Because of travel I have combined the last two months. We were away for the last week of April and the first week of May. As a result I only read one Tubb and one Bulmer instead of one each month. I also managed to get through a lengthy Moorcock novel. The rest is free reading, including four from my Delphi Classics series on Kindle.
But the end of May is also the time I look back on another year of reading. It is now ten years since I began the Avon/Equinox SF project (see separate blog). I am now down to mostly two authors, E C Tubb and Kenneth Bulmer. I am stepping back even from these two authors somewhat, and will read one book a month by one or the other, instead of both in the same month. This frees up my time for the Delphi Classics series, as well as for my ever growing list of unrelated fiction.
Here is the summary for June to December 2025 January through May 2026. In total I read 98 books. 22 of those were by authors from the Avon/Equinox SF series, while 71 one of them were novels by various and sundry authors, many from the Delphi Classics series. My ten year total for Avon/Equinox authors is now at an astounding 898 books! In the same period I have read 361 books by other authors. That makes 1259 books over ten years, all reviewed. I'm a busy guy when not looking at maps.
Scorpio Invasion
is from 1992 and is 238 pages long. It is #40 in the Dray Prescott
series by Kenneth Bulmer, and we find Dray face to face with the Star Lords once again,
after defying them in the previous book. All is well, however, and he
even manages to talk them into following his advice for his next step in
serving them. The Shanks ("Fishheads") are a savage and evil bunch
attempting to take over the entire planet and enslave everyone. Dray
has fought them before, but this time he volunteers to go into a city
that they have captured and are terrorizing. He enlists the help of
some renegades and like-minded slaves in hopes of timing his attack from
within the city with the upcoming one from without. Bulmer's attention
to detail is an awesome feat; I don't know how he kept track of events
from earlier books, but he even footnotes where readers can go back and
check if they so wish. Also, his sense of humour seldom lets up,
leaving behind all of the much more serious fantasy adventure novels in
this aspect. The novel ends at a cliffhanger moment, so we will have to
wait awhile to find out what happens next. Will Dray Prescott be able
to save his friends from slavery, or will he be captured and enslaved
himself? This fun and fascinating series continues to interest me, even
forty books on. *** stars.
Incident on Ath is from 1978 and is 188 pages long, #18 in the on-going saga of Earl Dumarest written by E C Tubb. Any book
in this series would make a fantastic SF movie, though the same could be
said for virtually any book by Tubb. But Star Wars marches on. This
time we begin on planet Juba, a place that Dumarest is trying to now
leave. He is being searched for the Cyclan, that race of Cybers--part
human, mostly machine) for knowledge he has tucked away in his brain.
This knowledge will advance their cause greatly in their scheme to rule
the galaxy, so our hero is always on the run. Where is he going? This
is the one weak link in this series. He wants to return to earth, where
he was born, but no one has heard of it and thinks it's a myth. His
reasons for returning are never given--when he left as a boy it was a
world devastated by war and environmental disasters. So why not go back
and see the old homestead. Anyway, he hears of the planet Ath, which
sounds like the planet he is looking for. As things turn out, Ath
likely had all the answers he needed, but, like the old TV series The
Fugitive, Tubb can never give him what he wants. The computer with the
knowledge gets blown up in a man's failed scheme to take over the
planet, which has something very much like Herbert's spice. And so we
move on to the next volume. Tubb weaves an amazing story around these
events, with a lot of science mixed in for good measure. He even
includes the arts, with a disillusioned painter and a very beautiful and
talented ballerina. This is one of the better entries in the series. *** stars.
The Whispering Swarm is
from 2014, the first book of The Sanctuary of the White Friars series by Michael Moorcock.
The book is 470 pages and is divided into 3 shorter books. I read one
of the shorter books each past month, the first one 190 pages long. 90% of
this first book is Moorcock's autobiography, and he throws in a little
bit of mysterious goings on in London for seasoning. I wish he had just
stuck to autobiography or to fiction; the two do not mesh very well.
In fact, Moorcock comes out looking like a total idiot, one of the
stupidest heroes of any book I have ever read. Even though he
continually wanders into a fantasy London area, he attributes it to
LSD. Really? Is anybody that dumb? While he goes on and on about how
great his imagination is, the best he can come up with for explaining
the strange goings on behind the big gate he sometimes has access to is
to say it was LSD. Very good, Michael. Very believable. He becomes
one of those characters you want to shake very badly, or see him get run
over by a bus. The fantasy part shows promise, whenever he decides to
get more serious about it. The autobiography is interesting since
Moorcock has met so many influential writers. Right now I have very
mixed feelings about the book, as it took 190 pages to convince himself
that something strange is actually happening to him. Great deduction.
More to follow next month.
Reviewed February 2nd/26
The 2nd book of The Whispering Swarm
continues pretty much in the same tradition as the first, except that
Michael now is beginning to believe something strange is going on. Ya
think? Was there ever such as moron in fiction who lived to tell the
tale? Michael divides his time between telling us more of his
autobiography, how much his loves his wife and daughters, how much he
loves the girl from behind the gates he's shagging, and how his tinnitus stops when he
goes there. Yet he still makes no real connection. In most horror
novels such a dimwitted hero would likely die and no one would miss
him. I am coming around to wishinf for that idea in this case.
Reviewed March 1st/26
In the 3rd book of The Whispering Swarm Moorcock
continues to use the kitchen sink approach to writing. He uses
autobiography a lot (changed somewhat, of course), fantasy, SF and, in
this book, increases the use of historical fiction. British history is
filled with opportunities to write fictional accounts of what might have
happened, and is a major genre of fiction writing today. Moorcock taps
into this with his Cromwell versus King Charles I. He joins a party of
loyalists who attempt to rescue the King from prison the night before he
is to be executed. Moorcock and readers know that Charles was
beheaded, but with Moorcock and his use of multi universes one never
knows where this angle might be going. Be reassured that history does
follow its course, but the reason that the rescue does not come off is
that Charles refuses to be rescued. There follows a climactic scene on
the frozen Thames at night during a winter thunder snowstorm. While
the third book in this volume is the best of the three, it still can't
really save a sinking ship. Planned as a series of four volumes, at least
one more has been written. I may or may not get around to it. If I
can pick up the next volume cheaply I will, but that is still no
guarantee it will get read and reviewed. I wish Moorcock had simply
written an autobiography. For now, Moorcock reading and reviews will be rested for a
time.
** 1/2 stars
Turning now to Delphi Classics I began with another round of stories featuring martin Hewitt, private detective. Just as smart as Holmes, and much more personable, Hewitt and his sidekick Brett tackle a mastermind criminal this time. Arthur Morrison's The Red Triangle is a series of six stories from 1903. Mastermind Maes is behind all of the crimes investigated, and though the stories can be read as separate tales, there are ingeniously woven together to form a novel. Similar to Moriarty and Holmes, Maes is thwarted in all of his misdeeds by Hewitt, and though they do have a final encounter in the sixth and final story, it ends very differently in this telling for the detective. All of the stories are well written and worth reading, and the linking device used to make us keep reading is a good one. All of Morrison's Martin Hewitt tales are recommended highly to fans of Sherlock Holmes, and they can stand up against most of Doyle's tales. *** 1/2 stars.
Next came another book by E. Nesbit concerning the Bastable Children. The New Treasure Seekers is from 1904 and contains several shorter stories loosely linked. In the first story one of the boys tries to stowaway to Rome, hiding in a clothing basket dressed in a clown suit. It becomes a true childhood misadventure. In the next story the children try to concoct a superior Christmas pudding. This story is pretty funny and more than plausible. Don't forget to wash the raisins and currents before using them.
The third story is about a distant cousin who visits and is slightly older than the Bastable children. Archibald is also a cad of the first order, but proves no match for his more sensible and decent younger cousins (and their female servant). In "Over The Water To China" the children get into a situation when they go searching for their lost dog. It takes them across the Thames from Greenwich and into a very poor area as they follow a lead on their missing dog. Three of them, led by Alice, end up in a street fight with five thuggish and unpleasant boys tormenting an elderly Chinese man. After a day long adventure it turns out that the dog wasn't missing after all.
In "The Young Antiquaries" they venture to Red House to meet again with the famous writer who lives there, and this time meet Mrs. Red House, who turns into a very good sport and super fine person. In the next story their Red House adventure continues, leading to an undiscovered extra room in the cellar and the treasures found there in.
The next story is one of revenge, but the result is far from sweet. In the next story the children try to do their writer uncle, who is in Rome, a favour by convincing his London editor that the chapter returned for a rewrite is worth printing as it is. Good intentions always seem to go off the rails with these children, and this episode is no different.
The final three stories take place at the seaside, after the children are sent there to recuperate following a measles outbreak. Along with Mr and Mrs Redhouse, a new adult friend is made, the sister of the woman they are lodging with. It ends by the narrator (Oswald, of course) informing us that there will be no further Bastable stories. And he was correct.
*** stars.
P D Wodehouse wrote a number of books about upper grade public school boys, usually involving cricket as a central theme. The Head of Kay's is from 1905 and follows the day to day adventures of several boys at boarding school. The funny thing about these books, and probably why they were popular with boys at the time, is that there is no mention of actual school work or in-class scenes. The story revolves around life before and after classes and on weekends. Girls play no part in the stories, either. Sport, mischief and getting along with others is a recurring theme, though Wodehouse is such a fine storyteller that a reader can sail through the book effortlessly and not be minded about themes or ideals very much. Kay's is one of the school houses, identified by the teacher put in charge of it, and old Kay himself is a character to be reckoned with. His house has a bad reputation and so he pilfers a senior from a different house to try and bring some order to his realm. *** stars.
I brought two books to London with me, one to read at the hotel at night and the second to read on the long plane ride home. Roddy Doyle's The Deportees and Other Stories was published in paperback in 2007 and contains 8 stories. All of the stories are concerned with the immigrant experience in Ireland, and while each story has something important to say on the topic, a few say it better than anything I have ever come across. "Guess Who Is Coming To Dinner" is about a black man coming to dine in a typical working class Irish household, and the father's reaction to the event. The story is priceless and very well told. The title story is a sort of followup to the author's best known novel, The Commitments. This time the band is built using only immigrant talent. The story is very funny and worth reading just as a lark, never mind the deeper meaning it may have. It is worth the price of the book. "New Boy" is a terrific tale of a young black schoolboy enduring his first day in a new school in a new country. A virtuoso telling of a traumatic experience. "57% Iris is a funny story about what it means to be Irish, and how such a concept can be broken into a mathematical statement of fact. Funny and very original. "The Pram" is a first rate horror tale about a haunted pram and the Polish woman who must push it every day with the baby she looks after for an Irish family. This is one of the grimmest tales of immigrant experience I have ever read. All in all this is a rich collection containing several unforgettable tales. Highly recommended.
***1/2 stars.
Outside Looking In is a truly remarkable story by T. C. Boyle from 2019. It is a fictional look at the history of LSD and its use among early researchers. The story begins in a Swiss lab during WW II, then jumps to the early 1960s at Harvard. This is a not very thinly disguised history of Timothy Leary's LSD experiments. The story centers around Fritz, a grad student studying Psychology, and his wife Joanie and their young son Corey. Fritz comes under the influence of the very charismatic Tim(othy) and he and his wife begin using LSD for research purposes. Timothy Leary remains one of the most fascinating characters of the 20th C, polarizing people's views as to his research methods and his use of drugs to gain enlightenment. While the novel focuses on the early years of experimentation, including several seasons at Millbank and the Mexico summers, the book really dives deep into the milieu of early 60s drug experimentation, with Boyle's focus on one family as a way to show outsiders what was really going on. Fitz's inability to free himself from the group experience (his wife eventually pulls out with their son), and the fact that his life is going absolutely nowhere, is the tragic outcome of a science experiment that ditched the science and went with the drug experience instead. Fritz essentially fell into a black hole and was unable to extricate himself. The final words of the novel are shocking, though we knew all along what was happening and what wasn't. The search for Truth evaporated into an alcoholic and drug induced haze of existence; it became a never ending party, fundraising event and nothing more. This is a story that I didn't want to end, but the ending was perfect, as we watch the (sinking) ship sail on. And on. **** stars.
A good read to follow up with was Paddy Chayefsky's 1978 novel Altered States. I have seen the film many times and have always wanted to read the novel. The author did a lot of research before he began writing it, but he still takes us where no man has ever gone before. This is a fascinating SF novel about one man's search for Truth, and finding it. There is a good deal of science talk and the main characters are all doctors of some sort, including medical. This should not turn off a general reader as the story is as fascinating as it gets. In the previous novel reviewed above we saw Leary and others fail in their search for Truth through the use of LSD. In the end they just became addicted to the high. It would be like just watching the trippy light show scene from 2001 over and over again, rather than the entire film. The hero in Altered States is just as crazy as Leary, but a bit more serious about achieving his goal. What a fascinating line of thought to realize that within us might be locked away the entire history of evolution. Is there a way to tap into it? Edward Jessop tries an isolation tank, then drugs, then a combination of both before hitting on the bullseye. Though the film version is terrific, the novel is much better, with clearer goals and outcomes than the film. The book is pretty short, highly readable and very highly recommended. **** stars.
The Starless Sea is a book that I was greatly looking forward to reading. Erin Morgenstern had written a fantasy masterpiece in her previous work The Night Circus. I was excited to finally see her second novel arrive at the top of my reading list. Published in 2019, I can honestly say that the book was a great disappointment. It is a muddled mess with cardboard characters (less than dolls), no line of direction, and an ending so confusing that I doubt many readers (if they even read that far) came away with anything. It's the kind of novel that some people might encounter and think they are reading something very profound. While the ideas behind the book are original and very intriguing, their handling leaves so much to be desired.
For starters, the book is way too long. It needs a brutal edit. That would hopefully knock off about 150 unnecessary pages. The author needs to focus on what it is she is doing, saying and trying to achieve. None of the characters appear to know, usually a bad sign in a novel. The lead character is a gay male gamer who gets caught up in a whirlwind of fairy tale activity, most of it below ground. He is constantly off balance, wondering what is happening to him. None of the characters grow or change in any way during the novel. The author seems lost herself in a world of fairy tales, with the Alice stories uppermost in her mind as she writes. While her fantasy world creations are every bit as enchanting as those found in the Alice stories, Morgenstern's wit and writing skills fall far below those of Lewis Carroll. I cannot recall a single funny line in the current book, nor any attempt to link what is happening underground to anything above. Humourless fantasy books become very tiring after a while, and this one really tuckered me.
As to the writing itself, there are some passages better suited to poetry; good poetry. Most of the time, however, the writing is less than stellar. I will give two examples; if you require more I can easily provide them. These examples are from Book V "The Owl King."
"A sword and a crown surrounded by a swarm of paper bees. A ship without a sea. A library. A city. A fire. A chasm filled with bones and dreams. A figure in a fur coat on a beach. A shape like a cloud or a small blue car. A cherry tree with book-page blossoms."
Seriously? What the hell is that suppose to contribute to a 500 page novel? Necessary? Illuminating? She is supposedly writing for adults. I feel offended. Another paragraph:
Zachary Ezra Rawlins looks down at words he has been longing to read, near delirious to have finally found another sentence that starts with the son of the fortune-teller in a familiar serifed typeface on a piece of paper removed from a book before being turned into a paper star and then gifted to him by a small owl and then he stops.
Quite the run on sentence, is it not? Did this book even have an editor? If you want more examples, message me or better yet read the book and keep count. I stopped counting after a while. Now we come to the ending, such as it is (spoiler alert). Zachary Ezra Rawlins (as he is always called in the book by the author) dies. But his boyfriend (luckily) found a beating heart in a box. When they finally meet up, after searching for each other a long time, he places the heart (surgical technique not specified) in Zach and brings him back to life. Afterwards, I believe they live happily ever after. How's that for a terrific ending, after 499 pages of wandering around aimlessly and trying to figure out what is happening? You may be wondering about that starless sea we hear so much about. It's really far underground, and it consists of honey. Yup. Honey. It rises up at the end, too.
Was there anything I liked about the book? I liked the possibility of books being important in more than obvious ways. I liked the idea of a fairy tale for adults. I like some of the author's descriptions, and even her original fairy tale stories were quite good. So it wasn't all a bad dream. But it was a disappointing one. ** stars.
I finished up with "Killer's Choice", #5 in Ed McBain's 87th Precinct series and published in 1957. These are hard boiled police procedures along the lines of Dragnet, but the writing is amazingly good. In 1957 detective work was an all boys club, and the 87th is no exception. Usually more than one crime is dealt with in a book, and this one has two murder investigations going on at the same time. A detective new to the squad arrives from a somewhat softer precinct, and he makes a mistake that almost gets his partner killed. Luckily he learn fast. A brutal thief kills a cop during a robbery, and a woman is murdered at her liquor store workplace. Both are interesting cases, but the woman's murder is better written in every way. Two things stand out about the investigation into her murder. Firstly, every person who knew her and was interviewed by the detectives give vastly a different version of who she really was. Her ex, her mother, her employer etc all paint almost totally different pictures of her character. This is not something readers encounter very often in detective stories, and it adds an intriguing dimension. The second stand out feature is the woman's young daughter. Monica is 5 and in kindergarten and lives with her mom (now deceased but she is never told in the story) and grandmother. She is a charmer from the first time we meet her and proves to be a reliable witness after taking a phone call and telling the detectives about it. All about it. She has a flawless memory. We really feel for this girl, who will have to live her life without her mother. A very good entry in the series. ***1/2 stars.
See you next month.
Mapman Mike
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