The Spacejacks

by Robert Wells

Ryder's recovery system united was just trying to stay in business, getting to space wreckage faster than the competition. When a mammoth, mysterious starcraft began showing up near earth giving evidence of posessing that impossibility, faster than light speed, Trix Ryder thought that her father's business was in deep trouble.

Genres: Science Fiction

186 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

UK writer, born Frank Charles Robert Wells on 31 January 1929 in London, that began publishing Science Fiction with "The Machine that was Lovely" for the Observer in 1954.
Other works:
* The Parasaurians (1969);
* Candle in the Sun (1971);
* Right-Handed Wilderness (1973) and
* The Spacejacks (1975).

Reviews

[Bryan Singleton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robert Wells’ fourth novel is Spacejacks and was published in 1975. Near the end of this novel a sudden realization hit me: Wells writes like A.E. van Vogt. Those of you that have read van Vogt know his writing can be difficult to follow. Many passages in Spacejacks required reading through several times before I was able to decode the events. It was further exacerbated by the lack of chapter divisions; the book was solid text with no breaks, other than that of paragraphs. Less than halfway through the book, Shroud is brought back as a character and he plays a major role. His much younger girlfriend, Selinda, returns as well. I wouldn’t call this a direct sequel to Right-Handed Wilderness, but it takes place in the same universe. Oh, and the telepathy that Shroud and Selinda shared in the previous book is finally explained here: they had a rapport. Yes, a rapport. That is certainly one way to explain telepathy.

Spacejacks are astronauts that salvage wrecked spaceships and answer SOS calls. There are many companies that compete for salvage rights and one company suddenly starts using a ship that is incredibly fast and maneuverable. The main characters are members of Ryder’s Recovery and they feel threatened by this new ship, so they conduct some industrial espionage. Some of the situations in this book, especially those involving espionage, are genuine page turners. My attention was held rapt, unlike the first three books by Wells. It’s unfortunate he didn’t produce more novels, since this one was an improvement. This book was basically a story of alien invasion, which was handled with impressive subtlety.

NOTE: It is essential to read Right-Handed Wilderness before reading Spacejacks, because of the reappearance of Shroud and Selinda. They make an interesting pair.

[colleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

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