least in part by Edna May Hull van Vogt, wife of A.E. van Vogt. They were originally published under her name alone, but his writing style is pretty obvious from time to time in the narrative. Possibly her main contribution is that Evana and other women in the stories get to actually do things.
Make no mistake, Artur Blord is the star of this book. He’s almost always two steps ahead of the competition, so prepared that he has a selection of corpses stored away in various locations just in case he ever needs a decoy corpse. One of his few worthy opponents is the Skal, a seemingly immortal lizard-thing of immense mental powers who develops a grudging respect for Blord.
Oh, and one of Blord’s amazing talents is that he’s still friends with all of his exes!
The book comes within an ace of passing the Bechdel Test. Two named women have a conversation about science…but we don’t see it, instead Evana tells Blord about it later. (And no, it’s not just because Blord is the hero, we have several scenes with Evana or Marian (the scientist) alone or talking with men who aren’t Blord.)
The Ridge Stars are not a friendly place for women overall; polygyny is a recognized thing but not polyandry, and sex slavery for women only is a repeated plot element. (Blord’s against it, but he can’t be everywhere.) Brainwashing technology exists, and both good and bad guys use it.
The final storyline ties up the various plot pieces nicely, and Blord realizes that the Ridge Stars will have to move on to a more civilized way of life as he himself is settling down.
While as mentioned the women in the story do get a look in, this is very much a book for readers who like their heroes omnicompetent and beholden to no lesser men. There’s a smack of protagonist-centered morality too, Blord lying and murdering when he feels the whim doesn’t stop him from being treated as a paragon by the narrative.
Recommended with reservations for those who like van Vogt’s style.
July 24, 2013
Every single thing about this book is fast paced. In the first chapter, Evena Travis is ripped off by a space travel/transport company, kidnapped, drugged, poisoned, extorted into illegal activities, and introduced to her new boss. You can't bootstrap a novel any quicker than that.
The story is very episodic, and I wouldn't be surprised if it were actually a fix-up of several short stories. As such, each is given a perfunctory treatment and presented as a defensive action: trouble comes to the attention of Artur Blord, in the form of pirates or gangsters or rivals who threaten his enterprise and who may be targeting him personally, and who all work by infiltration and corruption and deviously Machiavellian intrigue. There's no real build-up of suspense, much less anything else.
The Ridge Star setting is a place of uncontrolled capitalism, where the big-man trillionaire 'operators'--a poorly defined term which lies somewhere between 'businessman' and 'gangster'--control vast holdings and means of production extending to entire planets. It reads sort of like a Doc Smith novel: everything is in the scale of millions of tons of ore, thousands of ships, trillions of 'stellors'. Economic control is absolute and in the hands of the business magnates, who control their companies personally and individually.
It is of course all nonsense held together with plot velocity and handwaving, and the authors seem to waver in their opinion of whether this is a utopia or dystopia. The entire story has an old-fashioned charm that made me look away from the underlying misogyny and inability to get a clear idea of what this story is about.
The story is very episodic, and I wouldn't be surprised if it were actually a fix-up of several short stories. As such, each is given a perfunctory treatment and presented as a defensive action: trouble comes to the attention of Artur Blord, in the form of pirates or gangsters or rivals who threaten his enterprise and who may be targeting him personally, and who all work by infiltration and corruption and deviously Machiavellian intrigue. There's no real build-up of suspense, much less anything else.
The Ridge Star setting is a place of uncontrolled capitalism, where the big-man trillionaire 'operators'--a poorly defined term which lies somewhere between 'businessman' and 'gangster'--control vast holdings and means of production extending to entire planets. It reads sort of like a Doc Smith novel: everything is in the scale of millions of tons of ore, thousands of ships, trillions of 'stellors'. Economic control is absolute and in the hands of the business magnates, who control their companies personally and individually.
It is of course all nonsense held together with plot velocity and handwaving, and the authors seem to waver in their opinion of whether this is a utopia or dystopia. The entire story has an old-fashioned charm that made me look away from the underlying misogyny and inability to get a clear idea of what this story is about.
May 7, 2012
Entertaining and enjoyable old style SF
March 14, 2015
"Ο εχθρός του γαλαξία", εκδόσεις Κάκτος.
Το δεύτερο βιβλίο που διαβάζω από Α. Ε. Βαν Βογκτ, μπορώ να πω ότι και αυτό με άφησε αρκετά ευχαριστημένο, χωρίς να ήταν κάτι το ιδιαίτερο ή το συγκλονιστικό. Βασίζεται σε κάποια διηγήματα του E. Mayne Hull, τα οποία ο Βογκτ τα "ένωσε" ώστε να αποτελέσουν ένα μυθιστόρημα. Φυσικά είναι ευδιάκριτο ότι το βιβλίο χωρίζεται σε πέντε ιστορίες, αλλά και σαν μυθιστόρημα μια χαρά μπορεί να θεωρηθεί. Είχε πολύ ενδιαφέροντα πραγματάκια, επιχειρηματίες του διαστήματος, συνωμοσίες, πλεκτάνες, μπόλικη περιπέτεια και διάφορα τεχνολογικά πραγματάκια που είχαν φάση, όπως π.χ. οι διάφορες μεταμορφώσεις που μπορούσε να πάρει ένας άνθρωπος, δηλητήρια εφτά ημερών, έλεγχος του νου, ρούχα που σε κάνουν αόρατο και διάφορα άλλα ωραία. Η γραφή χαρακτηριστική παλπ γραφή που όμως σε κανένα σημείο δεν με κούρασε, οι χαρακτήρες απλοί, γενικά μπορώ να πω ότι είναι από τα βιβλία που διαβάζονται εύκολα, έχουν το ενδιαφέρον τους, αλλά μέχρι εκεί. Η μετάφραση από τον Κάκτο μου φάνηκε εντάξει.
Το δεύτερο βιβλίο που διαβάζω από Α. Ε. Βαν Βογκτ, μπορώ να πω ότι και αυτό με άφησε αρκετά ευχαριστημένο, χωρίς να ήταν κάτι το ιδιαίτερο ή το συγκλονιστικό. Βασίζεται σε κάποια διηγήματα του E. Mayne Hull, τα οποία ο Βογκτ τα "ένωσε" ώστε να αποτελέσουν ένα μυθιστόρημα. Φυσικά είναι ευδιάκριτο ότι το βιβλίο χωρίζεται σε πέντε ιστορίες, αλλά και σαν μυθιστόρημα μια χαρά μπορεί να θεωρηθεί. Είχε πολύ ενδιαφέροντα πραγματάκια, επιχειρηματίες του διαστήματος, συνωμοσίες, πλεκτάνες, μπόλικη περιπέτεια και διάφορα τεχνολογικά πραγματάκια που είχαν φάση, όπως π.χ. οι διάφορες μεταμορφώσεις που μπορούσε να πάρει ένας άνθρωπος, δηλητήρια εφτά ημερών, έλεγχος του νου, ρούχα που σε κάνουν αόρατο και διάφορα άλλα ωραία. Η γραφή χαρακτηριστική παλπ γραφή που όμως σε κανένα σημείο δεν με κούρασε, οι χαρακτήρες απλοί, γενικά μπορώ να πω ότι είναι από τα βιβλία που διαβάζονται εύκολα, έχουν το ενδιαφέρον τους, αλλά μέχρι εκεί. Η μετάφραση από τον Κάκτο μου φάνηκε εντάξει.
September 12, 2013
Fairly traditional SciFi. Not very exciting
September 17, 2020
I very much enjoyed this fix-up novel of World War Two era stories. Originally published in John W. Campbell's golden age Astounding SF magazine, the six stories in the Artur Blord series were all by-lined solely as being written by E. Mayne Hull, who also happened to be Mrs. van Vogt. Ten years later, five of the six stories in the series were gathered to comprise this novel and published in hardback in the mid 1950s, which was also credited solely to her. Sales were poor, the book went out of print, and they were unsuccessful in finding a paperback publisher interested in reprinting it. Eventually van Vogt (or his agent, Forrest J. Ackerman) located a small and obscure publisher, Book Company of America, located in Los Angeles, and they were willing to bring out a paperback version with the proviso that van Vogt's name be added to the cover in order to increase sales. Later printings had only his name on the cover. I have read several different versions of how much input that van Vogt actually had on the book, ranging from none whatsoever to claims that he completely rewrote it. We'll probably never know... Anyway, it's the story of Artur Blord, financial tycoon of Ridge Stars, who faces corporate criminals, the evil alien Skal, and corrupt politicians, along with his loyal secretary Evana Travis, whom he rescued in the opening adventure. They're fun stories, more accessible than much of van Vogt's work, and are quite entertaining. I was delighted by the happy endings. My 1965 Book Company of America edition has a terrific cover that was painted by Albert Nuetzell, who was the brother of the owner of the company, Charles Nuetzell. It features Artur in futuristic garb before a blueprint with mysterious planets in the background, watching a fleet of spaceships launch off to the side. It perfectly captures the 1950s sense-of-wonder that made the genre so popular.
January 26, 2025
This "novel" is a fix-up of five 1940s published short stories. It's therefore a mess in terms of plot and a bit childish. A man named Arthur Blord is portrayed like a superhero, like a cowboy western hero with no gun maybe some teens at the time might admire, but he doesn't even really succeed over his antagonists. His treatment of women is 1940's patronizing. It's weird stuff, but not in a good or even interesting way. I gave up on it after 57 pages, almost one third of the way into the book. The plots of even the parts didn't entirely make sense; motivations were off. Not recommended for anyone.
July 10, 2022
Un grande no a questo libro.
A parte l'aria di maschilismo e pro-capitalismo, che metterei anche da parte visto che viene da anni in cui era normale, le storie di per sé non mi sono piaciute.
Le risoluzioni sono affrettate, veloci, a volte 3 pagine prima dicono che non sarebbe avvenuto ciò che avrebbe risolto e poi avveniva comunque.
Delle trame traballanti.
Dei personaggi scadenti, unica nota positiva l'unico alieno, lo Skal, di cui però alla fine non sappiamo nulla.
Un'ambientazione non valorizzata e non tirata fuori
A parte l'aria di maschilismo e pro-capitalismo, che metterei anche da parte visto che viene da anni in cui era normale, le storie di per sé non mi sono piaciute.
Le risoluzioni sono affrettate, veloci, a volte 3 pagine prima dicono che non sarebbe avvenuto ciò che avrebbe risolto e poi avveniva comunque.
Delle trame traballanti.
Dei personaggi scadenti, unica nota positiva l'unico alieno, lo Skal, di cui però alla fine non sappiamo nulla.
Un'ambientazione non valorizzata e non tirata fuori
January 17, 2020
È fantastico vedere in quanti modi possa essere declinato il genere fantascientifico.
C'è chi parla di robotica, chi si focalizza sulla società, chi sulle nuove tecnologie o i viaggi interstellari.
Un punto centrale della narrativa di Van Vogt (almeno in questa raccolta) è lo sviluppo delle capacità psichiche, grazie a nuovi studi e nuove tecnologie.
Sicuramente un autore che merita di essere approfondito.
C'è chi parla di robotica, chi si focalizza sulla società, chi sulle nuove tecnologie o i viaggi interstellari.
Un punto centrale della narrativa di Van Vogt (almeno in questa raccolta) è lo sviluppo delle capacità psichiche, grazie a nuovi studi e nuove tecnologie.
Sicuramente un autore che merita di essere approfondito.
April 20, 2022
Quando ho preso in mano questo libro avevo grandi aspettative, dato che l’autore è Van Vogt. Non avrei mai immaginato di trovarmi di fronte ad un’accozzaglia insensata è puerile di avventure non credibili, di personaggi non caratterizzati, a-contestualizzati. Questa roba rientra tra IL PEGGIO pubblicato da Urania. Poco importa se Van Vogt ha solo revisionato ed in realtà i racconti sono stati scritti dalla moglie… stateci lontano.
December 11, 2017
I loved this so much I want to start my own series called capitalist space [tm].
The future is tree trade and property! civilization!
democracy is fasicsm!
Love it!
ruthless forces and an intelligent alien challenge arthur blord in this series.
I read somewhere vogt wrote them without much help but let his girlfriend put her name in as well.
The future is tree trade and property! civilization!
democracy is fasicsm!
Love it!
ruthless forces and an intelligent alien challenge arthur blord in this series.
I read somewhere vogt wrote them without much help but let his girlfriend put her name in as well.
January 19, 2018
Totally fun!
February 13, 2019
I couldn't finish this. I have liked a lot of van Vogt's work such as "Black Destroyer", 5 stars, "The Weapon Shops of Isher", 4 stars. But this mash-up of some mid 1940's stories was far too dated. I agree with Denis that this feels like it was written by van Vogt instead of his wife Edna Hull. It has a typical Ayn Rand style intellectual super hero that can always find a way to defeat his enemies. A typical comment about Blord is that he was the type of man born only once a century. While it's not as obvious as the Null-A novels the hero seems to have the mental attributes that van Vogt attributed to General Semantics.
The hero worship by all the women in the novel was a bit much also. The technology was a little too Buck Rogerish even for 1945. The Fringe stars seemed as little cartoonish with the way the Chicago style criminal organizations ran all the illegal activities although there was a super alien who seemed to be based on Fu Manchu anf was the main counterpoint to the super hero Blord. Things happened quickly to people who had the "right stuff" such as the young girl who got off an immigration ship on the wrong planet and was blackmailed into helping capture Blord for the criminal masterminds. Of course, with a experience with a former job that sounded like a 1945 file clerk, she quickly becomes one of Blord's main assistants who regularly contributes to his grandiose strategy sessions in a few months time.
The hero worship by all the women in the novel was a bit much also. The technology was a little too Buck Rogerish even for 1945. The Fringe stars seemed as little cartoonish with the way the Chicago style criminal organizations ran all the illegal activities although there was a super alien who seemed to be based on Fu Manchu anf was the main counterpoint to the super hero Blord. Things happened quickly to people who had the "right stuff" such as the young girl who got off an immigration ship on the wrong planet and was blackmailed into helping capture Blord for the criminal masterminds. Of course, with a experience with a former job that sounded like a 1945 file clerk, she quickly becomes one of Blord's main assistants who regularly contributes to his grandiose strategy sessions in a few months time.
January 22, 2014
Di immensi imperi galattici la fantascienza ne conta non pochi: dai più primitivi, popolati di mostri, di cadetti spaziali e di principesse, ai più complessi e articolati, con tanto di filosofie e di intrighi d'alta politica. E' un tema affascinante e inesauribile sul quale Van Vogt (in collaborazione con sua moglie) impegna qui tutta la sua bravura di narratore: il suo "impero" è però un particolarissimo impero industriale, un campo di battaglia per grandi compagnie rivali, che si disputano con astuzia e ferocia i tesori dell'universo, senza esclusione di colpi e di pianeti.
(source: Anobii.com)
June 1, 2015
1981 grade B+
January 6, 2017
I read this without being aware until afterwards that it was actually 5 short stories written over several years previously combined and edited into one. This does explain a few things about the flow of the story and the odd little inconsistent breaks sometimes between chapters.
I've enjoyed the previous, albeit currently few, Van Vogh stories I've read and overall did enjoy this. It goes along at a fast rate and follows a certain idea pattern I've already noticed by him. This is namely characters with hyper intelligence, or other attributes that give this effect, pitting their wits against one another. This is not a complaint but merely an observation which I find curious. There are cliches throughout the story, certain characters and the way they fit into the world, but there's definitely a few surprises and twists and turns that I didn't expect.
If you like Van Vogt then it's well worth reading. If you're new to him then I wouldn't suggest this as your first; The Best of Van Vogh was my introduction and my recommendation.
I've enjoyed the previous, albeit currently few, Van Vogh stories I've read and overall did enjoy this. It goes along at a fast rate and follows a certain idea pattern I've already noticed by him. This is namely characters with hyper intelligence, or other attributes that give this effect, pitting their wits against one another. This is not a complaint but merely an observation which I find curious. There are cliches throughout the story, certain characters and the way they fit into the world, but there's definitely a few surprises and twists and turns that I didn't expect.
If you like Van Vogt then it's well worth reading. If you're new to him then I wouldn't suggest this as your first; The Best of Van Vogh was my introduction and my recommendation.
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