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The Day Before Forever and Thunderhead
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The Day Before Forever:
The year was 2103. The place was Earth. And time-voyager Steve Dravek had already found out too much for his numbed brain to absorb. About the science of Cryonics, the freezing of human beings. About the visas caried by every man, woman and child - permits for living and for dying. About the reign of terror that enveloped Earth. Now, gun in hand, Ste ...more
The year was 2103. The place was Earth. And time-voyager Steve Dravek had already found out too much for his numbed brain to absorb. About the science of Cryonics, the freezing of human beings. About the visas caried by every man, woman and child - permits for living and for dying. About the reign of terror that enveloped Earth. Now, gun in hand, Ste ...more
Paperback, 157 pages
Published
1968
by Dell
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3 stars for the story and an extra for a rediscovered story from my early teens that still holds up.
Two very different short stories from the late sixties from the very overlooked and nearly forgotten Keith Laumer.
The Day Before Forever is classic action sci-fa in style of early Heinlein, a man awakes without a memory a slowly puts the pieces together while discovering a world several hundred years after the one he was born in.
Thunderhead a bittersweet story about a forgotten corporal on an ou ...more
Two very different short stories from the late sixties from the very overlooked and nearly forgotten Keith Laumer.
The Day Before Forever is classic action sci-fa in style of early Heinlein, a man awakes without a memory a slowly puts the pieces together while discovering a world several hundred years after the one he was born in.
Thunderhead a bittersweet story about a forgotten corporal on an ou ...more

A fast read of a typical pulpish 60s-type science fiction story (actually from 1968). By Keith Laumer (1925-1993), one of the more prolific SF authors of the 60s. I consider him an average SF author, with some good stories, but nothing outstanding (as far as I know!). This one is typical Laumer. Steve Dravek wakes up in the future-the year 2103. And it's a bummer-the world is controlled by a dictatorship. But Steve is a tough guy, if not a superman, and he's ready to take on the global tyranny.
...more

The Day Before Tomorrow is a hard-boiled mystery with an interesting twist on the time-travel-through-cryogenics theme. It hasn't aged as well as one might wish, but it's good for Laumer fans. I preferred Thunderhead, the shorter of the two, a military story of duty and honor that would have been right at home in Campbell's Astounding alongside stories like Theodore Cogswell's The Specter General.
...more

review of
Keith Laumer's "The Day Before Forever" and "Thunderhead"
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - March 30, 2015
Ok, regular readers of my reviews may know by now that when I read a Keith Laumer bk it's b/c I'm extremely depressed & I want something simple & undemanding to read to tide me over while I try to recoup my energies. It's kindof like taking a laxative to get the Fallon out of you.
The weird thing about this one is that I'm sure I read the Thunderhead story before but I can't find it ...more
Keith Laumer's "The Day Before Forever" and "Thunderhead"
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - March 30, 2015
Ok, regular readers of my reviews may know by now that when I read a Keith Laumer bk it's b/c I'm extremely depressed & I want something simple & undemanding to read to tide me over while I try to recoup my energies. It's kindof like taking a laxative to get the Fallon out of you.
The weird thing about this one is that I'm sure I read the Thunderhead story before but I can't find it ...more

Laumer’s always tough for me to review. I love the gritty, action-oriented pulp feel of his stories, they’re fast, fun, and engaging. But the toxic manliness that he felt compelled to infuse in the whole thing is grating. The only emotions are oh so masculine. The only female characters are there as love interests at best, “conquests” at worst. I get that it was the 60s, but...I really enjoy some aspects of his fiction, but I always have to brace for impact.
This was a collection of a couple nove ...more
This was a collection of a couple nove ...more
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John Keith Laumer was an American science fiction author. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force and a U.S. diplomat. His brother March Laumer was also a writer, known for his adult reinterpretations of the Land of Oz (also mentioned in Keith's The Other Side of Time).
Keith Laumer (aka J.K Laumer, J. Keith Laumer) is best known for his Bolo stories and his sa ...more
Keith Laumer (aka J.K Laumer, J. Keith Laumer) is best known for his Bolo stories and his sa ...more
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