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Galactic Storm
This is John Brunner's first novel, published under the house name "Gill Hunt" by Curtis Warren when Brunner was 17. (Brunner wrote the novel when he was 16; he didn't acknowledge it in an official bibliographical sense until 1983).
GALACTIC STORM tells the tale of a young genius who uses a supercomputer to discover an alarming trend of global warming that will see half the world's ice-caps melted within fifty years. This leads to an expedition to the South Pole to investigate the problem, and from there to the discovery of a sinister plot of extraterrestrial origin....
GALACTIC STORM tells the tale of a young genius who uses a supercomputer to discover an alarming trend of global warming that will see half the world's ice-caps melted within fifty years. This leads to an expedition to the South Pole to investigate the problem, and from there to the discovery of a sinister plot of extraterrestrial origin....
- GenresScience Fiction
110 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1951
16 people want to read
About the author
John Brunner
572 books479 followersJohn Brunner was born in Preston Crowmarsh, near Wallingford in Oxfordshire, and went to school at St Andrew's Prep School, Pangbourne, then to Cheltenham College. He wrote his first novel, Galactic Storm, at 17, and published it under the pen-name Gill Hunt, but he did not start writing full-time until 1958. He served as an officer in the Royal Air Force from 1953 to 1955, and married Marjorie Rosamond Sauer on 12 July 1958
At the beginning of his writing career Brunner wrote conventional space opera pulp science fiction. Brunner later began to experiment with the novel form. His 1968 novel "Stand on Zanzibar" exploits the fragmented organizational style John Dos Passos invented for his USA trilogy, but updates it in terms of the theory of media popularised by Marshall McLuhan.
"The Jagged Orbit" (1969) is set in a United States dominated by weapons proliferation and interracial violence, and has 100 numbered chapters varying in length from a single syllable to several pages in length. "The Sheep Look Up" (1972) depicts ecological catastrophe in America. Brunner is credited with coining the term "worm" and predicting the emergence of computer viruses in his 1975 novel "The Shockwave Rider", in which he used the term to describe software which reproduces itself across a computer network. Together with "Stand on Zanzibar", these novels have been called the "Club of Rome Quartet", named after the Club of Rome whose 1972 report The Limits to Growth warned of the dire effects of overpopulation.
Brunner's pen names include K. H. Brunner, Gill Hunt, John Loxmith, Trevor Staines, Ellis Quick, Henry Crosstrees Jr., and Keith Woodcott.
In addition to his fiction, Brunner wrote poetry and many unpaid articles in a variety of publications, particularly fanzines, but also 13 letters to the New Scientist and an article about the educational relevance of science fiction in Physics Education. Brunner was an active member of the organisation Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and wrote the words to "The H-Bomb's Thunder", which was sung on the Aldermaston Marches.
Brunner had an uneasy relationship with British new wave writers, who often considered him too American in his settings and themes. He attempted to shift to a more mainstream readership in the early 1980s, without success. Before his death, most of his books had fallen out of print. Brunner accused publishers of a conspiracy against him, although he was difficult to deal with (his wife had handled his publishing relations before she died).[2]
Brunner's health began to decline in the 1980s and worsened with the death of his wife in 1986. He remarried, to Li Yi Tan, on 27 September 1991. He died of a heart attack in Glasgow on 25 August 1995, while attending the World Science Fiction Convention there
aka
K H Brunner, Henry Crosstrees Jr, Gill Hunt (with Dennis Hughes and E C Tubb), John Loxmith, Trevor Staines, Keith Woodcott
Winner of the ESFS Awards in 1980 as "Best Author" and 1n 1984 as "Novelist"..
At the beginning of his writing career Brunner wrote conventional space opera pulp science fiction. Brunner later began to experiment with the novel form. His 1968 novel "Stand on Zanzibar" exploits the fragmented organizational style John Dos Passos invented for his USA trilogy, but updates it in terms of the theory of media popularised by Marshall McLuhan.
"The Jagged Orbit" (1969) is set in a United States dominated by weapons proliferation and interracial violence, and has 100 numbered chapters varying in length from a single syllable to several pages in length. "The Sheep Look Up" (1972) depicts ecological catastrophe in America. Brunner is credited with coining the term "worm" and predicting the emergence of computer viruses in his 1975 novel "The Shockwave Rider", in which he used the term to describe software which reproduces itself across a computer network. Together with "Stand on Zanzibar", these novels have been called the "Club of Rome Quartet", named after the Club of Rome whose 1972 report The Limits to Growth warned of the dire effects of overpopulation.
Brunner's pen names include K. H. Brunner, Gill Hunt, John Loxmith, Trevor Staines, Ellis Quick, Henry Crosstrees Jr., and Keith Woodcott.
In addition to his fiction, Brunner wrote poetry and many unpaid articles in a variety of publications, particularly fanzines, but also 13 letters to the New Scientist and an article about the educational relevance of science fiction in Physics Education. Brunner was an active member of the organisation Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and wrote the words to "The H-Bomb's Thunder", which was sung on the Aldermaston Marches.
Brunner had an uneasy relationship with British new wave writers, who often considered him too American in his settings and themes. He attempted to shift to a more mainstream readership in the early 1980s, without success. Before his death, most of his books had fallen out of print. Brunner accused publishers of a conspiracy against him, although he was difficult to deal with (his wife had handled his publishing relations before she died).[2]
Brunner's health began to decline in the 1980s and worsened with the death of his wife in 1986. He remarried, to Li Yi Tan, on 27 September 1991. He died of a heart attack in Glasgow on 25 August 1995, while attending the World Science Fiction Convention there
aka
K H Brunner, Henry Crosstrees Jr, Gill Hunt (with Dennis Hughes and E C Tubb), John Loxmith, Trevor Staines, Keith Woodcott
Winner of the ESFS Awards in 1980 as "Best Author" and 1n 1984 as "Novelist"..
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
April 23, 2022
I was going to dismiss this first novel by noted British science fiction writer John Brunner as simply dreadful but a little bit of charity is in order. It is adolescent because, well, it turns out that Brunner was an adolescent when he wrote it, aged 16 (published in 1951 as by 'Gill Hunt') in 1950.
Once you understand that, you can still think it is dreadful by any reasonable literary standards and then rather admire the sheer verve and inventiveness of a young author who seems to have poured out a private fantasy on to the page without any fear of the reputational consequences.
The story line is fairly simple (even if the exposition is not) - a cunning and evil plan to destroy the atmosphere of the planet so that it can be inhabited by cunning and evil Venusians who are thwarted by a young genius, his sidekick and a podgy American government agent.
Two of the last three (not the narrating sidekick who is Watson to Holmes) seem to be remarkable geniuses capable of creating technologies out of advanced science at the drop of a hat. The earth is saved in a roller coaster of events with close shaves in every chapter.
I would like to say that you can read this for the sheer irresponsible and absurd fun of it all but life is short. I feel that I have sacrificed some hours of mine so that you do not have to. Fortunately, Brunner waited another eight years before writing another.
September 5, 2016
I bought and read this when I should have been studying Foundation Accounting (or something - shows how much attention I paid to studying) back in 1976. This was unmemorable but, as a hoarder of things (something like the internet of things but less organised) it took until 2007 for me to discover Gill Hunt - the writer credited on the front cover - was actually John Brunner. Well that took me by surprise
Still got my edition - the back's fallen off - it's a non-standard paperback somewhat like the magazine size format used by SF periodicals of the time and unhappily the cover is flimsy.
Okay - end of stream of consciousness flashback. This volume is notable for being the first novel by John Brunner.
Still got my edition - the back's fallen off - it's a non-standard paperback somewhat like the magazine size format used by SF periodicals of the time and unhappily the cover is flimsy.
Okay - end of stream of consciousness flashback. This volume is notable for being the first novel by John Brunner.
July 17, 2016
Q) When do you purchase a book that is difficult to find, and that you know in advance won't be very good?
A) When you want to read the first published novel of one science-fiction's greatest writers, to see how he got his start.
This is the case with John Brunner's GALACTIC STORM, published when he was seventeen, written when he was sixteen. I won't spend much time on the plot, which involves a supercomputer named Charlie, a Venusian conspiracy, telepathy, global warming, and space colonization. It actually starts in a reasonable, even sedate manner, but quickly goes off the rails after thirty pages or so.
The writing itself is wildly inconsistent, mixing American colloquialisms with British formalism, often spending pages on elaborate points of scientific exposition (and at least in one case apologizing for it right after!) and then hammering away with staccato action.
Here is the opening line, to give you a taste: "They fetched Sharp out the other day, a doddering, maundering white-haired imbecile of thirty, who, supported by two white-coated doctors, waved fatuously and laughed at the milling crowds under his balcony."
In fact, Brunner returns to this right at the end, and this image of Sharp will stay with me, for thematic reasons.
Despite the obvious problems in technique, this novel shows that John Brunner was a genius. I repeat, he wrote it when he was sixteen. It comes nowhere near the quality of his great novels, or even his second-tier works, but it's still substantially better than, say, anything R. L. Fanthorpe ever wrote.
And for the s-f fan, I caught at least two references of interest. One is to H. G. Wells' "The Star," and the other to Clark Ashton Smith's "Voyage to Sfanomoe."
This book didn't appear on Goodreads, so I took the liberty of adding it.
A) When you want to read the first published novel of one science-fiction's greatest writers, to see how he got his start.
This is the case with John Brunner's GALACTIC STORM, published when he was seventeen, written when he was sixteen. I won't spend much time on the plot, which involves a supercomputer named Charlie, a Venusian conspiracy, telepathy, global warming, and space colonization. It actually starts in a reasonable, even sedate manner, but quickly goes off the rails after thirty pages or so.
The writing itself is wildly inconsistent, mixing American colloquialisms with British formalism, often spending pages on elaborate points of scientific exposition (and at least in one case apologizing for it right after!) and then hammering away with staccato action.
Here is the opening line, to give you a taste: "They fetched Sharp out the other day, a doddering, maundering white-haired imbecile of thirty, who, supported by two white-coated doctors, waved fatuously and laughed at the milling crowds under his balcony."
In fact, Brunner returns to this right at the end, and this image of Sharp will stay with me, for thematic reasons.
Despite the obvious problems in technique, this novel shows that John Brunner was a genius. I repeat, he wrote it when he was sixteen. It comes nowhere near the quality of his great novels, or even his second-tier works, but it's still substantially better than, say, anything R. L. Fanthorpe ever wrote.
And for the s-f fan, I caught at least two references of interest. One is to H. G. Wells' "The Star," and the other to Clark Ashton Smith's "Voyage to Sfanomoe."
This book didn't appear on Goodreads, so I took the liberty of adding it.
June 4, 2022
John Brunner's first novel was published when the author was just 17...and it shows. This book is most remarkable today mainly because of the dilemma posed for the Earth: global warming (in 1951!). Brunner even got a lot of the science of global warming correct (particularly ozone depletion and the effects of increased carbon in the atmosphere). The plot moves quickly, which is appropriate for a pulp novel, and the characters are broad stereotypes with little in the way of memorable or sophisticated development.
Taken as a pulp this would be pretty standard fare, but the work overall is marred by nearly 10% of its overall length deriving from tedious (and pointless) exposition _after_ the climax and resolution; it's almost as if the publishers asked Brunner to lengthen the book and instead of trying to rework the novel as a whole Brunner merely added on to the end of the manuscript to reach the required length. Needless to say, Brunner's greatness lay ahead of him; I can't even say that this work gives any insight into his later works. It is entirely a forgettable work.
Taken as a pulp this would be pretty standard fare, but the work overall is marred by nearly 10% of its overall length deriving from tedious (and pointless) exposition _after_ the climax and resolution; it's almost as if the publishers asked Brunner to lengthen the book and instead of trying to rework the novel as a whole Brunner merely added on to the end of the manuscript to reach the required length. Needless to say, Brunner's greatness lay ahead of him; I can't even say that this work gives any insight into his later works. It is entirely a forgettable work.
February 25, 2024
A full video review of this work can be found here: https://youtu.be/p7hKwpacPNk?si=vE3pd...
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews