“Mission Impossible with Nazis.” Tom Cruise’s Valkyrie is essentially a caper movie. Cruise and a group of Germans who see Hitler, the Nazis, and the SS ruining their country decide to assassinate Hitler. We see the planning, the setup, and the execution. But, as one of the characters remarks to Cruise, “Nothing goes as planned.” The supporting cast of Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson, and a dozen other good character actors ensure top-notch performances. The only flaw, and it’s a big one, is that everyone knows how this movie is going to end before it starts. GRADE: B-.

Henry Kuttner died when he was 43. There’s no doubt in my mind that Kuttner could have been as great a writer as Asimov, Heinlein, and Jack Vance. The Dark World is one of Kuttner’s early sword and sorcery fantasies. Yet even in this genre, Kuttner’s brilliance shines through. Planet Stories is reprinting Henry Kuttner’s Robots Have No Tails this Spring. Don’t miss this great writer!

For hardcore Dumarest fans, you might want to check out http://www.homeworldpress.com/dumarest/index.htm for the cover artwork for the entire Dumarest series.

Back in 1967, E. C. Tubb’s Winds of Gath introduced an adventurer who was looking for his home planet.  The adventurer was Earl Dumarest and his homeworld is Earth.  The problem was that mysteriously almost all evidence of Earth had been expunged.  For 33 books, Tubb described Dumarest’s search for his home across a galaxy of planets.  Here and there, Dumarest would find clues that pointed the way to Earth’s secret location.  Of course, there has to be a bunch of Bad Guys trying to stop Dumarest.  Tubb chose the cyborgs called the Cyclan who hunt Dumarest to prevent him from finding Earth.  In addition, Dumarest also possesses the affinity twin, a way to control the mind of anyone he comes in contact with.  The Cyclan want the affinity twin to help them achieve galactic domination.

Yes, the writing is formulaic.  Yes, some of the middle volumes don’t advance Dumarest’s search very much.  But, all in all, the Dumarest series is satisfying space opera.

I felt sorry to see the series end.  DAW Books dropped the Dumarest series in 1985.  Volume 32, The Return, was published by a small press in 1997.  Since then, I’ve dreamed about completing the series.  But now Tubb has done that for me.  I have mixed feelings about Child of Earth.  It concludes the series, but leaves plenty unexplained.  At 89, I’m guessing E. C. Tubb isn’t going to do much more writing so this final volume will have to suffice.

Merry Christmas.

I didn’t get you anything physical, this year I got you something digital.

It’s a website. I got GeorgeKelley.org because everything else was taken. But we could get you something else later. It is set up as a blog. As in, you can keep writing things, and they will go in this space, where I am currently writing. I could write a lot of things, but really, that is what you are meant to do here. So, I am going to leave you to it. 

The header (up there) I made. It is inspired by early pulp fiction books. Hence the cheap price and the terrible red and yellow covers. If you want changes I will think about it. While some early versions had smutty women, I removed them. You will have to talk to mom about that.

Yes, you are allowed to delete this note.

I will show you how to use this tomorrow.

Your lovely son,

Patrick.