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Ultima Thule
Ronny Bronston has dreamed all his life of getting a United Planets job that would take him off-world. He finally gets the opportunity when he is given a provisional assignment with Bureau of Investigation, Section G. But will he be able to complete his assignment and find the elusive Tommy Paine?
- GenresScience FictionAudiobook
74 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1961
4 people are currently reading
76 people want to read
About the author
Mack Reynolds
509 books43 followersDallas McCord "Mack" Reynolds was an American science fiction writer. His pen names included Clark Collins, Mark Mallory, Guy McCord, Dallas Ross and Maxine Reynolds. Many of his stories were published in "Galaxy Magazine" and "Worlds of If Magazine". He was quite popular in the 1960s, but most of his work subsequently went out of print.
He was an active supporter of the Socialist Labor Party; his father, Verne Reynolds, was twice the SLP's Presidential candidate, in 1928 and 1932. Many of MR's stories use SLP jargon such as 'Industrial Feudalism' and most deal with economic issues in some way
Many of Reynolds' stories took place in Utopian societies, and many of which fulfilled L. L. Zamenhof's dream of Esperanto used worldwide as a universal second language. His novels predicted much that has come to pass, including pocket computers and a world-wide computer network with information available at one's fingertips.
Many of his novels were written within the context of a highly mobile society in which few people maintained a fixed residence, leading to "mobile voting" laws which allowed someone living out of the equivalent of a motor home to vote when and where they chose.
He was an active supporter of the Socialist Labor Party; his father, Verne Reynolds, was twice the SLP's Presidential candidate, in 1928 and 1932. Many of MR's stories use SLP jargon such as 'Industrial Feudalism' and most deal with economic issues in some way
Many of Reynolds' stories took place in Utopian societies, and many of which fulfilled L. L. Zamenhof's dream of Esperanto used worldwide as a universal second language. His novels predicted much that has come to pass, including pocket computers and a world-wide computer network with information available at one's fingertips.
Many of his novels were written within the context of a highly mobile society in which few people maintained a fixed residence, leading to "mobile voting" laws which allowed someone living out of the equivalent of a motor home to vote when and where they chose.
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
April 20, 2010
I'd give this a bit under 4 stars.
The premise of this novella is that humanity's expansion out to the stars was often motivated by groups of people who wanted their own planet for their chosen form of political, economic or religious society. As a result, the various planets have radically different cultures which would see each other as misguided. They are held together in a confederation with the number one rule of non-interference with each other.
Ronnie is hired as a new agent of a United Planets agency which is supposed to ensure this non-interference. He is assigned to track down a man, Tommy Paine, who apparently travels from planet to planet stirring up trouble. He is given an assistant who has the annoying habit of disagreeing with every opinion he expresses about any of the cultures they encounter.
Their first stop is a planet with a theocracy where the leader has just been assassinated. The case is somewhat analogous to a locked-door mystery. The assassin used a bomb that could not have been made on that planet. However, the only outsiders that have been permitted on the planet have been United Planets employees - and none of them fit the profile for Paine.
As Ronnie continues his search on other planets, he begins to come to new conclusions.
It's an interesting view of interstellar civilization.
The writing style is decent, but not great. There's also something about it that gives the story an older feel to it.
It's available free from Project Gutenberg and Librivox.
The premise of this novella is that humanity's expansion out to the stars was often motivated by groups of people who wanted their own planet for their chosen form of political, economic or religious society. As a result, the various planets have radically different cultures which would see each other as misguided. They are held together in a confederation with the number one rule of non-interference with each other.
Ronnie is hired as a new agent of a United Planets agency which is supposed to ensure this non-interference. He is assigned to track down a man, Tommy Paine, who apparently travels from planet to planet stirring up trouble. He is given an assistant who has the annoying habit of disagreeing with every opinion he expresses about any of the cultures they encounter.
Their first stop is a planet with a theocracy where the leader has just been assassinated. The case is somewhat analogous to a locked-door mystery. The assassin used a bomb that could not have been made on that planet. However, the only outsiders that have been permitted on the planet have been United Planets employees - and none of them fit the profile for Paine.
As Ronnie continues his search on other planets, he begins to come to new conclusions.
It's an interesting view of interstellar civilization.
The writing style is decent, but not great. There's also something about it that gives the story an older feel to it.
It's available free from Project Gutenberg and Librivox.
October 23, 2017
This features some interesting musings about technological progress, societies and the fragility of the state in the light of our place in the universe all packed into an intergalactic agent story which sometimes slightly feels like an annex, a vehicle added later as means for Reynolds to bring his point across. However this was a very enjoyable read nonetheless and can be recommended for any sci-fi fan that likes some food for thought but still wants to be mainly entertained.
June 5, 2020
Obvious a bit dated, this pulpy fun sci-fi is a short and surprisingly engaging read. A bit didactic, but overall good fast-paced plot that makes you think. Read through Librivox, where hhe narrator did a wonderful job as well with voices and accents for most characters.
October 18, 2017
I listened to this book - and that's a rare thing for me to be able to do these days. I'm glad I listened to it because if I was reading I might have put it down and not gone back. Given that the story was originally published in 1961 it shouldn't be surprising when I say - there are a lot of very dated bits in this book. No - seeing 50 or more years into the future nobody will get everything right, but more than that the social changes that have come about since then just highlight those details.
Here's the spoilery bit if that can be said for a story this old.
The fact that the whole thing was an exercise to test the main character wasn't a big shock to me. I've seen it before in something that is relatively contemporary. IF you want to find a comparable story look for Pandora's Legion by Anvil. The similarities will show there, but that was a fun story.
If you've got the time, this one is worth the read (or listen).
Here's the spoilery bit if that can be said for a story this old.
The fact that the whole thing was an exercise to test the main character wasn't a big shock to me. I've seen it before in something that is relatively contemporary. IF you want to find a comparable story look for Pandora's Legion by Anvil. The similarities will show there, but that was a fun story.
If you've got the time, this one is worth the read (or listen).
September 27, 2022
Other reviewers are correct: it's a generally entertaining story about intelligence/security officers roaming the galaxy to prevent insidious attempts at instilling chaos. Interesting, but the story serves largely as a delivery system for ideas about societal organization, with each of those systems being viewed as problematic in different ways. Which is undoubtedly correct, since, no matter the effort put into it, societal structure is better for some people than for others; eg. Brigadoon. Nevertheless, the ideas are worth considering. It ends rather abruptly, though; i would have felt more fulfilled with some resolutions. In fact, I had to look it up to be sure that i hadn't missed a chapter or two.
May 27, 2022
Entertaining space listening 🎶🔰
Another will written fantasy Sci-Fi space opera adventure thriller short story by Mack Reynolds about a new recruit to the agency. He is then sent into space to train and find a fugitive. The trainee figures it out as just training. I would highly recommend this novella to readers of fantasy space adventurer novels 👍🔰. Enjoy the adventure of reading 👓 or listening 🎶 to Alexa as I do because of health issues. 2022 👒💼😊
Another will written fantasy Sci-Fi space opera adventure thriller short story by Mack Reynolds about a new recruit to the agency. He is then sent into space to train and find a fugitive. The trainee figures it out as just training. I would highly recommend this novella to readers of fantasy space adventurer novels 👍🔰. Enjoy the adventure of reading 👓 or listening 🎶 to Alexa as I do because of health issues. 2022 👒💼😊
June 14, 2018
A little mid-century sci fi novella that spends way too much time discussing socioeconomic systems. No action. A strange read and despite its attempt at "deep thinking" comes across as ridiculous because of its heavy reliance on the trope of planets having a monoculture. Short enough read that I don't feel like I wasted my time, but there's not much here and I wouldn't recommend it.
January 18, 2022
Mack Reynolds is an intelligent pulp sci-fi author. I checked out the Ham and Eggs political party in California. There was such a bunch. I like how he worked that tidbit into his story. But as for the “punch line” of the story, I guessed that at the half-way point. No harm done though.
December 19, 2024
Not what I expected. Basically, a science fiction story about a guy that joins a government agency that monitors and manipulates foreign governments. The lead character is sent on a snipe hunt to test his worth.
August 5, 2020
A great old time science-fiction story was a good twist. I enjoyed the read, made me smile.
dnf
October 5, 2021Dnf. The LibriVox narrator read a little too fast for me.
March 29, 2025
This is a most interesting, intriguing & relevant story of mankind & its current travails.
December 13, 2025
The usual style of Reynolds. A new agent is manipulated and tested to determine his suitability to protect Earth from an unknown alien species. I first read this at school! Great stuff.
June 16, 2012
Mankind was exploding through this spiral arm of the galaxy. There was a racial enthusiasm about it all. Man's destiny lay out in the stars, only a laggard stayed home of his own accord. It was the ambition of every youth to join the snowballing avalanche of man into the neighboring stars.
It took absolute severity by Earth authorities to prevent the depopulation of the planet. But someone had to stay to administer the ever more complicated racial destiny. Earth became a clearing house for a thousand cultures, attempting, with only moderate success, to co-ordinate her widely spreading children. She couldn't afford to let her best seed depart. Few there were, any more, allowed to emigrate from Earth. New colonies drew their immigrants from older ones.
Lucky was the Earthling able to find service in interplanetary affairs, in any of the thousands of tasks that involved journey between member planets of UP. Possibly one hundredth of the population at one time or another, and for varying lengths of time, managed it.
Ronny Bronston was lucky and knew it. The thing now was to pull off this assignment and cinch the appointment for good.
When Ronny Bronston manages to land a job at Section G of the Bureau of Investigation he is told that it is a cloak and dagger department, whose role is to upholding articles one and two of the United Planets Charter, which forbid United Planets and its member planets from interfering in each others' political, socioeconomic and religious institutions.
His first off-planet assignment s a probationary agent is to track down 'Tommy Paine', a legendary revolutionary who has been active throughout the United Planets for the past couple of decades., although Branch G don't know if he is one man, or a group, or even if he exists at all. After several months of training by experienced agents, Tommy Paine surfaces again, rumoured to be involved in the assassination of an immortal god-king on the planet of New Delos and Ronny is sent off with a super-competent female agent called Tog as his assistant. The planets they visit are not much known by the outside world, since the less planets know about each others' internal political, socioeconomic and religious institutions, they less likely they are to break the rules by interfering.
Project Gutenberg created this illustrated e-book from an illustrated version of this novella that was published in Analog Science Fact and Fiction Magazine in March 1961. The story is basically a mystery, as Ronny tries to work out the identity of Tommy Paine as he follows his tracks from planet to planet, and although I had worked out his identity before Ronny did, the final revelation back on earth came as a surprise. I am glad that I read the illustrated version, as the illustrations really brought home the period feel of the story.
It took absolute severity by Earth authorities to prevent the depopulation of the planet. But someone had to stay to administer the ever more complicated racial destiny. Earth became a clearing house for a thousand cultures, attempting, with only moderate success, to co-ordinate her widely spreading children. She couldn't afford to let her best seed depart. Few there were, any more, allowed to emigrate from Earth. New colonies drew their immigrants from older ones.
Lucky was the Earthling able to find service in interplanetary affairs, in any of the thousands of tasks that involved journey between member planets of UP. Possibly one hundredth of the population at one time or another, and for varying lengths of time, managed it.
Ronny Bronston was lucky and knew it. The thing now was to pull off this assignment and cinch the appointment for good.
When Ronny Bronston manages to land a job at Section G of the Bureau of Investigation he is told that it is a cloak and dagger department, whose role is to upholding articles one and two of the United Planets Charter, which forbid United Planets and its member planets from interfering in each others' political, socioeconomic and religious institutions.
His first off-planet assignment s a probationary agent is to track down 'Tommy Paine', a legendary revolutionary who has been active throughout the United Planets for the past couple of decades., although Branch G don't know if he is one man, or a group, or even if he exists at all. After several months of training by experienced agents, Tommy Paine surfaces again, rumoured to be involved in the assassination of an immortal god-king on the planet of New Delos and Ronny is sent off with a super-competent female agent called Tog as his assistant. The planets they visit are not much known by the outside world, since the less planets know about each others' internal political, socioeconomic and religious institutions, they less likely they are to break the rules by interfering.
Project Gutenberg created this illustrated e-book from an illustrated version of this novella that was published in Analog Science Fact and Fiction Magazine in March 1961. The story is basically a mystery, as Ronny tries to work out the identity of Tommy Paine as he follows his tracks from planet to planet, and although I had worked out his identity before Ronny did, the final revelation back on earth came as a surprise. I am glad that I read the illustrated version, as the illustrations really brought home the period feel of the story.
August 6, 2010
Since this was public domain (available at gutenberg.org and librivox.org) I assumed it was an early (pre-1923) science fiction story. I was wrong. It's a 1960 story that somehow became public domain.
About a guy who wants to join the space patrol, or star police, or whatever the hell they called the interplanetary government agency in this book. And then he gets his first assignment. And he's DISILLUSIONED.
It's not deep, though it thinks it is. I guess one reason I look down my nose at a lot of science fiction is that it makes society its target. Society is a pretty easy target anyway, but with science fiction, the writer creates a fake universe with things just so to make his or her point. 'Just so' often involves straw men, or things that feel 'thinner' than real life. When humans inhabit 2000+ planets, I think things will feel more complicated than they do now - not the sense that there's like one culture on every planet, and two representative people on that planet.
Yeesh.
(Great reading as always by Karen Savage though).
About a guy who wants to join the space patrol, or star police, or whatever the hell they called the interplanetary government agency in this book. And then he gets his first assignment. And he's DISILLUSIONED.
It's not deep, though it thinks it is. I guess one reason I look down my nose at a lot of science fiction is that it makes society its target. Society is a pretty easy target anyway, but with science fiction, the writer creates a fake universe with things just so to make his or her point. 'Just so' often involves straw men, or things that feel 'thinner' than real life. When humans inhabit 2000+ planets, I think things will feel more complicated than they do now - not the sense that there's like one culture on every planet, and two representative people on that planet.
Yeesh.
(Great reading as always by Karen Savage though).
March 23, 2010
This is a great science fiction story. I highly recommend it. It's rather short (about 30k words), so it's a quick read (about 2 hours of listening if you get the free LibriVox recording that I did—see the book link above).
Anyway, there are a lot of ideas seen in this story that future authors (such as Orson Scott Card, in /Speaker for the Dead/) revisit. It reminds me of a mix between the said Card book and /The Scarlet Pimpernel/, with the perspective all switched around. It's kind of a mystery story, though, but a good one, I think. There's enough plot for a novel, and so the story seems fulfilling, unlike some stories of this length might be.
Anyway, there are a lot of ideas seen in this story that future authors (such as Orson Scott Card, in /Speaker for the Dead/) revisit. It reminds me of a mix between the said Card book and /The Scarlet Pimpernel/, with the perspective all switched around. It's kind of a mystery story, though, but a good one, I think. There's enough plot for a novel, and so the story seems fulfilling, unlike some stories of this length might be.
January 24, 2013
Who or what is Tommy Paine and what is the secret of Section G, Ronny Bronston soon finds out...
July 27, 2016
Nice short amusing science fiction novella.
And, as it was FREE, for download on the Kindle, I certainly got my money's worth.
Will be checking out some more Mack Reynolds science fiction soon.
And, as it was FREE, for download on the Kindle, I certainly got my money's worth.
Will be checking out some more Mack Reynolds science fiction soon.
June 4, 2014
Enjoyable quick read on "school" night.
January 2, 2016
This is a provocative novella which makes you think about colonization and types of government.
March 3, 2016
has aged very well, still interesting and thought provoking
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews