Day of the Moron, by H. Beam Piper

Science Fiction

I’ve been an H. Beam Piper fan since I was a young whippersnapper. With the new Fuzzy novel out, I dusted this one off, as well. Day of the Moron is a story I read as a child, and it always troubled me a bit. Although dated, it is appropriate for modern times.

There is trouble at a nuclear power plant, and it stems from a labor/management showdown. The protagonist, Melroy, wants to test his union employees to make sure they aren’t morons. They, of course, object. It follows tired lines of melodrama and the very foreseeable ending doesn’t cast the “enlightened individual vs. everyone else” Ayn Randian moral that I think was Mr. Piper’s intent. It comes off as a self-assured blowhard doing things that he knows will have a bad result, and he does them at the worst possible moment. In the end, Melroy might have proven himself to be technically correct, but you have to wonder about the intelligence of someone who does what he did.

The “enlightened individual” who saves everyone is a theme in Piper’s work, and when the characters are capable of self-reflection, don’t preach, and are up against clearly bad people, he pulls it off. This is not one of those stories. I guess there is a reason this one doesn’t see the light of day very often.


Day of the Moron is available at Project Gutenberg. (It’s free!)

Review written by Christopher Jones.

Fuzzy Nation, by John Scalzi

Science Fiction

Billed as a reboot of Little Fuzzy, Fuzzy Nation is indeed a reboot. Gone are mentions of contragravity and collapsium. Also gone is the Yeoman Farmer pipe-dream that was always a hallmark of H. Beam Piper’s work. There is a hint of it at the beginning, but it evaporates by the end. While I did miss contragrav and ExTeeThree, the story rings true and Scalzi kept my attention.

The story begins much the same as the original, with the addition of a running gag that’s present throughout. And it works. The list of characters is a bit different, but still full of rivalry and tension. Whereas Holloway of the original was a gunslinger, Scalzi’s Holloway is a schemer. It’s a sad state of affairs but it’s not an indictment of the work; merely an observation Scalzi wove into the story line. Perhaps it’s also a wry comment on the current state of our schizophrenic Nash Equilibrium obsessed world.

I’m a bit of a retro-grouch and protective of my childhood scifi. Even so, I can still recommend Fuzzy Nation.

Review written by Christopher Jones

Space Viking by H. Beam Piper

My Mixed Book Bag has Space Opera today.

H Beam Piper published his first Science Fiction story in 1948 and continued to write and publish until his death in 1964. Space Viking was published as a serial in Analog in 1963. The copyright has expired on the book and it is available free on Gutenberg as are all of Piper’s books. Many of the books have also been republished in paperback. I picked Space Viking up at library book sale. This edition was published by Cosmos Books and looks to be fairly recent.

Piper wrote adventure mixed with the lessons of history. Space Viking has quite a bit of commentary on government and why it fails. His comments are as relevant today as they were in the 1960’ when he wrote the book. This is space opera full of action and adventure and all political comments are skillfully woven into the story line. It makes for an enjoyable fun read. The book suffers in one regard. Women have little or no significant role in the story. As this was true of most Science Fiction written in the 1960’s I just overlooked the lack and enjoyed the story.

Pick up Space Viking and follow Lucas Trask as he starts out to avenge his wife’s murder and ends up founding and ruling a new star nation.