Two Thousand Million Or So Years Ago Two Galaxies Were Colliding
June 11, 2007 by Elijah
I must admit that I’m a relative newcomer to science fiction (not on purpose, Lord knows, it just somehow happened that way) so when I just recently got a real start on reading the genre I decided, after becoming interested, to start at the beginning.
Not the beginning meaning Welles and Verne (although I have already read and loved that stuff, of course) but the beginning of the rip-roaring, adventurous, GRANDIOSE (as Doc Smith would probably put it) sub-genre of the Space Opera. I love old, pulpy stuff, as a rule, and E.E. “Doc” Smith’s Lensman series is rife with such wonder.
I realize that most seasoned fans of the genre are already aware of this series, but apparently not all. When I loaned the first book, Triplanetary, to a rabid sci-fi reader friend of mine, he was absolutely stunned upon reading it and essentially said: “oh my God, this started everything!” Which I had heard before, but it meant more coming from someone I knew.
Now, I’m not going to go on and on about the series at this juncture. The main reason it’s in my mind at the moment is because I am positively racing to finish book number four, Grey Lensman, before the 12th of the month–this is because the 12th is when Tobias Buckell’s Ragamuffin drops (you can read the first 13 chapters for free right here). My one rule of reading multiple books at once is that I can’t have two of the same genre at a time, so to handle Buckell’s self-styled “Caribbean Space Opera” I need to have finished my current Smith novel. Since Ragamuffin’s precursor Crystal Rain was what finally got me into reading science fiction regularly, I really haven’t a choice but to buy and start this new book as soon as humanly possible.
But, until I get into Lensman on this site with more vigor, let me just throw out there real quick that the series is for you if you want to see the beginning of many, many science fiction conventions… or, conversely, if you like reading fun passages like this one:
No ordinary storage cells fed those mighty projectors; along no ordinary bus-bars were their Titanic amperages borne. Those maulers were designed to do just one thing–to maul–and that one thing they did well; relentlessly and thoroughly.
Besides, how could you possibly front on those beautiful old covers?
