Second Stage Lensmen (The Lensman Series, Book 5)

Rating:
Summary: Best of Kimball Kinnison
Review: Finally the book I have been waiting for since 1982. I first read this book in the 1970's, and read it at least 50-60 times. However, it was lost while moving in 1982 and I have been searching avidly for it ever since. In this book, Kimball Kinnison does some of his best work as a lensman. However then best part about this book is we get to see the work of other lensman, as well as of the galactic patrol itself. In this we see that much of what makes people great are the people they associate with; a lesson of great value today. This is perhaps the inspiration for many of today's ensemble cast shows. An excellent read by one of the worlds greatest storytellers.

Rating:
Summary: By Noshabkeming, it's still a great yarn!
Review: If you ever wonder how much American society has changed since the early '50's, just a little of Smith's dialogue will set you up with everything you need to know.

"'Listen, angel-face!' the man commanded. 'You're as mad as a radeligian cateagle - you're as cockeyed as Trenco's ether. Get this, and get it straight. To any really intelligent being of any one of forty million planets, your whole Lyranian race would be a total loss with no insurance. You're a God-forsaken, spiritually and emotionally starved, barren, mentally ossified, and completely monstrous mess. If I, personally, never see either you or your planet again, that will be exactly twenty seven minutes too soon. If anybody else ever hears of Lyrane and thinks he wants to visit it, I'll take him out of - I'll knock a hip down on him if I have to, to keep him away from here. Do I make myself clear?'"

And that's the ur-goodguy addressing the head of state of a neutral planet. Golly.

The science is ludicrous, the politics militaristic and jingoistic in the extreme. I never can keep all the trenchant, searing, biting space battles of brain-straining refractoriness straight. The dialogue often makes me laugh out loud, and the gender and (to the extent they appear at all) race relations make me squirm in my chair. So why is all this still so readable?

I guess it's for the same reason the old Conan stories by Robert E. Howard (a much inferior writer to Smith) are still among my favorites: STORY. Once you get past all the back-story in Triplanetary, the narrative just grabs you by the collar and doesn't let you go until Kit Kinnison sends out his message in a bottle in the epilogue of the final volume. If I had back all the hours of sleep I've traded for late night sessions with "Doc" Smith, I wouldn't wake up for months.

And by the nine purple hells of Palain, isn't that what escapist reading is for?

Rating:
Summary: By Noshabkeming, it's still a great yarn!
Review: If you ever wonder how much American society has changed since the early '50's, just a little of Smith's dialogue will set you up with everything you need to know.

"'Listen, angel-face!' the man commanded. 'You're as mad as a radeligian cateagle - you're as cockeyed as Trenco's ether. Get this, and get it straight. To any really intelligent being of any one of forty million planets, your whole Lyranian race would be a total loss with no insurance. You're a God-forsaken, spiritually and emotionally starved, barren, mentally ossified, and completely monstrous mess. If I, personaly, never see either you or your planet again, that will be exactly twenty seven minutes too soon. If anybody else ever hears of Lyrane and thinks he wants to visit it, I'll take him out of - I'll knock a hip down on him if I have to, to keep him away from here. Do I make myself clear?'"

And that's the ur-goodguy addressing the head of state of a neutral planet. Golly.

The science is ludicrous, the politics militaristic and jingoistic in the extreme. I never can keep all the trenchant, searing, biting space battles of brain-straining refractoriness straight. The dialogue often makes me laugh out loud, and the gender and (to the extent they appear at all) race relations make me squirm in my chair. So why is all this still so readable?

I guess it's for the same reason the old Conan stories by Robert E. Howard (a much inferior writer to Smith) are still among my favorites: STORY. Once you get past all the back-story in Triplanetary, the narrative just grabs you by the collar and doesn't let you go until Kit Kinnison sends out his message in a bottle in the epilogue of the final volume. If I had back all the hours of sleep I've traded for late night sessions with "Doc" Smith, I wouldn't wake up for months.

And by the nine purple hells of Palain, isn't that what escapist reading is for?

Rating:
Summary: Doc's best
Review: Perhaps the best of the Lensman series, with Doc's best alien, Nadreck of Palain VII.

Rating:
Summary: The 5 "Second Stage" Lensmen (and Lenswoman) at Work!
Review: Possibly the best in the Series, though anyone would tell you, that is a difficult determination to make. The 5 most powerful "Second Stage" Lensmen do detective, spy and combat duty to ferret out and destroy the denizens of Boskone. The beams are hotter, the technology heavier, the battles bigger and the mental powers greater than ever before. See the sunbeam roast planets! This book is loaded with everything good about the Lensmen series. My favorite chapter is "Nadreck at Work", about a non oxygen breathing, Second Stage Lensman with a decidedly, uh, er, different moral outlook on things. Clarissa Kinnison, Kim's wife, comes into her own as a woman hero to make this series accessible to women also.