Category Archives: Leigh Brackett

Back, and in Time for Leigh Brackett’s Birthday

No, I’m not dead, and I’ll post an update within the next few days. It’s been a hectic few months that have involved a lot more travel than I was expecting. Hopefully, I’ll post more regularly. Things are starting to get into a routine.

Leigh Brackett

But today, I want to mention Leigh Brackett (1915-1978). I’ve not read anything by her for this post, but I didn’t want to let her birthday pass.

As I’ve stated in numerous other posts, Brackett is one of my favorite writers. Her space opera is some of the best around. She often managed to blend it with a hardboiled tone.  It’s worth seeking out if you can find it. I’ve noticed that other than the Skaith trilogy, which I started rereading earlier this year, she’s pretty hard to find in paper.

So, I’ll raise a glass to her memory before I go to bed and hope I dream of a solar system like the one she created.

Leigh Brackett Birthday Post Placeholder

Today, December 7, is the birthday of Leigh Brackett  (1915-1978). I’ve read a couple of her stories, but I’m not up for a post tonight. I’ve spent the evening finishing grading final exams and responding to student inquiries as to why their lab grade isn’t an A. (“You have multiple zeroes. Try attending all the labs next time. “)

I’ll post something of substance sometime in the next few days. But I didn’t want this day to pass without mentioning it.

Blogging Northwest Smith: “The Tree of Life”

C. L. Moore (1911-1987) was born on this date, January 24. Shen  was one of the greatest writers of the fantastic in the 20th Century.

For today’s post, I’m going to continue the series I’ve been doing on her character Northwest Smith. Smith is frequently regarded as a Han Solo prototype.

In “The Tree of Life” he’s on his own, without his Venusain partner Yarol.

The opening of the story could have been written by Leigh Brackett, and I had to remind myself that this story is set on a different Mars than the one Brackett wrote about. Continue reading

Blogging Brackett: “The Beast-Jewel of Mars”

Today, December 7, is the birthday of Leigh Brackett (1915-1978). That’s big deal here.

For today’s birthday post, I’m going to look at “The Beast-Jewel of Mars”. It was first published in the Winter 1948 issue of Planet Stories. It is currently available in the ebook Martian Quest (not to be confused with the omnibus of the same name from Haffner Press. That one is out of print. Amazon lists one copy of the Haffner volume for $256.)

Burk Winters is a spaceship captain who has resigned. His fiance, Jill Leland, took a flier out into the desert. Her flier was found crashed, but her body is missing. He’s going to look for her. Burk has an unusual plan to do that.

There’s a Martian practice known as Shanga, the going-back. In it a person regresses to a more primitive state. It’s like a legalized drug. There are Shanga parlors, sort of like opium dens, but the experience is weak. Burk wants the full experience, which is technically illegal. Jill was a Shanga addict, and Burk is hoping to find her.

Here’s how Brackett describes what Burk sees when he goes to a Shanga parlor.

Their faces (the Earthmen’s) were pallid and effeminate, scored with the haggard marks of life lived under the driving tension of a super-modren age.

A Martian woman sat in an alcove, behind a glassite desk. She was dark, sophisticatedly lovely. Her costume was the aftfully adapted short rove of ancient Mars, and she wore no ornament. Her slanting topaz eyes regarded Burk Winters with professional plesantness, but deep in them he could see the scorn and the pride of a race so old that the Terran exquisites of the Trade Cities were only crude children beside it.

Burk goes to an ancient city on a canal, a city that was once a port on an ancient sea, now long dry. There he undergoes Shanga, and he finds a lot more than he bargains for.

Leigh Brackett

One of the pleasures of reading Brackett is that, like REH, she could describe action with poetry. She can set a mood with a few lines of description like few writers can. There is a strong undercurrent of anti-colonialism in this story. That’s something of a trend today in what’s being currently written. Brackett shows the effects of colonialism in this story, and she didn’t need a doorstop of a book to do it. And she does it without neglecting character or action.

Burk is like many of Brackett’s characters. He’s a hard, bitter man who is looking for a lost love. This is a theme that crops up often in Brackett’s work, and in her hands, it’s always fresh.

I found “The Beast-Jewel of Mars” to be an excellent story. I’m not going to give the ending away. I’ll let you read it for yourself. There’s something about Brackett’s work that speaks to me deep in my soul. Yeah, I know, that sounds pretty deep. But her work scratches an itch that few other writers can. You should check her out if you haven’t yet.

 

Retro Hugos: “The Jewel of Bas” by Leigh Brackett

I did a post on this story a few years ago, which you can find here. I’m not going to write another review.  I did reread “The Jewel of Bas”, mostly in the waiting room while my son was having his wisdom teeth removed this afternoon. I’ll post a few thoughts on it below and try not to repeat what I wrote in the original post.

“The Jewel of Bas” was originally published in the Spring 1944 issue of Planet Stories. I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be it on the cover or not. The man and the woman don’t look like the two principle characters in the story, but the rest of the illustration could be.

I said in the earlier post on this story that I didn’t think it was part of Brackett’s solar system but that it might could be. Having read the story again, I am going to back off of that position a little. I very well could be.

I also liked how Brackett  mentioned Cimmeria and Hyperborea, and made them a part of the world of the story. One thing I missed was that the god Bas said that he came from Atlantis and that the priests of Dagon there considered him a living blasphemy.  One of Henry Kuttner’s Elak of Atlantis stories was titled “The Spawn of Dagon”  Kuttner was a friend of Brackett’s and something of a mentor to her as she was beginning her career. An homage to Kuttner in this reference. I doubt we can know for sure at this late date, but I like to think so.

I really liked this story a lot.  There’s one more in the novella category left, and that’s Kuttner’s “A God Named Kroo”.  That will be the next in this series.

UPDATE: I saw after I posted this review that the Retro Hugo winners had been announced. I wasn’t expecting that for a couple of days. I had gotten the impression they were going to be announced Saturday.  I’ll still do the Kuttner post, but I may not break m y neck to get it up tomorrow.

 

Thoughts on the Retro Hugos and a Question

The nominees for the Retro Hugos were announced yesterday.  If you aren’t familiar with them, they are given for the best science fiction or fantasy for the previous year, only for a year 75 years prior. In this case, it’s the 1945 Retro Hugos for the works from 1944.  Here are the fiction nominees.  I’m not going to worry about editors, artists, fanzines, or any of the other categories.  I’ll have a few things to say below the list, as well as a question for you. Continue reading

“Mars Minus Bisha” and Leigh Brackett

“Mars Minus Bisha”
Originally published in Planet Stories, January 1954

Today, December 7, marks the birth of Leigh Brackett (1915-1978). As has become customary in these here parts, we observed that day by reading one of her works. This year it’s the story “Mars Minus Bisha”.

The was collected in the long out of print book The Coming of the Terrans. It’s set in the year 2016. Fraser is a doctor doing research on viruses outside a remote Martian village. He lives in a Quonset hut juts past the edge of town. He’s not exactly welcome there. Continue reading

Black Friday, Adventures Fantastic Style: Ladies Edition

If you saw my post last year, I observed Black Friday by looking at a number stories by Robert E. Howard that contained the word “black” in the title.

If you are unaware of what Black Friday is, I envy you here’s the scoop. Because our consumer driven economy is totally whacked, we have to make our year’s profit in about a month. (I’m a hardcore free-market capitalist, but give me a break.) So anyone not living in a cave or under a rock (Is there room under there for me?) will find themselves bombarded with advertising, sales, and spam. Pohl and Kornbluth’s The Space Merchants nailed it.

In order to provide relief from the insanity last year, I looked at Howard. This year, in the interest of gender equity, it’s the ladies’ turn.  Last year I had enough time to read all the stories I listed. This year I was a little pressed for time, so I’m providing links to previous reviews. Continue reading

Hey! It’s Leigh Brackett’s Birthday Again

Leigh Brackett was born on this date, December 7, in 1915.  I’m not sure what I can say about her that I haven’t said before.  Today is the first day of final exams and I just sent the last of over 2000 lab grades to the lecture instructors, so I haven’t  had a chance to read anything by her or come up with a good angle for a birthday tribute.

Or to put it another way, consider this post a placeholder.  I’ll try to read a Brackett story I haven’t read before or reread since I was a teenager and post a review sometime in the next week or so.

Until then, lift a glass in her memory and read one of her stories.  You’ll be glad you did.

C. L. Moore Channels Brackett and Howard

“There Shall Be Darkness”
Miracle in Three Dimensions
Isle Press
Trade Paper, $16.95
Original publication, Astounding, February 1942

I meant to have this review posted a few days ago, but Real Life got in the way. (I am legally prohibited from discussing the situation; its a personnel matter.) I just finished reading the story a little while ago.

It’s definitely a blend of Brackett setting and Howardian themes. James Douglas, AKA Jamie, is the commander of the Earth forces on the planet Venus. There’s some indication this may taken place in the future of the Northwest Smith series. In the first scene, Jamie comes in and asks for segir whiskey, the preferred drink of Northwest Smith. If it is the same future, it’s much later along the timeline.

You can’t blame him for wanting a drink. He’s in a bad situation. He’s just received his orders to evacuate Venus. The Empire of Earth is falling. Barbarians, the less developed races in the solar system in this instance, have conquered Mars and are in the process of invading Earth. There are overtones of ancient Rome in this setup. Jamie’s Venusian lover, Quanna, begs him to take her to Earth. He refuses, so she takes matters into her own hands.

Jamie is dealing with an outlaw chieftain, Vastari, who is the only person who can unite the squabbling Venusian tribes into a single unit. Vastari sees himself as a freedom fighter, a soldier struggling to throw off the yoke of tyranny. He’s also Quanna’s brother. Jamie thinks she’s a loyal lover. Vastari thinks she’s a loyal spy. Quanna is only loyal to herself. Continue reading