 First edition | |
| Author | Jack Vance |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| Publisher | Ballantine |
Publication date | 1966 |
| Media type | Print (paperback) |
| Pages | 190 |
| OCLC | 2304721 |
The Blue World is a science fiction adventure novel by American writer Jack Vance. The novel is based on Vance's earlier novella "The Kragen", which appeared in the July 1964 edition of Fantastic Stories of Imagination . [1]
Sklar Hast, the protagonist, had achieved a measure of success and prosperity by passing his examination to be a “Hoodwink”, or semaphore tower operator – a prestigious position on the Blue World, a planet with no land at all. During the space of twelve generations, the descendants of a crashed prison ship have created a rudimentary civilization on the water-covered planet, living on huge sea plants. They have a hierarchy of castes named after the different classes of criminal: the highest caste is the Incendiarists and the lowest is the Hooligans. They also have no idea that their ancestors were criminals, believing them to have been the victims of oppressors. They have evolved a peaceful society, and ignore the hints in texts saved from the first generation of what their origins actually were. [2]
The world is mostly safe. However, they must beware the kragen, giant, semi-intelligent squid-like predators which roam the ocean. The colonists eventually develop a relationship with one of these, King Kragen. It drives off other kragen in return for offerings of food organized by an entrenched quasi-religious priesthood built up over generations. King Kragen grows to become the largest and most powerful kragen, demanding more and more food as time goes by.
When Sklar questions the need to continue to worship and feed this predator, King Kragen appears, wrecks his home and kills his mentor. Rather than regard this as divine punishment, Sklar suspects that the conservative priesthood has enough control over King Kragen to kill those who oppose their views, and to thus uphold their privileged status.
Sklar's mission is to convince his fellow citizens that they must kill King Kragen in order to be free. And, if so, to discover how can they do it in a world without materials to make weapons.
The Blue World was nominated for the Nebula Award in 1966. It was also a preliminary nominee for the Prometheus Award for “Best Classic Libertarian SF Novel” in 1988, 1994, 1995 and 1996. [1]
Stanisław Lem criticised the novel's technological aspect as being highly unrealistic. [3]
Dying Earth is a fantasy series by the American author Jack Vance, comprising four books originally published from 1950 to 1984. Some have been called picaresque. They vary from short story collections to a fix-up, perhaps all the way to novel.
Stanisław Herman Lem was a Polish writer of novels, short stories and essays on various subjects, including philosophy, futurology, and literary criticism. Many of his science fiction stories are of satirical and humorous character. Lem's books have been translated into more than 50 languages and have sold more than 45 million copies. Worldwide, he is best known as the author of the 1961 novel Solaris. In 1976 Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world.
The Languages of Pao is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Vance, first published in 1958, based on the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis, which asserts that a language's structure and grammar construct the perception and consciousness of its speakers. In the novel, the placid people from the planet Pao rely on other planets for technological innovations and manufactured goods and they do not resist when an invading force occupies the land and levies heavy taxes. To expel the aggressors and make the planet more independent, three new languages are introduced. A scientific language induces its speakers to innovate more; a well-ordered language encourages its speakers to be industrious; and a warlike language induces competitiveness and aggression. The new languages change the culture and Pao ousts their overlords and develops a sophisticated modern economy.
Fiasco is a science fiction novel by Polish author Stanisław Lem, first published in a German translation in 1986. The book, published in Poland the following year and translated into English by Michael Kandel in the same year, is a further elaboration of Lem's skepticism: in Lem's opinion, the difficulty in communication with extraterrestrial intelligence is more likely cultural disparity rather than spatial distance. It was nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award.
Demon Princes is a series of five science fiction novels by Jack Vance, which cumulatively relate the story of Kirth Gersen, a man trained by his grandfather to exact revenge on five notorious interstellar crime bosses, collectively known as the Demon Princes, who carried the people of his village off into slavery during his childhood. Each novel deals with his pursuit of one of the five Princes.
The Dying Earth is a collection of science fantasy/fantasy short fiction by American writer Jack Vance, published by Hillman in 1950. Vance returned to the setting in 1965 and thereafter, making it the first book in the Dying Earth series. It was retitled Mazirian the Magician in the Vance Integral Edition (2005), according to Jack Vance's expressed preference.
Big Planet is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Vance. It is the first novel sharing the same setting, an immense, but metal-poor and backward world called Big Planet.
The Magellanic Cloud is a 1955 science fiction novel by Polish writer Stanisław Lem. Fragments of the novel were published earlier, in 1953 and 1954, in the magazine Przekrój. Some significant literary tropes featured in the novel include interstellar travel, "first contact", psychological fiction, a Communist utopia, and criticism of the capitalist militarism, which Lem himself characterized as an "extract of the times of Socialist realism".
Return from the Stars is a science fiction novel by Polish author Stanisław Lem. Written in 1961, it is the story of a cosmonaut returning to his homeworld, Earth, after more than a century in Earth time, but just 10 years for him, finding it a completely different place, with many developments he dislikes. The novel touches the ideas of social alienation, culture shock and dystopia. It was first translated into English in 1980 by Barbara Marszal and Frank Simpson.
The Houses of Iszm is a science fiction novella by American writer Jack Vance, which appeared in Startling Stories magazine in 1954. It was reissued in book form in 1964 as part of an Ace Double novel, together with Vance's Son of the Tree. The story published in Startling Stories is about 22,000 words while the version that appears in the Ace Double still less than novel length at about 30,000 words. The Houses of Iszm was re-published as a stand-alone volume in 1974 by Mayflower.
Star King is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Vance, the first in his Demon Princes series. It tells the story of a young man, Kirth Gersen, who sets out to track down and avenge himself upon the first of the Demon Princes, the five arch-criminals who massacred or enslaved nearly all the inhabitants of his colony world when he was a child.
Showboat World is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Vance, first published in 1975. It is the second, stand-alone novel in a pair of novels that share the same setting, a backward, lawless, metal-poor world called Big Planet. The plot structure which involves a series of dramatic presentations, often with humorous consequences, has parallels with Vance's 1965 novel Space Opera.
"The Moon Moth" is a science fiction novelette by American author Jack Vance, first published in Galaxy Science Fiction.
Telek is a science fiction novella about telekinesis by American author Jack Vance. It was first published in the January 1952 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.
The Five Gold Bands is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Vance, first published in the November 1950 issue of Startling Stories magazine. It was published in 1953 as a separate book under the title The Space Pirate, and in 1963 it was paired with Vance's Hugo Award-winning novella The Dragon Masters in the form of an Ace Double.
Wyst: Alastor 1716 (1978) is a science fiction novel by Jack Vance first published by DAW Books. It is the third and last novel set in the Alastor Cluster, a group of thousands of stars and planets ruled by the mysterious Connatic, which is a part of Vance's Gaean Reach.
Night Lamp is a science fiction adventure novel by Jack Vance. It follows an orphan named Jaro Fath on his quest to learn where he came from.
The Alastor Cluster is the fictional setting of three of American writer Jack Vance's novels: Trullion: Alastor 2262 (1973), Marune: Alastor 933 (1975), and Wyst: Alastor 1716 (1978), each named after a world in the cluster. Vance planned a fourth novel Pharism: Alastor 458, but it was never written.
Marune: Alastor 933 (1975) is a science fiction novel by Jack Vance, the second of three books set in the Alastor Cluster, ‘a whorl of thirty thousand stars in an irregular volume twenty to thirty light-years in diameter’. Three thousand of the star systems are inhabited by five trillion humans, ruled by the mostly hands-off, laissez-faire Connatic, who occasionally, in the manner of Harun al-Rashid of The Thousand and One Nights, goes among his people in disguise. The novel was preceded by Trullion: Alastor 2262 (1973) and followed by Wyst: Alastor 1716 (1978).
Galactic Effectuator is a 1980 science fiction/mystery anthology by American writer Jack Vance, containing the novella The Dogtown Tourist Agency and the novelette "Freitzke's Turn". Both stories are about an intergalactic sleuth, Miro Hetzel, who uses his wits to pursue challenging cases.