I tried sending Patti a notice that I'd like to take part in Forgotten Books Friday but I don't think we managed to connect. It's the first time in a long time I've had a chance to do anything for that. Anyway, here's an unofficial entry for Forgotten Books Friday:
Anything that I could find at our small-town library that
smacked of science fiction got checked out and brought home. Thus it was I
stumbled upon a little paperback called “Crashing Suns,” by Edmond Hamilton. I
didn’t recognize the author’s name at the time; I was more familiar with
Asimov, Clarke, Anderson, Heinlein. It didn’t matter. The cover showed a
rocket-ship and a round, pink, fuzzy alien with multiple limbs pointing a
blaster at an astronaut. More importantly to me, the words “Crashing Suns” and
the catch phrase on the cover of “Red alert for the Interstellar Patrol”
ignited my imagination. Many, many years later, I found a copy of this book in
a used book store and snapped it up. It’s too brittle and worn to read again
but I still cherish it.
The book contains five novella length space opera stories,
the title piece, “The Star Stealers,” “Within the Nebula,” “The Comet Drivers,”
and “The Cosmic Cloud.” From what I can find out, all five of the stories were
published in Weird Tales between 1928
and 1930. All but the first involve the Interstellar Patrol, sort of a
pre-Federation Starfleet that defends the galaxy from evil. Hamilton apparently
wrote these tales in a white heat and they sometimes show it. The science is
often inaccurate and the language is quite overblown with flights of fancy in
many places. But, you know, I don’t care. Hamilton was clearly enjoying himself
and I enjoyed right along with him. There’s passion and excitement and that can
make up for a lot of technical slights. I still want to join the Interstellar
Patrol. I may be 56 on the outside, but inside I’m still 12 when I hear the
siren call of “Crashing Suns.”
