Psychogeist

by Leslie Purnell Davies, L.P. Davies (AKA)

From the back cover:

In a breathtaking sci-fi shocker, L.P. Davies brings together three men from the farthest regions of space and time, spinning a web of excitement and intrigue which turns a peaceful, sleepy village into a nightmare of violence, horror and death. There was Murchison, the long haired youth in a black leather jacket, a wanderer who stood at the side of a lonely country road thumbing a lift...in any direction. There was Edward Garvey, who cowered in his room, afraid to sleep because of the fantastic dreams that sleep would bring. And a million light years away, on the planet Andrida, somewhere on the dark fringes of the Galaxy, there was Argred, the dying man who dragged himself through the caverns of the Lost Moon in search of a legendary secret.

Genres: Science Fiction

218 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1966

About the author

Pseudonyms: Leslie Vardre, L.P. Davies, Leo Barne, Robert Blake, R. Bridgeman, Morgan Evans, Ian Jefferson, Lawrence Peters, Thomas Phillips, G.K. Thomas and Rowland Welch.

Leslie Purnell Davies was a British novelist whose works typically combine elements of horror, science fiction and mystery. He also wrote many short stories under several pseudonyms.

Davies' books deal with the defects, evolution or manipulation of human consciousness, and in some ways are comparable to the works of Philip K. Dick. His protagonists frequently suffer from amnesia or other loss of identity, and their quest to find out who they really are drives the plot.

(adapted from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Harmen de Jong · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dit is één van mijn eerste sciencefiction boeken, gekocht op 5 december 1972, bij de Slegte. Echter ik heb het nooit gelezen, het Engels was vermoedelijk toch iets te taai. Maar meer dan 50 jaren later is het dan zover, ik ben het aan het lezen. Het is een warrig verhaal. Er wordt gesuggereerd dat ergens in het heelal iemand in contact komt et de 'ouden' die zich allemaal in machines hebben verplaatst. Iemand op aarde droomt daarover. Uiteindelijk lijkt die beschaving niet te bestaan maar droomt iemand over een oud comic book ofzo. Warrig is dat wel, want iemand anders is weer dood en kan allerlei enge apparaten maken. Snapt u het nog? Heel even is er een Medium dat een goed beeld lijkt hebben over de situatie, maar die komt niet meer terug im het verhaal.
Blij dat ik het niet 50 jaar eerder heb gelezen, ik was waarschijnlijk geen SF liefhebber geworden.

[Bhakta Jim · Rating 2 out of 5]

I bought a used copy of this book because Wikipedia told me it was one of the novels the movie Project X was based on, the other being The Artificial Man, which I also bought.

After reading it, I have to conclude that Wikipedia was wrong. Nothing in this book is anything like what happens in that film. The Artificial Man must be the sole basis for Project X.

Having bought the book, I read it, and was disappointed. The story does not make a great deal of sense. At the start of the novel we learn of a man who experiences the life of a man on another planet by dreaming about it. This experience affects his waking life and leads to the events in the story.

About halfway through the book we discover that the man on another planet does not really exist, but is in fact a character in a comic book story from many years before of which nobody remembers all the details. Events in the story start happening in real life, including the construction of futuristic weapons that apparently really work.

I think this is intended as more of a horror story than straight science fiction, but for me it doesn't really work as either one. I had to force myself to finish it.