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The Atlantic Abomination
An alien hidden in the ocean's depths is awakened--and wreaks havoc on mankind--in this science fiction classic from the Hugo Award-winning author.
In The Atlantic Abomination, an exploratory expedition to the bottom of the ocean discovers the remnants of a long-lost civilization, and then, the enormous body of an alien being preserved for unknown millennia. An attempt to raise the body unleashes a horror beyond imagining as the creature revives from a long sleep and begins to exert control over men's minds throughout the world. This is a classic SF horror story in the mode of John W. Campbell's The Thing, the source material for SF thriller movies in the 1950s and again, via John Carpenter, in the 1980s.
For each generation, there is a writer meant to bend the rules of what we know. Hugo Award winner (Best Novel, Stand on Zanzibar) and British science fiction master John Brunner remains one of the most influential and respected authors of all time, and now many of his classic works are being reintroduced. For readers familiar with his vision, this is a chance to reexamine his thoughtful worlds and words, while for new readers, Brunner's work proves itself the very definition of timeless.
In The Atlantic Abomination, an exploratory expedition to the bottom of the ocean discovers the remnants of a long-lost civilization, and then, the enormous body of an alien being preserved for unknown millennia. An attempt to raise the body unleashes a horror beyond imagining as the creature revives from a long sleep and begins to exert control over men's minds throughout the world. This is a classic SF horror story in the mode of John W. Campbell's The Thing, the source material for SF thriller movies in the 1950s and again, via John Carpenter, in the 1980s.
For each generation, there is a writer meant to bend the rules of what we know. Hugo Award winner (Best Novel, Stand on Zanzibar) and British science fiction master John Brunner remains one of the most influential and respected authors of all time, and now many of his classic works are being reintroduced. For readers familiar with his vision, this is a chance to reexamine his thoughtful worlds and words, while for new readers, Brunner's work proves itself the very definition of timeless.
147 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1960
About the author
John Brunner
567 books493 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 - 30 of 36 reviews
November 17, 2022
An Abomination!
No pictures, please!
One needs only imagination to see what an abomination looks like. And I used plenty of imagination while reading this monstrosity!
Just imagine what the world would be like if some repulsive alien horror came to earth 100,000 years ago, and then decided to stay put.
When the monster decides to wake up from its slumber, the earth and its people are changed…but it makes no difference.
Five fantastic stars. ✨
No pictures, please!
One needs only imagination to see what an abomination looks like. And I used plenty of imagination while reading this monstrosity!
Just imagine what the world would be like if some repulsive alien horror came to earth 100,000 years ago, and then decided to stay put.
When the monster decides to wake up from its slumber, the earth and its people are changed…but it makes no difference.
Five fantastic stars. ✨
April 7, 2026
This is a rather short novel by Brunner in which a Cthulhu-like alien is found on the ocean floor, and when it's brought to the surface it uses its alien evil mental powers to enslave mankind. It's set in a near-future world with some cautionary messages about nuclear weapons and the Cold War. The oceanographic scenes are most enjoyable. It's not in the same league as Stand on Zanzibar or The Sheep Look Up, but it's a fast, fine, and fun entertainment. Ace published it in 1960 as half of one of their Doubles (bound with The Martian Missile by David Grinnell, which was a pseudonym of Ace editor Donald A. Wollheim), and then re-printed it as a small single sometime in the late '60s with no update to the copyright page. Fortunately, they kept the cool and creepy Ed Emshwiller cover that had been on the original, though they replaced it with something bland and boring for their final printing in 1976.
October 23, 2018
A lovely little classic, three and half stars.
The Atlantic Abomination is good! Not as impressive as the best known science fiction especulative novels by the author (such as Stand by Zanzíbar) but it is an entertaining story about a mysterious creature found in an Atlantic abyssal deep. This novella maybe was influenced by the monster movies of the fifties, but it is not a “monster novel”, or not exactly, it is a good science fiction story. Disregarding some prejudices from its time: the role of the woman character only as the protagonist romantic counterpart, it has some good retrofuturistic ideas which makes worth the reading.
The Atlantic Abomination is good! Not as impressive as the best known science fiction especulative novels by the author (such as Stand by Zanzíbar) but it is an entertaining story about a mysterious creature found in an Atlantic abyssal deep. This novella maybe was influenced by the monster movies of the fifties, but it is not a “monster novel”, or not exactly, it is a good science fiction story. Disregarding some prejudices from its time: the role of the woman character only as the protagonist romantic counterpart, it has some good retrofuturistic ideas which makes worth the reading.
April 30, 2023
When the expedition set out for the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, its members did not know what they would find. Yet what they discovered utterly astonished them: evidence of buildings far older than anything previously known. Even more astonishing was the rescue of the expedition member who apparently died in the process of discovering it, only to turn up alive hours after his oxygen supply was supposed to have run out. No sooner did he recover, though, than he disappeared once again with their exploration craft – the first of many slaves to the ancient horror the team unearthed beneath the waves.
This is the third of Brunner’s novels that I have read, after an unsuccessful attempt to read Stand on Zanzibar and a more enjoyable experience with his fixup Times Without Number, which ranks among my favorites. This novel predates both works, and it is every bit a product of its times. Though ostensibly set in the future, it is a retro one as far as gender relations are concerned, which is only accentuated by the emphasis on plot rather than character. It is the book’s pacing, though, that really exposes its age. After a relatively slow start Brunner practically races the reader through events, which proves counter-productive to his efforts. There is almost a Lovecraftian element to Brunner’s antagonist, the menace of which would have been made even more effective had he developed it more slowly and relied more on suspense to build up the feeling of dread he so obviously wants to invoke. Instead, he tells rather than shows, which makes both the threat it poses and its resolution somewhat anticlimactic.
This is the third of Brunner’s novels that I have read, after an unsuccessful attempt to read Stand on Zanzibar and a more enjoyable experience with his fixup Times Without Number, which ranks among my favorites. This novel predates both works, and it is every bit a product of its times. Though ostensibly set in the future, it is a retro one as far as gender relations are concerned, which is only accentuated by the emphasis on plot rather than character. It is the book’s pacing, though, that really exposes its age. After a relatively slow start Brunner practically races the reader through events, which proves counter-productive to his efforts. There is almost a Lovecraftian element to Brunner’s antagonist, the menace of which would have been made even more effective had he developed it more slowly and relied more on suspense to build up the feeling of dread he so obviously wants to invoke. Instead, he tells rather than shows, which makes both the threat it poses and its resolution somewhat anticlimactic.
July 24, 2016
review of
John Brunner's The Atlantic Abomination
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - February 3, 2014
After writing a huge review of OPEN SPACE 15/16 ( https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/... ) it's a relief to read something that I don't have much to say about. Brunner's been my 'new' favorite SF writer for awhile now so I don't mind considering one of his works to be borderline mediocre since all in all I like his work immensely. THIS is possibly the 'worst' thing I've read by him yet. It's pretty much a generic potboiler: monster-from-outer-space-lurking-in-hibernation discovered-by-scientists-wakes-up-&-threatens-humanity. That sort of thing.
That sd, I'll mostly ignore the plot from now on & concentrate on more ephemeral things that interest me. The Atlantic Abomination has a "Cast of Characters" near the beginning. This was published in 1960 by Ace Books, Brunner's The Rites of Ohe (1963) was also published by Ace & also has a "Cast" list. See my review of that one here: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/72... . I assume the Cast was imposed by Ace on these bks. That's probably of little interest to just about anyone but me but I find such formal devices vaguely important as cultural dating signs.
My "potboiler" accusation is exemplified by this type of prose: "How many times had the weaklings of this world fled cowering before the wrath of Ruagh and others of his kind? It was of no comfort to recall and count such occasions. Now he, Ruagh—the unquestioned master of thousands—was himself in flight, before the terrible and not-to-be-withstood anger of blind nature. . . ." (p 5)
& to get ephemeral again:
""And who," asked Peter of the trees around the little lodge, "gets up early on their honeymoon?"
""Queen Victoria and Prince Albert," said Mary mysteriously, coming out of the door on to the sun porch with a plate of pancakes.
""What?"
"" 'S fact," she nodded, portioning out maple syrup. "I read somewhere that they got up early on the first morning after their wedding, and the lord chamberlain or some bigwig wrote disapprovingly in his diary that this was no way to ensure an heir to the throne."
"Their eyes met across the table. For a moment they kept straight faces, but at length they burst into helpless laughter.
""Poor Victoria!" Mary said when at last she could speak.
""Poor Albert, don't you mean?" Peter contradicted. "Or maybe not. He always seemed like a straightlaced kind of prig to me. Say, these are delicious."" - pp 57-58
I don't know if Brunner was practicing any tongue-in-cheek humor here but the Victorian Era in England saw substantial population growth & one of the most common penis piercings is called the "Prince Albert" (wch may or may not have anything to do w/ the actual prince & wch may or may not've been known as such at the time of the writing of this bk). At any rate, there was also a London-based underground sex magazine called "The Pearl" (July 1879-December 1880) during the Victorian era that's pretty spicy.
One of the more interesting things about this novel for me is that there's a near future in wch nuclear bombs are tightly controlled by international agreement - something that Brunner, as an anti-war activist, wd've certainly endorsed:
""I'm not going to authorize the construction of a nuclear missile without UN approval," the president said bluntly. "It took us years of squabbling to get rid of the damnable things, and I for one hope there'll never be another made on this planet! How about conventional missiles? Is there any way of pinpointing the exact location of the monster?"" (pp 80-81) ""Yes, I still want UN permission to build that nuclear missile." (p 97)
One of the largely unexplained reasons for this nuclear deproliferation perhaps having something to do w/ this bit of casually thrown in background: "There were no cars or trucks moving in Jacksonville. The wide streets, laid out anew after the great disaster of '65, when a missile from the coastal defense base fell during practice firings and wrecked the heart of town". (p 84) This "great disaster of '65" wd've been set by Brunner a mere 5 yrs after the publication of The Atlantic Abomination - showing Brunner's concern that such a disaster really might be imminent.
The political situation of this future is further hinted at:
""What's the President doing?"
""He's in Minnesota somewhere at an emergency hideout left over from the Cold War. Reports are he will broadcast to the nations this evening."" - pp 94-95
Note that this is post Cold War, more wishful thinking, it seems, on Brunner's part since the Cold War was in full bloom at the time of this bk's writing & the threat of nuclear war between the USA & the USSR was enuf to scare many people into thinking that the full-blown annihilation of most humans as a result of some sort of imbecility on politicians &/or the military was all too possible.
"Men had done this to each other, too. Feeling the habit of marching taking over from his conscious volition, Peter had visions of other armies of history. They had thought men were finished with such cruel stupidity. Perhaps this last time was going to set the seal of guarantee on the hope." - p 95
"They had thought men were finished with such cruel stupidity"!! Now,there's a future I'd like to live to see! I don't expect it, tho. I almost feel nostalgic for the animosity between the USSR & the USA these days where the conflict of State Terrorism vs Religious Terrorism is so horrifying.
As a widely read 60 yr old who was only born 8 yrs after the end of WWII, some aspects of this bk are understandable in ways to me that might not be to a younger reader: "What had made the master single these out? Peter wondered. Perhaps he could not in fact control the whole population of the world. Perhaps he intended to train a corps of collaborators, Quislings, who would make his authority effective." (p 88) "Some of the others he's picked are genuine bastards. There's an old-time prison governor from Alabama who was here on vacation, and a genuine sadist like I never saw before. There's a first-class Quisling-type woman." (p 89)
A "Quisling"? A British reader in 1960 wd've likely known this term given that it was purportedly coined by a British newspaper in 1940 to mean a collaborator w/ a foreign invader. The term refers to the Norwegian WWII era leader who cooperated w/ the invading nazis so that he cd rule the collaborationist Norwegian government. It seems to me that such a term might be dying out.
But what about something like this?:
""That's up to you, general, I'm afraid. Or rather, to the technical experts. By the way, I told Vassiliev about this, out at the Atlantic site, and from what he said I think we can expect something rather special in the way of Soviet electron-amplifiers shortly. That might be the answer to getting usable pictures from a super-fast missile." - p 99
The USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) existed from 1922 to 1991. To someone of my age, it was a major force in world politics & the above passage showing the US & the USSR working together reeks of utopian fantasy - but what about to someone born in, say, 1992? The word "Soviet" might already be just a vague referent. How long before it, too, disappears along w/ Quisling as something understandable to the general population?!
"Even the last chance, the sowing of a curtain of blazing napalm across their path, brought such hideous results" (p 107) - "napalm"?: again, anyone of my generation will probably remember napalm vividly, in some way or another, after seeing the famous photograph of a young naked Vietnamese child (purportedly named "Phan Thi Kim Phuc") running screaming down a road, badly burned by napalm, on June 8, 1972. This was another heinous invention brought to the world by Americans (at Harvard, no less).
"Men change their gods, and when they have changed them often enough they cease to fear their power."
John Brunner's The Atlantic Abomination
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - February 3, 2014
After writing a huge review of OPEN SPACE 15/16 ( https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/... ) it's a relief to read something that I don't have much to say about. Brunner's been my 'new' favorite SF writer for awhile now so I don't mind considering one of his works to be borderline mediocre since all in all I like his work immensely. THIS is possibly the 'worst' thing I've read by him yet. It's pretty much a generic potboiler: monster-from-outer-space-lurking-in-hibernation discovered-by-scientists-wakes-up-&-threatens-humanity. That sort of thing.
That sd, I'll mostly ignore the plot from now on & concentrate on more ephemeral things that interest me. The Atlantic Abomination has a "Cast of Characters" near the beginning. This was published in 1960 by Ace Books, Brunner's The Rites of Ohe (1963) was also published by Ace & also has a "Cast" list. See my review of that one here: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/72... . I assume the Cast was imposed by Ace on these bks. That's probably of little interest to just about anyone but me but I find such formal devices vaguely important as cultural dating signs.
My "potboiler" accusation is exemplified by this type of prose: "How many times had the weaklings of this world fled cowering before the wrath of Ruagh and others of his kind? It was of no comfort to recall and count such occasions. Now he, Ruagh—the unquestioned master of thousands—was himself in flight, before the terrible and not-to-be-withstood anger of blind nature. . . ." (p 5)
& to get ephemeral again:
""And who," asked Peter of the trees around the little lodge, "gets up early on their honeymoon?"
""Queen Victoria and Prince Albert," said Mary mysteriously, coming out of the door on to the sun porch with a plate of pancakes.
""What?"
"" 'S fact," she nodded, portioning out maple syrup. "I read somewhere that they got up early on the first morning after their wedding, and the lord chamberlain or some bigwig wrote disapprovingly in his diary that this was no way to ensure an heir to the throne."
"Their eyes met across the table. For a moment they kept straight faces, but at length they burst into helpless laughter.
""Poor Victoria!" Mary said when at last she could speak.
""Poor Albert, don't you mean?" Peter contradicted. "Or maybe not. He always seemed like a straightlaced kind of prig to me. Say, these are delicious."" - pp 57-58
I don't know if Brunner was practicing any tongue-in-cheek humor here but the Victorian Era in England saw substantial population growth & one of the most common penis piercings is called the "Prince Albert" (wch may or may not have anything to do w/ the actual prince & wch may or may not've been known as such at the time of the writing of this bk). At any rate, there was also a London-based underground sex magazine called "The Pearl" (July 1879-December 1880) during the Victorian era that's pretty spicy.
One of the more interesting things about this novel for me is that there's a near future in wch nuclear bombs are tightly controlled by international agreement - something that Brunner, as an anti-war activist, wd've certainly endorsed:
""I'm not going to authorize the construction of a nuclear missile without UN approval," the president said bluntly. "It took us years of squabbling to get rid of the damnable things, and I for one hope there'll never be another made on this planet! How about conventional missiles? Is there any way of pinpointing the exact location of the monster?"" (pp 80-81) ""Yes, I still want UN permission to build that nuclear missile." (p 97)
One of the largely unexplained reasons for this nuclear deproliferation perhaps having something to do w/ this bit of casually thrown in background: "There were no cars or trucks moving in Jacksonville. The wide streets, laid out anew after the great disaster of '65, when a missile from the coastal defense base fell during practice firings and wrecked the heart of town". (p 84) This "great disaster of '65" wd've been set by Brunner a mere 5 yrs after the publication of The Atlantic Abomination - showing Brunner's concern that such a disaster really might be imminent.
The political situation of this future is further hinted at:
""What's the President doing?"
""He's in Minnesota somewhere at an emergency hideout left over from the Cold War. Reports are he will broadcast to the nations this evening."" - pp 94-95
Note that this is post Cold War, more wishful thinking, it seems, on Brunner's part since the Cold War was in full bloom at the time of this bk's writing & the threat of nuclear war between the USA & the USSR was enuf to scare many people into thinking that the full-blown annihilation of most humans as a result of some sort of imbecility on politicians &/or the military was all too possible.
"Men had done this to each other, too. Feeling the habit of marching taking over from his conscious volition, Peter had visions of other armies of history. They had thought men were finished with such cruel stupidity. Perhaps this last time was going to set the seal of guarantee on the hope." - p 95
"They had thought men were finished with such cruel stupidity"!! Now,there's a future I'd like to live to see! I don't expect it, tho. I almost feel nostalgic for the animosity between the USSR & the USA these days where the conflict of State Terrorism vs Religious Terrorism is so horrifying.
As a widely read 60 yr old who was only born 8 yrs after the end of WWII, some aspects of this bk are understandable in ways to me that might not be to a younger reader: "What had made the master single these out? Peter wondered. Perhaps he could not in fact control the whole population of the world. Perhaps he intended to train a corps of collaborators, Quislings, who would make his authority effective." (p 88) "Some of the others he's picked are genuine bastards. There's an old-time prison governor from Alabama who was here on vacation, and a genuine sadist like I never saw before. There's a first-class Quisling-type woman." (p 89)
A "Quisling"? A British reader in 1960 wd've likely known this term given that it was purportedly coined by a British newspaper in 1940 to mean a collaborator w/ a foreign invader. The term refers to the Norwegian WWII era leader who cooperated w/ the invading nazis so that he cd rule the collaborationist Norwegian government. It seems to me that such a term might be dying out.
But what about something like this?:
""That's up to you, general, I'm afraid. Or rather, to the technical experts. By the way, I told Vassiliev about this, out at the Atlantic site, and from what he said I think we can expect something rather special in the way of Soviet electron-amplifiers shortly. That might be the answer to getting usable pictures from a super-fast missile." - p 99
The USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) existed from 1922 to 1991. To someone of my age, it was a major force in world politics & the above passage showing the US & the USSR working together reeks of utopian fantasy - but what about to someone born in, say, 1992? The word "Soviet" might already be just a vague referent. How long before it, too, disappears along w/ Quisling as something understandable to the general population?!
"Even the last chance, the sowing of a curtain of blazing napalm across their path, brought such hideous results" (p 107) - "napalm"?: again, anyone of my generation will probably remember napalm vividly, in some way or another, after seeing the famous photograph of a young naked Vietnamese child (purportedly named "Phan Thi Kim Phuc") running screaming down a road, badly burned by napalm, on June 8, 1972. This was another heinous invention brought to the world by Americans (at Harvard, no less).
"Men change their gods, and when they have changed them often enough they cease to fear their power."
June 15, 2022
Overall, this is not a perfect novel. However, the “wow-factor” of the parts that were well done overshadows the not-so-good parts of the novel. The first chapter is amazingly well written. Not only that, but the cover artist, Ed Emshwiller, drew the cover based on that first chapter and his vision matches the absolute horror and awesomeness of Brunner’s story.
Generally, its pacing is a little off and at points it does feel like the writer is not sure where he wants to go with his storyline and is stalling for time. The storyline rather runs to the humans-all-band-together deal and readers know that monsters and aliens are apt to underestimate human ingenuity. So, the storyline grinds along with humans working together to stumble upon solutions, which they, basically, do because they all work together and science never fails.
A good read because, as they say, they don’t make ’em like this any more. Very good first chapter, as I have said, and general easy reading the rest of the way. Nothing standout, but nothing utterly atrocious.
Generally, its pacing is a little off and at points it does feel like the writer is not sure where he wants to go with his storyline and is stalling for time. The storyline rather runs to the humans-all-band-together deal and readers know that monsters and aliens are apt to underestimate human ingenuity. So, the storyline grinds along with humans working together to stumble upon solutions, which they, basically, do because they all work together and science never fails.
A good read because, as they say, they don’t make ’em like this any more. Very good first chapter, as I have said, and general easy reading the rest of the way. Nothing standout, but nothing utterly atrocious.
April 23, 2021
A proper old school science fiction/horror story. Short and punchy. Reads a lot like a B Movie!
The tension builds up nicely and it's interesting to see the thoughts of both sides, it's just a bit of shame that it concentrates only on the human viewpoint at the end.
It's interesting how these books often have a sudden ending!
A pleasant read inspired by the Science Fiction Book Club and my mate Gray.
The tension builds up nicely and it's interesting to see the thoughts of both sides, it's just a bit of shame that it concentrates only on the human viewpoint at the end.
It's interesting how these books often have a sudden ending!
A pleasant read inspired by the Science Fiction Book Club and my mate Gray.
March 13, 2023
In his 1953 novel "The Kraken Wakes," English author John Wyndham gave his readers a tale concerning aliens who land on Earth and proceed to terrorize the planet from their bases on the ocean floor. But this, of course, was not the last time that a British writer would regale his readers with a story about malevolent space visitors living beneath the seas. Thus, in John Brunner's novel of seven years later, "The Atlantic Abomination," we find another set of hideous and destructive underwater dwellers, but unlike the "xenobathetic, millebrachiate pseudocoelenterates" in Wyndam's book, Brunner's are a whole different kettle of fish--or something--as will be seen.
"The Atlantic Abomination" initially appeared as one-half of one of those cute little 35-cent "Ace doubles" (D-465, for all you collectors out there) in 1960, with cover art by the great Ed Emshwiller; David Grinnell's "The Martian Missile" (with cover art by another equally great Ed, Ed Valigursky) resided on the flip side. The edition that I was fortunate enough to acquire is an undated, Ace stand-alone version, a 60-cent affair that those in the know have placed from late 1969 to early 1970, and with that same wonderful Emsh cover. Ace would come out with another iteration in 1976, a $1.50 paperback with (what I deem to be) a much inferior cover, and this would sadly prove to be the book's final English-language publication to date, although a Kindle edition is currently available. So the bottom line is that "The Atlantic Abomination" should not pose an insurmountable obstacle to those prospective readers who wish to obtain it. And that is a very fortunate state of affairs, as a recent perusal has revealed the book to be an exciting, intelligent and even frightening science fiction adventure that has not dated one bit, despite it being 63 years old as of this writing.
As for Brunner, the Oxfordshire-born author surely needs no introduction at this late date. Today, Brunner is perhaps best remembered as the Hugo and BSFA (British Science Fiction Association) Awards winner for his 1968 novel "Stand on Zanzibar." His 1969 novel "The Jagged Orbit" would also cop the BSFA Award, while his 1972 novel "The Sheep Look Up" was a Nebula Award nominee. But years before Brunner began writing these big, intellectually challenging and award-winning opuses, he was working hard at churning out pleasingly entertaining space operas for publishers such as Ace. He wrote his first novel, "Galactic Storm," in 1951, at the age of 17 (!), but it wasn't until 1959 that he began to write professionally. Around three dozen novels would spring from his typewriter before "Stand on Zanzibar" would usher in a more "mature" phase in his career. As a newcomer to all things Brunner, I figured I would begin with one of his earlier, pulpier, and less intimidating works, and "The Atlantic Abomination," which had been sitting on my shelf unread for decades, despite the lure of that fascinating Emsh cover, has turned out to be a perfect place to start. To be succinct, I loved it!
Brunner's book is divided into two sections. The first, titled "The Mystery," starts out on the Earth of some 110,000 years ago, when a seismic upheaval was in the process of inundating land masses and creating new undersea mountains. We witness the plight of the hideous alien Ruagh, who is using his mental commands to coerce hundreds of quivering Earthlings to carry his many-ton bulk, on a palanquin, across the quaking ground and away from his city of Avvan (as depicted on Emsh's great cover). Ruagh begs one of his fellow aliens to allow him to share his prearranged shelter, is refused, and so dies in the ensuing catastrophe. Flash forward 1,100 centuries to the futuristic year of around, uh, 1980. Operating from a cutting-edge deep-sea "bathynef" operating from the ship Alexander Bache, somewhere east of the great Atlantic Ridge, oceanographers Peter Trant, Mary Davis and Luke Wallace encounter a catastrophe of their own more than a mile down. While exploring an undersea cave, an avalanche of mud results in Wallace's apparent death, and during a subsequent rescue mission, Trant unearths the carved and inlaid remnants of what appears to be a lost city! Their superior, Dr. Gordon, on board the ship, hopes that it is the fabled Atlantis that they have uncovered, but sadly, that is hardly the case here. Miraculously, Wallace manages to be found in a dazed but living condition almost a full day after his oxygen tanks should have given out! But later, acting under some kind of hypnotic compulsion, the scientist steals the bathynef, returns to a spot a mile beneath the waves, and is seemingly lost again. And after a passenger ship disappears completely, the reader learns the sorry truth: Ruagh's fellow alien, after a hibernation of many millennia, has at last awoken, to its surprise now beneath the ocean, and soon proceeds to use Wallace and the cruise ship's 1,800 passengers as its slavelike cat's-paws!
And in the book's appropriately titled second section, "The Terror," things grow even worse. Here, Peter and Mary's honeymoon is interrupted by a message from Gordon. The remains of the long-dead Ruagh had earlier been found, but now this living alien specimen has begun causing all manner of grief. Peter flies in a copter above the cruise ship and receives the full brunt of the monster's punishing mental lash. And when the alien compels his slaves to ground the ship off of Jacksonville, Florida, Peter lies in hiding onshore, to observe. Sadly, he is soon brought under the alien's mental sway, and is then forced to spend many weeks with all those others, doing harsh manual labor for his alien master. Jacksonville is soon reduced to a cordoned-off zone of the living dead; stumbling, half-starved automatons who cannot refuse to obey their hideous overlord. And as they begin dying off, new recruits are compelled to arrive from along the Georgia coast. Meanwhile, the U.S. president and his foremost four-star general, Barghin, can only throw ineffective missiles into the city, while they weigh their ultimate option...the nuclear one....
On the back cover of my 1969/1970 Ace edition there is a blurb that reads "Godzilla, Gorgo, King Kong...stand aside for The Atlantic Abomination!" And while I would never dream of taking anything away from those three cinematic greats, it must be admitted that those prehistoric beasts and the lovesick giant ape did little more than, er, tear cities apart and summarily kill people. The Atlantic Abomination, whose real name we are never told, is perhaps an even scarier proposition, however, as it not only makes slaves of humans, but treats them like the lowest and most disposable of commodities. A bridge is out? Compel the humans to build one out of their living bodies! Food supplies are low? Force the humans to eat each other! The slaves are dying? Free them from your mental control and just let them drop! It is a startlingly callous and unfeeling alien menace that Brunner gives us here; one who learns the hard way that Earthlings have developed just a wee bit since circa 110,000 B.C.! Whereas Wyndham had given us a veritable army of iceberg-melting alien menaces in his 1953 book, Brunner just gives us this one representative sample, but he really is quite bad enough, thank you! The Ace blurb is spot-on, though, when it comes to associating Brunner's book with some of the great monster movies of the past, many of which the author must assuredly have assimilated. What a fantastic early '60s sci-fi monster movie this book could have been turned into! I can almost picture Richard Denning as Peter, and Mara Corday as his wife! That Ace book cover also asks "A horror novel by John Brunner?," and yes, it is true: This book most assuredly does function as a horror novel as well, especially in its second half, whose nightmarish feel just might linger with you for days.
But despite the fact that a scary monster story is at the heart of this novel, Brunner's telling is unfailingly intelligent, and his book is filled with interesting scientific discussions and told in a highly credible manner. Its largish cast of oceanographers, crewmen, military men and the president is efficiently sketched in by the author, and for once even the military brass--as represented by Gen. Barghin, especially--are depicted as thoughtful, decent sorts. Brunner's book, overall, is tremendously suspenseful, exciting and unputdownable; short as it is (a mere 128 small-print pages, in my Ace edition), it will probably be gobbled down in one or two breathless sittings by most readers. The novel, concise thought it may be, yet contains any number of wonderful scenes, among them: Luke's reappearance after being given up for dead; the first glimpse of the monster aboard that ocean liner; the march of the zombified recruits from Savannah and Brunswick; and, really, every little bit that transpires in the increasingly untenable, and increasingly nightmarish, Jacksonville, where Peter is compelled to do many horrible things, while his injured arm grows more and more gangrenous....
And yet, despite all the horrors on display here, and despite having been written at the height of the Cold War, "The Atlantic Abomination" is at heart a fairly optimistic book. In Brunner's depiction of 1980, the Cold War is over, and the U.S. and Russia are shown cooperating fully and sharing their mutual bathynef knowledge. There are space stations in existence as well as a lunar base, and most impressively, nuclear weapons had all been banned and dismantled many years earlier. Hence, the president's dilemma of whether or not to build and use a new atomic bomb in the present. It will be recalled that Brunner himself was an active campaigner for nuclear disarmament, and this early book, written when he was 26, reveals that same yearning for global peace and international cooperation.
For the rest of it, Brunner's novel is surprisingly U.S. based, as opposed to British (as was Wyndham's, for the most part), with a perfect knowledge evinced of U.S. politics and speech patterns. And I must add that I just loved the scenes shown from the monster's haughty and disdainful POV, as Brunner gives us a glimpse into the alien's thought processes. This is a book that could easily have paved the way for a sequel, and indeed, early on, our nameless nasty mentions to Ruagh, during the cataclysm, "You should have done as I did...But I was wise, and some few others who foresaw this day." The reader cannot help but wonder how many of those other aliens still lie in hibernation on the Atlantic bottom, as does Peter, who reflects toward the end on what must happen when the people of Earth encounter these aliens again. So yes, Brunner's book concludes on a deliciously bleak note that opens the possibility for a follow-up story, but sadly, that continuation would not be forthcoming.
I really have very few complaints to lodge against Brunner's very fine work here. Yes, I wish it could have been a bit longer, and that we might have been given some more background about the monster and its home world. But this book is lean and mean, and as I've said before, there is nothing wrong with conciseness of expression, and with leaving your audience wanting more. I also wish the aliens might have been more fully described, other than just being told that they're more than 30 feet long, with legs and a swollen belly. Perhaps Emsh's depiction of a four-legged, bloated, and beak-faced monstrosity really is the best way to envision it. It's also somewhat strange that the alien Ruagh, who dies early on, is given a name, while the alien who menaces our 20th century is not. And, oh...where does that word "bathynef" come from, anyway? Still, these are obviously conscious decisions of omission on the author's part, and who am I to argue? These are merely quibbles, and "The Atlantic Abomination" remains a top-notch and intelligent (there's that inescapable word again!) sci-fi/horror entertainment. I find myself eager now to try another of these pulpy, early John Brunner novels, and fortunately, there is another of his little Ace books that's been sitting in my bookcase, unread, for ages. That book is "The Super Barbarians," from 1962, and that is where this reader will be heading next....
(By the way, this review originally appeared on the FanLit website at https://fantasyliterature.com/ ... a most ideal destination for all fans of John Brunner....)
"The Atlantic Abomination" initially appeared as one-half of one of those cute little 35-cent "Ace doubles" (D-465, for all you collectors out there) in 1960, with cover art by the great Ed Emshwiller; David Grinnell's "The Martian Missile" (with cover art by another equally great Ed, Ed Valigursky) resided on the flip side. The edition that I was fortunate enough to acquire is an undated, Ace stand-alone version, a 60-cent affair that those in the know have placed from late 1969 to early 1970, and with that same wonderful Emsh cover. Ace would come out with another iteration in 1976, a $1.50 paperback with (what I deem to be) a much inferior cover, and this would sadly prove to be the book's final English-language publication to date, although a Kindle edition is currently available. So the bottom line is that "The Atlantic Abomination" should not pose an insurmountable obstacle to those prospective readers who wish to obtain it. And that is a very fortunate state of affairs, as a recent perusal has revealed the book to be an exciting, intelligent and even frightening science fiction adventure that has not dated one bit, despite it being 63 years old as of this writing.
As for Brunner, the Oxfordshire-born author surely needs no introduction at this late date. Today, Brunner is perhaps best remembered as the Hugo and BSFA (British Science Fiction Association) Awards winner for his 1968 novel "Stand on Zanzibar." His 1969 novel "The Jagged Orbit" would also cop the BSFA Award, while his 1972 novel "The Sheep Look Up" was a Nebula Award nominee. But years before Brunner began writing these big, intellectually challenging and award-winning opuses, he was working hard at churning out pleasingly entertaining space operas for publishers such as Ace. He wrote his first novel, "Galactic Storm," in 1951, at the age of 17 (!), but it wasn't until 1959 that he began to write professionally. Around three dozen novels would spring from his typewriter before "Stand on Zanzibar" would usher in a more "mature" phase in his career. As a newcomer to all things Brunner, I figured I would begin with one of his earlier, pulpier, and less intimidating works, and "The Atlantic Abomination," which had been sitting on my shelf unread for decades, despite the lure of that fascinating Emsh cover, has turned out to be a perfect place to start. To be succinct, I loved it!
Brunner's book is divided into two sections. The first, titled "The Mystery," starts out on the Earth of some 110,000 years ago, when a seismic upheaval was in the process of inundating land masses and creating new undersea mountains. We witness the plight of the hideous alien Ruagh, who is using his mental commands to coerce hundreds of quivering Earthlings to carry his many-ton bulk, on a palanquin, across the quaking ground and away from his city of Avvan (as depicted on Emsh's great cover). Ruagh begs one of his fellow aliens to allow him to share his prearranged shelter, is refused, and so dies in the ensuing catastrophe. Flash forward 1,100 centuries to the futuristic year of around, uh, 1980. Operating from a cutting-edge deep-sea "bathynef" operating from the ship Alexander Bache, somewhere east of the great Atlantic Ridge, oceanographers Peter Trant, Mary Davis and Luke Wallace encounter a catastrophe of their own more than a mile down. While exploring an undersea cave, an avalanche of mud results in Wallace's apparent death, and during a subsequent rescue mission, Trant unearths the carved and inlaid remnants of what appears to be a lost city! Their superior, Dr. Gordon, on board the ship, hopes that it is the fabled Atlantis that they have uncovered, but sadly, that is hardly the case here. Miraculously, Wallace manages to be found in a dazed but living condition almost a full day after his oxygen tanks should have given out! But later, acting under some kind of hypnotic compulsion, the scientist steals the bathynef, returns to a spot a mile beneath the waves, and is seemingly lost again. And after a passenger ship disappears completely, the reader learns the sorry truth: Ruagh's fellow alien, after a hibernation of many millennia, has at last awoken, to its surprise now beneath the ocean, and soon proceeds to use Wallace and the cruise ship's 1,800 passengers as its slavelike cat's-paws!
And in the book's appropriately titled second section, "The Terror," things grow even worse. Here, Peter and Mary's honeymoon is interrupted by a message from Gordon. The remains of the long-dead Ruagh had earlier been found, but now this living alien specimen has begun causing all manner of grief. Peter flies in a copter above the cruise ship and receives the full brunt of the monster's punishing mental lash. And when the alien compels his slaves to ground the ship off of Jacksonville, Florida, Peter lies in hiding onshore, to observe. Sadly, he is soon brought under the alien's mental sway, and is then forced to spend many weeks with all those others, doing harsh manual labor for his alien master. Jacksonville is soon reduced to a cordoned-off zone of the living dead; stumbling, half-starved automatons who cannot refuse to obey their hideous overlord. And as they begin dying off, new recruits are compelled to arrive from along the Georgia coast. Meanwhile, the U.S. president and his foremost four-star general, Barghin, can only throw ineffective missiles into the city, while they weigh their ultimate option...the nuclear one....
On the back cover of my 1969/1970 Ace edition there is a blurb that reads "Godzilla, Gorgo, King Kong...stand aside for The Atlantic Abomination!" And while I would never dream of taking anything away from those three cinematic greats, it must be admitted that those prehistoric beasts and the lovesick giant ape did little more than, er, tear cities apart and summarily kill people. The Atlantic Abomination, whose real name we are never told, is perhaps an even scarier proposition, however, as it not only makes slaves of humans, but treats them like the lowest and most disposable of commodities. A bridge is out? Compel the humans to build one out of their living bodies! Food supplies are low? Force the humans to eat each other! The slaves are dying? Free them from your mental control and just let them drop! It is a startlingly callous and unfeeling alien menace that Brunner gives us here; one who learns the hard way that Earthlings have developed just a wee bit since circa 110,000 B.C.! Whereas Wyndham had given us a veritable army of iceberg-melting alien menaces in his 1953 book, Brunner just gives us this one representative sample, but he really is quite bad enough, thank you! The Ace blurb is spot-on, though, when it comes to associating Brunner's book with some of the great monster movies of the past, many of which the author must assuredly have assimilated. What a fantastic early '60s sci-fi monster movie this book could have been turned into! I can almost picture Richard Denning as Peter, and Mara Corday as his wife! That Ace book cover also asks "A horror novel by John Brunner?," and yes, it is true: This book most assuredly does function as a horror novel as well, especially in its second half, whose nightmarish feel just might linger with you for days.
But despite the fact that a scary monster story is at the heart of this novel, Brunner's telling is unfailingly intelligent, and his book is filled with interesting scientific discussions and told in a highly credible manner. Its largish cast of oceanographers, crewmen, military men and the president is efficiently sketched in by the author, and for once even the military brass--as represented by Gen. Barghin, especially--are depicted as thoughtful, decent sorts. Brunner's book, overall, is tremendously suspenseful, exciting and unputdownable; short as it is (a mere 128 small-print pages, in my Ace edition), it will probably be gobbled down in one or two breathless sittings by most readers. The novel, concise thought it may be, yet contains any number of wonderful scenes, among them: Luke's reappearance after being given up for dead; the first glimpse of the monster aboard that ocean liner; the march of the zombified recruits from Savannah and Brunswick; and, really, every little bit that transpires in the increasingly untenable, and increasingly nightmarish, Jacksonville, where Peter is compelled to do many horrible things, while his injured arm grows more and more gangrenous....
And yet, despite all the horrors on display here, and despite having been written at the height of the Cold War, "The Atlantic Abomination" is at heart a fairly optimistic book. In Brunner's depiction of 1980, the Cold War is over, and the U.S. and Russia are shown cooperating fully and sharing their mutual bathynef knowledge. There are space stations in existence as well as a lunar base, and most impressively, nuclear weapons had all been banned and dismantled many years earlier. Hence, the president's dilemma of whether or not to build and use a new atomic bomb in the present. It will be recalled that Brunner himself was an active campaigner for nuclear disarmament, and this early book, written when he was 26, reveals that same yearning for global peace and international cooperation.
For the rest of it, Brunner's novel is surprisingly U.S. based, as opposed to British (as was Wyndham's, for the most part), with a perfect knowledge evinced of U.S. politics and speech patterns. And I must add that I just loved the scenes shown from the monster's haughty and disdainful POV, as Brunner gives us a glimpse into the alien's thought processes. This is a book that could easily have paved the way for a sequel, and indeed, early on, our nameless nasty mentions to Ruagh, during the cataclysm, "You should have done as I did...But I was wise, and some few others who foresaw this day." The reader cannot help but wonder how many of those other aliens still lie in hibernation on the Atlantic bottom, as does Peter, who reflects toward the end on what must happen when the people of Earth encounter these aliens again. So yes, Brunner's book concludes on a deliciously bleak note that opens the possibility for a follow-up story, but sadly, that continuation would not be forthcoming.
I really have very few complaints to lodge against Brunner's very fine work here. Yes, I wish it could have been a bit longer, and that we might have been given some more background about the monster and its home world. But this book is lean and mean, and as I've said before, there is nothing wrong with conciseness of expression, and with leaving your audience wanting more. I also wish the aliens might have been more fully described, other than just being told that they're more than 30 feet long, with legs and a swollen belly. Perhaps Emsh's depiction of a four-legged, bloated, and beak-faced monstrosity really is the best way to envision it. It's also somewhat strange that the alien Ruagh, who dies early on, is given a name, while the alien who menaces our 20th century is not. And, oh...where does that word "bathynef" come from, anyway? Still, these are obviously conscious decisions of omission on the author's part, and who am I to argue? These are merely quibbles, and "The Atlantic Abomination" remains a top-notch and intelligent (there's that inescapable word again!) sci-fi/horror entertainment. I find myself eager now to try another of these pulpy, early John Brunner novels, and fortunately, there is another of his little Ace books that's been sitting in my bookcase, unread, for ages. That book is "The Super Barbarians," from 1962, and that is where this reader will be heading next....
(By the way, this review originally appeared on the FanLit website at https://fantasyliterature.com/ ... a most ideal destination for all fans of John Brunner....)
August 25, 2016
A giant alien monster is unearthed by deep-sea explorers, along with the ruins of its ancient city. Using its powers of psychic dominance, the beast corrals an army of human slaves to do its bidding. This future-world has ended the Cold War peacefully, having all but given up on nuclear weapons, and traditional countermeasures aren't slowing the beast down. There's also the issue of the millions of innocent slaves it's accrued, including the protagonist. So what's the military to do?
Sound like a campy B-movie? Yeah, Brunner channels Twenty Million Miles to Earth and The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms and all the other Monstervision greats in this short tale. The novel itself is pretty campy, like a novelized B-movie that was never filmed, which gives it some nostalgic kitsch appeal. That's about all there is; it's flimsy and underdeveloped and predictable, just like your average B-movie.
Not an indicator of Brunner's later strengths, much less the occasional high points in his earlier, trashier pulp novels. Medicore, rather unexceptional, and forgettable, neither a great nor a terrible read.
Full review found here.
Sound like a campy B-movie? Yeah, Brunner channels Twenty Million Miles to Earth and The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms and all the other Monstervision greats in this short tale. The novel itself is pretty campy, like a novelized B-movie that was never filmed, which gives it some nostalgic kitsch appeal. That's about all there is; it's flimsy and underdeveloped and predictable, just like your average B-movie.
Not an indicator of Brunner's later strengths, much less the occasional high points in his earlier, trashier pulp novels. Medicore, rather unexceptional, and forgettable, neither a great nor a terrible read.
Full review found here.
May 17, 2022
Vivid SF monster horror with a moral subtext. I can see the influence of Lovecraft's sleeping alien god here, but Brunner's underwater abomination isn't horrifying just because it's an icky undead beastie with a powerful mental influence over humans. It's horrifying because it is an absolutely selfish creature of almost unlimited power. They're the worst kind of monster, and they leave behind the most godawful carnage. Not for reading if you're feeling depressed.
February 1, 2018
This is one of the worst books that I have ever actually finished.
"Horror" is way too kind. Horrific, perhaps. Gross and largely pointless.
But other than that, I didn't care for it at all.
"Horror" is way too kind. Horrific, perhaps. Gross and largely pointless.
But other than that, I didn't care for it at all.
November 1, 2025
This was a fun, engrossing read. I enjoyed Brunner's writing style immensely and felt he set up a thrilling premise and an unusual, but menacing antagonist. While Peter is the de facto protagonist, it's truly a "humanity" vs. monster story with multiple humans contributing the the fight.
SLIGHT SPOILERS AHEAD
I appreciated that, while -- unabated -- the monster could possible have taken over the world, the stakes were contained to Jacksonville, Fla. and the unfortunate people who lived there. By keeping the danger localized and continually describing the deplorable conditions of enslaved, the impact remained understandable. It wasn't "the world" in peril. It was individual human beings.
The stakes grew reasonably -- one character taken over, a cruiserliner taken over, a city ... and then multiple cities. The tension grew as one attempt after another to beat the creature was thwarted.
The monster is truly evil, treating anyone it enslaves worse than chattle. Its motivations weren't global domination, but it's own ego and comfort. THAT is something we can all understand given the pettiness of world leaders at the moment. They're satisfied for the world to burn if they remain comfortable and worshipped.
My main challenge with the novel is in the end. It simply ... wraps up. Perhaps this was meant to beget a sequel, but I doubt it. It felt more like Brunner got caught up in his world-building and then realized, "I'm only getting paid for 130 pages ... I'd better wrap this up." That rushed ending was abrupt and wholly unsatisfying. I would have, at least, liked more time to see what Jacksonville was like in the wake of the monster's departure.
SLIGHT SPOILERS AHEAD
I appreciated that, while -- unabated -- the monster could possible have taken over the world, the stakes were contained to Jacksonville, Fla. and the unfortunate people who lived there. By keeping the danger localized and continually describing the deplorable conditions of enslaved, the impact remained understandable. It wasn't "the world" in peril. It was individual human beings.
The stakes grew reasonably -- one character taken over, a cruiserliner taken over, a city ... and then multiple cities. The tension grew as one attempt after another to beat the creature was thwarted.
The monster is truly evil, treating anyone it enslaves worse than chattle. Its motivations weren't global domination, but it's own ego and comfort. THAT is something we can all understand given the pettiness of world leaders at the moment. They're satisfied for the world to burn if they remain comfortable and worshipped.
My main challenge with the novel is in the end. It simply ... wraps up. Perhaps this was meant to beget a sequel, but I doubt it. It felt more like Brunner got caught up in his world-building and then realized, "I'm only getting paid for 130 pages ... I'd better wrap this up." That rushed ending was abrupt and wholly unsatisfying. I would have, at least, liked more time to see what Jacksonville was like in the wake of the monster's departure.
September 11, 2025
Quando una spedizione oceanografica risveglia qualcosa di ancestrale e sconosciuta nelle profondità marine l’umanità dovrà fare i conti con una nuova minaccia sopita da millenni.
“Abominazione atlantica” racconto scritto da John Brunner, uno degli autori sci-fi inglesi più conosciuti nella sua epoca, pubblicato nel 1960 è una storia di fantascienza senza lode ne infamia.
La storia prende il via senza tanti preamboli, gli avvenimenti sono tutti immediati e senza fronzoli catapultando così il lettore subito nell’azione.
I personaggi, eroi e antagonisti, sono pochi e dalle descrizioni molto scarne così come gli accadimenti che spesso risultano, per scelte narrative, quasi troncati il chè fa perdere un pó il senso di alcuni passaggi.
Un racconto, questo, che pare quasi abbia fretta di concludersi sin dall’inizio e che se avesse avuto un pó più di cura nei particolari e nella narrazione avrebbe sicuramente appassionato di più il lettore.
“Abominazione atlantica” racconto scritto da John Brunner, uno degli autori sci-fi inglesi più conosciuti nella sua epoca, pubblicato nel 1960 è una storia di fantascienza senza lode ne infamia.
La storia prende il via senza tanti preamboli, gli avvenimenti sono tutti immediati e senza fronzoli catapultando così il lettore subito nell’azione.
I personaggi, eroi e antagonisti, sono pochi e dalle descrizioni molto scarne così come gli accadimenti che spesso risultano, per scelte narrative, quasi troncati il chè fa perdere un pó il senso di alcuni passaggi.
Un racconto, questo, che pare quasi abbia fretta di concludersi sin dall’inizio e che se avesse avuto un pó più di cura nei particolari e nella narrazione avrebbe sicuramente appassionato di più il lettore.
April 9, 2020
An undersea expedition accidentally awakens an alien being who has been slumbering under the waves for thousands of years. Upon awakening, he gleefully uses his enormous mental powers to enslave as much of humanity as he can... An early work by Brunner, different to his later more serious works., this is a rattling good read, with disturbing images of an entire city (Jacksonville, Florida) under the merciless mental control of the creature, forcing people to work until they drop.
July 12, 2021
I was pleasantly surprised by this one. It's short, only 128 pages. But, it's riveting and, given that it's written in 1960, the technical area isn't too out of date. The situation of a hibernating, alien being who we disturb and then tries to take over the world is new to me. The solution is also different than what I've seen before. But the overall optimism is quite heartening. Recommended.
May 22, 2023
Actually a pretty fun Brunner book. Not overly complicated or long like his more famous novels, but still enjoyable. It tells of a creature that was stuck in the Atlantic 100,000 years ago. It kept humans as slaves using telepathic punishment. An underwater excavation team digs up the creature and it wakes up to continue its domination over humans. But it hasn't anticipated people advancing so much during this time.
December 8, 2024
An elder god versus Team America.
Brunner usually comes up with a decent premise that one can have fun with, populated with stock characters and kind of dated, overly expository dialogue. A lot of his lesser works remind me of high concept SF movies from the 90s (Demolition Man being an acknowledged exemplar). So, I enjoy them as mind candy...with super rushed endings. As candy tends to do? I'm learning how to savor, but it's hard.
Brunner usually comes up with a decent premise that one can have fun with, populated with stock characters and kind of dated, overly expository dialogue. A lot of his lesser works remind me of high concept SF movies from the 90s (Demolition Man being an acknowledged exemplar). So, I enjoy them as mind candy...with super rushed endings. As candy tends to do? I'm learning how to savor, but it's hard.
November 3, 2022
A fun monster movie type story. It’s got great pacing a big baddie that has some pretty cool POV’s. There’s quite a bit to laugh about over the Absurdity of it all. Be prepared for not the greatest writing by this author, but get the popcorn ready.
March 5, 2025
A science-fiction-horror novella about a prehistoric alien found buried under the Atlantic Ocean. It reads like a script for a 1950s B-movie like a combination of Reptilicus and stories from the Cthulhu Mythos.
December 6, 2017
Brunner's take on Cthulu.
December 20, 2019
Enthralling!
A horrific horror story! I was totally enthralled by this book, the whole time I was reading it. My imagination kept me going. I couldn’t put this book down.
A horrific horror story! I was totally enthralled by this book, the whole time I was reading it. My imagination kept me going. I couldn’t put this book down.
September 16, 2020
It's fine. Definitely not up to the level of The Sheep Look Up, but just some decent older sci-fi.
April 4, 2023
Man, meet your Master! The terrifying science of mental domination once allowed the Masters to rule the Earth... but will it still be enough one hundred thousand years later?
January 5, 2021
This is a rather short BEMMY* novella. It's fun, though a bit dated.
*BEM= Bug Eyed Monster.
*BEM= Bug Eyed Monster.
January 21, 2024
I picked up a stack of old scifi paperbacks a year or so ago, this one was in the pile. I liked the cover, so I started it this morning. A very quick read, it's only 130 pages. It's a bit dated, but it's still a very entertaining story. There's some deep sea exploration, and it's well told. It reminded me, in feeling, of Sphere or The Abyss, if those were done in the 60's. It's not too fanciful, but it does extend technology a bit from where we were in the 50's. I really enjoyed the mystery of the first half of the book. The second half of the book concerns an alien that is jump-starting his plan to enslave all of humanity. That's a bit more like the Puppet Masters/Body Snatchers, or even King's Tommyknockers. But it's much shorter, crisper, and adventure driven than those other works. I really did get an early 60's 'Johnny Quest' vibe through a lot of this, it felt like a story of scientists and adventure-men off having adventure-time! With maybe a little Doctor Strangelove mixed in...just that era of story telling. I enjoyed it quite a lot, and could see where this short novel could be fleshed out into a more substantial work today. It's worth a look if you can find it.
June 13, 2014
Great Cover! And totally references the story. The scene in the front is pretty well described in the prologue, while the cool futuristic tower comes into play at the end.
Published 1960.. funnily enough, the back cover proclaims it a Horror Novel, though it's very clearly sci-fi. Looks like it was written in novel form (though, at 128 smallish pages, maybe more of a novella) from the start. it appears this was the 2nd printing of the book, first appearing as a double novel with The Martian Missile (I'm assuming the double novel was first due to the lower cover price).
There's also a later edition with a cheesy cover that doesn't do the monster justice. Amazon apparently recently put it out on Kindle, with a hypno-pattern cover (appropriate, but not as cool as the one I have)
Plot: In the days of promoridal Earth Ruagh ruled his portion of it, and his many human slaves with an iron mind. Then the land split asunder, and Ruagh, too long dependent on his slaves, was unable to save himself... on of his kind, with careful planning and forethought, retreated to a safe cave to wait out the cataclysm.
100,000 years later, Peter Trant heads an expedition deep in the Atlantic, and the unearth what may be a long forgotten civilization. The sleeper awakes, and attempted to re-establish his dominion over mankind... the fight for Earth is on!
Analysis: I think I've read John Brunner before (a couple of the titles on his wiki entry looked familiar), but nothing struck me (good or bad) enough to be memorable.
While not particularly fantastic or noteworthy, this was a quite enjoyable little story. Set in an unnamed Future from 1960, it has good pacing, a logical plot, and a fun conclusion. You see both the humans planning and the alien monster's internal thoughts, which is fun. You have a bit of a political message (it's stated quite a few times that it was a shame there were so many missile treaties, so they couldn't just nuke the alien into oblivion. That, and the collateral damage, but still), which was interesting in it's uniqueness. The author is quite enamored of missiles in the story, in fact. The real highlight was the vivid descriptions and characterization of how this alien monster used and abused the humans he enslaved... quite chilling, and probably why they described it as a horror novel.
Published 1960.. funnily enough, the back cover proclaims it a Horror Novel, though it's very clearly sci-fi. Looks like it was written in novel form (though, at 128 smallish pages, maybe more of a novella) from the start. it appears this was the 2nd printing of the book, first appearing as a double novel with The Martian Missile (I'm assuming the double novel was first due to the lower cover price).
There's also a later edition with a cheesy cover that doesn't do the monster justice. Amazon apparently recently put it out on Kindle, with a hypno-pattern cover (appropriate, but not as cool as the one I have)
Plot: In the days of promoridal Earth Ruagh ruled his portion of it, and his many human slaves with an iron mind. Then the land split asunder, and Ruagh, too long dependent on his slaves, was unable to save himself... on of his kind, with careful planning and forethought, retreated to a safe cave to wait out the cataclysm.
100,000 years later, Peter Trant heads an expedition deep in the Atlantic, and the unearth what may be a long forgotten civilization. The sleeper awakes, and attempted to re-establish his dominion over mankind... the fight for Earth is on!
Analysis: I think I've read John Brunner before (a couple of the titles on his wiki entry looked familiar), but nothing struck me (good or bad) enough to be memorable.
While not particularly fantastic or noteworthy, this was a quite enjoyable little story. Set in an unnamed Future from 1960, it has good pacing, a logical plot, and a fun conclusion. You see both the humans planning and the alien monster's internal thoughts, which is fun. You have a bit of a political message (it's stated quite a few times that it was a shame there were so many missile treaties, so they couldn't just nuke the alien into oblivion. That, and the collateral damage, but still), which was interesting in it's uniqueness. The author is quite enamored of missiles in the story, in fact. The real highlight was the vivid descriptions and characterization of how this alien monster used and abused the humans he enslaved... quite chilling, and probably why they described it as a horror novel.
July 31, 2013
You know those giant monster B-movies from the 'Fifties and 'Sixties? This is a thinking man's version of that. Imagine if Godzilla emerged from the ocean, but instead of stomping Japan flat, he wanted everyone to worship him instead. That's what this book is kind of like. The monster in this one has the ability to control people's minds, and before long, it has a legion of worshippers as the government does its best to battle the thing. It's a lot of fun, and the cover is one of the more loathsome things I've ever seen. (It's not the cover Goodreads shows, it's the one for the Ace double paperback from the 'Sixties.) It shows a horde of humans trying to hold up a blob of a creature. It's like something out of Dante, it's that cool.
September 4, 2012
I'm a little embarrassed to say I actually enjoyed this book. It's not very well written, or thought provoking, or compelling. But I found it a fun read. The ending didn't really make much sense at all... it's like the alien suddenly got stupid. Why not just go to another part of the world and begin the mind take-over process again? Instead he just sorta gets blowed up real good. Oops- spoilers.
April 16, 2014
Well...what an odd book. A contrast of respectable science fiction and pulpy science fiction; potentially good story and awful clichéd B-movie scripting; progressive vision and period sexism; flashes of decent prose and cringing melodrama. Too short to have any depth, the book's best feature is its short length. Still, I intend to read a few more of his before returning to Stasheff and Chalker.
November 29, 2016
Not in the style of Brunner's great novels, just a modest one. Even so is a good reading. Characters are not so developed but it is a short novel, just 100 pages, so I think plot was more important. Although for today's standards maybe is not a good book, I enjoyed it, and that was enough.
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