George O. Smith (1911–1981)

I wasn't expecting much when I picked this up, but was pleasantly surprised.
Definitely has that 1950s feel about it, but the story kept moving with a few twists along the way.
Characters were a bit wooden.

Apparently the original title was "Highways in Hiding" which is more apt.

Presumably for marketing at the time "Space Plague" was preferred even if a bit misleading.
As was the inside blurb: "Cause: Unknown - except for one thing - it came from outer space. It was spread by unknown, deadly beings whose sole aim was to keep it spreading - UNTIL ALL THE WORLD WAS IN THEIR POWER!"

It's actually more like a good old fashioned detective / action novel than a space drama.… (más)

This is a sort of science fiction, with lots of scienc-y sounding words that don't really have any actual meaning, things like "Space Resinator".

It seems that the Almogordo Affair, i.e. the first testing of the atomic bomb in New Mexico in July, 1945, had three possible outcomes. Each outcome created a separate world, depending on what actually happened as a result of the test.

Ed Bronson, was fiddling with some kind of radio equipment in his basement, and started intercepting weird messages from someone named Virginia Carlson. It seems she was sending messages from Earth 2. Eventually, they find ways to get together and scope out the three different worlds, and arrange things so that the three worlds once again become one. Something like that.

I didn't find the book all that engaging, but that's, in part, because I'm not really much of a SciFi fan. Fortunately, it was short. I'd actually append a minus sign to the three stars, where I able. Please remember ***- is a not so great book, but one that is better than ** .… (más)

George O. Smith was a regular contributor to Astounding science Fiction and this novel length story was originally published in 1946, but repackaged as a novel in 1951. This is the first novel I have read by Smith and I almost gave up about a quarter of the way through because of the silly dialogue between the characters, which made up the majority of the text. Stellor Downing and Cliff Lane are two commanders of the Solar Guard, one based on Mars and the other on Venus. They are summoned to earth to spearhead an attack on a mysterious artefact some light years away from earth that is seen as a danger to earth's expanding civilisation. The artefact has been discovered by a race of small humanoid people from the planet Tlembo who are working with the earthlings. Stellor Downing and Cliff Lane are suitors for the same girl who happens to be the daughter of Co-Ordinator Kennenbec. The testosterone on show seems to have no limit as the two commanders try to outdo each other, hence some awful dialogue and sexist attitudes.

The novel is saved by a decent space opera story that kicks in, once Downing and Lane become forgotten characters. The assault force from earth must overcome a ruthless race of cat like people to destroy the artefact, but uncover a much more serious threat from another alien race the Loard-vogh who are planning to invade the solar system. Billy Thompson the commander of the Earth forces pits his wits against the aliens and the author Smith parades some hard science theories on interstellar space. There are space battles and inventive super weapons, but it is the psychological warfare between the races that makes this novel readable. Much of the dialogue in the latter part of the book is subsumed in the narrative, which was a relief to this reader who made it through to the end. There are plenty of Smith's science fiction novels out of copyright and available on the internet. 3 stars.… (más)