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Stowaway to Mars #1
Stowaway to Mars
Aircraft designer Dale Currance undertakes a journey to Mars in an effort to capture the prize being offered to the first man to complete an interplanetary journey, but a female stowaway throws his plans into disarray.
An international prize of one billion has been offered to the first man to complete an interplanetary trip, and Dale Curtance, a millionaire adventurer, emerges as the British entrant. With a hand-picked crew, he blasted off from Salisbury Plain in the spaceship Gloria Mundi, destination—the planet Mars. Once free of Earth's atmosphere, they discover a stowaway—a woman. Her extraordinary story helps them prepare for the dangers they encounter on the Red Planet, and the fantastic world that exists there.
An international prize of one billion has been offered to the first man to complete an interplanetary trip, and Dale Curtance, a millionaire adventurer, emerges as the British entrant. With a hand-picked crew, he blasted off from Salisbury Plain in the spaceship Gloria Mundi, destination—the planet Mars. Once free of Earth's atmosphere, they discover a stowaway—a woman. Her extraordinary story helps them prepare for the dangers they encounter on the Red Planet, and the fantastic world that exists there.
189 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1935
51 people are currently reading
1735 people want to read
About the author
John Wyndham
375 books2,010 followersJohn Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris was the son of a barrister. After trying a number of careers, including farming, law, commercial art and advertising, he started writing short stories in 1925. After serving in the civil Service and the Army during the war, he went back to writing. Adopting the name John Wyndham, he started writing a form of science fiction that he called 'logical fantasy'. As well as The Day of the Triffids, he wrote The Kraken Wakes, The Chrysalids, The Midwich Cuckoos (filmed as Village of the Damned) and The Seeds of Time.
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April 18, 2025
“A flash stabbed out between the tail fins. The great rocket lifted. She seemed balanced upon a point of fire, soaring like the huge shell she was into the blue above. Fire spewed from her ports in a spreading glory of living flame like the tail of a monstrous comet. And when the thunder of her going beat upon the ears of the crowd, she was already a fiery spark in the heavens.”
Stowaway to Mars was written in 1935, by the author “John Beynon”, right in the heyday of the pulp era in science fiction. It was his second novel, and falls squarely into this genre, being only really worth reading in the context of this author’s later works. Stowaway to Mars was first published in book form in 1936, under the title “Planet Plane”, which describes the story just as well, but is less of a spoiler. It had been serialised in various different magazines, under each title.
In 1972, three years after the author had died, the publisher settled on “Stowaway to Mars” as the title for the reissued novel. It was then finally attributed to the author who had by now become a household name. He was the inventor of the Triffids, had redefined chrysalids, the kraken, and the existing village of Midwich, and had written several astoundingly original and thoughtful Science Fiction novels. He was, of course, John Wyndham.
John Wyndham’s birth name was “John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris”, and he began writing at the age of 22 in 1925, after making several false starts in various careers. By 1931 he was selling short stories and serials to American science fiction pulp magazines. Most of this early work was published under various pseudonyms, such as the “John Beynon” of this novel, “John B. Harris”, “John Beynon Harris” and “Lucas Parkes”. In 1951, the writer was to use “John Wyndham” for the first time, for the novel that was to make him famous: “The Day of the Triffids”. His pre-war writing career of pulp fiction was perhaps deliberately not mentioned in the book’s publicity, so most people mistakenly assumed that this was the debut novel of a new writer.
After this success, the author kept the nom de plume “John Wyndham”, and went on to write and publish six more novels. However, when he died in 1969, some of his unsold work began to appear, and much of his early material such as “Stowaway to Mars” was also reprinted under this more famous name. Whether this is what he would have chosen, is debatable. Why did he choose so many names? Was it to keep his more serious work separate from the pulp? Or was it perhaps to enable him to publish the same story in different American magazines, under a different name and title? There certainly is a remarkable different in quality between the pre-war works such as Stowaway to Mars and the later ones. The exemplary Science fiction author Christopher Priest puts it very well:
“The stories that Wyndham sold before the war, the ones as Beynon or Beynon Harris, were not particularly well executed and were of their period, not giving much idea of what the writer might later become capable of producing. They were for the most part adventure stories about rocketry, death rays, voyages to other planets, lost races living in subterranean worlds, and so on.
These were, in fact, the very subjects which were to haunt science fiction writers for years to come. Stories about Martians chasing young women wearing no more than a bathing costume and a fish-bowl over their heads created what seemed to be an obsession with unlikely scientific developments or incredible beings from other worlds. Wyndham’s early work is not substantially different from that of other writers of the period, although some might feel they were told and written slightly better than the average stories.
All the evidence is that in his later years Wyndham was uncomfortable with his early stories, even embarrassed by them.“
But as pulp goes, Stowaway to Mars is not all bad. It is superior in that it is better written than most pulp; it just has more sensational appeal than a serious novel. The first chapter reads more like one from a guntoting gangster novel, for instance, than the quiet literary voice we recognise as John Wyndham’s.
The story is about a daredevil aircraft designer Dale Currance, who is addicted to speed, and cannot resist an opportunity to create a rocket which will take him to Mars. If he accomplishes this, he will win the prize being offered to the first man to complete an interplanetary journey. But in chapter 1, a mysterious stranger seems determined to scupper these plans. After a shooting, we then move to chapter 2, a domestic scene, and meet Dale’s wife, Mary.
Of course Dale’s pregnant wife is horrified by the whole enterprise. Dale had promised her that he would stop the daredevil aeronautics. Now he is planning something far more dangerous and unknown, undertaking a journey not even to the moon, but to another planet in our solar system. Her maid (a signal to English readers that this is a privileged upper middle class family) brings her breakfast in bed, and as she reads the news, she faints (as befits women in these types of novels).
Throughout this novel, John Wyndham polarises males and females, making males obsessed by machines, and females either in fear of them or using them reluctantly, considering them a necessary evil. It’s not really clear why he emphasised this so much. Was it perhaps because this is how the readership of the day saw things, so he was playing to a stereotype? Or was he consciously raising the issue of, as one character calls it, “sex-antagonism”? Only a few short years later, plenty of females were to be employed in the mechanical sector, for the war effort. The fact that they were reluctant to give up these jobs to the returning male soldiers, after the war had ended, is well documented. Whatever the reason, here we have an example of the species: machine-hating woman:
“[Mary] had fled to the quiet Dorset countryside, where only an occasional gyrocurt with its white sails whirling as it sauntered along amid summer clouds reminded her of the reign of machines.
This was a man’s world, women walked unhappily and fearfully among its gears and flywheels, making shift with dreams and snatching what little joy was spared them. The machines were the hateful dictators of men and women alike. Only men could be so dense as to think that they themselves were the rulers …“
The author uses multiple points of view, although some of these are types rather than individuals. Here he ostensibly sympathises with Dale’s wife, but the thinking behind it is misconceived. Also, we see the omniscient narrator’s views here, with a different female character:
“The part she had cast herself for was that of a young man and an equal, and she did her best to play it.”
We see far more subtlety in this writer’s later work. In fact this character, Joan, is described with more nuances. She is a studious person, who stands apart from the squabbling men. Joan is a far cry from the “bathing costume and a fish-bowl over their heads” female in pulp, as described by Christopher Priest. Nevertheless, there are quite a few points where a modern reader might want to throw the book across the room. For instance although she does not bother to find out knowing how much oxygen she has with her on Mars, she conveniently finds that she has a lipstick to write with. She does not have a pen or pencil, or any means of wireless communication—but she does have the essential personal grooming tools—as she hastily combs her hair at one point. Of course she does. She’s a woman.
To be fair though, the men do not fare much better in the realism stakes. They all stand around on Mars smoking cigarettes! Not even considering for a moment whether the planet’s atmosphere would enable this, what happened to the oxygen masks we were told they were all wearing? Did they literally disappear into thin air? No wonder John Wyndham was embarrassed by these early works. This may be so-called “soft” science fiction, but it still does not excuse gaffes like that!
One episode must have been quite shocking in 1935, and remains unpleasant, whatever your gender and inclination. I cannot decide who should feel more insulted by this offensive nonsense! It is not explicitly detailed; in fact one episode happens offstage and is merely referred to, but it is unnecessary, irrelevant, and objectionable.
So back to the story, which is set in the then future of 1982. It is no spoiler to say that there is a trip to the planet Mars, even though in our fictional world, nobody has actually landed on the Moon yet. There had been a successful manned rocket trip round the Moon by a Richard Drivers in 1969:
“The story of that amazing man’s persistence in the face of a jeering world when three of his friends had already crashed to their deaths upon the Moon, and the tale of his lonely flight around it are among the deathless epics of the race.”
In fact it is remarkably prescient for a novel written in in 1935, since as we know with hindsight, 1969 was the actual year of the first Moon landings. In Stowaway to Mars, that manned space flight had led to the Kreutz prize being offered. The American millionaire Mr. Kreutz had said:
“If man can reach the Moon he can reach the planets.”
So there wasn’t really any need to land on the Moon at all, and our heroes bypass that part of the Space Race. Big things are expected of the son of David Curtance, “the man who made the Gyrocurts—the Flivvers of the Air—the Multi-Millionaire, the world’s paramount mass-producer of aircraft”. The world is not disappointed, and the press (headed by the wonderfully named “Lord Dithernear”) have a field day. They have their courageous hero, and Dale Curtance picks his own team to crew the rocket. All five men view themselves as pioneers. The others are Geoffrey Duggan, the youthful assistant pilot and navigator, Froud, the cynical, keen-eyed journalist, James Burns, the slightly belligerent engineer, and the nervous medical Doctor Grayson—who was quite an elderly space traveller, at 56. Plus, as we know from the title there is a stowaway.
We have the machines Science Fiction authors love to invent: police gyrocurts, charaplanes, “Machines of every kind from the dainty gyrobus, all with the early morning sunlight glancing from brightly painted bodies beneath swirling white sails”. We have plane-parks and car-parks. And we have the rocket, sited on Salisbury Plain:
“The ‘Gloria Mundi’ gleamed in the sunlight. She towered on the level plain like a monstrous shell designed for the artillery of giants; a shapely mass of glistening metal poised on a tripod of three great flanges, her blunt nose pointing already into the blue sky whither—if all went well—she would presently leap”.
Overt references are made to H.G. Wells, Jules Verne and Edgar Rice Burroughs’ stories and predictions. There are even mentions of lesser known classic SF works such as J.J. Astors’s “Journey to Other Worlds”, or 19th century astronomers such as Giovanni Schiaparelli. There are throwaway wry lines such as “Somebody would have to invent an automatic acceleration control”, as all the crew become unable to breathe, and pass out under the increased speed through the atmosphere. We have macho posturing parried with sardonic wit. It all adds to the entertainment, and is highly enjoyable.
“which of the storytellers was nearest the truth[?] Wells, with his jelly-like creatures, Weinbaum, with his queer birds, Burroughs, with his menageries of curiosities or Stapledon, with his intelligent clouds?”
Sometimes we seem to be on the verge of serious discussion, such as when the comparative merits of ideographic and alphabetic writing are postulated. However, the physical journeys to Mars and back again are breezily dismissed with:
“I cannot do better than to refer you again to “The Bridging of Space” which Dale has crammed with vast (and to me, indigestible) quantities of mathematical and technical information.”
Granted this is for verisimilitude. Referring to a fictitious book written by a character in the novel, reinforces the conceit that the author is telling factual events. However, it is also a cop-out!
The stowaway is not seeking publicity, but has a good scientific reason for being there. The result is a perfect opening for a sequel. Indeed, there was a sequel, although it is only a novella in a book of short stories.
The story has been diverted on to this strange relationship, Eventually the “Gloria Mundi” returns home.
The ending is not particularly dramatic for most of the characters. Indeed it rather tails off, except for a final devastating—and revealing—sentence. (Please note, what follows is a huge spoiler):
Pulp fiction is defined as “popular or sensational writing that is regarded as being of poor quality” The term “pulp” means a soft, wet, shapeless mass of material. It derives from the cheap wood pulp paper on which the magazines were printed—throwaway reading matter.
So am I going to read the sequel? You bet I am! Yes it has faults, and some parts make the reader cringe. But despite all this, it is by John Wyndham, and shows a nascent idea of his remarkable prescience, imagination, and exploration of ideas.
“Stars like diamonds, bright and undiffused, shone in brilliant myriads against a velvet blackness. Bright sparks which were great suns burnt lonely, with nothing to illuminate in a darkness they could not dissipate. In the empty depths of space there was no size, no scale, nothing to show that a million light years was not arm’s length, or arm’s length, a million light years. Microcosm was confused with macrocosm.”
Stowaway to Mars was written in 1935, by the author “John Beynon”, right in the heyday of the pulp era in science fiction. It was his second novel, and falls squarely into this genre, being only really worth reading in the context of this author’s later works. Stowaway to Mars was first published in book form in 1936, under the title “Planet Plane”, which describes the story just as well, but is less of a spoiler. It had been serialised in various different magazines, under each title.
In 1972, three years after the author had died, the publisher settled on “Stowaway to Mars” as the title for the reissued novel. It was then finally attributed to the author who had by now become a household name. He was the inventor of the Triffids, had redefined chrysalids, the kraken, and the existing village of Midwich, and had written several astoundingly original and thoughtful Science Fiction novels. He was, of course, John Wyndham.
John Wyndham’s birth name was “John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris”, and he began writing at the age of 22 in 1925, after making several false starts in various careers. By 1931 he was selling short stories and serials to American science fiction pulp magazines. Most of this early work was published under various pseudonyms, such as the “John Beynon” of this novel, “John B. Harris”, “John Beynon Harris” and “Lucas Parkes”. In 1951, the writer was to use “John Wyndham” for the first time, for the novel that was to make him famous: “The Day of the Triffids”. His pre-war writing career of pulp fiction was perhaps deliberately not mentioned in the book’s publicity, so most people mistakenly assumed that this was the debut novel of a new writer.
After this success, the author kept the nom de plume “John Wyndham”, and went on to write and publish six more novels. However, when he died in 1969, some of his unsold work began to appear, and much of his early material such as “Stowaway to Mars” was also reprinted under this more famous name. Whether this is what he would have chosen, is debatable. Why did he choose so many names? Was it to keep his more serious work separate from the pulp? Or was it perhaps to enable him to publish the same story in different American magazines, under a different name and title? There certainly is a remarkable different in quality between the pre-war works such as Stowaway to Mars and the later ones. The exemplary Science fiction author Christopher Priest puts it very well:
“The stories that Wyndham sold before the war, the ones as Beynon or Beynon Harris, were not particularly well executed and were of their period, not giving much idea of what the writer might later become capable of producing. They were for the most part adventure stories about rocketry, death rays, voyages to other planets, lost races living in subterranean worlds, and so on.
These were, in fact, the very subjects which were to haunt science fiction writers for years to come. Stories about Martians chasing young women wearing no more than a bathing costume and a fish-bowl over their heads created what seemed to be an obsession with unlikely scientific developments or incredible beings from other worlds. Wyndham’s early work is not substantially different from that of other writers of the period, although some might feel they were told and written slightly better than the average stories.
All the evidence is that in his later years Wyndham was uncomfortable with his early stories, even embarrassed by them.“
But as pulp goes, Stowaway to Mars is not all bad. It is superior in that it is better written than most pulp; it just has more sensational appeal than a serious novel. The first chapter reads more like one from a guntoting gangster novel, for instance, than the quiet literary voice we recognise as John Wyndham’s.
The story is about a daredevil aircraft designer Dale Currance, who is addicted to speed, and cannot resist an opportunity to create a rocket which will take him to Mars. If he accomplishes this, he will win the prize being offered to the first man to complete an interplanetary journey. But in chapter 1, a mysterious stranger seems determined to scupper these plans. After a shooting, we then move to chapter 2, a domestic scene, and meet Dale’s wife, Mary.
Of course Dale’s pregnant wife is horrified by the whole enterprise. Dale had promised her that he would stop the daredevil aeronautics. Now he is planning something far more dangerous and unknown, undertaking a journey not even to the moon, but to another planet in our solar system. Her maid (a signal to English readers that this is a privileged upper middle class family) brings her breakfast in bed, and as she reads the news, she faints (as befits women in these types of novels).
Throughout this novel, John Wyndham polarises males and females, making males obsessed by machines, and females either in fear of them or using them reluctantly, considering them a necessary evil. It’s not really clear why he emphasised this so much. Was it perhaps because this is how the readership of the day saw things, so he was playing to a stereotype? Or was he consciously raising the issue of, as one character calls it, “sex-antagonism”? Only a few short years later, plenty of females were to be employed in the mechanical sector, for the war effort. The fact that they were reluctant to give up these jobs to the returning male soldiers, after the war had ended, is well documented. Whatever the reason, here we have an example of the species: machine-hating woman:
“[Mary] had fled to the quiet Dorset countryside, where only an occasional gyrocurt with its white sails whirling as it sauntered along amid summer clouds reminded her of the reign of machines.
This was a man’s world, women walked unhappily and fearfully among its gears and flywheels, making shift with dreams and snatching what little joy was spared them. The machines were the hateful dictators of men and women alike. Only men could be so dense as to think that they themselves were the rulers …“
The author uses multiple points of view, although some of these are types rather than individuals. Here he ostensibly sympathises with Dale’s wife, but the thinking behind it is misconceived. Also, we see the omniscient narrator’s views here, with a different female character:
“The part she had cast herself for was that of a young man and an equal, and she did her best to play it.”
We see far more subtlety in this writer’s later work. In fact this character, Joan, is described with more nuances. She is a studious person, who stands apart from the squabbling men. Joan is a far cry from the “bathing costume and a fish-bowl over their heads” female in pulp, as described by Christopher Priest. Nevertheless, there are quite a few points where a modern reader might want to throw the book across the room. For instance although she does not bother to find out knowing how much oxygen she has with her on Mars, she conveniently finds that she has a lipstick to write with. She does not have a pen or pencil, or any means of wireless communication—but she does have the essential personal grooming tools—as she hastily combs her hair at one point. Of course she does. She’s a woman.
To be fair though, the men do not fare much better in the realism stakes. They all stand around on Mars smoking cigarettes! Not even considering for a moment whether the planet’s atmosphere would enable this, what happened to the oxygen masks we were told they were all wearing? Did they literally disappear into thin air? No wonder John Wyndham was embarrassed by these early works. This may be so-called “soft” science fiction, but it still does not excuse gaffes like that!
One episode must have been quite shocking in 1935, and remains unpleasant, whatever your gender and inclination. I cannot decide who should feel more insulted by this offensive nonsense! It is not explicitly detailed; in fact one episode happens offstage and is merely referred to, but it is unnecessary, irrelevant, and objectionable.
So back to the story, which is set in the then future of 1982. It is no spoiler to say that there is a trip to the planet Mars, even though in our fictional world, nobody has actually landed on the Moon yet. There had been a successful manned rocket trip round the Moon by a Richard Drivers in 1969:
“The story of that amazing man’s persistence in the face of a jeering world when three of his friends had already crashed to their deaths upon the Moon, and the tale of his lonely flight around it are among the deathless epics of the race.”
In fact it is remarkably prescient for a novel written in in 1935, since as we know with hindsight, 1969 was the actual year of the first Moon landings. In Stowaway to Mars, that manned space flight had led to the Kreutz prize being offered. The American millionaire Mr. Kreutz had said:
“If man can reach the Moon he can reach the planets.”
So there wasn’t really any need to land on the Moon at all, and our heroes bypass that part of the Space Race. Big things are expected of the son of David Curtance, “the man who made the Gyrocurts—the Flivvers of the Air—the Multi-Millionaire, the world’s paramount mass-producer of aircraft”. The world is not disappointed, and the press (headed by the wonderfully named “Lord Dithernear”) have a field day. They have their courageous hero, and Dale Curtance picks his own team to crew the rocket. All five men view themselves as pioneers. The others are Geoffrey Duggan, the youthful assistant pilot and navigator, Froud, the cynical, keen-eyed journalist, James Burns, the slightly belligerent engineer, and the nervous medical Doctor Grayson—who was quite an elderly space traveller, at 56. Plus, as we know from the title there is a stowaway.
We have the machines Science Fiction authors love to invent: police gyrocurts, charaplanes, “Machines of every kind from the dainty gyrobus, all with the early morning sunlight glancing from brightly painted bodies beneath swirling white sails”. We have plane-parks and car-parks. And we have the rocket, sited on Salisbury Plain:
“The ‘Gloria Mundi’ gleamed in the sunlight. She towered on the level plain like a monstrous shell designed for the artillery of giants; a shapely mass of glistening metal poised on a tripod of three great flanges, her blunt nose pointing already into the blue sky whither—if all went well—she would presently leap”.
Overt references are made to H.G. Wells, Jules Verne and Edgar Rice Burroughs’ stories and predictions. There are even mentions of lesser known classic SF works such as J.J. Astors’s “Journey to Other Worlds”, or 19th century astronomers such as Giovanni Schiaparelli. There are throwaway wry lines such as “Somebody would have to invent an automatic acceleration control”, as all the crew become unable to breathe, and pass out under the increased speed through the atmosphere. We have macho posturing parried with sardonic wit. It all adds to the entertainment, and is highly enjoyable.
“which of the storytellers was nearest the truth[?] Wells, with his jelly-like creatures, Weinbaum, with his queer birds, Burroughs, with his menageries of curiosities or Stapledon, with his intelligent clouds?”
Sometimes we seem to be on the verge of serious discussion, such as when the comparative merits of ideographic and alphabetic writing are postulated. However, the physical journeys to Mars and back again are breezily dismissed with:
“I cannot do better than to refer you again to “The Bridging of Space” which Dale has crammed with vast (and to me, indigestible) quantities of mathematical and technical information.”
Granted this is for verisimilitude. Referring to a fictitious book written by a character in the novel, reinforces the conceit that the author is telling factual events. However, it is also a cop-out!
The stowaway is not seeking publicity, but has a good scientific reason for being there. The result is a perfect opening for a sequel. Indeed, there was a sequel, although it is only a novella in a book of short stories.
The story has been diverted on to this strange relationship, Eventually the “Gloria Mundi” returns home.
The ending is not particularly dramatic for most of the characters. Indeed it rather tails off, except for a final devastating—and revealing—sentence. (Please note, what follows is a huge spoiler):
Pulp fiction is defined as “popular or sensational writing that is regarded as being of poor quality” The term “pulp” means a soft, wet, shapeless mass of material. It derives from the cheap wood pulp paper on which the magazines were printed—throwaway reading matter.
So am I going to read the sequel? You bet I am! Yes it has faults, and some parts make the reader cringe. But despite all this, it is by John Wyndham, and shows a nascent idea of his remarkable prescience, imagination, and exploration of ideas.
“Stars like diamonds, bright and undiffused, shone in brilliant myriads against a velvet blackness. Bright sparks which were great suns burnt lonely, with nothing to illuminate in a darkness they could not dissipate. In the empty depths of space there was no size, no scale, nothing to show that a million light years was not arm’s length, or arm’s length, a million light years. Microcosm was confused with macrocosm.”
June 5, 2021
I'm guessing that it has to be getting on for forty years since i last read this book, and although thats quite a while it was still an enjoyable read. Dated , well yes, it was written nearly 90 years ago, but given some of the concepts, it does not feel that old at all.
The book centres on a race to be the first men to reach the planet Mars. Now unlike our reality where space flight was originally only affordable by the richer nations, in this book it is the wealthy private individuals who own corporations that paved the way to the moon and now are racing to reach Mars first. First and foremost amongst the challengers is the Brit, Dale Curtance who was in this reality the first man to the moon.
Despite someone from maybe one of the rival factions trying to sabotage Dale's rocket, Dale is the first to take off for Mars. However, a few days into the flight, a stowaway is discovered on board.
But this turns out to be the least of Dale and his fellow travellers issues. Mars turns out not to be the quiet peaceful place that was expected. A series of adventures follows, a kidnapping, a hijack, aliens, rogue robots, 2 further spaceships arriving, before Dale and his crew eventually get off the planet heading back to earth.
An enjoyable if not too taxing story, that is in some ways typical Wyndham. although the book focusses primarily on the "hero" Dale Curtance, the real hero of the book as in most of Wyndham's book is his female lead, which in this case, is Joan Shirning. Daughter of a ridiculed professor whose career was ultimately destroyed after he spoke about discovering an alien machine from Mars, .
As I said this is not too taxing but in some ways it is amazingly prescient regarding Wyndham's view of the future 1970s and and 80s, to him at the time, almost 50 years in the future.
A fun read, although not as good as some of his later books like The Chrysalids or Midwich Cuckoos.
The book centres on a race to be the first men to reach the planet Mars. Now unlike our reality where space flight was originally only affordable by the richer nations, in this book it is the wealthy private individuals who own corporations that paved the way to the moon and now are racing to reach Mars first. First and foremost amongst the challengers is the Brit, Dale Curtance who was in this reality the first man to the moon.
Despite someone from maybe one of the rival factions trying to sabotage Dale's rocket, Dale is the first to take off for Mars. However, a few days into the flight, a stowaway is discovered on board.
But this turns out to be the least of Dale and his fellow travellers issues. Mars turns out not to be the quiet peaceful place that was expected. A series of adventures follows, a kidnapping, a hijack, aliens, rogue robots, 2 further spaceships arriving, before Dale and his crew eventually get off the planet heading back to earth.
An enjoyable if not too taxing story, that is in some ways typical Wyndham. although the book focusses primarily on the "hero" Dale Curtance, the real hero of the book as in most of Wyndham's book is his female lead, which in this case, is Joan Shirning. Daughter of a ridiculed professor whose career was ultimately destroyed after he spoke about discovering an alien machine from Mars, .
As I said this is not too taxing but in some ways it is amazingly prescient regarding Wyndham's view of the future 1970s and and 80s, to him at the time, almost 50 years in the future.
A fun read, although not as good as some of his later books like The Chrysalids or Midwich Cuckoos.
October 14, 2022
Another enjoyable John Wyndham. I had so much fun with all the books that were available on Audible in the plus catalogue, and am now looking forward to reading more of his work in print form - eventually anyway!
May 25, 2021
This is an interplanetary travel / first contact novel originally published in 1936, by John Wyndham (here under pen-name John Beynon), the author more known for his after the WW2 works such as The Kraken Wakes, The Midwich Cuckoos and The Day Of The Triffids. I read is as a part of monthly reading for May 2021 at The Evolution of Science Fiction group.
The story starts with a playboy millionaire Dale Curance from England. He is a son of a man, who made rockets/planes as commonplace as Henry Ford made cars; he has a bunch of record flights under his belt. And now he plans to visit Mars. It is 1981, there were some (mostly unsuccessful) space flights, but in 1969 a guy named managed to take his rocket right round the Moon and bring it safely back to Earth (note that it almost in line with the real life - Apollo 8 (December 21–27, 1968) was the first crewed spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit, and also the first human spaceflight to reach another astronomical object, namely the Moon, which the crew orbited without landing, and then departed safely back to Earth). Dale gathers four other men (a biologist, a journalist, an engineer and a young guy) and starts to Mars.
Soon they find away that there is a mysterious young woman trying to free ride on their ship. In the beginning they see her as a crazy girl, who watched to many romantic movies, but in reality she has what to give to the expedition, namely the Martian written language!
The book is quite simple and straightforward, but there are some interesting tidbits. For example, characters show knowledge of main SF of the period, referencing Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Edgar Rice Burroughs and Olaf Stapledon among others. Usually such fandom allusions are found in much more recent SF texts. Also out of 5 men in the ship there were 2 (40%), who tried to force themselves on the women. Moreover, a rape attempt is a significant plot twist, which surprised me in such an old book.
TL;DR While nothing spectacular, it is quite strong for the period it was written and may be of interest to people, who want to know more about development of the SF genre.
The story starts with a playboy millionaire Dale Curance from England. He is a son of a man, who made rockets/planes as commonplace as Henry Ford made cars; he has a bunch of record flights under his belt. And now he plans to visit Mars. It is 1981, there were some (mostly unsuccessful) space flights, but in 1969 a guy named managed to take his rocket right round the Moon and bring it safely back to Earth (note that it almost in line with the real life - Apollo 8 (December 21–27, 1968) was the first crewed spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit, and also the first human spaceflight to reach another astronomical object, namely the Moon, which the crew orbited without landing, and then departed safely back to Earth). Dale gathers four other men (a biologist, a journalist, an engineer and a young guy) and starts to Mars.
Soon they find away that there is a mysterious young woman trying to free ride on their ship. In the beginning they see her as a crazy girl, who watched to many romantic movies, but in reality she has what to give to the expedition, namely the Martian written language!
The book is quite simple and straightforward, but there are some interesting tidbits. For example, characters show knowledge of main SF of the period, referencing Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Edgar Rice Burroughs and Olaf Stapledon among others. Usually such fandom allusions are found in much more recent SF texts. Also out of 5 men in the ship there were 2 (40%), who tried to force themselves on the women. Moreover, a rape attempt is a significant plot twist, which surprised me in such an old book.
TL;DR While nothing spectacular, it is quite strong for the period it was written and may be of interest to people, who want to know more about development of the SF genre.
March 17, 2023
Pre-war science fiction by John Wyndham under another name, this has similarities to early Heinlein and other pulp authors. I like the Martians and mechanicals, but attempted rape is not a welcome addition to this novel.
The idea of a "prize" for first to land on Mars and return drives the plot, and the "stowaway" sub-plot is initially subordinate. This novel was first published as "Planet Plane" and then "The Space Machine". The writing is fairly good, though it lacks the subtle horror of Wyndham's later works.
What was an okay pulp novel is pulled down by misogyny and attempted rape, along with the eventual kidnapping of the woman in question and the "oh well" attitude of the rest of the crew. Painful to read or explain to anyone.
There is a sequel, though to explain why may involve spoilers. I'll probably not pick it up anytime soon.
The idea of a "prize" for first to land on Mars and return drives the plot, and the "stowaway" sub-plot is initially subordinate. This novel was first published as "Planet Plane" and then "The Space Machine". The writing is fairly good, though it lacks the subtle horror of Wyndham's later works.
What was an okay pulp novel is pulled down by misogyny and attempted rape, along with the eventual kidnapping of the woman in question and the "oh well" attitude of the rest of the crew. Painful to read or explain to anyone.
There is a sequel, though to explain why may involve spoilers. I'll probably not pick it up anytime soon.
March 1, 2016
Lesenotizen
"Ungeheurer ist viel und nichts
Ungeheurer als der Mensch.
Er überschreitet auch das graue Meer
Im Notossturm
Unter tosenden Wogen hindurch."
(Sophokles)
An diesem Unternehmergeist hat sich nichts geändert, nur die zu überwindenden Strecken sind größer geworden. In DIE REISE ZUM MARS will der Brite Dale Curtance, reicher Erbe und Wagehals, 1981 den interplanetarischen Raumflug wagen und mit einer selbst konstruierten Rakete als erster Mensch zum Mars und zurück fliegen und ganz nebenbei den hochdotierten amerikanischen Keuntz-Preis einstreichen.
Dabei schätzt Curtance das Riskio des Unternehmens recht ähnlich ein wie der pragmatische Neil Armstrong: "Jeder wusste um das Risiko und akzeptierte es, es muss nur stets im richtigen Verhältnis stehen zur Größe des Erfolges", meint Armstrong. "Als Kampfpilot im Koreakrieg war ich weit größeren Gefahren ausgesetzt".
Das liest sich bei Wyndham so: "Natürlich bestehen Risiken (...) Jedoch: wir sind überzeugt, daß wir gegenüber all diesen Risiken eine mehr als - wenn ich so sagen darf - sportliche Chance haben. Hätten wir diese Überzeugung nicht, würden wir uns auf dieses Unternehmen nicht einlassen."
Armstrong schätzte 1969 die Chance auf ein Gelingen der Mission auf 50 Prozent, die auf eine gesunde Rückkehr jedoch höher, und diese Prognose reichte ihm.
Wyndhams 1936 erschienener Roman PLANET PLANE (der dann 1937 als Fortsetzungsroman unter dem bekannteren Titel STOWAWAY TO MARS erschien) ist kein für seine Zeit typischer Pulp-Roman, sondern wird in dem für Wyndham typischen Stil sachlich und größtenteils unaufgeregt erzählt. Wyndham ist eher als Erbe Jules Vernes zu betrachten, der um einen möglichst realen Unterbau für seine Zukunftsvision bemüht ist und auch gelegentlich politische oder gesellschaftliche Themen anschneidet, nicht immer ohne augenzwinkerndem trockenen Humor:
"Am Rande des Schlachtenlärms verkündete der sozialistische "Aufmerker": "Der Mars muß internationalisiert werden!" Und der Leitartikler Swannen Haffer stellte die Frage: "Werden die Arbeiter auf dem Mars ausgebeutet werden?"
Und obwohl die Presse in Wyndhams Romanen immer eine Rolle spielt, steht er ihr offenbar nicht ganz unkritisch gegenüber, heißen die Erzeugnisse doch beispielsweise "Morgen-Exzess" oder "Tägliche Buntschau". Auch wird in amerikanischen Zeitungen gemutmaßt, ob ein amerikanischer Geldpreis überhaupt an einen Engländer ausgezahlt werden müßte, gelänge denn die Mission. Und wenn beim Raketenstart der rührende Abschied des Helden von Frau und Kind ausbleibt, wird sich die Presse mit einer Fotomontage zu behelfen wissen zwecks Delektierung der Massen, die sich ähnlicher Geringschätzung erfreuen.
"Ungeheurer ist viel und nichts
Ungeheurer als der Mensch.
Er überschreitet auch das graue Meer
Im Notossturm
Unter tosenden Wogen hindurch."
(Sophokles)
An diesem Unternehmergeist hat sich nichts geändert, nur die zu überwindenden Strecken sind größer geworden. In DIE REISE ZUM MARS will der Brite Dale Curtance, reicher Erbe und Wagehals, 1981 den interplanetarischen Raumflug wagen und mit einer selbst konstruierten Rakete als erster Mensch zum Mars und zurück fliegen und ganz nebenbei den hochdotierten amerikanischen Keuntz-Preis einstreichen.
Dabei schätzt Curtance das Riskio des Unternehmens recht ähnlich ein wie der pragmatische Neil Armstrong: "Jeder wusste um das Risiko und akzeptierte es, es muss nur stets im richtigen Verhältnis stehen zur Größe des Erfolges", meint Armstrong. "Als Kampfpilot im Koreakrieg war ich weit größeren Gefahren ausgesetzt".
Das liest sich bei Wyndham so: "Natürlich bestehen Risiken (...) Jedoch: wir sind überzeugt, daß wir gegenüber all diesen Risiken eine mehr als - wenn ich so sagen darf - sportliche Chance haben. Hätten wir diese Überzeugung nicht, würden wir uns auf dieses Unternehmen nicht einlassen."
Armstrong schätzte 1969 die Chance auf ein Gelingen der Mission auf 50 Prozent, die auf eine gesunde Rückkehr jedoch höher, und diese Prognose reichte ihm.
Wyndhams 1936 erschienener Roman PLANET PLANE (der dann 1937 als Fortsetzungsroman unter dem bekannteren Titel STOWAWAY TO MARS erschien) ist kein für seine Zeit typischer Pulp-Roman, sondern wird in dem für Wyndham typischen Stil sachlich und größtenteils unaufgeregt erzählt. Wyndham ist eher als Erbe Jules Vernes zu betrachten, der um einen möglichst realen Unterbau für seine Zukunftsvision bemüht ist und auch gelegentlich politische oder gesellschaftliche Themen anschneidet, nicht immer ohne augenzwinkerndem trockenen Humor:
"Am Rande des Schlachtenlärms verkündete der sozialistische "Aufmerker": "Der Mars muß internationalisiert werden!" Und der Leitartikler Swannen Haffer stellte die Frage: "Werden die Arbeiter auf dem Mars ausgebeutet werden?"
Und obwohl die Presse in Wyndhams Romanen immer eine Rolle spielt, steht er ihr offenbar nicht ganz unkritisch gegenüber, heißen die Erzeugnisse doch beispielsweise "Morgen-Exzess" oder "Tägliche Buntschau". Auch wird in amerikanischen Zeitungen gemutmaßt, ob ein amerikanischer Geldpreis überhaupt an einen Engländer ausgezahlt werden müßte, gelänge denn die Mission. Und wenn beim Raketenstart der rührende Abschied des Helden von Frau und Kind ausbleibt, wird sich die Presse mit einer Fotomontage zu behelfen wissen zwecks Delektierung der Massen, die sich ähnlicher Geringschätzung erfreuen.
January 13, 2017
A disappointment. Not only was the story itself rather boring, but the rampant casual sexism was entirely off-putting. Of course, I expect a certain amount of that as par for the course in books of this era, but this just took the piss, really. Not only is Joan (the stowaway) a victim of multiple attempted sexual assaults, which very few of the other characters appear to take seriously, but she amounts only to a character who is rescued by martians and over the course of two days falls in love with and is impregnated by one, only to die in childbirth nine months later while her son lives. What's most galling is that Joan is actually the character with the most potential and most interest - most of the others fall flat. Add to this long-winded discussions that can only be titled "Why Women Don't Like Machines" (where, ironically, the woman on board is not consulted) and you've basically got the entirety of this trip to Mars in a nutshell. Also, I still can't get a statement from the beginning of the book out of my head: Curtance suggests to his wife that her insistence on him only building rockets for other people is 'like giving birth to one stillborn child after another', a comment for which he is only mildly rebuked. Sadly there isn't enough story here to cushion the blows of such attitudes.
May 21, 2021
Better than the typical SF novels of the 1930s. By no means an essential read. Wyndham's more famous later novels are supposedly much better. I should someday get around to those.
BTW: I read the e-book version ASIN B004MPQB7U by Old LandMark Publishing. I'm glad they made this available as an e-book. But the number of mistakes was atrociously high. It was obviously converted from text by optical character recognition and many mistakes were not fixed. The computer had particular trouble telling the difference between the characters lL!iI1 and just freely mixed them.
BTW: I read the e-book version ASIN B004MPQB7U by Old LandMark Publishing. I'm glad they made this available as an e-book. But the number of mistakes was atrociously high. It was obviously converted from text by optical character recognition and many mistakes were not fixed. The computer had particular trouble telling the difference between the characters lL!iI1 and just freely mixed them.
November 23, 2020
Early Wyndham, and it shows. The ideas and concepts are good, but it seems a little on the pulp side of the sci-fi house. Wyndham is refining his style. Worth reading if you want to see his development as a writer.
August 19, 2020
Ο Τζων Γουινταμ είναι ένας μύθος της Ε. Φ. Ο συγγραφέας μεταξύ αλλων του The day of the Triffids και του The Midwich Cuckoos (οι δύο ταινίες με τιτλο the village of the damned ηταν βασισμένες σε αυτό το μυθιστορημα) είναι ένας συγγραφέας must read για τους φίλους του είδους.
Το συγκεκριμένο μυθιστόρημα ομως, που γράφτηκε με το ψευδώνυμο John Beynon και εκδοθηκε το 1936, δεν είναι μια από τις πολύ καλές στιγμές του.
Βρίθει σεξιστικων, μισογυνικων αλλά και συντηρητικων γενικώς στερεοτυπων που θα ζήλευε και ο Μπογδανος. Μοιάζει γραμμένο βιαστικά ενώ η κεντρικη ιδέα που πραγματευεται είναι πολύ ενδιαφέρουσα και άξιζε μεγαλύτερης προσοχής και καλύτερης ανάπτυξης. Πιθανολογώ ότι οι μεταφράσεις και η επιμέλεια στο πόδι ολης της συγκεκριμενης σειράς βιβλίων του Λυχναριου φέρουν μια ευθύνη για το αποτέλεσμα, αλλά η κυρία ευθύνη βαρύνει σίγουρα τον συγγραφέα.
Πρόκειται πάντως για ένα βιβλίο που δείχνει εμφατικά, αν διαβάσεις και τα επόμενα του, την εξέλιξη του συγγραφέα, προς το καλύτερο ευτυχώς. Η ιδέα του πολύ πιθανά να επηρέασε λιγο τον Κινγκ για το Trucks.
Το συγκεκριμένο μυθιστόρημα ομως, που γράφτηκε με το ψευδώνυμο John Beynon και εκδοθηκε το 1936, δεν είναι μια από τις πολύ καλές στιγμές του.
Βρίθει σεξιστικων, μισογυνικων αλλά και συντηρητικων γενικώς στερεοτυπων που θα ζήλευε και ο Μπογδανος. Μοιάζει γραμμένο βιαστικά ενώ η κεντρικη ιδέα που πραγματευεται είναι πολύ ενδιαφέρουσα και άξιζε μεγαλύτερης προσοχής και καλύτερης ανάπτυξης. Πιθανολογώ ότι οι μεταφράσεις και η επιμέλεια στο πόδι ολης της συγκεκριμενης σειράς βιβλίων του Λυχναριου φέρουν μια ευθύνη για το αποτέλεσμα, αλλά η κυρία ευθύνη βαρύνει σίγουρα τον συγγραφέα.
Πρόκειται πάντως για ένα βιβλίο που δείχνει εμφατικά, αν διαβάσεις και τα επόμενα του, την εξέλιξη του συγγραφέα, προς το καλύτερο ευτυχώς. Η ιδέα του πολύ πιθανά να επηρέασε λιγο τον Κινγκ για το Trucks.
December 31, 2017
Reading a John Wyndham novel has never left me disappointed, but before reading ‘Stowaway to Mars’ I was made aware that it had a much lower rating than some of his better known books such as ‘Day of the Triffids’, ‘Chrysalids’ and ‘The Kraken Wakes’. It is worth noting that this did lower my expectations, and quite possibly this contributed to my surprise enjoyment of the story.
It is important to take two caveats into consideration before you read this book. Firstly it was written in the 1930’s. This is imperative to understanding some of the sexism and misogyny that you will encounter. It was definitely a different time, and if you can take that with a pinch of salt you might enjoy the book as much as I did. In fact some of the outright sexist remarks gave me the best laughs I’ve ever had from a Wyndham novel. Secondly, another point to take into account is that this was one of Wyndham’s first novels. He was still formulating his style. It still has all of his usual trademark outlandish kooky premises but it’s never going to be a universal classic in the same vein as the titles I mentioned earlier.
That being said, I did think the story touched on two fundamental points that were, I’m sure, highly pioneering for the time. The whole concept of machines (and automation) and man's place alongside them is an integral theme of the narrative and it really fascinated me that people in the 1930’s were just as apprehensive about our role in a technologically advanced world as we are today. Machines taking over and rendering man obsolete is a concept that has troubles big thinkers for much longer than I had imagined.
The second point that I found poignant was the idea that our quest for knowledge and our ultimate survival will one day grind to a shuddering halt. Drawing parallels between our thriving planet, with it’s abundant lifeforms and natural (albeit it slowly depleting) resources, and that of Mars on its last legs was a great device to drive home the concept of humanity’s fragility, so often dismissed by man's arrogance.
I have no option but to give this book a 5 star rating as it fulfilled all my criteria for a good book. It made me laugh, I couldn’t put it down and it left me with a myriad of lingering thoughts that inspired me to even write a review on Goodreads. That being said, Wyndham is my favourite author.
It is important to take two caveats into consideration before you read this book. Firstly it was written in the 1930’s. This is imperative to understanding some of the sexism and misogyny that you will encounter. It was definitely a different time, and if you can take that with a pinch of salt you might enjoy the book as much as I did. In fact some of the outright sexist remarks gave me the best laughs I’ve ever had from a Wyndham novel. Secondly, another point to take into account is that this was one of Wyndham’s first novels. He was still formulating his style. It still has all of his usual trademark outlandish kooky premises but it’s never going to be a universal classic in the same vein as the titles I mentioned earlier.
That being said, I did think the story touched on two fundamental points that were, I’m sure, highly pioneering for the time. The whole concept of machines (and automation) and man's place alongside them is an integral theme of the narrative and it really fascinated me that people in the 1930’s were just as apprehensive about our role in a technologically advanced world as we are today. Machines taking over and rendering man obsolete is a concept that has troubles big thinkers for much longer than I had imagined.
The second point that I found poignant was the idea that our quest for knowledge and our ultimate survival will one day grind to a shuddering halt. Drawing parallels between our thriving planet, with it’s abundant lifeforms and natural (albeit it slowly depleting) resources, and that of Mars on its last legs was a great device to drive home the concept of humanity’s fragility, so often dismissed by man's arrogance.
I have no option but to give this book a 5 star rating as it fulfilled all my criteria for a good book. It made me laugh, I couldn’t put it down and it left me with a myriad of lingering thoughts that inspired me to even write a review on Goodreads. That being said, Wyndham is my favourite author.
April 29, 2020
I received this book as part of a giveaway and am very glad I did! Despite being a fan of John Wyndham's work, I had not heard of Stowaway to Mars before, as it was originally published under a different name.
Stowaway to Mars tells the story of five men attempting the first return flight to Mars. Their plans begin to go awry when they discover a stowaway on board their rocket. This stowaway, Joan, becomes the source of conflict in the novel, primarily because her presence - and in particular her femaleness - elicits a range of reactions from the other passengers. Even while zipping through space, gender roles and expectations persist amongst these extremely-of-their-time interplanetary explorers. I do not think, as other reviewers have suggested, that this book is sexist, though its characters undeniably are. Instead, Stowaway works as a parable of colonialism, with its characters carrying to Mars the threat of more than just foreign bacteria; these astronauts bring their misogyny and imperialism too.
Stowaway's analysis (and, I think, criticism) of its heroes' attitudes towards conquest and discovery is paired with a discussion of the relationship between humans and machines, and of the blurring of boundaries between the two. Though the characters spout a lot of nonsense on this subject, Wyndham manages to tease out some interesting ideas about humanity's relationship with machinery. And any irritation caused by the short-sightedness of the characters' various declarations is diffused by Wyndham's playful approach to the subject.
But, as is often the case with Wyndham, the ending lets the book down. Once the rocket finally lands on Mars, the narrative loses much of its focus. A love affair appears out of truly nowhere, and Joan's character changes dramatically and incomprehensibly. The story's attempts in these final chapters to explore the nature of sentience are less successful than might have been hoped.
Despite these shortcomings, Stowaway to Mars remains a fantastic read and far exceeded my expectations (surely Wyndham could have come up with a better name for this book? It deserves something better). This is excellent science fiction - both thought-provoking and entertaining.
Stowaway to Mars tells the story of five men attempting the first return flight to Mars. Their plans begin to go awry when they discover a stowaway on board their rocket. This stowaway, Joan, becomes the source of conflict in the novel, primarily because her presence - and in particular her femaleness - elicits a range of reactions from the other passengers. Even while zipping through space, gender roles and expectations persist amongst these extremely-of-their-time interplanetary explorers. I do not think, as other reviewers have suggested, that this book is sexist, though its characters undeniably are. Instead, Stowaway works as a parable of colonialism, with its characters carrying to Mars the threat of more than just foreign bacteria; these astronauts bring their misogyny and imperialism too.
Stowaway's analysis (and, I think, criticism) of its heroes' attitudes towards conquest and discovery is paired with a discussion of the relationship between humans and machines, and of the blurring of boundaries between the two. Though the characters spout a lot of nonsense on this subject, Wyndham manages to tease out some interesting ideas about humanity's relationship with machinery. And any irritation caused by the short-sightedness of the characters' various declarations is diffused by Wyndham's playful approach to the subject.
But, as is often the case with Wyndham, the ending lets the book down. Once the rocket finally lands on Mars, the narrative loses much of its focus. A love affair appears out of truly nowhere, and Joan's character changes dramatically and incomprehensibly. The story's attempts in these final chapters to explore the nature of sentience are less successful than might have been hoped.
Despite these shortcomings, Stowaway to Mars remains a fantastic read and far exceeded my expectations (surely Wyndham could have come up with a better name for this book? It deserves something better). This is excellent science fiction - both thought-provoking and entertaining.
April 19, 2022
I've enjoyed so many of John Wyndham's Sci-Fi novels. The Day of the Triffids, The Kraken Wakes, The Chrysalids and The Midwich Cuckoos are some of my all-time favorite Sci-Fi novels. Over the past few years, I've discovered his earlier work and tried them as well.
Stowaway to Mars was originally published in 1935 (also under the name Planet Plane under the pseudonym John Beynon). It is more a typical space adventure, the journey to another planet, this time being Mars.
Dale Curtance an intrepid English adventurer is head of a rocket plane company and is building a ship to compete in a contest to be the first to land on another planet. When his rocket finally takes off, with a crew of five, they discover a stowaway, a woman Joan, who has snuck onboard for her own particular reasons. This will, of course become apparent.
The story is relatively simple, the build-up to take-off, the actual take-off, the outward journey, the landing and what they discover... and, well, do they successfully return??? For you to discover.
As I mentioned at the beginning, unlike Wyndham's later efforts, this is a simpler, more straight-forward story. If you enjoy space adventures, classic Sci-Fi, you'll like this. While it's not as perfected as the later works, it's still entertaining, well-paced and just a fun story. (3.5 stars)
Stowaway to Mars was originally published in 1935 (also under the name Planet Plane under the pseudonym John Beynon). It is more a typical space adventure, the journey to another planet, this time being Mars.
Dale Curtance an intrepid English adventurer is head of a rocket plane company and is building a ship to compete in a contest to be the first to land on another planet. When his rocket finally takes off, with a crew of five, they discover a stowaway, a woman Joan, who has snuck onboard for her own particular reasons. This will, of course become apparent.
The story is relatively simple, the build-up to take-off, the actual take-off, the outward journey, the landing and what they discover... and, well, do they successfully return??? For you to discover.
As I mentioned at the beginning, unlike Wyndham's later efforts, this is a simpler, more straight-forward story. If you enjoy space adventures, classic Sci-Fi, you'll like this. While it's not as perfected as the later works, it's still entertaining, well-paced and just a fun story. (3.5 stars)
Read
December 25, 2022I know I've said before, but... So many books to read. No sense wasting time on a bad one. Later Wyndham is excellent. But I'm having to accept the fact that his early novels are quite trashy, badly written adventure stories for men. This second attempt at a sci fi novel is as unfinishable as his first, The Secret People.
January 12, 2023
Is she misogynistic or is it Wyndham’s commentary on how society and sci-fi view smart, capable women???? The world may never know, but I like to think that Wyndham, judging from the treatment of women in his other books, is just being a cheeky lad!!!
July 28, 2018
I will start my thought about this book by saying I love Wyndham so much. He still amazed me. He lived in a very different era, yet his works are still relevant with current affair. Maybe we—as human race—don’t change that much. (Beware of spoilers.)
‘So, you see, we are not pioneers. We are only followers in a great tradition, hoping to tread the way of knowledge a little farther than the last man. If it is granted to us to be successful, we shall be satisfied to have been not entirely unworthy of our forerunners and our country.’ (Page 22)
This is a story depicting human fascination with inter planetary travel. Lead by Dale Curtance (I imagined him as humble Elon Musk, married, loved by people), Gloria Mundi with its carefully picked crew blast off from Earth, bound for Mars. There’s just one problem: a stowaway called Joan which wreck the calculations and threaten the mission and has an intriguing tale suggesting that Mars could be a more dangerous destination than they expected.
It’s little bit of too dramatic actually. There’re some affairs that kind of dull. May be that’s how they complete the stories at that time? I don’t know. Wyndham even put it in the dialogue regarding Joan as a woman. Then there’s also long dialogues, mansplaining why woman dislike machine in front of a woman which I wasn’t comfortable reading that since it’s so weird and annoying and unnecessary, nowadays.
‘It’s axiomatic in my profession. The unexpected appearance of any girl is alway Romance. And I am the representative of the world population—two thousand million persons, or thereabouts, all avidly clamoring fo Romance—is it fair, is it decent, that you for a mere whim should deprive—?’ (Page 53)
Dale’s thoughts regarding his mission and his hope are so interesting. How he hoped for acknowledgment, being the Conqueror of Space, was threatened by one thing and another. He is a compelling character. It’ll be fascinating to read all the stories based on his point of view (with writing style is like other Wyndham).
"Why wasn't Earth big enough for them? It must be a queer kind of man who could find so little of interest in all five continents and seven seas that he wished to shoot himself in to the emptiness of space. And what good would it do any body, even if they managed it?" (Page 32)
The Martians was a little bit disappointing. As evolved as they were depicted, Wyndham described them based on people of the Earth. Even their way of life was not that different.
And of course it’s not Wyndham without some parts that mocking human being so human. When I read how Dale planted a Union Jack flag the first time he stepped on Mars, I think it’s so poetic and heroic. But then Wyndham knocked me hard when Russian’s rocket landed and they fought with British crew how to govern Mars. The most sensible person was only Joan (minus the affair and drama obviously).
It’s also interesting how machine was told. It’s written in the 30s and Wyndham wrote such an astounding tale regarding men and machine, which somehow is so true.
‘Machines have come early into your race history. They were not necessary. They were thrust suddenly upon a race with no great problems, a race, moreover, so primitive that it was still—is still—full of superstition. We did not invent the machine until it was necessary for our survival. You invented the machine and caused it to be necessary for your survival. It saved us, but you thrust upon a world not yet ready for it, and you have failed to adapt to it.’
This book might not be my most favorite but it still left me a good feeling and a lot of thoughts.
‘So, you see, we are not pioneers. We are only followers in a great tradition, hoping to tread the way of knowledge a little farther than the last man. If it is granted to us to be successful, we shall be satisfied to have been not entirely unworthy of our forerunners and our country.’ (Page 22)
This is a story depicting human fascination with inter planetary travel. Lead by Dale Curtance (I imagined him as humble Elon Musk, married, loved by people), Gloria Mundi with its carefully picked crew blast off from Earth, bound for Mars. There’s just one problem: a stowaway called Joan which wreck the calculations and threaten the mission and has an intriguing tale suggesting that Mars could be a more dangerous destination than they expected.
It’s little bit of too dramatic actually. There’re some affairs that kind of dull. May be that’s how they complete the stories at that time? I don’t know. Wyndham even put it in the dialogue regarding Joan as a woman. Then there’s also long dialogues, mansplaining why woman dislike machine in front of a woman which I wasn’t comfortable reading that since it’s so weird and annoying and unnecessary, nowadays.
‘It’s axiomatic in my profession. The unexpected appearance of any girl is alway Romance. And I am the representative of the world population—two thousand million persons, or thereabouts, all avidly clamoring fo Romance—is it fair, is it decent, that you for a mere whim should deprive—?’ (Page 53)
Dale’s thoughts regarding his mission and his hope are so interesting. How he hoped for acknowledgment, being the Conqueror of Space, was threatened by one thing and another. He is a compelling character. It’ll be fascinating to read all the stories based on his point of view (with writing style is like other Wyndham).
"Why wasn't Earth big enough for them? It must be a queer kind of man who could find so little of interest in all five continents and seven seas that he wished to shoot himself in to the emptiness of space. And what good would it do any body, even if they managed it?" (Page 32)
The Martians was a little bit disappointing. As evolved as they were depicted, Wyndham described them based on people of the Earth. Even their way of life was not that different.
And of course it’s not Wyndham without some parts that mocking human being so human. When I read how Dale planted a Union Jack flag the first time he stepped on Mars, I think it’s so poetic and heroic. But then Wyndham knocked me hard when Russian’s rocket landed and they fought with British crew how to govern Mars. The most sensible person was only Joan (minus the affair and drama obviously).
It’s also interesting how machine was told. It’s written in the 30s and Wyndham wrote such an astounding tale regarding men and machine, which somehow is so true.
‘Machines have come early into your race history. They were not necessary. They were thrust suddenly upon a race with no great problems, a race, moreover, so primitive that it was still—is still—full of superstition. We did not invent the machine until it was necessary for our survival. You invented the machine and caused it to be necessary for your survival. It saved us, but you thrust upon a world not yet ready for it, and you have failed to adapt to it.’
This book might not be my most favorite but it still left me a good feeling and a lot of thoughts.
June 16, 2019
John Wyndham only started writing under the name John Wyndham after the Second World War, around 1950, after a long hiatus since 1936, covering the war years and a while either side of them. His writing before the war was under the names John B Harris and John Beynon. This is the first book I’ve read from that period and I’m frankly shocked at how bad it is especially considering that the next book he wrote was the classic Day of the Triffids, published in 1951. He was already 33 in 1936 so it’s not just down to ‘youth’ but something certainly changed; maybe the war was the main factor. Regardless, this book is very much in the same vein as Verne’s much earlier From the Earth to the Moon it is a heroic account of the first manned voyage to Mars.
The one really big difference (apart, obviously, from the destination) is the stowaway of the title, a woman at a time when, despite the advances in equality made during the war, women’s place is still firmly considered to be in the home looking after the children. There is even one passage early on where the (male) main protagonist exclaims to his wife that denying him the pleasure of working with machines and competing in speed challenges would be like denying her her long awaited pregnancy! I mean I do try to be understanding of the changes in attitudes but this was a step too far for me and particularly surprising considering the lengths he went to later, in The Trouble with Lichen (1960), to deal sympathetically with the problems faced by women who wanted both children and careers.
However I pressed on telling myself times have changes (some) but then later our female stowaway is assaulted separately by two of the male crew (including the main protagonist) and it’s considered to be in poor taste but not anything exceptionally bad. I mean WTF!
The story itself was just okay with its content being a mix between the aforementioned From the Earth to the Moon and Burroughs’ Carter stories (mentioned in the book and discussed as, at the time, a possibly valid hypothesis of life on Mars). And I think that’s almost certainly the first time I’ve dammed John Wyndham with such faint praise. I was severely unimpressed with this book and now consider that I have read all the quality books by him and will not delve further into his earlier works. Sad but I’d rather remember his writing in the context of Triffids, Chrysalids, Cuckoos, Lichen and, of course, Chocky.
The one really big difference (apart, obviously, from the destination) is the stowaway of the title, a woman at a time when, despite the advances in equality made during the war, women’s place is still firmly considered to be in the home looking after the children. There is even one passage early on where the (male) main protagonist exclaims to his wife that denying him the pleasure of working with machines and competing in speed challenges would be like denying her her long awaited pregnancy! I mean I do try to be understanding of the changes in attitudes but this was a step too far for me and particularly surprising considering the lengths he went to later, in The Trouble with Lichen (1960), to deal sympathetically with the problems faced by women who wanted both children and careers.
However I pressed on telling myself times have changes (some) but then later our female stowaway is assaulted separately by two of the male crew (including the main protagonist) and it’s considered to be in poor taste but not anything exceptionally bad. I mean WTF!
The story itself was just okay with its content being a mix between the aforementioned From the Earth to the Moon and Burroughs’ Carter stories (mentioned in the book and discussed as, at the time, a possibly valid hypothesis of life on Mars). And I think that’s almost certainly the first time I’ve dammed John Wyndham with such faint praise. I was severely unimpressed with this book and now consider that I have read all the quality books by him and will not delve further into his earlier works. Sad but I’d rather remember his writing in the context of Triffids, Chrysalids, Cuckoos, Lichen and, of course, Chocky.
August 3, 2024
This book caught my eye - a release of a Wyndham novel I had not seen before. Unfortunately I bought it. Sometimes early works are probably best left unpublished by an author’s estate.
Not only did the writing show lack of experience in composition but the text is full of misogynistic elements. Although some of the ideas about machine/human interaction are prescient, I would focus on Wyndham’s later works instead of this one. There is a sequel but I am not tempted.
Not only did the writing show lack of experience in composition but the text is full of misogynistic elements. Although some of the ideas about machine/human interaction are prescient, I would focus on Wyndham’s later works instead of this one. There is a sequel but I am not tempted.
June 1, 2010
Wellllll, kinda pulp-y, which I don't mind, but not my fave. Interesting example of sci-fi from this era. This author definitely specialized in the "creep-me-out" genre more, so check out his other, horror stuff first.
November 13, 2024
This book is strictly (insofar as I can order you about) for curiosity's sake. It was written n 1935, so many aspects of it are extremely dated. For example, the idea of making a manned trip to Mars but not having a radio on your ship because they're too heavy seems ludicrous now. Yet, I can read 'Planet of Doubt' by Stanley G. Weinbaum and find the idea of a spaceship without radar just a quaint reminder that they didn't have radar in the 1930's. But, like many people, I read Weinbaum for the quality of the writing, and that's why I read Wyndham, too.
In brief, an enterprising Englishman takes off with a scientist, an engineer, a journalist and what I can best describe as a dogsbody to the planet Mars. Unbenknownsst to them, though, because they havne't read the title of their own story, they have a stowaway on board. Said stowaway wants to travel to Mars to find answers to the questions that drove her father to penury, disrepute and death. The presenceof a woman on baord has some consequences that very dark for the time this was written, and I had to admire the courage of Wyndham to write them when he did.
There are aspects of the writing that crop up again in, for example, The Day of the Triffids or Consider Her Ways and Others. In the former, much time is spent ruminating on Man as a gregarious creature and how wholesale extinction following mass blindness renders us inhuman because we can't associate. with each other. In the latter's title story, there is much ruminating on the purpose of women, and how they're fulfilled by having children. The same theory is elaborated on in this story, to the point where the sexism in it makes me a smidge uncomfortable.
If you can get over that, there is another more interesting theory—that a machine culture, where machines can reprosuce themselves, will undergo evolution and some machines will be left, as it were, on the scrap heap, having to scavenge their own parts from the corpses of their fellow machines when those ones suffer the fatal consequ3nces of trying to attack armed men. Unfortunately, the idea is only half-developed before Wyndham backpedals a bit and says that the machines are mostly made the native Martians and are only slightly 'evolved'.
Also dating it a little is the idea that Mars would be landed on and claimed for the British Commonwealth. Not bad for 1935, and to make sure that this wasn't the current publishers fixing the text for political correctness, there is a long discussion about Britain's territorial claims during the days of the Empire that shows that Wyndham clearly meant 'commonwealth'. (This may be posthumous editing by some unknown person. The original story is from 1935, but this ebook comes from a 1972 version.) During this bit, much is said about how the USSR denies Britian's right to claim Mars as a Commonwealth territory and insists that the local natives (whom only one person has seen at this point) have the right to apply to join the USSR as another Soviet republic. The politics, therefore, is either typical 1950's or amazingly predictive.
In case you're wondering, the American ship blows up.
Finally, Wyndham's vision of Mars is halfway between Weinbaum's and Ray Bradbury's, so it's kind of cute nowadays, when we know Mars is full of dust, UV and Andy Weir.
The publishing history of this book interests me only so far as to explain those parts of it—the Commonwealth, the way the Russians are—that don't seem like 1935. Wyndham's writing, though, is up there with the best SF of the 1930's, so it's worth reading.
In brief, an enterprising Englishman takes off with a scientist, an engineer, a journalist and what I can best describe as a dogsbody to the planet Mars. Unbenknownsst to them, though, because they havne't read the title of their own story, they have a stowaway on board. Said stowaway wants to travel to Mars to find answers to the questions that drove her father to penury, disrepute and death. The presenceof a woman on baord has some consequences that very dark for the time this was written, and I had to admire the courage of Wyndham to write them when he did.
There are aspects of the writing that crop up again in, for example, The Day of the Triffids or Consider Her Ways and Others. In the former, much time is spent ruminating on Man as a gregarious creature and how wholesale extinction following mass blindness renders us inhuman because we can't associate. with each other. In the latter's title story, there is much ruminating on the purpose of women, and how they're fulfilled by having children. The same theory is elaborated on in this story, to the point where the sexism in it makes me a smidge uncomfortable.
If you can get over that, there is another more interesting theory—that a machine culture, where machines can reprosuce themselves, will undergo evolution and some machines will be left, as it were, on the scrap heap, having to scavenge their own parts from the corpses of their fellow machines when those ones suffer the fatal consequ3nces of trying to attack armed men. Unfortunately, the idea is only half-developed before Wyndham backpedals a bit and says that the machines are mostly made the native Martians and are only slightly 'evolved'.
Also dating it a little is the idea that Mars would be landed on and claimed for the British Commonwealth. Not bad for 1935, and to make sure that this wasn't the current publishers fixing the text for political correctness, there is a long discussion about Britain's territorial claims during the days of the Empire that shows that Wyndham clearly meant 'commonwealth'. (This may be posthumous editing by some unknown person. The original story is from 1935, but this ebook comes from a 1972 version.) During this bit, much is said about how the USSR denies Britian's right to claim Mars as a Commonwealth territory and insists that the local natives (whom only one person has seen at this point) have the right to apply to join the USSR as another Soviet republic. The politics, therefore, is either typical 1950's or amazingly predictive.
In case you're wondering, the American ship blows up.
Finally, Wyndham's vision of Mars is halfway between Weinbaum's and Ray Bradbury's, so it's kind of cute nowadays, when we know Mars is full of dust, UV and Andy Weir.
The publishing history of this book interests me only so far as to explain those parts of it—the Commonwealth, the way the Russians are—that don't seem like 1935. Wyndham's writing, though, is up there with the best SF of the 1930's, so it's worth reading.
Read
July 19, 2023I suspect that if John Wyndham had not experienced greater success in the 1950s with Day of the Triffids, that Stowaway to Mars might have disappeared from literary history. Which is a pity because this little novel is a competently written science fiction novel, with more than just a far fetched plot.
It is curious to read a book written in 1935 talking about events in 1982 as futuristic, but Wyndham here, as in his "logical science fiction" novels, anchors the events in the world of his time.
Having come to this from reading The Kraken Wakes I was struck by some of the touches common to both. Wyndham explores how the events play out in the geopolitics of his time, the rivalry of the superpowers which then included Great Britain and Germany but excluded China. We also see him in both novels, making fun of the way the major British newspapers make themselves look silly by the angle they take to the events of the day.
I've noted in stories like "Dumb Martian" that Wyndham takes a different view to how human and extra terrestrial life might interact with each other. Here the Martians are once again well removed from the aggressive, expansionist and above all malevolent Martians of H G Wells, but he sticks to the trope of Mars as a planet in decline and its life forms as also in decline.
Wyndham considers though, faced with terminal decline, how would an intelligent species adapt? This leads to some long discussions among the characters about what we might re cast as Artificial Intelligence. Otherwise I find the discussion about the role of machines in society as irrelevant.
The characters exist to advance the plot; yet we can see that has been thought out. The process of how Burns becomes insane is set out to us but it is not particularly convincing. Even more challenging is how the relationship between Joan and Vaygan develops even when it is admitted that the explorers spend no more than forty hours on Mars. Even the manner in which Joan and Vaygan learn to communicate, is contrived, but the reader can accept this.
The Kraken Wakes has been described as an early example of climate fiction in its detailed analysis of what sea level rise would be like. However, Wyndham was not describing climate change as the reason for sea level rise so that claim can be rejected. However, in his analysis of why life on Mars is in decay, Vaygan does make some points on climate change:
"For many thousands of years we have fought Nature and held our own, but at last she has the upper hand."
As far as I know, Wyndham never wrote thrillers but when he sets out to write in the style of the thriller he is masterful. The first few hours on Mars, Burns' madness, the silent attack on him and Joan, the arrival of the machines, then the Russians all make for an exciting read for the reader who persists through the debates about the value of machinery in human civilisation.
It is curious to read a book written in 1935 talking about events in 1982 as futuristic, but Wyndham here, as in his "logical science fiction" novels, anchors the events in the world of his time.
Having come to this from reading The Kraken Wakes I was struck by some of the touches common to both. Wyndham explores how the events play out in the geopolitics of his time, the rivalry of the superpowers which then included Great Britain and Germany but excluded China. We also see him in both novels, making fun of the way the major British newspapers make themselves look silly by the angle they take to the events of the day.
I've noted in stories like "Dumb Martian" that Wyndham takes a different view to how human and extra terrestrial life might interact with each other. Here the Martians are once again well removed from the aggressive, expansionist and above all malevolent Martians of H G Wells, but he sticks to the trope of Mars as a planet in decline and its life forms as also in decline.
Wyndham considers though, faced with terminal decline, how would an intelligent species adapt? This leads to some long discussions among the characters about what we might re cast as Artificial Intelligence. Otherwise I find the discussion about the role of machines in society as irrelevant.
The characters exist to advance the plot; yet we can see that has been thought out. The process of how Burns becomes insane is set out to us but it is not particularly convincing. Even more challenging is how the relationship between Joan and Vaygan develops even when it is admitted that the explorers spend no more than forty hours on Mars. Even the manner in which Joan and Vaygan learn to communicate, is contrived, but the reader can accept this.
The Kraken Wakes has been described as an early example of climate fiction in its detailed analysis of what sea level rise would be like. However, Wyndham was not describing climate change as the reason for sea level rise so that claim can be rejected. However, in his analysis of why life on Mars is in decay, Vaygan does make some points on climate change:
"For many thousands of years we have fought Nature and held our own, but at last she has the upper hand."
As far as I know, Wyndham never wrote thrillers but when he sets out to write in the style of the thriller he is masterful. The first few hours on Mars, Burns' madness, the silent attack on him and Joan, the arrival of the machines, then the Russians all make for an exciting read for the reader who persists through the debates about the value of machinery in human civilisation.
December 7, 2022
3.75 Stars
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Right off the bat I want to make something clear, a bit of a content warning if you will. This book was written in 1939 and as such is very much a product of its time, particularly in the way the book handles the role of women in society. However, if you stick with this story, you’ll actually find that while there certainly are those moments where the men of this story view the women as being an inferior gender that are only there to look pretty and be a good housewife to their husbands, Wyndham does a pretty solid job of making Joan, the primary female character in this story, a pretty important part of the plot. Arguably the character who has the most important moments and discussions of the entire story.
This book asks some big questions, most notably centered around the role of machines in our world and with humanity. Are they meant to serve us(humans) or should they be viewed as equals? Are they essentially the next step in human evolution? These questions, and more, are tackled through dialogue driven conversations between the Joan and the crew aboard the Gloria Mundi and later between Joan and “The Martians”.
If you enjoy classic sci-fi adventures that ask some big questions for us to examine after we finish the book, you’ll find a lot to love here. Just be aware that it IS classic sci-fi and as such it’s a slower paced adventure more focused on the dialogue and conversations than it is on the action and adventure aspects, which can leave you feeling a little bored at times.
Get subscribed to the Storyphoria podcast where you can hear my full thoughts, SPOILER FREE, on this and many others! Or subscribe to the newsletter if you prefer to read them!
https://solo.to/storyphoria
Right off the bat I want to make something clear, a bit of a content warning if you will. This book was written in 1939 and as such is very much a product of its time, particularly in the way the book handles the role of women in society. However, if you stick with this story, you’ll actually find that while there certainly are those moments where the men of this story view the women as being an inferior gender that are only there to look pretty and be a good housewife to their husbands, Wyndham does a pretty solid job of making Joan, the primary female character in this story, a pretty important part of the plot. Arguably the character who has the most important moments and discussions of the entire story.
This book asks some big questions, most notably centered around the role of machines in our world and with humanity. Are they meant to serve us(humans) or should they be viewed as equals? Are they essentially the next step in human evolution? These questions, and more, are tackled through dialogue driven conversations between the Joan and the crew aboard the Gloria Mundi and later between Joan and “The Martians”.
If you enjoy classic sci-fi adventures that ask some big questions for us to examine after we finish the book, you’ll find a lot to love here. Just be aware that it IS classic sci-fi and as such it’s a slower paced adventure more focused on the dialogue and conversations than it is on the action and adventure aspects, which can leave you feeling a little bored at times.
December 5, 2022
This was more like it! I’ve been working through a bunch of Wyndham lately and not all of it has scratched my itch, but this one was a cracker. It’s made even more interesting by the fact that it was written under his pseudonym, John Benyon.
As the title suggests, this is basically about a rocket launch in which the astronauts then discover that there’s a stowaway on board. She’s a woman, shock horror, and so we get a healthy dose of human interest and social commentary alongside a cracking sci-fi read.
But what I liked most of all here is that this was first published at the onset of the Second World War, and so way before the Space Race and modern rocket flights. Despite that, Wyndham somehow predicted a moon mission in 1969, though he had the astronauts get stuck in space and starve to death.
And then of course, we have the context in which I’m reading it, with NASA’s Artemis mission and an eventual Mars mission.
As the title suggests, this is basically about a rocket launch in which the astronauts then discover that there’s a stowaway on board. She’s a woman, shock horror, and so we get a healthy dose of human interest and social commentary alongside a cracking sci-fi read.
But what I liked most of all here is that this was first published at the onset of the Second World War, and so way before the Space Race and modern rocket flights. Despite that, Wyndham somehow predicted a moon mission in 1969, though he had the astronauts get stuck in space and starve to death.
And then of course, we have the context in which I’m reading it, with NASA’s Artemis mission and an eventual Mars mission.
April 10, 2023
I gave this book three stars after I finished reading it last night, but now that I look at those stars in the cold light of day, they seem far too generous. This is a mediocre and fairly corny old science fiction novel of the type where astronauts bring rifles along on their voyage to Mars. Of course, this was written at a time when the existence of intelligent creatures on Mars seemed like a legitimate possibility, and any intelligent creature would be wise to immediately attack the first humans that arrive on its planet, but still, corny.
There are some interesting ideas here about how machines might continue on after the beings that created them were wiped out in one way or another. These ideas were doubtless fresh and new back in 1935 and they're the best bits in the book. But everything that happens in the first half of this book is a drag. The book ends in a way that sets up sequels, and I don't know if these sequels were ever written or not, but I do know that I will never read them.
There are some interesting ideas here about how machines might continue on after the beings that created them were wiped out in one way or another. These ideas were doubtless fresh and new back in 1935 and they're the best bits in the book. But everything that happens in the first half of this book is a drag. The book ends in a way that sets up sequels, and I don't know if these sequels were ever written or not, but I do know that I will never read them.
July 27, 2022
Another exploration of some early work from John Wyndham. Certainly lacking the polish and thematic skills displayed in his more famous novels but this was an interesting look at 1930s science fiction writing that is very much a product of its time.
I was also comparing and contrasting to the contemporary and seeing some minor similarities to topics such as travel to Mars or first contact, and how authors such as Andy Weir would present them today.
Anyway, I will continue to check out more obscure Wyndham before tackling some of the more well known ones....
I was also comparing and contrasting to the contemporary and seeing some minor similarities to topics such as travel to Mars or first contact, and how authors such as Andy Weir would present them today.
Anyway, I will continue to check out more obscure Wyndham before tackling some of the more well known ones....
September 16, 2022
Really old sci-fi is often ruined by the anachronisms throughout the text. Stowaway had flying cars, but telegraph poles and horses, rockets, but no way to communicate with the rocket ships in outer space. One favorite scene involved the rocket ship captain getting out his slide rule to figure out why they used more fuel than calculations suggested were needed. Later they find the stowaway amongst the paper charts they use to get to Mars.
The story is written better than most pulp, but only barely so. The interesting parts are glossed over and instead we get a gun fight with alien machines on Mars.
By far the worst part of the book is the treatment of women. At one point the crew of five debates what to do with the stowaway woman. They suggest that if she wants equal rights to a man then it would only be fair to throw her into space like they would a man. Later an entire chapter is devoted to women's purpose. Spoiler a alert, it's making babies.
It's odd because the stowaway is clearly the most intelligent of the characters in the book. She can communicate with the Martians and had actually thought about what to do if they encountered Martians. As opposed to the men who get into a fight with the Soviets who dispute whether the British can claim an entire planet by planting a flag in it after getting there first. Our stowaway woman also sleeps with the first and only Martian she encounters.
On the whole this is not a good book. It is however worth reading to be reminded how far sci-fi has come as a genre and how far we've come as a society. Also the Modern Classics version I have had a very nice cover design.
The story is written better than most pulp, but only barely so. The interesting parts are glossed over and instead we get a gun fight with alien machines on Mars.
By far the worst part of the book is the treatment of women. At one point the crew of five debates what to do with the stowaway woman. They suggest that if she wants equal rights to a man then it would only be fair to throw her into space like they would a man. Later an entire chapter is devoted to women's purpose. Spoiler a alert, it's making babies.
It's odd because the stowaway is clearly the most intelligent of the characters in the book. She can communicate with the Martians and had actually thought about what to do if they encountered Martians. As opposed to the men who get into a fight with the Soviets who dispute whether the British can claim an entire planet by planting a flag in it after getting there first. Our stowaway woman also sleeps with the first and only Martian she encounters.
On the whole this is not a good book. It is however worth reading to be reminded how far sci-fi has come as a genre and how far we've come as a society. Also the Modern Classics version I have had a very nice cover design.
June 14, 2024
As far as golden age pulp SF goes Wyndham is a pretty damn good writer, though the tale is a bit dull. Hergé must have read this, because some plot points are borrowed by him for Tintin’s Destination Moon.
John Berkey’s cover, as a always, rules.
John Berkey’s cover, as a always, rules.
March 22, 2022
Readable but has not stood the test of time as well as his later works.
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