Has anyone here read any Edmond Hamilton?

[Orrex]

I picked up a copy of 1960's The Haunted Stars and am finding it quite enjoyable. Sure, there's a fair bit of old-school sf sexism, but the book is a product of its time.

It reads very much like Clarke but without as much hard science. And then about 2/3 of the way through it takes a slight downturn, but overall it's not bad.

Anyone else familiar with this author?

[YankeyMCC]

1. I've only read one story by him

"The Star Stealers" which is included in The Space Opera Renaissance edited by David G. Hartwell

I don't remember it in detail, I remember it was a fun read but I think a clear example of the shortcomings of some of the older works, wrong guesses scientifically, flat or biased characters.

[Orrex]

2. After posting

I read his wiki article, and it makes a similiar criticism of much of Hamilton's earlier works. Wiki notes that the space opera themes that served him so well in the early decades later damaged his literary respectability when they began to seem corny, dated, and trite. I can see that; I have little interest in Flash Gordon-style epics, no matter how well received in their day. Hamilton was hugely prolific in Weird Tales, and apparently he knew what his audience wanted to read.

The Haunted Stars takes a very different tone, I think, and the writing is pretty good compared to a lot of other sf I've read from the period (omitting the "sf giants" for a moment).

Re: the sexism I mentioned before, I'd have to assert that it's not even as bad as what you'll see in Forbidden Planet or some of the early Trek episodes, but women are still sorely underrepresented in this novel. At one point, the main protagonist (an otherwise mild and reserved character) actually swats an alien woman's ass when she acts stubbornly. I found this a little jarring, I confess, even though it was just one sentence in a 200-page book.

The author interests me in part because he grew up very near where I now live, and I wasn't aware of any sf authors from this area.

[YankeyMCC]

3. At at least Kirk know to admonish

a kid for swatting a woman's ass :)

A slightly more serious note, even such imperfect writers (aren't they all, although some more than others of course) can be interesting or produce some interesting works from one angle or perspective or another.

A lot of the stuff in that Space Opera anthology I have was definitely not stuff I would return to but I don't think I felt I wasted my time with any single story for one reason or another.

[Babel_17]

4. The Star of Life

I read it 40 years ago, here's the best summary I could find.

"Kirk Hammond was a man alone. He had been chosen to ride the first manned
satellite to go out around the Moon and back to Earth. But when the
satellite failed to orbit properly, it went on past the Moon into the
vastness of outer space, and a whole world watched helplessly as he was
borne toward an unthinkably lonely death. Yet destiny decreed that Kirk
Hammond should suffer not death, but pseudo-death. He awoke to find that a
hundred centuries had passed and the conquest of space had changed humanity
into several species."

http://www.speedreading.com/phpBB2/ftopic102865.html