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Time Tunnel #1
The Time Tunnel
THE TIME TUNNEL was the most important -- and most secret -- weapon ever developed. Scientists Tony Newman and Doug Phillips knew that the destiny of the world depended on it. Now the Tunnel was threatened with destruction -- and the only way Doug and Tony could save it was to take a blind leap into the whirling mists of time!
143 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1964
5 people are currently reading
193 people want to read
About the author
Murray Leinster
909 books125 followerssee also:
Will F. Jenkins
William Fitzgerald Jenkins
Murray Leinster was a nom de plume of William Fitzgerald Jenkins, an award-winning American writer of science fiction and alternate history. He wrote and published over 1,500 short stories and articles, 14 movie scripts, and hundreds of radio scripts and television plays.
An author whose career spanned the first six decades of the 20th Century. From mystery and adventure stories in the earliest years to science fiction in his later years, he worked steadily and at a highly professional level of craftsmanship longer than most writers of his generation. He won a Hugo Award in 1956 for his novelet “Exploration Team,” and in 1995 the Sidewise Award for Alternate History took its name from his classic story, “Sidewise in Time.” His last original work appeared in 1967.
Will F. Jenkins
William Fitzgerald Jenkins
Murray Leinster was a nom de plume of William Fitzgerald Jenkins, an award-winning American writer of science fiction and alternate history. He wrote and published over 1,500 short stories and articles, 14 movie scripts, and hundreds of radio scripts and television plays.
An author whose career spanned the first six decades of the 20th Century. From mystery and adventure stories in the earliest years to science fiction in his later years, he worked steadily and at a highly professional level of craftsmanship longer than most writers of his generation. He won a Hugo Award in 1956 for his novelet “Exploration Team,” and in 1995 the Sidewise Award for Alternate History took its name from his classic story, “Sidewise in Time.” His last original work appeared in 1967.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews
October 22, 2025
A clever twist to resolve the paradox!
From the very birth of the conception of time travel, sci-fi authors and scientists alike have wrestled with the difficulties of time travel paradoxes most commonly expressed in the question of what would happen if you killed your grandfather during your trip to the past. In TIME TUNNEL, Murray Leinster has treated his readers to what was probably the first (and quite possibly the best) instance of the infuriating mental tangles that one can encounter when the immutability of the progression of real time collides with the flexibility of time travel.
Leinster has crafted a positively ingenious combination of characters into a fascinating novel of high adventure that will both delight and fascinate his fans - a scientist who felt compelled to change the past in order to rescue the future from an impending atomic war between China and the US; young lovers who, fearing for their lives in a war-torn modern world, felt compelled to flee to a safer past; a 20th century burglar and con artist who realized the early 19th century was ripe for the plucking; and a playboy who was horrified to watch his grandfather die unmarried and childless.
The story begins in 1964 when Harrison, completing research for his PhD thesis in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, discovers long-buried correspondence showing that, in 1805, a gentleman named de Bassompierre had written to certain scientists handing out modern knowledge long before its acknowledged discovery. In one case, for example, "He wrote to Laplace, the astronomer, assuring him that Mars had two moons, very small and very close to its surface. He also said that there were three planets beyond Saturn, and that the one next out had a period of eighty-four years and two moons, one retrograde. He suggested that it should be called Uranus. He added that in the year 1808 there would be a nova in Persis, (which there was!) and he signed himself very respectfully, de Bassompierre." When Harrison and his friend, Pepe Ybarra, reach the conclusion that de Bassompierre was a time traveler who is attempting to change the future by handing out modern ideas before their time, the high jinks begin in earnest and the time travel conundrums drop into the readers' laps at a dizzying pace.
And the ending ... sigh! What a wonderfully clever simultaneous resolution of both the adventure plot-lines and the time travel paradoxes.
Recommended as a scintillating addition to the library of any reader who savours classic sci-fi from the pulp era.
Paul Weiss
From the very birth of the conception of time travel, sci-fi authors and scientists alike have wrestled with the difficulties of time travel paradoxes most commonly expressed in the question of what would happen if you killed your grandfather during your trip to the past. In TIME TUNNEL, Murray Leinster has treated his readers to what was probably the first (and quite possibly the best) instance of the infuriating mental tangles that one can encounter when the immutability of the progression of real time collides with the flexibility of time travel.
Leinster has crafted a positively ingenious combination of characters into a fascinating novel of high adventure that will both delight and fascinate his fans - a scientist who felt compelled to change the past in order to rescue the future from an impending atomic war between China and the US; young lovers who, fearing for their lives in a war-torn modern world, felt compelled to flee to a safer past; a 20th century burglar and con artist who realized the early 19th century was ripe for the plucking; and a playboy who was horrified to watch his grandfather die unmarried and childless.
The story begins in 1964 when Harrison, completing research for his PhD thesis in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, discovers long-buried correspondence showing that, in 1805, a gentleman named de Bassompierre had written to certain scientists handing out modern knowledge long before its acknowledged discovery. In one case, for example, "He wrote to Laplace, the astronomer, assuring him that Mars had two moons, very small and very close to its surface. He also said that there were three planets beyond Saturn, and that the one next out had a period of eighty-four years and two moons, one retrograde. He suggested that it should be called Uranus. He added that in the year 1808 there would be a nova in Persis, (which there was!) and he signed himself very respectfully, de Bassompierre." When Harrison and his friend, Pepe Ybarra, reach the conclusion that de Bassompierre was a time traveler who is attempting to change the future by handing out modern ideas before their time, the high jinks begin in earnest and the time travel conundrums drop into the readers' laps at a dizzying pace.
And the ending ... sigh! What a wonderfully clever simultaneous resolution of both the adventure plot-lines and the time travel paradoxes.
Recommended as a scintillating addition to the library of any reader who savours classic sci-fi from the pulp era.
Paul Weiss
October 22, 2025
A clever twist to resolve the paradox!
From the very birth of the conception of time travel, sci-fi authors and scientists alike have wrestled with the difficulties of time travel paradoxes most commonly expressed in the question of what would happen if you killed your grandfather during your trip to the past. In TIME TUNNEL, Murray Leinster has treated his readers to what was probably the first (and quite possibly the best) instance of the infuriating mental tangles that one can encounter when the immutability of the progression of real time collides with the flexibility of time travel.
Leinster has crafted a positively ingenious combination of characters into a fascinating novel of high adventure that will both delight and fascinate his fans - a scientist who felt compelled to change the past in order to rescue the future from an impending atomic war between China and the US; young lovers who, fearing for their lives in a war-torn modern world, felt compelled to flee to a safer past; a 20th century burglar and con artist who realized the early 19th century was ripe for the plucking; and a playboy who was horrified to watch his grandfather die unmarried and childless.
The story begins in 1964 when Harrison, completing research for his PhD thesis in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, discovers long-buried correspondence showing that, in 1805, a gentleman named de Bassompierre had written to certain scientists handing out modern knowledge long before its acknowledged discovery. In one case, for example,
"He wrote to Laplace, the astronomer, assuring him that Mars had two moons, very small and very close to its surface. He also said that there were three planets beyond Saturn, and that the one next out had a period of eighty-four years and two moons, one retrograde. He suggested that it should be called Uranus. He added that in the year 1808 there would be a nova in Persis, (which there was!) and he signed himself very respectfully, de Bassompierre."
When Harrison and his friend, Pepe Ybarra, reach the conclusion that de Bassompierre was a time traveler who is attempting to change the future by handing out modern ideas before their time, the high jinks begin in earnest and the time travel conundrums drop into the readers' laps at a dizzying pace.
And the ending ... sigh! What a wonderfully clever simultaneous resolution of both the adventure plot-lines and the time travel paradoxes.
Recommended as a scintillating addition to the library of any reader who savours classic sci-fi from the pulp era.
Paul Weiss
From the very birth of the conception of time travel, sci-fi authors and scientists alike have wrestled with the difficulties of time travel paradoxes most commonly expressed in the question of what would happen if you killed your grandfather during your trip to the past. In TIME TUNNEL, Murray Leinster has treated his readers to what was probably the first (and quite possibly the best) instance of the infuriating mental tangles that one can encounter when the immutability of the progression of real time collides with the flexibility of time travel.
Leinster has crafted a positively ingenious combination of characters into a fascinating novel of high adventure that will both delight and fascinate his fans - a scientist who felt compelled to change the past in order to rescue the future from an impending atomic war between China and the US; young lovers who, fearing for their lives in a war-torn modern world, felt compelled to flee to a safer past; a 20th century burglar and con artist who realized the early 19th century was ripe for the plucking; and a playboy who was horrified to watch his grandfather die unmarried and childless.
The story begins in 1964 when Harrison, completing research for his PhD thesis in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, discovers long-buried correspondence showing that, in 1805, a gentleman named de Bassompierre had written to certain scientists handing out modern knowledge long before its acknowledged discovery. In one case, for example,
"He wrote to Laplace, the astronomer, assuring him that Mars had two moons, very small and very close to its surface. He also said that there were three planets beyond Saturn, and that the one next out had a period of eighty-four years and two moons, one retrograde. He suggested that it should be called Uranus. He added that in the year 1808 there would be a nova in Persis, (which there was!) and he signed himself very respectfully, de Bassompierre."
When Harrison and his friend, Pepe Ybarra, reach the conclusion that de Bassompierre was a time traveler who is attempting to change the future by handing out modern ideas before their time, the high jinks begin in earnest and the time travel conundrums drop into the readers' laps at a dizzying pace.
And the ending ... sigh! What a wonderfully clever simultaneous resolution of both the adventure plot-lines and the time travel paradoxes.
Recommended as a scintillating addition to the library of any reader who savours classic sci-fi from the pulp era.
Paul Weiss
March 28, 2020
Drei Sterne (eigentlich nur 2,5) - das Äquivalent zum Adjektiv "nett"; trifft hier leider zu: Der Roman, eine klassische Zeitreisegeschichte, beginnt gut, aber dann wiederholt Murray die Gedanken der Protagonisten mehrfach, vermutlich um sicherzustellen, dass seine Leserschaft ihn versteht. Etwas mehr Druck auf dem Kessel hätte mir besser gefallen, auch handlungsmäßig; vielleicht hätte Leinster aus dem Stoff besser eine Short=Story gemacht?
Mit der Kult-TV-Serie hat der Roman übrigens nur den Namen gleich.
Mit der Kult-TV-Serie hat der Roman übrigens nur den Namen gleich.
March 1, 2025
The Time Tunnel is half of a very confusing bibliographic Murray Leinster situation. Pyramid Books published an original novel in 1964 which was titled Time Tunnel in which he plays with some of the intriguing and interesting paradoxical questions of time travel. It's an entertaining and well written story, and the concept and title are occasionally credited as being an inspiration for the Irwin Allen television program which ran on ABC for thirty episodes in 1966 - '67. Otherwise, that book has nothing to do with the television show; no Tony or Doug or Ann or Tic-Toc or Kirk or Clark... no relation. However, Leinster was hired to write this tie-in novel, which was also published by Pyramid, of almost identical length, which was titled The Time Tunnel, and it appeared in January of 1967. This book does feature many of the same characters and concepts as the television series, obviously, but it has no relation to the first novel other than the title similarity. It's an original adventure set within the framework of the Allen production, not an episode adaptation, and is also a well-written and entertaining story, though perhaps on a somewhat more simplified level. There are some significant differences from the broadcast version; perhaps Leinster was given an early version of the show "bible" from which to work. They're both enjoyable books, but in the same way that apples and oranges or dogs and cats are both good things. In retrospect, I'll bet Leinster would have wished that one of them had been published under his real name, William F. Jenkins, to avoid the confusion which will last as long as memory of his books do. I'm rating this one as a three and the earlier novel as a four... now, don't mix 'em up!
January 18, 2025
First, let's clarify that this novel is NOT the one based on a television series. You'll notice that multiple reviewers for this edition have believed it is. Even Goodreads thinks so, because they have this book listed as "Time Tunnel #1," with the second book being "Timeslip". Why the confusion? Because the same author, Murray Leinster, DID write a novelization of the popular television series that ran from 1966-67, which was produced by Irwin Allen. And that book was called "THE Time Tunnel," and was published in 1967, while the one I'm reviewing today was published in 1964. And it is the 1967 book that had a sequel called "Timeslip," not this one.
Simple, right? Well, it gets worse. Both the 1964 and the 1967 novels not only have similar names, but were both published by the same company, Pyramid Books. The covers are different, but share that same design aesthetic so that even if you owned both books, you'd be forgiven for simply thinking you got two different editions of the same novel until you read them. And to make matters even worse, Leinster published another novel called "Tunnel Through Time" in 1966, which is more of a kid-friendly story about a boy named Bob who's dad invents a time ring.
It certainly seems that, late in his career, Leinster certainly had time on his mind. And so now readers in the future are all confused as to which book is which. But I'm here to try to set things straight if I can.
"Time Tunnel" is a completely original novel that has nothing to do with 1967's "The Time Tunnel." The characters and plot are completely different. However, there may be some truth to the notion that this book did inspire the TV series, and this may also be why Leinster was commissioned to do the promotional novelization a year after the show first aired.
I've not read both books, so I can't compare the two as far as quality. But I can say, as someone who has read quite a bit of Leinster's earlier work, that this one feels much more polished and researched than his usual output. His characters are often tropes, usually of the stoic kind, with little personality beyond what is required to move the plot along. But here, his cast has a lot more life, each with their own quirky personalities, and they exchange dialogue brimming with charm. This novel is also more overtly political than his usual fare.
Here is the set-up. Two friends meet up in Paris in 1964, but notice some glitches in their memories. This is more than a case of the Mandela effect. Somebody is going back in time and bringing modern technology secrets to effect the past. They go to visit their old university professor, who believed you could create a time tunnel using an untouched artifact from the past to create a fixed point in time. It's not really explained too well how it works, but needless to say, the old boy has actually succeeded. He uses the tunnel to go back to 1804 and retrieve goods from the past that he sells in his shop of antique curios. But someone else has learned the professor's secret and is using it for more nefarious purposes than stocking a store. The professor and his two former students travel through his time tunnel to try to catch the culprit and prevent the present from altering irreversibly. They need to hurry, because the Chinese suddenly seem to have nuclear technology and plan on starting nuclear war over the island of Formosa.
This story was actually inspired by real events. The Fifties saw two conflicts over Taiwan, and U.S. President Eisenhower threatened the People's Republic of China with nuclear escalation. Though cited as a successful example of the nuclear deterrent, the incident prompted Chairman Mao to begin his own nuclear weapons programming, with China's first successful bomb test being set off in 1964, just as events play out in this book. So Murray Leinster imagined a scenario where China was sold nuclear capability from a bad foreign actor, with a time travel twist.
"Time Tunnel" is an effective blend of fantastic adventure in another era, a bit of a mystery, a political thriller, and a lot of social satire. It plays up the political messaging a bit too heavily, and repetitively pounds home certain stakes and themes as if Leinster didn't trust his audience to understand what he was trying to say. But otherwise, I found this to be quite a fun and thoughtful little book.
If you are a fan of science fiction from the Cold War, give this a try.
SCORE: 3.5 rounded to 4 time tunnels out of 5
Simple, right? Well, it gets worse. Both the 1964 and the 1967 novels not only have similar names, but were both published by the same company, Pyramid Books. The covers are different, but share that same design aesthetic so that even if you owned both books, you'd be forgiven for simply thinking you got two different editions of the same novel until you read them. And to make matters even worse, Leinster published another novel called "Tunnel Through Time" in 1966, which is more of a kid-friendly story about a boy named Bob who's dad invents a time ring.
It certainly seems that, late in his career, Leinster certainly had time on his mind. And so now readers in the future are all confused as to which book is which. But I'm here to try to set things straight if I can.
"Time Tunnel" is a completely original novel that has nothing to do with 1967's "The Time Tunnel." The characters and plot are completely different. However, there may be some truth to the notion that this book did inspire the TV series, and this may also be why Leinster was commissioned to do the promotional novelization a year after the show first aired.
I've not read both books, so I can't compare the two as far as quality. But I can say, as someone who has read quite a bit of Leinster's earlier work, that this one feels much more polished and researched than his usual output. His characters are often tropes, usually of the stoic kind, with little personality beyond what is required to move the plot along. But here, his cast has a lot more life, each with their own quirky personalities, and they exchange dialogue brimming with charm. This novel is also more overtly political than his usual fare.
Here is the set-up. Two friends meet up in Paris in 1964, but notice some glitches in their memories. This is more than a case of the Mandela effect. Somebody is going back in time and bringing modern technology secrets to effect the past. They go to visit their old university professor, who believed you could create a time tunnel using an untouched artifact from the past to create a fixed point in time. It's not really explained too well how it works, but needless to say, the old boy has actually succeeded. He uses the tunnel to go back to 1804 and retrieve goods from the past that he sells in his shop of antique curios. But someone else has learned the professor's secret and is using it for more nefarious purposes than stocking a store. The professor and his two former students travel through his time tunnel to try to catch the culprit and prevent the present from altering irreversibly. They need to hurry, because the Chinese suddenly seem to have nuclear technology and plan on starting nuclear war over the island of Formosa.
This story was actually inspired by real events. The Fifties saw two conflicts over Taiwan, and U.S. President Eisenhower threatened the People's Republic of China with nuclear escalation. Though cited as a successful example of the nuclear deterrent, the incident prompted Chairman Mao to begin his own nuclear weapons programming, with China's first successful bomb test being set off in 1964, just as events play out in this book. So Murray Leinster imagined a scenario where China was sold nuclear capability from a bad foreign actor, with a time travel twist.
"Time Tunnel" is an effective blend of fantastic adventure in another era, a bit of a mystery, a political thriller, and a lot of social satire. It plays up the political messaging a bit too heavily, and repetitively pounds home certain stakes and themes as if Leinster didn't trust his audience to understand what he was trying to say. But otherwise, I found this to be quite a fun and thoughtful little book.
If you are a fan of science fiction from the Cold War, give this a try.
SCORE: 3.5 rounded to 4 time tunnels out of 5
March 1, 2025
Time Tunnel is half of a very confusing bibliographic Murray Leinster situation. Pyramid Books published this original novel in 1964 in which he plays with some of the intriguing and interesting paradoxical questions of time travel. It's an entertaining and well written story, and the concept and title are occasionally credited as being an inspiration for the Irwin Allen television program which ran on ABC for thirty episodes in 1966 - '67. Other than that, this book has nothing to do with the television show; no Tony or Doug or Ann or Tic-Toc or Kirk or Clark... no relation. However, Leinster was hired to write a tie-in novel which was also published by Pyramid, of almost identical length, which was titled The Time Tunnel, and it appeared in January of 1967. It does have many of the same characters and concepts as the television series, but no relation to the first novel other than the title similarity. It's an original adventure set within the framework of the Allen production, not an episode adaptation, and is also a well-written and entertaining story, though perhaps on a somewhat more simplified level. There are some significant differences from the broadcast version; perhaps Leinster was given an early version of the show "bible" from which to work. They're both enjoyable books, but in the same way that apples and oranges or dogs and cats are both good things. In retrospect, I'll bet Leinster would have wished that one of them had been published under his real name, William F. Jenkins, to avoid the confusion which will last as long as memory of his books do. I'm rating this one as a four and the novelization as a three... now, don't mix 'em up!
November 11, 2011
Harrison was in Paris researching for his doctoral thesis, the Napoleonic era, when he runs into an old friend, Pepe Ybarra, that he hadn't seen in a few years.
In catching up, he mentions some oddities he'd discovered while going through dusty old books and correspondence: a series of letters by a man named M. de Bassompiere to a number of leading lights of the time, discussing things he couldn't possibly know about. Things like telling Ampere about alternating current years before direct was in common usage, Champolian he tells how to decipher the just discovered Rosetta Stone, though he doesn't try it for years, mathematician LaGrange gets an explanation of statistical analysis, mentions in one letter to the Academie des Sciences a theory about how atoms resemble a solar system, and was great friends with Talleyrand, mentioning Emperor Maximillian of Mexico fifty years before such took place.
Pepe tells him of a shop he'd discovered, Carroll, Dubois et cie, with the line under the store name, import-export to 1804. It was filled with old flintlocks, books of the era, newspapers, only one copy of each, exquisite silver snuff boxes. They couldn't be real. The newspapers looked new, though they were made of paper no longer made and had type no longer used.
They had to be reproductions, except the prices on them were cheap. Pepe had bought a snuff box for 2500 Francs(twenty American) and taken it to an artist friend who said he couldn't reproduce it for less than ten times what Pepe had paid.
The only explanation they could think of seemed too fantastic.
They traveled to the isolated country home of the owners to interview him and were surprised to learn Carroll was their old college professor. They explain what they think, as strange as it seems, only to have him start moaning.
It seems he'd found a way to travel in time, using an old cannon factory abandoned since the early 1800s with a cannon still in the mold the molten metal had been poured. His work had opened up a tunnel to 1804 and his business woman wife was using her brother to go back and get product for their shop.
Now it appeared that this de Bassompiere had found the tunnel, or even worse, had his own and was trying to change time. Events in the world were proceeding to war with China threatening to drop nuclear bombs on Formosa.
The three men and a thief named Albert make a desperate trip through the tunnel to find this de Bassompiere and upset his plans.
Of course things go wrong. Leinster even tosses a couple of twists in near the end.
Enjoyed this old book.
In catching up, he mentions some oddities he'd discovered while going through dusty old books and correspondence: a series of letters by a man named M. de Bassompiere to a number of leading lights of the time, discussing things he couldn't possibly know about. Things like telling Ampere about alternating current years before direct was in common usage, Champolian he tells how to decipher the just discovered Rosetta Stone, though he doesn't try it for years, mathematician LaGrange gets an explanation of statistical analysis, mentions in one letter to the Academie des Sciences a theory about how atoms resemble a solar system, and was great friends with Talleyrand, mentioning Emperor Maximillian of Mexico fifty years before such took place.
Pepe tells him of a shop he'd discovered, Carroll, Dubois et cie, with the line under the store name, import-export to 1804. It was filled with old flintlocks, books of the era, newspapers, only one copy of each, exquisite silver snuff boxes. They couldn't be real. The newspapers looked new, though they were made of paper no longer made and had type no longer used.
They had to be reproductions, except the prices on them were cheap. Pepe had bought a snuff box for 2500 Francs(twenty American) and taken it to an artist friend who said he couldn't reproduce it for less than ten times what Pepe had paid.
The only explanation they could think of seemed too fantastic.
They traveled to the isolated country home of the owners to interview him and were surprised to learn Carroll was their old college professor. They explain what they think, as strange as it seems, only to have him start moaning.
It seems he'd found a way to travel in time, using an old cannon factory abandoned since the early 1800s with a cannon still in the mold the molten metal had been poured. His work had opened up a tunnel to 1804 and his business woman wife was using her brother to go back and get product for their shop.
Now it appeared that this de Bassompiere had found the tunnel, or even worse, had his own and was trying to change time. Events in the world were proceeding to war with China threatening to drop nuclear bombs on Formosa.
The three men and a thief named Albert make a desperate trip through the tunnel to find this de Bassompiere and upset his plans.
Of course things go wrong. Leinster even tosses a couple of twists in near the end.
Enjoyed this old book.
January 26, 2019
A guilty pleasure, but definitely a pleasure. Leinster did this novelization of the Irwin Allen TV series, and, as I'd expect, he did it better than the TV writers did.
Remembering reruns of the TV series, which I always thought had better ideas than Allen allowed it to play with, I had long wanted to read this novelization. While keeping roughly within the structure of the TV series, Leinster clearly has a lot of fun with this. He makes the 'science' a little more credible: for example the scientists have to wear harnesses to stay in contact with the Tunnel, and there is a lot of attention to understanding the calibration of early time travel jumps.
Leinster has three 'jumps' after the two scientists take the risk of jumping back: to the Johnstown Flood, to the attack at Adobe Wells in the 1870s, and to a future that looks promising except for the attack of Vegan aliens. None of those jumps were stories from the TV series, although they are in keeping with the 'jumping around to significant events in the past and future' that was the norm for the series. It is clear the Leinster is totally fascinated by the Johnstown and Adobe Wells stories, and believes they should be better known. I was pleased that, unlike in the TV series, our heroes are returned in the end.
The real negative of the read: the sexist attitude about Ann MacGregor, who is portrayed as a scientist of world-class capability who none-the-less is mooning over Doug, and has a hysterical break (their words) when he is in continuous danger in the past. Some of the omniscient narrator's thoughts about her motivations are horrible by modern standards. I don't know whether to write off the whole novel because of these -- I'm tempted to cut out those paragraphs so no one ever has to read them again. I know this was 1965, but still ...
I needed something lightweight that I really wanted to read. This fit that bill, although maybe it would only be so for someone like me who wished more had been done with the original series.
Remembering reruns of the TV series, which I always thought had better ideas than Allen allowed it to play with, I had long wanted to read this novelization. While keeping roughly within the structure of the TV series, Leinster clearly has a lot of fun with this. He makes the 'science' a little more credible: for example the scientists have to wear harnesses to stay in contact with the Tunnel, and there is a lot of attention to understanding the calibration of early time travel jumps.
Leinster has three 'jumps' after the two scientists take the risk of jumping back: to the Johnstown Flood, to the attack at Adobe Wells in the 1870s, and to a future that looks promising except for the attack of Vegan aliens. None of those jumps were stories from the TV series, although they are in keeping with the 'jumping around to significant events in the past and future' that was the norm for the series. It is clear the Leinster is totally fascinated by the Johnstown and Adobe Wells stories, and believes they should be better known. I was pleased that, unlike in the TV series, our heroes are returned in the end.
The real negative of the read: the sexist attitude about Ann MacGregor, who is portrayed as a scientist of world-class capability who none-the-less is mooning over Doug, and has a hysterical break (their words) when he is in continuous danger in the past. Some of the omniscient narrator's thoughts about her motivations are horrible by modern standards. I don't know whether to write off the whole novel because of these -- I'm tempted to cut out those paragraphs so no one ever has to read them again. I know this was 1965, but still ...
I needed something lightweight that I really wanted to read. This fit that bill, although maybe it would only be so for someone like me who wished more had been done with the original series.
December 31, 2018
As a kid who liked history, I greatly enjoyed "The Time Tunnel" TV series from the 1966-67 season. And I picked up this book by Murray Leinster ( Will F. Jenkins) (1896-1975) thinking it was a novelization of that series. But there's no Doug and Tony running through the Time Tunnel to the Alamo or Pearl Harbor. This is a completely different story, published in 1964. In this story, a time tunnel is created linking 1964 to 1804. The tunnel exists in France, so that at the 1804 end, you can emerge into Napoleonic France, as Napoleon is preparing his invasion of England. Our hero Harrison discovers a time traveler is back in 18o4 meddling with history, so he needs to go back to prevent history from being changed. Then, as the world of 1964 stands on the brink of war, with Red China threatening to attack Formosa ( today we call it Taiwan) and the West preparing to go to war to protect the island, Harrison desperately tries to change history to prevent WWIII. As I don't remember any war with China back in '64, you know that Harrison succeeded in his mission. An interesting little story that I read very fast. I would've preferred to see someone trying to help Napoleon conquer the world-- perhaps by providing him with zeppelins, submarines, and gatling guns. That would be interesting!
May 3, 2023
A bit telegraphed, plot-wise. The time travel is very hand-wavy. The female roles are very uh... yeah. The scientist keeps physically carrying off his wife and locking her in rooms but we're supposed to feel bad for him because she's so unpleasant? Mmmhmm.
Related: Why is it always a fear of killing one's grandfather and not grandmother? How much dna do you really share with your great-grandfather? Mitochondria is strictly matrilineal, so I feel male ancestors are probably less important. (and, as this story shows - less provable). You only have to go back to, I think, the 14th century for all Europeans to be related... ergo I imagine your unique genome could come about from completely different ancestors. We're more alike than not.
I digress. Just chewing on that for my own time-travel hobby-horses.
The strength of the story is in the moments where Leinster deftly shows how people in the present would NOT know their world had changed. It's fairly playful. And I kinda like the idea of an import/export store to the past. Oh the fabrics I would buy.
Related: Why is it always a fear of killing one's grandfather and not grandmother? How much dna do you really share with your great-grandfather? Mitochondria is strictly matrilineal, so I feel male ancestors are probably less important. (and, as this story shows - less provable). You only have to go back to, I think, the 14th century for all Europeans to be related... ergo I imagine your unique genome could come about from completely different ancestors. We're more alike than not.
I digress. Just chewing on that for my own time-travel hobby-horses.
The strength of the story is in the moments where Leinster deftly shows how people in the present would NOT know their world had changed. It's fairly playful. And I kinda like the idea of an import/export store to the past. Oh the fabrics I would buy.
June 22, 2016
This is a slice of total pulp Sci-Fi from an evidently highly prolific and better known than I would have guessed author (real name William Jenkins, which evidently sounded too refined for his type of novels, screenplays, Radio and TV work). The subject is Time Travel, but the vehicle used for it – like so much in the novel - is never fully, or really at all, explained. Since I don’t believe time travel is possible anyway, I could have lived with that but the story had way too many holes and underdeveloped characters and almost no real understanding of the Butterfly Effect, so it wasn’t even that fun, a Cardinal Sin for pulpy Sci-Fi. Short, thank God, and interesting in parts, but recommended only for big time Dime Novel Sci-Fi fans or Leinster completists. 65/100
May 9, 2011
This barely qualifies as sci-fi. People discover a tunnel, the other end leading to a different time. They go back and forth. Mischief ensues. This is not related to the TV series of the same title. The existence of the tunnel makes little sense; how did it get there? The way it works makes no sense; it just does. The stories share no characters. This adventure is not thrilling. The style is ho-hum, and consequently, so is the book.
November 23, 2011
A novel based on the Irwin Allen TV series of the sixties. This had the advantage of a real science fiction writer handling it. Leinster makes an attempt to answer some of the inconsistencies of the show.
Tony Newman and Doug Philips are the scientists that make the attempt to stop the projec from being shut down.
Three stories told here, although the last one, an alien invasion scenario, is rather short(the whole book is only a 144 pages.
The first uses some of the elements of the pilot episode, but the main story is different. In the pilot, they landed on the Titanic. In the book it was the Johnstown flood where five thousand people died.
We have a Senator that wants to shut the project down because of that old paradox about killing your grandfather in the past before your father is born, so you can't be born to go into the past and kill your grandfather... Mustn't change the past, it will change the future. As normal human beings, they want to warn the people about what's going to happen, damn the consequences!. No one believes them of course and when the flood comes, the pair are caught in town and trying to rescue as many as possible. Records show a building that survived and an eight year old girl is handed across a line of men to Tony and Doub before they are overwhelmed by the raging waters.
It turns out the young girl is the future grandmother of the Senator out to shut down the project.
The second story finds them in Adobe Walls, a trading post in Texas, in 1874. It's about to be attacked by a force of 1300 hundred Indians, from four tribes, in an effort to wipe out the buffalo hunters before they can destroy the Texas herds as the northern were virtually wiped out. One of the hunters is a young Bat Masterson.
Records show that the post was awakened early by a wooden lodge pole that collapsed, no one knows why, and the 28 men and one woman were alert when the attack started. They held them off, not without losses, until help arrived.
Tony and Doug in the novel use two buffalo guns, with Xs cut into the bullets to break the lodge pole.
It appears that history can't be changed by time travelers. Whatever you do becomes a part of the history you know.
Both the novel and the show were very much a part of their time. One of the scientists, a woman named MacGregor(played by Lee Meriwether), so named because of her manner and training. Ye she seems to fall apart and go into hysterics at the drop of a hat.
There's a second novel I'll get to soon, but at the end of this one, the two scientists are safely home. They never made it in the series, continually being bumped from one historical setting to another. It appears in the second novel they go into the past to correct something, a nuclear missle lost in time when sent through the tunnel. Why they would send a nuclear weapon through the time tunnel? I'll find out.
Tony Newman and Doug Philips are the scientists that make the attempt to stop the projec from being shut down.
Three stories told here, although the last one, an alien invasion scenario, is rather short(the whole book is only a 144 pages.
The first uses some of the elements of the pilot episode, but the main story is different. In the pilot, they landed on the Titanic. In the book it was the Johnstown flood where five thousand people died.
We have a Senator that wants to shut the project down because of that old paradox about killing your grandfather in the past before your father is born, so you can't be born to go into the past and kill your grandfather... Mustn't change the past, it will change the future. As normal human beings, they want to warn the people about what's going to happen, damn the consequences!. No one believes them of course and when the flood comes, the pair are caught in town and trying to rescue as many as possible. Records show a building that survived and an eight year old girl is handed across a line of men to Tony and Doub before they are overwhelmed by the raging waters.
It turns out the young girl is the future grandmother of the Senator out to shut down the project.
The second story finds them in Adobe Walls, a trading post in Texas, in 1874. It's about to be attacked by a force of 1300 hundred Indians, from four tribes, in an effort to wipe out the buffalo hunters before they can destroy the Texas herds as the northern were virtually wiped out. One of the hunters is a young Bat Masterson.
Records show that the post was awakened early by a wooden lodge pole that collapsed, no one knows why, and the 28 men and one woman were alert when the attack started. They held them off, not without losses, until help arrived.
Tony and Doug in the novel use two buffalo guns, with Xs cut into the bullets to break the lodge pole.
It appears that history can't be changed by time travelers. Whatever you do becomes a part of the history you know.
Both the novel and the show were very much a part of their time. One of the scientists, a woman named MacGregor(played by Lee Meriwether), so named because of her manner and training. Ye she seems to fall apart and go into hysterics at the drop of a hat.
There's a second novel I'll get to soon, but at the end of this one, the two scientists are safely home. They never made it in the series, continually being bumped from one historical setting to another. It appears in the second novel they go into the past to correct something, a nuclear missle lost in time when sent through the tunnel. Why they would send a nuclear weapon through the time tunnel? I'll find out.
October 11, 2021
Some confusion here regarding this book. The original The Time Tunnel book, which I read was written in 1964 by Murray Leinster and was really fun and well written story! It may have inspired the TV series but this pre-dates the show by a couple of years.
If you are lucky enough to stumble across this “original”
Story you will find yourself thinking more about the Chronicles of St. Mary’s by Jodi Taylor than a mid 1960’s sci fi show!
If you are lucky enough to stumble across this “original”
Story you will find yourself thinking more about the Chronicles of St. Mary’s by Jodi Taylor than a mid 1960’s sci fi show!
January 16, 2012
An odd thing happened in the sixties. An author who had created a concept years before was ripped off when his idea was greatly changed for TV. They even used his title. He ended up writing the novelization anyway. It is not a bad book, and occasionally fairly good, but your life will not be poorer if you skip it.
July 13, 2017
The resolution was a little predictable, but I couldn't help but enjoy it, especially now that I'm collecting 1960s pulp time travel fiction with awesome covers! This one is a prize in the collection! (I give the cover 4 stars, though the story is a 3-star story, at best.)
January 2, 2016
The omniscient point of view can't commit to clarity, and opens with ambiguity.
April 8, 2026
Companion book to Irwin Allen's TV series.
April 7, 2018
Enjoyable, easy read, with a satisfying ending, whether you've guessed what's coming or not (I did, and still loved it when it played out). Time travel is a perpetual theme of science fiction novels, perhaps because there are many angles from which to approach. Typically, what makes or breaks a time travel story is the characters, and while none of the characters in this novel are particularly deeply developed, their various personalities and qualities are just right for driving the story. This is not a tale heavy on science, rather focusing on the practical concerns of anachronisms and consequences.
Other reviewers have mentioned - but it bears repeating - this 1964 novel is unrelated to the later television show The Time Tunnel, despite the fact that Leinster was engaged to write the novelization of that show, the same publisher was used, and - inexplicably!! - the same cover art was used. To be fair, I did pick up this book because I enjoyed the TV show and the title therefore grabbed me, but I enjoyed it on its own merits.
Other reviewers have mentioned - but it bears repeating - this 1964 novel is unrelated to the later television show The Time Tunnel, despite the fact that Leinster was engaged to write the novelization of that show, the same publisher was used, and - inexplicably!! - the same cover art was used. To be fair, I did pick up this book because I enjoyed the TV show and the title therefore grabbed me, but I enjoyed it on its own merits.
August 13, 2022
A slightly interesting take on the concept, although this book narrows down the periods between which travel occurs to 1804 and 1964. I became a little tired of the oft-repeated paradox of killing one's own grandfather, but there is a nice twist at the end that depends on just that. Oddly enough, the world in which the 1960's travelers live is threatened by atomic war instigated by mainland China's desire to invade and regain Taiwan (known as Formosa then); so obviously Leinster was a time traveler himself and visited the 2020's before writing this book.
May 29, 2020
Definitely not one of his best. Too much repetition and very little clarity.
February 12, 2021
If you have ever read a story from a 1950s sci-fi magazine, then this is that kind of story, but a little better than most, not so campy.
May 1, 2022
I read this a long, long time ago, some 4.5 decades ago, and yet I can still remember parts of it. :)
January 15, 2024
Interesting philosophical ideas towards the end of the book. Enjoyable if one can ignore the sexism and standard description of women that's common for this era of SF pulp.
April 18, 2013
From the very birth of the conception of time travel, sci-fi authors and scientists alike have wrestled with the difficulties of time travel paradoxes most commonly expressed in the question of what would happen if you killed your grandfather during your trip to the past. In "Time Tunnel", Murray Leinster has treated his readers to what was probably the first (and quite possibly the best) instance of the infuriating mental tangles that one can encounter when the immutability of the progression of real time collides with the flexibility of time travel.
Leinster has crafted a positively ingenious combination of characters into a fascinating novel of high adventure that will both delight and fascinate his fans - a scientist who felt compelled to change the past in order to rescue the future from an impending atomic war between China and the US; young lovers who, fearing for their lives in a war-torn modern world, felt compelled to flee to a safer past; a 20th century burglar and con artist who realized the early 19th century was ripe for the plucking; and a playboy who was horrified to watch his grandfather die unmarried and childless.
The story begins in 1964 when Harrison, completing research for his PhD thesis in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, discovers long-buried correspondence showing that, in 1805, a gentleman named de Bassompierre had written to certain scientists handing out modern knowledge long before its acknowledged discovery. In one case, for example, "He wrote to Laplace, the astronomer, assuring him that Mars had two moons, very small and very close to its surface. He also said that there were three planets beyond Saturn, and that the one next out had a period of eighty-four years and two moons, one retrograde. He suggested that it should be called Uranus. He added that in the year 1808 there would be a nova in Persis, (which there was!) and he signed himself very respectfully, de Bassompierre." When Harrison and his friend, Pepe Ybarra, reach the conclusion that de Bassompierre was a time traveler who is attempting to change the future by handing out modern ideas before their time, the high jinks begin in earnest and the time travel conundrums drop into the readers' laps at a dizzying pace.
And the ending ... sigh! What a wonderfully clever simultaneous resolution of both the adventure plot-lines and the time travel paradoxes.
Recommended as a scintillating addition to the library of any reader who savors classic sci-fi from the pulp era.
Leinster has crafted a positively ingenious combination of characters into a fascinating novel of high adventure that will both delight and fascinate his fans - a scientist who felt compelled to change the past in order to rescue the future from an impending atomic war between China and the US; young lovers who, fearing for their lives in a war-torn modern world, felt compelled to flee to a safer past; a 20th century burglar and con artist who realized the early 19th century was ripe for the plucking; and a playboy who was horrified to watch his grandfather die unmarried and childless.
The story begins in 1964 when Harrison, completing research for his PhD thesis in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, discovers long-buried correspondence showing that, in 1805, a gentleman named de Bassompierre had written to certain scientists handing out modern knowledge long before its acknowledged discovery. In one case, for example, "He wrote to Laplace, the astronomer, assuring him that Mars had two moons, very small and very close to its surface. He also said that there were three planets beyond Saturn, and that the one next out had a period of eighty-four years and two moons, one retrograde. He suggested that it should be called Uranus. He added that in the year 1808 there would be a nova in Persis, (which there was!) and he signed himself very respectfully, de Bassompierre." When Harrison and his friend, Pepe Ybarra, reach the conclusion that de Bassompierre was a time traveler who is attempting to change the future by handing out modern ideas before their time, the high jinks begin in earnest and the time travel conundrums drop into the readers' laps at a dizzying pace.
And the ending ... sigh! What a wonderfully clever simultaneous resolution of both the adventure plot-lines and the time travel paradoxes.
Recommended as a scintillating addition to the library of any reader who savors classic sci-fi from the pulp era.
June 9, 2020
I vaguely remember reading this back when I was in the sixth grade. I liked it better then than I do now.
While the book is most assuredly of its day, it's still hard to overlook the casual racism and sexism that pervades the novel. Yes, it was normal back in the Sixties to portray Indians as bad guys, paying light lip service to how justified some of the actions of Quanah Parker and other native Americans were. We're meant to cheer their defeat. The battle at Adobe Wall, Texas is positioned as Whites vs. Injuns very clearly.
Then there's the character of Ann MacGregor, or the MacGregor as she's often referred to. While we're told she's a highly competent operator of the Time Tunnel, she's still portrayed as an overemotional, fragile woman, typical of the Sixties. Why, she even has a nervous breakdown because the man she loves, "Dou-Dr. Phillips" is trapped in the past in dangerous situations. It's hard to imagine the genders being flipped - Ann in the past and Dr. Doug Phillips at the Tunnel's controls - and Doug having a nervous breakdown.
Biggest problem for me is how boring I now find this book. It's a bit overwritten to me, killing the pace of the narrative. The historical events depicted in "The Time Tunnel" (the Johnstown Flood, the battle at Adobe Wall)should be exciting, entertaining. Yet, they're too drawn out and tedious.
Equally annoying is what feels like an unresolved plot point - Tony Newman's infatuation with a girl at Adobe Wall. Murray Leinster makes numerous references to how Tony is attracted to Elena. Yet, aside from reading a news report about the death of Elana, there's no pay-off for the infatuation. It was unnecessary and distracting.
Ultimately, Murray Leinster's "adaptation" of "The Time Tunnel" TV series is a disappointment.
While the book is most assuredly of its day, it's still hard to overlook the casual racism and sexism that pervades the novel. Yes, it was normal back in the Sixties to portray Indians as bad guys, paying light lip service to how justified some of the actions of Quanah Parker and other native Americans were. We're meant to cheer their defeat. The battle at Adobe Wall, Texas is positioned as Whites vs. Injuns very clearly.
Then there's the character of Ann MacGregor, or the MacGregor as she's often referred to. While we're told she's a highly competent operator of the Time Tunnel, she's still portrayed as an overemotional, fragile woman, typical of the Sixties. Why, she even has a nervous breakdown because the man she loves, "Dou-Dr. Phillips" is trapped in the past in dangerous situations. It's hard to imagine the genders being flipped - Ann in the past and Dr. Doug Phillips at the Tunnel's controls - and Doug having a nervous breakdown.
Biggest problem for me is how boring I now find this book. It's a bit overwritten to me, killing the pace of the narrative. The historical events depicted in "The Time Tunnel" (the Johnstown Flood, the battle at Adobe Wall)should be exciting, entertaining. Yet, they're too drawn out and tedious.
Equally annoying is what feels like an unresolved plot point - Tony Newman's infatuation with a girl at Adobe Wall. Murray Leinster makes numerous references to how Tony is attracted to Elena. Yet, aside from reading a news report about the death of Elana, there's no pay-off for the infatuation. It was unnecessary and distracting.
Ultimately, Murray Leinster's "adaptation" of "The Time Tunnel" TV series is a disappointment.
May 16, 2023
While this was an interesting and well contrived story about time travel, it truly had nothing to do with the Time Tunnel tv show I often viewed as a child. I can see how this story inspired the that tv show to write stories about the people and history involved in where/when the their time tunnel was connected (they had a movable malfunctioning tunnel which always almost retrieves the 2 scientist who happened through it accidentally). Anyway, I recommend the book and its author to anyone who enjoys time-travel stories.
October 28, 2014
I enjoyed this book, though it is not the greatest example of classic time travel sci fi. A lot of traipsing back and forth between 1804 and 1964 Paris. Slow moving, yet short. I enjoyed the characters, the Time Tunnel has a weak scientific excuse for being there, but once the rules are laid down, Leinster follows them.
July 23, 2011
More 60's era time travel stuff. It's probably the original for all the cliches, but since I grew up with the cliches and just read this now, it felt pretty stale to me.
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