RPG Articles

So, I’ve started reading this, in between reading all of the Bond books. It’s from the early 50’s, which is important to keep in mind when reading it.

I’m only a short ways in, through the first tale and into the second. The thesis this is written under is similar to a lot of stories I’ve read from that period, with the addition of sentient dogs. Really they aren’t even an addition, since I don’t get the impression you interact with them in the slightest. So, the basic thought pattern, thus far, is that technology, specifically personal aircraft and cheap, clean (hah!), nuclear power have made cities obsolete. Everyone moves to the country, with incentives from the government, in order to make nuclear war “impractical”. You have to let these statements slide, because duh, the 50’s. This sort of naivety is rampant in sci-fi of the time. No, I don’t know why anyone thought a dominant species with increasing birth rates and longevity would be able to spread out with 10 to 100 acres to a family.

Still, it got me thinking. I’ve come up with nothing new, but it did remind me of other things I’ve read, which seem to hold true enough to be what gave me pause at Simak’s assertions about people, as a whole, wanting to live in a country scene. To make a gross generalization of my own, there’s effectively two types of people, those that chafe psychologically at close contact with others, and those that thrive in it. It’s held true throughout our development where a segment of a population decides “fuck it, I’m outta here”, and they wander to some obscure part of the world, generating a new frontier. After them come people that aren’t really sure about this frontier stuff, but see a profit to be made from trading with the crazy people. From there you have a steady influx of support structures and people that are more and more the city type, until bam, you have a city, or at least a concentrated group of humans. By this point the wandering folks are old, and settle into a rural community to farm, mine, ranch, or whatever with their families. Eventually it gets to be too much for some of the people there, and off they go again, to make new frontiers.

There’s always some justification, like gold, beaver pelts, or whatever, but I really think it’s just a genetic impulse, driving them from groups of people and into new territories. It’s a good life strategy, because it helps maximize our diversity and strengths. You have a few people that go out, get strange diseases, killed by strange animals, or die off from other inhospitable conditions, and then the survivors eventually breed back into the main line. Misfits always drive evolution. Errors that turn up uniquely useful.

Ok, so this isn’t really a review of the book, but rather some meandering thoughts I had. So far there’s little to distinguish this from other books of the time, except for a really idealized version of dogs. Apparently the author never saw packs of dogs running around, forgetting the civillity we train them into. I like dogs, a lot, but the idea that they wouldn’t fight or make wars, given the capability, is pretty thin. Nibbler once ran around stabbing the walls with a knife she stole from an open dishwasher, and really it was just a matter of time before that went bad, know what I mean?

PS- I’m not a fan of the latest layout of WordPress’ article writer panel.

This is just a small note to anyone writing a book or story. If you’re going to make up some poetry or lyrics for the story, think twice. Examine whether or not you really need to. If you have heat stroke and decide yes, this is really what you need, then write a rough draft and have people that don’t like you, not just don’t know you but actually dislike you, read through it. Chances are good that it is awful, but strangers and friends will be too polite.

I hesitate to call this a book review. It had interesting characters, and some old, but trusty, story elements, but anything that could be called climactic was left out. It really just sort of becomes someone talking about how crappy modern America is, and how we should have more God in our lives. It’s better than that sounds, but still a really awkward bag.
In the end it sort of came off like a collection of story ideas that he edited together, so it just didn’t satisfy me at all.
It’s short, very short, so read it if you’re bored or something and it happens to be around.

I’ve read a fair amount of Koontz books, and the response I have is damned near binary. We have the morose quasi-religious books, and the hectic adventure novels. The Husband isn’t really any different, in that it completely fails to engage and is morose. There’s some half-hearted spirituality, but it’s almost as muddled and ignorable as that sort of thing is in real life.

What’s it about? Well, some dude, Mitch, he runs a small landscaping business, receives a call from some people saying that they’ve kidnapped his wife, and he has 60 hours, I think it was, to come up with 2 million dollars. Sounds like an adventure, doesn’t it? Tragically no, it’s just boring crap. You’re made to assume that Mitch is likeable and a good sort, but there really isn’t anything in the story to help convince you of that. It’d be like me introducing my roommate to people by saying “He’s very likeable!”, then refusing to let you talk to him.

Anyway. We plod along, waiting for the action to pick up or the characters to get more interesting. There’s some half-assed ode or jab or something at Running With Scissors in there, in the form of Mitch’s parents. The idea wasn’t bad, but the execution was way hard to swallow and they come off as little more than a paragraph that could be boiled down to “Hey, I read that book. Those people were crazy.”.

Then we get to the bad guys. Replace “likeable” in my roommate example with “evil” and you’ll get the idea.

I’d suggest reading it only if someone gives it to you and you’re too broke to make a trip to the bookstore seem like a good idea. It’s better than a poke in the eye, but a lot worse than doing anything fun, interesting, or terrifying.  Maybe you should play mumbly peg instead.