Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star - Ian Hunter

 DIARY OF A ROCK'N'ROLL STAR - IAN HUNTER

Don't you get tired of accolades and plaudits used to promote and exult the quality or even the significance of whatever book they're referring to? All too often you'll get a quote from someone like Thurston Moore or someone who's obviously an acquaintance of the author plastered onto the front cover of a book praising it to the skies but on actually reading the book you end up wondering if they've read the same one as you or if they've even read it at all? Or sometimes you'll get a quote simply attributed to where it was written such as 'Mojo Magazine' or the 'Sunday Times' rather than the actual name of the writer, as if the name of the platform gives the quote some added weight.

So to Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star by Ian Hunter that says of it on the back cover 'This best-selling title is universally acclaimed as one of the most outstanding and essential music books ever written'. And on the front cover a quote from Q Magazine: 'This is the greatest music book ever written'.

Well that certainly raises the bar somewhat and places a bit of weight upon its shoulders. So let's tip-toe in and see what's going on, shall we? Although firstly, let's consider Mott The Hoople for a moment.

All The Young Dudes, of course, is the song most people know Mott The Hoople for and the Bowie story behind it is probably as equally well-known. Mott The Hoople were a quintessentially English rock band who seemed to fall between the two stools of Heavy Rock and Glam but in doing so, the kind of mega-success achieved by other bands who fully aligned themselves with either of these two genres eluded them. Mott The Hoople's impact upon those who appreciated them, however, was of much more substance.

As has been pointed out before, the Velvet Underground never sold many albums but everyone who did buy one often went on to form a band. Mott The Hoople may never have reached the same level of stardom as some of their peers but the people they did reach, they influenced. A prime example of this is Mick Jones of The Clash, who as a teenager would follow Mott The Hoople around the country, bunking trains to get to their gigs. The autobiographical nature of some of Mott The Hoople's songs is evident in many Clash songs as is similarities in guitar playing.

In addition, let's consider for a moment All The Young Dudes, a contender for one of the greatest rock'n'roll songs of all time - and that's my opinion, not that of Thurston Moore, Q Magazine or some hack from the Sunday Times.

All The Young Dudes is like an excerpt from a teenage opera, a kiss goodbye to the Sixties and a hello to the first rays of light from the Seventies. It's the view from the top floor of Leonard Cohen's mythic Tower Of Song peering down into the abyss below through a cider and speed-tinted mindset. In a world of little meaning it's a song trying to create one, a song of a time when girls could be boys and boys were learning to be girls, when any pop hero of note would be wearing make-up, stack heels and a screwed down hairdo. It's a signifier of a generation landslide where the world is spent and the teenage dream has ended at Altamont in a flurry of fists, the waving of guns and the flashing of knives. All The Young Dudes is a last grasp for hope eternal. It's the sound of the ball being passed in the hope that there is someone there to catch it. It's the capturing of the moment before the dawning of punk rock - or the dawning of The Clash, at least.

Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star, as Ian Hunter puts it in the preface, is 'a documentary about Mott The Hoople when on a five-week tour of America in 1972, a letter to a fan in the front row at the Rainbow, a diary to keep in touch.' It could be then a letter to Mick Jones himself, in his pre-Clash, crushed velvet loons and afghan coat, his face full of spots from ripping off the stars from his face. Funky little boat race.

On describing the band flying in to LaGuardia airport in New York from England, Ian writes 'Everybody in the world should see the world. It should be made compulsory. The kids from Bradford, Newcastle, Liverpool, Sunderland and all those northern towns whose only buzz is signing on Wednesdays and Fridays may never get to see the sight I see now and I'm woefully inadequate at translating it to paper'.

As anyone who has ever flown to New York would testify, the sight at night of the lights below as you come in to land is something to behold. Akin to looking down upon rather than looking up to the mothership taking off at the end of Close Encounters Of The Third Kind. The sight of looking down upon clouds even, rather than looking up to them is mind-boggling itself when you're new to flying.

What Ian Hunter does, however, is not only convey the sheer wonder of going to America but also the trouble that can come with it. The winter cold, the snow, the flight delays, the discomfort. 

In the same light - though he doesn't explicitly say it as such - it should probably be compulsory for everybody to play in a rock'n'roll band, at least for a time. Especially in a rock'n'roll band of the Mott The Hoople ilk, touring America in the early 1970s. To suggest it would effect you somewhat is an understatement though what Ian Hunter accentuates is that it wouldn't be all for the better. Of course, there are certain highs such as coming off stage after a successful concert that can't be replicated through any other means but there are also plenty of lows that would leave you with your world-view altered irrecoverably. In particular when it came to your opinion of the human race, or certain members of it at least.

Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star isn't the greatest music book ever written or rather it might have been in 1974 when it was first published but it is no longer. It's all subjective obviously but there have been better music books written since, a good example I would argue being the one about Nico - Songs They Never Play On The Radio, by James Young. If you've ever played in a band or ever dreamed of being in one then Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star is probably essential reading, far more so in fact than that other much-touted 'bible', Hammer Of The Gods, the story of Led Zeppelin's so-say on tour antics.

For anyone who's ever travelled through America, Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star is also going to appeal as it's more than likely going to ring a few bells. One of the most surprising things about it, however, is the cameo appearance of Keith Moon who rather than being depicted as the cliched madman of rock'n'roll, is presented in a whole different and really nice light. Which in a way is evidence of Diary Of A Rock'n'Roll Star being different to a lot of other music books in the fact that it draws back the curtain on the mythology of sex and drugs and rock'n'roll and shows it as it all really is: rouge blusher, hangovers, poverty, the good, the bad, the ugly and all points in-between. 

John Serpico

Riot City - Protest And Rebellion In The Capital - Clive Bloom

 RIOT CITY -

PROTEST AND REBELLION IN THE CAPITAL -

CLIVE BLOOM

The first thing that struck me about Riot City - Protest And Rebellion In The Capital, by Clive Bloom was the actual title. There's some copyright infringement going on here, surely, because everyone knows that it's Bristol that is the genuine and original riot city? Its tradition and history of protest and rebellion is a proud one stretching back centuries, with there even having been a Bristolian record label called Riot City in its honour. Of course, there's always been riots in London as well but the mobs involved with these have often come from outside - and that means from places like Bristol - descending upon the city with our flaming torches, our cudgels, our bags of marbles to throw under the hooves of police horses, and our strictly non-Cockney accents.

On a more serious note, the second thing that struck me about the book was the accolades at the front. You know when favourable quotes are taken from reviews and highlighted as endorsements? In Riot City they're from such people as Michael Binyon OBE - a Leader Writer for The Times; and Danny Kruger MBE - the former speechwriter to David Cameron. It leaves you wondering: though I doubt very much if these people have even read the book, how did a copy end up in their hands to begin with? What interest would such such people have in reading a book such as this? And what does it bode for the book when such people are praising it? 

Well, a clue is given just five pages in where the urban rioters of 2011 are described as being 'inarticulate and badly educated', which in my eyes is quite a loaded categorization. It's a description that can only be applied by someone who feel themselves to be articulate and well-educated. Someone perhaps from a public school background, educated at Eton or Cambridge perhaps, peering down upon the urban poor from their position of privilege? It's almost enough to put me off reading any further but as Don Corleone once advised: 'Keep your friends close but your enemies closer'. So I persevere. 

An interesting thing about Clive Bloom's 'inarticulate and badly-educated' comment is in its relation to one of the main subjects of his book, that being the student riots of 2010. These specific riots were instigated by the announced rise in tuition fees and the abolishment of the Educational Maintenance Allowance (EMA). Bloom writes about how free education at all levels had been since the Second World War the only way to beat the poverty trap, and how this idea was a cornerstone of 'socialist-modified' capitalism and the welfare state. In the same breath, however, he also writes of how free education had actually only ever been a privilege rather than a right. And there's the nub of it: that word 'privilege'. It just keeps cropping up.

Clive Bloom would be fully aware of his privileged position but he also might think he can circumnavigate it and that it have no relevance to his writing? He certainly knows his stuff when it comes to the subjects of protest and rebellion, and Riot City is certainly well-researched but if he thinks he can write from an unbiased and impartial position then he's clearly not read Chomsky. Bloom writes from a position of having a favourable network of specific contacts. He writes from a position of conservatism.

'Since the premiership of Tony Blair, mainstream politics had suffered a malaise,' Bloom tells us. As if mainstream politics pre-Blair was some different beast altogether where everyone held hands in a land of milk and honey basking under a Conservative sun.

Elsewhere he mentions and quotes Ayn Rand but in such a way that he almost gives his game away. Does Bloom's political sympathies lie with free market, laissez-faire capitalism of the kind Rand once advocated? I suspect so but then like a lot of other Randists and supporters of Objectivism he would probably deny it even to himself.

For all that, Riot City is an interesting read not least for acting as a reminder of what we've lived through and of the calibre of those who were governing over us during the period of which Bloom writes. For example, there's the reminder of Boris Johnson's view of the Occupy London lot camping out at St Paul's as being 'hemp-smoking, fornicating hippies'. If only. And then there was the Evening Standard headline declaring 'St Paul's Junkies a Health Hazard'. As with most things with the Evening Standard: only in their fevered dreams.

And then there was Michael Gove in his role as the Secretary of State for Education during the student riots in 2010 arguing for soldiers fresh from the front line of Iraq and Afghanistan to be retrained on a 'troops to teachers' plan in order to tackle classroom indiscipline.

And Theresa May in her role as Home Secretary in 2011 authorising the potential use of rubber bullets in response to the riots rocking the country that year. 

And Eric Pickles, the then Community Secretary going on about the 'uneducated, unemployed sub-class'. Pickles would some years later be summoned to the Grenfell Tower inquiry where he would make it clear he had better and more important things to do with his time than answer a load of questions about 72 people burned alive.

Bloom's book ends with a supplementary essay entitled 1968: The Revolutionary Model Redefined, which is - surprisingly - really rather good even if the relevance of the inclusion of it is questionable. It's just nineteen pages long but it's packed with references, ideas and interesting insights that suggests it's actually groundwork for a whole other book. It's a critique, essentially, of the New Left movement that came to prominence during the late Sixties, its full flowering realised in the Sorbonne in Paris of '68.

Bloom writes of one of the ideas thrown up during the Sixties that said in order to cure the alienation of capitalist exploitation and banality it would be necessary to take alienation to its extreme possibility, thereby promoting shock. The shock would be via art but of a specific kind: anti-cooperative, non-recuperable and evanescent. The same tactic, of course, that elements of Punk Rock would later immerse themselves in.

Bloom traces the failure as he sees it of the New Left  and its ultimate dissolvement into personal identity politics, ending up with a situation that merely reinforces so-called 'natural' and political conservatism. It's a convincing argument but moreover you can read between the lines that Bloom is basing much of his theory on his own personal experience.

Bloom has stared into the sun, peered at the horizon and gazed into the abyss but now he's back to square one. Back to him acknowledging the fixed position of his own privilege under state control, consumption and capitalism. Though recognising and acknowledging at the same time that the barbarians are at the gate, armed with flaming torches, cudgels, bags of marbles to throw under the hooves of police horses, and strictly non-Cockney accents.

John Serpico

The Girl From U.N.C.L.E - The Global Globules Affair - Simon Latter

 THE GIRL FROM U.N.C.L.E -

THE GLOBAL GLOBULES AFFAIR - SIMON LATTER

Pulp fiction for the broad of mind, based on the cult television series The Girl From U.N.C.L.E starring Stefanie Powers and Noel Harrison that itself was a spin-off from the classic cult television series The Man From U.N.C.L.E starring Robert Vaughan and David McCallum. The Global Globules Affair written by Simon Latter gives nothing away in its title as to what it might actually be about although at the same time it tells us all we really need to know, that being it's the brand that counts not the content.

Published in 1967, it starts off quite fittingly in Carnaby Street where everything's groovy baby until U.N.C.L.E agent April Dancer who's on holiday in London for a few days sees some girl model-types sashaying along dressed in fashion garments woven from what looks like metal armour. At the same time she also spies an ex-professor of hers from when she was studying in Paris and her special-agent intuition is immediately buzzing. Something was going on warranting further investigation.

To cut to the chase, the professor has invented a fluid designed to attack all known banknote paper and reduce it to mush. Administered as a fine mist, the only thing it cannot penetrate is the metal armour material as sported by the Carnaby Street girls which means no money is safe anywhere, not in your purse, your wallet, or even your bank. The metal material has also, of course, been invented by the professor and the girls are agents of his.

The plan is is to destroy as much money as possible so that financial chaos ensues throughout the world leaving the professor and the forces of global crime embodied by the T.H.R.U.S.H organization to step in with their own currency and become the new financial rulers.

It's all good, ludicrous stuff and preposterous with it but weirdly it all makes sense and makes for a ripping yarn. U.N.C.L.E agents Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin are given brief mention whilst the weapons of choice are Karate chops, gas guns and high explosives in the form of saliva-activated chewing gum.

As an aside, there's an unexpected and very good description of Dartmoor (where the professor has his secret base) that Simon Latter should be quite proud of that anyone with any knowledge of Dartmoor - of its beauty but also of its hidden dangers - should recognise: 'Like a woman full of promise, beckoning you to her scented embrace. And two men friends waiting behind the curtains with coshes.' Isn't that so very spot-on? Next time you go hiking on Dartmoor remember this.

As stated, The Global Globules Affair is pulp fiction for the broad of mind, and you can take it or you can leave it. Interestingly, the fact that Stefanie Powers name has been misspelt on the cover - spelling it with a 'ph' instead of an 'f' - serves only to add to the overall kitschy, daft but enjoyable quirkiness of it all.

John Serpico

Not Just Bits Of Paper - co-edited by Greg Bull and Mickey 'Penguin'

NOT JUST BITS OF PAPER -

CO-EDITED BY GREG BULL AND MICKEY 'PENGUIN'

Some might find it hard to believe and others impossible to comprehend but there was a time when the Internet didn't exist. A time when there was no Facebook, no X, Instagram or even MySpace. 'But how did you message anyone?' all the children ask in wide-eyed wonderment 'Or did you not message anyone ever and just sit instead around the piano of an evening singing songs?'

'Well, we had landline telephones and there were these things called 'pens' that you could write a letter with and send to people by something called 'post'. Have you heard of it?'

But by this time the attention of all the children has wandered so you instead open up your copy of Not Just Bits Of Paper and cast your mind back to slightly more interesting times when communication required effort and was a means to an end rather than an end in itself.

Not Just Bits Of Paper is a portal into a world now diminished, a world where the importance of specific bits of paper cannot be overstated. Not that these bits of paper had any intrinsic purpose beyond the sole reason they were produced for - that being to advertise and publicise events - though paradoxically, without it ever being stated or even considered they also represented nothing less than a vision.

The bits of paper we're talking about here are the flyers and posters created to announce upcoming concerts of the more 'earthy' punk rock type prevalent throughout much of the 1980s. Black-and-white, made with scissors, glue, pens, Letraset and found images. Utilising the 'cut'n'paste' method rather than desk-top publishing, then photocopied, fly-posted, stuck up in record shops, given out by hand and sent out by post enclosed with fanzines and cassette tapes purchased from various mail-order lists.

This was the way we communicated before the advent of the Internet and social media. Slow, time-consuming, sometimes wearisome but effective.

Many of these flyers and posters could be really basic in design and layout whilst others could be veritable mini-works of art. All, however, whatever the quality of them were meant to be throwaway. Ephemeral. To serve their one purpose then binned, which is what most people tended to do with them once the publicised event had passed. Very few people thought of saving them and those who did so saved them essentially for the sake of it. Not for having an eye on one day them being collectible or of any possible future monetary value to anyone. They saved them without thinking and for no reason but saved them - thankfully - they did.

Unlike nowadays, back then hardly anyone took photographs at concerts so the flyers and posters advertising these events are the only physical evidence of a lot of them ever happening. For sure, they're held in memories but memories tend to fade so the flyers and posters compensate, prod and serve to remind. Just as importantly if not more so, however, these flyers and posters - these bits of paper - acted at the time as seeds blown on the wind, as conduits for messages. Weaving gossamer-thin threads between not only friends and neighbours living in the same city, town or even village but between strangers and people of like-mind living in cities throughout the whole country.

It was subliminal. Unspoken. Like tiny beacons being lit on top of hills or flares being shot up into the night sky. These bits of paper acted as signals announcing an alternative to mainstream entertainment, mainstream news and even mainstream values. Announcing a vision. They were the corpuscles in the bloodstream of an underground punk culture that sought legitimacy not through commercial success but through the instigation of consciousness raising, further creativity and political action. Just as fanzines and concerts themselves were deemed to be, these bits of paper were the very life-blood of that punk culture.

Co-edited by Greg Bull and Mickey 'Penguin', Not Just Bits Of Paper collates a wide selection of flyers, posters and handouts from the anarcho punk era of the 1980s and for posterity lays them out and presents them in all their ragged, torn and tattered glory. As to be expected, Crass are heavily represented alongside The Mob, Flux Of Pink Indians, Antisect, Conflict, Poison Girls, Chumbawamba plus many more others. Thoughts are collected also in essays of various length and size written by some of those who were there at the time. Noticeably and interestingly they're all written from the audience point of view rather than from any band members and in doing so adds a whole other dimension to the book. Quality-wise these essays differ and again that's only to be expected but in among them are some very well-written pieces indeed, most noticeably from Ted Curtis, Rich Cross, Tristan 'Stringy' Carter and in particular one by Tim Voss.

Not Just Bits Of Paper documents a period in time that is unlikely to be ever repeated again. A period in time that impacted mightily upon a significant number of people to such an extent that their lives were inexorably altered - some say 'ruined' - for the better. A period in time that though now long gone still resonates, and that under the noise and technology-driven haste of modern day living still echoes.

John Serpico

Blood On Satan's Claw - Robert Wynne-Simmons

BLOOD ON SATAN'S CLAW -

ROBERT WYNNE-SIMMONS

Along with Witchfinder General and The Wicker Man, the 1971 film Blood On Satan's Claw is considered to be one of the main pillars of what is today referred to as 'folk horror'. As a genre, folk horror is a genuinely fascinating one though its meaning and what might fall under its umbrella is somewhat open to interpretation. According to writer and horror anthologist Johnny Mains, the definition of folk horror is 'the upper-class demonisation of lower/working classes' and this is true but it's only one aspect of it. Folk horror is much more to do with a certain 'something' lurking under the veil of nature. A presence that is beyond words. There is a distinction also between city and countryside folk horror, where the horror of the city is usually born of man as a freak of nature whilst the horror of the countryside is born before nature and only manifesting itself through nature, rather like the force behind the changing of the seasons.

There is a scene in Lars von Trier's film Antichrist where Willem Defoe pulls back some foliage to discover a self-disemboweling fox that then speaks to Defoe and says 'Chaos reigns'. This one scene is as close as anything to defining the true meaning of 'folk horror' though you probably require a sense of an understanding beforehand to actually fully appreciate it.

Published in 2022 via a crowdfunding venture, Blood On Satan's Claw is the first time a novelization of the film has been created. Written by the film's original screenwriter, Robert Wynne-Simmons, what it does is to expound upon the film's original premise as any good book of this type should be able to. So rather than being a typical movie tie-in it's more of a companion-piece with many of the film's themes fleshed-out and added to. In this instance, does it mean that the book is now better than the film? Yes it does, but at the same time the book compliments the film and vice versa.

Quite apart from the presence of the Devil lurking behind the simplicity of peasant village life, one of the main themes of Blood On Satan's Claw is the involvement of children in the unfolding events. One of the main conduits of the horror, for example, is a girl by the name of Angel Blake, who only when disrobing in front of the village chaplain in a bid to seduce him is it stated that she's all of fifteen-years of age.

It is this and similar aspects of the story that whilst not making it disturbing as such, adds to the sense that this is an adult tale. Subsequently this then lends weight to the idea that the countryside is all about sex, violence and strangeness where 'chaos reigns', and that 'folk horror' as a manifestation of this is a serious subject that demands adult consideration.

Read the book, see the film. See the film, read the book. Then under a blazing sun go lie-down in a field somewhere and try and feel the centuries of untrammeled life-force rumbling away underneath whilst you let your mind wander.

John Serpico

The David Bowie Story - George Tremlett

 THE DAVID BOWIE STORY - GEORGE TREMLETT

There are some books you read purely because of the cover and The David Bowie Story by George Tremlett is one such example. Published in 1974, the cover is pretty wonderful. Bowie in Ziggy Stardust mode against a backdrop of fractal art. What more could you ask for from a music book from the 1970s? It's Pop Art, man. It's psychedelic, Eric.

Books on Bowie, of course, are two a penny which means that for any to stand out there has to be an angle. With George Tremlett's book it's obviously the cover art but there's also the Kenneth Pitt connection. Pitt was Bowie's manager in his very early days and Pitt also happens to have been a long-time personal friend of the author and it's from talks between them both that the vast amount of the material in the book is drawn.

Pitt was dropped from his managerial role by Bowie in 1969 to be replaced by Tony De Fries, although Pitt's influence upon Bowie should not be underestimated. Bowie was always the proverbial social butterfly, flapping between different interests whenever the mood took him. One minute it was Buddhism up in Scotland, the next it was mime with Lindsay Kemp. One minute it was bit-part acting in The Virgin Soldiers, the next it was hanging out with Marc Bolan (and furiously taking notes). Pitt by all accounts was a very cultured man, a collector of Victorian literature and an authority on the works of Oscar Wilde, so you can see why Bowie might have been attracted to him. Significantly, it was Pitt who introduced Bowie to the music of the Velvet Underground.

Tremlett's book deals with the period in Bowie's career from his early days in 1966 of supporting The Who at the Marquee on Sunday afternoons, up to Ziggy Stardust's retirement announcement at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1973. For most, this was Bowie's most iconic period and there are clues given - particularly once Tony De Fries had taken over - in how this iconic status was achieved. It makes for an interesting read but for all the hype, the media manipulation and the projection it still at the end of the day comes down to how good the songs were. Media hype doesn't last, neither do styles of clothes, theatrical costumes and lightning streaks across the face. Songs do. And Bowie irrefutably had some very, very good ones.

John Serpico

Space Gypsies - Murray Leinster

 SPACE GYPSIES - MURRAY LEINSTER

Space Gypsies. Why would you not want to read a book called 'Space Gypsies'? Especially when looking at the cover it gives little away as to what it might actually be about, leaving you essentially dependent on the title for clues. Written by Murray Leinster. Never heard of him but then I'm not really up to speed with my sci-fi. And actually, do people still call science fiction books 'sci-fi' or is that term now past its sell-by date? Written in 1967. Which means it falls into the New Wave of science fiction - I know that much.

'Why should humanity destroy itself?' asks the blurb on the back cover 'The Marintha hurtled into space to discover the secret of the galactic ancestors of the human race. In the shattered rubble of great civilizations they discovered bizarre remnants of humanity beside whom they would battle the poisonous forces arrayed against all human life.'

Blimey! So in I go, and immediately find myself in a kind of forgotten episode of Star Trek where it turns out the space gypsies are an alien race of men-children, all looking about 12 years-old but with whiskers. They're encountered when a spaceship on a mission from Earth is attacked by an alien spaceship and crash-lands onto a planet where the men-children are hiding. Mankind, it seems, had long ago conquered space and had once inhabited various planets throughout the universe. The cities they had built upon these planets are all now just ruins and Earth is the only remaining world where man still exists, the human race being the ancestors of those long-gone space conquerors.

The spaceship from Earth is on a mission to explore these once-inhabited planets in a bid to understand where man has come from and what has led to the demise of their galactic empire. The presiding theory is that having reached the zenith of their capabilities and fulfilled their destiny, mankind's forefathers had destroyed themselves in some mad suicide pact. Being attacked by an alien spaceship, however, immediately dispels this theory, suggesting that rather than destroying themselves, mankind's forefathers were destroyed by these same alien forces. The space gypsy men-children, it turns out, are also descendants of mankind's forefathers but are fully aware of the homicidal aliens which is why they are in hiding on the planet the spaceship from Earth has crashed down on.

From there on, the battle is joined.

Space Gypsies is essentially light entertainment though of course there's nothing wrong with that in the slightest. There is no 'big idea' going on here nor does it have any message to convey. There's nothing in it to think about or ponder, which leaves nothing but the genre - science fiction itself - to consider.

What makes for a good science fiction book? What compels a man to write science fiction? Is the medium - the science fiction genre itself - the message? In the case of Space Gypsies it would appear so. In its pages are various tropes that anyone familiar with science fiction films would recognize, in particular Ridley Scott's 'Prometheus', although interestingly the thing that stands out about the book the most is the misogyny encapsulated by a line spoken by one of the main protagonists:

'"Karen," said Ketch in the same authoritative tone "is a woman. And a woman glories in being the wife of a fighting man."'

Now, I acknowledge this line is spoken by a fictional character but still, for a writer to come up with such a line and have one of his characters say it is pretty dire. How does a writer have his imagination fly off into the most fantastical realms yet his basic human sensibilities remain at knuckle-dragging level? That is the question. Murray Leinster in Space Gypsies leads by example and shows how.

John Serpico