The Planet Murderer

Spaceways #16

by Andrew J. Offutt, John Cleve (Pseudonym), Dwight V. Swain

Excellent Book

Genres: Science Fiction

224 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1984

About the author

Andrew Jefferson Offutt was an American science fiction and fantasy author. He wrote as Andrew J. Offutt, A.J. Offutt, and Andy Offut. His normal byline, andrew j. offutt, had his name in all lower-case letters. His son is the author Chris Offutt.

Offutt began publishing in 1954 with the story And Gone Tomorrow in If. Despite this early sale, he didn't consider his professional life to have begun until he sold the story Blacksword to Galaxy in 1959. His first novel was Evil Is Live Spelled Backwards in 1970.

Offutt published numerous novels and short stories, including many in the Thieves World series edited by Robert Lynn Asprin and Lynn Abbey, which featured his best known character, the thief Hanse, also known as Shadowspawn (and, later, Chance). His Iron Lords series likewise was popular. He also wrote two series of books based on characters by Robert E. Howard, one on Howard's best known character, Conan, and one on a lesser known character, Cormac mac Art.

As an editor Offutt produced a series of five anthologies entitled Swords Against Darkness, which included the first professional sale by Charles de Lint.

Offutt also wrote a large number of pornographic works under twelve different pseudonyms, not all of them identified. Those known include John Cleve, J.X. Williams, and Jeff Douglas. His main works in this area are the science fiction Spaceways series, most of whose volumes were written in collaboration, and the historical Crusader series.

Reviews

[Craig]

The Spaceways series spanned nineteen volumes that were published 1982 - '85, and were the creation of andrew j. offutt, who wrote a lot of works of erotic content under his John Cleve pseudonym. He wrote nine of the books on his own (1-6, 8-9, 19) and ten of them were collaborative, but all nineteen had terrific covers by Ken Barr. The first nine were published by Playboy Books and the rest appeared under the Berkley imprint. This one was written in collaboration with Dwight V. Swain, who was a very accomplished and prolific science fiction writer of the pulp era. There was definitely a lot of adult content, erotic rather than pornographic, though it must be remembered that standards in the early 1980s were much more oriented towards male dominance. Swain's experience writing pulp adventure during World War II shines through. The goal was to tell a space opera style adventure story while paying off and playing off of the sexy covers of the magazines of the '30s and '40s. This sixteenth story introduces new characters and situations that aren't well-connected to the balance of the continuity, but it's a fast-paced tale. What was that line about a hive of scum and villainy? It's one of the best stories of the ones not written solely by offutt (I mean J. Cleve, oops!) The series has a rich interstellar setting filled with nefarious characters, wild schemes, and adventures of all kinds. As always, there's nothing here in the way of literary worth, but it was just intended for fun.

[Otis Campbell]

This time, Andrew J. Offutt (under that worn-out "John Cleve" alias) dragged in a real old-school sci-fi professor named Dwight V. Swain to help him mash the typewriter keys. Swain used to teach folks how to write fiction, but lookin' at this book, he must've left his own rulebook out in the rain. With a high-falutin' name like The Planet Murderer, you’d expect some giant, planet-destroying laser or an alien supervillain crackin' worlds open like walnuts. Instead, the story is just a messy, confusing tangle of political backstabbing and corporate bickering that'll make your eyes cross. It’s got about as much planet-murdering action as a city council meeting. Two authors made the tractor run sideways. Even though Dwight V. Swain was a professional writing teacher, combining his style with Offutt’s smutty habits just made a total monster. The book stutters back and forth between tryin' to be a serious, high-concept sci-fi mystery and sloshing right back down into the gutter. It reads like two fellas tryin' to steer the same mule in opposite directions. For a sci-fi adventure, nothing moves with any kind of rhythm. Long stretches of the book are just characters jaw-jackin' in rooms, explaining the complicated history of fictional star systems, and actin' a fool. You could fall asleep, take a nap, wake up, and find they're still arguin' over the same pile of space-documents. Just like the previous fifteen books, the moment any kind of actual plot momentum starts buildin' up, the authors smash on the brakes for pages and pages of trashy, cookie-cutter adult-magazine business. By book sixteen, it ain't exciting anymore; it just feels like the authors had a checklist of racy scenes they had to clear before they were allowed to go down to the fishing hole.