Falling Toward Forever

by Gordon Eklund

As a mercenary soldier of fortune, Calvin Waller has grown used to danger. Danger is the air he breathes. But when he finds himself thrown from the midst of an African battle into a primitive farm community of the future, he is naturally disoriented. Trained as he is, he quickly gets his bearings and begins a new and different battle...only to be "thrown" again. He is being manipulated. Falling Toward Forever, is the story of his search for The Manipulator, and for himself. A strange and wonderful search...for The Manipulator holds all the strings.


Laser Books #10, November 1975. Three novels were issued per month until the line folded in February 1977.

Genres: Science Fiction

190 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1975

About the author

Gordon Eklund is a Nebula Award-winning, American science fiction author whose works include the "Lord Tedric" series and two of the earliest original novels based on the 1960s Star Trek TV series. He has written under the pen name Wendell Stewart, and in one instance under the name of the late E. E. "Doc" Smith (1890-1965).

Eklund's first published SF short story, "Dear Aunt Annie", ran in the April 1970 issue of Fantastic magazine and was nominated for a Nebula Award. Eklund won the Nebula for Best Novelette for the 1974 short story "If the Stars Are Gods", co-written with Gregory Benford. The two expanded the story into a full-length novel of the same title, published in 1977.

In his teens, Eklund was a member of a Seattle SF fan club, The Nameless Ones, and in 1977, Eklund was a guest of honor at the 1977 SF convention Bubonicon 9, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The Cushing Memorial Library of Texas A&M University has a "Gordon Eklund Collection" housing the typed manuscript of the story "The Stuff of Time".

Eklund has retired from a long career with the U.S. Postal Service, and is considering writing full-time again. He's a member of the Fantasy Amateur Press Association and the Spectator Amateur Press Society.

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was the tenth novel published under Roger Elwood's Laser/Harlequin imprint, with one of the most unappealing Kelly Freas covers ever. It has the potential to be an interesting story, but ends before there's a conclusion. Lots of fighting and time travel and unlikable characters. Not one of Eklund's better books.

[Kevin Phyland · Rating 2 out of 5]

Waller and Ahmed are fighting for insurgents in a village-by-village assault on government troops when, at the instant Waller is about to be killed, he is swept into darkness and wakes somewhere, and more disturbingly, somewhen else. In the new time era they go about fomenting social change by upsetting the power balance between the dominant and submissive tribal groups. Then they are transported through time once again. Each time further into the future, gaining unfortunate extra travellers as they go. They reach a period devoid of technology except in giant towers and once again their meddling induces their manipulator to move them on. Eventually they reach the far future and their insane nemesis and must try to return to their own times. The characters are pretty two-dimensional and unlikeable and the plot isn’t really explained, but Gordon Eklund’s short novel won’t waste a lot of your time.