Night of Masks

Dipple #2

by Andre Norton, Gray Morrow (Illustrator)

The story concerns Nik Colherne, who aids in a kidnapping to win a new face to replace his scarred one. He gets his new face and fights to free the kidnapped boy - and himself - from the Thieves Guild.
It is a rattling good adventure story which should be relished by science-fiction buffs of all ages

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy, American, Adventure, Young Adult

191 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1964

About the author

Andre Norton, born Alice Mary Norton, was a pioneering American author of science fiction and fantasy, widely regarded as the Grande Dame of those genres. She also wrote historical and contemporary fiction, publishing under the pen names Andre Alice Norton, Andrew North, and Allen Weston. She launched her career in 1934 with The Prince Commands, adopting the name “Andre” to appeal to a male readership. After working for the Cleveland Library System and the Library of Congress, she began publishing science fiction under “Andrew North” and fantasy under her own name. She became a full-time writer in 1958 and was known for her prolific output, including Star Man’s Son, 2250 A.D. and Witch World, the latter spawning a long-running series and shared universe. Norton was a founding member of the Swordsmen and Sorcerers' Guild of America and authored Quag Keep, the first novel based on the Dungeons & Dragons game. She influenced generations of writers, including Lois McMaster Bujold and Mercedes Lackey. Among her many honors were being the first woman named Gandalf Grand Master of Fantasy and SFWA Grand Master. In her later years, she established the High Hallack Library to support research in genre fiction. Her legacy continues with the Andre Norton Award for young adult science fiction and fantasy.

Reviews

[Len · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I read this story years ago – I was about the age of a Norton hero – I thought it one her best. Now, about fifty years later, I've changed. It remains a good, exciting adventure and the characters show some depth. Still only one female and that a minor figure, but that was the way of 1960s teenage science fiction, all chaps together, backslapping camaraderie, watching each other's backs, and strict celibacy. The planet of Dis has an infrared sun that requires cin-goggles to be worn if you want to see anything. It is inhabited by a vast array of vicious nocturnal prowling, flying, swimming, crawling, creeping, slithering nightmares that will bite your arm off given a half chance. Blasters are provided for personal protection, yet sunblock on exposed facial skin never seems necessary.

Despite that Dis is an interesting invention. It was a once a world that had a humanoid civilization with cities and culture, oceans, perhaps not green fields but something grew there that did not have a malicious intent. Then the sun went haywire, the people dug underground – and it failed to work. Dis was left a fearsome place of darkness on which lifeforms evolved to fight for survival, including the humanoids who seem to have an affinity to the Morlocks and with a similar appetite, as our hero Nik Kolherne (alias Hacon, an imaginary superhero) and his young charge Vandy eventually discover.

Nik is a young refugee from the galactic wars who was facially disfigured in a spaceship crash and finally shuffled off to the Dipple refugee camp on Korwar. He is used by the Guild's Captain Strode Leeds, a man who believes telling the truth is something fools indulge in, to kidnap Vandy, the son of rival warlord, and take him away from Korwar for safekeeping. His reward is a new surgically altered face. Not surprisingly Nik believes everything Leeds tells him.

And that is how Nik and Vandy end up on Dis and quickly find themselves fleeing for their lives from another Guild operative who sees Vandy as a key to his financial future. The flight through the horrors and ruins of Dis is the high point of the story with Nik slowly coming to understand that Leeds has tricked him and choosing to make an attempt at guiding Vandy into the safe hands of the Patrol and back to his father. The ending, as is often the case with Norton, is a little abrupt and one is left wondering to what extent Nik has been either forgiven or at least found not guilty of abducting a young boy and imperiling his life. As far as I know there was never a sequel to follow that up.

[Valerie]

This book, as many of Norton's, begins in the Dipple on Korwar (I had forgotten how attractive the depiction of the Dipple was to me in this volume). A disfigured boy is hired to impersonate the imaginary hero of a small boy, for reasons that never are satisfactorily explained.

The world of Dis is odd, and too often viewed in
lightning-like flashes (the dedication reads: "The author wishes to express appreciation to Charles F Kelly; who supplied the information leading to the development of Dis") Though there are evidently intelligent inhabitants, no real attempt is made to recruit them to help the escaping boys. It might easily have been possible to appeal to the locals' resentment of the invasion of their land to encourage them to help escapees, but there's no evidence this occurs to anybody.

The notion that a loving family would permit a child to be conditioned to be unable to eat anything from off-world, btw, is a horrifying one. I understand that it was intended to prevent the boy from being kidnapped, but there have GOT to be other ways.

One thing that seems never to have dealt with was that the Dipple; so long as it exists; is going to be a reservoir of discontent and a recruiting ground for dissidents and rebels. Even relatively mild mannered Dipple residents become a threat if they can't find any legitimate escapes.

Which raises Shevek's question: "Where are women"? There is; by my count; ONE woman in this book--and she's not of the Dipple: she's evidently a contractor for the Thieves' Guild. In other books with the Dipple in them; adult women are either dead or dying. And there seems to be only one girl: Ziantha from Forerunner Foray. What DID become of the women and girls who were probably the majority of the refugees sent to the Dipple?

[Andrea]

Although starting in the same place - with a loner outsider in the ghetto of Dipple - this is a far less successful book than Catseye. While the morally weak position of the main character is workable, the very long survival and monsters sections that make up a large portion of the book are for the most part just repetitive and dull.

[Doris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book begins the ghetto area known as the Dipple on the planet Korwar. Here we have a disfigured young man, Nik, who is hired by a ring of kidnappers to impersonate the imaginary hero of a small boy. The reasons for the kidnapping seem to be vaguely political, but the goal of Nik is obvious – if successful he will undergo expensive facial reconstruction to allow him to meld in with society. Like this world, Korwar also discriminates against those that are different. At the time this book was originally published, disfigured and disabled people were often sequestered, sometimes to the extent that outsiders to the family might not even know the poor person existed.

This then, is the premise behind the story – finding a way to entertain yet gently remind everyone that this kind of treatment is not only not right, but could have repercussions, as it does when Nik leaps at the chance to change and be "normal".

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Skimmed, not what I was expecting. Like a video game escort quest with unreliable narrators.

[Emma Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fast-paced adventure full of alien monsters and swashbuckling. Norton packs a commendable amount of worldbuilding ideas into 200 pages, but the short run time meant she couldn’t explore any of them as much as I would have liked.

[Forrest Tate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hard to follow and a weird story but super interesting themes of self awareness and perception!

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

After adopting a rather significant Andre Norton collection, I’ve felt compelled to try and get though as many books as possible. Unfortunately this is my second in recent times by this author and both have been fairly ordinary. Small glimpses of interesting imaginative elements are usually overshadowed by a storyline where not much really happens. Add to this the constant need to go back pages to see if a key storyline was missed, to find .. no .. it just randomly appeared then was forgotten just as quick. This made a relatively simple book more tedious and confusing.

I don’t have a lot of motivation to visit any other Norton books anytime soon. Do I bother ?
2.5/5

[Paul Davidson · Rating 5 out of 5]

In one Andre Norton's finest Sci-Fi novels, Nik Kolherne, poor, desperate and disfigured, is offered a new face at a price - to befriend the son of a rich man and lure him to a distant world, a world orbiting an infra red sun in permanent darkness. There, in the guise of the space hero the young boy spent years inventing, he must protect them both from unseen life forms and the criminal gang who hired him, before his disguise, and his subterfuge, is revealed. One of the very best depictions of an alien world I've read.

[Lia Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Hero Within

From out of the ashes, this hero had to remake himself. What a harrowing saga of the way fantasy and fiction can literally be the source of inspiration and strength to guide you through the very real and life threatening perils of reality. And along the way help us to discover the mettle of our soul. This is a story I would read again and recommend to readers of all ages.

[Pete · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of Norton's typical YA SF adventures. This one had potential. Dis, a dark, damp planet under an infrared sun, teams with strange life forms while a boy and a young man struggle to survive. This is a great framework for an adventure novel. Alas, Norton's prose generally does not bring the story to life. I suspect that she simply did not have the time to polish the novel before it was due at the publisher.

[Maegrauko · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe it is just me, but both Catseye and Night of masks do not convey the flow of time very well. Especially because the complete lack of day and night cycle, it was particularly bad in Night of masks. I suppose we share the same kind of confusion with the main character but most of the times it seems like he fed the kid the previous page and now the kid is starving already?

[Sye Keene · Rating 4 out of 5]

Orphan saves the "Prince"

War orphan gets drawn into intrigue as a pawn and scapegoat only to prove his worth and save the kidnapped boy.
Similar to many of Ms. Norton's the orphaned waif proves to be strong then suspected..

[J.A. McLachlan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read a lot of Andre Norton when I was young, and have been delving into my home library lately. This one is not her best. I fond it hard to care about the characters or be much interested in what happened to them.

[Virginia Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exceptional story from an exceptional author.

I have loved every story I have read by Andre Norton. This is no exception. Action, adventure, characters real enough to meet. One day I will come to the end of them and start all over again.

[Kathleen Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nik is asked by the Thieves Guild to pretend to be the imaginary hero of a lonely rich boy to lure him out of safety. It is Nik's only way out of his poverty and the disfigurement that makes him hide from humanity.

[Peter Chivers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic

This is another classic story set in the world's created by the Grand Dame of Science Fiction. It takes a man who has nothing on a journey with hope but facing danger beyond what he was prepared for. Is the ending what you expect? Probably not. Is it a great story? Absolutely! I have read this in one session, staying up beyond my planned bedtime because I needed to know the ending. Read it, or miss out.

[Alice Braddy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Night of Masks

I have loved reading Andre Norton's books since I was six years old! I am 60 now, and still love reading them just as much as I did then!

[Joanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this when I was a kid and I really liked it when I was a kid. I’d recommend it for kids wanting to get into science fiction or who already like science fiction.

[Kat Hooper · Rating 2 out of 5]

Will review at Fantasy Literature.

[Cathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad

[Philip Cavanagh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting read, the way SciFi/Fantasy was meant to be.

[Lori · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars. It was fun to reread this book from my early years reading SciFi. Yes, it's a bit YA for me now, but Andre Norton could tell a good story.

[Greg Schroeder · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an adventure novel. It is primarily a survival story but, as is often the case with Norton, survival with multiple meanings. Darwinian survival of the inhabitants of a difficult environment. Survival of a person with disabilities. Survival of a child. After over 50 years it holds up as just as readable today as when it was published.

[Kass Whitaker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like with all Norton stories, Night of Masks starts off and continues at an almost breakneck speed. We follow the all-familiar trope of the jaded character stuck looking after an affable child who eventually wins over their warden (i.e. The Last of Us, Wreck-it-Ralph, and Arya and Sandor of Game of Thrones). Though, the relationship dynamic in this book is not as deep or as prickly as the examples given.

Nik, with his heavily scarred face, is enticed to abduct a child by disguising himself as the kid's imaginary friend. In return, he will be gifted a new face and a new lease on life. The child, Vandy, has information that is valuable to many and it is up to Nik to very carefully extract this information, but the plan goes belly up. Nik is far too trusting and multiple times I caught myself cursing his naivety.

Norton always has inspired locales for her stories and Dis is no exception. The planet revolves around an ultraviolet sun that admits heat but no light penetrates the surface’s thick cloud cover. There are wild dangers on pitch-black Dis and Nik has to protect Vandy from hungry creatures and greedy humanoids. The locale, and big boss baddie at the end of the story, gives Night of Masks a sort of Love Craftian, cosmic horror vibe.

Overall, the story isn’t that deep and only delivers small samplings of Norton’s imagination. If you are new to the Norton Novelverse, I’d recommend a different title as this reads more like a sidequest to a larger story.

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sort of "inherited" a collection of "Andre Norton books when we moved into our curent house. Picked this one at random, as I had not read any of Norton. I've read a bit about her, and her books are largely aimed at a juvenile/YA audience, with characters who have a good deala of pluck and inner resourcefulness to overcome dangers and other challenges. This one tells of a youth, Nik, who is disfigured and gets a chance to have a normal-looking face if he will kidnap Vandy, a 10 year old son of a planetary official and take him from Dipple (one of the planets in one of her series) to Dis, a frontier world with feral denizens and an abandoned city/fortress. Nik accomplishes the kidnapping by pretending to be "Hacon," a sort of fantasized superhero that is Vandy's own hero. The action goes by fits and starts and some of the passages were eitherconfusing or just plain boring, but the gumption of both Nik and Vandy eventually triumphs, in a fairly satisfying manner. Will certainly read the others in this collection, but not right away.

[Liz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Set in the same dismal setting of displaced people after an interstellar war as Catseye which I reread last month. Written for juveniles (esp. boys) it has lots of adventure and danger but as with most of Norton, she has underlying themes. In these two books she is looking at refugees and what happens to displaced people (which feels all too familiar these days) and intelligence in species other than humans (guess what, we are not the only ones, we are just the ones writing the history). Fast & easy reads but with some punch. I started reading and collecting her books in the 1960s and think I will try and reread most of them as a goal for this year.

Reread in Kindle edition July 2023, would re-rate to 3.5 stars due to her ability to get into the whole displaced people aspect. Reading SF makes me realize how much we take our own self destruction with us wherever we go, makes me wonder if we really are all that intelligent….

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was one of my defining early reads. Compelling characters. Point of view character is moral and yet desperate enough that he is an easy dupe, despite experience. Faces up to a prime example of a Norton alien world.

I spent some time trying to figure out how exactly he was shielding his face and promptly got in the habit of using my stylized 'mask' in school when I wished to withdraw from the situation? Eventually remembered where the habit had come from and decided it wasn't a good habit to encourage, so have dropped it.

[Keith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this unique novel in the 1960's. A poor and badly disfigured young man agrees to do a kidnapping. He gets a brand new unscarred face in return. Nik kidnaps a young boy and changes his mind. He does not want any harm to come to the young boy and then proceeds to help the young boy escape in an alien world, knowing he himself might become a monster once more.

[Alice · Rating 2 out of 5]

Somewhat disappointed that this sequel doesn't follow Troy Hogan, Reme and the intelligent animals from cat's eye. So far Nik seems a far less appealing character than Troy, and I quite like the animals.