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Fallen Star
1st Arrow 1977 paperback edition, vg+ In stock shipped from our UK warehouse
- GenresScience FictionFiction
192 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1957
1 person is currently reading
72 people want to read
About the author
James Blish
454 books327 followersJames Benjamin Blish was an American author of fantasy and science fiction. Blish also wrote literary criticism of science fiction using the pen-name William Atheling Jr.
In the late 1930's to the early 1940's, Blish was a member of the Futurians.
Blish trained as a biologist at Rutgers and Columbia University, and spent 1942–1944 as a medical technician in the U.S. Army. After the war he became the science editor for the Pfizer pharmaceutical company. His first published story appeared in 1940, and his writing career progressed until he gave up his job to become a professional writer.
He is credited with coining the term gas giant, in the story "Solar Plexus" as it appeared in the anthology Beyond Human Ken, edited by Judith Merril. (The story was originally published in 1941, but that version did not contain the term; Blish apparently added it in a rewrite done for the anthology, which was first published in 1952.)
Blish was married to the literary agent Virginia Kidd from 1947 to 1963.
From 1962 to 1968, he worked for the Tobacco Institute.
Between 1967 and his death from lung cancer in 1975, Blish became the first author to write short story collections based upon the classic TV series Star Trek. In total, Blish wrote 11 volumes of short stories adapted from episodes of the 1960s TV series, as well as an original novel, Spock Must Die! in 1970 — the first original novel for adult readers based upon the series (since then hundreds more have been published). He died midway through writing Star Trek 12; his wife, J.A. Lawrence, completed the book, and later completed the adaptations in the volume Mudd's Angels.
Blish lived in Milford, Pennsylvania at Arrowhead until the mid-1960s. In 1968, Blish emigrated to England, and lived in Oxford until his death in 1975. He is buried in Holywell Cemetery, Oxford, near the grave of Kenneth Grahame.
His name in Greek is Τζέημς Μπλις"
In the late 1930's to the early 1940's, Blish was a member of the Futurians.
Blish trained as a biologist at Rutgers and Columbia University, and spent 1942–1944 as a medical technician in the U.S. Army. After the war he became the science editor for the Pfizer pharmaceutical company. His first published story appeared in 1940, and his writing career progressed until he gave up his job to become a professional writer.
He is credited with coining the term gas giant, in the story "Solar Plexus" as it appeared in the anthology Beyond Human Ken, edited by Judith Merril. (The story was originally published in 1941, but that version did not contain the term; Blish apparently added it in a rewrite done for the anthology, which was first published in 1952.)
Blish was married to the literary agent Virginia Kidd from 1947 to 1963.
From 1962 to 1968, he worked for the Tobacco Institute.
Between 1967 and his death from lung cancer in 1975, Blish became the first author to write short story collections based upon the classic TV series Star Trek. In total, Blish wrote 11 volumes of short stories adapted from episodes of the 1960s TV series, as well as an original novel, Spock Must Die! in 1970 — the first original novel for adult readers based upon the series (since then hundreds more have been published). He died midway through writing Star Trek 12; his wife, J.A. Lawrence, completed the book, and later completed the adaptations in the volume Mudd's Angels.
Blish lived in Milford, Pennsylvania at Arrowhead until the mid-1960s. In 1968, Blish emigrated to England, and lived in Oxford until his death in 1975. He is buried in Holywell Cemetery, Oxford, near the grave of Kenneth Grahame.
His name in Greek is Τζέημς Μπλις"
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
July 21, 2008
Quite a cute read - builds nicely, if preposterously, and the reveal is rather dated. Fun, if you like that sort of retro-feel sci-fi kinda thing (mainly coz it IS 50 years old now)...which I do.
July 7, 2020
There are no dinosaurs in this book. Wanted to make sure we all knew. #pursebook
August 29, 2020
First published in 1957, 'Fallen Star' is a SF novel set in 1958, plotted around an amateurish expedition to the Arctic. Enjoyable enough, and quite well written but based on a premise that is no longer applicable, like many sf stories of that time. I suppose this makes the 'suspension of disbelief' more important than ever, but really you just have to go with it or abandon the read.
December 10, 2023
In a way, this is a science fiction book in name only. The "science fiction" aspects of it underline elements of what motivated the characters behavior during the story, and play a role in the ending, but really it is a story about humans in the extreme conditions of the Arctic - and as any good story about humans in the Artic, about what happens when the humans start to lose to the environment.
Blish is a very good writer, and he can turn a story that is pretty schlocky into something that was at least interesting to read. Nonetheless, there isn't a lot of real depth here. About 80% of the story could survive completely outside of the science fiction context as just a period piece about how interpersonal relationships functioned (at least at a pretty superficial level) in the 1950s. The parts that involve the science fiction elements of the story also are presented in a "is it or isn't it real?" sort of way that means in a very real way this might not be a science fiction story at all, but a sort of psychological drama.
In any case, the writing and premise are just barely good enough to keep this at a 3/5, but unless you're really into Blish or pulp writing from the 50's, I don't think there are many reasons for you to find a copy of this one!
Blish is a very good writer, and he can turn a story that is pretty schlocky into something that was at least interesting to read. Nonetheless, there isn't a lot of real depth here. About 80% of the story could survive completely outside of the science fiction context as just a period piece about how interpersonal relationships functioned (at least at a pretty superficial level) in the 1950s. The parts that involve the science fiction elements of the story also are presented in a "is it or isn't it real?" sort of way that means in a very real way this might not be a science fiction story at all, but a sort of psychological drama.
In any case, the writing and premise are just barely good enough to keep this at a 3/5, but unless you're really into Blish or pulp writing from the 50's, I don't think there are many reasons for you to find a copy of this one!
October 2, 2025
It's easy to miss why this piece is brilliant, among Blish's corpus.
Its sci-fi vibes are very, very mild, most of the time. If I had to compare it to anything, albeit, I warn you, in a non direct, enigmatic way, I'd compare it to The Kraken Wakes by John Wyndham.
And since it's not the kind of sci-fi Blish is known for, I can see people being disappointed.
Perhaps, I was only able to enjoy it more since I had taken a small break from his works.
Here we have him at the height of his descriptive powers. The protagonist, Julian, is more than ever not the mirror of the reader, but a man with his own weaknesses, in life and in principle, and the book is so much more about him than about the events.
The prose is initially witty, funny even, and it's only too late when the horror strikes, and it strikes all the harder for the contrasts.
Some descriptions or pieces of dialogue will live in my head rent-free forever, and are too spoilery to be mentioned here.
I think this is a good, intense novel all around, that knows no distinction of genre.
Its sci-fi vibes are very, very mild, most of the time. If I had to compare it to anything, albeit, I warn you, in a non direct, enigmatic way, I'd compare it to The Kraken Wakes by John Wyndham.
And since it's not the kind of sci-fi Blish is known for, I can see people being disappointed.
Perhaps, I was only able to enjoy it more since I had taken a small break from his works.
Here we have him at the height of his descriptive powers. The protagonist, Julian, is more than ever not the mirror of the reader, but a man with his own weaknesses, in life and in principle, and the book is so much more about him than about the events.
The prose is initially witty, funny even, and it's only too late when the horror strikes, and it strikes all the harder for the contrasts.
Some descriptions or pieces of dialogue will live in my head rent-free forever, and are too spoilery to be mentioned here.
I think this is a good, intense novel all around, that knows no distinction of genre.
June 30, 2023
As with most other books of the period it kinda meanders and then rushes to a conclusion. I still enjoyed it though.
December 30, 2020
Very much a work of its era and perhaps with that laid-on more deliberately than one might first assume, this kept me reading but not particularly engaged.
August 3, 2011
Though I'm sure in the late Fifties this novel was a biting satire on the media, these days Blish's portrait of reporters and publicity hounds comes across as tame. Though that's oddly to the novel's credit, it takes away from the book's intended pleasure. What we're left with are some great characters in a sci-fi pot-boiler where the reader doesn't fear the homicidal killer as much as the fact that yesterday's caricature of the media is more restrained than today's reality.
February 24, 2009
A reasonably engaging story of how not to mount an Arctic expedition. I found the narrator to be an irritating know-it-all, and sexist even for the 1950s. No need for a re-read.
March 5, 2011
Grade C-
December 25, 2012
Mad Men by way of HP Lovecraft, decades before either was cool. You go James Blish, I guess.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews