Time Crime

Paratime Police

by H. Beam Piper

This short novel by H. Beam Piper was originally published in two parts in Astounding Science Fiction, February and March of 1955, and also appeared in the 1981 collection Paratime. In the world in which Time Crime takes place, human society has developed the technology to move laterally between parallel universes. The heroes of this story, Verken Vall and his wife Hadron Dalla, are ready to embark on a long-overdue vacation, when the Paratime Police send them both to investigate rumors of slavery in the Esaron Sector. Like many of Piper's stories, this is a police procedural, set in the world of the future.


Free audiobook:
http://www.podiobooks.com/title/time-...

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Time Travel, Short Stories, Adventure, Mystery, Audiobook

110 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1955

About the author

Henry Beam Piper was an American science fiction author. He wrote many short stories and several novels. He is best known for his extensive Terro-Human Future History series of stories and a shorter series of "Paratime" alternate history tales.

Reviews

[Perry Whitford · Rating 3 out of 5]

Punchy yarn about human trafficking between timelines, going on for ten years and possibly amounting to millions of transported slaves.

Verkan Vall and his wife Dalla lead the investigation for the Paratime Police, transporting between dimensions and uncovering a conspiracy of Wizard Traders that may go all the way up to the top. The future writers of <>Star Trek<> would have been proud to write such dialogue as this:

'Look; here are a hundred men and women who have been shifted from one time-line, on one paratemporal sector of probability, to another. Why, the world from which these people came doesn't even exist in this space-time continuum. There's only one way they could have gotten here, and that's the way we did—in a Ghaldron-Hesthor paratemporal transposition field.'

After you've ploughed through all the jargon and silly names Piper bombards you with from the outset, what emerges is a fairly sophisticated police procedural alongside additional extrapolations from the field of speculative psychology, such as narco-hypnotic interrogation and pseudo-memories.

As for the Paratime Police themselves, I can't say that I liked their own society, which was highly hierarchical in the vein of Huxley's Brave New World, with servants in place of slaves, a right-wing utopia contemptuous of all proletarians and the political left.

I have my reservations about Piper's politics, but he undoubtedly wrote with unusual force and intelligence compared to most of his contemporaries.

[SciFiOne · Rating 2 out of 5]

2019 grade Z = abandoned.

A long confusing story about a massive multilevel multi-time society. The time cops find an illegal slave operation going and set out to stop it. It was not that interesting and it was so confusing that I gave up when another entirely new POV popped up. I think I finished about half of it. It's hard to tell in these Kindle Mega-pack collections.

Not recommended.

[Lee · Rating 2 out of 5]

About five pages into this book I felt terribly confused, so did a little research and discovered that it's the penultimate tale in Piper's Paratime series of stories. Once I knew what the oft-mentioned "levels" were and a few other tidbits I began again and was a little more able to follow what was going on.

The premise as a whole was fairly interesting, but I found it hard to get that enthralled by the political intrigue having not read the other books in the series. The characters' names are all a little tough to remember, but there are only half a dozen that you really need to distinguish and they're all fairly easy to get to grips with, eventually. Methinks if I ever read the earlier books in this series I'll revisit this one and hopefully get a little more out of it.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just a *leetle* bit sexist...

[Trice · Rating 4 out of 5]

well, that was fun!

[Jonathan Palfrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novella is the last and longest of Piper’s Paratime stories, apart from the novel Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen. It describes the biggest threat that the Paratime Police have encountered: a large and wealthy criminal organization, including some politicians among its members, that has been slave-trading across different timelines for at least a decade without being noticed, because it operated on timelines unexplored by anyone else.

Although it’s a good story, it may be a bit confusing if read on its own: it would be better to read the preceding short stories first. In particular, “Police Operation” was the first story about the Paratime Police, and introduces the overall scenario more gently.

Note: This novella was first published in 1955, so it is of course old-fashioned in style, in attitudes to men and women, etc. But it’s silly to criticize old fiction for being old; if you don’t like old fiction, then don’t read it.

[Al Wright · Rating 4 out of 5]

An internal affairs thriller that tackles some dark subject matter without veering into melodrama.
While the pacing is occasionally brought to a halt by caches of expository dialogue, the premise is well executed enough that it keeps the story from sinking in the stream of its other sci-crime contemporaries. True, it does wallow in the details more than the action at times, but above all the tight and simplistic writing style prevents any risk of getting lost.
It's a straightforward story with a complex concept and Beam Piper handles it marvellously, a fun and fast read worth spending an afternoon on.

[Chan Fry · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s an imperfect book with interesting ideas and characters. Mostly I was flummoxed by far too many characters with little to distinguish between them, personal pronouns used often without it being clear to whom they referred, and far too little exposition about the world and society around them.

I wrote a longer review when I read this in 2015.

[Ronald Spitzer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Re-read this one. I read it years ago. The purpose was to refresh my memory of 1st level civilization and Paratime Police. I read all the Kalvan books a year ago so now I will read Paratime Trouble next which will go into the non-Kalvin troubles referenced in those books. Thank you John Carr for making these books available and continuing the series.

[Alex Shrugged · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to give this audiobook three stars simply for the excellent narration by Mark Nelson. Otherwise I found the story entirely too complex and confusing to follow. Maybe if I read it in book form I might find it easier to handle.

I might read the print version just to see if the story improves.

[Adam Windsor · Rating 2 out of 5]

A rather pedestrian effort from ol' HBP, this. It relies a fair bit on you knowing the main characters already, and the antagonists are pretty much entirely an "off screen" presence, which isn't really conducive to my deep engagement with the storyline. Not bad, but not memorable.

[Jefferson Fortner · Rating 2 out of 5]

A somewhat interesting if not particularly deeply developed action oriented sci-fi tale from the pulp magazines. I gave it a chance because I had enjoyed Piper’s novel Little Fuzzy, but this one did not rise to that level. It did not always hold my attention very well.

[Briana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read on LibriVox (free audio books in the public domain).

[Richard · Rating 2 out of 5]

I stopped reading at page 68. The story has an interesting premise but a ship load of details kills the story.

[George Nash · Rating 1 out of 5]

Just couldn't really seem to enjoy the book.

[Mark Rabideau · Rating 2 out of 5]

A dizzying maze of logic and boredom.

[Anne Patkau · Rating 2 out of 5]

Impossible proper names and sciency jargon. When high-up has secret door for strangers who order him what to do -- makes villains high in 'Organization' hard to pin down. Vall and Della are tight couple. Everyone smokes and drinks regularly. In our past more than future or alternate time-space.

[Bryan · Rating 2 out of 5]

You can download this and read it for free - the link is even included on Goodreads, but a quick search will find it elsewhere.

Okay, so I've just finished, and unfortunately I'm vastly underwhelmed. I'm not deleting it from my phone yet, because I plan to reread it and see if I can get more out of it the second time. Frankly, I got confused in keeping track of the various characters, and not knowing who was who, the plot became befuddling.

Fortunately, it's a short item, and it won't take me long to reread.

So, be warned, if you want to read this, you should take care to keep the characters straight in your mind. Unlike Jack Vance, who makes up nonsense names that are evocative and crisp, Piper's made-up names seem like random gibberish. And worse, they all follow a pattern: two syllables for the first name, and one syllable for the last name. Piper's habit of always using the full name just confuses things more.

Let's see if I can create a primer on the characters of Time Crime:

Verkan Vall - our hero, who works for the Paratime Police
Tortha Karf - Chief of Paratime Police
Skordran Kirv - undercover agent on Third Level Esaron Sector
Salgath Trod - Executive Councilman, and leader of the Opposition in Council
Ranthar Jard - Subchief for Third Level Kholgoor Sector
Yandar Yadd - reporter
Lovranth Rolk - Paratime Police - Home Time Line section of Paratime Code Enforcement Division
Kostran Galth - lookalike for Salgath Trod, currently working as field agent for Paratime Police


Minor Appearances by:
Jandar Jard - theatrical designer
Thalvan Dras - nobleman who owns Consolidated Foodstuffs (big man with black beard)
Vulthor Tharn - current Subchief for Third Level Esaron Sector (due to retire soon)
Gathon Dard - special detective
Krador Arv - special detective
Antrath Alv - special detective (maybe the same guy as above?)
Phrakor Vuln - synthesist
Sphabron Larv - reporter's helper
Varkar Klav - Deputy Claims Agent
Hasthor Flan - Councilman
Frasthor Klav - a doctor who specializes in attacking the scientific basis of psychotesting
Brogoth Zaln - confidential secretary to Thalvan Dras
Golzon Doth - who knows... somebody that sent in a report
Javrath Brend - financial attorney for Thalvan Dras
Zortan Harn - some guy that passes an urgent-business motion to investigate BuPsychHyg
Sothran Barth - lieutenant in Paratime Police
Zostha Olv - Chief Interoffice Coordinator
Nentrov Dard - a Psychist
Zulthran Torv - mathematician in charge of the Computer Office
Vlasthor Arph - Chief's Deputy assigned to Verkan Vall as adjutant
Elbraz Vark - Political Liaison Assistant
Dalgroth Sorn - Paratime Commissioner for Security
Nanthav Skov - Councilman, Management supporter
Asthar Varn - Speaker for the Council

Ohh... that's just too many names. Next time I read this, I will have this list of characters for reference. And really, it's just terribly confusing when Piper continually refers to them by their full name. It would have been easier had he just given them more disparity in their names, and then go with a single name.


And some technology you'll need to know about: timeline conveyers (for moving from one timeline to another, or transposition), boomerang-balls (automatic-return transposition spheres which operate as message-balls), narco-hypnosis (gaining access to somebody's memories, which does not permit them to lie to you)...

Good luck with it.

[Scott Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Piper's time police story is an interesting creative exploration of the phenomenon of slavery across time lines and raised all sorts of questions about the propensity of people and cultures to take advantages of others. The very concept of policing multiple time lines and managing the intersecting issues is fascinating. There are some time line story issues that Piper hasn't fleshed out as much as later writers have but it is good just the same.

[Gedvondur · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Paratime stories are a bit dated, but the concepts behind the paratime itself are fascinating. In some ways it reminds me of the shadows of Amber. Rough and ready stuff, written in a earlier time, yet still worth a read to those who wish to be well read in sci-fi.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Product Description

The book has no illustrations or index. Purchasers are entitled to a free trial membership in the General Books Club where they can select from more than a million books without charge. Subjects: Fiction / Science Fiction / Adventure; Fiction / Mystery

[Jeffrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is a strange sort of nostalgia in Piper's writing - a kind of a romantic rose tinted vision of a Victorian class based society that would appeal to a 1950s American reader.

This book is better as a novelty than a scifi story.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good old 1950s Sci-Fi.

There are millions of alternative Earths, but only one world that discovered the paratime secret. The Paratime police keep order and guard the paratime secret. The discovery of a cross world slavery ring threatens everything.

[glitrbug]

Kindle,.80,Amazon

[Lindsay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Likeable main characters, although I did get some of the more minor characters confused at times.

[Matt Kelland · Rating 2 out of 5]

Loved these when I was younger. Now... not so much.

[Victoria Gaile · Rating 4 out of 5]

Held up pretty well for stories written in the 50s. I expect I'll read them again.

[Sean Brennan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just did not like this story, far too much theory and too little plot!

[Jeanne · Rating 2 out of 5]

Outdated

Stories written in a gentler time. Story line is very paternalistic . They do not hold up well in these modern times. Attempts to show the future fall flat.

[Gabrielle · Rating 1 out of 5]

I listened to this book with my brother while in the car, so it took us a while to finish it. Maybe that is why it was not a book a would ever listen to again.